Coronavirus concerns are seeing Catholics being told not to touch or kiss the Cross during veneration on Good Friday. In the Philippines, updated liturgical guidelines issued by the Catholic Bishops’ Conference and posted on Twitter step up the precautionary measures the Conference announced in January. With the addition of the latest decree – that during Read more
The head of the Australian bishops’ conference, Archbishop Mark Coleridge, is in Rome for high-level discussions before the Church in Australia’s first plenary council since Vatican II. The plenary council is set to begin in Adelaide October. During his two-week trip to Rome, Coleridge will meet with senior curial figures and Pope Francis. They will Read more
Pope Pius XII’s wartime archives will be opened, the Vatican has announced. This will enable scholars to probe accusations that Pius turned a blind eye to the Holocaust. They will find he helped Jews behind the scenes, Holy See officials say. “I don’t think you will find a smoking gun,” Father Norbert Hofmann, the top Read more
Hundreds of students staged a mass walk-out of a Catholic school after two gay teachers resigned because of their sexuality. The teachers from Kennedy Catholic High in Seattle both quit after getting engaged to their same-sex partners. After the news broke to the students, hundreds of them caused havoc by blocking corridors, protesting and staging Read more
Survivors of church sex abuse have descended on Rome this week, marking the first anniversary of Pope Francis’ summit of church leaders on preventing abuse with calls for more accountability and acknowledgment of their pain. On Thursday, three deaf Argentines marched to St. Peter’s Square. They were among the victims of violent sexual abuse by Read more
Cardinal Angelo Becciu, the Holy See’s former Deputy Secretary of State (Sostituto), has strongly denied any misappropriation of funds from the Peter’s Pence collection, currently under investigation by the Vatican judiciary. The Sardinian cardinal, who is now prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, was questioned about the investigation on Feb. 17 at Read more
Vatican diplomatic corps members should first spend a year in ministry or as missionaries, Pope Francis has announced. Francis’s announcement approved a written suggestion made at the recent synod for the Amazon which asked for the current curriculum for trainee diplomats to change. Instead of doing an internship at the nunciature as happens now, trainees Read more
A Swiss cathedral’s first Catholic mass in nearly five hundred years will be celebrated at a cathedral in Geneva at the end of this month. The mass will be celebrated at Saint-Pierre de Genève Cathedral on 29 February. The last Mass celebrated at the cathedral took place in 1535. After the Reformation, it was taken Read more
Pope Francis is cherry-picking abuse reforms aimed at protecting children from clerical sexual abuse says a survivors of clerical abuse network. He has done little to seriously address the problem even though a year has passed since the summit where about 190 bishops and cardinals heard the testimony of victims, they say. The Pope closed Read more
About a quarter of all new Catholic priests in Europe are Polish, according to data from the Polish Institute for Catholic Church Statistics. Furthermore, since 2000 the statistics show a decline in the number of new priests in Poland, as well as a rise in the number of those leaving the priesthood. Around 350 new Read more