Johannesburg, 19 December, 2023 / 8:58 pm (ACI Africa).
Stephen Cardinal Brislin has called for prayer for an end to the Israel-Hamas war following the reported December 16 attack on the Holy Family Catholic Church in Gaza and on the Centre for Disabled Children, which the Missionaries of Charity run within the Parish compound.
In a December 16 statement, the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, which oversees the Catholic Church in the Holy Land, claimed that a sniper of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) “murdered two Christian women inside the Holy Family Parish in Gaza, where the majority of Christian families has taken refuge since the start of the war.”
The statement also indicated that there was no warning issued by the IDF ahead of the attack, alleging that the victims “were shot in cold blood inside the premises of the parish, where there are no belligerents.”
In a Tuesday, December 19 statement, the Archbishop of Cape Town in South Africa appeals for prayers, saying, “Let us pray for peace and an end to this horrifying violence that seems to have as its aim the annihilation of Gaza.”
Cardinal Brislin asks the Clergy, women and men Religious in his Metropolitan See to make parishioners aware of the attacks in Gaza. He says, “Please ask them to keep in prayer the minuscule Christian community in Gaza together with all those who have been so badly affected by the war – those killed, who have lost loved ones, those maimed, those displaced, those without food and water.”
