"The Bishops Abducted in 2013 Live" -- Marian Appearances of Mousseitbé

Syrian-Orthodox Bishop Daniel Kourie: "Abducted Bishops are
still alive" - 47th Annivesary of the Apparition of  Mousseitbé

(Beirut) The two bishops who were abducted in Aleppo in 2013, "are still alive". This was from the Syrian Orthodox Bishop, Daniel Kourié, on the 47th anniversary of the Marian apparition above the cupola of the Peter and Paul Cathedral of Mousseitbé, a suburb of Beirut.

The memorial of the apparition of the Virgin Mary is always on the first Sunday after Easter. This year, the anniversary coincided with the fourth anniversary of the abduction of two bishops in Aleppo. On April 22, 2013, the Syrian Orthodox Bishop of Aleppo, Gregorios Yohanna Ibrahim, and the Greek Orthodox Archbishop of the city, Boulos Yazigi, were abducted.

Bishop Daniel Kourié is the representative of his church for the abduction case. The Commission, led by him, had "knocked at every possible door", in Syria and Lebanon, to find traces of the two bishops.

"Religious and ethnic cleansing in the Middle East"

Bishop Kourié called on the Lebanese state to make the abduction case a "national cause". At the same time, the bishop complained about "religious and ethnic cleansing in the Middle East, especially in Syria, Iraq and Egypt." He criticized the states, which supported these purges under various forms "with men, weapons and money".

The miracles of Mousseitbé have been recognized as genuine by the Syrian Orthodox Church. The other churches in the country took little notice of them "because they were all still fixed on themselves, even to such phenomena as a warning and an appeal to unity, in the face of the first forebodings of the Islamic danger," said Fady Noun , A leading Maronite publicist of Lebanon.

Text: Giuseppe Nardi
Photo: Asianews

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG

2013 Catholics and Orthodox Will in Holy Land Will Celebrate Easter Simultaneously -- Soon in the Whole World?

(Jerusalem)  In 2013 Catholics of the Holy Land will celebrate Easter together with the Orthodox on May 5th and not on March 31st.  March as in the rest of the whole world.  In Jerusalem and the other Holy places Easter will be celebrated according to the Julian calendar as the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem reveals.

The Holy See has allowed the various rites the freedom to celebrate with the Gregorian or the Julian calendar.  The Catholics Bishops of the Holy Land have thus concluded, in order to strengthen the Christian unity in places,  where the son of God was born on earth, lived and died on the cross, to follow the Julian Calendar which the Orthodox Christians also use.

From Gregorian to Julian Calendar

The ecumenical gesture which has significant importance also has to do with questions which are significant to members of the Latin and Oriental rites.

Lent, Easter and Pentecost will be celebrated according to a decree published yesterday by the Latin Patriarchate, according to the Julian Calendar, and thus was a suggestion  triggered by the Bishops' Synod for the Near East in 2010.  The decision addressed the paradox of different feast times in the same territory, and with that the element of division which has reached even into families.

The Ruling is Valid for 2013 ad experimentum 

The decree will be issued ad experimentum only for the year of 2013.  In 2014 in any case, the dates for Easter fall on the 20th of April and without any help, together on the same day.  Til the year 2015 the Latin Patriarchate and the Holy See will meet for a final ruling. The Catholic Bishops of the Holy Land are prepared to give their agreement to a lasting adoption of the Julian Calendar and have expressed the wish that Rome may grant canonical approval.

In Israel, Palestinian Areas, Jordan and Cyprus the Western and Eastern Churches Celebrate Together

For the year of 2013 the ruling will effect the Catholic parishes of Israel, Palestinian Authority, Jordan and Cyrpus and then the complete sphere of influence of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem.  There will be at least two exceptions in 2013.  The parishes of Jerusalem and Bethlehem will celebrate according to the Gregorian Calendar during Easter on the 31st of March.

Exceptions exist in the Holy Sites of Jerusalem and Bethlehem because of the complicated legal system

Both exceptions are dependent upon the legal status quo, which date back to an Ottoman decree which certified the exact times the various confessions would use the various sites.  These ordinances are expected to change in Jerusalem and Bethlehem, yet are at present unforeseen where the various confessions are eager to fight for every centimeter and every minute in the Holy Site.  For the Catholic pilgrims who will visit the Holy Land and want to celebrate Easter in Jerusalem or Bethlehem, nothing will change.

The sign, which has been established by Catholics for the coming year, will be highly visible for the Christians in the Near East.   In the Holy Land the divisions between Christians is clearly visible.  It is not seldom that there is evidence of physical animosity between the confessions.  The Latin Patriarchate  wants to make a gesture of good will with this one-sided step and express the desire that for the faithful, whose families, might celebrate the feast at the same time.

Benedict XVI's desire For Worldwide Easter Between Orient and Occident

Pope Benedict XVI. has expressed many times the hope that Catholics and Orthodox will come to an accord for the celebration of the feast of Easter.  The Holy Land represents the first step for that.

Text: Giuseppe Nardi
Bild: Sizemore Insights

Link to original Katholisches...

Synod hears repeated calls for common Christian Easter date

By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- At a synod concerned primarily about peace and the continued presence of Christians in the Holy Land, one of the suggestions made repeatedly was that Catholics, Protestants, Anglicans and Orthodox finally celebrate Easter together each year.

"We truly hope for the unification of the Easter holiday with the Orthodox churches," Latin-rite Auxiliary Bishop William H. Shomali of Jerusalem told the Synod of Bishops for the Middle East Oct. 14.

Celebrating Easter on the same day also implies observing Lent together, he said, which would give Catholics of the East and West an opportunity to witness together to their disciplines of Lenten fasting and abstinence.

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