The New Zealand Catholic Bishops welcome the letter this week to the People of God from Pope Francis asking forgiveness for the sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable adults perpetrated by clergy and consecrated persons. As Pope Francis notes, these heinous crimes inflict deep wounds on the victims themselves and on their family members, and Read more
Deadly floods in Kerala, India, have seen Pope Francis call for solidarity and help from the international community. Incessant rains this month have caused the state’s worst floods in a century. At least 186 people have died, over 200,000 families have taken refuge at relief camps and about 800,000 have been displaced. Kerala is home Read more
Pope Francis’s Share the Journey campaign urging world leaders to reach an agreement on refugees has taken a new twist in Britain with an installation at London’s Westminster Cathedral. Led by two Catholic charities, CAFOD and Caritas Social Action Network (CSAN), Share the Journey has resulted in hundreds of pairs of shoes being displayed outside Read more
“If one member suffers, all suffer together with it” (1 Cor 12:26). These words of Saint Paul forcefully echo in my heart as I acknowledge once more the suffering endured by many minors due to sexual abuse, the abuse of power and the abuse of conscience perpetrated by a significant number of clerics and consecrated Read more
The Catholic Church is now ‘ruled by an individual rather than by… its own dictates of tradition plus Scripture’, according to Fr Thomas Rosica, a Vatican consultant who leads Canadian Catholic media organization Salt and Light television. Rosica says the Church is now “openly ruled by an individual [Pope Francis, who rules by his own Read more
When Pope Francis comes to Ireland in two weeks’ time it will be 39 years since the last visit by a head of the Catholic Church. Since then the status of the church in Ireland has declined dramatically. Those identifying as Catholic are down by 20 per cent, according to the last census. Mass attendance Read more
For those who often saw the cardinal archbishop of Buenos Aires at anti-death penalty gatherings in the years before he became pope, his move to formally change official church teaching on the issue will have come as no surprise. The official Vatican declaration that “the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on Read more
Pope Francis has changed the catechism to ensure the church’s opposition to the death penalty is clear. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) is of universal importance to Catholics, the change will spread the church teaching about capital punishment throughout the world. It will also require Catholics to work towards abolishing the death Read more
Pope Francis has personally written a letter to Chile’s bishops to thank them for changes they have made to their response to allegations of sexual abuse by clergy. Francis’s handwritten letter follows the bishops’ formal, written apology for failing to listen to clerical abuse victims. In addition to their apology, the bishops have made a Read more
English singer-songwriter Sting and his wife Trudi Styler caught the papal eye at the pope’s weekly audience last Wednesday. Afterwards Sting (former frontman of The Police) tweeted a series of pictures of the moment, with the caption, “Pope Francis is a true rock star! A genuine charisma that filled the room. Read more