Pope Francis could “sell out” China’s underground Catholic church, according to Emeritus Cardinal Joseph Zen. Hong Kong-based 85 year old Zen, who is the is China’s highest ranking prelate, said China’s communist rulers want “total surrender” from the Church. Pope Francis “is really naïve” and “doesn’t know the Chinese communists,” he said. “The people around Read more
Whenever Pope Francis talks about the need to welcome immigrants, to build bridges not walls, and to invest in the countries from which people are fleeing, critics inevitably will ask, “Okay, but what are you doing about it?” From snarky observations about the walls around Vatican city to wry observations about all the under-utilized ecclesiastical Read more
Catholic and Russian Orthodox relations will take a further step forward this week. Pope Francis and Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill are meeting in Switzerland to resume discussions they began last year in Havana. At last year’s meeting, the Catholic and Orthodox leaders discussed Christian brotherhood and unity. This year they will talk about progress and Read more
Hopeful signs suggest the Vatican and Beijing may meet half-way on who has the right to select and appoint mainland China’s bishops. Just who should be entitled to choose bishops has been a stumbling block between the Vatican and mainland China since 1951. Cardinal John Tong, who is the head of the Catholic church in Read more
Fake front-page newspaper reports and a rash of posters attacking Pope Francis have been appearing in Rome over the past week. A group of conservative Catholics who do not like Francis’s liberal views are said to be behind the smear campaign. The latest attack involved a fake front page being added to the official Vatican Read more
Healthcare is not a business as lives are at stake, Pope Francis says. He said in his view any public policy or private initiative regarding health care that does not make the dignity of the human person its central concern “engenders attitudes that can even lead to exploitation of the misfortune of others. And this Read more
Pope Francis and President Trump could meet in late May when Trump is in Italy for the G7 Summit. The British newspaper The Tablet, citing diplomatic sources, said the two will meet during President Trump’s visit to Italy. Trump will go to the G7 summit of world leaders meeting May 26-27 in Taorima, Sicily. Read Read more
In a Papal-first, Pope Francis sent a video message to tens of thousands of fans during Sunday’s Super Bowl game between the New England Patriots and Atlanta Falcons. The Super Bowl is the annual championship game of the National Football League In his message, Francis said he hoped the Super Bowl would provide “a sign Read more
The Roman Catholic Church will allow priests all over the world to grant forgiveness for abortion. This announcement came from Pope Francis at the end of the Jubilee of Mercy – a holy year dedicated to forgiveness. When the holy year concluded on Nov. 20, Pope Francis made permanent the permission that he had provisionally Read more
The Vatican’s first female-only association has been formally approved as a Vatican association. Donne in Vaticano (“Women in the Vatican”) is open to all 750 women working for the Holy See and its attached institutions. So far about 50 women have joined. Women make up about a fifth of the Vatican workforce. Most of them Read more