Tag: Christianity

New York, February 16, 2024

Photo: spc.rs     

His Holiness Patriarch Porfirije of the Serbian Orthodox begins a six-day visit to New York today.

This marks the Patriarch’s second trip to America. He also visited Serbian Orthodox communities in New York and the Midwest a year ago, and Patriarch Porfirije celebrates first Liturgy at fire-damaged NYC cathedral in 7 yearsAddressing the administration and faithful of the church, His Holiness called on them to remain faithful amidst their troubles, and even to increase their faith.

“>celebrated the first Divine Liturgy at St. Sava’s Cathedral in New York in seven years, after it was ravaged by fire on Pascha in 2016.

Pat. Porfirije will again visit St. Sava’s Cathedral and its parish community, reports the Serbian Orthodox Church.

His Holiness will celebrate the Divine Liturgy at the cathedral on Sunday, February 18, the third anniversary of his New Serbian Patriarch: Metropolitan Porfirije of ZagrebHis Eminence Metropolitan Porfirije of Zagreb and Ljubljana has been elected as the 46th Patriarch of the Serbian Orthodox Church, following the repose of His Holiness Patriarch Irinej in November.

“>election to the primatial throne.

He will also hold several working meetings relating to the cathedra’s ongoing reconstruction.

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Two local bishops offered prayers for victims after a shooting left one person dead and more than 20 people injured at the conclusion of the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory parade in front of Union Station on Ash Wednesday.

Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, told KMBC News that they’re treating 12 patients, 11 children and nine with gunshot wounds.

“Let’s offer our prayers for the victims of today’s shooting after the parade and rally and their loved ones,” Bishop James V. Johnston of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Missouri, wrote in a message shared on Facebook. “On this first day of Lent, we turn to God for mercy and healing for our broken world.”

Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann of Kansas City, Kansas, called for unity in prayer following the shooting in a statement Wednesday evening.

“As we continue to process the details of the tragic shooting that concluded what had been a unifying celebration for our city, let us now remain united in prayer for healing, both physically and mentally, for the victims, their families, and all who are understandably shaken by the heartbreaking event near Union Station,” he wrote. “We express gratitude for the swift actions of first responders and emergency personnel. May God guide the minds and hands of the medical professionals providing aid to the wounded. We humbly seek the Lord’s grace for the healing of all those who were impacted by this tragic event and we pray for peace and unity to envelop the Kansas City community during this difficult time.”

The Kansas City Fire Department said there are three victims in critical condition and five in serious condition following the incident. Kansas City Police Chief Stacey Graves said two suspects have been taken into custody.

“We are holding in prayer all those impacted by the shooting this afternoon near Union Station,” the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph wrote in a Facebook message. “We also pray in gratitude for the first responders caring for the victims and returning safety to the area.”

The Chiefs players and their families are reportedly safe, and many took to social media Wednesday afternoon to express their prayers for the victims and their families as well as gratitude for the first responders.

Chiefs quarterback and Super Bowl MVP Patrick Mahomes posted on X that he was “praying for Kansas City.”

Drue Tranquill, a linebacker for the Chiefs, also posted asking, “please join me in prayer for all the victims in this heinous act. Pray that the doctors & first responders would have steady hands & that all would experience full healing.”

Pro-life House members are calling for autopsies and a full investigation into whether federal laws were broken in the late-term abortions of five babies whose remains were discovered by pro-life activists in Washington, D.C.

Several members of Congress and pro-life leaders held a press conference in front of the Capitol on Wednesday in which they said that the five babies’ remains suggest they may have been killed via an abortion method known as “partial-birth abortion,” which is banned nationally under federal law.

Partial-birth abortion is a procedure in which a doctor partially delivers a baby only to kill him or her by either crushing the skull or removing the brain by suction. The leaders at the press conference demanded action from the federal government to determine whether the babies, often referred to as the “D.C. Five,” were killed in this manner.

“We’re talking about precious life that was just callously disregarded, discarded, just thrown away like refuse, that’s just unconscionable,” said Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas.

“We need to go seek the truth. We need to know what’s going to happen next. We need the Department of Justice … to look into this,” he said.

Who are the D.C. Five?

The secular pro-life group Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU) originally obtained the remains of the aborted babies in March 2022. The group said it acquired them from the Washington Surgi-Clinic run by Dr. Cesare Santangelo, an OB-GYN and well-known abortionist in the city.

The five babies, all of whom were in late stages of gestation, were discovered with major lacerations, torn limbs, and crushed skulls, all consistent with methods used in partial-birth abortions. Their discovery sparked outrage and calls for a federal investigation from pro-life groups and citizens.

Despite calls for an investigation, the Biden Department of Justice (DOJ) has not announced any plans to take action. On Feb. 5, PAAU announced that the office of the D.C. medical examiner had shared with the group its intent to cremate the babies’ remains at the behest of the DOJ. This prompted Roy and Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Arizona, to write a letter to the DOJ in which they said that “without an independent examination for the purposes of countering the argument of ‘lawful abortions’ it is not known how each child died.”

The D.C. medical examiner’s office has since reportedly postponed plans to cremate the babies’ remains; however, still no plans have been announced for an autopsy and their fate remains uncertain.

During the press conference, Rep. Bob Good, R-Virginia, accused the DOJ of being “complicit in covering up the cold-blooded murder” of “precious lives.”

“This is about murder and yet nothing’s been done,” Good said. “No autopsy. No investigation. You have to ask yourself: ‘Why?’ Are we a country that has a rule of law or not? Does the Justice Department actually dispense justice? Those are very fair questions.”

Good suggested that if the DOJ does not act, then Congress should investigate the killings.

“It’s high time Congress conduct its own investigation,” he said, “because the DOJ, if they won’t seek justice, then Congress, I think, is compelled to.”

On Feb. 8, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz issued a letter of his own in which he said: “Should the D.C. medical examiner’s office decide not to conduct timely autopsies, or preserve the bodies of these babies for outside examination, the Senate Judiciary Committee will have no choice but to expand this issue into a full hearing featuring the Department of Justice and the Office of the D.C. Medical Examiner as witnesses before the American public.”

Angel, Christopher X, Harriet, Holly and Phoenix, better known as the “DC Five,” are five children whose lives were cut short at a late-term abortion center just blocks from the White House.

They are the faces of the pro-abortion Left’s ‘reproductive freedom.’ #JusticeForTheFive pic.twitter.com/6BZ6EWsbkf

— SBA Pro-Life America (@sbaprolife) February 14, 2024

‘Their bodies tell a story’

Rep. Chris Smith, R-New Jersey, told CNA after the press conference that he believes the D.C. Five are not the only babies being killed through illegal partial-birth abortions and that they are just the “tip of a much larger human rights violating iceberg the likes of which Americans need to know about.”

“We’ve got to really shine the brightest light on what is going on,” he said. “Minimally, this particular doctor needs to be held to account. We do think he broke laws. But only evidence will prove that. Well, don’t destroy the evidence.”

Jamie Dangers, legislative director of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, who was also present at the conference, told CNA that it is especially important to find the truth about the D.C. Five because it proves the true barbarity of abortion.

“A lot of times with abortion, the whole idea can be very sanitized, and it can be construed as health care or anything like that,” Dangers said. “Yet, because we have the actual evidence, the actual bodies of these children, their bodies tell a story that cuts through all the euphemisms. And so, these five children, obviously their lives were cut short, we can’t help that, but what we can do is dignify their memories and use their stories to help protect other children from similar deaths.”

With Israel and Hamas still unable to reach a deal to free hostages and halt their war, Catholic leaders in the northwest United States are calling for an agreement between the sides, as well as for them to negotiate a two-state solution for lasting peace.

In a joint statement, Archbishop Paul D. Etienne of Seattle, Bishop Joseph Tyson of Yakima, Bishop Jeffrey Fleming of Great Falls-Billings, Seattle’s auxiliary bishops, and seven women’s religious communities, said they “deplore” the actions by both Israel and Hamas, beginning with Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack.

About 1,200 people were killed and 250 hostages taken by Hamas in the Oct. 7 attack. About 100 of those hostages remain in captivity. As of Feb. 13, Gaza’s health ministry said the Palestinian death toll has surpassed 28,000. The region also faces a growing humanitarian crisis with millions displaced.

“As Catholics, we pray for a peaceful end to the war in Israel and Gaza, which is destroying innocent lives and devastating families, and invite all people of faith to pray and advocate for a peaceful resolution,” the leaders said in a Feb. 14 statement.

“We call for a humanitarian ceasefire, knowing that the continued fighting will not resolve the root causes of this relentless cycle of violence, but instead, sow the seed of intergenerational hatred and animosity,” they continued. “We also fervently pray for the immediate release of all hostages and for everyone who is suffering due to the inhumanities and violence inflicted by this war.”

The Catholic leaders went on to say that they are concerned about the widening of the conflict. Specifically, the involvement of additional nations from the Middle East and West. They also highlighted the rise of anti-Semitism and Islamophobia throughout the world, “which exacerbates the sin of racism and ignores the dignity of the human person.”

What’s needed now, they said, is peace and accountability.

“Peace is needed now. Accountability rather than retribution is needed now,” the statement said. “Language that speaks of peace and reconciliation without words of violence and vengeance is needed now.”

Beyond the immediate need for ceasefire and freeing of hostages, the Catholics leaders also emphasized the importance of the sides reaching an agreement on a two-state solution that will provide lasting peace for the region. They advocate for the international community to support these efforts, and to make sure those who perpetrated war crimes from both sides are held accountable.

“We urge a return to negotiating a two-state solution and call on the international community to re-engage in active and sustained support for a just and lasting peace,” they said. “We also urge the United Nations and relevant authorities to investigate all war crimes and violations of international humanitarian law committed on Oct. 7, 2023, and beyond, as well as those committed in retaliation in the ensuing months, so that truth prevails, and accountability is ensured.”

Mauricio Acevedo remembers the angst he and his classmates faced during their 1974 senior year at Bishop Mora Salesian High in Boyle Heights.

The Vietnam War, still a year away from ending, required 18-year-olds to register for the military draft. Acevedo took an aptitude test to access his vocation skills.

“My test said I was going to be a mechanic — that bothered me for a long time,” said Acevedo. “I didn’t want to do that. I was good in biology and math. I was competitive with my buddies.”

He went to Sister Eliza Martin, a beloved chemistry and biology teacher at the all-boys school. She asked what he wanted to do instead. He brought up the idea of becoming a nurse, like his cousin in the Navy.

“I remember her telling me, ‘Why don’t you try to be a doctor and see what happens?’ ” said Acevedo.

After 40 years as an emergency room physician specializing in internal medicine for Kaiser Permanente in Baldwin Park, Acevedo became emotional talking about how Salesian prepared him for enrolling in Cal State L.A., then taking classes at USC Keck School of Medicine just blocks from his Lincoln Heights childhood home.

“Honestly, after all these years, what she said has stayed with me because, by the grace of God, that was an inspiration to keep me going,” said the 67-year-old Acevedo, standing outside of the Salesian High campus gym on Jan. 31 as he held on to his new Golden Diploma, one of 55 honored during the school’s annual Catholic Schools Week celebration for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

Alphabetically, Acevedo was first in line to receive the recognition, wearing a nametag with his 1974 yearbook portrait. Right behind him in line was his brother, Rudy, a retired engineer. Eventually, the group gathered on the stairs outside the gym for a photograph to commemorate their reunion.

For almost 10 years, Salesian has organized this Mass on the feast day of St. John Bosco as a tribute to its past, with all its pomp and circumstance. Moises Delgado, the Salesian High vice president and a member of the Class of 1997, called it a “win-win situation” for students and alums.

“The students get to hear the stories and see the school pride in the past traditions the school once had, and they get to share their experiences as well,” said Delgado. “The alumni recognize that even though time has passed, the same type of students attend Salesian today. It still serves students that come from hard-working families and have opportunities to succeed regardless of what area they came from.”

In addition to the 390 Salesian High students in attendance, another 140 elementary students from nearby School of Santa Isabel participated.

Outside at a reception area where the honored guests were treated to a lunch, students from the Salesian Lettermen Society sporting their light blue sweaters gathered to meet the alums.

Eddie Valdez pointed out to them where the former school gym was once down the hill at the site of the current football field. The gym they were just in was once a parking lot.

“This is the third Golden Diploma event I’ve been part of watching, and it’s interesting to see what they went through — and to think about what it might be like in 50 years,” said Isaiah Ochoa, a senior on Salesian’s Esports team.

Sergio Guzman, a senior receiver on the varsity football team, said the alum’s enthusiasm “makes me more excited each time to see them come back and it encourages more school spirit. I think of Salesian as a place where I have become a young man and may not have had the same opportunities at other schools.”

Jerry Vasquez, a senior middle linebacker on the football team, called it “a blessing to see my brothers come back and fully enjoy what it’s like to still be a Salesian Mustang — once a Mustang, always a Mustang, in church, at home, and on the playground.”

Chosen to speak to the gathering prior to the diploma distribution, Jose Sandoval, a retired Los Angeles Superior Court judge who studied at Harvard University and UC Berkeley, told his 1974 classmates that he recalled the Salesian as faculty “may have had more faith in us than we did in ourselves. … We were just kids from East LA trying to get by. They could foresee the challenges and setbacks we would face, and their guidance helped us get through. Our friendships have endured. A word to the new generation of Salesian students: Look around and value these guys. They will make a difference in your life.”

David Gonzalez, an Emmy Award-winning technical director, videotape engineer, and cameraman at ABC/Disney for the last 43 years, said as an alum, the best advice he can give to current day Salesian students: Never give up.

“The school had a profound impact on me,” said Gonzalez, who moved to the Inland Empire and is active in the alumni association. “We may have been poor, but purpose kept us alive.”

Francisco Ruiz recalled the persistence he learned from Salesian faculty as he studied at UC Santa Cruz, then at UCLA to get his MBA and work at AT&T for 32 years.

“We were taught to persevere, to move forward and make the best of what we had, stay up all night and study if you had to,” said Ruiz, who lives in Whittier. “I have bonds with these friends through the year — maybe stronger in the last few years than when we were in school.”

Acevedo, whose son became an orthopedic surgeon and his daughter became a nurse, laughs when he thinks about how he signed his classmates’ high school yearbook telling them he was going to be a doctor.

“And they didn’t believe me,” said Acevedo, a parishioner at Sacred Heart Church where he lives in Rancho Cucamonga. “I look back at all the years in college and interning and training and it all boils down to this is where my roots were set. That’s important because when the wind blows, something has to keep you grounded.

“I’m blessed because I started with nothing and here we are now. This was where I was supposed to be. Whatever Salesian is still doing now, it’s working. We can’t take that for granted.”

St. Claude de La Colombiere was born in 1641 near the south of France. He was one of seven children, and three of his siblings entered religious life or the priesthood. Claude attended a Jesuit school as a child, and entered the order when he was 17.

As a recruit, he admitted that he had a “horrible aversion” to the rigorous training that the Jesuits required. But he persisted, and sharpened his focus and natural talents. Later, he took a private vow to follow the order’s rules as perfectly as possible.

Claude was ordained a priest in 1669, and became known for his gift of preaching. He taught college students and tutored the children of King Louis XIV’s minister of finance.

In 1674, Claude became the superior of a Jesuit house in Paray-le-Monial. During this time, he served as confessor to the convent of Visitationist nuns, and met a sister who would later be canonized as St. Margaret Mary Alacoque.

Sr. Margaret Mary claimed to have received private revelations from God, urging devotions to his heart as the symbol and seat of God’s love for mankind. When she told others in her convent, they dismissed her. Claude became her spiritual director, and learned a great deal about her revelations. He eventually concluded that Sr. Margaret Mary had in fact received these revelations from Jesus.

Through his writings and his testimony, Claude helped establish the Sacred Heart as a hallmark of Catholic devotion. The Sacred Heart also helped combat the heresy Jansenism, which believed God did not want some people to be saved.

In 1676, Claude was called to England, where he ministered as chaplain and preacher to Mary of Modena, the Duchess of York. Two years later, when false rumors spread about a Catholic plot against the English king, Claude was arrested and spent several weeks in a dungeon. Ultimately, 35 innocents were killed, including eight Jesuits.

Claude’s imprisonment wrecked his health, and he returned to Paray-le-Monial in 1681. At the age of 41, he died from internal bleeding on Feb. 15, the first Sunday of Lent that year. He was beatified in 1929, nine years after the canonization of St. Margaret Mary, and was canonized 63 years later.

Photo: vratarnica.ru     

We Christians know that the greatest milestone in world history, its greatest miracle, is the appearance in the world of the God-Man Christ. Therefore, all significant events of His earthly life, such as Christmas Traditions Around the World. Part 1We will talk briefly on where the Christmas traditions came from, which of them became common in Europe, and on the special flavor of the celebration of Christmas in some areas and countries.

“>Christmas, Baptism, The Transfiguration of the Lord“>Transfiguration, Entry into Jerusalem and others, are filled with great meaning and are festive events for us. Undoubtedly, the feast of the Meeting, which is being celebrated today, is among them.

The events of this feast are known to us from the Gospel. When the infant Christ was forty days old, He was brought by His Most Pure Mother and the righteous Joseph to the temple in Jerusalem to fulfill the Old Testament rite of consecration to the Lord. They were met in the temple by the righteous Holy, Righteous Simeon the God-ReceiverRighteous Simeon the God-Receiver was, according to the testimony of the holy Evangelist Luke, a just and devout man waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. God promised him that he would not die until the promised Messiah, Christ the Lord, came into the world.

“>Simeon the God-receiver. Simeon was very old and had been promised by the Holy Spirit that he would not die until he had seen the Messiah come into the world. And so, when Mary brought the Child, the Holy Spirit revealed to Simeon that this baby was the Messiah, the Son of God and Savior of the world. With fear and trembling, as well as with great joy, Simeon took the Child in his arms and uttered his famous words: Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, O Lord…

Brothers and sisters, the word sretenie means “meeting” in Slavonic. Who met with whom today? God met with man, the Bridegroom met with the bride, the Lord met with the earthly Church. The history of waiting for this meeting, and therefore the history of today’s feast, begins literally from the first days of the existence of the world—from Adam and Eve. We know from the Bible that when Adam and Eve were expelled from Paradise and separated from God, the Lord promised them that a Messiah would come to earth one day, and would save people from damnation and death and bring them back to Paradise. From that time, the expectation of this promised meeting, or in Slavonic, sretenie, begins. It took many centuries and millennia before God’s promise to the first parents was fulfilled. So that people would not forget about the upcoming meeting and would not stop waiting for it, God repeatedly reminded them of it through the prophets.

We know that in the Old Testament times, of all the peoples of our planet, only one knew the true God and had the true faith—the Jewish people. The Jews had Solomon’s Temple, the only temple of the true God on earth at that time. The Jews called it “The House of the Lord” and believed that the Lord Himself would one day come to His house. This was stated in the sacred prophetic books. For example, the Prophet Malachi had written: Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the LORD of hosts. The people of God were waiting intensely for this coming, and this expectation was the main content of their entire Old Testament religion.

The temple itsefl seemed to be expecting this. It is very significant, for example, that the altar of the Old Testament temple faced west. The altars of our Christian churches always face east, and the entrance to them is always from the west. In Solomon’s temple, the opposite was true—it had an entrance from the east. It was as if the temple were waiting for its Master, its God and Lord, Who was to come from the east, from the heavenly land of light. For the prophets in their books often compared the coming Messiah with the rising sun, a star, or even simply light. The light and all the luminaries come from the east, and therefore that is where the entrance of the temple in Jerusalem faced.

Solomon’s temple waited a long time for the coming of its Lord. Exactly a thousand years passed before the prophetic scriptures were fulfilled and the event that we celebrate today took place—the coming of God into the temple and His meeting with His people. It is very symbolic that after the coming of Christ, our temples, the direct heirs of Solomon’s temple, turned the altar to the east. This means that the temple of Solomon fulfilled its purpose. It waited for the Messiah and the Lord, who by His coming revolutionized our world and enlightened people with the light of truth. Therefore the temples of God turned one hundred and eighty degrees, and Christians no longer pray facing west, as in Solomon’s temple, but facing east.

So, the Lord came to the temple in Jerusalem, thus fulfilling the prophecies of the Old Testament. Let us see, however, who met Him in the temple? The Gospel mentions the names of only two people who met the Lord. These are Simeon the God-receiver and Anna the Prophetess. Both people were great righteous ones who devoted their entire lives to serving the Lord and waiting for the Messiah. It is said of Simeon that the Holy Spirit dwelt in him, and of Anna it is said that she did not leave the temple, serving God by fasting and prayer day and night. From here it is clearly seen to whom the Lord reveals Himself and who can meet Him. Only the righteous, only people of high spiritual life are capable of meeting with the Lord.

One should also pay attention to the words of Simeon, for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation. “Thy salvation,” that is, the salvation of God, was often referenced in the books of the Old Testament as the coming Messiah.

For example, King David’s prayer for the enlightenment of all the peoples of the earth: God be merciful unto us, and bless us, And cause his face to shine upon us; That thy way may be known upon earth, Thy salvation among all nations (Ps. 67:1-3). Here, according to the interpretation of the holy fathers, “Thy salvation” should be understood as Christ Himself. Therefore, Simeon’s words clearly indicate that the Child brought to the temple is the long-awaited Messiah.

In addition, in Hebrew, the Savior’s name, Jesus, comes from the word “Yeshua,” which means “salvation,” and therefore the phrase mine eyes have seen Thy salvation sounds literally in Hebrew as “my eyes have seen Thy Jesus.” Also, the words of David mentioned, that they may know Thy salvation among all nations, literally sound like, “that they may know Thy Jesus in all nations.” Such is the interpretation of these words; such are the hidden meanings of the Holy Scripture.

When the Lord came to the Jerusalem temple, He filled it with Himself, with His presence. He sanctified it, confirmed and blessed it as the place of meeting between man and God. We know from history that Solomon’s Temple was living out its last years at that time. It would not be long before it was razed to the ground by the Roman general Titus. But from it, like shoots from their root, Christian temples, temples of the New Testament, would grow and spread throughout the earth, where people would be able to meet God—through prayer, through Grace, through the Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ.

Dear brothers and sisters, we are called to such a meeting, to such a meeting with the Lord. May the Lord guide us in this world so that at the end of our journey, having lived our lives in a Christian way and having pleased Christ, we may say together with the righteous Simeon the words of a wanderer returning to his heavenly Homeland: Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, O Lord, according to Thy word. Amen.

It happens every year on Ash Wednesday. In our downtown parishes, women and men, old and young, office and construction workers, corporate lawyers, police officers, messengers, and many others cut short their lunch hours and stream up the aisles to have a cruciform smudge of ashes planted on their foreheads.

It’s a yearly reminder that Catholicism is perhaps most successful in attracting people when, without making much fuss about it, it offers something that, on some deep and not necessarily well-understood level, many and diverse individuals actually want.

So, streaming up the center aisle and the side aisles they come, to receive the ashes and hear the words. What words are those? The older version, still in use, is, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” The newer one says, “Repent, and believe in the Gospel.”

Of the two versions, I prefer the older one, and I suspect quite a few other people feel the same. Yes, repenting and believing in the Gospel is a very good thing to do. But the older version seems somehow better suited to the occasion, when the repetition of that word “dust” — as if to rub it in — serves as an acerbic reminder of a hard truth that many of those people streaming up the aisles actually want to hear, in the awareness that it’s sometimes a salutary thing to hear the blunt truth spoken to them.

There are in fact two great formulas which, taken together, sum up human life. The first occurs in the first chapter of Genesis and its account of God’s creation of humankind: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Gen.1:27). The other comes with that smudge of ashes on the forehead: “You are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Thinking about these things, I recalled the enigmatic conclusion of Walker Percy’s National Book Award-winning novel “The Moviegoer.” Sitting outside a Catholic church in New Orleans, narrator Binx Bolling sees a Black man park his car and go in. It is Ash Wednesday, Binx recalls. A few minutes later the man comes back out, evidently having received his ashes. And watching him, Binx speculates on what it was that brought him here:

“Is it part and parcel of the complex business of coming up in the world? Or is it because he believes that God himself is here at the corner of Elysian Fields and Bon Enfants? Or is he here for both reasons: through some dim dazzling trick of grace, coming for the one and receiving the other as God’s own importunate bonus?

“It is impossible to say.”

We live in times of aggressive, soul-deadening secularization that has affected many people for the worse. Years ago the distinguished theologian Romano Guardini, writing immediately after the Chamber of Horrors that historians call World War II, explained what needed to happen.

Man, he wrote, has to “regain his right relation to the truth of things, to the demands of his own deepest self, and finally to God. Otherwise he becomes the victim of his own power, and the forecast of ‘global catastrophe’ … will really become inevitable.”

That’s a large order, of course. But those people who stream into the churches to have a smudgy cross traced on their foreheads testify to an enduring faith that still resides deep in many hearts. So cheer up — it’s Ash Wednesday again, with Easter not far behind.

The vice of “acedia,” often translated as “sloth,” can cause laziness, but it is much more than that; it is a lack of caring for anything and being bored with everything, even one’s relationship with God, Pope Francis said.

“The demon of acedia wants precisely to destroy the simple joy of the here and now, the grateful wonder of reality; it wants to make you believe that it is all in vain, that nothing has meaning, that it is not worth taking care of anything or anyone,” the pope said at his weekly general audience Feb. 14.

Holding his audience on Ash Wednesday, Pope Francis prayed that God would accompany and bless people through their Lenten journey, but his main talk was a continuation of his series on vices and virtues.

People spend too little time talking about “the capital sin” of acedia, he said, and even when they do, they refer to it as sloth or laziness.

But “in reality, laziness is an effect more than a cause,” the pope said. “When a person is idle, indolent, apathetic, we say he is lazy. But as the wisdom of the ancient desert fathers teaches us, often the root is acedia, which from its Greek origin literally means a ‘lack of care.’”

Pope Francis described acedia as “a very dangerous temptation that one should not mess around with,” because it makes a person “feel disgust at everything; their relationship with God becomes boring to them; and even the holiest acts, those that in the past warmed their hearts, now appear entirely useless to them.”

Acedia can sometimes feel like depression, but it is a vice that tempts people to let go of caring for themselves and for others, he said. “For those caught up in acedia, life loses meaning, praying is boring (and) every battle seems meaningless.”

“It is a bit like dying in advance and it’s awful,” the pope said.

When a person feels acedia creeping in, he said, they need to try to cultivate “the patience of faith” with a few small steps.

“In the clutches of acedia, one’s desire is to be elsewhere, to escape from reality,” the pope said, so to fight it “one must instead have the courage to remain and to welcome God’s presence in the ‘here and now,’ in the situation as it is.”

Take a breath, he said, set smaller goals and “persevere by leaning on Jesus, who never abandons us in temptation.”

The pope ended the audience encouraging Catholics to live Lent “as an opportunity for conversion and inner renewal in listening to the Word of God and in caring for our brothers and sisters most in need,” including by praying for those suffering because of war and violence in Ukraine, Palestine and Israel.

The Israeli Embassy to the Holy See has defined as “regrettable” remarks by Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, saying that Israel’s attacks on Gaza have been excessive.

Cardinal Parolin, speaking to reporters Feb. 13, said the Vatican continues its “clear and unreserved condemnation of what happened on Oct. 7” when Hamas militants entered Israel, massacred civilians and took more than 200 hostages.

The Vatican also continues its “clear and unreserved condemnation of all forms of antisemitism,” the cardinal told reporters after a meeting with top Italian government officials.

At the same time, the cardinal said, the Vatican also “requests that the right to defend itself that Israel has invoked to justify this operation be proportionate, and certainly with 30,000 dead it is not.”

An unsigned statement Feb. 14 from the Israeli Embassy to the Holy See said, “This is a regrettable statement. Judging the legitimacy of a war without taking into account ALL relevant circumstances and data inevitably leads to erroneous conclusions.”

For example, the statement said, “Gaza has been transformed by Hamas into the largest terrorist base ever seen. There is hardly any civilian infrastructure that has not been used by Hamas for its criminal plans, including hospitals, schools, places of worship and many others.”

The embassy also claimed that “the construction of this unprecedented terrorist infrastructure was actively supported by the local civilian population” and that civilians also were involved in the “unprovoked invasion of Israeli territory, killing, raping and taking civilians hostage. All of these acts are defined as war crimes.”

And while the embassy said that “all civilian casualties are to be mourned,” it also said that “available data” show that three civilians have died for every Hamas member killed.

“In past wars and operations by NATO or Western forces in Syria, Iraq or Afghanistan, the ratio was nine or 10 civilians for every terrorist,” so the Israeli Defense Forces’ efforts “to avoid civilian deaths” is evident “despite the fact that the battlefield in Gaza is much more complicated,” the statement said.

“On this basis,” it said, “any objective observer cannot help but come to the conclusion that the responsibility for the death and destruction in Gaza lies with Hamas and Hamas alone.”