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Herald Malaysia
7 days ago
- General
- Herald Malaysia
In Nagasaki, people urged to bring Christ's love, peace to world
Mass offered at Urakami Cathedral in the city on the exact day the US dropped an atomic bomb 80 years ago Aug 13, 2025 Archbishop Peter Michiaki Nakamura of Nagasaki (Photo: UCAN Files) By Mark Zimmermann/Catholic Standard, OSV News In his homily at a solemn Peace Memorial Mass August 9, Archbishop Peter Michiaki Nakamura of Nagasaki, Japan, issued a passionate plea to the world. "We must abandon the fists, weapons, and tools of violence we hold in our hands, and stop creating and using nuclear weapons. Let us use our hands to love and embrace others," he said. The Mass was offered at Urakami Cathedral in Nagasaki on the exact day that 80 years ago the US dropped an atomic bomb on that city -- which followed by three days the Aug. 6, 1945, U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the Mass, Japanese Catholics were joined by four US prelates -- two cardinals and two archbishops -- and by Catholic university leaders and students from the United States who were participating in a "Pilgrimage of Peace" to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the bombings and to pray together for peace and for a world without nuclear an English translation of Archbishop Nakamura's homily, which he had delivered in Japanese, he recounted the horror that the nuclear bombing unleashed on that city."Eighty years ago, on August 9, 1945, at 11:02 a.m., an atomic bomb exploded approximately 500 meters above Urakami in Nagasaki. The city was reduced to a wasteland. At that time, 74,000 of Nagasaki's 240,000 residents lost their lives. In Urakami alone, more than half of the 12,000 parishioners, totaling 8,500 people, lost their lives. The Urakami Cathedral, once hailed as 'the largest cathedral in the East,' was almost completely destroyed," he the Mass, a new bell donated by US Catholics rang out for the first time in one of the two bell towers of Urakami Cathedral, replacing a bell that had been destroyed in the Cathedral was rebuilt in 1959 with one of the original bells recovered in the rubble of the original cathedral. As a sign of solidarity and faith from U.S. Catholics, the Nagasaki Bell Project raised funds for the casting and installation of the new bell, which rang together with the recovered bell at 11:02 a.m. -- the moment when the atomic bomb exploded over the city in the Peace Memorial Mass at Urakami Cathedral began, Archbishop Nakamura blessed with incense two damaged religious artifacts that had been recovered in the rubble of the original cathedral after the bombing -- the head of a wooden statue of Mary and a wooden crucifix with the figure of Jesus missing his head and two items were displayed near the altar during the Mass, and the archbishop framed his homily around them. He told the story of a church in Germany damaged by bombing during World War II, and the arms of Jesus on its cross were missing. After the war, they kept the cross where it was, and in the place of the cross beam where Jesus's arms were missing, they put an inscription in German that read, "I have no hands but yours.""A similar thing happened here in Nagasaki. The head, hands and feet of Jesus on the cross that you see next to this altar are also missing. Mary's head is still there, but her face is blackened, and her eyes are gone. It was our hands that started wars and created weapons of mass destruction," Archbishop Nakamura that people use their hands, feet and minds to hurt others, Nagasaki's archbishop said, "We must work together with the hands of Jesus. More than that, we must live as the hands of Jesus. … Our hope lies in God's hands. Let us live as God's hands."Concluding his homily, Archbishop Nakamura said, "Our peace depends on what we do. … Our peace depends on how we walk. It depends on our feet, our way of thinking, our perspective, and our way of life. In other words, our peace depends on living like Christ. This means thinking, speaking, acting and loving like Christ."For that reason, let us once again begin our true journey by gazing upon Jesus and Mary who survived the bombing, and considering how they became like this out of love for us."During the Mass, Archbishop Francisco Escalante Molina, the Vatican's apostolic nuncio to Japan, noted that people had journeyed together to commemorate the anniversaries of the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, "to offer our prayers for those how suffered and those who died, and for lasting peace among all people."He noted that week included interreligious gatherings and meetings with civil authorities, religious leaders, diplomatic representatives and Hibakusha, survivors of the atomic bombings, to pray for peace, "a prayer that must never end."Archbishop Molina read a message from Pope Leo XIV, who offered respect to the Hibakusha, as the survivors of the atomic bombings are known. Their "stories of loss and suffering are a timely summons to all of us to build a safer world and foster a climate of peace," he and Nagasaki "remain living reminders of the profound horrors wrought by nuclear weapons. Their streets, schools and homes still bear scars -- both visible and spiritual -- from that fateful August of 1945," the pope words often said by Pope Francis, he said, "War is always a defeat for humanity."Decrying nuclear weapons, Pope Leo said, "True peace demands the courageous laying down of weapons -- especially those with the power to cause an indescribable catastrophe. Nuclear arms offend our shared humanity and also betray the dignity of creation, whose harmony we are called to safeguard."The concelebrants at the Mass included the four US prelates participating in the "Pilgrimage of Peace": Washington Cardinal Robert W. McElroy, Chicago Cardinal Blase J. Cupich, Archbishop Paul D. Etienne of Seattle, and Archbishop John C. Wester of Santa Fe, New remarks at the end of the Mass, Cardinal McElroy noted how while visiting Nagasaki three years ago, he had been deeply moved by visiting the Twenty-Six Martyrs Museum, the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum and Urakami Martyrs Museum honors 26 Japanese Christians who were arrested in 1597 and forced to march barefoot for 30 days to Nagasaki, where they were hung on crosses and martyred on the Nishizaka Hill overlooking the city. Those Christians included St. Paul Miki, who along with those other 25 martyrs of Japan was canonized in McElroy said his visits to those three places in Nagasaki pointed to the foundations for true peace in the world."The Martyrs Museum points to the need for true faith in God, who is the author and prince of peace. The Atomic Bomb Museum speaks to the need to recognize the tragic human failings that produce wars, inflame hatreds and inflict searing wounds. And the rebuilding of this great cathedral points to overwhelming hope, the sustaining star which guides us toward peace even when it seems farthest away," the cardinal the Mass, the pilgrims from the United States and Japanese Catholics marched together from Urakami Cathedral to Nagasaki Peace Park in a torchlight procession symbolizing the light of faith and the hope for a nuclear-free future that united them. On Aug. 10, the Japanese hosts and US pilgrims attended a Mass together at Oura Cathedral in Nagasaki, the oldest standing church in Japan and a national landmark built in 1864 by missionaries who learned that the hidden Christians had been keeping the faith alive there for
RTÉ News
15-05-2025
- Politics
- RTÉ News
How an Irish Catholic newspaper viewed World War II
Analysis: A supporter of European dictators, The Standard's main enemy before, during and after the war was the Godless Communism of Russia In November 1940, a reader using the pseudonym An Coileach Gaoithe (The Weathercock) wrote a letter to the Dublin-based Catholic newspaper The Standard. Under the eye-catching headline: "If I Were Dictator", the reader outlined various gripes about elements of the Irish Free State which did not function properly. That letter prompted a series of follow-ups from correspondents who had their own ideas about what they would do if given unlimited power. Dictators were, of course, much in vogue in Europe in 1940, and The Standard was well disposed towards most of them. So how did the newspaper view the events of the Second World War, which ended 80 years ago this month? The Standard, published weekly between 1928 and 1978 and called the Catholic Standard from 1963, supported the policy of wartime neutrality adopted by the Irish government. But it had to contend with censorship during the 'Emergency', as the period was known in Ireland. In 1942, it successfully sued the Daily Mail, who accused it of being "the organ of a group that would rather see Germany than England win the war". In 1945, it defended as an "act of international courtesy" the controversial decision of Taoiseach Éamon de Valera to offer condolences to the German Minister in Dublin, Eduard Hempel, on the death of Adolf Hitler. Much of the paper's wartime coverage focused on two Catholic countries which, being neutral, were exempt from censorship regulations. The Standard had been fervent supporters of Francisco Franco since the Spanish Civil War. They were even more enthusiastic about Portuguese dictator António de Oliveira Salazar, viewing his social reforms as a model for Ireland. In the pre-war era, they also wrote nice things about Benito Mussolini in Italy, whose 1929 Lateran Treaty with the Holy See established the Vatican City as an independent state. From RTÉ Radio 1's Today with Claire Byrne, Prof Diarmaid Ferriter from UCD on the history of Irish neutrality The Standard had been critical of Hitler after his rise to power, highlighting the difficulties experienced by the German Catholic hierarchy, but that criticism tapered off in the late 1930s. The paper's main enemy – before, during and after the war – was the Godless Communism of Russia. Through much of the preceding decade, the paper warned of increased Communist influence in Ireland. When war came, The Standard devoted far more attention to Soviet aggression in Finland and Eastern Poland than it did to German activities in western Poland. When the Germans overran France in 1940, The Standard reacted with something close to glee. France's defeat was attributed in the paper to various factors: "too few children", the "poisoning" influence of liberalism, and the removal of religious orders from schools. The Standard enthusiastically endorsed the actions of the puppet government installed by the Nazis at Vichy under Marshal Philippe Pétain: a ban on secret societies, the introduction of strict film censorship, and changes in French schools. A 1940 article by J.L. Benvenisti warned that if Britain was beaten, "her people will be reduced to conditions paralleled only by those of the Irish in the Famine Years". Commentary about the Soviet Union became officially subject to censorship after it joined the Allied side in 1941. But, as historian Donal Ó Drisceoil notes, The Standard was allowed an anti-Soviet 'bite' by the censors before the shutters came down. The paper ran a series of extracts from the Catholic press in Britain which, "while accepting the fact of Britain's military alliance with Soviet Russia", pointed to "the dangers" that attached to it. From RTÉ Radio 1's Brendan O'Connor show, Suzi Diamond, survivor of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, and Caryna Camerino, granddaughter of Auschwitz survivor Enzo Camerino, reflect on the Holocaust By June 1945, the war in Europe was over and public criticism of both Nazism and Bolshevism by Pope Pius XII received prominent coverage in The Standard. An accompanying article disputed the "widely-reported assertion" that this address contained the first Papal denunciation of the Nazis since 1937. "The protest has been clear and continuous," argued The Universe newspaper, the claim that offered The Standard its headline. If there was a sense there that both church and paper were repositioning themselves to take account of the new post-war reality, The Standard was on more comfortable territory discussing the rise of the Iron Curtain. An editorial in mid-June 1945 referred to Soviet-controlled Poland as 'the blackest spot in Europe' and suggested that "the one object for which the war was professedly fought" – the restoration of Polish independence – "has not yet been achieved". Newsreel footage of the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen and Buchenwald concentration camps was met with "gasps" in Irish cinemas in June 1945. The response in The Standard was more sceptical, as film critic Benedict Kiely argued that the camera is not able "to tell the whole truth". In her book That Neutral Island, Clair Wills suggests that Kiely "tried to mute the horror of the images of the death camps by arguing that they were simply one more example of the atrocity in which all sides had been engaged". The Standard regarded the Nuremberg trials, which investigated Nazi war crimes, as a form of victors' justice. It suggested that all the charges the German leaders had faced could also be "held at the door of Soviet Russia".
Yahoo
12-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Megyn Kelly defends Pope Leo XIV's past anti-Trump tweets
Conservative podcast host Megyn Kelly defended Pope Leo XIV's controversial anti-Trump tweets, arguing that all Catholic leaders support 'mass migration.' 'There's not going to be a pope who's not pro-mass migration. It's Catholicism,' the former Fox News anchor said during Friday's episode of 'The Megyn Kelly Show.' 'They're very pro-migrant, you know, wash the feet of the poor and the hungry and those who need us, and, you know, we're a bunch of bleeding hearts at bottom.' She then added: 'Unless if you're trans or gay, in which case, no, sorry.' Kelly went on to praise the the first American-born pope for his 'anti-trans' stance and his possible turn away from Pope Francis' progressive policies. 'Pope Francis, God rest him, was very progressive and, like, kind of turned the church in a progressive direction and did some battle with America and our president for a while, when it was Donald Trump, not when it really was Joe Biden, and we didn't much like that,' Kelly said. 'So it's great to see an American pope, and I actually am open-minded to this pope, notwithstanding those tweets,' she added. The newly-elected Pope Leo XIV, formerly known as Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost from Chicago, posted and re-posted several tweets critical of the Trump administration over the past few months. Like many other Catholics, the 69-year-old took issue with a comment Vice President JD Vance made earlier this year about the theological concept of ordo amoris, Latin of order of love. Vance told Fox News 'that you love your family and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens, and then after that, prioritize the rest of the world.' In February, Prevost reposted an article from Pope Francis, who corrected Vance's interpretation of ordo amoris to be 'a fraternity open to all, without exception.' He also boosted an article from the National Catholic Reporter titled, 'JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn't ask us to rank our love for others.' As a cardinal, he also reposted an article in the Catholic Standard criticizing Trump's meeting with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele earlier this year, when the two seemingly laughed off the mistaken deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia. The article asked, 'Do you not see the suffering? Is your conscience not disturbed? How can you stay quiet?' 'I really think even a conservative-leaning pope could have sent out those tweets because, I'm sorry, the Catholic Church is very pro-immigration. It's not my favorite thing, but it's the truth,' Kelly said. Kelly claimed the new pope 'voted in Republican primaries in Illinois and he is anti-transing of children and trans ideology,' citing 'a bunch of reporting.' The Chicago native has voted regularly in both Republican and Democratic primary elections, picking Republican ballots in more recent votes, according to state and local records in Illinois. He has made few comments on the LGTBQ+ community, though in 2017 he appeared to critique transgender communities when he spoke out against 'gender ideology' as bishop of Chiclayo, Peru. Then-Cardinal Prevost, who holds US and Peruvian citizenship, told local media at the time that this ideology 'seeks to eliminate biological differences between men and women.'
Yahoo
09-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Pope Leo shared content critical of Trump, Vance's immigration policies in social media posts
Prior to being elected pontiff, Pope Leo XIV had a presence on Twitter, and later X, where he sometimes shared messages that appeared to be critical of some of President Donald Trump's policies. Cardinal Robert Prevost appears to have an X account with the handle @drprevost and posted, replied and reposted content since 2011, according to his page. A picture of Prevost and Pope Francis holding each others arms in their robes inside a church is the profile image for the account. While most of the new pope's 439 posts involved posting articles about the latest developments from the Vatican and dioceses from around the world, he did share other posts from time to time dealing with political matters. MORE: What we know about Leo XIV, the new American pope He last posted on April 14, when he shared a post from prominent American Catholic commentator Rocco Palmo that criticized Trump and El Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele's controversial immigration policies. " As Trump & Bukele use Oval to 🤣 Feds' illicit deportation of a US resident …, once an undoc-ed Salvadorean himself, now-DC Aux +Evelio asks, "Do you not see the suffering? Is your conscience not disturbed? How can you stay quiet?" Palmo's post read. Palmo linked to a Catholic Standard editorial written by Bishop Evelio Menjivar, an auxiliary bishop of The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington. In an interview with ABC News on Thursday, Pope Leo's brother John Prevost in Chicago said immigration is an important issue for his brother. "I think because the way our country is going, I don't think he necessarily will always agree [with] what's happening. I think a big thing for him is immigration and is it right -- what's going on? I think that will be a challenge for him, because I think he'll say something about it, too." Asked about his brother's X account, John Prevost said, "I know that's his feelings, but I didn't know he was putting it out on social media." MORE: Pope Leo XIV pledges to 'build bridges' in 1st remarks as pontiff The pope's last original X post was on Feb. 13, when he posted a link to an America magazine editorial that criticized Vice President JD Vance about his interpretation of the Latin phrase "ordo amoris." Vance contended in a Fox News interview, that the idea meant that one must love their family first before the community. Pope Francis sent a letter to bishops after Vance's comment rebuking that interpretation without naming the vice president. Pope Leo, however, appeared to criticize Vance directly in a Feb. 3 post, where he linked to a National Catholic Reporter editorial that dismissed the vice president's stance on immigration. He shared the headline of the article "JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn't ask us to rank our love for others" and linked to the full story in his post. Leo had not posted on X between July 2023 and Feb. 3. The Vatican has not immediately commented about the social media account or posts. Vance and Trump both congratulated the pope on his election on social media posts. "I'm sure millions of American Catholics and other Christians will pray for his successful work leading the Church. May God bless him!" Vance wrote on X Thursday. Pope Leo shared content critical of Trump, Vance's immigration policies in social media posts originally appeared on
09-05-2025
- Politics
Pope Leo shared content critical of Trump, Vance's immigration policies in social media posts
Prior to being elected pontiff, Pope Leo XIV had a presence on Twitter, and later X, where he sometimes shared messages that appeared to be critical of some of President Donald Trump's policies. Cardinal Robert Prevost appears to have an X account with the handle @drprevost and posted, replied and reposted content since 2011, according to his page. A picture of Prevost and Pope Francis holding each others arms in their robes inside a church is the profile image for the account. While most of the new pope's 439 posts involved posting articles about the latest developments from the Vatican and dioceses from around the world, he did share other posts from time to time dealing with political matters. He last posted on April 14, when he shared a post from prominent American Catholic commentator Rocco Palmo that criticized Trump and El Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele's controversial immigration policies. " As Trump & Bukele use Oval to 🤣 Feds' illicit deportation of a US resident …, once an undoc-ed Salvadorean himself, now-DC Aux +Evelio asks, "Do you not see the suffering? Is your conscience not disturbed? How can you stay quiet?" Palmo's post read. Palmo linked to a Catholic Standard editorial written by Bishop Evelio Menjivar, an auxiliary bishop of The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington. In an interview with ABC News on Thursday, Pope Leo's brother John Prevost in Chicago said immigration is an important issue for his brother. "I think because the way our country is going, I don't think he necessarily will always agree [with] what's happening. I think a big thing for him is immigration and is it right -- what's going on? I think that will be a challenge for him, because I think he'll say something about it, too." Asked about his brother's X account, John Prevost said, "I know that's his feelings, but I didn't know he was putting it out on social media." The pope's last original X post was on Feb. 13, when he posted a link to an America magazine editorial that criticized Vice President JD Vance about his interpretation of the Latin phrase "ordo amoris." Vance contended in a Fox News interview, that the idea meant that one must love their family first before the community. Pope Francis sent a letter to bishops after Vance's comment rebuking that interpretation without naming the vice president. Pope Leo, however, appeared to criticize Vance directly in a Feb. 3 post, where he linked to a National Catholic Reporter editorial that dismissed the vice president's stance on immigration. He shared the headline of the article "JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn't ask us to rank our love for others" and linked to the full story in his post. Leo had not posted on X between July 2023 and Feb. 3. The Vatican has not immediately commented about the social media account or posts. Vance and Trump both congratulated the pope on his election on social media posts. "I'm sure millions of American Catholics and other Christians will pray for his successful work leading the Church. May God bless him!" Vance wrote on X Thursday.
