Catholic colleges and universities are ranked among some of the best in the country, US News & World Report’s annual rankings has shown. The University of Notre Dame in Indiana, is the top-ranked national university on the list, placing 18th in the magazine’s annual survey. Georgetown University in Washington was close behind in a three-way…
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New Pope-mobile for Francis
An Italian priest has given Pope Francis a 20-year-old white Renault 4 to drive himself around the Vatican. The car – which has 300,000 km on the clock – was presented to the Pope by Fr Renzo Zocca. Known for his humble lifestyle, Francis said he used to drive the same car in his native…
Pope’s letter published in Italy
Pope Francis has responded to the questions of a non-believer journalist, in a letter published on the front page of Rome-based daily La Repubblica. The Pope, who has won praise for spontaneous and unusual moves during his six month papacy, was responding to editorials written by the daily’s founder and long-time editor Eugenio Scalfari, who…
Diplomatic drive for peace
The Vatican’s new secretary of state plans to use the Church’s vast global diplomatic network to build peace. Archbishop Pietro Parolin (pictured) said Pope Francis has already injected a new impetus into the Vaticanís Secretariat of State structure and given a new push for Church-led diplomacy. The archbishop, who is currently the papal nuncio to…
US Catholic colleges lead rankings
Catholic colleges and universities are ranked among some of the best in the country, US News & World Report’s annual rankings has shown. The University of Notre Dame in Indiana, is the top-ranked national university on the list, placing 18th in the magazine’s annual survey. Georgetown University in Washington was close behind in a three-way…
Food stamp cuts
The chairman of the US bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development has urged the US House of Representatives not to accept a proposed $40 billion in cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps. Bishop Stephen Blaire of Stockton, California, called the programme “one of the most effective…
Canadian Bishops meet
Canada’s bishops will be discussing charity, at home and abroad when they meet in Quebec for their annual plenary session next week. Within the past several months, floods in southern Alberta, a fire at Lac-Megantic, Quebec and the flash flooding in Toronto highlighted the fact that Canada’s bishops do not have an organised structure to…
Dancing sun a meteorological phenomena
Dear Editor, Fr McGillicuddy’s letter in last week’s Irish Catholic (IC 19/09/13) should provide useful food for thought for those who may have doubts about the existence of God. Similarly, an open-minded study of the Miracle of the Sun in Fatima on October 13, 1917 can help non-believers. In recent years Gunther Stolz, a German scientist who…
The Illustrated Story of Art
Though the text is compact, the range of art over time which some five scholars have put together gives a revealing appreciation of what art has been since earliest times, enhanced by many fine and often unusual illustrations. As a basic text, it covers a great deal, though one has qualms that fully a quarter of…
Renewal buried under red tape
Dear Editor, The letter from Seamus Flanagan (‘We need renewal, not reform’ IC 05/09/13), is tremendous, yet written in clear, simple language. I agree completely with him. That is the very heart of the matter. Over the centuries the Church has been gradually choked. Whatever good reform brought, through councils, canon law, etc., has been…