The trial of 25 of the men accused of preparing the attacks began in November 2021 but was adjourned in January 2022.
In January 2023 a seven-judge panel from Sri Lanka’s Supreme Court found Sirisena and four other high-ranking government officials liable for the massacre because they possessed but failed to disclose credible information warning of the attacks. The court ordered Sirisena to pay victims’ families a total of $273,000 from his personal funds while other officials were similarly disciplined.
In April 2022, Pope Francis urged the government of Sri Lanka to take greater action to identify the perpetrators and bring justice for the victims and their families. “Please and for the sake of justice, for the love of your people, may it be clarified definitively who was responsible for these events. This will bring peace to your conscience and to the nation,” the pope said.
Perera said the cardinal is prioritizing opening the Easter martyrs’ canonization because he is convinced they died for their faith.
He “believes that since they were exercising an act of faith by coming to the church to participate in the liturgy of the risen Lord and to take part in spiritual activities of their own free will, and they had to lay down their lives for having done that, this fact itself is a cause good enough to promote them to the level of Servants of God and martyrs of the faith,” Perera said.
BLOOD-STAINED CHRIST: Easter service at Sri Lanka church bombed two years ago
Priests carry a statue of Jesus splattered with blood from a bomb attack in 2019, during yesterday’s Easter Mass at one of the attacked churches in Negombo City. (📷: Dinuka Liyanawatte via Reuters) pic.twitter.com/aloLyIzZRS
— GMA News Online (@gmanewsonline) April 5, 2021
Perera said the archdiocese hopes to receive approval from the Holy See and that “once this approval is given, we will work on the process of beatification and consider them Servants of God.”
Credit: Source link