Religious freedom and religious liberty are not code words for discrimination, Archbishop William E. Lori of Baltimore says. Lori was responding to assertions made by Martin Castro, chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. “Statements painting those who support religious freedom with the broad brush of bigotry are reckless and reveal a profound disregard Read more
Police raided a cloistered convent of Discalced Carmelites after a magazine published testimony from two former nuns, who claimed they were subjected to elements of torture and that the abbess wouldn’t allow them to leave the cloister. After the police raid in the northeastern province of Entre Rios, Argentina in late August, the two nuns Read more
Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI has revealed that while he agreed with the conclusion Pope Paul VI drew in his encyclical letter (Humanae Vitae) on artificial contraception, he struggled with the reasoning Pope Paul used to arrive at his conclusion. “In the situation I was then in, and in the context of theological thinking in which Read more
Auschwitz victims included a Scottish woman who died at the Nazi death camp after refusing to abandon the Jewish girls in her care at a missionary school in Budapest. Her will has been discovered in church archives. Jane Haining is the only Scot named as “righteous among the nations” – non-Jews who risked their lives Read more
Clergy seeking personal gain rather than helping those in need do not follow the spirit of Jesus who took upon himself the sufferings of others, Pope Francis said. Jesus often would rebuke leaders who use their positions for personal gain and warned his followers to “do what they say, but not what they do,” the Read more
False accusations of child abuse have led a priest to ask why Catholic Church authorities give any credence to anonymous allegations such as were presented against him. Fr Tim Hazelwood, parish priest at Killeagh in east Cork, explained how “in May of this year I was successful in securing an apology and an admission that Read more
Same-sex marriage and the Catholic church’s views on it are likely to change, says US Democratic Vice-presidential candidate and devout Catholic, Tim Kaine. His comments were made on Saturday at the US annual national dinner for the Human Rights Campaign. “My support for marriage equality now — my full, complete, unconditional support for marriage equality Read more
Christian migrants should be given priority over non-Christians in moving to Germany and Islamic face veils should be banned, say German chancellor Angela Merkel’s political allies. The Christian Social Union (CSU), which works alongside Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union party, has demanded the tougher immigration rules and also said that new arrivals must socially integrate and Read more
A refugee-proof wall is about to be built by the UK government outside a huge Calais refugee camp to prevent asylum seekers from entering the United Kingdom. This big new refugee-proof wall will be four-meters high and its construction will begin soon. It is part of a £17-million deal struck between the United Kingdom and Read more
Gay lobbyists at the Vatican got a short shrift from Pope Benedict XVI – an action he says he is particularly proud of The Emeritus Pope went into detail about what he considers to be the most important achievement of his papacy in his upcoming book, Final Conversations, which is an extended interview with German Read more