Cardinal Joseph Coutts, one of Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need’s longest-serving project partners in Pakistan, has issued an impassioned plea for prayers ahead of next week’s conclave.   In a video message received Friday, May 2nd, shortly after he arrived in Rome, the former Archbishop of Karachi, who was made cardinal by Pope Francis in June 2018, stressed that now is “the critical time” for prayers for the conclave.   He said, “Now that many cardinals – more than ...

Christians are a small minority in Turkey. With priests serving the scattered faithful, Mass stipends provided by ACN are essential support.  “We do not forget you when we ascend to the Lord’s altar,” writes Father Massimiliano Testi, one of 26 priests in the Apostolic Vicariate of Istanbul to recently receive Mass stipends from Aid to the Church in Need (ACN).  Turkey was once an ancient center of Christianity, but today, Christians are a tiny minority — “only 0.1 percent,” says ...

Spanish priest Father Alfonso Delgado, who arrived in Venezuela in the 1970s with a group of fellow missionaries, gradually found himself alone as the years passed and his companions passed away. However, he found a home among the Sisters of the Missionary Work of Jesus and Mary, a congregation that he had helped establish in Carora, in western Venezuela, over 50 years ago.  “A few months ago, when I was struck down by cancer, I did not know where to ...

During his visit to the international headquarters of ACN, Cardinal Désiré Tzarahazana emphasized the urgency of an authentic and committed faith. In the face of many social problems, which, for a long time, have undermined Madagascar, he insists on the importance of pastoral work so that the Gospel may transform hearts and society.  “How can we live and transmit the Gospel so that people can have a deep faith, a solid faith, able to transform our lives according to the ...

Christians in the Holy Land are very proud of their heritage but often have only a shaky understanding of the basic tenets of the Faith. The current Catholic leadership wants to improve this situation and to bridge the gaps in their Christian knowledge by engaging in a robust spiritual formation program, thanks to ACN’s partnership with the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem (LPJ).  George Akroush puts it bluntly: “We belong to a tribe which is Christians of the Middle East, but ...

Pope Francis was the “Pontiff for the people on the edges of society and a tireless fighter for religious freedom and oppressed Christians,” the Executive President of the pontifical foundation Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), Regina Lynch, said on the passing of Pope Francis, who died on April 21 at the age of 88. “That is how we remember him, and we trust that we now have another advocate in heaven for our work,” Lynch said.  “I met ...