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During the Synod on the Word of God, Archbishop Ramzi Garmou of Teheran for the Chaldeans, soberly remarked: “The whole Bible…tells us that faithfulness to the Word of God leads to persecution….According to the Gospel, persecution is considered as the most eloquent sign of faithfulness to the Word of God.” To say that the only Christians in danger of persecution are those who have not capitulated to the “rights” claimed by the modern state seems paradoxical. Christians in both Muslim and Hindu lands appeal to civil government for protection against persecution. In the post-liberal state, all religions are equally private....

IS THAT A PROMISE?

Fr. Bernard Digal has died after a slow agony of more than two months. The religious, brutally beaten by Hindu fundamentalists the night of August 25, has died two months later, this evening at 9:25 local time, from the serious injuries he suffered in the assault. On Saturday, October 25, a feverish Fr. Digal was taken to St. Thomas Hospital in Chennai, in Tamil Nadu; the doctors operated on him to remove a blood clot from his brain, caused by the beating on the night he was attacked. Yesterday, his lungs collapsed and he fell into a coma. This morning,...

Christians and aid workers are distraught and filled with dismay over the killing of Gayle Williams, an aid worker with Serve Afghanistan, who was gunned down yesterday as she went to work. The Taliban, which claimed responsibility for the murder, claimed that the woman “was working for an organisation which was preaching Christianity in Afghanistan”. This is not the first time that the Muslim fundamentalists have justified killing on religious grounds, but some Catholics doubt that it is real reason behind the British aid worker’s death. Gayle Williams, 34, had been in the country for several years, working with the...

Catholic Online offers the opportunity for our readers to comment on many of our articles. There have been numerous responses to our continued coverage of the horrid persecution of Catholics and other Christians by militant, extremist Hindus in India. Here are just a few: “Please influence CNN and bring this news in public press and TV.” “Let's all ask our Pastors and Priests what we can do as a Catholic community to bring attention to these atrocities. I never see this mentioned in the NY Daily News, Post or WSJ.” “Where are the protests from our democratic form of government...

No end is in sight to the attacks and violence against Christians. In Orissa, where for more than three weeks a pogrom against Catholics and Protestants has been underway, two more killings have been recorded. Iswar Digal and Purinder Pradhan were murdered and cut to pieces. Iswar Digal, was from the the village of Gatringia in the district of Kandhamal; he was stopped on September 20 by a group of Hindu extremists while he and his wife were trying to escape to a refugee camp. Their home was burned. The other victim was from Nilungia. His body was cut to...

The guard at the Carmelite convent in Banduha (Ujjain, Madya Pradesh) has been wounded while trying to protect the sisters; in Karnataka, the Syro-Catholic church of St George in Ujire was devastated and burned; a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes was destroyed in Kolar. This is some of the new violence against Christians recorded today. All of these attacks took place overnight, or in the early morning. The wave of violence, which began in Orissa three weeks ago, has so far killed at least 45, and wounded more than 18,000.

Fr Augustine Kanjamala is a Verbite clergyman who teaches at the University of Mumbai. He appeals to the Churches of the world to “express their protest to the government of India” which has remained “inactive” with regards to anti-Christian violence. He openly charges the Orissa state government for its increasingly explicit collusion with the pogrom currently underway against the community of faithful. According to Father Kanjamala a plan to cleanse Orissa of its Christian population has been in the making for years, especially in the district of Kandhamal (where most of the atrocities have taken place) where Christians now constitute...

Our Times: The Age of Martyrs by Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J. Never in the history of the papacy has any Bishop of Rome written at greater length about martyrdom than Pope John Paul II. His encyclical The Gospel of Life devotes a thousand or more words to the call to martyrdom in our age.He reminds us that the revelation from the Old Testament to the new, and from the time of Christ to the present day, is the history of martyrdom as a witness to the truth.He names Susanna, who refused to consent to lechery and was ready to...

The stained glass window of Sts. Paul and Peter in St. Mary Mother of God Catholic Church, Washington, DC (The following is excerpted from Dom Prosper Guéranger's entry in The Liturgical Year for 30 June -- the Commemoration of St. Paul, in Volume XII of the 1983 Marian House edition of the English translation by the Benedictines of Stanbrook.) "...Paul, having appealed to Caesar [see Acts 25: 11-12], landed in Italy at the beginning of the year 56. Then at last the apostle of the Gentiles made his entry into Rome...." "Instead of having to await in prison the day...

TEHRAN (AFP) — Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said the country's economic woes can be solved by the "culture of martyrdom, the Mehr news agency reported. "If we want to build the country, maintain our dignity and solve economic problems, we need the culture of martyrdom," Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying in a speech on Wednesday in the western city of Hamedan. He described martyrdom, dying or being killed for one's religious beliefs, as "a quick and shortcut way to reach the summit of salvation." He did not say how becoming a martyr would help the economy, which is struggling...

As if things weren't crazy enough already in the Middle East, here's the officially sanctioned message in sixth-grade Palestinian textbooks for 11- and 12-year-old kids: "The noble soul has two goals: death and the desire for it."...It's Jonestown, writ large, a cult of suicide for the collective, for Palestine. Israel isn't on the maps in the Palestinian textbooks. ...A recent article in Rolling Stone, "The Unending Torture of Omar Khadr," tells the story of a 15-year-old captured by U.S. troops in Afghanistan .... "Born into a fundamentalist Muslim family in Toronto," Omar Khadr "had been prepared for jihad since he...

Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto has been critically injured after a suspected suicide attack at a political rally in Pakistan. It was believed to be a suicide attackShe is undergoing emergency surgery at a nearby hospital, Sky News sources say. The explosion went off just after Ms Bhutto left the rally in Rawalpindi, minutes after her speech to thousands of people.

Dear brothers and sisters, The day after Christmas, the liturgy celebrates the 'birth in heaven' of the first Christian martyr, St. Stephen. 'Filled with faith and the Holy Spirit' (Acts 6,5), he was chosen as a deacon by he community if Jerusalem, along with six other disciples who had a Greek education. With the power given to him by God, Stephen performed many miracles and announced the Gospel in the synagogues with "inspired wisdom.' He was stoned at the gates of the city and died, like Jesus, invoking forgiveness for his executioners (Acts 7,59-60). The profound link that united Christ...

Green MartyrdomSeveral months ago I heard a provocative description of martyrdom from Fr. Robert Cook, President of the new Wyoming Catholic College. His idea was that martyrdom in the modern age is not necessarily one of bloody (red) martyrs who die violently for the Faith. Neither is it the daily, silent and sacrificial (white) martyrdom of humble believers. He says that modern martyrs will manifest their heroic courage economically; that is, we will be called to pay dearly for our principles, not necessarily at the cost of lives, but at the cost of dollars. This is “green” martyrdom, and it...

Great vid of terrorist accidentally blowing himself up!

An Iraqi man arrested this month at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport for immigration law violations was charged Wednesday with lying to authorities about his travels outside the United States and about anti-American material he was carrying. When Ali Mohammed Abboud Almosaleh, 40, arrived at the airport on a flight from Amsterdam July 7, he told customs officers he had been out of the country for one month and had traveled to Syria, court documents said. But he actually had been gone for five months and had visited Iraq. He told officers that his digital video discs with images of...

'I Hoped To Be A Glorious Martyr' A woman who was inside Islamabad's Red Mosque when it was stormed by Pakistani troops on 10 July has given the BBC one of the first accounts of the final hours of the siege. Unwilling to be named, the survivor said she was not held hostage by militants inside. More than 100 people died in the army operation - she was one of only 30 women to walk out alive after soldiers went in. Following are excerpts from the interview with Rafia Riaz of the BBC's Urdu service. ..."They asked me to come...

CAIRO, Egypt (AP) - A new al-Qaida videotape posted Sunday on a militant Web site featured a short, undated clip of a weary-looking Osama bin Laden praising martyrdom. The bin Laden clip, which lasted less than a minute, was part of a 40- minute video featuring purported al-Qaida fighters in Afghanistan paying tribute to fellow militants who have been killed in the country. It was posted by the group's media production wing. Bin Laden glorified those who die in the name of jihad, or holy war, saying even the Prophet Muhammad "had been wishing to be a martyr." "The happy...

Part 1- Hamas TV continues promotion of Shahada (martyrdom) for children Part 2- Overview of the history of promotion of children's Shahada – Martyrdom Hamas TV continues active promotion of Shahada (martyrdom) directed at children. The new video clip, broadcast Sunday, follows the growth of a young Palestinian boy from a child into a Hamas Shahid – Martyr for Allah. The video shows the young child going to the mosque, praying and reading from the Quran, and then holding an automatic rifle together with the Quran as he envisions future participation in violent acts.