Category: WM Special

Iran is over 99% Muslim and Islam is the state religion. The Church’s roots in Iran are very old going back to the 2nd century. Is Christianity the oldest religion in Iran?  No, we have two older communities, older than Christianity. First, we have the Zoroastrian community which goes back centuries before the arrival of Christianity and Islam. Second, we have the Jewish community. The Zoroastrian community consists of about 20,000 people and the Jewish, between 20,000 and 35,000. These two communities are older than the Christian community.    Today, Iran is over 99% Muslim. How does Islam permeate daily life?  If you are on the streets of Tehran, or any part of the country, you will notice the portrait of the martyrs, the Ayatollah, the late Khomeini, the current Ayatollah Khamenei. If you use a phone in public telephone booths, you will hear the voice of Imam Hussein telling you what to do.    So, if you pick up a phone, immediately you will hear a (recorded) voice of the Imam?  Right. And in schools, the Disciplines are permitted but through a perspective based on the Koran and Hadith and other Islamic sciences.    In fact, if I understand correctly, the picture of the Ayatollah is even on the cover of the catechism books?  Right, and maybe it is a way to show that Christians are under the protection of the regime and are considered dhimmis (protected people) in the Islamic Sharia. It is a way to say that you [Christians] are under our [Islamic] regime. Then, you have the religious police.    What about the modesty patrols that make sure that women are properly garbed?  Sometimes they are hard liners and sometimes not depending on the regime. Under Khatami, for instance, they were a little bit liberal so girls could show a little bit of their heads. Under Ahmadinejad, it is stricter.   It is very strict now and back to the complete covering?  Yes, only the face is seen. But there are women who cover their hands and faces, too.    Christians number about 100,000 in a population of 71 million. How are Christians viewed in Iran?  Christians are viewed as an ethnic minority because the Christians are predominantly Armenians, and Syro-Chaldeans. We have 80,000 Orthodox Armenians who are also called Gregorian or Apostolic Armenian, 5,000 Catholic Armenians, and around 20,000 Assyro-Chaldeans plus other communities such as Latin, Protestants Churches which, all together, make up between 100,000 to 110,000. So, they are seen as an ethnic minority and as such, they are not allowed to celebrate their rites in Farsi, the official language of Iran. They can’t celebrate the Holy Mass in Farsi but in Armenian or Chaldean only.    To distinguish them as foreigners?  Not only that but to prevent them from being attractive and understood by the local Iranians.    To prevent the Iranians from being attracted to the faith?  Right, and to prevent them [Iranians] from understanding what they [Christians] are saying. There was

ARMENIANS. Armenia, part of modern Turkey, was under Soviet rule until 1991, when Communism fell. At various stages of its history, it was under Arab, Byzantine, and Turkish rule. The monk Mechitan sought safety in Venice. His followers formed the congregation of the Mechitists, which started the development of Armenian culture. Only 4% of the population are Roman Catholics, while the majority (94%) are “Armenian Apostolic Catholics.” A “Katholikos” heads the Roman Catholics. They were banned from attending the Council of Chalcedon in 451, which condemned the heresy of monophysitism, that is, Christ has only one divine nature, despite His earthly birth, life, death, and resurrection. Later, they accepted conciliar decrees of the Council of Ferrara-Florence in 1453, and confirmed the union with the Roman Catholic Church. In 1996, Pope John Paul II and Katholikos Karekin I (+1999) signed a joint declaration to bridge the gap between the two Churches. The Armenian Apostolic Catholics (or Oriental Orthodox) had also accepted the decrees of Chalcedon. For political reasons, the Byzantine Emperor, influenced by the monphysites, opposed them. They reunited with Rome for more than two centuries (1198-1375), but internal conflicts prevented total union among themselves.   CHALDEANS. They form a minority group today in Iran, Iraq, and Turkey. Already mentioned in ancient writings, the Old Testament considered them people with magical powers. They are either Nestorians, who admit a divine and human nature in Christ, but which are merely accidentally united in Him, or Oriental Rite Roman Catholics. The Chaldean Catholics trace their roots to the Latin Crusaders, and they had always sought reunion with the Roman Catholic Church. But centuries of conflict due to circumstances of time, place, and persons, have always blocked their efforts. In 1552, their patriarch, Simon III Baida, journeyed to see Pope Julius III. Refusing election to the Patriarchate twice, they forced him physically to accept the position. The following year, the Pope proclaimed Sulaqa as the Patriarch of the Chaldeans, an event which marks the official establishment of the Chaldean Catholic Church.   COPTS. The name is Arabic for “Egyptian.” St. Mark brought the Christian Gospel from Alexandria to Egypt and Abyssinia. Wrongly thinking that monophysitism was the orthodox doctrine, for it was supposedly taught by St. Cyril of Alexandria, the Patriarch of Alexandria accepted the heretical teaching. The Byzantines, too, had accepted the decrees of Chalcedon, and their followers are known as “Melkites,” or the “King’s men.” But the traditionalists in Egypt resented the “upstart” Byzantines, and so, to promote peace, Emperor Justin II created a Melkite Patriarchate and a non-Chalcedonian Patriarch. The majority went with the non-Chalcedonian Patriarch, and observed a modified Alexandrian liturgy, while the Melkites followed the Byzantine. Their Arab conquerors subjected them to taxes, tributes, or Islam – or death. Many embraced Islam. The first attempt of reunion with Rome occurred during the Council of Ferrara-Florence (1439). Pertinent documents were issued, but their Church leaders refused to sign them. In 1600, a Franciscan friar was named their Vicar and, in

In 1054, the mid-Eastern Christian churches split from the Roman Catholic Church, and all efforts in the last 10 centuries to reconcile them have failed. Differences in culture, language, social traditions, politics, and even human ambition have been the factors of this continued alienation and suspicion. And yet, both sides believe in the same God and receive the same sacraments. A number of them have rejoined the Roman Catholic Church, but one remains aloof and refuses to accept the primacy of the Pope in Rome. St. Peter, the Prince of the Apostles, was martyred in Rome, the Eternal City and capital of the ancient Roman Empire. The bishops who succeeded him there inherited his primacy and supreme authority over all Christian churches, and Rome is now the head and center of Christianity. The other mid-Eastern churches can also claim apostolic origins, but do not enjoy the same privilege. Antioch traces its beginnings to St. Peter, but he did not die there. Alexandria in Egypt, a Jewish center of culture and learning, was the second imperial city as big as Rome. Tradition says that St. Mark, St. Peter’s close disciple, was the founder of its Christian Church. St. James the Apostle headed Jerusalem, the cradle of Christianity, where he was martyred. Constantinople, founded in 324 by Constantine the Great as the seat of his new empire, could not claim the same apostolic origin. Christianity was persecuted until Emperor Constantine the Great granted it legal existence in 313 A. D. For strategic reasons, he abandoned Rome and, in 324, built a new seat of his empire in Byzantium, renamed Constantinople (“Constantini polis,” or Constantine’s City). The new imperial capital soon eclipsed Rome in importance, grandeur, and culture. Because Christianity flourished under imperial protection, it seemed a matter of course that the Emperor would be considered head of the Christian community, and he was expected to promote the well-being of both the Empire and the Church. And Constantine himself believed that religious unity and uniformity of belief would consolidate imperial unity, and he banned everything that threatened to disrupt it.   The first councils Sincere Christian leaders were perplexed over many Christian mysteries, especially the Trinity. Arius (+336), a priest in Alexandria, could not rationally explain how Jesus could also be divine. If He was, how could there be only one God? He concluded that Jesus could not be divine, but only a mere creature, lower than the Father. To worship Jesus was idolatry. More importantly, His death on the cross was useless and could not save the world. In this way, Arius believed he was preserving the doctrine of only one supreme God intact. To settle the dispute, Constantine convoked the first ecumenical council in Nicaea in 325, which unequivocally condemned Arius and his teachings. It drew up a succinct summary of the articles of Christian faith, we now know as the Nicene Creed. Not all accepted the condemnation, and Constantine imposed his imperial authority to force everyone to accept the Nicene

As the 2003 United States-led invasion of Iraq began, the country’s Christians started streaming across the border into neighboring Jordan. Today, most of them continue to live here in abject poverty with no hope of ever returning to the land of their ancestors. “We have lost our home country, we are not willing to lose our faith,” says Brahim, a 65-year-old chemistry teacher and Christian Iraqi residing in Amman. According to figures released by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the Iraqi refugee population is largest in Syria, with some 220,000 registered with the body. Another 47,000 have been registered with UNHCR in Jordan, while Lebanon hosts 10,000 registered refugees. “The number of Christian Iraqi refugees in Jordan has decreased dramatically from about 30,000, only a few years ago, to some 10,000 to 15,000 today,” says Rev. Father Raymond Moussalli. Christians residing in Jordan belong mostly to the Chaldean, Syriac, Assyrian and Protestant Churches. “Most of us speak Chaldean, which is very similar to the original language of our Lord Jesus Christ,” says Oussama, a 24-year-old Iraqi Christian. Christians congregate daily at the basement of the small Chaldean Church in Webdeh hills, where it is headquartered. They come to exchange stories of their home country, pray in silence, or simply to find solace with other refugees who, like them, are forced to live in a foreign land. Many live around the area as well as in other older Amman quarters, such as Jabal Hussein or Markah. “The international community has become indifferent to the plight of Christians still residing in Iraq, whose number is dwindling from nearly a million to less than 400,000 today,” complains Brahim. Batoul, a woman in her 60s, fled the Iraqi capital only a few months ago. “We owned two buildings in Bagdad. One morning, I woke up and saw that someone had painted a message in bright red on the garden’s wall. It was a threat to kill us if we did not come up with 80,000 dollars. The police asked us to immediately leave the country, saying that they did not have the means to protect us,” she recalls with sadness. Brahim’s story is similar. “I resigned from my teaching job at a Christian school when Father Youssef Aboudi, our head priest, was killed by militants after being accused of proselytism. The threats did not stop when I stayed home. I eventually had to leave for the sake of my 24-year-old daughter,” he adds. Many Iraqi refugees escape with few funds, adding to the hardship they face in their land of refuge. Iraqis wishing to obtain a Jordanian residency which allows them to work, for example, have to place about 50,000 US dollars in a special account. Refugees registered with the UNHCR hold asylum-seeker cards, but without residency, the refugees cannot work legally and, therefore, have no access to healthcare and education. “Living conditions are extremely difficult and expenses run very high. We need as much as 1,000 dollars a month in

The last 50 years have seen an unprecedented and unsustainable spike in consumption, driven by a culture of consumerism that has emerged over that period, says a report released by the Worldwatch Institute. This consumerist culture is the elephant in the room when it comes to solving the big environmental issues of today, the report says, and those issues cannot be fully solved until a transition to a more sustainable culture is begun. “State of the World 2010,” subtitled “Transforming Cultures: From Consumerism to Sustainability,” tries to chart a path away from what Worldwatch President Christopher Flavin calls “the consumer culture that has taken hold, probably, first in the U.S. and now in country after country over the past century, so that we can now talk about a global consumerist culture that has become a powerful force around the world.” In this culture, says the book-length report, people find meaning and contentment in what they consume, but this cultural orientation has had huge implications for society and the planet. The average U.S. citizens, for instance, consume more each day, in terms of mass, than they weigh. If everyone lived like this, the Earth could only sustain 1.4 billion people. Flavin admits consumerism is not the only factor driving environmental degradation but says it is one of the key root causes on which other factors are built – and, as a cultural framework, it is expanding. “In India and China, for instance, the consumer culture of the U.S. and Western Europe is not only being replicated but being replicated on a much vaster scale,” he says.   A sixfold rise in consumption Consumption has risen sixfold since 1960, the report says, citing World Bank statistics. Even taking the rising global population into account, this amounts to a tripling of consumption expenditures per person over this time. This has led to similar increases in the amount of resources used – a sixfold increase in metals extracted from the earth, eightfold in oil consumption and 14-fold in natural gas consumption. “In total, 60 billion tons of resources are now extracted annually – about 50% more than just 30 years ago,” the report says. Escalating resource consumption has also led to unsustainable systems of distributing and producing those resources. In the field of agriculture, for instance, every one dollar spent on a typical U.S. food item yields only about seven cents for the farmer, while 73 cents go to distribution, says the report’s chapter on shifting to a more sustainable agricultural system. It points to this as one outcome of increasingly unsustainable consumption habits. These habits have formed only recently – the same dollar yielded 40 cents for the farmer in 1900 – but they have now become ingrained. This consumption is based on more than individual choices. As co-author Michael Maniates says, “We’re not stupid, we’re not ignorant, we don’t even have bad values.” Rather, we are acting under the heavy influence of cultural conventions that influence our behavior by making things, like

God works wonders even through casual human encounters. It is for the evangelizer to bring a faith-filled quality to them. He/she may come across a serious religious ‘searcher’ on his travels or in casual correspondence. We can never know how far just one word or a simple statement can take him/her. The word of God has power to change hearts. We see that happen. “Man does not live on bread alone” (Mt 4:4), so wrote a hostel student years ago to his companion studying in a Hindu Mission School in Kolkata. The writer had been requested by his friend to lend him a little money when he was hard up. The writer was ready to help, but was himself short of money those days. The occasion made him pass on a good thought to his friend. “Man does not live on bread alone,” he wrote. If the sender of the message meant well, its receiver accepted the message equally well. The latter began to wonder what was the source of so profound an idea. “How true,” he mused. “Indeed, man does not live on bread alone. This is a deep thought and very powerful. Where does it come from?” When he heard that the quotation was from the Bible, he was even more interested. He had never heard about the Bible. “What is the Bible?” he inquired. He was from Arunachal Pradesh and had never been exposed to Christianity. Now he came to know, for the first time, that the Bible was the holy book of the Christians. Who are these Christians, he began to wonder. His curiosity led him further. He went to a Christian group at Jorhat, made further inquiries about Christian teachings, became interested, studied more seriously, and ultimately became a Christian. So did the original sender of the message. This latter person became the first Catholic of his own part of Arunachal Pradesh, and one of the first Catholics of the diocese of Miao and of the entire State. His name was Wanglat Lowangcha. The Catholic community in Eastern Arunachal Pradesh began with him.    Jesus wept! We do not know when, where and how the Lord is going to touch us with His powerful Word. He overtakes us by surprise. The following story may be apocryphal. But I remember reading, years ago, about a daughter of Stalin who, brought up in atheism, was deeply impressed by these words from the Scriptures, “The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?” (Ps 27:1). She had been taught atheism, and it was a surprise to come across a word like the ‘Lord,’ who could be light and salvation, knowing whom one would have no reason to fear any more. She was eager to know more about this ‘Lord.’ When she went further in this search, she did find Him and her entire life was changed. We are told that she became a believer. A Muslim friend once told me that what impressed him most

There is no uniform system of beliefs and practices in the cult of ancestors in black Africa. In fact, one finds differences in details even in the same ethnic group. Moreover, the ancestral veneration which will be described here is not found in each African traditional community. Nevertheless, the cult belongs to the majority of the peoples. Besides, notwithstanding the differences, there are many elements shared in common by many ethnic societies. This fact justifies the assertion that there are common conceptions on ancestors and their cult. It is on such common views that the exposition which follows will be mainly centered.  That ancestral veneration in Africa is intimately linked with the traditional worldview. In this worldview, life – understood as sacred power (vital force) – is a central element. The ideal of African culture is the coexistence and strengthening of vital force in the human community and the world at large. This ideal is one of the basic motivations of ancestral cult. That is why, in many African societies, ancestral status is closely linked with procreative fecundity. In some (but by no means all) communities, a person without offspring cannot become an ancestor.  There are even cases where it is believed that the naming of the descendant after the name of his ancestor makes it possible for the ancestor to continue to live in his descendant. The belief is widespread that the ancestor will continue to survive as ancestor only on condition that he is not forgotten, i.e. if his descendants will communicate regularly with him through prayer and ritual offering. Hence, the African desires to have many children who will remember him and ritually communicate with him. An ancestor, on his part, is believed to procure benefits for his living kin such as health, long life and the begetting of children.    Super-human status African ancestral relationship includes the idea of kinship as an indispensable factor. No one can be an ancestor of an individual who is not kinly related to him. It is for this reason that rituals for the dead without any particular reference to kinship are generally considered not belonging to ancestral cult. And although there are cases where ancestral relationship is not founded on family ties (e.g. when such relationship is grounded on common membership in a religious or secret society), yet such relationship rarely – if ever – goes beyond tribal limits.  Thanks to his death, an ancestor is believed to enjoy a sacred super-human status with special magical religious powers that can be beneficial or even harmful to his earthly kin. Such superhuman condition is expressed in various ways. Thus, for instance, both bodily and spiritual qualities are ascribed to the ancestors: invisibility or visibility in human but in unusual form, capacity to enter into and possess human individuals or brute animals, capacity to consume food or drinks, special nearness to the Supreme Being, capacity to exist anywhere – although the ancestors are believed to have localities of preference (e.g. shrines, particular

Among us, Christians, it is not always self-evident that we live the same faith in many different ways. In fact, many of us tend to think that ours is really the only good way of living as disciples of Christ. Our generosity in following, as closely as we possibly can, the way indicated in the Gospels sometimes leads us to presume that the best way (best for us!) is, in reality, the only one – to the exclusion of all others. Or if we happen to be rather open-minded and tolerant, we will, at best, think that ours is the highest path while efforts different from our own are considered less successful.  This year, I was the animator of a group of 16 young deacons who were completing their studies of specialization in various fields of theology while preparing for their ordination as priests in the coming months. Plurality is something that we experience everyday: there are sixteen of us in the group, and we come from eleven different countries! In one of the sessions of evaluation of our life and journey together, I was struck by the sharing of our two Chinese brothers. One of them confessed candidly that, in all his years as an active Christian and then as a seminarian, he had never realized that there was an ‘underground side’ of the Catholic Church in China. In fact, he said, he simply was born and began his journey of faith in the particular context of the ‘official church’ and simply presumed that that was the Catholic Church, and the way of living as disciples of Jesus. He was quite surprised when, coming to Rome to continue his studies and his preparation for priesthood, he encountered other seminarians from his own country who considered themselves an ‘underground’ Catholic community.  The other deacon (now already ordained a priest) shared that he was very much aware of the two sides of the Church in China. When he arrived in our community in Rome, he was very much surprised to encounter seminarians from ‘the other side of the Church’ who were very much like him, sharing most everything that has to do with the essentials of Christian faith and life. Both of them shared with joy the fact that in the three years spent here together in the same community, they have actually become very good friends. Returning to their communities in China in a month or two, they firmly intend to share their experience of ‘friendship across the border’ with their fellow priests and work for the effective reconciliation among their two communities. Central in their experience was the fact of participating daily in the same celebration of the Eucharist. They learned to focus on what is fundamental in the common faith. Instead of remaining tied up with the problems, contrasts, mutual suspicions of the past; they were able to enjoy living and praying together in the present while looking at the common goal of a reconciled Church for the

The beginning of the new year for us in South Korea – in 2010, the Year of the Tiger, according to the Chinese lunar calendar fell on February 14 – was celebrated, early in the morning, by every family, with a “ritual for the ancestors.” It is an observance which every first-born son must do – with care, respect and devotion – for deceased parents. Of what does it consist? To explain it in a few words is not easy because it is a complex and important reality; to reduce it to a few lines would be to risk not understanding the deeper meaning. Maybe that explains why, in 1500, Fr. Matteo Ricci, the great Jesuit missionary in China, an astrologer, mathematician and a man of great culture, when he spoke of these traditions before the Roman Curia, was misunderstood and from that time on, Catholics were forbidden to celebrate these rituals because they were considered pagan. The question became totally complicated because from that time on, China has always seen the Catholic religion as an enemy of its own traditions and has blocked any rapport with the Church of Rome. Only in recent decades have they understood that the worship of ancestors is not a form of idolatry but rendering homage to family members who have preceded us in heaven and, for that reason, it is permitted that Catholics, too, may celebrate it. That’s why, on the first day of the Year of the Tiger, I got ready at 7 in the morning to celebrate this important ritual of the Oriental culture, together with the boys of our family home. I had seen it done many times before but never done it myself. But that day, my expert worker took a day off so I had to do it myself. That is not easy, given the complexity of the action which requires much attention to gestures and form. A table with two candlesticks must be prepared, along with a small tablet, on which the names of the deceased persons are written, and a bowl for incense. Then, in a set order, one puts on the table a large quantity of cooked food to offer to the ancestors: steak, chicken, fish, apples, pears, persimmons, candies, chestnuts, wine, rice, took-cook (a special soup that is served only on this occasion), meat patties and pancakes. When everything is ready, one bows before this altar-table with great devotion, then in a kneeling position, twice touching the ground with the forehead; then there is a third bow but less profound. One prays in silence for a few moments, entrusting to these departed souls all of one’s desires and hopes for the new year that is about to begin. Together with the boys, I too bowed, remembering my loved ones in paradise and praying for them. Then the boys bowed profoundly again before the oldest one there – in this case, me – as a sign of respect. Next, after some words of best wishes