The Rev. Andres Arango for decades said “We baptize you in the name of the …” instead of “I baptize you in the name of …” After diocesan officials found that out, they said last month that people who Arango baptized aren’t technically Catholic. That means they weren’t eligible, from a Catholic point of view, for other sacraments.
The story made news around the world. Some wondered how what appears to have been an innocent mistake over pronouns could threaten people’s very sense of religious security. Others saw evidence of a long time debate among Catholics about who holds power, laypeople or the clergy. Cases of priests whose own childhood baptisms had the word “we” started to surface.
Looking for more information, The Washington Post this week interviewed the Rev. Thomas Reese, a political scientist and long time journalist who has written several books about the inner workings of the Catholic Church. Reese first wrote about the baptism wording issue in 2020, in an article whose headline began: “Vatican causes chaos.”
“ The [Vatican’s doctrine-enforcing arm] that year issued a document saying any baptism using “we” vs. “I” is not only illicit but invalid; the baptism doesn’t happen. I said then that this will cause absolute chaos in the Church. There were priests doing this out of the feeling it might make [the baptism ceremony] more colloquial. No one thought anything serious about it. Maybe it’s against the rules but the baptisms were still valid, people thought. When the [Vatican] did this in June 2020, I felt it was a pastoral disaster for the Church and for people. I thought: “They have to pull this rule, to reverse this.” said Rev. T. Reese. “They issued what’s called a “doctrinal note,” which are usually responses to questions they get from bishops or priests. I don’t think the use of “we” was widespread. It was one of those things that happened after the Second Vatican Council [in the 1960s] when people were a little looser with liturgical rules. Some Catholics wanted to be more inclusive and less clerical, and some felt using “we” would do that.” Pope Francis talks about synodality, but that’s what this is – it’s about consulting and talking and listening to all kinds of voices in the Church.
“My strong feeling is, if the Church wants us to say “I,” I will. But then to say that if someone says “we,” that the baptism is invalid? I think it’s nuts.”

Indian Christian and Mu-slim leaders have hailed a Supreme Court judgment directing a refund of fines collected by the Uttar Pradesh state government from those protesting against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) Bill.
The fines amounting to 2.24 million rupees (US$29, 900) were imposed on more than 800 protesters alleging they had damaged public property during the nationwide agitation in 2019.
In a landmark judgment, the apex court directed authorities in the northern state to refund the entire amount, saying the proceedings were contrary to the law and cannot be sustained.
The state authorities were pushed on the back foot after being accused by the apex court of being the “complainant, adjudicator and prosecutor” and arbitrarily recovering the fines from elderly people over 90 years of age, women, students and activists.
The authorities had accused these protesters of vandalizing public property while participating in protests held nationwide against a legal amendment to the citizenship law that was based on religion and discriminatory.
The controversial bill sought to amend the Citizenship Act, 1955, to make illegal migrants who are Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan eligible for Indian citizenship. The bill relaxed the requirement of residence in India from 11 years to six years for these mi-grants but excluded Muslims.

Catholic bishops in a southern Indian state have launched a campaign to mobilize political support to end discrimination against Dalit Christians in the country.
“We have already handed over memoranda to all federal ministers, parliamentarians and state legislators from Kerala state seeking their support to end discrimination against Dalit Christians,” Aux. Bishop Jacob Muricken of Pala told on Feb. 23.
Kerala’s bishops want India’s political leadership to help them improve the conditions of Dalit Christians who still bear the brunt of social discrimination and economic back-wardness.
“We know our Dalit Christian brothers and sisters are discriminated on the basis of their faith despite the fact that the Indian constitution is religion-neutral,” Bp Muricken said.
Dalits (formerly untouchables), who constitute the lowest stratum of the Hindu caste system, have converted to various other religions including Buddhism, Sikhism, Christianity and Islam. They are officially categorized as scheduled castes (SCs) and entitled to special welfare benefits.
However, Dalits among Christians and Muslims are denied SC status and are thus deprived of welfare schemes such as reservations in government jobs, educational institutions and electoral politics.

The Christian-majority state of Mizoram in northeast India has been rocked by a marriage leading to a religious conversion and granting of tribal status to an outsider.
At the center of the heated controversy is the scheduled tribe (ST) certificate issued by the Aizawal district administration in 2018 to Kamrul Islam Laskar, a non-tribal man who married a local Mizo woman. Laskar converted to Christianity and even adopted a local name – Kamlova Chhangte – but the nativist organizations who are dead against outsiders marrying into the predominantly Christian tribes want nothing of it.
The Mizo people are known to be inseparably knitted together by their strong ethnic, familial and religious bonds.
A coordination committee steered by the Young Mizo Association (YMA), arguably the most influential student body in the state, now wants state authorities to cancel the ST certificate issued to Laskar.
The YMA has long demanded a law to ensure that Mizo women who marry a non-tribal man should lose their ST status, robbing them of special privileges guaranteed in the Indian constitution including reservations in education and employment.
It has been joined by other influential student organizations like the Mizo Zirlai Pawl (MZP), known for administering an oath to school students across the state to not marry outside the Mizo tribes.

A homeless mother with two children received a new house, thanks to the volunteers of Don Bosco Arts and Science College at Angadikadavu in Kerala’s Kannur district.
The project began when Lucy George, a Salesian cooperator, heard during a bus journey Jessy talk about her problems of being homeless.
George mentioned this to the students at Don Bosco Arts and Science College, who along with their teachers and management took up the challenge of constructing a house.
The 600-square-feet house has two bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room and a work area. The cost was provided for by donations from students, staff, management and well-wishers. It is the fourth house constructed by the college’s volunteers, reports Salesians Mission “Newswire.”

Catholic officials in the southern Indian state of Kerala have begun lodging police complaints against what they call a rising trend in media to defame the Church, particularly priests and nuns. “Our priests and nuns have lodged more than 160 police complaints across the state against certain online, mainstream and social media platforms for portraying Catholic priests and nuns in a poor light,” said Father Michael Pulickal, secretary of Kerala Catholic Bishops’ Council’s commission for social harmony and vigilance.

A convent was gutted in a fire accident February 22 in the north-eastern Indian state of Manipur.
All three sisters in the Daughters of St Francis de Sales convent managed to come out of their rooms when the fire broke out at 00:15 am. The convent was situated at Laii village in Senapati district.
“It is fortunate that there was no loss of life,” Father Solomon Thezii, chancellor of Imphal archdiocese, told Matters India.
The convent was in an isolated area. However, villagers rushed to the convent hearing the noise and prevented the fire from spreading to an adjacent school.

In a statement sent to Crux, the Apostolic Nunciature in India said it wanted to make “clarifications” about a February 2 meeting of the Dalit Christian Liberation Movement (DCLM) with the Apostolic Nuncio, Italian Archbishop Leo-poldo Girelli.
Dalits were formerly known as “Untouchables,” the lowest level on the Hindu caste system. In India, it is common for caste discrimination to exist even in non-Hindu religions, including Christianity.
The DCLM had said it was “highly disappointed” with the meeting, which touched on the situation of the Church in the jurisdictions of Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry, a former French colony that was taken over by India in 1954. Dalit Catholics comprise about 70 percent of the Catholics in Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry, but there is only one Dalit bishop now among the 18 dioceses in this region. During their meeting with the nuncio, the DCLM stated that much progress was made in the appointment of bishops between 1993-2007, when four Dalit bishops were appointed in Pondicherry and Tamil Nadu.
“It all happened only because of the conscious decisions and efforts of then Apostolic Nuncios and the Vatican Dicasteries concerned. It was a historical moment for the Dalit Catholics,” the Dalit group said in a letter given to the nuncio.
“But unfortunately, in the next fifteen years from 2007, even this progress initiated was reversed by the two Nuncios during this period and so we are now left with only one Dalit Bishop representing the Dalit Catholics who comprise more than 70 percent of the Catholics here. Your Excellency, we recall to you that historical moment, only to appeal that this progress initiated is continued now during your tenure,” the letter continued.