On the morning of Thursday 22 May, the friars of the Custody of the Holy Land gathered in the Basilica of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem to celebrate a Thanksgiving Mass for the election of the new Pope, Leo XIV. The Eucharistic celebration was presided over by the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, and concelebrated by Mons. Adolfo Tito Yllana, the Apostolic Nuncio in Israel and Apostolic Delegate to Jerusalem and Palestine, and by Fra Francesco Patton, Custos […]
The eleven “Martyrs of Damascus” will be declared saints on 20 October in Rome. For this solemn occasion, a gem of faith and art will enter St Peter’s Square, a reliquary which holds a relic of the martyrs, killed out of hatred of the faith in Damascus in 1860 (you can read the whole story here). This work of art was made in Bethlehem in 1926 and was already used for the ceremony of beatification in the same year and […]
We met Br. Francesco Ielpo, appointed Custos of the Holy Land by His Holiness Pope Leo XIV on Tuesday, June 24. We reach him by phone, still immersed in his responsibilities as General Visitor of the Franciscan Provinces of Campania, Basilicata, and Calabria, before he begins his full-time service as Custos of the Holy Land in the coming days. Br. Francesco, what does it mean to be a Franciscan today? I answer as St. Francis did: when asked this question, […]
The Italian-language Commissaries of the Holy Land met in Jerusalem for a period of learning, meeting and sharing. About twenty friars followed the course of “Jerusalem, holy city” from 1st to 9th June. A course for falling in love The course for Commissaries was organized by the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum (SBF). The programme combined theoretical and practical aspects, with lessons in the classroom and excursions to Jerusalem and its surroundings. “The basic idea is to make the Commissaries fall in […]
