Saint Joseph Catholic Church

Archbishop Ndagoso, 66, was bishop of Maiduguri (2003-07) until his appointment as archbishop of Kaduna. Kaduna has been the site of recent anti-Christian violence, as attested by CWN reports (November 18, December 4, February 9).

The prelate succeeds Archbishop Lucius Iwejuru Ugorji of Owerri, who has completed a four-year term as conference president.

The nation of 243 million (map), the most populous in Africa and sixth most populous in the world, is 47% Muslim, 46% Christian (11% Catholic), and 7% ethnic religionist.

COMECE drew attention to a resolution passed in January by the European Parliament. In the resolution, the lawmakers said that “while Christianity remains the most persecuted religion in the world today, with more than 380 million people affected, there is no European coordinator responsible for combating Christianophobia, even though a coordinator has been appointed to combat Islamophobia.”

Archbishop Gilbert Garcera of Lipa said that the nonviolent revolution, which led to the removal of authoritarian President Ferdinand Marcos from office, was “not simply people power; it was people power sustained by prayer: Rosaries in hand, hymns in the air, flowers offered to soldiers, and ordinary people standing unarmed before tanks.”

“Brothers and sisters, the greatest danger today is not only historical distortion, but moral fatigue,” Archbishop Garcera warned. “When freedom is treated merely as a memory and not a duty; when faith is reduced to devotion without moral courage; when peace is sought without justice—the spirit of [the revolution] slowly dies.”

A proponent of changes to Catholic teaching on sexual morality, Bishop Wilmer was once rumored to be under serious consideration for appointment as prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Bishop Erik Varden, OCSO, of Trondheim, Norway, reflected on “Becoming Free” and “The Splendor of Truth” in his February 24 Lenten retreat conferences to the Pope and the Roman Curia.

César Piscoya, described by the Vatican newspaper as a “dear friend of the Pope,” discerned in the 1990s whether to profess vows as an Augustinian. Father Robert Prevost, his spiritual director, “was a very disciplined man; he would get up at 4:00 AM and be in the chapel by 5:00 AM ... In short, he taught us by example. He was very demanding regarding study and homework.”

Piscoya eventually married, had three children, and was widowed when his eldest child was nine. Bishop Prevost appointed him a lay diocesan official in Chiclayo, where he recalled that the bishop acted “with discretion and clarity, without showmanship, but with evangelical consistency.”

“Everyone remembers the Pope as a gringo who was more Peruvian than all the Peruvians,” said journalist Harry Gordillo, who added:

In him you found not only a spiritual guide, but also a warm person who opened his arms to you in any situation. He was a priest who never stopped listening and helping in any way possible. That’s why so many people in Chiclayo say Robert Prevost is their friend.

A leading Anglo-American publishing firm, HarperCollins Publishers, published a book by Pope Leo XIV under its HarperOne imprint.

The Pontiff made the donation, valued at over €1 million ($1.18M), in response to a plea from Bishop Pavlo Honcharuk, the Latin-rite bishop of Kharkiv-Zaporizhzhia. Vatican News reported that a gift from the Banco Farmaceutico ETS Foundation paid for most of the assistance.