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Photo: Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I embrace.
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CWN - Chaldean Catholic Patriarch Louis Sako says that Muslims in Iraq are mounting a “grass-roots revolt against terrorism, against violence.”
The Chaldean Patriarch told the AsiaNews service that ordinary Muslims are rejecting extremism and offering public support to their Christian neighbors. He cited the Christmas trees that were distributed in Baghdad, the Muslims who attended Mass on Christmas Day, the massive inter-faith celebration of New Year’s Day, and the public statements by political leaders encouraging Christians to return to their homes after the military offensive that drove out the Islamic State.
“It is possible to defeat those who seek death, destruction, emigration,” the Patriarch said.
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CWN - The head of the Russian Orthodox Church has expressed gratitude for recent developments in Syria, in which ISIS and jihadist rebels have suffered setbacks.
Looking back on 2016, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow said that “the greatest problems that our country and the whole world faced started settling thanks to God’s grace,” according to the Interfax news agency.
“I mean the very dangerous political situation in the Middle East, in Syria,” he explained. “There have been certain changes that saved this crisis and the whole human race from perhaps a very dangerous political development.”
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CWN - The Maronite and Chaldean Catholic bishops of Aleppo joined the patriarch of the Syriac Orthodox Church on January 1 in praying for peace.
The Catholic and Syriac Orthodox prelates, joined by a local evangelical leader, prayed at Mor Aphrem Cathedral in Aleppo for the release of the city’s Greek and Syriac Orthodox bishops, who were abducted in 2013.
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CWN - Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad visited a Christian religious community on Christmas Day.
Accompanied by his wife, Assad traveled to the Greek Orthodox monastery of Our Lady of Saydnaya, about an hour north of Damascus. He conveyed his Christmas greetings to the nuns living in the convent there.
Our Lady of Saydnaya monastery—an ancient strucure that was reporetedly built by the Emperor Justinian in the 6th century—was damaged by shelling during the Syrian civil war. Assad’s visit there came on the same day that Christians in Aleppo celebrated openly for the first time since the city was captured by the Islamic State.
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Maadi, Egypt - A meeting of the Council of Eastern Catholic Patriarchs and Bishops of Alexandria was held at St. Stephanos' House, Maadi, Egypt, on 27-28 December, 2016, under the chairmanship of Coptic Catholic Patriarch Ibrahim Isaac (Sidrak) and in the presence of Melkite Patriarch Gregorios III.
The fathers discussed the importance of the presence and role of Christians in the Middle East where Jesus was born and how Christians can continue their role in Egypt's predominantly Muslim society.
Photos are below.
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CWN - The Middle East’s Christians continue to suffer from severe persecution, the region’s Eastern Catholic patriarchs said in separate Christmas messages.
Maronite Cardinal Bechara Boutros al-Rahi warned that terrorists are “killing and displacing families and depriving them of their rights and dignities,” according to a CNS report. He called upon the UN to secure peace in the region and work for the return of Christian refugees to their homelands.
Because of their “faithfulness to Jesus the Savior,” Syrian and Iraqi Christians “endured the horrible consequences of war, violence, and all kind of persecutions,” said Syriac Catholic Patriarch Ignatius Joseph III Yonan. “We have to keep hoping that the local government and international leaders will expel the terrorists and restore peace and security.”
The patriarch cited Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) by name as he praised the “many Catholic politicians in the West who would disagree with the official policy of their government in dealing with the plight of Christians in the Middle East.”
It is “quite evident that our people have been persecuted because of religious hatred and forgotten because of the political opportunism of the powerful of this world,” Patriarch Yonan added.
Melkite Greek Catholic Patriarch Gregory III Laham warned that “today in the Middle East, the cradle of Christianity, the Christian presence is threatened ... by wars that have given rise to this terrifying exodus, especially of Christians.”
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