Cardinal asks Bolivians to 'tone down' carnival celebrations following Haitian earthquake

La Paz, Bolivia: January 21, 2010, (PCTV Newsdesk)

The Archbishop of Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Cardinal Julio Terrazas Sandoval, called on the faithful of Bolivia to show solidarity with the people of Haiti, as their dignity is currently "in the hands of all the peoples of the world."  He then invited Bolivians to tone down the country's upcoming carnival celebrations prior to Lent as a sacrifice for the suffering people of Haiti.

He added that these events should be marked by a "spirit of sobriety."

"We cannot be content giving only what is left over, the cardinal said at Mass last Sunday.  "The situation in Haiti is urgent right now" and as Catholics and believers we are called to a greater level of sharing and giving.

"Hope must take precedent amidst the destruction," Cardinal Terrazas said, warning that while there may be earthquakes that take the lives of many people, hope will always spring forth. He explained that "hope" is "full of love" and trusts "that this will not go on forever." 

"This is a people that has suffered, a nation poor like our own."  Nonetheless, he continued, they are "a decent people" whose "human dignity is in the hands of all the nations of the world, of all the peoples, especially of Latin America and the Caribbean," he concluded.

News source: www.catholicnewsagency.com