Mayor in Spain removes cross from convent, throws it in dump
- Jan 25, 2021
The feast of St. Dimitrie of Basarabov, the patron saint of Bucharest, is a show of Orthodox Christianity’s strength in Romania, where a weeklong festival devoted to the former hermit typically draws up to 100,000 people from all over the country to the capital every October.
On Sunday Romania marked its first ever National Day of Awareness of Violence against Christians, a move intended to honor Romanian Orthodox martyrs and raise awareness about global anti-Christian persecution.
Stretching the church calendar, Orthodox Easter arrived over a month late in a Romanian city on the shores of the Black Sea.
Although Catholics in most East European countries have backed measures to control the COVID-19 pandemic, for some it has also revived painful memories of communist rule. Sensitivities over church closures have also surfaced in Western Europe, where some Catholics have questioned the right of civil authorities to prohibit religious worship.
Pope Francis told Jesuits in Romania that tensions and struggles within the Church have left it wounded and that the only path forward is through humble dialogue, not futile arguments.