12 pastoral care workers of Catholic Church killed in 2012

December 31, 2012 - 12 pastoral care workers of the Catholic Church were killed in 10 countries of the world, during the course of the last 12 months. Fides, the Vatican’s news agency that compiled the year-end list, noted that 10 priests, a religious and a lay woman were killed violently in 2012. For the fourth consecutive year, Latin America continued to be the region with the highest toll in church personnel with 6 priests, followed by Africa with 3 priests and a nun, and Asia with a nun and a lay woman. In Latin America, 2 priests were killed in Brazil, 2 in Mexico and one each in Colombia and Guatemala. Fides noted that most of the pastoral care workers were killed in attempted robberies. In the southern Philippines, lay Catholic woman, Conchita Francisco, a pastoral care worker, was shot dead by unknown gunmen in front of the Catholic Cathedral in Bongao, where shortly before she had prayed the Rosary and attended Mass. Tension runs high in the area due to the presence of Muslim rebels, pirates, terrorists and criminals. The other Asian is Lebanese Maronite priest Fr. Elie Gergi al-Makdessi, who was killed in a street during an attempted robbery. In Africa, a nun was stabbed to death in the D.R. Congo, which a priest each was killed in Mozambique, Tanzania and Madagascar. Fides noted that the pastoral care workers killed during the year 2012 did not carry out sensational acts, were not brought to the attention of the mass media for their initiatives, but they simply "confessed the beauty of following the Lord Jesus wherever they were called to give witness of their being Christians." They lived faith in the humility of daily life, in particular in the context of human and spiritual poverty, degradation, violence, where the respect for life and human dignity are values that do not count, trying to bring in these environments their witness of love, that love of the Father that Jesus Christ came to show.