Malaria and cold weather are worsening the suffering of Mozambican refugees who have fled to Malawi to escape violence at home, according to the Malawi director for Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS). By mid-February there were more than 6,500 people in Mwanza district’s Kapise camp, 95km south of the national capital Lilongwe, with more arriving every…
Chinese authorities are continuing their campaign of removing crosses in Zhejiang province, one of the latest being taken from a Catholic Church. Government officials removed the cross of Yongqiang parish’s Zhuangyuan Church just before dawn on February 25, two weeks after Zhejiang’s religious affairs director called for “religious stability” in the region ahead of the…
The Year of Mercy was the focus of a meeting of 14 bishops from the Americas who gathered in Tampa, Florida to discuss how to invite the faithful into what Pope Francis has called “an encounter with Jesus Christ”. Representatives of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Latin American bishops’ council, known as CELAM,…
Common date for Easter and Christmas a step closer – Greek Orthodox Patriarch Sharing Christmas and Easter together is a common Christian dream, the Greek Orthodox Archbishop of Sebaste in Palestine has said, pointing to this as a possible development that could follow from the recent meeting in Cuba of Pope Francis and Moscow’s Patriarch Kirill. “I think there is not a Catholic or an Orthodox who…
A bill to grant legal recognition to same-sex couples and unmarried heterosexual couples has passed through the Italian Senate after months of public debate, following a recent suspension of the legislative process to allow politicians to reflect on the proposed law. The legislation passed after its sponsors removed a controversial clause that would allow for…
Australia’s Cardinal George Pell has denied knowing anything about the abusive activities of a fellow cleric when he was a priest in the Victoria suburb of Ballarat in the 1970s. The cardinal has also claimed that he was victim to “a gross deception” by his then bishop, Dr Robert Mulkearns, and Msgr Leo Fiscalini, with…
“Our time needs credible people who can speak of God in a way that makes God real”, writes Andrew O’Connell While the rest of the country was engrossed in election tallies last Saturday morning, I was at the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin where all one hundred seats were filled for a private screening of…
“Give me the child, and I will mould the man”, Grace Bozzino at quadrapheme.com quotes St Francis Xavier as having said. “If that’s the case,” she points out, “then parents have some fairly important questions to ask. To whom are we giving our children? What sort of men – and women –will be returned to…
Stitches: A Handbook on Meaning, Hope and Repair by Anne Lamont (Hodder & Stoughton, £9.99) In this wise little book, popular writer Anne Lamont draws on the now almost lost art of make and mend which our grandmothers so firmly believed in. A stitch in time can save not only that favourite garment, but also, she…
My Other Self: Conversations with Christ on Living Your Faith by Clarence J. Enzler (Christian Classics Ave Maria Press, $13.95 / £8.99; e-book £8.54; ISBN: 978-0870612480) Donal Anthony Foley This book comes with high praise from figures including the late Fr Benedict Groeschel (who also wrote the foreword to this edition), in which he argues that “trust” is…
Greg Daly
Peter Costello