Catholic News Service

A triumphant independence euphoria worldwide 10 years ago welcomed the birth of the Republic of South Sudan, the world’s newest nation.

The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines elected Bishop Pablo Virgilio David of Caloocan as its new president July 8. He will begin his two-year term as head of the conference Dec. 1.

Father Juan Sosa, pastor of the Catholic church that is close to the now-demolished condominium building in Surfside, held up a photo of 11-year-old Lucia Guara’s first Communion in 2019. He placed it on the casket holding her and her sister, Emma, 4, during the funeral Mass July 6 for the girls and their parents.

As the nation’ celebrates its independence on the Fourth of July, Americans should recall the country’s “other founding” by the missionaries who, beginning in the 1500s, came to proclaim “the love of Jesus Christ to Indigenous peoples,” said Los Angeles Archbishop José H. Gomez.

Two more Catholic churches on First Nations land have been destroyed by fire, while fire damaged an Anglican church on First Nations land in northern British Columbia. Police are calling all the blazes “suspicious.”