Ishtartv.com
- asianews.it
06/26/2021
In 27 Jun, 2021, in all dioceses
of Iraq, the Chaldean
Church will hold prayers for peace in the region and for the end of
decades of violence, extremism and bloody conflicts. This will coincide with
the Consecration of the Middle East to the Holy Family.
The Chaldean Primate, Card Louis
Raphael Sako, will celebrate Mass in the Chaldean Cathedral of St Joseph in
Baghdad’s Karrada district, in communion with all the prelates of the country.
The service will be broadcast
live on the Patriarchate’s website and a video message with Pope Francis’s
apostolic blessing is expected at the end.
The "Day of Peace for the
Middle East", with its consecration to the Holy Family, is an initiative
of the Episcopal Committee of Justice and Peace of the Council of Catholic
Patriarchs of the Middle East, 130 years after the publication of the
Encyclical Rerum Novarum of Pope Leo XIII.
In Iraq, in addition to the
Chaldean primate, every local bishop will join the consecration with a Mass
celebrated inside their respective cathedral.
In Lebanon, Maronite Patriarch
Beshara al-Rahi will lead the Eucharistic liturgy in Diman, his summer
residence. He is scheduled to travel to the Vatican for a meeting on
1 July with Pope Francis to talk about the situation in his country.
Archbishop Pierbattista
Pizzaballa, Patriarch of Jerusalem of the Latins, will preside over the act of
consecration in the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth.
The pontiff will also join in, in
a message posted on the Chaldean Patriarchate’s website, that will stress the
parallel between Joseph and Mary who fled to protect Jesus and the many refugee
families today in the Middle East who fled from wars, hunger and violence.
This consecration, the Pope
notes, will help rediscover the nature of the vocation of those who profess the
Christian faith in the region.
Speaking about living together,
the pontiff cites the metaphor of the carpet, which is made up of many
different threads, becoming a complete work when they are intertwined with each
other.
If violence, conflict and hatred
tear even one thread, “everyone suffers,” the Pope says, and the design is
lost.
In his message the Pontiff
mentions the consolatory work of the Holy Spirit and the light of faith that
overcomes the fear of disciples and illuminates the journey of believers
(Christians, Jews and Muslims) who share the common lineage of Abraham, father
of all believers.
Thus, he calls on everyone to
experience what was prophesied in the human brotherhood predicted in the Abu
Dhabi document he signed together with the Grand Imam of al-Azhar Ahmed al
Tayyieb and in the meeting in Najaf with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.
At the end of the text, Pope
Francis blesses those who will take part, live or through the internet and
social media, in the liturgical celebrations taking place tomorrow across the
Middle East.
In conjunction with the consecration,
an icon of the Holy Family painted and inlaid with the relics of the Basilica
of the Annunciation of Nazareth, preserved above the altar of St Joseph's
Church, will be taken on pilgrimage to the different countries of the region.
The journey, the promoters
explain, will start in Lebanon and reach Rome by 8 December 2021, feast day of
the Immaculate Conception, and then finally return to the Holy Land.
|