The celebration of Migrant and Refugee Sunday in the Catholic Church has been a minority activity this year. The times do not favour it. It’s not that there are few migrants and refugees to bother about. The difficulty is that they are many and growing. Welcoming, not blaming People who are doing it hard, as Read more
According to a study by the Pew Research Center (PRC), 47% of migrants around the world are Christians. By examining “adults and children who currently live outside their country of birth” in every country, the American research centre highlights the overrepresentation of Christians among migrants. The study defined “migrants” as those living outside their country Read more
A Pew Research Centre study released on Monday has found Christian migrants make up about 47 percent of the world’s 280 million migrants today – despite Christians accounting for only about 30 percent of the global population. The study reported that Muslims and Jews are migrating in big numbers. “Pew’s latest data – collected in Read more
Pope Francis has returned from touring Hungary, a bastion of European conservatism, where his mixed messaging is seemingly at odds with national sentiment. At a Mass celebrated Sunday in Budapest, His Holiness called on the Hungarian government — led by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and President Katalin Novák, both Christian, neither Catholic — to loosen Read more
Pope Francis canonised a 19th-century bishop known as “the father of migrants” on Sunday. In so doing, Francis sent a message to Catholic leaders on the importance of caring for refugees. His pontificate has been marked by his concern for migrants. Bishop Giovanni Battista Scalabrini lived at a time of mass migrations in Europe. The Read more
On the second and final day of his visit to Malta, Pope Francis spoke of migrants and of mercy to others. Everyone is deserving of mercy, whether they’re foreigners or simply people in need of compassion, he said at the Grotto of St Paul in Rabat. He went on to speak of Malta’s tradition of Read more
Pope Francis, at an emotional meeting with migrants, said on Friday he had a responsibility to tell the hard truth about the suffering of refugees, many held in conditions he compared to those in Nazi and Soviet camps. Francis, who has made defence of migrants and refugees a cornerstone of his pontificate, spoke at the Read more
For Catholics who put their faith first, before anything else, there is one way – above all others – to view the life and death issues facing local communities, the nation and the world: and that is, through the lens of the Gospel and Catholic social teaching! But instead, it clearly appears that more often Read more
Pope Francis seems to be recovering nicely from his July 4 surgery, when the 84-year-old pontiff underwent a three-hour procedure for diverticular stenosis. But even with the best prognosis, age is catching up to Francis. Barring a miracle, he will only be expected to continue as pope for five or six years. We may look Read more
In four years participants in a Caritas campaign have logged about 600,000km in symbolic solidarity walks with migrants and refugees. The global “Share the Journey” campaign aims to build “bridges of hope between islands separated by fear,” says Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, president of Caritas Internationalis. Although the campaign has formally ended, its message continues. Read more