.- During the official presentation of Pope John Paul II’s Lenten message 2004, entitled “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me,” Archbishop Paul Josef Cordes, President of the Pontifical Council “Cor Unum,” announced two Vatican initiatives to favor Children with AIDS.
The two initiatives will be the production by the Vatican Post Office of a series of special stamps on the Lenten message; and a development project for orphan children with AIDS in the diocese of Nairobi, Kenya.
This last initiative is run by U.S.-born Jesuit Angelo D’Agostino, founder and medical director of “Nyumbani,” The Children of God Relief Institute in Nairobi.
Referring to the tragedy of AIDS, which John Paul II talks about in the Pope’s message, the president of “Cor Unum” said that children affected by the disease “prompt the greatest question that man asks himself about the goodness of the Heavenly Father: What evil have these children done to merit such suffering?”
“From a human standpoint, there is no response to such a question. The Pope responds in this way in the Message: ‘Only faith can make us begin to understand so profound an abyss of suffering’.”
