News

Details

Last Updated: 28 March 2015

CWN - Police in Pakistan have arrested 200 Christians in connection with the lynchings that took place after the bombing of two churches in Lahore.

Following the arrests in the heavily Christian Youhanabad district, police declined to explain how they selected the people who were taken into custody. Local Christians have protested that the arrested seemed to be made at random.

“We are not opposed to the arrest of those who have done something wrong, but the arrest of innocent people is unacceptable,” said a spokesman for the Lahore archdiocese. Some Christians were reportedly leaving the area, fearful of more arrests.

Two Muslims were lynched by angry mobs on March 15, after bombings at two Lahore churches left 17 people dead. While condemning the lynchings, Church leaders have also complained about the slow police response to the bombings and the failure to provide security for the Christian minority.

Details

Last Updated: 28 March 2015

CWN - In India, Christians “feel that their Christian identity is being questioned,” the president of the country’s bishops’ conference has said.

Cardinal Baselios Cleemis Thottunkal of Trivandrum told an interviewer said that despite recent assurances given to the Christian minority by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, there is still a sense of hostility toward Christians. Pointing to continued acts of anti-Christian violence, he said that the prime minister’s support was welcome, but “not everybody has taken it seriously.”

The cardinal said that it is “very painful and very sad” to hear prominent officials make anti-Christian charges—such as a recent highly-publicized comment that Mother Teresa served the poor only because she wanted to bring converts into the Catholic Church. He criticized the government for celebrating “Good Government” day on Christmas, saying that good government should be practiced every day, but the Christian holiday should be respected.

Details

Last Updated: 28 March 2015

CWN - An Egyptian appeals court has upheld the conviction of an Islamic leader for burning a Bible.

Ahmed Mahmoud, popularly known as Abu Islam, was found guilty of violating an Egyptian law against public displays of contempt for religion. His conviction is the first for a Muslim charged with offending against Christianity.

Abu Islam, a militant Salafist, had burned Bible outside the US embassy in September 2012, to protest the burning of a Qu’ran by the American Evangelical preacher Terry Jones. He was originally sentenced to an 11-year prison term for the offense, but that sentence was reduced to a 5-year term. The court also ordered him to pay a fine of about $1,000.

Details

Last Updated: 28 March 2015

CWN - The 21 Coptic Christians who were slaughtered by the Islamic State in Libya are “true martyrs” and will be recognized as such, an Egyptian bishop has said.

Bishop Kyrillos William Samaan of Assiut told Aid to the Church in Need that the Coptic Catholic Church will follow the Coptic Orthodox Church in recognizing the 21 martyrs. “Pope Francis himself recognised them as martyrs,” he observed. “They were killed because they were Christians.”

Bishop Samaan said that Egyptian Christians have been moved by the response of the government to the killings. Egypt’s President el Sisi visited the Coptic Orthodox Pope Tawadros to express his personal condolences; the prime minister visited the town from which most of the slain Copts came. The governor of that province has announced plans to build a church in their honor, and their village has been renamed “Village of the Martyrs.”

“Egypt is on the path to renewal,” the bishop said, commenting on these gestures. He voiced his hope that the government’s expressions of sympathy would overshadow the inflammatory rhetoric of militant Muslims. In general, he said, “the murders have brought Muslims and Christians closer together. The prevailing sentiment is that Egyptians have been attacked.”

Details

Last Updated: 28 March 2015

Vatican City, 20 March 2015 (VIS) – The Holy Father has:

- reorganised the Hungarian Greek-Catholic Church, elevating it to the status of “sui iuris Metropolitan Church, by the following measures:

- elevation of the eparchy of Hajdudorog for Catholics of Byzantine rite (Cathlics 270,000, priests 190, permanent deacons 4, religious 13) to a metropolis, with its seat in Debrecen, appointing eparchal Bishop Fulop Kocsis as the first Metropolitan;

- elevation of the apostolic exarchate of Miskolc (Catholics 56,200, priests 70) for Catholics of Byzantine rite to the status of eparchy, making it a suffragan of the metropolitan see of Hajdudorog, appointing Msgr. Atanaz Orosz, formerly apostolic exarch of Miskolc, as the first eparchal bishop;

- erection of the eparchy of Nyiregyhaza for Catholics of Byzantine rite, with territory taken from the eparchy of Hajdudorog, making it a suffragan of the metropolitan see of Hajdudorog, appointing Bishop Atanaz Orosz as apostolic administrator “sede vacante”.

Details

Last Updated: 28 March 2015

CWN - In an interview that will air on the CBS news show 60 Minutes, the Chaldean Catholic archbishop of Erbil, the capital of Iraq’s Kurdistan region, said that war is the only way to protect Iraq’s Christians and stop the Islamic State.

“For me, Daesh [the Islamic State] is a cancer,” said Archbishop Bashar Warda. “So sometimes you take some hard measures, unfortunate measures, to deal and treat this cancer.”