Venezuela, La Guaira, 26.10.2022 700 parishioners from six ecclesiastical parishes attended the liturgical celebration for the 158th anniversary of the birth of Blessed José Gregorio Hernández, who was a doctor of Catholic vocation, and Venezuelan Secular Franciscan, declared blessed by the Catholic Church. The celebration was held on October 26, 2022 at the quasi-parish Oscar Arnulfo Romero in La Guaira. The mass was presided over by Monsignor Raúl Biord Castillo, bishop of the Diocese of La Guaira.
CV NEWS FEED // A ten-year-old neighborhood in Venezuela named after communist President Hugo Chàvez now has its first Catholic parish.
Dedicated to Saint Òscar Arnulfo Romero, a Salvadoran martyr and bishop, the new parish will have a diocesean shrine dedicated to the Venezuelan “doctor of the poor,” Blessed José Gregorio Hernández.
Located in La Guaira Diocese in the city of Vargas, Ciudad Chàvez was one of 35 major urbanization projects in the country during Chàvez’s presidency. According to Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), the neighborhood “was planned as a new Nowa Huta – a socialist district in Poland, famously constructed to be Godless.”
It is now the first of its kind to have its own Catholic parish.
“Christ wasn’t supposed to be present in this neighborhood. That was the idea. Ten years later, Christ will be incarnate and living amongst us,” Bishop Raúl Biord of La Guaira told ACN.
Quoting Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Bishop Biord continued:
No man can live without God, if he does not believe in God, he will create an idol to worship […] The creation of this parish has a deep meaning. You cannot remove religion from the life of the people. Man is not just flesh; he is body and soul. Pure materialism impoverishes humanity.
According to Biord, the Catholic community in Ciudad Chàvas has been celebrating Mass in the streets for the past ten years due to ongoing tension between the Church and the Venezuelan government.
“The people wanted to have a temple where they could meet,” the bishop said, adding: “I cannot leave 20,000 souls without spiritual nourishment.”
However, according to the bishop, the community of Ciudad Chàvas received “wide support” in its efforts to construct the new church, despite the presence of some militant atheists in Venezuelan government representatives:
For me, it is a miracle that we managed to build the church so quickly. Despite the difficulties the country faces – the economic situation, lack of materials, problems and disparities that the construction could have caused – we got it completed in 15 months. I thought it would take much longer than that. It has been a miracle of God to be able to include people with such a wide range of opinions”
As of now, 106 children are set to receive their First Communion and Confirmation in the new church.
