Religion

13, November 2018

Rev.Fonki is a good example to demonstrate that practice does not make perfect ⁰

The political class has failed Cameroon and it is presently driving the divided nation closer to a failed state. The church has contributed enormously to this failure and the chaotic situation that has rocked Cameroon is made worse by the Christian community leaders who are now acting like agents of the CPDM crime syndicate.

The case of the Moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon, Rev Fonki Samuel is very glaring and many including the Cameroon Concord News Group are of the opinion that it is time the PCC looks for a decent man to run its spiritual affairs.

Under Rev. Fonki Samuel, Presbyterian Christians have grown cold in their prayer lives and the power of a praying church that was the motto of the PCC is now a thing of the past. The choice of this editorial has been informed by the observable trend of cold and insincere prayer attitude that characterised the Presbyterian community in particular and the entire Christian fold in Southern Cameroons; the reason why the situation of Cameroon has not possessed the wishes of God for his people.

The heart of the PCC which is the Bastos congregation in Yaounde is now operating like a commercial centre and Presbyterians there have not been praying enough because both their spiritual leader and the Moderator have compromised with the Biya regime rather than keep to their calling of being the prophetic voices of the people.

Rev Fonki Samuel and the Archbishop of Yaounde have failed Cameroon and the Christian Community and the need for fervent prayer culture to oust both men from their respective positions of trust should and must become highly important as it is a command by God, which is an acceptable link between God and his children and an avenue to demonstrate God’s power.

Rev Fonki Samuel is a good example to demonstrate that practice does not make perfect. Criticised for opening a Protestant University in Bali and at the same time sending his own kid abroad for studies, the so-called Man of God and Moderator abandoned children who were reportedly kidnapped by armed militia backed by the Minister of Territorial Administration, Paul Atanga Nji and rushed to congratulate 85 year President Biya for stealing the October 7 polls.

We of the Cameroon Concord News and the Cameroon Intelligence Report can authoritatively say that the leadership of the PCC has abandoned the role of the church which is to salvage the course of the nation through godly behaviours and Rev Fonki is behaving like a common Christian leader running a small church in a ware house near the Mamfe Motor Park.

A complete change of leadership will help the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon and its fast growing Diaspora and this can only be achieved through the cries of the righteous in prayer. It is on this note that we of the Cameroon Concord News Group are calling on the pastors of the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon and all the Rev Fathers in the Archdiocese of Yaounde to rise up to all the challenges posed by poor spiritual leadership through persistent prayers and righteous living to enable Christians wade into the appalling situations of the nation.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

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3, November 2018

Indiana family to return home after missionary father shot, killed in S. Cameroons ⁰

The family of an American missionary who was shot and killed in front of his wife and son in Cameroon will travel back home to Indiana this week, a pastor told IndyStar on Thursday.

Charles Wesco, 44, was fatally wounded while sitting in a car in Bamenda, Cameroon on Tuesday, according to Dave Halyaman, an assistant pastor at Believers Baptist Church in Warsaw, Indiana. The church sent the Wescos to do missionary work in the African nation.

Wesco’s wife, Stephanie, and his second oldest son were in the car when he was struck in the head, Halyaman said.

The U.S. State Department confirmed to IndyStar on Tuesday that a U.S. citizen died in Bamenda, but didn’t provide the person’s identity or further details on the person’s death.

The town where the Wescos were staying is in the nation’s English-speaking area, where armed separatists have been fighting to create an independent state, the Associated Press reported.

Wesco’s wife and their eight children have left the area and as of Thursday morning were headed to the Cameroon capital of Yaoundé, Halyaman said. They plan to fly back to the U.S. on Saturday, he said. The family is from Mishawaka, a city in northern Indiana. They traveled to Cameroon almost two weeks ago , Halyaman said.

Halyaman said the Wescos were aware of the dangers in the region.

“They knew there was fighting,” he told IndyStar. “They didn’t go into it blind.”

Halyaman said the body of Charles Wesco is expected to be flown back to the U.S. by the end of this week for a funeral in Warsaw.

Wesco’s brother is Indiana House Rep. Timothy Wesco. Gov. Holcomb released a statement on Tuesday, saying he and his wife “are thinking of Rep. Tim Wesco and his family as they grieve the death of his brother Charles.”

Halyaman said the church mourns Wesco’s death, but said they believe “God is in perfect control.” He described Wesco as a business owner — he ran a piano tuning service — who “loved God and loved service.”

“He was smart,” Halyaman said, “and he had a good heart, too.”

Source: Indy Star

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2, November 2018

Cameroon clergy condemn killing of American missionary ⁰

Church leaders in Cameroon have condemned the killing of an American missionary in the southwest of this West African nation, where the government is battling secessionist rebels.

Charles Trumann Wesco, 44, a clergyman from Indiana, died on Tuesday (Oct. 30), barely two weeks after arriving in the region, allegedly caught in crossfire between rebels and government soldiers near the town of Bamenda. He was being driven to a market by another missionary, together with his wife and a son, when two bullets struck the car’s windshield, badly injuring Wesco. He was rushed to a hospital in Bamenda but did not survive.

“We deplore the death of the missionary. It is unfortunate they fired the guns and he was killed. I don’t think he was a target,” the Rev. Edward Njini, a senior pastor at Nkwen Baptist Church in Bamenda, told Religion News Service.

The area where Wesco was traveling has seen unrest since late 2016, when an attempt by the government to enforce the use of French, the country’s official language, on the English-speaking southwest and northwest corners of Cameroon resulted in strikes and protests.

The protests gradually coalesced into a secessionist movement, with rebels in two provinces declaring independence on Oct. 1, 2017, calling their new state Ambazonia and organizing the Ambazonia Defence Forces (ADF). The government has responded by sending its armed forces to repress the rebellion.

Recently, the separatists started targeting local chiefs, accusing them of being collaborators with the government. Since July, seven chiefs have been abducted in the southwest and three in the northwest, according to news reports. At least 400 people have been killed and more than 200,000 displaced. More than 20,000 have fled to neighboring Nigeria as refugees.

“The area is unsafe for everyone,” Njini said. “There is an armed confrontation. There is a lot of hostility and everyone is exposed. People are being killed left and right.” Each side blamed the other for Wesco’s death. Joseph Beti Assamo, Cameroon’s defense minister, said Wesco had encountered rebels who were on their way to attack the university there. The rebels maintain that Wesco was killed by government bullets.

Two years ago, Wesco started fundraising in the United States with plans to move to Cameroon. That plan materialized this year, with the minister and his family arriving in Cameroon on Oct. 18 and settling in Bambili, a suburb on the outskirts of Bamenda.

“We’re shocked and grieving at what’s occurred. We’re trying to get over the shock of losing someone as wonderful as Charles was,” Dave Halyman, assistant pastor at the Believers Baptist Church in Warsaw, Ind., which sent the Wescos on their mission, told Voice of America. “While we don’t like this, we understand that God has a great purpose.”

Wesco and his wife, Stephanie, who is the daughter of the senior pastor at Believers Baptist, have eight children.

Source: Religion News Service

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30, October 2018

October 7 Polls: Roman Catholic Church issues conflicting comments ⁰

The Roman Catholic church, the main religious body in Cameroon has issued conflicting comments on the conduct of the October 7 presidential election in which incumbent Paul Biya was declared the winner.

Church bells ring at Our Lady of Victories Cathedral in Yaounde, inviting Catholics to a mass to be said by metropolitan Archbishop Jean Mbarga. Mbarga says the special mass is to pray for peace in Cameroon and salute the victory of President Paul Biya in Cameroon’s October 7 presidential election.

He says people should congratulate Paul Biya for his victory especially as electoral disputes were handled in a transparent manner by the constitutional council. He says everyone should recognize Biya as the president elect, start preparing for the next election and thank God for the peace that was observed during the presidential poll.

The archbishop’s declaration that the election was transparent sharply contradicts the position of the episcopal conference of Cameroon Roman Catholic bishops of which Mbarga is a member.

Samuel Kleda, archbishop of Douala and president of the episcopal conference had criticized the election saying that the large turnout announced by the elections management body ELECAM along Cameroon’s northern border with Nigeria, was particularly suspicious.

Archbishop Samuel Kleda of Doulala on an outing with Protestant and Muslim clerics in Yaounde, Cameroon, Sept. 19, 2018.

Kleda said that the fighting in the English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions and the Boko Haram insurgency along Cameroon’s northern border with Nigeria had displaced large numbers of people and they could not vote.

Kleda says he is surprised at claims that the ruling party candidate Paul Biya scored overwhelming victories in many parts of Cameroon including the English-speaking northwest and southwest regions where they themselves said they were unable to go to campaign because of galloping insecurity.

He says petitions filed by opposition party candidates that the election were marred by massive fraud and did not even take place in several regions ought to have been taken seriously by the government because Cameroon’s unity is threatened.

Cameroon’s Roman Catholic bishops have been divided before, even though it has never been as public as it is now. When the separatist movement in the Anglophone regions became violent, Kleda condemned the government troops for brutality, while some bishops, including Mbarga, said it was legitimate defense.

An estimated 35 percent of Cameroon’s 24 million people are of the Roman Catholic faith.

Cameroon's President Paul Biya, of the Cameroon People's Democratic Movement party, waits to cast his vote during the Presidential elections in Yaounde, Oct. 7, 2018. — Cameroon’s President Paul Biya, of the Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement party, waits to cast his vote during the Presidential elections in Yaounde, Oct. 7, 2018.

On Oct. 22 incumbent Paul Biya was declared the winner with 71 percent of the vote, with his main challenger, Maurice Kamto, only receiving 14 percent.

Several opposition candidates accused Biya’s ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement (CPDM) party of massive electoral fraud to keep the 85-year-old leader in office for another seven years. Biya is Africa’s longest serving president, having entered office in 1982.

Source: VOA

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28, October 2018

Cameroon bishops say election results ‘decided before voting took place’ ⁰

Catholic bishops in Cameroon have disputed the results of the Oct. 7 presidential election in the country. The official results were released on Oct. 22 and declared incumbent Paul Biya the winner with 71 percent of the vote, with his main challenger, Maurice Kamto, only receiving 14 percent.

Biya’s ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement (CPDM) party has been accused of massive electoral fraud to keep the 85-year-old leader in office for another seven years. Biya is Africa’s longest serving president, having entered office in 1982.

In the latest election, he was challenged by seven other candidates. In an Oct. 23 press conference, the president of Cameroon’s bishops’ conference, Archbishop Samuel Kleda, said serious questions needed to be asked with regard to the outcome of the ballot.

“This election led me to ask questions,” the archbishop told journalists in Douala.

He noted the large turnout for the president in the Far North Region of the country as being particularly suspicious.

The region is home to the worst poverty levels in Cameroon, with 74 percent of the people living below the poverty line compared with 37.5 percent nationally, according to the International Crisis Group.

“I don’t see up to 89 percent of people going through such suffering voting for the same person who has been there, doing nothing about the hardship of the people…the far north is one of the poorest and most undeveloped regions in Cameroon…I am seriously puzzled by those figures,” Kleda said.

“This means that all the problems we were looking to resolve before the election will not be resolved.” he added.

The archbishop also questioned the declared victory of Biya in the troubled North West and South West regions.

These are the Anglophone areas of Cameroon and have been engulfed in violent clashes dating back to October 2016.

Teachers’ and lawyers’ strikes over perceived attempts by the francophone-dominated administration to destroy the Anglo-Saxon-educational and legal systems practiced in Anglophone Cameroon mutated into political demands for independence by the Anglophone minority.

Kleda noted that the fighting in the two regions had displaced large numbers of people who couldn’t therefore vote.

“At a time when it was impossible to campaign in the two regions, where are all these figures coming from?” Kleda asked.

Kamto, who claims the election was stolen, has called for the annulment of the results in seven of Cameroon’s ten regions, citing cases of massive fraud.

Another opposition candidate, Joshua Osih, has called for the annulment of the entire poll, because “no election took place in the North West and South West Regions.”

“If I am declared winner of this election, I will decline to be sworn in because I cannot be president of only one part of Cameroon,” Osih told the country’s Constitutional Court.

Kleda complained about what he called the “hasty ruling of the Constitutional Council” in declaring the official results.

“I think all the candidates, Kamto, Cabral and Osih had a strong case and proofs to show there were irregularities, especially the petition of the SDF [the main opposition party] on the North West and South West Regions where few people voted…They had to listen to them… Cameroon is a country with the rule of law, the council kept rejecting all the petitions based on technicalities which was not normal,” the archbishop said.

Kleda then dismissed the results as prefabricated saying it was a trend in the region.

“One has the impression that in the Central African sub region, election results are decided before voting takes place,” he said.

The Emeritus Archbishop of Douala, Cardinal Christian Tumi, a virulent critic of Biya, surprisingly took a more conciliatory tone.

“I would say only one thing: let’s take everything as God’s will, because no one wields power on earth which doesn’t come from God. Those who govern us will render account of how they governed us to God. So, let’s not create problems for them. Let’s accept (the results) and wait for another occasion to choose another person,” the cardinal said.

The bishops are considered by many to be a key to peace in the country, which is 40 percent Catholic.

In May, the Brussels-based International Crisis Group issued a report on Cameroon saying other than the Catholic clergy, “there are few prospective peacemakers.”

“If no one fills that role, the separatist sentiment already voiced by many Anglophones will continue to grow, fueling further violence and exacerbating the ongoing insurgency in the Anglophone regions,” the report said, before noting the 2018 elections could be “a flashpoint.”

Source: Crux

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26, October 2018

Vatican: Bishop Andrew Nkea says Africa offers synod an example ⁰

While European bishops discuss how to bring young people back to the Church at the 2018 Synod of Bishops, one bishop from Cameroon said that he has the opposite problem.

“My churches are all bursting, and I don’t have space to keep the young people,” said Bishop Andrew Nkea Fuanya of Mamfe said at a Vatican press conference Oct. 24. “And my shortest Mass would be about two and a half hours,” he added.

A study by Pew Research Center in August 2018 found that church attendance and prayer frequency was highest in sub-Saharan Africa and lowest in Western Europe. Four out of five Christians in Cameroon said that they pray everyday.

“People ask me, ‘Why are your churches full?’” the Cameroonian bishop said. For Bishop Fuanya, it all comes down to family, community, and traditional values.

“Coming from Africa, the family is a very, very strong institution,” Fuanya said. “We come from a culture in which tradition normally is handed from one generation to the other.”

“Our traditional values still equate to the values of the Church, and so we hand over the tradition to our young people undiluted and uncontaminated,” he continued.

When asked about the potential inclusion of so-called “LGBT” language in the synod’s final document, the bishop reiterated that point.

“I wouldn’t vote for any article that has LGBT.” Fuanya said, explained that “99.9 percent” of the young people in his diocese would “stand at my door and say, ‘What’s this?’”

“With matters of doctrine that the church teaches, it is not like in this synod we are trying to invent new teaching … Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life … we cannot be taking positions that contradict the Gospels,” he added.

On that point, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, Archbishop of Munich and Freising, told the press conference: “Quite honestly I don’t remember that we had discussed this issue in Germany so I can’t acknowledge that there is a specific conversation on this.”

“This is not a synod on sexuality. It is a synod on the young,” Marx added. Fuanya suggested that two of the key ways in which the faith and teaching of the Church is handed over to younger generations are through the family and community. In these, he said, the African Church was setting an example.

“Church as community. Church as family is very strong for us,” said the bishop. A strong sense of community in the Church is something “very important that Europe can learn from Africa,” Fuanya said.

In Africa, “there’s still a lot of things we do as community. That is the difference. What we are trying to do in these small Christian communities is to fight the increeping of individualism,” he added. There are significant demographic differences in family size in Europe and Africa.

A 2010 USAID report on the number of children desired by people in various parts of the world, showed that the desired number of children is highest among people in western and middle Africa, ranging from 4.8 in Ghana to 9.1 in Niger and 9.2 in Chad, with an average of 6.1 children for the region.

In the European Union, 47 percent of households with any children only have one child, only thirteen percent have three or more children, according to 2017 data.

While the differences between Europe and Africa could provide helpful lessons, Fuanya noted that the synod was about seeking a universal perspective.

“It is not like Africa has come to help Europe solve their youth problem, it is the Church that has come together to see how to solve the problem of the youth,” Fuanya said.

“When we are looking at things in the synod, we are not solving problems of particular continents or particular local churches. We are looking at the Church from a global point of view.”

“We reflect on the empty churches, but at the same time we reflect on the poverty situation. We reflection on migration. We reflect on all those things that show the Church from a holistic point of view,” Fuanya said.

For Cardinal Marx, one global issue that needs to be addressed is the sexual abuse crisis. “The discussion on sexual abuses in the past few months … drew global attention. I believe it is an important global matter that needs to be discussed,” Marx said in German.

“It is the Church that needs to change … the youth have said this,” he continued. “We need to do this together in the theme of accompaniment.”

Source: Catholic News Agency

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21, October 2018

US: Voices of concern for Southern Cameroons at a New Jersey Church ⁰

Silva Munuza was describing the deadly conflict back home in Cameroon to Cliff Jones, his pastor in Laurel Springs.

A 38-year-old accountant who lives in Clementon and has a young daughter, Munuza talked about the brutality of the security forces, the burning of villages, and of the dead. And then his voice broke.

“Silva couldn’t keep on speaking,” Jones recalled. “He knows people who have been killed.”

The effect on the pastor was profound.

“When I saw a brother in Christ break down four times in the space of five minutes,” he said, “I realized that we need to do something.”

That’s why St. Paul’s Presbyterian, a cozy church on a pretty street in small-town Camden County, is praying for Cameroon, a West African nation where six complicated decades of tension between the English-speaking minority and the French-speaking majority threaten to erupt into civil war.

The pastor, Munuza, and others in the church hope to educate the congregation and the public about the situation in that riven, faraway land, and are exploring other ways to help. A good number of the 200 people in the English-speaking Cameroonian community that has taken root in South Jersey during the last 20 years are Presbyterian, and belong to St. Paul’s.

JOSE F. MORENO

Silva Munuza, center, who emigrated from Cameroon to the United States 10 years ago, prays during Sunday services at St. Paul’s Presbyterian Church in Laurel Springs. Munuza is an elder at the church and is working to educate the congregation about the increasingly deadly political violence in his homeland.

I met Munuza there during services on a recent Sunday, and later sat down with him and five other Cameroonians in Fellowship Hall at the church.

Until I started working on this column, pretty much all I’d known about Cameroon was that the Sixers’ amazing Joel Embiid is from there. I’ve since been reading news stories online and watching YouTube clips about the turmoil, and I’ve seen some of the awful images — a man on his knees being beaten, a charred body in a ruined, roofless house, entire villages reduced to cinders — that have been widely disseminated on social media. I’ve also visited the website of the self-described “interim government” of an envisioned English-speaking, independent Cameroonian state to be called the Federal Republic of Ambazonia.

But nothing prepared me for the conversation around the table.

“My brother died on the spot, and a neighbor who was like a father to me had just left his home and also was killed,” said Ernest Awa, 40, a health-care worker who lives in Lindenwold. “I lost those two people,” he said softly.

Awa was describing the events of Sept. 1 in Pinyin, a village in the northwestern portion of the English-speaking part of the country, where many of the Cameroonians in South Jersey have family. Witnesses posted videos charging security forces the government claims are seeking to quell a separatist rebellion with shooting civilians at will.

At the table, a young Cameroonian woman who lives in Camden County and asked not to be identified because she feared for her family’s safety said she hasn’t been able to reach her father back home for the last two weeks. He’s in his 70s and escaped an attack near Pinyin by hiding in the wilderness, she said.

“I don’t know when I will be able to go back there,” said Valerie Mouthchia, 45, a project manager who lives in Clementon. She has become an American citizen and said the U.S. should not support the government in Cameroon, which she said is responsible for human rights violations there.

The people around the table described the conflict as a colonial legacy made worse by the authoritarian rule of longtime francophone President Paul Biya. The results of a contentious Oct. 7 presidential election are expected to be made public Oct. 22, with some media in the country predicting Biya will win.

Despite the rising numbers of casualties, displaced persons, and refugees — thousands of Cameroonians have fled across the border into Nigeria — Americans generally know little about Cameroon or its escalating crisis.

JOSE F. MORENO

Pastor Cliff Jones, right, greets Marcel Njighe, who’s originally from Cameroon, at St. Paul’s Presbyterian Church in Laurel Springs. The congregation prays for Cameroon, which some observers describe as on the verge of civil war. Jones said the people in his flock also want to learn more about the situation, and to do more to help.

Nevertheless, “Americans can become more aware,” Munuza said. “They can call their representatives. They can tweet. They can call for an end to the genocide.”

I asked the pastor of St. Paul’s how even a faith-filled, 360-member-strong congregation could realistically expect to have an impact on a complicated human tragedy so far away.

“For us, prayer is important,” Jones said. “Knowing people who are going through this, whose immediate family members have been killed, brings this to a much more personal level. We need to do something, and not just in words.”

Source: The Inquirer

12, October 2018

Pope Francis accepts Washington archbishop’s resignation amid sex abuse scandal ⁰

Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Cardinal Donald Wuerl as archbishop of Washington, D.C., the Vatican said on Friday, making him one of the most senior Catholic figures to step down in a worldwide sexual abuse crisis.

Wuerl, 77, who was bishop of Pittsburgh between 1988 and 2006, has been under scrutiny over his handling of sexual abuse cases during that period. He keeps the title of cardinal.

In a letter by the pope released in Washington, Francis indicated that he accepted the resignation reluctantly and at Wuerl’s insistence. He asked Wuerl to stay on as administrator until another archbishop could be appointed.

Wuerl has been under fire since the release in August of a U.S. Grand Jury report on sexual abuse found evidence that at least 1,000 people, mostly children, had been sexually abused by some 300 clergymen over the course of 70 years. The report covered six dioceses in Pennsylvania, including Pittsburgh when it was led by Wuerl.

He has also been accused of knowing about sexual misconduct by his predecessor in Washington, ex-cardinal Theodore McCarrick.

Wuerl has defended his overall record in Pittsburgh. He also has denied knowing that McCarrick, once one of the U.S. Church’s most prominent figures, had forced male adult seminarians to have sex with him years ago.

In July McCarrick became the first cardinal in about 100 years to be stripped of his red hat and title of “eminence”.

Francis ordered McCarrick to retire to a life of prayer and penitence after American Church officials said as part of a separate investigation that allegations that McCarrick had sexually abused a 16-year-old boy almost 50 years ago were credible and substantiated.

(REUTERS)

22, September 2018

Der Spiegel heavily criticises Francis’s papacy in 19-page report ⁰

Prominent German magazine Der Spiegel has published a 19-page report criticising Pope Francis’s leadership of the Catholic Church and accusing him of ignoring abuse survivors in Argentina. Their cover story, titled “Thou shalt not lie” and subtitled “The silence of the shepherds”, attacks the Pope’s handling of the abuse crisis and his attempted Church reforms.

“Pope Francis promised when he took office a renewed, cosmopolitan Catholicism,” the magazine says. “Five-and-a-half years and many abuse cases later, the Universal Church is divided as never before.”

The magazine, which is generally regarded as left-liberal, is considered one of the most influential in Europe.

According to LifeSiteNews, its report covers cases such as that of Fr Inzoli, a convicted abuser laicised by Benedict XVI but restored to the priestly state by Pope Francis. Francis later laicised him again. It also examines the ongoing McCarrick scandal, and the members of the C9 council of cardinals who have faced allegations of covering up abuse.

On his handling of issues such as Communion for Protestant spouses and Communion for the divorced and remarried, De Spiegel says the Pope may “go down in history as the one who split the Church”.

The report most notably includes an interview with an abuse survivor from Argentina who says she was one of a group of victims who wrote to Francis shortly after his election, but never received a reply.

The woman, Julieta Añazco, says she was sexually abused by a priest when she was seven years old. She said that in 2013, shortly after Pope Francis was elected, she and 13 other victims wrote to him to describing what had happened.

They sent the letter by recorded delivery and, three weeks later, received a confirmation of receipt. However, they never received a reply.

The accused priest was subsequently transferred to a nursing home where he “continues to celebrate Mass”.

“During Bergoglio’s time as cardinal, many of the abuse victims in Buenos Aires had turned to him for help; nobody was permitted access to him,” the magazine says, adding that there are currently 62 trials in process against Argentine priests. “The number of their victims could be in the thousands.”

A legal defender for Argentine abuse survivors, Juan Pablo Gallego, says that Pope Francis is “now in exile in Rome – has found his refuge there, so to speak”. Gallego adds that in Argentina Francis faces “the suspicion that he protected for years rapists and abusers of children.”

He cites the example of Fr Julio César Grassi, who is now in prison for raping teenage boys. Francis had been Grassi’s confessor and ordered a legal report to defend Grassi against the charges.

Gallego says that in 2006 he had a conversation with the then Cardinal Bergoglio. “He was withdrawn and mistrusting, he said no word about the fact that the Church paid Grassi’s lawyers. The current image of an open, sympathetic Pope Francis does not fit the man whom I sat in front of at the time.”

Source: Catholic Herald

20, September 2018

Religious leaders denounce atrocities in Southern Cameroons ⁰

Religious leaders of the Protestant Council, the Islamic Superior Council and the National Episcopal Conference of Cameroon on Wednesday condemned acts of violence in the two war-torn Anglophone regions of the country, the Southwest and the Northwest.

“We denounce the arbitrary and indiscriminate killings of Cameroonians by armed forces and the Amba Boys,” the leaders said in a statement on Wednesday.

Cameroonians generally refer to armed separatist forces as “Amba Boys”, as they seek to form a new nation called “Ambazonia”.

“We denounce the rampant attacks on educational institutions and the deprivation of children of their right to education,” the statement said, criticizing the “sluggishness and inadequate methods” with which the government is acting to solve the problem.

The leaders who said they were speaking “in one voice and on behalf of all believers and people of good will” insist the conflict can only be resolved through reconciliation and peace.

“We call on the government to promptly initiate and announce a national plan for resolving this crisis, taking into account its real and profound causes in view of establishing veritable peace,” Archbishop Samuel Kleda, president of the National Episcopal Conference and one of the signatories of the statement told Xinhua.

An armed conflict is in progress in the two Anglophone regions of Cameroon where armed separatist forces have declared “independence”.

According to the United Nations, the conflict has displaced over 180,000 people internally and at least 30,000 are seeking refuge in neigbouring Nigeria.

Xinhuanet