Vatican Archbishop: Francis' Pontificate Is “True Springtime of the Church”
Archbishop José Tolentino Mendonça has called the pontificate of Pope Francis a – quote – “true springtime for the Church.” Francis named Mendonça last September a Librarian of the Holy Roman Church making him an archbishop. Mendonça told the Portuguese Bishops news agency Ecclesia that he is - quote - "completely at the service" of Francis, while in reality, he should be at the service of Vatican’s library.
“We Serve the Times and Demands of the Masses”
Father Michael Fiedrowicz, a professor for Patristics in Trier, Germany, and expert on Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, has compared the days of Gregory with our times. Talking to the German Kirchliche Umschau, Fiedrowicz offered the following quote of Gregory, "We serve the times and demands of the masses. We leave our boat to the wind which happens to blow at the moment, and like chameleons, we know how to give our word many colours."
Evangelical Boom in Iran
Operation World, an Evangelical reference book, lists Iran as having the fastest-growing evangelical church in the world. It writes that more Iranians have become Christians in the last twenty years than in the previous 1,300 years since Islam came to Iran. As of 1979, there were about five hundred known Christians from a Muslim background in Iran. In 2005, it was estimated that there were 40,000 ethnic Iranian Christians, not including ethnic minority Christians who live in Iran. Today, the average estimates of Christians within Iran range from 300,000 to upwards of one million, according to some experts. It seems that the Catholic Church in Iran is not part of this boom.
Saint Nicholas of Myra
Among Catholics, Saint Nicholas of Myra is mostly a forgotten saint who to a certain extent lives on as “Santa Claus”. This is very different in the Orthodox Church where Saint Nicholas is very popular. When Nicholas relics were brought from Bari, Italy, to Russia, the pilgrims who wanted to venerate the saint formed kilometre-long queues. A few days ago, hundreds of Russian pilgrims and four metropolitan bishops came to Bari. They participated on May 21 in the local Russian Church at matins. The choir of the clergy of Moscow diocese sang.
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