Addressing priests during a Mass concluding the Jubilee for Priests, Pope Francis said: “A shepherd after the heart of God has a heart sufficiently free to set aside his own concerns. He does not live by calculating his gains or how long he has worked: he is not an accountant of the Spirit, but a Good Samaritan who seeks out those in need.
“Woe to the shepherds who privatize their ministry! A heart that seeks out does not set aside times and spaces as private, a heart that is not jealous of its legitimate quiet time and never demands that it be left alone. This heart takes risks to imitate the Lord, and doesn’t worry about protecting its comfort zone.
“Christ is not a boss to be feared by his flock, but a shepherd who walks alongside them and calls them by name. He wants to gather the sheep that are not yet of his fold. So it is also with the priest of Christ.”
China bars church reparation service
Bishop Stephen Yang Xiangti, of Xiao Di Ba, in Hebei province, China, has been refused permission to organise a day of reparation after the Eucharist was desecrated in a local church. The bishop had asked his community to gather in Eucharistic adoration after a tabernacle was ransacked, and consecrated hosts strewn on the ground.
The police intervened, saying the prayer service was a threat to public security, and ordered it cancelled. The young man responsible for the desecration was arrested and charged with theft.
‘Eradicate human trafficking’ – Pope
In an unexpected address to a summit on human trafficking hosted at the Vatican, Pope Francis praised those who work “to eradicate human trafficking and smuggling and the new forms of slavery such as forced labour, prostitution, organ trafficking, the drug trade and organised crime.”
“As my predecessor Benedict XVI said, and I’ve affirmed it myself on several occasions, these are real crimes against humanity that should be recognised as such by all religious, political and social leaders – and reflected in national and international laws,” the Pope added.
Pope Francis also called upon judges to sense “the importance of their responsibility towards society… Without over-extending a metaphor, we could say that the judge is to justice what the religious leader and the philosopher are to morality, and the ruler – or whichever personalised figure of sovereign power – is to the political.”
Bishop fears ‘Brexit’
Bishop William Kenny, an auxiliary of the Birmingham archdiocese, while conceding that the EU is very much in need of reform, added that “we have got to reform every organisation from the inside; you will never reform it from outside.”
He also argued that ‘Brexit’ would endanger funding for Catholic charities. He said that Caritas Europa, the umbrella organisation for Catholic charitable agencies, “always negotiates for funding from the EU, and the UK, should it decide to leave, will be outside of that.”
New ministries for lay, family at Vatican
Pope Francis has established at the Vatican a new ministry, technically called a dicastery, for the laity, family, and life. This will take the place of the Pontifical Council for the Laity and the Pontifical Council for the Family. The head of the new dicastery may be a lay person. There will also be three lay undersecretaries.
(Compiled by Fr Joe Borg)