Posted on 12/27/2004 1:27:59 PM PST by Mike Fieschko
New Delhi, Dec. 27 (CWNews.com) - Following the devastating tidal wave that has claimed nearly 8,000 lives in India on Sunday, the Catholic Church is mourning the tragedy.Tidal waves rising as high as 40 feet hit the eastern coast of India as well as Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia. The tsunami followed a powerful earthquake, measuring 8.9 on the Richter scale, in the Indian Ocean with its epicenter under the sea near Sumatra island in Indonesia.
Describing the aftermath of the tidal wave as "dreadful tragedy", the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India (CBCI) on Monday said that the Indian Church is "very much saddened by the shocking news of the massive earthquake and resultant tidal waves that hit the coastal areas. on Sunday morning."
Several hundred Catholic pilgrims died at the Marian shrine of Velankanni, which faces the sea in the southern Tamil Nadu state. "This is a catastrophe," Bishop Devadass Ambrose of Thanjavur told CWN from the Basilica of Our Lady of Good Health at Velankanni. Nearly 20 million pilgrims from all over India and southeast Asia visit the shrine, which is south of the city of Chennai (earlier known as Madras)-- in search of healing for physical ailments.
"I have never seen a calamity like this," said Bishop Ambrose, whose diocese includes the shrine. "There has been no casualty inside the basilica as the water did not enter the basilica compound," reported the bishop. About 2,000 people were attending Mass inside the basilica when the tidal wave hit the Velankanni coast, crushing the walls around the shrine.
However, Bishop Ambrose said that hundreds of pilgrims had been on the beach in front of the basilica when the tidal wave hit without warning. Other pilgrims who were shopping in the stalls in front of the shrine, or stopping in the barber shops to receive a tonsure-- an old custom there-- were also killed. "We recovered more than 400 bodies today. There could be more bodies lying around," Bishop Ambrose added.
Elsewhere on the Indian coastal region, several parishes have been reported deaths of its members and damage to church properties. Two churches crowded with faithful parishioners-- one in Tamil Nadu, the other in neighboring Andhra Pradesh-- crowded were struck during Sunday Mass. At least 100 people died in those churches.
Meanwhile, the CBCI said that in the affected areas-- mostly in the eastern coastal states of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and the islands of Andaman and Nicobar in the Bay of Bengal-- "the Catholic institutions, including churches, have been made temporary shelters to those who are victims of this unprecedented tragedy."
While Caritas India has already made available 10 million rupees ($223,000) for emergency relief supplies to those rendered homeless by the tidal wave, Catholic Relief Services and the Catholic Hospital Association of India have rushed emergency relief and medical teams to the affected areas.
Was the Mass they were attending the Latin Tridentine Mass , just wondering?
Trying to figure out whether to pray for them or not?
Thank you for posting this. I just posted it to a list of Camino de Santiago pilgrims.
BTTT!
I would hope everyone would pray for them regardless of the Mass they were attending!
Actually, they weren't spared.
So would I, but the question was asked for a reason.
Sad news. Prayers offered for the grieving.
Oh, okay. I was thinking of the pilgrims in general, not just those attending the Mass.
This is a terrible thing. I walked the Camino de Santiago as a pilgrim in August/Sept of this year, and one of the truly stunning things was the devotion of everybody doing it (even athiestic Germans), as well as our connection with each other. To have made this pilgrimage and have had many of your fellow pilgrims dragged out to sea and drowned must have been a horrible, horrible thing.
Prayers for all of them, the living and the dead.
In the Middle Ages, about 2/3 of the pilgrims who did the Camino de Santiago did not return. Some of them probably stayed in Spain (because the kings of the areas along the Camino were trying to encourage re-settlement in the aftermath of the Muslim attacks), but many, many more died. People setting out normally made their wills, and most of the pilgrim "hospitales" (hostels or refuges) had notaries on hand to draft wills for the pilgrims who ended up there knowing that they would go no further.
Of course not, what kind of a person asks that question?
Was taught to pray for all , but also for the conversion of sinners, help those who are in need , ect. make no mistake it is a very sad thing, I was mearly connecting Our Lady's protection on this Church and persons, for a reason.It is a good and wonderous thing.
Ok, It was most likely the "Power of the holy Rosary" which spared these people.....Yes, they were protected because of this,....looking at the schudule you posted..yeap, rosaries were a going daily!
It is a miracle if you ask me, and at this wrath of God, Our Lady , covered Her own and proved that praying the rosary reeps immense benefits. Hopefully those others will find the same WAY, in all the terror. It is sooooooo unbelievably sad.
It is the Mass that really matters, the Faith, and this is a horrible thing, ......I know Mary was watching that particular place, and if not for her intercession....more destruction.They said their rosary...no doubt that spared them, no doubt at all.
The reason is very simple, then the news people would have to mention God, mention the history of the Church built in the 1500's , mention the name of the Mother of God, Mary, whose Shrine this was dedicated too, how could they remind anyone or get anyone thinking on God and His Catholic Church ??? Big NONO...in public like no prayer in schools ect.. Big NONO.
Christ founded the Catholic church in the yr, 2000..He wants all people to belong to His Church but,will not belong.
Those inside were saved I believe because the Mother of God, made a statement to the above explanation. Keep the Ten commandments.
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