"The Christianity of history is not Protestantism. If ever there were a safe truth it is this, and Protestantism has ever felt it so; to be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant." (-John Henry Newman, An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine).

"Where the bishop is, there let the people gather; just as where ever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church". -St. Ignatius of Antioch (ca 110 AD)a martyr later thrown to the lions, wrote to a church in Asia Minor. Antioch was also where the term "Christian" was first used.

“But if I should be delayed, you should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth.” 1 Timothy 3:15

"This is the sole Church of Christ, which in the Creed we profess to be one, holy, catholic and apostolic." -CCC 811

Tuesday, March 8, 2016

Brave Enough! That's How Catholic Missionaries Witness to Christ's Love for All.

Catholic Missionaries are always willing to offer their precious lives to Christ even to die as martyrs.  That is WITNESSING.God bless our Religious Missionaries around the world especially those who are in places where Christians are roundly persecuted by Muslim terrorists!

Source: Breitbart
By Thomas D. Williams, Ph.D.4 Mar 2016

Franciscan Friars: ‘We Will Not Leave Lands Occupied by Jihadists’

After serious deliberation, the Franciscan Friars of the Custody of the Holy Land, a group of monks living in territory occupied by the Islamic State in Syria, have made the decision to stay on despite the dangers, insisting that a good shepherd never abandons his sheep.

In recent days, the Prior of the community, Father Pierbattista Pizzaballa, took a survey among his confreres asking whether whether in the face of new risks of violence and persecution it was better to stay on with the few remaining Christians or to move to safer territory.

The number of local Christians in the parishes of the Syrian villages under the control of Islamist forces continues to dwindle as many leave on their own or are driven out. Moreover, outright persecution against the Christians has also increased. Not long ago, one of the Franciscans, Father Dhiya Azziz, was abducted by Islamist militants, and only released after 12 days of detention.

After receiving a good number of responses, Father Pizzaballa said that “almost all have clearly expressed the view that it is only right to remain in the villages, without consideration for the number of parishioners or the danger involved.”

Pizzaballa also reflected that the Franciscans of the Custody “have never left the places and people that the Church has entrusted to it, even at risk of danger,” adding that “not a few of our martyrs, even in recent times, died in circumstances not too dissimilar from the current situation.”

“A shepherd does not abandon his flock,” he said, “and does not ask whether his sheep are worth much or little, or if they are numerous or young. For a shepherd all the sheep are important and he loves them all the same way.”

There are several hundred Christians in the regions of Syria where the Islamist militants rule, and the jihadists do everything in their power to make life as unpleasant as possible for the so-called infidels.

The villages of Knayeh, Yacoubieh and Jdeideh in the Orontes valley, for instance, are home to some four hundred baptized Christians. They continue to live, pray and attend mass there, even though the jihadists have stripped the three Catholic parishes in the area of bells, crosses and statues of saints.

Under the jihadist domination, Christians are allowed no public expressions of the Church’s life: no bells, no processions, no crosses on the churches, and no statues.

In autumn 2014, one of the Franciscans, Father Hanna Jallouf, the pastor of Knayeh, went in person to the Islamic Court in the area to denounce the increasing abuses perpetrated by Islamist brigades against the monastery.

Father Jallouf intended to see whether the “new order” imposed by the jihadists would guarantee the limited rights of a Christian subject, even those prescribed under Sharia law.

As a result, the jihadists arrested Father Jallouf on trumped up charged of cooperation with the regime of Bashar al-Assad, along with a group of young people of the parish, and they were held in detention.

Eventually Jallouf’s sentence was commuted to house arrest.

Nonetheless, the Franciscans are staying, insisting that until they are killed off, there will still be Christians in the Holy Land.

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