Remembering President George H.W. Bush, dead at 94

Jesuit priest who led teacher training center killed in South Sudan

Catholic News Service


Nov 16, 2018 CONTRIBUTOR



Father Victor Luke Odhiambo, 62, a Jesuit priest from Kenya, was killed Nov. 14 when armed men stormed a church compound where he lived in central South Sudan, said John Madol, Gok state information minister. The priest had been the director of a Catholic Church-run training center for teachers. (Credit: CNS photo/courtesy East Africa Province.)

NAIROBI, Kenya - A Jesuit priest from Kenya was reported killed in central South Sudan, according to local media.

Father Victor Luke Odhiambo, 62, died Nov. 14 when armed men stormed a church compound where he lived, said John Madol, Gok state information minister.

The priest had been the director of a Catholic Church-run training center for teachers.

Madol told Radio Tamazuj that a motive for the killing remained unclear.

“One person has been arrested and in custody. He will tell us who the other people involved,” he said.

In response, the Gok state officials declared three days of mourning in memory of Father Odhiambo.

About 37 percent of the South Sudan population is Catholic while most people are Christian.

The priest’s body was transferred to the Diocese of Rumbek for repatriation to Kenya.



The death was the second of a Kenyan clergyman ministering in South Sudan in the past two years. In June 2017, a Protestant minister was murdered in the capital of Juba by a young man who accused him of preaching too loudly during morning prayers.

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Indonesian Quake, Tsunami Kills Hundreds, Death Toll Seen Rising

No level of alcohol consumption is healthy, scientists say

HEALTH 

12 hours ago

 

By Christopher Carbone | Fox News

A new study says that no amount of drinking is good for you. (iStock)

When it comes to drinking alcohol, the healthiest thing to do is abstain entirely, according to a large, wide-ranging report published by scientists.

Alcohol led to 2.8 million premature deaths in 2016; it was the leading risk factor for premature mortality and disability in the 15 to 49 age group, accounting for 20 percent of deaths, according to the researchers at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, who carried out the study.

Millions of people turn to the Nerds to find the best credit cards, up their credit score, land the perfect mortgage and so much more. Ma...


Globally, 27.1 percent of cancer deaths in women and 18.9 percent in men over age 50 were linked to the their drinking habits, according to the study’s findings, which were published in the Lancet medical journal.


Researchers investigated the health effects of alcohol consumption in 195 countries between 1990 and 2016—using data from 694 studies to find out how common drinking was and from 592 studies to determine health risks.

The study, which received funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, also analyzed whether moderate levels of drinking could have health benefits—which previous studies have indicated. 

Senator John McCain dies at 81

Pope appeals for end of migrant shipwrecks, prays for dead

 

11 hrs ago 

 

© The Associated Press Paramedics carry a person rescued from a boat that capsized off Cyprus' northern coastline, as he is brought to a hospital in Silifke, near the city of Mersin, southern Turkey, late Wednesday, July 18, 2018. A boat carrying about 150 migrants capsized off the northern coast of Cyprus on Wednesday, with the search continuing and some 105 people rescued so far according to the Turkish coast guard. (Mustafa Ercan/DHA-Depo Photos via AP) 

VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis has lamented the latest migrant deaths in shipwrecks of smugglers' boats and entreated nations to act swiftly to prevent more tragedies.

Francis in his traditional Sunday appearance to faithful in St. Peter's Square expressed sorrow over recent deaths in the Mediterranean Sea and assured victims' loved ones of his prayers.

He called on "the international community to act decisively and quickly so similar tragedies aren't repeated" and said the "safety, respect of rights and the dignity of all must be guaranteed."

Far fewer migrants have arrived in Italy this year compared to the same period in 2017, but U.N. refugee officials say recent crossings have been deadlier.

With Italy's new populist government and Malta not allowing aid groups' boats to dock, rescued migrants lately have been stranded at sea for days.

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Crocodile kills pastor during lakeside baptism in Ethiopia

The man was conducting a ceremony for 80 followers on the edge of Lake Abaya when he was mauled to death by the reptile.

12:13, UK, Wednesday 06 June 2018

 

The crocodile spotted the pastor on the edge of the water before pulling him into the lake. File pic

A pastor has reportedly been killed by a crocodile whilst carrying out a lakeside baptism in Ethiopia.


Docho Eshete was conducting a ceremony for 80 people when the reptile leapt up at him from the water on Sunday, according to African media.


The crocodile dragged the pastor into Lake Abaya - situated in the southern city of Arba Minch - as those with him watched on, the Ethiopian news site Borkena reported.

His body was later recovered from the water with bite marks on his back, legs and hands, according to local reports.

The crocodile was not captured.

Fishermen and those who attended the ceremony are said to have tried to save the pastor.

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Ethiopia: Crocodile Kills Pastor Baptizing Followers Near A Lake In Arba.   Lake Abaya which covers an area of 1,162 km² is known to have a huge Crocodile population.
  Residents and fishermen made a huge effort to save the pastor’s life but were unsuccessful. #BIC97FM

12:27 AM - Jun 6, 2018

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Police officer Eiwnetu Kanko told local reporters that they used fishing nets to stop the crocodile from taking the pastor's body further into the water.

Shimelis Zenebe, director general of the Abaya National Park, told local radio station Sheger that crocodiles have started preying on animals on the edge of the lake.

He said this is because of decreasing fish populations.

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‘If You Were To Die Tonight’: Preacher Causes Panic In Theater At ‘Avengers’ Showing

April 27, 2018 at 10:42 pm



REDLANDS (CBSLA) — An outing to catch one of the season’s most anticipated films turned into a panic-filled afternoon for some moviegoers Friday.

Armed officers rushed to the Harkins Mountain Grove 16 theaters in Redlands, where people had just finished watching the latest installment of the “Avengers” franchise, fearing there might a gunman inside. Witnesses said when the movie was over, a man stood up and started yelling in what sounded like a preacher’s sermon.

“I think when he said, ‘If you were to die tonight, would your passage to heaven be guaranteed?’ — something along those lines — I think that’s when people started panicking,” Susie Arias told CBS2 News.

Arias said she and her partner were able to walk out, but they said people behind them started running and pushing in an effort to exit quickly.

“That’s when the kind of chaos happened in the little exit, where people were jumping over the railings, and kind of falling over, twisting their ankles and hitting their head,” recalled Adrian Arias.

In footage taken immediately after the incident, a man can be seen limping out of the theater. Police said a woman hit her head and had to be hospitalized.

“I thought she had fainted, passed out, completely passed out,” said Susie.

The culprit in all this chaos? Michael Webber.

The 28-year-old preacher with Truth and Triumph Ministries told CBS2 via phone he’s preached at the theater before with no problems.

“Last night was an anomaly,” said Webber. “The lights did not turn up for quite a few minutes, and so I really couldn’t see anyone’s reaction except those of the people just right around me.”

He added he didn’t know the people in the theater couldn’t see he had his hands up, showing he did not have a weapon.

“It’s extremely unfortunate that anyone sustained injuries because of this,” lamented Webber. “Again, I was unarmed.”

Susie told CBS2 she wasn’t aware of that at the time, and she didn’t want to take any chances, given what has happened at theaters around the world in recent years, such as the shooting at a theater in Aurora, Colorado in 2012.

“I think that’s why people reacted,” said Susie. “They just felt like, ‘We have to get out, no matter what the cost.'”

Arias said she hopes Webber realizes the fear she caused in others.

“If you’re gonna try to draw people towards the Bible, that’s not the way to do it, and he needs to stop,” admonished Arias.

Webber has been charged with a misdemeanor. He told CBS2 this will not deter his evangelizing, but he might reconsider his setting.

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Billy Graham Death "A SIGN"? - False Prophets, False Revival and a FALSE...

Former first lady Barbara Bush dies at 92

The military's run of fatal accidents: Coincidence, or crisis?

by Jamie McIntyre
| April 08, 2018 12:01 AM

O March 14, a Navy F/A-18 Super Hornet jet crashed in the waters outside Key West, Fla. There have been four more military aviation incidents this year alone.
(Rob O'Neal/The Key West Citizen via AP)


It’s been a bad few weeks for U.S. military aviation.

Since a U.S. Navy F/A-18 Super Hornet crashed off the Florida coast March 14, killing both pilots, there have been four more aviation accidents that have claimed a dozen more lives. And that’s just this year.

In the last three months of 2017, four major accidents killed 12 more service members. That’s 26 deaths in six months.

Barone's Guide to Government: Freedom of Religion

That can’t be normal. Or can it?

Pentagon officials have to tread warily when discussing unusual clusters of deadly accidents that may be a statistical anomaly, but are nevertheless tragic and may have been avoidable.

So even if the safety data indicates that the number and rate of military accidents are on a par with years past, no military official can be seen as callously dismissing deaths as simply a normal cost of doing business.

Trump Tower fire: One dead, four New York City firefighters hurt

USA TODAY

Christal Hayes 38 mins ago 

© Mark Lennihan, AP Trump Tower in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City, shown on March 16, 2016, has 58 floors of offices and condominiums, including 263 residential units.

Fire crews responded Saturday evening to a small blaze at Trump Tower in New York that left at least one person dead and four firefighters injured, officials say.


A man, 67, was taken to the hospital but later died of his injured, said New York Police Department spokesman Ofc. George Tsourovakas, adding an investigation was underway.

Four firefighters also were injured as they battled the blaze on the 50th floor, including two who were burned. Their injuries are not life threatening according to New York City Fire Department.

© Muhammed Said Tanl/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images Smoke rises from the 50th floor of Trump Tower in New York, United States on April 7, 2018.

Onlookers outside Trump Tower took photos and video of the blaze as it grew, flames and smoke billowing from several high-rise windows. Some footage showed debris falling hundreds of feet to the street.

The fire started in a large apartment on the 50th floor, and when firefighters responded about 5:30 p.m., the entire unit was engulfed, said Daniel Nigro, commissioner of the New York City Fire Department.

► Jan. 8: Fire breaks out on roof of Trump Tower in NYC

► Sept. 19: 3 congressmen arrested outside Trump Tower in DREAM Act protest

"Members pushed in heroically, they were knocking down the fire and found one occupant of the apartment," he said, adding crews had a hard time battling the fire because it was up 50 stories and in a large unit.

Nigro said about 200 firefighters and EMS officials were called to the scene.

‘I’m not afraid:’ What Stephen Hawking said about God, his atheism and his own death

By Lori Johnston

March 14 at 11:02 AM
1:48

World-renowned physicist Stephen Hawking dies at 76

Theoretical physicist Stephen W. Hawking died on March 14 at age 76. Hawking was considered to have one of the greatest minds of this generation. (Amber Ferguson/The Washington Post)


British theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking schmoozed with popes during his lifetime, even though he was an avowed atheist. The famous scientist, who died Wednesday in England at 76, was often asked to explain his views on faith and God. During interviews, he explained his belief that there was no need for a creator.

He said during an interview with El Mundo in 2014: “Before we understand science, it is natural to believe that God created the universe. But now science offers a more convincing explanation. What I meant by ‘we would know the mind of God’ is, we would know everything that God would know, if there were a God, which there isn’t. I’m an atheist.”

That followed comments made to Reuters in 2007 in which Hawking, who had a condition much like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease or ALS) since 1963, described himself as “not religious in the normal sense.”

Billy Graham dies at 99

Danny Vierra, Adventist Health Reform Minister has passed away

This evening I've found out that Danny Vierra of Modern Manna Ministries, BellaVita Lifestyle Center, and the author of several books, including his most popular ,"Is the Virgin Mary dead or alive?", passed away on Sunday, December 31, 2017.

Here's a facebook post from Danny Vierra's Health Page:

Daniel Joseph Vierra is with Lauren Borges and 4 others.
December 31, 2017 at 11:40pm ·


Dear Friends,
We wanted to let you know that our Father passed away peacefully this evening, December 31 at 6:25 p.m. with his five children and their families, siblings, and close friends by his side. It has been an unexpected and difficult journey, but God has been beside us through it all. Thank you for giving us the time to grieve this loss. We will give you a more in-depth update in the coming days. May God bless you as you begin this new year. Come quickly, Lord Jesus.
Blessings,

Vierra Children

Danny Vierra's Health Page

Ireland Wanted to Forget. But the Dead Don’t Always Stay Buried.

THE LOST CHILDREN OF TUAM


By DAN BARRY OCT. 28, 2017


TUAM, Ireland

Behold a child.

A slight girl all of 6, she leaves the modest family farm, where the father minds the livestock and the mother keeps a painful secret, and walks out to the main road. Off she goes to primary school, off to the Sisters of Mercy.

Her auburn hair in ringlets, this child named Catherine is bound for Tuam, the ancient County Galway town whose name derives from a Latin term for “burial mound.” It is the seat of a Roman Catholic archdiocese, a proud distinction announced by the skyscraping cathedral that for generations has loomed over factory and field.

Two miles into this long-ago Irish morning, the young girl passes through a gantlet of gray formed by high walls along the Dublin Road that seem to thwart sunshine. To her right runs the Parkmore racecourse, where hard-earned shillings are won or lost by a nose. And to her left, the mother and baby home, with glass shards embedded atop its stony enclosure.

Behind this forbidding divide, nuns keep watch over unmarried mothers and their children. Sinners and their illegitimate spawn, it is said. The fallen.

But young Catherine knows only that the children who live within seem to be a different species altogether: sallow, sickly — segregated. “Home babies,” they’re called.

The girl’s long walk ends at the Mercy school, where tardiness might earn you a smarting whack on the hand. The children from the home are always late to school — by design, it seems, to keep them from mingling with “legitimate” students. Their oversize hobnail boots beat a frantic rhythm as they hustle to their likely slap at the schoolhouse door.

A sensitive child, familiar with the sting of playground taunts, Catherine nevertheless decides to repeat a prank she saw a classmate pull on one of these children. She balls up an empty candy wrapper and presents it to a home baby as if it still contains a sweet, then watches as the little girl’s anticipation melts to sad confusion.

Everyone laughs, nearly. This moment will stay with Catherine forever.

After classes end, the home babies hurry back down the Dublin Road in two straight lines, boots tap-tap-tapping, and disappear behind those Gothic walls. Sometimes the dark wooden front door is ajar, and on her way home Catherine thrills at the chance of a stolen peek.

Beyond those glass-fanged walls lay seven acres of Irish suffering. Buried here somewhere are famine victims who succumbed to starvation and fever a century earlier, when the home was a loathed workhouse for the homeless poor.

But they are not alone.

Deep in the distant future, Catherine will expose this property’s appalling truths. She will prompt a national reckoning that will leave the people of Ireland asking themselves: Who were we? Who are we?

At the moment, though, she is only a child. She is walking home to a father tending to the cattle and a mother guarding a secret, away from the Irish town whose very name conjures the buried dead.


Ritual and Remembrance

In Ireland, the departed stay present.

David Rockefeller, Philanthropist and Head of Chase Manhattan, Dies at 101

By JONATHAN KANDELLMARCH 20, 2017

Credit

Michael Evans/The New York Times

David Rockefeller, the banker and philanthropist with the fabled family name who controlled Chase Manhattan bank for more than a decade and wielded vast influence around the world even longer as he spread the gospel of American capitalism, died on Monday morning at his home in Pocantico Hills, N.Y. He was 101.

A family spokesman, Fraser P. Seitel, confirmed the death.

Chase Manhattan had long been known as the Rockefeller bank, though the family never owned more than 5 percent of its shares. But Mr. Rockefeller was more than a steward. As chairman and chief executive throughout the 1970s, he made it “David’s bank,” as many called it, expanding its operations internationally.

His stature was greater than any corporate title might convey, however. His influence was felt in Washington and foreign capitals, in the corridors of New York City government, art museums, great universities and public schools.

Mr. Rockefeller could well be the last of an increasingly less visible family to have cut so imposing a figure on the world stage. As a peripatetic advocate of the economic interests of the United States and of his own bank, he was a force in global financial affairs and in his country’s foreign policy. He was received in foreign capitals with the honors accorded a chief of state.

He was the last surviving grandson of John D. Rockefeller, the tycoon who founded the Standard Oil Company in the 19th century and built a fortune that made him America’s first billionaire and his family one of the richest and most powerful in the nation’s history.

As an heir to that legacy, Mr. Rockefeller lived all his life in baronial splendor and privilege, whether in Manhattan (as a boy he and his brothers would roller-skate along Fifth Avenue trailed by a limousine in case they grew tired) or at his magnificent country estates.

Imbued with the understated manners of the East Coast elite, he loomed large in the upper reaches of a New York social world of glittering black-tie galas. His philanthropy was monumental, and so was his art collection, a museumlike repository of some 15,000 pieces, many of them masterpieces, some lining the walls of his offices 56 floors above the streets at Rockefeller Center, to which he repaired, robust and active, well into his 90s.

The Cuban Dichotomy: Solemn Mourning in Cuba, and Exuberant Celebration in Miami

..

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

Observation:

These same Cubans if they leave Cuba, they will then condemn the Castro Regime;
But, the Cuban Refugees are not so critical of the Dictatorship when they return for a vacation in their homeland. 

Perplexing!

 

Former Jesuit Black Pope (Kolvenbach) dies at 87

Former Jesuit leader who faced stiff tests dies at 87

Crux Staff

November 26, 2016

AUTHOR

Father Peter Hans Kolvenbach. (Credit: Image courtesy of the Society of Jesus.)
Father Peter Hans Kolvenbach, who led the worldwide Jesuit order for a quarter century from 1983 to 2008, and who broke with tradition by voluntarily resigning what had once been a lifetime job, died on Sunday in Beirut four days shy of his 88th birthday.


Father Peter Hans Kolvenbach, who led the worldwide Jesuit order for a quarter century from 1983 to 2008, and who broke with tradition by voluntarily resigning what had once been a lifetime job, died on Sunday in Beirut four days shy of his 88th birthday.

An internal Jesuit email broke the news of Kolvenbach’s death and told members that “further information will follow.”

Born in the Netherlands, to a Dutch father and mother of Italian heritage, Kolvenbach did his early Jesuit studies at a college in Nijmegen in the years immediately after World War II.

Kolvenbach spent much of his career in Lebanon, having earned his doctorate in Beirut and being ordained as a priest of the Armenian Catholic Church. At one point he was also the superior of the Jesuits’ Middle East vice-province, which includes Lebanon, Syria and Egypt.

From 1964 to 1976, Kolvenbach taught general and Oriental linguistics both in Europe and Beirut. Eventually he was appointed Professor of General Linguistics and Armenian at Université de Saint-Joseph, and after that served as rector of the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome.

Kolvenbach took over leadership of the Jesuits at a sensitive moment, after St. Pope John Paul II set aside the order’s constitutions by imposing his own interim team - in part because the then-superior, Father Pedro Arrupe, had suffered a stroke, but also because Arrupe’s strongly pro-social justice and church reform orientation was seen by critics as having made the Jesuits something akin to John Paul’s in-house opposition.

Over his tenure as the “Black Pope,” Kolvenbach generally tried to stay out of the limelight, but at times found himself handling delicate situations such as the Vatican investigation of Belgian Jesuit theologian Father Jacques Dupuis.

Kolvenbach tried to work some back-room diplomacy but still saw Dupuis’ work criticized by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith under then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the future Benedict XVI.

Over time, Kolvenbach was credited with having managed to win back the trust of John Paul II and his Vatican team, without alienating the more liberal members of the order.

In 2006, Kolvenbach informed his fellow Jesuits that with permission of then-Pope Benedict XVI, he would resign his office two years later. Benedict himself, of course, would follow suit a few years later, resigning the papacy.

Upon retirement Kolvenbach returned to Beirut, making his home in a Jesuit community in the city.

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Pope Francis grieves, prays for atheist revolutionary Castro

Reuters

November 26, 2016



VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Francis said the death of Cuba's revolutionary leader Fidel Castro was "sad news" and that he was grieving and praying for his repose.

Francis expressed his condolences in a Spanish-language message to Fidel's brother, President Raul Castro on Saturday.

The pope, who met Fidel Castro when he visited Cuba last year, said he had received the "sad news" and added: "I express to you my sentiments of grief."

Fidel Castro, who was a professed atheist, was baptized as a Catholic and educated in schools run by the Jesuits, the religious order of which the pope is a member.

(Reporting by Philip Pullella; Editing by Alexander Smith)

Raw: Pope Francis' Last Mass Of Cuba Trip


Speaking at Mass in Cuba's holiest shrine, with President Raul Castro attending, Pope Francis calls on Catholics to "build bridges, sow reconciliation." (Sept. 22)



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