The Catholic Church in Mizoram on November 20 ended the celebration of the 75 years of the presence of priests in the northeastern Indian state with Cardinal Oswald Gracias hailing the Mizo society for setting an example for the rest of the country.
“Your core values of solidarity, concern for the other, community feeling, decision by consensus, kindness, casteless society, and non-discrimination that are the values of Jesus,” the cardinal, who is the archbishop of Bombay and the chief guest, told a public reception. The public meeting concluded the November 18-20 celebrations. It was preceded by a solemn Mass presided over by the cardinal at the Christ the King Cathedral at Kulikawn, Aizawl, the state capital.
Enforcement directorate attaches Christian medical college funds for cheating
A federal agency dealing with economic offenses has attached close to 10 million rupees of movable assets of a Christian medical college in Kerala as part of its probe into a money laundering case.
A November 22 statement from the Directorate of Enforcement (ED) says it has provisionally attached movable pro-perties worth 9,525,000 rupees from the bank balance of Dr Somervell Memorial Medical College, Karakonam, in Thiruvananthapuram district, under the Church of South India.
The amount is equivalent to the amount of funds the officials of the medical college, including a doctor and Bishop Dharmaraj Rasalam, had collected from parents promising to give their children seats in MBBS and masters courses in the institution. The agency also said it initiated the money laundering investigation on the basis of multiple first information re-ports registered by Vellarada Police Station and Kerala Police’s Crime Branch.
The probe revealed that the officials had indeed collected the amount from their parents but failed to give admissions to their children even after taking the money.
The accused, ED release points out, had used part of the cash for developing infrastructure in the medical college and the remaining amount was di-verted to the parent Organisation – the South Kerala Diocese of the Church of South India.
Hawaii school welcomes Indian nuns
The arrival of three Mi-ssionary Sisters of Mary Help of Christians from India has answered the 22-year long prayers of the parishioners and parents of a Catholic school in Hawaii for the return of nuns to their school. On October 7 their prayers were answered.
They arrived at Lihue airport to assume involvement in parish ministry at St. Catherine of Alexandria Church and School in Kapaa, Kauai. They are Sisters Jincy Thomas from the southern India state of Kerala; Rachel Marius from the northeastern India state of Manipur; and Philisita Jyrwa from the northeastern India state of Meghalaya.
The sisters were warmly greeted by St. Catherine’s ad-ministrator Father Nicholas Apetorgbor and parochial vicar Father Dario Rinaldi, and with more leis of aloha from about a dozen pari-shioners.
The three sisters expand the community’s Hawaii mission to seven members. Four others serve on Oahu.
Liturgy dispute: Protesting Catholics prevent apostolic administrator’s cathedral entry
The liturgy dispute in a Catholic archdiocese in Kerala took an ugly turn November 27 when its administrator was prevented from forcibly entering the cathedral church to offer Sunday Mass.
Archbishop Andrews Thazhath, the administrator, came to St Mary’s Basilica Cathedral Church escorted with police to offer Mass in the synod-approved format that is being opposed by the majority of Catholics and clergy in the archdiocese.
Those opposing the administrator had already filled the basilica compound and locked the church gate preventing the prelate to enter the church.
Sensing trouble, the police officials accompanying the archbishop did not allow him to get out of the car. After waiting for almost 10 minutes in front of the basilica, the prelate returned to the nearby Archbishop’s House along with the police and his supp-orters.
The administrator’s supporters broke open the Archbishop’s House’s main gate so that the prelate could enter. They also destroyed a television set, chairs, and photo of former Metropolitan Vicar Archbishop Antony Kariyil among other things in the building.
However, the police officials chased Archbishop Thazhath’s supporters as they continued to indulge in violence.
In the meantime Archbishop Thazhath sat in his car outside the main gate of the Archbishop’s House with the police escort.
A couple of his supporters, who broke open the Archbishop’s House’s main gate, were seen in many video footages urging Archbishop Thazhath to enter the building.
The latest developments took place a day after a three-member panel appointed by the Syro-Malabar Church’s permanent synod agreed to convey the demands of the Ernakulam-Angamaly archdiocese to the apex body and promised to find a solution.
The Church’s permanent synod of bishops on November 24 appointed the panel after it realized that Archbishop Thazhath was leading the archdiocese to a breakaway point.
On November 25, the panel led by Archbishop Mathew Moolakkatt of Kottayam had a cordial meeting for three hours with the representatives of the priests and laity of the archdiocese of Ernakulam-Angamaly. The other members in the panel are Archbishop Joseph Pamplany of Tellicherry and Bishop Jose Chittooparambil of Rajkot.
However, Archbishop Thazhath ignored the panel’s promises and tried to forcibly enter the cathedral to offer the Synod Mass.
Peace rally revives messages of Buddha, Kabir
Cultural activists working for peace in northern India have organized a rally on harmony and reconciliation amid hate messages and violence against Christians, Muslims, Dalits, Tribals and women.
The five-day rally that covered the eastern region of Uttar Pradesh state concluded November 26, the Constitution Day, in Purvanchal Gramin Seva Samiti, the social service coordination center of the Catholic diocese of Gorakhpur.
The participants recited the Preamble of the Indian constitution and promised to protect the constitutional values and to fight against all odds to assure that fundamental human rights enshrined in the constitution are enjoyed by all.
They also promised to live and practice the fundamental duties of the citizens. The rally was organized by the Vishwa Jyoti Communications, the media wing of the Indian Missionary Society, its theater wing Prerana Kala Manch and activists. It began November 22 at Gorakhpur, a major town in Uttar Pradesh, under the banner of Buddh Se Kabir Tak (BSKT, From Buddha to Kabir).
The rally was led by Indian Missionary Society Father Anand Mathew, director of Vishwa Jyoti Communications, and Vinod Mall, a re-tired director general of police of Gujarat, a western Indian state. Around 40 peace activists from Gorakhpur and neighboring towns and villages joined the peace really. BSKT Music Band joined the cultural activists of Vishwa Jyoti to sing songs of harmony, peace, love, forgiveness, reconciliation, unity and composite cultural diversity.
The rally covered the region where Lord Buddha preached his message of peace and love following a middle path and condemned religious superstitions.
It was the same region where 15th century Sufi saint Kabir Das sang songs of mystical and social love and condemned fundamentalism, superstition and sectarianism of both Hindus and Muslims of that time.
Indian court grants reprieve to interfaith couples
A top court in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh has restrained the provincial government from prosecuting interfaith couples under a law that prohibits religious conversion for the purpose of marriage.
A division bench of the Madhya Pradesh High Court in Jabalpur its interim order on Nov. 14 directed that “till further orders, respondent [state government] shall not prosecute adult citizens if they solemnize marriage on their own volition and shall not take coercive action for violation of section 10 of the [Madhya Pradesh Freedom of Religion] Act of 2021.”
The bench of Justice Sujoy Paul and Justice Prakash Chandra Gupta said that “a strong prima facie case is made out by the petitioners” against any coercive action.
Northeast Christian leaders decry “alarmist” conversion news
Christian leaders in north-eastern India on November 24 voiced great anxiety about “alar-mist news” being spread in co-nnection with the issue of con-version.
Such “painful developments” are “nothing but an effort to malign our community which has rendered yeoman service in the field of education, health and social development to all sections in society irrespective of caste, creed, or ethnicity,” said the leaders who met at Guwahati, the commercial capital of Assam state and nerve center of north-eastern India.
“We have been the first to denounce any sort of “forced” conversion. At the same time, we also affirm the right of every citizen to choose any religion of his/her own choice that the Constitution guarantees, see Article 25-28,” asserts a press statement the leaders issued after the meeting.
They termed as “very wrong to make false allegations of ‘con-version’ by force, fraud or inducement with the intention of humiliating our community. We feel that such accusations are made with the deliberate intention of dividing our society.”
The leaders represented the Council of Baptist Churches in North East India, Church of North India, Presbyterian Church of India, North East Christian Council (All Protestant Churches), Evangelical Fellowship Of India (All Pentecostal Churches) and the Regional Catholic Bishops Con-ference of North East India (All Catholic Churchs of the region).
Christians in Chhattisgarh beaten up for not giving up faith
Members of eight tribal fa-milies who practice Christian faith in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh are now living in fear after people of their commu-nity thrashed them for not giving up their new faith. “We were beaten up on November 22 night with stick and slippers after for-cing into our houses,” said one of the villagers who follow the Chri-stian faith, but is not converted to Christianity.
The sudden attack led to inju-ries to around 15 people, includ-ing women and children. How-ever, only two women and a man are serous and they now w undergo treatment in a government hospi-tal in Kondagaon district. The villager, who did not want to be named, told, “We are fearing for our lives as the attackers had threatened to burn our houses if we continued with our faith in Lord Jesus.” He, however, insist-ed, “We will not give up our faith,” adding, “after coming to this faith we got peace in our lives.”
The Police reached the village on the same night of the attack, but did not initiate action against the attackers. Instead, they had friendly talk with them and left the spot.
Meanwhile Omkar Diwan, the station house officer (SHO) of Bade Dongar police station under which the violent attack took place denied the allegation that the police did not act upon the Christians’ complaints.
Church calls for dignified burial for Filipino prisoners
Catholic bishops in the Philippines have called for the dignified burial of dead prisoners as the authorities in the country’s biggest penitentiary started burying 200 unclaimed, decomposing bodies.
The authorities at the New Bilibid Prisons Cemetery in Muntinlupa City started the process of disposal of the unclaimed bodies on November 25 following an order from the Department of Health stating the health hazards entailed in keeping corpses in closed facilities.
The Health Department’s Nov. 22 order “strongly recommended” the disposal of the bodies due to pending infection caused by decaying corpses.
“We need to dispatch the bodies according to the advisory of the Department of Health for the safety of our prison facilities. As much as we would like to wait for their loved ones to claim their bodies… but we cannot wait because we need to dispose of them for public health reasons,” Bureau of Correction officer Donald Worones told.
The 60 bodies were the first batch to be disposed of among the 200 unclaimed bodies, he said.
“We have been waiting for their families to reclaim the remains because some were already in their advanced state of decompo-sition and some were already mummified,” Worones added.
The Health Department has given a deadline to claim the corpses but required the Bureau of Corrections to send out a notice to their families one last time.
“When a prisoner dies, we reach out to their relatives, or if from the provinces, they inform the superintendents of each camp to inform the relatives. If we have not heard from them, then we mark each body and we ready them for burial,” prison health officer Clarence Salgado told.
Philippine Church slams violent land grabs from tribal people
Two Catholic dioceses in the Philippines have condemned atta-cks against ethnic tribal people who attempted to save their ancestral land from grabbing by a private corporation in the Min-danao region.
The reactions from Malayba-lay diocese and Cagayan de Oro archdiocese came after guards posted by a private company alle-gedly fired shots at members of the tribal Lumad community at Barangay Butong in Bukidnon province on Nov. 22 as they tried to harvest root crops that they planted.
Lumad is a collective term for indigenous people concentrated in the Mindanao region of the Philippines.
Six guards reportedly approa-ched them while pointing fire-arms, forcing them to leave the area at once.
“We cannot go back to our land because their guards won’t allow us.”
“More than three of them opened fire. We were nervous be-cause we could see the soil spla-tter after being hit by bullets,” Angel Pilutiin, an ethnic Lumad, told.