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By Holly Meyer and David Crary |
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By Holly Meyer and David Crary |
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Happy Friday, World of Faith readers.
This week, we bring you a dispatch from our Vatican correspondent who is with Pope Leo XIV for the first foreign trip of his papacy. For everyone else traveling, we have a look at airport chapels and the spiritual respite they offer. We also explain why Catholic clergy and singer Madonna are excited about a Spanish pop star’s new album. |
Pope Leo XIV and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, the spiritual leader of the world's Eastern Orthodox Christians arrive for an ecumenical prayer service in Iznik, Turkey, marking the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra) |
Pope Leo XIV joins Orthodox leaders at historic Council of Nicaea site |
The pope joined Orthodox patriarchs and ecumenical leaders in commemorating an important moment in Christian history, gathering at the site in Turkey of an unprecedented A.D. 325 meeting of bishops to pray that Christians might once again be reunited. Leo, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I and other Christian leaders met on the shores of Lake Iznik, the site of the Council of Nicaea that produced a creed, or statement of faith, that is still recited by millions of Christians today. Read more.
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Leo flew by helicopter to Iznik from Istanbul to take part in an ecumenical prayer to commemorate the 1,700th anniversary of the Nicaea meeting, the highlight of his visit to Turkey. He arrived just after the Muslim call to prayer rang out from a nearby mosque.
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The Nicaea gathering happened when the Eastern and Western churches were still united. Even today, despite past schisms, Catholic, Orthodox and most historic Protestant groups accept the Nicaean Creed -- the most widely accepted creed in Christendom.
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As a result, celebrating its origins at the site of its creation with the spiritual leaders of the Catholic and Orthodox churches and other Christian representatives marked a historic moment in the centuries-old quest to reunite all Christians.
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Airport chapels stay on the radar of workers and travelers even as role of faith in public shifts |
In the United States, this Thanksgiving week is one of the busiest times of the year for air travel. So we figure it’s a good time to take a look at the longstanding phenomenon of airport chapels. One of the oldest is Our Lady of the Airways at Logan International Airport in Boston. It was built in the 1950s so that airport employees could attend Mass right in their workplace. Read more.
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The chapel at Logan remains officially a Catholic church — though Muslim prayer rugs discreetly placed on the rear pews show it welcomes a variety of believers. Most other airport chapels are explicitly interfaith spaces — providing a place for a wide variety of travelers and airport workers to seek a few moments of contemplation and serenity. Tucked behind baggage claims or above food courts, chapels are idiosyncratic, influenced by the local history and demographics, as well as sometimes tensely negotiated arrangements between local faith leaders and municipal and airport authorities.
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Catholic clergy are ecstatic about Rosalía’s songs of faith in her new album ‘Lux’ |
Rosalía, the global Spanish pop star loved by millions for fusing flamenco with Latin hip-hop and reggaeton, has amazed her fans with a radical shift. The singer and songwriter’s new album, “Lux” (“Light” in Latin), is unabashedly spiritual. Fifteen songs, sung in 13 different languages, including fragments in Latin, Arabic and Hebrew, are laden with a yearning for the divine. And it is receiving praise from on high. Read more.
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Xabier Gómez García, bishop of Sant Feliu de Llobregat, which includes Rosalía’s hometown of Sant Esteve Sesrovires near Barcelona, was one of the first church leaders to laud her work in an open letter to his flock. Madonna has declared herself a fan of “Lux,” and composer Andrew Lloyd Webber has lavishly called it the “album of the decade.” Rosalía has said she let her long-held longing for the spiritual guide her in making “Lux.” Like many Spaniards, she grew up in a once staunchly Catholic Spain that has quickly secularized in recent decades, especially among the younger generations, leaving churches mostly to elderly parishioners.
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