Jesuit Father Praveen Martis has been appointed the first vice chan-cellor of the newly created St. Aloy-sius Deemed University in Mangalu-ru. This was announced on March 19 by Jesuit Karnataka provincial Father Dionysius Vaz, the university chancellor, in the southwestern India city. Fr. Martis is a former principal of St. Aloysius College (Autono-mous).

The Lithuanian Embassy in New Delhi on March 22 organized a fun-ction to recall the services of a Jesuit priest who worked more than six de-cades among the poor in the western Indian state of Maharashtra.
Jesuit Father Donatas Slapsys, born in Lithuania in 1921, came to India in 1950 and served the people of Ahmednagar in Maharashtra until his death in 2010.
Lithuanian ambassador Diana Mickeviciene welcomed the gathe-ring where Laurynas Kudijanovas made the presentation titled “Heritage and cultural memory of Lithuanian Jesuit missionary Fr. Donatas Slapsys in India.” Kudijanovas said most people in Ahmednagar area remem-ber him as a water-diviner as he had helped many to dig wells and bore-wells.

The Naga Baptist Christians of Oting village in India’s Nagaland state, not far from the international border with Myanmar, are now trying to come out of the worst period of darkness in their life.
Their village had courted ill fate and controversy on Dec. 4, 2021, when a botched-up military operation killed 14 coal mine workers, mistaking them for militants.

Cardinal Filipe Neri Ferrao, archbishop of Goa and Daman, has hailed the Catholic religious men and women as a blessing since they rejuvenate the Church.
“You render service to the holiness of the Church. We need your prophetic voice and action. You can teach the entire church to walk the synodal path,” the cardinal told the general body meeting of the Goa unit of the Conference of Religious India.

Nirmala Carvalho, a veteran journalist who contributes regularly to Church publications in India and overseas, has won the prestigious Golden Pen Award for excellence in journalism, given by The Examiner, a 175-year-old weekly published from Mumbai.
Cardinal Oswald Gracias, Archbishop of Bombay, presented her the 21st award on March 10 during a function in the western Indian city to mark the 175th anniversary of the weekly.

More than 25,000 people, who attended the annual feast of a Marian shrine associated with a Hindu woman in Odisha, have credited Mother Mary for the Vatican recognition of the Kandhamal martyrs.
Saraj Nayak, the secretary of the development committee of Partamaha Marian Shrine, says the Vatican approval for the Kandhamal martyrs was “a joyful and proud moment for us.”

Fisherman S.K. Cruz has been facing hard times looking after his four-member family since the government opened a 103.5 megawatts wind power plant on the coast of the Gulf of Mannar in northern Sri Lanka four years ago.
Earlier, he used to take his plastic boat out five nautical miles to sea in the morning and return home with a decent catch by the evening. This is now a thing of the past.
Now, the 58-year-old father of two needs to travel at least 15 nautical miles and spend three times more on fuel to get a decent catch to put food on the table. He blames the noise from dozens of wind turbines for driving the once-rich fish stocks further away from the coastline, causing misery for thousands of local fishermen like him. “There’s no fish near the coast anymore,” Cruz told.

Two important initiatives to encounter East Asian religious tradition and thought see the Taiwan-Hong Kong Interreligious Dialogue Dicastros engaged in these days.
An international seminar entitled “Christians promoting dialogue with Confucians: guidelines and perspectives” was held March 8 and 9 in New Taipei, Taiwan. The initiative-promoted in collaboration with the Department of Religious Studies at Fu Jen Catholic University-is part of a track that aims to formulate official guidelines for Catholics engaging in dialogue with followers of Confucianism.
Already last January 15, the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue had convened an online study group, animated by Prof. Umberto Bresciani, an Italian for more than 50 years in Taiwan who has been pursuing this reflection at Fu Jen Catholic University for some time. That first discussion was attended by scholars and practitioners of interreligious dialogue who live or have roots, in addition to Taiwan, in the People’s Republic of China, In Japan, Malaysia, South Korea, Vietnam, Australia, Italy and the United States.
Msgr. Indunil Kodithwakuu Kankanamalage, secretary of the dicastery, opening that meeting had explained that this study group is part of a tradition carried on by the Vatican body, which has already developed guidelines for dialogue with Buddhists, Hindus and traditional Asian religions. Now,” he had added, “a new need has emerged to develop an official dialogue with Confucians. “And as we work to build on the ‘seed’ that has been planted,” he had concluded, “let us always keep in mind that ‘God is the One who makes it grow.
The meeting held these days in New Taipei was a significant step forward in this journey, involving a wider audience interested in promoting Confucian-Christian dialogue.
The drafting of the guidelines,” the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue explains in a statement, “will be followed by a final review process and is expected to serve as a valuable resource for individuals, organizations and communities both inside and outside the Catholic Church seeking to engage in dialogue with followers of Confucianism.

A great pioneer of Islamic-Christian dialogue who still inspires the path of the Church in India today. Thus in Delhi the figure of Fr. was remembered in recent days. Victor Curtois, a Belgian Jesuit who explored Islamic identity in depth in Calcutta in the mid-20th century.
The occasion to celebrate him in recent days was the seventh edition of the Victor Courtois Memorial Lecture organized by the Association of Islamic Studies in Delhi. This year’s conference was held on February 25th with the intervention of prof. Michael Calabria, Franciscan friar minor, who spoke on the topic: “From Morocco to the Mughal Empire: Franciscan meetings with Muslims and their meaning for today’s interreligious dialogue”.
The Islamologist Fr. Victor Courtois, who died in Kolkata in 1960 at the age of 53, is considered an apostle of Islamic-Christian dialogue in Calcutta. His brother Fr. Victor Edwin, secretary of the Association for Islamic Studies based in New Delhi, explained to AsiaNews: “Fr. Courtois spent much of his life in India and played a fundamental role in transforming relations between Christians and Muslims in this country.
He inaugurated an era of relationships and respect”. The Belgian missionary taught that Christians and Muslims are brothers, since God is the Father of all men. “Fr. Courtois – added Fr. Edwin – he encouraged Christians and Muslims not to hesitate in bearing witness to each other’s faith.”

Religious Sisters from different institutes have joined forces to offer a new opportunity to hundreds of youths in difficult situations in Bengaluru (Bangalore), in the Indian state of Karnataka, with particular focus on the future of girls and their rights.
The Sisters Led Youth Initiatives (SLDY) programme began some months ago, which Sr Nirmalini, Superior General of the Congregation of the Apostolic Carmel and President of the Conference of Women Religious of India (CRWI), has decided to share with AsiaNews on International Women’s Day.
“By 2025, we envisage to empower 1,200 youths in the Bengaluru region, bringing changes to their families by improving their living conditions,” Sr Nirmalini explained.
The activity promoted by CRWI brings together the Sisters of the Apostolic Carmel, the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians (Salesian Sisters), the congregation of the Missionary Sisters of Mary Help of Christians (MSMHC), the Salesian Missionaries of Mary Immaculate (SMMI), the Poor Handmaids of Jesus Christ (PHJC), and the Sisters of St Joseph of Tarbes (SJT).
“The Synodal journey invites us to walk together,” Sister Nirmalini explained.