Catholic church, school attacked, archbishop escapes without injury

Catholic church, school attacked, archbishop escapes without injury
12/18/2006

Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

NEW DELHI, India (Catholic Online) – A Catholic church, a Catholic school, Catholic priests and an archbishop were attacked in separate incidents Dec. 17 and Dec. 18 in Bangalore by what was described by the Catholic Bishops Conference of India as “an unruly mob.”

St. Thomas Church and St. Claret School in suburban Bangalore were the site of the Dec. 17 evening attack, which apparently occurred when a group of parents of students from the school lodged a complaint against the school principle, who was accused of inappropriate behavior with students. When the Claretian priests who were running the school came out to see what was happening, the bishops’ conference Web site reported that they too were attacked.

When Archbishop Bernard Moras of Bangalore, his secretary, Father Anthony Sarny, and archdiocesan finance officer Father C. Francis went to the site the next morning, the car in which they were traveling was attacked. The archbishop reportedly escaped physical injuries.

“As we arrived at the school gate, the car was attacked and smashed. They tried to hit me and my spectacles fell within the car and, providentially, I escaped injury,” said Archbishop Moras said to the bishops’ conference communications department.

“The police force was present at the site in sufficient numbers. Unfortunately, they were only mute spectators. They could have certainly avoided the incident, or at least alerted us not to proceed to the school gate,” said Father Samy.

Archbishop Stanislaus Fernandes, secretary general of the bishops’ conference, Archbishop Oswald Gracias of Bombay and Archbishop Vincent Concessao of Delhi have strongly condemned the attack and urged the Karnataka government to provide the necessary protection to its people, especially minority groups and their institutions.