Bulgaria, Germany

Bulgaria: the 60th anniversary of the martyrdom of Eugene BossilkovThe Church of Bulgaria celebrates the memory of Blessed Eugene Bossilkov, 60 years after his martyrdom under the communist regime. The month of July marks in fact three of the most significant stages of his life. On 25 July 1926 he was ordained priest, July 26, 1947 he was elected bishop of Nicopolis. On 16 July 1952 began his martyrdom with his arrest by the security police and his imprisonment in Sofia. After a sham trial and months of physical and moral torture, the then Bishop Bossilkov was shot the night of 11 November of 1952. The Communist authorities buried his body at an undisclosed location and they said nothing of the execution, not even to his close relatives. His murder was known only twenty years later. In fact, until 1975 the Pontifical Yearbook continued to record the name of Bossilkov Eugene as the bishop of Nicopolis, adding, under the personal data, the following annotation: "Jailed for Faith and later, in October 1952, sentenced to death, his fate is unknown". In other words, in the free world no one knew that the sentence had been executed and the bishop killed. Only in the 1976 the Pontifical Yearbook could acknowledge the death of Bossilkov and report, for the Diocese of Nicopolis, the name of the new bishop appointed in the meantime. One year after his beatification by John Paul II, which took place in the Vatican Basilica in Rome on March 15, 1998, the Bulgarian authorities discovered a plaque in the prison of Sofia where Bossilkov had been segregated. The Minister of Justice had words of regret and admiration for the heroic martyr of the faith, fully rehabilitated from the sentence, pronounced 47 years earlier, of subversion and espionage. At the time the regime worked to separate the Bulgarian Catholic Church from Rome. For this reason, the bishop was offered the office of Primate of the national Church, i.e. the Communist Church, which he refused. Torture, harassment, deprivations of every kind, violent interrogations and threats to confess nonexistent crimes were to no avail. He did not ask for pardon. His shooting was the end of the calvaries. Born in 1900 in Beleni, in the Diocese of Nicopolis, he joined the Passionists at a young age. He was above all a man of commitment and prayer, that he implemented by devoting his life to prayer, to the apostolate, catechesis, parish activities and to the religious formation of the youth. In 1948, under Stalinist increasingly repressive and suspicious regime, he managed to obtain a permission for a short trip to Rome, where on September 17 he was received by Pius XII. Many advised him not to return to Bulgaria. "I am the shepherd, there is my flock. I cannot leave them", he said. Germany: the satire of Titanic is a grave insult On July 10 the Court of Hamburg ruled against the publication of the last edition of the German satirical magazine "Titanic", bearing seriously offensive images of Benedict XVI. "We welcome the prompt decision of the Court of Hamburg" that "makes it clear when satire is no longer such and instead hurts and offends the person", reads a statement from the German Bishops’ Conference (DBK) immediately after the news of the Court ruling. The magazine, the bishops write, "goes far beyond tolerable limits". In a statement to SIR Europe, DBK spokesman Matthias Kopp, said: "Not only does it exceed the limit of good taste, in fact, no account was taken of any limit. With this departure ‘Titanic’ ceased being satire, and replaced it with humiliation and outrage against the Pope". Moreover, "what would happen in our region, if other religious representatives or policymakers were represented in the same way? Where necessary, we must mark the boundaries. From this perspective, the decision of the Regional Court in Hamburg is an important sign". Meanwhile, the magazine "Titanic" has in turn decided to take legal action against the ban. "It’s about time – Kopp said – that the editor of the magazine understood that the cover and also the back cover can not be considered a joke". In addressing the issue SIR Europe stated in a note: "Saying that public figures – referring to the German satirical magazine ‘Titanic’ with rigged pictures of the Pope – must necessarily be subject to insulting media bombardment, affects the freedom and dignity of all and not just of those who are directly involved. "It’s about time – Kopp said – that the editor understood not only how many are affected. The insult, conveyed with a satire concealed as artistic creation, is practiced without scruple and without too much risk. For these kinds of people ethics is a relative concept, (is it a coincidence that it is so grossly directed against the man who attacked prevailing relativism?). Indeed, the only ethical code that is acknowledge is the one that increases the sales of the magazine". The decision of the Court of Hamburg, the bishops write in their final remarks, "is shared by all those – the majority – who see the reality behind the satirical communication of Titanic, namely, a plethora of vulgarity, coarseness and squalor".