John L. Allen Jr.
Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo of Kinshasa, Congo, president of the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar, gives his blessing at the end of a Mass in St Peter’s Basilica for participants in the assembly of the Synod of Bishops at the Vatican October 13, 2023. Photo: CNS/Lola Gomez Letter from Rome Though it’s likely apocryphal, the story goes that during British rule of India, colonial officials became concerned about poisonous cobras in the city of Delhi and decided to offer a bounty for every dead snake. Enterprising locals, naturally, began to breed cobras in order to collect the reward. When the British discovered…
