By Fr. Benedict Mayaki, SJ

The Bishops of Eritrea have expressed their deep sadness over the conflict between Ethiopia’s federal government and the regional government of Tigray state. They are appealing for peace and a cessation of the destructive hostilities.

Eritrea is Ethiopia’s northern neighbour bordering the Tigray region. The countries have a long and troubled history of conflict with war breaking out between the nations in 1998 over a complex territorial, economic and political dispute that left tens of thousands of people dead. Despite the Algiers peace agreement in December 2000 ending the border conflict, Ethiopia and Eritrea remained in a state of armed standoff for nearly 18 years.

Meanwhile observers report an escalating regional tension as Tigray Peoples Liberation Front leaders in recent months have increasingly accused Eritrea of meddling in Ethiopia’s domestic affairs.  

What’s more, there are currently four refugee camps in northern Ethiopia sheltering nearly 100,000 Eritrean refugees. Humanitarian agencies, who have asked for the opening of humanitarian corridors, are expressing fears the refugees may be facing threats of violence, harassment and food shortages amid conflict in the Tigray region

No winner in war

War, the Eritrean Bishops said in a recent statement, “is anti-life and anti-development…it kills, maims, destroys, displaces and sows lasting grievances and hatred among people,” and they added, it also destroys the four pillars of peace: truth, justice, love and freedom/liberty.

Once a war starts, continued the Bishops, “no one knows when and where it ends,” they said, noting that “all the parties are losers and there is no winner.” This, according to the Bishops, is why Pope Saint John Paul II said: “war does not have any meaningful value, and is always unjust.”

The Bishops further pointed out that the consequences of war are a “self-evident truth to the world” – especially to the peoples in the Horn of Africa where, nonetheless, conflicts sadly persist unabated. 

Pillars of peace

Outlining the pillars of peace as truth, justice, love and freedom, the Bishops stressed their importance to the situation.

Truth, they pointed out, assures individual rights, safeguards the common good and protects the rights of others; Justice for its part, “guarantees the rights of others, incentivizing progress to build peace.” 

At the same time, Love instills empathy for the needs of others and creates reciprocity to build peace through “intellectual and spiritual participation in dignity.” Freedom allows people to assume their obligation in contributing to the development of peace.

Peace and truth connected

To achieve Peace, there must be respect for human dignity and human rights, the Eritrean Bishops affirmed. 

In this regard, peace and truth become connected through the transmission of true and correct information, a transparent democratic process that guarantees the participation of all citizens, access to equal justice for all before the law, and a readiness to resolve conflicts through constructive, peaceful means.

The Eritrean Bishops, therefore, call for an end to the hostilities and appeal that both sides resolve the conflict through peaceful dialogue instead of “all the inflammatory words and propaganda that are fanning the fire.” 

Pope’s appeal for peace

Pope Francis, during the Angelus on 8 November appealed for peace in the troubled Tigray region. He said that he “is following with concern” the news regarding the escalation of violence in Ethiopia and appealed to authorities to “reject the temptation of armed conflict.”

The Pope also invited all Ethiopians to pray for the nation and encouraged “fraternal respect for dialogue and the peaceful resolution of discord.”

Ethiopia’s conflict

Ethiopia’s northern state of Tigray is run by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). The group, once the dominant ruling coalition in the East African country, began to lose its hold on power after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed took office in 2018. The Prime Minister dissolved the ruling coalition and merged its regional parties into one single party, sparking allegations of unfair treatment.

Tensions escalated in August after the Abiy Ahmed-led government rescheduled national elections till next year because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Tigray leaders, alleging that the postponement was the Prime Minister’s strategy to prolong his stay in office, organized their own elections in September, with over 2 million people going to the polls.

The Ethiopian government, in retaliation, placed sanctions on the Tigray state, setting into motion a series of recriminations between the state and federal governments.

On 4 November, Abiy announced a military offensive against Tigray in response to an alleged attack on a military base in Mekelle. Several hundred have been killed in the violent conflict and over 200,000 Ethiopians have fled for their lives into neighboring Sudan.

Vatican News staff writer

The worst of the second wave of the coronavirus is over: Those were the words of French President Emmanuel Macon as he gave a televised address to the nation on Tuesday evening.

But he also warned, “We must do everything to avoid a third lockdown.” With that in mind, he said restaurants, cafes and bars would stay shut until Jan. 20 to avoid triggering a third wave.

Easing of restrictions

This gradual easing of curbs means that from Saturday, November 28, shops will re-open following a month long lockdown imposed on Oct 30.

In mid-December, the lockdown will be lifted if the number of new cases has fallen to around 5,000 a day, and people will be free to travel across the country to see family and friends over the Christmas period. Theatres and cinemas will also be allowed to open their doors again.

France registered over 9,000 cases on Tuesday, and crossed the 50,000 deaths milestone.

Church response

However, not everyone is happy with the new arrangements. The French Bishops’ Conference said in a statement the announcement of a resumption of public ceremonies with a maximum of 30 people was both “disappointing and surprising.”

The statement went on to say that the matter was discussed in a phone call between the French President and the President of the Bishops’ Conference, Archbishop Eric de Moulins-Beaufort.

The Archbishop tweeted on Tuesday evening that Catholic voices were not heard and the Conference was asking that the measure be revised.

In an updated statement on Wednesday the Bishops said, “It appears that a realistic, yet strict, measure will be defined by Thursday morning for implementation in two stages: Saturday 28 November and then after the reassessment of 15 December.” “It is in this perspective that the EFC (French Episcopal Conference) continues its dialogue with the offices of the Prime Minister and the Minister of the Interior”.

Prime Minister Jean Castex is due to hold a press briefing Thursday morning to detail Emmanuel Macron‘s announcement concerning the gradual lifting of restrictions.

So, for the time being, while the resumption of public worship in France is now a certainty, the way it is implemented continues to be subject to adjustments.

By Christopher Wells

At the General Audience on Wednesday, Pope Francis turned his gaze to the prayer life of the early Church, as he continued his catechesis on prayer.

“The Church’s first steps in the world were interspersed with prayer,” the Pope said. The writings of the New Testament, and especially the Acts of the Apostles, give us “the image of an active Church on the move, yet which gathered in prayer finds the basis and impulse for missionary action.”

Prayer, the driving force of evangelization

The Holy Father pointed out four essential characteristics of ecclesial life, drawn from St Luke’s account in the book of Acts: “listening to the Apostle’s teaching” which involves preaching and catechesis; the continual quest for fraternal communion; the “breaking of the bread,” the Eucharist, which is the Sacrament of Jesus’ presence among us; and prayer, “which is the space of dialogue with the Father through Christ in the Holy Spirit.”

Anything that arises outside of those “coordinates,” the Pope warned, “is deprived of a foundation… deprived of ecclesiality.” When these four characteristics are present, however, it is a guarantee of the Holy Spirit. 

Pope Francis said that reading the Acts of the Apostles, “we then discover what a powerful driving force of evangelization the prayer gatherings can be.” In prayer, he explained, we experience Christ’s presence among us “and are touched by the Spirit.”

Making Jesus present

The Pope quotes the Catechism: “The Holy Spirit … keeps the memory of Christ alive in his Church at prayer, also leads her toward the fullness of truth and inspires new formulations expressing the unfathomable mystery of Christ at work in his Church’s life, sacraments, and mission.” This, Pope Francis explained, “is the Spirit’s work in the Church: making us remember Jesus.”

He insisted, however, that this is not simply a question of recalling facts. Instead, “Christians, walking on the paths of mission, remember Jesus while they make Him present once more; and from Him, from His Spirit, they receive the ‘push’ to go, to proclaim, to serve.”

Love, the mystical root

Prayer, the Pope said, “immerses” Christians in God’s love for each and every person and provides the missionary impulse to preach the Gospel to every human person. “God is God for everyone,” the Pope said, “and in Jesus every wall of separation has definitively crumbled.”

The exchange of love – God’s love for us, and the love He asks in return – is “the mystical root of the believer’s entire life,” Pope Francis said. And, both for the early Christians and for Christians today, prayer enables us to live that experience. Through prayer, the Pope continued, every Christian can make his own the words of St Paul: “the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

Pope Francis said it is “only in the silence of adoration” that “we experience the full truth of these words… And this prayer is the living flame of the Spirit that gives strength to witness and mission.” 

By Devin Watkins

Wednesday, 25 November, marks the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, which seeks to raise awareness of what the UN calls a “shadow pandemic”.

The Spanish NGO Manos Unidas (“Hands United”) joined its voice to those of many others to decry the situation in which countless women find themselves.

“Societies cannot remain indifferent to abuse and violence,” according to Ricardo Loy, the Secretary General of the Catholic organization. “We cannot abide that 30% of the world’s women and girls live in fear of violence, of speaking out, or of the reactions of those around them… And all this in the face of widespread apathy from most of society.”

Staggering statistics

According to the World Health Organization, around one third of all women in a relationship have been subjected to physical and/or sexual violence by their partner.

UN Women adds that domestic violence shot up by 30% in many countries during widespread lockdowns earlier this year put in place due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

However, a recent study says data from 30 countries indicates that only 1% of abused women have ever sought professional help.

Back in 2013, the WHO called violence against women “a global health problem of epidemic proportions.”

Excluded and invisible

Mr. Loy said Manos Unidas finds itself working on various fronts in developing nations because violence is not limited to the physical kind nor only to the household.

Education carried out by the NGO, he pointed out, “aims to deal with those religious or cultural customs that physically harm women, or make them invisible and exclude them.”

Raising awareness

One Manos Unidas partner offered an example from a project in Sierra Leone, where women and girls are subdued into silence and economic privation, since violence is widespread.

Fr. Peter Konteh, director of Caritas Freetown, said they are so often subjected to rape that the Prime Minister declared the situation a national emergency in 2018. “He even set up a police unit to deal with rape cases, especially against children.”

Killing a culture of silence

Thanks to the help of Manos Unidas, Fr. Konteh said the local Caritas outfit was able to make inroads in combatting the culture of silence, which kept victims from going to the authorities.

Now, he noted, “women, girls, and families are willing to talk openly about abuse, and the guilty parties are brought to justice.”

Fr. Konteh said the projects biggest success was making many people in Sierra Leone aware of the horrors of violence against women.

“One great victory,” he said, “is knowing that the project is warning ‘potential abusers’ and thus protecting women and girls from further abuse.”

By Vatican News staff writer

The Provisional Agreement between the Holy See and the People’s Republic of China is bearing fruit. A new bishop, the third since the Agreement was signed in September 2018, was appointed in communion with the Successor of Peter and ordained. The news was confirmed by the Director of the Holy See Press Office, Matteo Bruni.

“I can confirm that the Reverend Thomas Chen Tianhao is the third bishop appointed and ordained within the framework of the Provisional Agreement between the Holy See and the People’s Republic of China on the appointment of bishops,” he said, in response to questions by journalists.

Bruni also added that “certainly other episcopal consecrations are expected in the future because various processes for new episcopal appointments are underway.”

Upon its expiration date at the end of September, the Provisional Agreement was extended for two more years. It does not directly concern diplomatic relations between the Holy See and China, nor the legal status of the Chinese Catholic Church or relations between the clergy and the authorities of the country. The Provisional Agreement concerns exclusively the process of nomination of bishops: an essential issue for the life of the Church and for the communion of the pastors of the Chinese Catholic Church with the Bishop of Rome and the bishops of the world.

The objective of the Provisional Agreement has always been genuinely pastoral: its purpose is to allow the Catholic faithful to have bishops who are in full communion with the Successor of Peter and at the same time are recognized by the authorities of the People’s Republic of China.