Opening the Door of Mercy at the Basilica of St John Lateran, Rome, Pope Francis said: “We have opened the Holy Door, here and in all the cathedrals of the world. Even this simple sign is an invitation to joy. It begins a time of great forgiveness. It is the Jubilee of Mercy. It is time to rediscover the presence of God and his fatherly tenderness. God does not love rigidity. He is Father; He is tender; everything done with the tenderness of the Father.
“Before the Holy Door we are called to pass through, we are asked to be instruments of mercy, knowing that we will be judged on this. He who is baptised knows he has a greater commitment. Faith in Christ leads to a journey that lasts a lifetime: to be merciful, like the Father. The joy of crossing through the Door of Mercy is accompanied by a commitment to welcome and bear witness to a love that goes beyond justice, a love that knows no boundaries.”
Patriarch against Isis
According to the Chaldean Catholic Patriarch Louis Raphael I Sako, the conditions of Christians in Iraq and Syria are getting worse. Speaking in Rome, the patriarch called for a united front against the Islamic extremists.
Among the measures he said should be taken there are the freezing of financial assets, committing ground troops to counter the Islamic State offensive and a systematic effort to ensure religious freedom.
Meanwhile Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington has joined Chaldean Catholic bishops, Orthodox and Protestant leaders, and others in urging US Secretary of State John Kerry to designate the Islamic State’s killing of Christians as a genocide.
Don’t try convert Jews
‘The Gifts and the Calling of God are Irrevocable’, a document published by the Vatican, states that Catholics should not actively seek the conversion of Jews. The document is the work of the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews. It emphasises the Jewish roots of Christian faith, and stresses that God first revealed Himself to the Hebrews.
“The Church is therefore obliged to view evangelisation to Jews, who believe in the one God, in a different manner from that to people of other religions and world views,” the document says. It adds that “although Jews cannot believe in Jesus Christ as the universal redeemer, they have a part in salvation, because the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. How that can be possible remains an unfathomable mystery in the salvific plan of God.”
This means the Church neither conducts nor supports any specific institutional mission work directed towards Jews, the Vatican said.
Church defies US state
The Catholic Church in Indianopolis, Indiana, US, resettled a family of Syrian refugees in direct contravention of a state-wide moratorium on any new refugees arriving into the state of Indiana. Indianapolis Archbishop Joseph Tobin and the archdiocese’s refugee and immigrant services had strongly lobbied for the resettlement of the family who have relatives in the area.
The family underwent two years of extensive security checks and personal interviews by the US authorities before their application for refugee status was accepted.
About 40 Syrian refugees have been resettled in Indiana since 2010 and the state takes in about 1,600 refugees from around the world each year, with the largest population being Burmese. After the admission of Syrian refugees was barred, the archdiocese of Indianapolis said it had raised enough private funds to take the financial burden of resettlement off the state.
(Compiled by Fr Joe Borg)