US clergy have urged community members to come together “to support one another in this time of grief” after a mass shooting on St Valentine’s Day at a Broward County high school that left at least 17 people dead. “With God’s help, we can remain strong and resolute to resist evil in all its manifestations,”…
Jacob Zuma’s resignation as president of South Africa is long overdue, the country’s bishops have said, noting that his scandal-plagued presidency fostered corruption and dereliction of duty at all levels of government. “The fact that Mr. Zuma has been allowed to hold on to the highest position in the land despite long-standing and overwhelming evidence…
Pope Francis often meets on Fridays with survivors of sex abuse, he has said. Speaking to a group of Jesuits in Lima during his visit to Peru last month he revealed that these meetings, which he said do not always become public knowledge, make it clear that the survivors’ process of recovery “is very hard”.…
Few people have considered how communities and nations actually tolerate and encourage human trafficking, particularly as it relates to prostitution, Pope Francis has said. Modern forms of slavery “are far more widespread than previously imagined, even within the most prosperous of our societies”, the Pontiff said during a meeting with an international group of law…
The US bishops have praised signs of progress against ‘abortion ideology’, in response to a State Department report on new limits to US funding for groups involved in abortion. “Abortion undermines basic human rights, certainly for the child, and it also can wound the mother emotionally and physically,” Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York said.…
Catholic Olympic gold-medallist Yuna Kim lit the torch at the Opening Ceremony for the 2018 Olympic Games in Pyeongchang, South Korea. The Korean skating sensation has long expressed a desire to use her public role to share the light of Christ by witnessing to her Catholic faith in international competitions and performances. Kim was honoured…
Even though the Church has all the necessary norms and laws in place to safeguard minors from abuse by clergy, the problem continues to be a lack in understanding or caring about those rules and guidelines and applying them effectively, said one Jesuit expert. What must change “without a doubt” are Church procedures for handling…
As the Church celebrated the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, a French bishop announced the 70th officially recognised miraculous cure of a pilgrim to the Lourdes grotto where Mary appeared 160 years ago. Bishop Jacques Benoit-Gonnin of Beauvais formally declared this week “the prodigious, miraculous character” of the healing of Sr Bernadette Moriau, a…
Healing found in wounds of Christ, Pope tells Stigmatines A devotion to and meditation on the five wounds of Christ “may sound a bit medieval”, but anyone who recognises he or she is wounded will find mercy and healing in the passion of Christ, Pope Francis has said. Meeting with members of the Stigmatine order, the Pope distributed his prepared text and then…
Formalising their unity in the intimate setting of the papal residence’s chapel, Pope Francis and Melkite Patriarch Joseph Absi have concelebrated Mass together in the presence of members of the Melkite synod of bishops. Instead of giving a homily at the February 13 early morning Mass, Pope Francis explained the special nature of Patriarch Absi’s…