A Catholic priest was killed in Myanmar on Friday, an incident that “deeply shocked and saddened” Cardinal Charles Maung Bo, the President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Myanmar.
Fr Donald Martin Ye Naing Win from the Archdiocese of Mandalay in Upper Burma, was killed by a group of armed men on the evening of February 14 in Kangyi Taw village of the Shwebo Township.
The 44-year-old was a priest at Our Lady of Lourdes’s Parish and had been a priest for seven years. His body was found in a forest near the old town of Pyu in Kangyi Taw.
Christians make up about 6% of Myanmar’s overwhelmingly Buddhist population, but about 34% of Kachin’s estimated 1.7 million population.
“The Catholic Church throughout Myanmar mourns this loss together with Archbishop Marco Tin Win, the priests, the religious, the faithful of the Archdiocese of Mandalay and parents and relatives of Father Donald Martin Ye Naing Win. May God the Father, the Lord of all life, comfort your mourning hearts and ours,” the cardinal said in a statement.