As opposition marches were held across Venezuela on January 23, at least 700 opposition supporters were trapped in Maturin’s Cathedral of Our Lady of Mount Carmel for several hours, besieged by the Venezuelan Army.

The Jan. 23 marches were convoked by the National Assembly, Venezuela’s democratically elected legislature, which is controlled by the opposition. At one of these marches in Caracas, Juan Guaido, head of the National Assembly, declared himself interim president, calling leader Nicolas Maduro illegitimate.

Tens of thousands of Venezuelans marched in support of the opposition, and security forces met some of the protesters with tear gas. Local NGOs have said 14 people were shot dead during protests Jan. 22-23.

Bishop Enrique Pérez Lavado of Maturin reported that seminarians, priests, and some 700 people participating in the demonstration were besieged in the cathedral, with the military “trying to break their way inside,” according to the Venezuelan bishops’ conference on Twitter.

Soon after, Pérez reported that the soldiers had surrounded the church, with more than a thousand opposition demonstrators inside: “The National Bolivarian Army is guarding the entrances to Our Lady of Mount Carmel Cathedral where there are more than a thousand opposition supporters.”

According to a report on Twitter by Radio Fe y Alegría, government supporters were also inside the cathedral. The station said that Father Samael Gamboa negotiated with the security forces for the people to leave in groups, “to guarantee their human rights.”

The people took refuge in the cathedral due to repression by the regime’s security forces and by pro-government groups. Earlier this month, the bishops called illegitimate Maduro’s swearing in for a second term as president. Maduro won a May 2018 presidential election which was boycotted by the opposition and has been rejected by much of the international community.

A church wounded by sin can paralyze, confuse and tire the hearts of Catholic clergy and laypeople, causing them to doubt their mission in the modern world, Pope Francis said.

Celebrating Mass at the Cathedral Basilica of Santa Maria La Antigua on Jan. 26 with priests, consecrated men and women and members of lay movements, the Pope warned that the burdens and troubles in the church can lead to a “weariness of hope” that “calls into question the energy, resources and viability of our mission in this changing and challenging world.”

“The weariness of hope comes from seeing a church wounded by sin, which so often failed to hear all those cries that echoed the cry of the Master: ‘My God, why have you forsaken me?’” he said. Thousands of pilgrims and Panamanians waited outside — some camped outside since 4 a.m. — cheering loudly as the bells of the cathedral hailed Pope Francis’ arrival.

Upon entering the 220-yearold church, the Pope was greeted with applause by those present, including President Juan Carlos Varela of Panama and his wife, Lorena Castillo.

The Pope then spent several minutes praying before a statue of Santa Maria La Antigua, patroness of Panama. The original image, which depicts Mary holding baby Jesus in her arms and carrying a rose, was first brought into the country by Spanish conquistadors in 1510.

During the Mass, Pope Francis consecrated the altar of the newly renovated cathedral. Removing his chasuble and rolling up his left sleeve, he poured chrism oil and anointed the altar. According to World Youth Day officials, the Cathedral Basilica of Santa Maria La Antigua is the first cathedral in the Americas to have an altar consecrated by a Pope.

The Czech Parliament’s lower house has approved a proposal drafted by Communist lawmakers to tax the compensation that the country’s churches receive for property seized by the former Communist regime.

On January 23, 106-56 vote shows the rising influence of the Communists. The party is not part of the centre-left ruling coalition led by Prime Minister Andrej Babis but helped the minority Cabinet survive a confidence vote.

The nation’s churches, including the Roman Catholic Church and the Jewish community, have had some property held by the state returned, and they are also to receive some $3 billion over 30 years.

Pope Francis closed the door Jan. 27 on his making celibacy optional for all Catholic priests, but also expressed openness to allowing older married men to be ordained to the priesthood where there is a “pastoral necessity.”

In a press conference aboard the papal flight back to Rome after a five-day visit to Panama, the pontiff first stated firmly: “I am not in agreement with making celibacy optional.”

But the Pope then noted that there are areas of the world where Catholics are deprived of the Eucharist — mentioning specifically the Pacific Islands and the Amazon region — and said “it is a thing to think [about] when there is a pastoral necessity.”

“I believe that the issue must be open in this sense: where there is a pastoral problem because of the lack of priests,” said Francis. “I will not say that it must be done. Because I have not reflected, I have not prayed sufficiently over this. But the theologians must study.”

Francis spoke about priestly celibacy in a 47-minute press conference in which he also sought to downplay expectations for an upcoming February Vatican summit on clergy sexual abuse with the presidents of the world’s Catholic bishops’ conferences.

On celibacy, the pontiff was asked if he could imagine a future in which the Catholic Church would adopt the practice of Orthodox Churches, which allow priest candidates to choose during their formation period whether to marry or remain celibate.

The Pope referred to a phrase he attributed to Pope Paul VI: “I would prefer to give my life before changing the law of celibacy.” He noted that in the Orthodox tradition, priestly candidates must choose whether they will marry before they are ordained deacons.

“My decision is: optional celibacy before the diaconate, no,” said Francis.

“It’s personal, but I will not do it,” he said. “Maybe I am closed-minded, but I do not feel that I can place myself before God with this decision.”

“But where there is not the Eucharist … who will make the Eucharist?” Francis asked.

Pope Francis has warned against the increasing narcissism and “spirals of hatred” found on social media networks, encouraging people to cultivate community in their internet interactions. In his World Communications Day message, published on January 25, Pope Francis said that online discussion is “too often based on opposition to the other.”

“We define ourselves starting with what divides us rather than with what unites us, giving rise to suspicion and to the venting of every kind of prejudice (ethnic, sexual, religious and other),” Francis wrote.

This creates a digital environment that nourishes “unbridled individualism which sometimes ends up fomenting spirals of hatred,” he explained.

“As Christians, we all recognise ourselves as members of the one body whose head is Christ. This helps us not to see people as potential competitors, but to consider even our enemies as persons,” he said. “We no longer need an adversary in order to define ourselves” because in “the all-encompassing gaze we learn from Christ” our identity and our relationship in communion with others, he explained.

The Archbishop of Canterbury has said he is perfectly happy if members of the Church of England convert to Catholicism, and that it can even be “wonderful.”

In an interview with Fraser Nelson, editor of The Spectator, the Most Rev Justin Welby says he does not mind at all that many of Church of England clergy defected to Rome after the ordination of women priests.

“Who cares?” he says. “I don’t mind about all that. Particularly if people go to Rome, which is such a source of inspiration. I had an email from a very old friend, an Anglican priest who has decided to go to Rome. I wrote back saying: how wonderful! As long as you are following your vocation, you are following Christ. It’s just wonderful.

“What we need is for people to be disciples of Jesus Christ. I don’t really care whether it’s the Church of England or Rome or the Orthodox or Pentecostals or the Lutherans or Baptists. They are faithful disciples of Christ.” The Spectator reports that Archbishop Welby has a Catholic priest, Fr Nicolas Buttet, as his spiritual adviser and that one of his closest friends is Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster. He also goes see the Pope regularly and they talk about personal things.

His interview comes as Bishop Brian Farrell, LC, Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, suggests that after a difficult year for ecumenism, the churches might be at a new “turning point.”

According to an analysis of Pew Centre surveys of 34 European countries, there are clear differences in religion from East to West and from North to South.

The further south and east one goes in Europe, in general, the more Catholic a country is. And the further east one goes, the more conservative it is as well.

In 1910, for example, the continent was home to 65% of the world’s Catholics. A century later, that number has plummeted, to 24%.

So where have all the Catholics gone? Latin America, Pew points out, now hosts more Catholics (39% of the world’s Catholics) than Europe or any other region. Sub-Saharan Africa has 16%, and the Asia-Pacific region 12%.

But the European countries with the largest shares of Catholics are mostly located in southern and central Europe. “For example, at least threequarters of adults in Poland (87%), Italy (78%) and Portugal (77%) identify as Catholic, as well as majorities in Spain (60%) and Hungary (56%),” Pew points out on its blog, Fact Tank. “But there are exceptions to this pattern: Ireland is 72% Catholic, and 75% of Lithuanians are Catholic. There are also sizable Catholic populations scattered throughout the rest of the continent, including in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands (19% each), as well as Ukraine (10%).”

Catholics in Central and Eastern Europe are more likely to say they attend church monthly (median of 44% vs. 33%), pray daily (36% vs. 13%), consider religion very important in their lives (31% vs. 13%), and believe in God (91% vs. 80%).