Thirteen years ago, researchers at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum began the grim task of documenting all the ghettos, slave labor sites, concentration camps and killing factories that the Nazis set up throughout Europe. What they have found so far has shocked even scholars steeped in the history of the Holocaust. The researchers have cataloged some Read more
Many in Germany haven’t always had an easy relationship with the conservative-minded Pope Benedict XVI, but most on Monday praised their countryman’s courage in deciding to step down from his position amid failing health. Chancellor Angela Merkel, a Protestant, said that the 85-year-old pope’s decision that he was no longer fit enough to continue in Read more
A controversial procedure that lets would-be parents test embryos for certain genetic defects will soon be allowed in special cases in Germany. What does this mean for society? Do people have the right to a healthy child? “No,” says Tina Stark, “they don’t.” Her daughter Maya, an eight-month-old with strawberry blonde hair, is lying on Read more
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has urged Protestants and Catholics to emphasise what they have in common as Germany prepares to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation in 2017. “Especially in a very secular world, we should always stress what is common in the Christian religion,” said Merkel, who is the daughter of a Read more
Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki of Berlin has declined a nomination for the 2012 Respect Award by the Berlin Alliance Against Homophobia (Buendnis gegen Homophobie) for being the first high-ranking figure in the Catholic Church to speak out in favour of a “new cooperation with homosexuals in society”. The cardinal said that as a Catholic, respect Read more
The German Bishops’ Conference says the Vatican has quietly dropped its lawsuit against a satirical German magazine over a cover that depicted Pope Benedict XVI with a yellow stain on his robe. A Hamburg court had granted an injunction barring the magazine, Titanic, from distributing the image that fronted its July edition, headlined “Hallelujah at Read more
Reliable voices in the Vatican are saying Cardinal William Levada, Prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, will retire by the end of June. Italian daily La Stampa reports that Levada has told Pope Benedict he wants to return home to the United States and that Benedict will accept his resignation. David Read more
Over 172 German priests and deacons in the Archdiocese of Freiburg have openly stated they regularly give communion to divorced and remarried couples. “In our communities, remarried divorcees take communion and receive the sacraments of reconciliation and the anointing of the sick, with our approval,” the priests say on their website. Calling their actions a Read more
Pope Benedict XVI has personally written to the head of the German bishops’ conference to change the text of the Mass to say that Christ died “for many” rather than “for all”. The Pope said he was writing “to avoid a split” in the Church after Zollitsch told him during a March visit that “the Read more
A leading German conservative politician said on Thursday that Islam did not belong in Germany. “Islam is not part of our tradition and identity in Germany and so does not belong in Germany,” Volker Kauder, head of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives in parliament, told the Passauer Neue Presse. “But Muslims do belong in Germany. As Read more