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Photo: Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I embrace.
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In an interview with AsiaNews, the Russian Orthodox Bishop Hilarion of Vienna said that Metropolitan Kirill might be a member of Putin’s delegation on the visit to Rome. Metropolitan Kirill is the chief ecumenical-affairs officer for the Moscow patriarchate.
Preparations for the meeting between the Pope and President Putin have revived discussions about the prospects for a meeting between the Pontiff and Russian Patriarch Alexei II. In the past, Putin has said that he hopes to act as a catalyst for talks between Rome and Moscow.
In his AsiaNews interview Bishop Hilarion said that relations between the Holy See and the Moscow patriarchate have been improving steadily in recent months.
Via CWNews.com
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ROME, MARCH 1, 2007 (Zenit.org).- A priest of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Iraq laments that the faithful are "losing hope" in the war-torn nation.
Father Philip Najim, procurator to the Holy See for the patriarch of Babylon, commenting to ZENIT on the situation of Catholics in Iraq, said that the "only armament we have to create peace is our prayer."
Father Najim said that, in addition to traditional Lenten sacrifices, Iraqi Catholics need to witness the peace of Christ in their behavior and attitudes by drawing strength from God.
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Mar. 1, 2007 (CWNews.com) - A Russian Orthodox prelate has told reporters that a meeting between Pope Benedict XVI (bio - news) and Russian Patriarch Alexei II could take place this year.
Bishop Hilarion of Vienna, who is representating the Moscow patriarchate at a planning meeting for the joint Catholic-Orthodox commission on theological dialogue, said that a meeting between the Pope and the Patriarch would be likely to take place at a “neutral” location, rather than in Russia or Italy.
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The president of the Pontifical Council Cor Unum, which helps the Pope to promote and coordinate the Church's charitable work, said this on Tuesday when opening an international conference at the Catholic University of St. Anthony in Murcia.
"Catholic charitable associations must work to reduce poverty, but their primary objective is to show the love of God in the world," Archbishop Cordes said.
The 72-year-old prelate exhorted ecclesial groups "to firmly maintain their roots and objectives so as not to lose their ecclesial nature, giving priority to evangelization in the charitable activities in which they engage."
His conference was entitled "Socio-Charitable Activity in the Encyclical 'Deus Caritas Est.'"
The prelate said that "Christian associations as well as believers must not seek supports in the field of socio-charitable action that are not in accord with the Gospel."
"Church and state need each other in the quest for man's good; hence, the need for cooperation between both institutions is inevitable," Archbishop Cordes added.
The prelate praised the work of civil associations, particularly those nongovernmental organizations that "engage in charitable activity philanthropically."
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A Muslim extremist group claimed responsibility for threatening letters and phone calls which branded the three men as infidels, AsiaNews reported.
In an interview with Aid to the Church in Need, Bishop Coutts said he would not let himself be intimidated and that he would persist "with interreligious activities, in favor of social harmony and religious peace in the country."
The bishop added: "We have experienced the violence of certain extremist Muslim groups, a violence that in former times did not exist. This is for us a new phenomenon, which does not spring from the population in general, but from the promotion of this way of thinking within extremist groups."
Catholics account for 1.5 million of Pakistan's 165 million inhabitants.
Recent years have seen the development of positive relations between Christians and Muslims in Faisalabad, the third largest city of Pakistan, AsiaNews reported.
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BAGHDAD, Iraq, FEB. 28, 2007 (Zenit.org).- Christians in war-torn Iraq have been asked to add Lenten sacrifices to their daily privations as an offering to God.
Chaldean Auxiliary Bishop Shlemon Warduni of Babylon explained this to the Italian bishops' SIR news agency.
"They are renunciations that are added to the privations that we experience daily in Iraq," said Bishop Warduni. Such privations include lack of drinking water, food, medicines and electricity.
"It is paradoxical, moreover, that in an oil-rich country such as Iraq there is no gasoline for the population's needs," he added in the interview published Friday by SIR.
"We have no security or stability, or job possibilities, and we suffer violence and abuses," the prelate said. "Despite this, we have asked our faithful to offer all these difficulties to God so that he will keep present the fate of Iraq, of its children, of its sick, of its elderly, and of peace and security."