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Vatican to launch special web site in February exclusively for Jubilee 2000 activities

      As the time grows nearer to the plethora of events planned for Jubilee 2000 that will last from Christmas Eve this year through the Feast of the Epiphany 2001, the Holy See has deemed it necessary to launch a web site specifically to cover the Jubilee. This will also prevent their regular vatican web site from becoming overloaded as well as providing universal news on events, documents, prayers and activities. For more, click on Jubilee 2000.

      VATICAN (CWNews.com) -- Beginning on February 22, 1999, the Vatican will make extensive information about the celebration of the Jubilee Year 2000 available on the Internet.

      When it is launched, the new site-- Jubil2000.org-- will provide information and announcements from the central committee coordinating the Jubilee celebration at the Vatican. It will also offer news about local events around the world, on the basis of reports obtained from apostolic nuncios and national committees.

      For now the site is available only on a restricted basis, for those who have obtained a password. But in February it will be made open to the public, and the various announcements will be available in 7 languages: Italian, French, English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, and Polish. Eventually the translations will also include Russian and Chinese.

      The new site is an answer to the Holy Father's request to the New Evangelization through mass media. In his encyclical Redemptoris Missio, Pope John Paul II affirmed: "Involvement in the mass media, however, is not meant merely to strengthen the preaching of the Gospel. There is a deeper reality involved here: since the very evangelization of modern culture depends to a great extent on the influence of the media, it is not enough to use the media simply to spread the Christian message and the Church's authentic teaching. It is also necessary to integrate that message into the `new culture' created by modern communications."

      At a January 15 press conference in Rome, Cardinal Roger Etchegaray-- the president of the Jubilee committee-- announced the construction of the new Internet site among the major accomplishments of the Jubilee effort. He also unveiled new publications designed to help pilgrims coming to Rome for the Jubilee; these publications will offer practical guides as well as calendars of events and suggestions for prayers.

      The Jubilee committee has also completed the composition of an official hymn for the Jubilee year, and a special votive Mass "pro jubileo" which will be offered for use by the world's priests during the holy year.

      The committee is establishing a welcome center for the millions of pilgrims who are expected to travel to Rome during 2000. The center will be a joint project of the Vatican and secular officials in Rome. And the committee has signed agreements with hotels, religious institutes, and bed-and-breakfast establishments, to guarantee that at least 60,000 beds will be available to visitors.

      In a related story out of Frankfort, Germany, DaimlerChrysler AG announced on Wednesday that it had received a major contract from a Rome-based transportation company to provide more than 1,000 buses in time for the Jubilee Year in 2000.

      DaimlerChrysler's German-based EvoBus GmbH Setra-Omnibusse unit said that it had agreed to provide the Templa consortium with the buses by 2000. The first buses would be delivered this July under the 500 million mark (US$2.98 million) contract. More than 25 million pilgrims are expected to visit the Eternal City during the Holy Year marking the start of the third Christian millennium.

      The Holy Year starts on Christmas Eve, 1999 and ends on January 6, 2001. The event is expected to possibly attract history's biggest pilgrimage to Rome. The Setra S 315 GT-HD and Mercedes-Benz O 404, also called Satellite coaches, are to be bought by Italian bus companies to transport visitors to Rome.

Hope heightens for kidnapped Sierra Leone prelate with declaration of cease-fire in that war-torn African country

      The news late last week out of Sierra Leone was encouraging with the announcement that peacekeeping forces have the rebels on the run. In order to survive, the rebel forces have asked for a cease-fire truce, hoping to ransom their jailed leader by exchanging hostages - two of which are Archbishop Joseph Ganda, kidnapped last week, and Father Mario Guerra who has been in captivity for two months. For more, click on Hostage exchange.

      FREETOWN, Sierra Leone (CWNews.com) - Sierra Leone rebels are prepared to ask for a cease-fire after a West African peacekeeping force drove them from the capital Freetown following a month of fight, according to UN officials on Thursday.

      UN special envoy Francis Okelo said he had been contacted by the rebel Revolutionary United Front who planned to begin the cease-fire on Monday. The rebels also demanded to speak to their imprisoned leader, Foday Sankoh, and insisted on his release next week.

      Meanwhile, the Rome-based MISNA missionary news agency said rebels told Catholic officials that Archbishop Joseph Ganda of Freetown, who was kidnapped this week, and Italian missionary Father Mario Geurra, who was kidnapped in November, could be released in exchange for a cease-fire.

Mexican faithful hoping the Holy Father will touch a nerve with the administration on economic sanctions

      It's no secret Mexican officials are a bit on edge in anticipation if Pope John Paul II, during his papal visit later this week, will address an issue that could be a bombshell between the government and the people - the economic imbalance that makes the rich richer and the poor poorer. While some are doubtful the Pope will delve into such a delicate matter, there are many who believe he cannot afford not to. For more, click on No mincing in Mexico.

      MEXICO CITY (CWNews.com) - A rising controversy over the Mexican government's "neoliberal" economic policies has raised speculation this week that Pope John Paul will address the issue when he visits the country next week.

      The government has passed new austerity measure in the latest budget that sharply increase gasoline prices and deregulate the price of tortillas, the staple food of the Mexican diet -- moves which many see as part of an effort to pad the pockets of a few at the expense of many. "We are caught in the whirlwind of an economy which has exclusion as its premise ... and which has placed in the hands of a few the majority of goods, leaving millions without real opportunities for progress," Cardinal Norbeta Rivera of Mexico City said in a homily at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe.

      Mexican officials were said by some commentators to be nervous that the Holy Father might speak on the issue which allow opposition groups to seize on the comment and use it against the government policies. But Bishop Luis Morales Reyes, president of the Mexican bishops' conference, said: "He will not touch on delicate subjects. He has always shown the utmost respect for the autonomy of each country."

Pope admonishes Bosnian Bishops to refurbish the faith and seek a reconciliating posture in their land

      Despite Sarajevo Cardinal Vinko Puljic's claims that vocations are on the increase, the Holy Father insisted that the Bishops concentrate on refurbishing the faith and feelings that have been greatly damaged over this past decade from ethnic cleansing and terrible conflicts throughout Bosnia-Hercegovina. He issued the challenge of pardoning and seeking pardon during the Bishops' ad limina visit to the Vatican late last week. For more, click on Beginning anew in Bosnia

      VATICAN (CWNews.com) -- The plight of refugees was the top item on the agenda when Pope John Paul II met with the bishops of Bosnia-Herzegovina, who were making their ad limina visit on Friday.

      On the last ad limina visit by the bishops of Bosnia-Herzegovina, in 1993, the Pope had expressed deep concern about the radical drop in the number of Catholics living in the divided country, the flood of refugees, and the devastation suffered by the local dioceses during the fighting in central Bosnia-- especially around the dioceses of Banja Luka and Posavina. Now, with the Church in the midst of a major rebuilding project, the Holy Father emphasized the need to guarantee a stable peace, to ensure that refugees are able to return to their homes, and to provide equal treatment for the three main ethnic groups of Bosnia-Herzegovina: the Bosnians, Serbs, and Croats.

      "What is demanded of Catholics should apply to the other religious communities and ethnic groups as well," the Pope said. He encouraged the bishops to continue their active participation in dialogue with other groups, mentioning in particular the Orthodox churches. "Be untiring messengers of pardon and reconciliation," he urged them.

      The bishops of Bosnia-Herzegovina, led by Cardinal Vinko Puljic of Sarajevo, reported that the Church is recovering from the devastation of war, and religious vocations have been numerous in the post-war years.

For more headlines and articles, we suggest you go to the Catholic World News site at the CWN home page and Church News at Noticias Eclesiales. Both CWN and NE are not affiliated with the Daily CATHOLIC but provides this service via e-mail to the Daily CATHOLIC Monday through Friday.

    Today, in kicking off Christian Unity Week, we feature a site dedicated to this - providing an excellent hands-on blueprint on an individual basis and parish level in preparing now for the great influx of souls who will return after the illumination of the soul conversion, also referred to as the Warning and Miracle prophesied at Garabandal. This site is the MOTHER OF UNITY web site which has been awarded our coveted GOLDEN CHALICE AWARD. The ministry is under the capable direction of an excellent spiritual director, Father Bill McCarthy, Director of My Father's House in Moodus, CT and who contributed a regular column in this publication for many years.

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January 18, 1999 volume 10, no. 11   DAILY CATHOLIC