The president of Poland’s bishops’ conference has urged critics of a landmark abortion ruling to express their opposition “in a socially acceptable way” after protesters disrupted Sunday Masses. Archbishop Stanisław Gadecki issued the appeal on October 25, after the country’s constitutional court ruled that a law permitting abortion for foetal abnormalities was unconstitutional. In a…
Category: World Report
Planned Parenthood is now getting more US government funding, despite defunding efforts
Recent annual reports show that federal funding to Planned Parenthood has increased, despite efforts by the Trump administration to eliminate federal funding for the abortion provider over the last four years. One healthcare funding expert told CNA that without congressional action, new avenues of federal funding for abortion providers could soon be made available by…
French cases lead Focolare to promise investigation of handling abuse claims
The president of Focolare has accepted the resignations of the lay movement’s top leaders in France and announced the group will ask an independent committee to investigate how allegations of the sexual abuse of minors have been handled. “The task of this body will be to listen to the presumed victims and to gather further…
Catholic teachers ‘united in solidarity’ after France attack
The president of the French bishops’ council for Catholic education expressed solidarity with the country’s school community following the beheading of a school teacher in an Islamist terror attack last week. “In these dark hours, Catholic education feels deeply united in solidarity with the whole school community…and first of all with the teachers,” Archbishop Laurent…
Belarusian archbishop says Vatican doing all it can to secure his return
A Belarusian archbishop who has been denied entry back into his own country said the Vatican was doing everything in its power to resolve the situation and help him return. To live in “forced exile” is difficult, Archbishop Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz of Minsk told SIR, the news agency of the Italian bishops’ conference. “I can only live in…
Church group brands Philippine budget as anti-poor
A Catholic Church labour group in the Philippines has accused lawmakers of ignoring the poor, as well as the health and labour sectors with its budget for 2021 by not allocating a “sufficient amount” to cushion the effect of the coronavirus on hard-hit Filipinos. The Church People-Solidarity Group, an organisation composed of clergymen and churchgoers…
Congolese bishops call for special court to try war crimes
Catholic bishops in Congo are calling for a special international criminal court to try people suspected of mass killings and human rights abuses in the African country, where thousands of women and girls have been raped by armed men. The bishops made the call in a statement released October 19 after their plenary meeting in the capital,…
Vatican Roundup
Pope names new archbishop of Lyon after resignation of Cardinal Barbarin Pope Francis has named Bishop Olivier de Germay of Ajaccio, Corsica, to be the new archbishop of Lyon, France, succeeding a cardinal whose conviction on charges of failing to report clerical sex abuse was overturned. Cardinal Philippe Barbarin’s conviction was overturned in January, but…
In Brief
Catholic Coney Barrett sworn in as US Supreme Court justice US President Donald Trump has sworn in his latest nominee to the Supreme Court. The White House ceremony took place on Monday night after Amy Coney Barrett’s [pictured] nomination was approved by congress. She will be the 115th justice in US history and the fifth…
World Mission Sunday: number of Catholics continues to rise
The number of Catholics worldwide increased by almost 16 million in a year to 1.33 billion, according to statistics highlighted by the Vatican around the 2020 World Mission Sunday. The figures, shared by the Fides News Service, showed that there were 15,716,000 more Catholics at the end of 2018 – the most recent year where numbers are…










