We have a very Full issue of the First.

In addition to the participation of Cardinals Blase Cupich and Vinko Puljić, we are happy to announce that Cardinal Peter Turkson, Prefect of the Dicastery on Human Development will be joining us in Sarajevo and speaking at our closing dinner. Also, Toni Ross, Kristin Heyer, Andea Vicini, Antonio Autiero and I are going to meet in Sarajevo from May 14-17 to go over last minute plans. 

I am right now contacting media for coverage of the conference. We have participants from The Tablet, America, NCR and Commonweal. We are now

contacting others in Europe, Asia and Latin America. If you have suggestions, let me know directly. 

To prepare you for visiting Sarajevo, Kristin Heyer has provided a reading and viewing list of recommendations on Sarajevo. Please see it immediately below this letter.

Unfortunately, I have to share with you the death of the renowned ethicist, Luigi Lorenzetti. We attach below his obituary. Regarding the Forum, we have articles from Stan Alla (India), Pablo Blanco (Argentina), and Tom Massaro (USA). 

We have lots of regional news from Asia, North America, Europe, and Latin America.

And we conclude with still outstanding calls for papers.

Happy 1st of May.....

Jim

From James Keenan, SJ:

A very good start:  ABC NEWS reporting on Sarajevo two

months after the outbreak:

  http://abcnews.go.com/Archives/video/bosnia-war-sarajevo-siege-1992-9866571 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A good summary of the siege of Sarajevo:  

 

 

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Sarajevo

 

Remember: the war in all of Bosnia was bigger than 

just the siege of Sarajevo

Wikipedia gives a thorough background of how the 

vote for independence from Yugoslavia prompted 

the Bosnian Serbs to take back the referendum:   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosnian_War

 

So just when it is clear follow the war in Mostar:  

 

 

And then there's the Srebrenica massacre , 3 years 

after the outbreak of the war

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymf5p3LbCAE

 

21 years after Srebrenica, Radovan Karadzic is  sentenced

 

 

 

Ratko-Mladic is still not sentenced

  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/07/ratko-mladic-must-get-life-sentence-say-war-crimes-prosecutors

 

Art and culture reflecting on Sarajevo war:

 

A thoughtful 90 second reflection:  

 

 

Bono and Pavarotti doing Miss Sarajevo: 6minutes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zlmg0yzxKvQ

 

 

 

 

From William O'Neill, SJ:

The Bridge Betrayed: Religion and Genocide in Bosnia by  Michael A. Sells 

Available worldwide: Comparative Studies in Religion and Society

---

Summary:

 

The recent atrocities in Bosnia-Herzegovina have stunned people throughout the world. With Holocaust memories still painfully vivid, a question haunts us: how is this savagery possible? Michael A. Sells answers by demonstrating that the Bosnian conflict is not simply a civil war or a feud of age-old adversaries. It is, he says, a systematic campaign of genocide and a Christian holy war spurred by religious mythologies.

This passionate yet reasoned book examines how religious stereotyping-in popular and official discourse-has fueled Serbian and Croatian ethnic hatreds. Sells, who is himself Serbian American, traces the cultural logic of genocide to the manipulation by Serb nationalists of the symbolism of Christ's death, in which Muslims are "Christ-killers" and Judases who must be mercilessly destroyed. He shows how "Christoslavic" religious nationalism became a central part of Croat and Serbian politics, pointing out that intellectuals and clergy were key instruments in assimilating extreme religious and political ideas.

Sells also elucidates the ways that Western policy makers have rewarded the perpetrators of the genocide and punished the victims. He concludes with a discussion of how the multireligious nature of Bosnian society has been a bridge between Christendom and Islam, symbolized by the now-destroyed bridge at Mostar. Drawing on historical documents, unpublished United Nations reports, articles from Serbian and Bosnian media, personal contacts in the region, and Internet postings, Sells reveals the central role played by religious mythology in the Bosnian tragedy. In addition, he makes clear how much is at stake for the entire world in the struggle to preserve Bosnia's existence as a multireligious society.

 

From Mark Potter:

Logavina Street: Life and Death in a Sarajevo Neighborhood  by Barbara Demick

 

Destination Sarajevo website:   https://sarajevo.travel  

 

Sarajevo Navigator iPhone app used during 2017 visit:   https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/sarajevo-navigator/id1054780849?mt=8  

 

Other books and films about Sarajevo:

Link to the obituary of Luigi Lorenzetti.

Despenalizacian del Aborto en Argentina: el debate que nadie esperaba

Thomas Massaro,  Opioid Addiction: A National Crisis in Slow Motion

1. Conference announcement from Singapore (copied below);  the weblink is: 

https://www.monash.edu.my/sass/research/research-workshops-and-conferences/international-conference-on-gender-and-sexuality-in-asia-cogen-2018-november-12-14,-2018

2. Call for Papers for Asian Horizons (See Call for Papers Section below).

3.   Theological and Ethical Confab on Socio-Political Questions Held in Manila, Philippines - Three hundred people who are engaged in current socio-political issues in the Philippines participated in a two-day confab last April 19 and 20, 2018, held at the CICM Maryhill School of Theology in Quezon City. With the theme "The Prophetic Mission of the Church in Present-day Philippines," sixteen presentations and discussions dealt with various theological and ethical questions vis-à-vis the populist authoritarian regime of President Rodrigo Duterte. One of the major highlights of the gathering, and which the participants shared as a Christian imperative with a sense of urgency, is to challenge the culture of silence, deceit, intimidation, violence, and the weaponization of the laws and the social media through which the present political administration has been forcibly imposing its will upon the people. This prophetic work implies converting from within the structures and practices of the churches by moving out of its "self-referential" praxis and to become a "church of the periphery" (inspired by Pope Francis) that serves and find solace in the pains and hopes of the most vulnerable people in society. The participants are unanimous that solidarity with the poor, weak, victims, and forsaken is what is called for in order to advance the common good and to reassert engaged democratic citizenship in the country today. The Confab was spearheaded by  Laiki Agora - Philippines

, an association of professionals from various fields and disciplines that creates spaces of dialogue, discernment, and action on socio-political questions. - Emmanuel Serafica de Guzman  

On 17 April nearly 60 ethicists signed a statement

"Ethicists Without Borders on the Crisis in Syria"

 with 4 of its 6 drafters including North American Catholic theological ethicists Tobias Winright, 

 María Teresa Dávila, Anna Floerke Scheid, and Michael Jaycox. Additional signatures are still be accepted; please contact Tobias Winright at [email protected].

How can the church welcome, support and guide families who do not live according to the ideal of formal, lifelong and heterosexual marriage and who cannot fall back on previous experiences or proven role models? What social and spiritual resources are already present in these families? How should one adequately value the commitment and resilience, the joys and hopes that characterize them?

These were some of the major questions that were addressed during the international INTAMS Symposium on 26-28 April 2018 at the Catholic University of Leuven. Pope Francis' invitation to the church in Amoris laetitia to "accompany with attention and care the weakest of her children, who show signs of a wounded and troubled love, by restoring in them the hope and confidence" (AL 291), provided the title and the starting point for the reflection and discussion at the symposium. Most participants agreed that the magisterium, theologians and pastors alike should rethink approaches that regard the traditional marriage-based family type as normative and other forms of couple and family life as deficient. What is needed in this regard is on the side the awareness and a proper discernment of the complexity of today's interpersonal relationships and on the other side theological frameworks that help recognizing that God's grace is also at work in relationships which do not conform to traditional standards. In order to pave this double path, the organizers of the conference had invited a number of experts who addressed these questions from a sociological, psychological and theological perspective (among the theologians were Susannah Cornwall from Exeter University, Jochen Sautermeister from the University of Bonn and Martina Kreidler-Kos from Münster/Osnabrück) but they gave the floor also to testimonies from lived reality during a long panel session. How these personal accounts of divorce and remarriage, of a newly constituted family, of a longstanding gay relationship, of a lesbian relationship with children and of deliberately chosen single motherhood can both challenge and enrich theological thinking and imagination became an ongoing topic of discussion during the whole conference. Another highlight of the gathering was an evening conversation with Mgr. Johan Bonny, the bishop of Antwerp. Witnessing to his personal experience, the bishop reported how personal encounters with persons in non-traditional relationships had contributed to transforming his theological and pastoral approach.

The contributions to the Symposium will be shortly published in INTAMS' review Marriage, Families & Spirituality (see http://www.intams.org/journal/intro/ )

Participants of the Panel Session in Leuven

 

 

Report about the International Summer School entitled "The Potentials of Ageing" at the Theological College of Pecs, Hungary, 8 - 13 April, 2018 (written by Anthonyaiah Everest Dias, from Sri Lanka, studying at the University of Vienna)

 

It was a cherishing, wonderful and an unforgettable opportunity for a group of an International theological students of around 25 from about eleven countries around the world to participate in a summer school organized on the theme of 'The Potentials of Ageing' by the theological college of Pecs, Hungary with the sponsorship of CEEPUS from 8^th to 13^th of April 2018.

The five days of program with inputs given and excursion connected to the theme by different resourceful persons from different international Universities were extra ordinarily arranged. The students who are in touch with their theological studies, were from different nations such as Austria, India, Sri-Lanka, Tanzania, Ghana, Croatia, Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Slovenia and Hungary. The arrangement of the whole program with an interesting methodology was very much appreciable. The themes of the day dealt by different Professors were also pointing to the subject: The aspect of Autonomy and the meaning of Ageing by Prof. Kovács Gusztáv, The stage of getting old with dignity and Ageing and Discrimination  by Prof. Piotr Morciniec, The Discussion on the Potentials and problems of Ageing by Prof. Roman Globokar, Ageing in Biblical and Patristic perspective by Prof. Zdravko Jovanovic, Ageing: the chance for a better understanding of Mortality by Prof. Sigrid Müller. Other appropriate programs such as the visits to the Szent Lorinc home for the Elderly, The Holy Eucharist together with the Inmates, the exposure to the historical and religious places specially to the Cathedral, the Bishop palaces and the Climbing of Mount, the cultural dances of Hungary and the communal meal together were wonderfully organized.

The movie views and the group discussions, the inputs and role play and theatres were very meaningful to the theme as well as for our personal integrations. The unity in understanding the fact of the potentials of the aged people in our society was the strength in multiplicity of different cultures and backgrounds of the participants. The object of the whole program was to make us the new generation understand the fact that the Ageing is a gracious gift given by God to cause us to ask about and work on the real and significant issues of life. It was not only an eye opening for new generations but also a lesson to what and how we are going to face the reality and experience the same stage in the future. It was also a pastoral learning of how the church should respond to the need of Ageing people. I thank all the good people and the whole organizing team on behalf of all the Participants for this wonderful and unforgettable experience.

The overall activities and organizations specially the food and provisions and accommodation were very well done. The role of Prof. Gusztáv Kovács, the rector and the chief organizer and his whole team work was excellent. The sponsorship by CEEPUS is to be greatly appreciated as we all were delighted to have such a wonderful and generous scholarship in summer school. Köszönöm!

Pablo Blanco nos cuenta que el 3 de marzo en el auditorio SADOP de Buenos Aires

Call for papers for a guest-edited issue of the Journal of Moral Theology. The issue's focus is on Catholic bioethics and health care ethics, and it will be co-edited by Tobias Winright, Rachelle Barina, and Nathaniel Hibner. Submissions due on May 15, 2018

Link to the journal website

Call for papers for the International Conference for Gender and Sexuality Asia: 

Link to pdf

The Pontifical Universities of Rome now offers a one year joint diploma in Integral Ecology.

Click here for more information