Source: Agenzia Fides – MIL OSI
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Baku (Agenzia Fides) – “We thank the Lord once again for this day, for the missionaries, for Bishop Vladimir Fekete, and for the first local priest, Father Beibud Mustafaev. All this means that the Church is alive in Azerbaijan,” said Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle at the end of his homily during the Holy Mass he celebrated on Sunday, October 19, in the Catholic Church of Baku. These words recall the path of hope and perseverance that the small local community has traveled in recent decades.On the penultimate Sunday of October, the day the Catholic Church worldwide celebrates World Mission Sunday, the Azerbaijani capital also celebrated the 25th anniversary of the “Missio sui iuris” of Baku, founded on October 11, 2000, and entrusted to the care of the Salesians. It was an important milestone for the “new beginning” of the Catholic Church in Azerbaijan after decades of Soviet rule and the destruction of the only parish by the Stalinist regime in 1931.Cardinal Tagle, Pro-Prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization (Section for First Evangelization and New Particular Churches), spent World Mission Sunday in Baku, meeting with Salesian missionaries and all other missionaries and pastoral workers from more than ten countries who proclaim the Gospel together in the Apostolic Prefecture of Azerbaijan. “I will tell Pope Leo,” Cardinal Tagle promised during his homily, “that I met missionaries of Hope from all over the world here in Baku, Azerbaijan.”Cardinal Tagle came to Baku at the invitation of the Apostolic Prefect of Azerbaijan, Bishop Vladimir Fekete. On Saturday, October 18, the Pro-Prefect of the Missionary Dicastery visited the construction site of the St. John Paul II Church in Baku. The land for the construction of the second Catholic church in Baku was granted by a special decree of the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev. In December 2024, the Holy See’s Secretary for Relations with States and International Organizations, Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, participated in the blessing ceremony for the construction site and the laying of the foundation stone of the future church.In Baku, Cardinal Tagle met with Ramin Mammadov, Chairman of the State Committee for Relations with Religious Organizations of the Republic of Azerbaijan, and praised the conditions created in the former Soviet Republic for the activities of the Catholic faith community.During his visit to the Apostolic Prefecture of Azerbaijan, Cardinal Tagle also had the opportunity to celebrate Mass at the House of the Missionaries of Charity and to learn about the activities of the St. Teresa of Calcutta Homeless Shelter. Over the past 25 years, the small Catholic community in Azerbaijan was visited by both Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis. In recent years, the Catholic Church in Azerbaijan has also experienced the joy of seeing the first local priestly and religious vocations flourish. “Every Sunday of the Lord,” Cardinal Tagle said at the beginning of his homily, “is a day of gratitude, but today we have a special reason to give thanks to the Lord. Here in Baku, we thank the Lord for the 25th anniversary of the founding of the “Mission sui iuris” and for the 25th anniversary of the Salesian Mission in Azerbaijan. Thanks to the Lord, to the Salesian family, and to the people of Azerbaijan. It is symbolic and enlightening that these anniversaries are being celebrated on the occasion of World Mission Sunday.”The Cardinal also addressed the theme of World Mission Sunday 2025: “Missionaries of Hope among All Peoples,” recalling that “all of us—priests, religious women and men, and lay faithful—are called to be missionaries of hope, hope in God, hope in the Kingdom of God. And we proclaim Jesus as our hope—not just to our people, but to all men and all peoples.” (GV) (Agenzia Fides, 20/10/2025)
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