Bulletins, Newsletters, and Flocknotes

Appointment of Pontifical Legate for the celebration of the eighth centenary of the Cathedral of Bruxelles

Appointment of coadjutor bishop of Darjeeling, India

Appointment of auxiliary bishops of the archdiocese of Fortaleza, Brazil

 

Appointment of Pontifical Legate for the celebration of the eighth centenary of the Cathedral of Bruxelles

The Holy Father has appointed His Eminence Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Secretary of State, as Pontifical Legate for the Eucharistic celebration to be held on Sunday 11 January 2026, on the occasion of the eighth centenary of the Cathedral of Bruxelles.

 

Appointment of coadjutor bishop of Darjeeling, India

The Holy Father has appointed the Reverend Edward Baretto, of the clergy of the diocese of Darjeeling, India, until now director of the Divya Vani Pastoral Centre , as coadjutor bishop of the same diocese.

Curriculum vitae

Msgr. Edward Baretto was born on 5 January 1965 in Nirkan, in the diocese of Mangalore, India. He studied philosophy and theology at the Morning Star Regional Seminary in Calcutta. He was awarded a master’s degree in philosophy at the Jnana Deepa Institute of Philosophy and Theology in Pune and a licentiate in canon law at Saint Peter’s Pontifical Institute  in Bangalore.

He was ordained a priest on 25 March 1993 for the diocese of Darjeeling.

He has held the following offices: deputy director of Saint John XXIII Minor Seminary in Darjeeling (1993–1996 e 2003-2004); professor at the Morning Star Regional Seminary in Barrackpore (1998–2000); judicial vicar of the diocese of Darjeeling (2004–2007); professor at the Saint   John XXIII Minor Seminary  (2004–2007); chargé at Our Lady of Lourdes , Liza Hill Tea Garden (2004–2007); parish priest of Mary Mother of God in Kalimpong (2007–2016); judicial vicar and judge of the Ecclesiastical Tribunal (2016–2021); parish priest of Saint Paul in Tadong (2021–2023); and to date, director of the Divya Vani Pastoral Centre in Darjeeling.

 

Appointment of auxiliary bishops of the archdiocese of Fortaleza, Brazil

The Holy Father has appointed the following as auxiliary bishops of Fortaleza, Brazil: the Reverend Jânison de Sá Santos, of the clergy of the diocese of Propriá, adjunct undersecretary for pastoral care of the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil, assigning him the titular see of Cillio, and the Reverend Antônio Carlos do Nascimento, of the clergy of the archdiocese of Fortaleza, judicial vicar of the Ecclesiastical Tribunal, assigning him the titular see of Cibaliana.

Curriculum vitae of Msgr. Jânison de Sá Santos

Msgr. Jânison de Sá Santos was born on 8 December 1969 in Propriá, in the diocese of the same name, in the State of Sergipe. He studied philosophy at the São Bento Monastery in Olinda-PE and theology at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas in Rome. He was awarded a licentiate and a doctorate in theology, specializing in catechesis at the Salesian Pontifical University of Rome and subsequently a post-doctoral qualification at the Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro.

He was ordained a priest on 18 August 1995, and incardinated in the diocese of Propriá.

He has held the following offices: parish priest of Nossa Senhora da Saúde in Japaratuba-SE (1999-2003), diocesan pastoral coordinator, diocesan catechesis coordinator and regional catechesis coordinator (2000-2003), bursar of the Nossa Senhora da Conceição of the ecclesiastical province of Aracajú (2002-2003), assessor of the Biblical-Catechetical Commission of the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil (2003-2007/2019-2022), assessor of the Biblical-Catechetical Commission of the Nordeste 3 Region (2011-2017), rector of the Nossa Senhora da Conceição Major Seminary of the ecclesiastical province of Aracajú (2011-2018), member of the Presbyteral Council (2011-2018), member of the Group of Specialists in Catechesis of the C.E.L.A.M. (2011-2019), collaborator in Prison Pastoral Care in Sergipe (2015-2017), teacher in the specialist course in catechetic pedagogy of the Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Goiás (2011-2017) and in the Faculdade do Planalto Central – Campus Aracajú (2017-2018), parish priest of São João Batista in Cedro de São João – SE (2019); assessor of the National Episcopal Pastoral Commission for Biblico-Catechetical Animation (2019-2023); member of the Sociedade dos Catequetas Latino-americanos ; member of the National Pastoral Institute Padre Alberto Antoniazzi and assessor of the Commission for General Guidelines on Evangelizing Action (since 2023), member of the National Animation Team for the Synod (since 2025).

He is currently adjunct undersecretary for pastoral care of the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil (since 2023) and president of the Sociedade Brasileira de Catequetas.

Curriculum vitae of Msgr. Antônio Carlos do Nascimento

Msgr. Antônio Carlos do Nascimento was born on 22 November 1972 in Fortaleza, in the archdiocese of the same name, in the State of Ceará. He studied philosophy at the Universidade Estadual do Ceará and theology at the Instituto Teológico Pastoral do Ceará in Fortaleza. He was awarded a licentiate in canon law at the Pontifical Gregorian University of Rome.

He was ordained a priest on 22 December 2003, and incardinated in the archdiocese of Fortaleza.

After ordination, he held the roles of parish vicar of Nossa Senhora da Conceição in Messejana (2003-2004), judge auditor of the Regional Ecclesiastical Court of Appeal (2003-2005), parish priest of Nossa Senhora do Perpétuo Socorro (2005-2016), professor of canon law at the Faculdade Católica de Fortaleza (since 2010), member of the Presbyteral Council (since 2015), parish priest of São Pio X (2016-2025), canonical assessor of the Nordeste I Region of the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil (since 2019) and member of the College of Consultors (since 2021).

He is currently pursuing a doctorate in canon law at the Universidad Católica Argentina , and serves as judicial vicar, president of the Ecclesiastical Court of Appeal of Ceará (since 2015) and parish vicar of Mãe Santíssima in Fortaleza.

At 8.45 (local time), the Holy Father Leo XIV transferred by car to the Sultan Ahmed Mosque.

On arrival, the Pope was welcomed and accompanied to the Mosque by the Head of the Diyanet, the President for Religious Affairs of Türkiye.

The Pope visited the Mosque in silence, in a spirit of contemplation and listening, with deep respect for the place and the faith of those who gather there in prayer.

At the end of his visit to the mosque, at 9:30, the Holy Father travelled by car to the Syriac Orthodox Church of Mor Ephrem for a private meeting with the heads of the Christian Churches and communities.

On arrival, the Pope was received by the Syriac Orthodox Patriarch and the Metropolitan of the Syriac Orthodox Church of Antioch for the dioceses of Istanbul, Ankara and İzmir. The Patriarch and the Holy Father entered the Church and joined the religious leaders for a group photograph. The choir then sang a hymn of invocation to the Holy Spirit, and the leaders took their place at the round table. The meeting continued behind closed doors, with short interventions from each leader, followed by an address from the Pontiff. Before leaving the Church, the Patriarchal Vicar of the Syriac Orthodox Church of Antioch led the recitation of the Lord’s Prayer.

At the end of the private meeting, at 11.45, the Pope transferred by car to the Apostolic Delegation.

At 14.15 (local time), the Holy Father Leo XIV left the Apostolic Delegation and transferred by car to Istanbul-Atatürk Airport where he departed by helicopter for İznik, arriving at 15.15, to particpiate in the Ecumenical Prayer Service near the archaeological excavations of the ancient Basilica of Saint Neophytos.

On arrival, at 15.30, the Pope was welcomed by the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, His All-Holiness Bartholomew I, at the entrance to the Visitor Centre near the ancient Basilica of Saint Neophytos. The religious leaders present walked in procession to the platform near the archaeological excavations and stood in a semicircle in front of the icons of Christ and the Council, where they lit a candle.

After an opening hymn and a symbolic gesture, Patriarch Bartholomew I addressed some words of welcome to the Holy Father, who, after the ecumenical prayer and the reading of the Gospel, delivered his address.

At the end of the service, after the hymns, the choral recitation of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, the invocations, the recitation of the Our Father and the blessing, the Holy Father and the Patriarch left the platform, followed by the religious leaders, in procession towards the Visitor Centre.

At 16:15, the Pope travelled by car to the İznik heliport and from there, by helicopter, reached Istanbul-Atatürk Airport at 17:00. He then transferred by car to the Apostolic Delegation.

At 18.30, the Holy Father met privately with the bishops of Türkiye.

The following is the address delivered by Pope Leo XIV to those present during the Ecumenical Service:

 

Address of the Holy Father

Dear brothers and sisters,

At a period of history marked by many tragic signs, in which people are subjected to countless threats to their very dignity, the 1700th anniversary of the First Council of Nicaea is a precious opportunity to ask ourselves who Jesus Christ is in the lives of men and women today, and who he is for each one of us personally.

This question is especially important for Christians, who risk reducing Jesus Christ to a kind of charismatic leader or superman, a misrepresentation that ultimately leads to sadness and confusion (cf. Leo XIV,  Homily, Holy Mass Pro Ecclesia , 9 May 2025). By denying the divinity of Christ, Arius reduced him to a mere intermediary between God and humanity, ignoring the reality of the Incarnation such that the divine and the human remained irremediably separated. But if God did not become man, how can mortal creatures participate in his immortal life? What was at stake at Nicaea, and is at stake today, is our faith in the God who, in Jesus Christ, became like us to make us “partakers of the divine nature” (2  Pet  1:4; cf. Saint Irenaeus,  Adversus Haereses , 3, 19; Saint Athanasius,  De Incarnatione , 54, 3).

This Christological confession of faith is of fundamental importance in the journey that Christians are making towards full communion. For it is shared by all Christian Churches and Communities throughout the world, including those which, for various reasons, do not use the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed in their liturgies. Indeed, faith “in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten Son of God, born of the Father before all ages... consubstantial with the Father” ( Nicene Creed ) is a profound bond already uniting all Christians. In this sense, to quote Saint Augustine, in the ecumenical context we can also say that, “although we Christians are many, in the one Christ we are one” ( Exposition on Psalm 127 ). Consequently, with an awareness that we are already linked by such a profound bond, we can continue our journey of ever deeper adherence to the Word of God revealed in Jesus Christ, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, in mutual love and dialogue. In this way, we are all invited to overcome the scandal of the divisions that unfortunately still exist and to nurture the desire for unity for which the Lord Jesus prayed and gave his life. The more we are reconciled, the more we Christians can bear credible witness to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which is a proclamation of hope for all. Moreover, it is a message of peace and universal fraternity that transcends the boundaries of our communities and nations (cf. Francis,  Address to participants in the Plenary Session of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity , 6 May 2022).

Today, the whole of humanity afflicted by violence and conflict is crying out for reconciliation. The desire for full communion among all believers in Jesus Christ is always accompanied by the search for fraternity among all human beings. In the Nicene Creed, we profess our faith “in one God, the Father.” Yet, it would not be possible to invoke God as Father if we refused to recognize as brothers and sisters all other men and women, who are created in the image of God (cf.  Second Vatican Ecumenical Council , Declaration  Nostra Aetate , 5). There is a universal fraternity of men and women regardless of ethnicity, nationality, religion or personal perspectives. Religions, by their very nature, are repositories of this truth and should encourage individuals, groups and peoples to recognize this and put it into practice (cf. Leo XIV,  Address at the conclusion of the Meeting for Prayer for Peace , 28 October 2025). Furthermore, we must strongly reject the use of religion for justifying war, violence, or any form of fundamentalism or fanaticism. Instead, the paths to follow are those of fraternal encounter, dialogue and cooperation.

I am deeply grateful to His All Holiness Bartholomew, for it was with great wisdom and foresight that he decided to commemorate together the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea in the very place where it was held. I likewise warmly thank the Heads of Churches and Representatives of Christian World Communions who have accepted the invitation to participate in this event. May God the Father, almighty and merciful, hear the fervent prayers we offer him today, and grant that this important anniversary may bear the abundant fruits of reconciliation, unity and peace.

 

The following is the Message sent by the Holy Father Leo XIV to participants in the global meeting of The Economy of Francesco , taking place from 28 to 30 November 2025 (Castel Gandolfo):

 

Message of the Holy Father

Dear young people,

No-one is more in touch with the “new things” on which humanity is staking its future than you. This is why your world meeting is so valuable and takes place in gremio Ecclesiae : not only in the heart, but in the womb of a Church that, with God’s grace, generates faith and love. The Economy of Francesco is the joyful expression of a journey that enriches economic thought and initiative with the seed of the Gospel, which Saint Francis of Assisi accepted sine glossa and to whose transformative power our beloved Pope Francis bore witness with all his strength. Yes, dear friends, the Gospel transfigures human work and produces changes in us that bring abundant life into the world. You know all this well, because in Assisi you did not just dream, but you met people and started projects inspired by the Gospel and capable of making even the desert bloom.

This year, naturally, our grateful thoughts go to Pope Francis: his death was on the day and with the fragrance of Easter. This helps us to preserve his legacy creatively, and particularly commits you, who had a deep understanding with him, to organize the hope that this journey has kindled. In the month of September last year, my Predecessor said to some of you: “In your midst, may a new way of being together and doing business be born that does not produce waste but material and spiritual well-being”. And he immediately added a wish that I would like to make my own: “Have courage, dear friends, have courage! If you are faithful to your vocation, your life will blossom, you will have wonderful stories to tell your children and grandchildren”. [1]

Dear friends, the network of friendship and work that you represent is a “no” to resignation. You can urge many other young people to break out of indifference or the confines of personal or group objectives, in order to welcome the Kingdom of God and his justice through new ways of loving the common good. It is a matter of rekindling dreams, of valuing prayer, study and work, of thinking together, as true energies of renewal.

The title of your meeting is “ Restarting the Economy ”: an economy that restarts is not just a machine that produces, but an activity that restores life to people, to communities, to our common home. To restart means to free from the chains of injustice, to restore what was harmed and to create spaces where every man and woman can breathe dignity and hope. To restart can imply changing direction and exploring new paths.

In the recent meeting with popular Movements, I wished to dwell on the theme of the “new”, because Pope Leo XIII wrote, at the end of the nineteenth century, the Encyclical Rerum Novarum , and this title challenges us to this day. “There are certainly ‘new things’ in the world but, when we say this, we generally adopt a ‘view from the centre’ and refer to things like artificial intelligence or robotics. However today I would like to look at the ‘new things’ with you, taking a view from the periphery”. [2] You are well acquainted with this perspective, because only an economy that divests itself of privilege and embraces reality, starting with the leper, that is, those who are discarded, expelled and removed, can be considered to be “of Francesco”. “This is the viewpoint that I want to convey: the new things seen from the periphery, and the fact that in your efforts you do not limit yourselves to protesting, but also look for solutions”. [3] In this regard, the French Benedictine Ghislain Lafont identified a “principle of smallness” which, he wrote, “It can be expressed thus: the driving force of history is not power, but poverty; or rather: real change comes about through the action of weak elements”. [4]

Dear young people, I encourage you to show through your lives, your endeavours, your studies, the shortcomings of a system that increases inequality and fails to care for the small and the weak. Together, we can welcome God’s dreams and see that they expand our dreams, drawing us into an adventure as a people in which walls and prejudices fall and peace prevails.

I urge you, so that your tireless work is not just social action and linked to passing fads, to nourish your spirit and return to your heart: the Gospels and other books of the Bible are the landscape in which God still makes his voice heard and inspires our visions, putting us in dialogue with his friends, the protagonists of the history of salvation. You will be good businesspeople and good economists if you know the divine economy in this way: it is the secret of so many witnesses who have gone before us and who still walk with us.

Dear young people, go forward. Indeed, let us go forward together! May my blessing reach you and accompany you.

From the Vatican, 26 November 2025

LEO PP. XIV

_____________________

 

[1] Francis, Address to the Delegation of The Economy of Francesco, 25 September 2024.

[2]  Address to participants in the World Meeting of Popular Movements , 23 October 2025.

[3] Ibidem.

[4] Ghislain Lafont, Piccolo saggio sul tempo di papa Francesco , EDB, Bologna 2017, p. 51.

Appointment of auxiliary bishop of Hildesheim, Federal Republic of Germany

The Holy Father has appointed the Reverend Martin Marahrens, of the clergy of the diocese of Hildesheim, until now rector of the major seminary and canon of Hildesheim Cathedral, as auxiliary bishop of the same diocese, assigning him the titular see of Cercina.

Curriculum vitae

Msgr. Martin Marahrens was born on 24 May 1977 in Gahrden, diocese of Hildesheim, Land Niedersachsen. He studied philosophy and theology at the Philosophisch-Theologische Hochschule Sankt Georgen in Frankfurt and at the Pontifical Gregorian University of Rome, as a resident of the Pontifical German-Hungarian College of Rome.

He was ordained a priest on 10 October 2004 for the diocese of Hildesheim.

He was awarded a doctorate in theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University of Rome in 2008, and went on to hold the following offices: deputy parish priest in Burgdorf (since 2008), head of Emmaus youth pastoral care in Duderstadt (2008-2014), pastoral service in the deanery of Hildesheim (2014-2023), vicar of Hildesheim Cathedral (2015-2023), representatives for priests in the personnel department of the Episcopal Curia (since 2023), and until now, rector of the diocesan seminary (since 2014) and canon of Hildesheim Cathedral (since 2024).