Brian Bergkamp, a seminarian from the diocese of Wichita, went to the aid of a woman who fell into the Arkansas River on July 9.

Mr Bergkamp, 24, was among five people travelling in separate kayaks on the river.

They were caught in turbulent waters.

The seminarian jumped from his kayak to save the woman, before getting pulled under himself.

He was not wearing a life jacket. The other kayakers made it to shore.

By midday on July 12, he remained missing. Friends and family members remember were holding vigils to pray for the recovery of his body.

Wichita Bishop Carl Kemme said he knew ""Brian to be an exceptional seminarian, well on his way to demonstrating so many of the qualities needed to be a good and faithful priest".

Bishop Kemme said the seminarian was quiet, dedicated, diligent in his work and studies, and presented himself always with a sense of decorum and maturity, well beyond his years.

"I was looking forward to how God would use him as a priest in the diocese of Wichita.

"Now, we must all mourn his much anticipated ministry and the many fruits we all knew would be abundant by his priestly life and ministry."

Mr Bergkamp had just finished his second year at Mount St Mary's Seminary in Emmitsburg, Maryland, which is in the archdiocese of Baltimore.

"Brian's death is a great tragedy and a great loss, not only for his family and friends," said Baltimore Archbishop William E. Lori, "but to all who knew him and to the Church he was so generously seeking to serve."

Mr Bergkamp's brother Andy was ordained to the transitional diaconate in May.

Sources

• Catholic News Service
• Image: JCEworld

The Pope said he decided to visit Lampedusa, a small island with a population of 6000 and just 70 miles from Tunisia, after seeing newspaper headlines in June describing the drowning of immigrants when a boat sank offshore.

The thought of the tragedy was "like a splinter in the heart that causes suffering", he said.

"I felt the duty to come here today to pray, to perform a gesture of closeness, but also to awaken our consciences so that what happened doesn't repeat itself."

After a flight from Rome, the Pope boarded a boat to arrive at the port of Lampedusa, pausing along the route to cast a floral wreath on the waters that have claimed the lives of thousands of migrants.

On arrival at the port he met a group of around 50 immigrants, many of them Muslims, living in reception shelters, and greeted them one by one.

Later, celebrating Mass at a soccer field, he remarked on the sad irony of "immigrants dying at sea, in boats which were vehicles of hope and became vehicles of death".

To emphasise that he was there to mourn the dead and to encourage everyone around the world to examine their consciences about how they directly or indirectly contribute to the problems of immigrants, Pope Francis wore the purple vestments of repentance and used the prayers from the Mass for the Forgiveness of Sins.

In his homily the Pope spoke about the failure of Christians to recognise refugees and migrants as their brothers.

He decried the "culture of comfort" that "makes us insensitive to the cries of other people, makes us live in soap bubbles which, however lovely, are insubstantial".

He said: "We have become used to the suffering of others, it doesn't affect me; it doesn't concern me; it is none of my business. The globalisation of indifference makes us all 'unnamed', responsible yet nameless and faceless."

Sources:

Catholic News Service

Vatican Radio

Vatican Information Service

Image: UCANews

The Tongan community is rallying around the grieving family of those lost in the Manukau boating tragedy.

Family members cried out when the bodies of 45-year-old So'saia Paasi and his son were recovered by police divers yesterday.

The father and his seven-year-old son Tio died after their dinghy capsized on Sunday.

Assistant Tongan chaplain Soane Vahe said the Tongan community and Catholic Church members have been supporting the Paasi family.

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