VATICAN INFORMATION SERVICE   
   YEAR XXII - # 092   
   DATE 19-05-2015   
      
   Summary:   
   - Statistics on the Catholic Church in Bosnia and Herzegovina   
   - The Pope to the Italian bishops: denounce corruption, which impoverishes all   
   - Other Pontifical Acts   
      
   ___________________________________________________________   
      
    Statistics on the Catholic Church in Bosnia and Herzegovina   
    Vatican City, 19 May 2015 (VIS) - The Holy Father will make an apostolic trip   
   to Sarajevo, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, on 6 June. The following are some   
   statistical data on the Catholic Church in this country, from the Central   
   Office   
   of Church Statistics.   
    Bosnia and Herzegovina has a surface area of 51,197 sq. km. and a population   
   of   
   3,833,000 inhabitants, of whom 43,900 are Catholics - 11.5% of the population.   
   There are four ecclesiastical circumscriptions, 304 parishes and one parish   
   centre. The apostolate consists of six bishops, 624 priests, 14 men religious   
   and 537 women religious. There are 68 catechists and 120 major seminarians.   
    The Catholic Church in Bosnia and Herzegovina has 16 educational centres   
   including pre-school, primary, middle, secondary and high schools, and a   
   university. There are also six clinics, four rest homes for the elderly and   
   disabled, four orphanages and nurseries, six family counselling centres and   
   life   
   protection centres, three centres for social education or re-education, and six   
   centres of other types.   
      
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    The Pope to the Italian bishops: denounce corruption, which impoverishes all   
    Vatican City, 19 May 2015 (VIS) - "Our vocation is to listen when the Lord   
   asks   
   us: 'Console my people'. Indeed, we are asked to console, to help, to   
   encourage,   
   without discrimination, all our brothers who are oppressed by the weight of   
   their crosses, without ever tiring of working to lift them up again with the   
   strength that comes only from God", said Pope Francis yesterday afternoon to   
   the   
   bishops of the Italian Episcopal Conference, as he inaugurated the 68th   
   assembly, to be held in the Vatican to analyse the reception of the Apostolic   
   Exhortation "Evangelii Gaudium" (The Joy of the Gospel).   
    Proclaiming the Gospel today, a difficult moment in history, requires prelates   
   to "go against the grain: or rather, to be joyful witnesses of the Risen Christ   
   to transmit joy and hope to others", said the Holy Father, who went on to   
   illustrate the importance of the "ecclesial sensibility", which means assuming   
   the same sentiments as Christ, "sentiments of humility, compassion,   
   concreteness   
   and wisdom".   
    A sensibility that also involves "not being timid ... in denouncing and   
   fighting   
   against a widespread mentality of the public and private corruption that   
   shamelessly impoverishes families, pensioners, honest workers and Christian   
   communities, discarding the young, who are systematically deprived of any hope   
   for their future, and above all marginalising the weak and the needy. It is an   
   ecclesial sensibility that, as good pastors, makes us go forth towards the   
   People of God to defend them from ideological colonisations that take away   
   their   
   identity and human dignity".   
    This sensibility is also made tangible in pastoral decisions and in the   
   elaboration of documents "where the abstract theoretical-doctrinal aspect must   
   not prevail, as if our directions were intended not for our People or our   
   country, but only for a few scholars or specialists - instead we must make the   
   effort to translate them into concrete and comprehensible proposals",   
   emphasised   
   Francis.   
    The strengthening of the essential role of the laity is another of the   
   concrete   
   applications of pastoral sensibility, since "laypeople with an authentic   
   Christian formation should not need a bishop-guide ... to assume their own   
   responsibilities at all levels, political to social, economic to legislative.   
   However, they do need a bishop-pastor".   
    Finally, the ecclesial sensibility is revealed in a tangible way "in   
   collegiality and in the communion between bishops and their priests; in the   
   communion between bishops themselves; between dioceses which are materially and   
   vocationally rich and those in difficulty; between the periphery and the   
   centre;   
   between episcopal conferences and the bishops, and the Successor of Peter". He   
   remarked, "in some parts of the world we see a widespread weakening of   
   collegiality, both in pastoral planning and in the shared undertaking of   
   economic and financial commitments. The habit of checking the reception of   
   programmes and the implementation of projects is lacking. For example,   
   conferences or events are organised which promote the usual voices,   
   anaesthetising the Communities, approving choices, opinions and people, instead   
   of allowing us to be transported towards the horizons where the Holy Spirit   
   asks   
   us to go".   
    "Why do we let the religious institutes, monasteries and congregations age so   
   much, almost to the point of no longer giving evangelical witness faithful to   
   the founding charism? Why do we not try to regroup them before it is too   
   late?".   
   This is a global problem that, as the Holy Father stated, indicates a lack of   
   ecclesial sensibility.   
    "I will end here, after have presented to you a few examples of weakened   
   ecclesial sensibility due to the need to continually face enormous global   
   problems and the crisis that spares not even the Christian and ecclesial   
   identity itself", he concluded, asking the Lord to grant to all during the   
   Jubilee Year of Mercy "the joy of rediscovering and making fruitful God's   
   mercy,   
   with which we are all called to console every man and every woman of our time".   
      
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    Other Pontifical Acts   
    Vatican City, 19 May 2015 (VIS) - The Holy Father has appointed:   
    - Rev. Fr. James Massa and Rev. Fr. Witold Mroziewski as auxiliaries of   
   Brooklyn (area 466, population 4,838,406, Catholics 1,403,137, priests 604,   
   permanent deacons 225, religious 1,053), U.S.A.   
    Bishop-elect Massa was born in Jersey City, U.S.A., in 1960 and was ordained a   
   priest in 1986. He holds a master's degree in theology from the Yale University   
   School of Divinity, New Haven, and a doctorate in systematic theology from   
   Fordham University, New York. He has served in a number of roles in the diocese   
   of Brooklyn, including parish vicar, chaplain and professor at the Kansas   
   Newman   
   College, professor at the Pope John XXIII national seminary and the seminary of   
   the Immaculate Conception, executive director of the ecumenical and   
   interreligious committee of the U.S.A. episcopal conference, consultor of the   
   Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, professor of the St. Joseph   
   seminary, moderator of the curia and administrator of the Holy Name Parish.   
    Bishop-elect Mroziewski was born in Augustow, Poland in 1966 and was ordained   
   a   
   priest in 1991. He holds master's degrees in theology and canon law, and a   
   doctorate in canon law from the Catholic University of Lublin, Poland. He has   
   served in a number of roles, including parish vicar in the diocese of Lomza,   
   Poland, and in Brooklyn, parish vicar, administrator, parish priest, judge at   
   the diocesan tribunal, coordinator of the Polish apostolate, adjunct promoter   
   of   
   justice for criminal causes, member of the presbyteral council and defender of   
   the bond. He is currently parish priest of the Holy Cross parish in Maspeth.   
      
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