{"id":15563,"date":"2016-06-08T06:39:20","date_gmt":"2016-06-08T06:39:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.acnmalta.org\/?p=15563"},"modified":"2016-06-08T06:39:20","modified_gmt":"2016-06-08T06:39:20","slug":"mexico-bishop-appeals-for-end-to-violence-and-murders-acn-malta","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acnmalta.org\/_oldsite\/2016\/06\/08\/mexico-bishop-appeals-for-end-to-violence-and-murders-acn-malta\/","title":{"rendered":"MEXICO &#8211; Bishop appeals for end to violence and murders &#8211; ACN Malta"},"content":{"rendered":"<style type=\"text\/css\"><\/style><h2><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>MEXICO &#8211;\u00a0<\/strong><strong>B<\/strong><strong>ishop <\/strong><strong>appeals for end to violence and murders<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Bishop Jos\u00e9 de Jes\u00fas Mart\u00ednez Zepeda of Irapuato is appealing for peace in Mexico after years of shockingly high murder rates. According to Mexico\u2019s National Institute for Statistics and Geography, between 2007 and 2014 there were 164,345 homicides in the country. The period covers some of the bloodiest years of fighting between the drug cartels and the Mexican government since the \u201cwar on drugs\u201d started in 2006.<\/p>\n<p>In 2015 three priests were murdered in Mexico, according to the Investigation Unit of the Catholic Multimedia Center. There have also been more recent attacks on Catholic churches and priests, including one in Bishop Mart\u00ednez\u2019s own diocese of Irapuato last month. \u00a0Four armed men assaulted Fr. Efren Silva while he was in the sacristy of Lord of Mercy parish in Irapuato&#8217;s Lazaro Cardenas neighborhood. \u201cThe robbers came in, tied him up and roughed him up so he would tell them where the money was. In reality, it&#8217;s a very poor parish, when the money comes in and goes out on a daily basis\u201d said the bishop. The thieves stole nearly $400 from the church.<\/p>\n<p>Bishop Mart\u00ednez said this is not an isolated incident. He recently heard that a priest from Salamanca had been attacked by robbers who \u201cstruck him on the forehead, inflicting such a wound that he had to go to a medical center to get stitches.\u201d Appealing for peace, he said \u201cWe hope these incidents will soon stop.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The bishop firmly believes that the solution to ending the violence lies in changing people\u2019s hearts, and that making peace should involve being at peace with God and with your neighbour. Otherwise Mexico cannot expect a good future.<\/p>\n<p>Bishop Mart\u00ednez offered words of encouragement to the faithful, stating that there is no reason to lose hope, for \u201cChrist has risen, the tomb is empty; we need to work so that the Resurrection of Christ encompasses our society.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><em><strong>ACN Malta<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.acnmalta.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/ACN-20160201-35402.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-15567\" src=\"http:\/\/www.acnmalta.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/ACN-20160201-35402-1024x847.jpg\" alt=\"ACN-20160201-35402\" width=\"275\" height=\"227\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MEXICO &#8211;\u00a0Bishop appeals for end to violence and murders &nbsp; Bishop Jos\u00e9 de Jes\u00fas Mart\u00ednez Zepeda of Irapuato is appealing for peace in Mexico after years of shockingly high murder rates. According to Mexico\u2019s National Institute for Statistics and Geography, between 2007 and 2014 there were 164,345 homicides in the country. The period covers some&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15565,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15563","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-e-newsletters"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>MEXICO - Bishop appeals for end to violence and murders - ACN Malta - Aid to the Church in Need (Malta)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/acnmalta.org\/_oldsite\/2016\/06\/08\/mexico-bishop-appeals-for-end-to-violence-and-murders-acn-malta\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"MEXICO - Bishop appeals for end to violence and murders - ACN Malta - Aid to the Church in Need (Malta)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"MEXICO &#8211;\u00a0Bishop appeals for end to violence and murders &nbsp; Bishop Jos\u00e9 de Jes\u00fas Mart\u00ednez Zepeda of Irapuato is appealing for peace in Mexico after years of shockingly high murder rates. 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