Catholic Bisho-ps’ Conference of India (CBCI) has appointed Father Roque Noronha as the new national coordinator of Port Chaplains in India.
Born on November 2, 1965, in Margao, Goa, Fr. Noronha was ordai-ned a priest on May 7, 1994, for the Society of the Missionaries of St Francis Xavier (SFX) or the Pilar Society. He holds a Masters degree in Social Work and another one in Business Administration. He is fluent in English, Hindi, Konkani and Assamese.
In a new initiative, the Agra Joint Cemeteries Committee (AJCC) has decided that henceforth one family will be buried in one grave. This decision has been taken in view of the shortage of land for cemeteries at a recent meeting of the AJCC. AJCC Chairman Father Moon Lazurus said that those who attend church services will be informed of the decision soon. The committee takes care of “Goronka Kabristan” and the “TotakaTaal” graveyard meant for Christians. “We have decided that the graves will now be dug deeper and after the dead body is buried, a slab will be placed on which another body from the same family can be buried.
A former nun, working in a Church-managed school in Kerala, has joined the pro-Hindu-leaning National Teachers Union (NTU).
Silimol Sebastian, a teacher at St John’s Nepumsian’s Higher Secondary School, Kozhuvanal, formally took the membership of the union saying she needs the union’s support to fight for her rights.
Silimol left nunnery in August 2016 without making any public announcements for her reasons to leave her religious life.
With Prime Minister Narendra Modi starting his second term after leading his pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to victory in India’s recent election, complaints of violence are growing from the country’s persecuted Christians.
Christians face a new wave of threats from Hindu groups after the BJP retained its grip on power in May.
“A second term for the BJP has for sure boosted the morale of Hindu groups, who keep threatening and intimidating minorities for being non-Hindus in India, which they think belongs to Hindus only,” Christian leader A.C. Michael, an official of the Indian chapter of the Alliance Defending Freedom, told ucanews.com.
The BJP won 303 seats in the 545-seat parliament in a landslide victory in the April-May national election following the completion of Modi’s first term that began in May 2014.
Later Modi took office on May 30, violence against Christians was reported in states including Karnataka, Jharkhand, Haryana, Mahara-shtra, Tamil Nadu, Pondicherry and Uttar Pradesh, Michael said.
On May 30, as Modi was taking his oath as Prime Minister, police in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh detained Pastor Roopsen Paswan of the Assemblies of Believers Church in Rai Bareli district.
He was arrested on charges of continuing an assembly after it was commanded to disperse. Church officials said he was released on bail the same day but was warned of dire consequences if he continued to hold church services in the district.
On June 2, Hindu groups ordered pastors in Jagannath Nagar in Maharashtra not to hold any Sunday prayer services. The pastors were threatened with violence if they refused. The arrest of a Missionaries of Charity nun on allegations of selling babies and the ongoing investigations against her congregation to find out if they used funds for religious conversion are examples of such harassment, he said.
Brooks said even Christian hospitals and schools are not spared allegations of violating the anti-conversion laws that exist in seven Indian states.
Cardinal George Alenche-rry, head of the Syro-Malabar Church, has called for peace and composure among priests and faithful as the rift between him and a section of priests in Ernakulam-Angamaly archdiocese widened.
“All members of the Church are united with the power of the Holy Spirit and must, through their actions and words, contribute to strengthening the unity of the Church,” said the cardinal on July 3 speaking on the occasion of the Syro Malabar Church Day, the feast of Saint Thomas the Apostle.
Cardinal Alencherry also wants the priests and the faith-ful to strive to strengthen “the Church in a spirit of love, brotherhood and unity, prayerfully and with the strength imbibed from the Holy Spirit.”
Pope Francis has formally approved the canonization of Indian Blessed Mariam Thresia Chiramel Mankidiyan, founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of the Holy Family and decreed that the canonization will take place in St Peter’s Square on Sunday, Oct. 13.
The Holy Father made the announcement at a July 1st ordinary public consistory of cardinals on causes of canonization at the Vatican.
Oct. 13 was speculated as the most likely date for the canonization. Indian bishops will be in Rome for their ad limina visit during that time, and so the canonization of Blessed Mariam Thresia Chiramel Mankidiyan would coincide well with their visit.
A Catholic family in Jharkhand is awaiting justice for a tribal man, who was lynched by cow vigilantes in the eastern Indian state nearly two years ago, a lay leader says. The death of Ramesh Minj “did not enter the discourse of persecution of Christians,” bemoans John Dayal, general secretary of the All India Christian Council and president of the All India Catholic Union. “Christian NGOs were not involved.” Meanwhile, “the family is still waiting for justice,” the Catholic lay leader told AsiaNews. A mob of Hindu radicals beat 37-year-old Minj to death in August 2017.
“Minj lived in Tingaru, a village in Palamu district, Jharkhand. He married Anita Minj ten years ago. The couple lived in the predominantly Christian Oraon village,” Dayal said, adding that the victim had many talents. During the sowing season, “he drove a tractor;” off season, “he drove a Bolero taxi.” Two years ago, “A mob of 120 people beat him for slaughtering a bullock.”
Minj was eventually arrested and taken to the police station in Bhandaria. His wife managed to see him before he died in jail. She said he had a torn leg and his body was covered in bruises. Police indicted 17 people in connection with his death, but no one was arrested. He was buried next to Sal trees.
Recently, Tabrez Ansari, a 24-year-old Muslim was lynched in Jharkhand. The pictures of him crouching and pleading mercy have gone viral online. Dayal says “This is a wake-up call for the Church and the community. What impacts Muslims eventually impacts Christians and other religious and caste minorities. Such is the nature of the violent beast, political Hindutva that has been unleashed this past decade.”
A Catholic archbishop has applauded an Indian state government’s plans for new punishments against vigilante-style violence, carried out to protect cows that are considered sacred by orthodox Hindus.
So-called cow protection groups have conducted a wave of lynchings across India in recent years mainly against religious minorities. The mainly Hindu nationalist mobs attack Muslims and others whom they suspect of storing beef or transporting cows for slaughter, a crime in most Indian states.
The government of central Madhya Pradesh State plans to amend a law allowing the jailing of those found guilty of such violence for up to five years and fines of up to 50,000 rupees.
The state cabinet approved on June 26 changes to the law, which currently does not include specific punishments for vigilante violence in the name of cow protection. Madhya Pradesh is governed by the secular Congress Party.
If passed by the state legislature it would become the first law in any Indian state to stipulate punishment for cow-related violence.
“The amendment is a right step as cow vigilantism has become a major worry, particularly among Christians and Muslims,” said Archbishop Leo Cornelio of Bhopal, based in the state capital.
Some lay people have approached the Kerala High Court against “illegal quarrying” on the land of two parishes under Thamarassery diocese. The Catholic Laymen’s Association also wants the court to act against the state government for its failure to check the diocese’s bishop and vicars of Little Flower Church, Pushpagiri, and St George Church, Chundathumpoyil, both near Koodaranji in Kozhikode district.
Pope has decided to restore the administrative responsibilities of the Archdiocese of Ernakulam-Angamaly to Cardinal George Alencherry, a press statement from the Syro-Malabar Media Commission said on June 27.
Cardinal Alencherry resumed office of archbishop of Ernakulam-Angamali archdiocese on June 27 morning. He resumed office as the interim responsibility of Bishop Jacob Manathodath as administrator ended a day earlier.
The term of Bishop Manathodath as the apostolic administrator of the arch-diocese ended and he would now look after his original diocese – Palghat, said the statement signed by Auxiliary Bishop Joseph Pamplany of Tellicherry, chairman of the media commission.
Bishop Manathodath was appointed the apostolic administrator in June 2018 in the wake of controversies pertaining to sale lands belonging to Ernakulam-Angamaly archdiocese.
The commission statement claimed that the Pope has also removed Sebastian Adayanthrath and Jose Puthenveetil as auxiliary bishops of the Ernakulam-Angamaly Archdiocese based on a report Bishop Manathodath submitted to Rome.
The Syro Malabar Synod will take a decision on their new responsibilities.
Pope Francis took the decision in the light of studies carried out on different levels over the recent developments in the Ernakulam-Angamaly Archdiocese.