Pope Francis is putting up a Syrian refugee family from Damascus in a Vatican apartment, aides revealed last week. The Christian family is the first of two that the Catholic leader has promised to find space for in the Vatican’s two parishes. This is part of a broader Church effort to help shape Europe’s response Read more
Posts Tagged ‘Syria’
Chaldean Patriarch: inciting emigration is irresponsible
Friday, September 18th, 2015
“Now our people are criticising us. They want us to find them flights, visas and welcome centres in other countries. This is impossible. A state cannot do this. And neither can the Church.” The Chaldean Patriarch of Baghdad, Louis Raphael I, says he is concerned. He is not convinced about certain consequences of Europe’s new Read more
Millions of refugees have no place to call home
Friday, September 18th, 2015
The heartbreaking photo of the little Syrian refugee boy washed up dead on the shore of Bodrum, Turkey strikingly illustrates the tragic plight of desperate refugees – mostly Syrian – fleeing for their lives from the Islamic State and other violent groups in the Middle East and Africa. The 3-year-old boy, named Aylan, along with Read more
No-Fly zone urged to support ‘remaining’ Syrians
Friday, September 11th, 2015
New Zealand Marist priest, Peter Healy is encouraging people to sign an online petition to create a No-Fly zone over Syria. “Signing the petition is a small and significant step in solidarity with those Syrians who have remained and who are struggling to rebuild the nation”, says Peter Healy. The petition will be sent to Read more
Hungary bishop at odds with papal perspective
Friday, September 11th, 2015
Hungarian Bishop, Laszlo Kiss-Rigo is warning that Pope Francis has gotten the refugee situation wrong. “They are not refugees. This is an invasion,” Kiss-Rigo told the Washington Post. The bishop says he is in total agreement with the Prime Minister. The pope “does not know the situation”, says the bishop of a predominantly Catholic country. “They Read more
Syria – Morally indefensible not to help where I can
Friday, September 11th, 2015
My role, as a journalist, should be to act as a witness; to report on the situation as a bystander and then leave it as I found it,” says journalist Rachel Smalley. “But an incident in 2013 changed my perspective on the Syrian crisis, and I now find it morally indefensible not to help where Read more
Govt should put Christian refugees top of queue
Friday, September 11th, 2015The Government would do well to rethink how it selects refugees coming to New Zealand says Pastor Michael Hewat While he agrees impartiality is regarded as one of the fundamental principles of humanitarian action, he believes that in the current situation in the Middle East and North Africa, need and religious belief are inextricably linked. Continue Read more
Pope calls on Europe parishes to shelter refugee families
Tuesday, September 8th, 2015
Pope Francis has called on Catholic parishes, convents and monasteries across Europe to shelter at least one refugee family each. The Pope said the two small parishes at the Vatican “will welcome in these days two families of refugees”. The plight of refugees from war-torn Syria has sparked calls for action worldwide, notably after a Read more
- Leader of Syrian Catholic Church hopes drowning tragedy will inspire world to take action
- Church agencies highlight growing urgency of Europe’s refugee crisis
- Archbishop Chaput attacks Donald Trump’s belligerent bombast on migrants
- Strong words from the Vatican as migrant crisis spikes worldwide
- We need to prioritise Christians
A priest in Aleppo, where God never ceases to amaze
Tuesday, August 4th, 2015
“The parish is not yet directly under threat, but some of our neighbours risk their lives every day. Most of the jihadists who attack us do not even speak Arabic. They all come from faraway countries and have little to do with the Syrian revolution.” 43-year-old Fr. Ibrahim Alsabagh, has been serving as a parish Read more
Where refugees come from and where they go
Tuesday, June 30th, 2015
Some 14.4 million people around the world were forced from their homes in 2014, the highest number of newly displaced people in 20 years. The main countries refugees were fleeing from and to shifted greatly last year, according to a new report by the United Nations. The crisis in Syria hugely affected the refugee population’s flow Read more