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Browsing News Entries

Leading Holy Land Franciscan: 'We are in the grip of a bellicose madness' (Vatican News (Italian))

Father Francesco Patton, O.F.M., the Custos (superior) of the Franciscan Holy Land province from 2016 to 2025, said that “we are in the grip of a bellicose madness, the notion that everything can be resolved through force and weaponry.”

Speaking from Jordan, Father Patton said that “I think daily of my confreres living in Lebanon—in Beirut and elsewhere, both in the south and the north—who are currently being tested beyond measure.”

“The convent in Tyre has been converted into a refugee camp, while those in Beirut are desperately striving to assist the civilian population, which has reached its breaking point; there are now one million displaced persons out of a total population of six million,” Father Patton added.

The Franciscan friar warned that “in the aftermath of every recent Middle Eastern conflict, new forms of terrorism have emerged, giving rise to new organizations, such as Al-Qaeda, ISIS, Hezbollah, and Hamas. All of these were born out of conflicts in the Middle East that were left politically unresolved—the bitter fruit of attempts to impose military solutions upon conflicts that, in reality, required a different approach.”

Pope Leo says that universal health coverage is a 'moral imperative' (Dicastery for Communication)

Pope Leo XIV said that “health cannot be a luxury for the few” and that “universal health coverage is not merely a technical goal to be achieved; it is primarily a moral imperative for societies that wish to call themselves just.”

The Pontiff made his remarks in a March 18 address to participants in a conference organized by the Council of the European Bishops’ Conferences, the Italian Episcopal Conference, and the World Health Organization.

Pope Leo also called for concern the suffering of others, as taught by Christ in the parable of the Good Samaritan, and said that “urgent attention must also be given to people’s mental health, particularly that of young people, because invisible psychological wounds are no less severe than those that are visible.”

Pope Leo: 'The Christian is called to be an instrument of peace' (CWN)

At the conclusion of his March 18 general audience, Pope Leo called upon Christians to be instruments of peace, “so that true peace may prevail among all peoples.”

Mar. 19 Solemnity of St. Joseph, Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Solemnity

The Church celebrates the Solemnity St. Joseph, the spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the foster-father of Jesus. St. Joseph was probably born in Bethlehem and probably died in Nazareth. His important mission in God's plan of salvation was "to legally insert Jesus Christ into the line of David from whom, according to the prophets, the Messiah would be born, and to act as his father and guardian" (Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy). Most of our information about St. Joseph comes from the opening two chapters of St. Matthew's Gospel. No words of his are recorded in the Gospels; he was the "silent" man. We find no devotion to St. Joseph in the early Church. It was the will of God that the Virgin Birth of Our Lord be first firmly impressed upon the minds of the faithful. He was later venerated by the great saints of the Middle Ages. Pius IX (1870) declared him patron and protector of the universal family of the Church.

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