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Nigerian Muslims have expressed anger at a ruling by a court in the country to maintain a ban on Hijab in public primary and secondary schools of Lagos city. The Lagos State Area Unit of the Muslim Students Society of Nigeria (MSSN) is protesting the judgment delivered by Justice Grace Onyeabo of the Ikeja High Court. On September 17, Onyeabo, a Christian, ruled against the use of Islamic headscarves in schools, claiming that it would affect the secular nature of Lagos. The judge refused to pay heed to numerous arguments over the past two years that the Nigerian constitution and international laws guarantee the freedom of religion, thought and conscience. However, the MSSN Lagos rejected the ruling, describing it as the rape of the constitution. The MSSN Lagos says it will ask the court to put an end to the humiliation and harassment of female Muslims for wearing Hijab.
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- Ngwa Bertrand
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Soter Agbaw-Ebai with files from Orock Eta in Boston
The Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Mamfe in Cameroon His Lordship Bishop Andrew Nkea has administered the sacrament of Confirmation on Cameroon Concord US Bureau Chief Bertrand Etukeni Agbaw-Ebai including seven other Christians from the Cameroon Catholic Community in Boston. Rev. Dr. Andrew Nkea performed the symbolic Roman Catholic ritual on the last lap of his US visit. At the Saint Anne Parish Salem, the Bishop administered the Sacraments of Confirmation and Marriage. It was another exciting scenario for the congregation to listen to an inspirational homily from Bishop Andrew Nkea. In explaining the significance of the sacraments, the Bishop of Mamfe gave the Cameroon Catholic Community a take home sermon. In his homily, Bishop Andrew Nkea dwelled on the two sacraments that he had to celebrate within the Sacrament of the Holy Mass: the Sacrament of Confirmation and the Sacrament of Marriage. He stressed the distinction between the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, which God gives for the service of the community, and the fruits of the Holy Spirit meant for the edification and salvation of the individual. What we should aspire for as Christians are for the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Concerning marriage a topic currently heating the Vatican, the man of God said Christian marriage is between one man and one woman for life. Parents, uncles, aunts are external distractions. The ministers of the sacrament of Marriage are the couples themselves with the deacon, priest or Bishop acting as the official witness of the Church.The Bishop of Mamfe congratulated Tina and Johnson Ashu for taking the courageous step to celebrate their wedding as first couple in the Cameroon Catholic Community of Boston. We of Cameroon Concord would love to congratulate our colleague and the 7 Christians who received the sacrament of Confirmation.
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- Ngwa Bertrand
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Fon Lawrence
Roman Catholic Bishops have said no to gayness showing deep commitment to the values of the Holy Roman Catholic Church at the end of a two-week meeting sought by Pope Francis to chart a more inclusive approach to ministering to Catholic families. The Bishops rejected a concocted watered-down section claiming on ministering to homosexuals The outcome showed a Roman Catholic Church that has survive 2000 years and beyond and it has also raised as rightly pointed out by Cameroon Concord’s Chief Executive Officer Soter Agbaw-Ebai, the need for the next Pope after Francis to be a teacher like Pope Benedict XVI.
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- Ngwa Bertrand
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By Rev. Dwight Longenecker: The Rev. Dwight Longenecker is the parish priest of Our Lady of the Rosary parish in Greenville, South Carolina. His latest book is The Romance of Religion published by Thomas Nelson
The Holy Father has been very good in lecturing priests and telling us what to do. We are to go out into the world and “make a mess.” We are to “smell like the sheep.” We are to welcome all with compassion, forgiveness, and mercy. We are to be good and kind pastors who administer the sacraments with care and concern. We are to seek out the poor, castigate the rich, side with the unfortunate, heal the sick, support the immigrants, and reach out to the lowly. We are to welcome the divorced and remarried, not judge those with same-sex attraction, and open the doors of the Church to all with a warmhearted and affirming form of evangelization by attraction.
This is a message I endorse and embrace. I want to be that kind of priest. I want to be Jesus to the world. I long to care for the poor and hungry, minister to their needs, welcome all to the Church as the father welcomes the prodigal. I wish to have the open heart Pope Francis has. I want to show the attractiveness of Christ, the radiant truth of the gospel, and the joy of the abundant life that Jesus brings to the world. I long to celebrate the sacraments with love, care, hope, joy, and compassion. I want to be the persona Christi, the image of God, and the face of the Father not only to my flock, but to all who I meet.I have heard the words of my Holy Father and taken them to heart. I sincerely want to be that kind of priest.
However, I can do this only if the timeless truths of the Catholic faith are firmly defined and defended. The dogmas, doctrines, and disciplines of the Catholic faith are the tools of my trade. They provide the rules for engagement, the playbook for the game, the map for the journey, and the content for the mercy and compassion I wish to display. The historic teachings of the Catholic faith, founded on the teachings of Christ the Lord, revealed by divine inspiration, and developed through the magisterium of the Catholic Church, provide the method for my mercy, the content for my compassion, and the only saving truths I have to share.
This is teamwork, Holy Father. I can only do the job you want me to do if you do the job you have been called to do. With the greatest respect and love, please don’t feel that it is your job to tinker with the timeless truths. If my job is to be the compassionate pastor for those in the pew and beyond, then your job is to be the primary definer and defender of the faith. I can’t do my job if you don’t do yours.
Yes, I know you want to inspire us to be that kind of compassionate pastor, but to be honest, I find that inspiration elsewhere. I remember meeting Mother Teresa of Calcutta and being inspired by her compassion. I am inspired by St. Damien of Molokai, St. Maximillian Kolbe, St. Isaac Jogues, and a host of other valiant and radiant souls. While your example of compassion, humility, and simplicity is stunning and attractive, your most important work is to define and defend the teachings of the Catholic Church so that together we can all proclaim it and live it with the compassion, mercy, and forgiveness we all agree is necessary.
I know the Synod on the Family is an attempt to make the Church more compassionate and caring, but with respect, this is not best done at the Vatican or diocesan level but on the parish level. I was taught that subsidiarity is a Catholic principle: that solutions to problems and ideas for initiatives are best taken within the local community. Compassion, mercy, and the struggle with family issues happen every day at the parish level. You know that from your own work at the front line as a priest and bishop. At the Vatican level, the discussion is theoretical and theological — as it should be. If you try to tinker with these matters at the global level, it doesn’t help. It makes life more confusing and frustrating for us at the local level.
Here is an example: Twice in the past week I have had to deal with Catholics in irregular marriages. One woman married outside the Church and told me that she thought it was now okay for her to come to Communion because “the pope has changed all those old rules.” Another man has divorced his wife and is living with another woman. He also assured me very confidently that it was now fine for him to come to Communion because “Pope Francis has changed the rules.” I know you mean well, Holy Father, and I admire and like you, but this process on which you have led us is not helping.
Here is another example from my experience as a parish priest: A young couple came for marriage preparation. They do not practice their faith and are living together already as husband and wife. I welcomed them and listened to their story. I told them it was good that they wanted to be married. I said we would help prepare them not only for a Catholic wedding, but for a Catholic marriage. However, when I gently began a conversation about their irregular lifestyle, the girl began to pout and accuse me of being “unwelcoming.” Then she said, “I thought with this new pope we would be welcomed.” What she meant by this was, “I expected Pope Francis’ Catholic Church to condone cohabitation.”
You have been very good at giving us fatherly instruction, and I have listened and learned. You have also asked for a frank debate on these matters. So that I can do my job, I respectfully ask you to do yours. I’ll do my best to evangelize by being compassionate, welcoming, and merciful if you do your best to sharpen the tools I need for the job.Compassion without content is mere sentimentality. Mercy without truth is an empty gesture. Kindness without correction is cowardly.I’ll do my best to preach and live the merciful faith once delivered to the saints, but I need you to do your best as the successor of Peter, the Vicar of Christ, and the Servant of the Servants of God to define, defend, and uphold that unchanging faith in which mercy is grounded.
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- Ngwa Bertrand
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James Eyong with files from Fon Lawrence in Rome
They say that a confrontation like this had never been seen before, perhaps not even at the Second Vatican Council. Soon after nine on Thursday, 16th of October 2014, Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, General Secretary to the Synod, takes the floor and announces that the relationes of the circuliminores would not be made public, a reverse course from what had always happened in the past and affirmed in the previous days. In other words, only the Relatio post disceptationem, signed by Cardinal Erdo and written by Abp. Bruno Forte, would have been fed to the press. Against the novelty presented by Baldisseri, rose up Cardinal George Pell, who strongly contested the decision. After him, a long line of Fathers, from the Archbishop of Brussels, Abp. Léonard, to that of Durban, Cardinal Napier, asked for the matter to be at least put to a vote. Even the Secretary of State took the floor. At the end, as Cardinal ChristophSchönborn would say some hours later at the press conference, "the decision to render public the relationes of the circuli was taken by large majority." The texts are clear, and go in an opposite direction as the one upheld by Cardinal Walter Kasper. A taste of what was to happen had already been given on late Wednesday by the Cardinal-Archbishop of New York, Timothy Dolan, who sided himself in a clear way to positions taken in the Hall by Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke. The Major Archbishop of Kiev, SviatoslavShevchuk, spoke directly of the need of "sending a clear message to the faithful and to the Pope" on the fact that "the family is the stable, faithful, and sacramental union between a man and a woman." The most controversial and delicate points, from the question of the approaching of remarried divorcees to the Eucharist to the overture to homosexual unions, were dismantled almost unanimously. That also because, as more than one Synod Father said, very little had been said of the unions between persons of the same sex - not more than three interventions in the assembly -and yet Monday's Relatio spoke about it ad abundantiam. The conclusions of the group [Gallicus B] moderated by Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah, President of the Pontifical Council "Cor Unum", were particularly stern. On the third point, that of difficult pastoral situations, the thrashing was total: "The doctrine of the Church on the indissolubility of matrimony and non-admission of the remarried divorced to the sacraments of reconciliation and the Eucharist cannot be changed." The first Italian group [Italicus A], moderated by Cardinal Fernando Filoni, prefect of Propaganda Fide, notes that, "the Fathers, though moved by the problem, propose that the argument be re-studied under the light of n. 84 of [John Paul II's Apostolic Exhortation] FamiliarisConsortio, with the goal of specifying eventual conditions different from the current discipline." A clear consequence of Baldisseri's blunders and Kasper's Anti-African interview to Edward Pentin, led to the addition of one African to the original six-man papal drafting committee, Cardinal Napier, and also an Australian, Abp. Dennis Hart of Melbourne.Several commentators are saying, with greater vehemence, that the situation of Card. Kasper and Abp. Forte is untenable from now onward. Kasper has now been publicly revealed, thanks to the Pentin interview and his denial, as a man filled with incomprehensible and anti-Christian racial superiority, and a perverter of truth. Forte, on the other hand, is a manipulator who single-handedly tried to destroy the permanent and unchangeable doctrine of the Church on several sensitive issues, in particular homosexuality, by fiat with no support whatsoever from the Synod Fathers.
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The controversial, televangelist and healer T.B.Joshua has been spotted carrying three bags of rice on his head. There are still no details where the photo was taken or what the pastor's motive. However, some have suggested that it was some kind of humanitarian act for the members of his church.
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