“The Catholic Church in Bulgaria is following with bitterness and apprehension the construction of a 19-storey skyscraper just a few metres away from St. Joseph’s Cathedral in Bucharest”, declares the Apostolic Exarch of Sofia for Catholics of Byzantine-Slav rite resident in Bulgaria, Monsignor Christo Proykov, who joins his voice to the protests of the Romanian clergy: “We could call this affair – he says – the agony of the Catholic Church in Romania. In past years the Church has had to suffer and support silence; it has had to remain silent for decades, deserving in full the name of ‘Church of silence'”. What change, asks Msgr. Proykov, “has Romanian politics undergone” if, after the silence of the past, “the cries of the present day have no value? What is needed to make the authorities recognise that the Millennium company [building the skyscraper] is flouting European laws on the safeguard and protection of the historical and cultural heritage of the country and of a religious minority?”. “We want – concludes the Apostolic Exarch of Sofia – to launch the challenge of being counter-tendency: of swimming against the tide of corruption and personal interests. Let us pray united with the whole world that the Lord may stop the invisible hand of evil and move the hearts of those who have the chance to do good and don’t do it. Let us pray that the house of prayer of the Lord be saved”.
