VATICAN CITY — Six months after becoming the first Latin American pontiff, Pope Francis invited an octogenarian priest from Peru for a private chat at his Vatican residence. Not listed on the pope’s schedule, the September 2013 meeting with the priest, Gustavo Gutiérrez, soon became public — and was just as quickly interpreted as a Read more
This summer, Pope Francis plans to release an encyclical letter in which he will address environmental issues, and very likely climate change. His statement will have a profound impact on the public debate. For one, it will elevate the spiritual, moral and religious dimensions of the issue. Calling on people to protect the global climate Read more
It’s 8.10 pm at the Vatican City and just a few meters away from Saint Anne’s Gate (Porta Sant’Anna) is a grey Fiat Ducato van. Its boot is filled with canned food, milk, juices, crates of fruit and toothbrush and toothpaste kits. Before getting in, a small group of people recite the Our Father. There Read more
The Extraordinary Jubilee promulgated by Francis will be the 65th in history. The first was announced by Sixtus V in 1585. The “special” Holy Year does not alter the recurrence of Ordinary Jubilees. The last Pope to open the (cemented shut) Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica for an universal Extraordinary Jubilee was the future Read more
Pope Francis has made no secret of his conviction that human-induced climate change, along with other forms of environmental degradation, represents a grave threat to humanity’s future. At times he even speaks in quasi-apocalyptic terms: “Let us not allow omens of destruction and death to accompany the advance of this world!” His forthcoming “ecological encyclical” Read more
One good thing has come out of the fuss over the pope’s comments about it being ok to smack your children (so long as their dignity is maintained); it has flushed out the former Irish president, Mary McAleese, as tiresomely conventional in much the same way as her predecessor, Mary Robinson – the very incarnation of PC. Read more
It all depends on how you interpret Humanae Vitae. That’s essential to understanding what Pope Francis “really meant” in his recent string of remarks on having children. In fact, it’s a line that comes from the pope himself. He used it in an interview in March with Italy’s biggest-selling daily newspaper, Corriere della Sera. The Read more
“Teach your children that it is not possible to be Christian outside the Church, and it is not possible to follow Christ outside the Church, as the Church is our mother, and lets us grow in the love of Jesus Christ” (Pope Francis, 11 January 2015). It must then follow that the Catholic Church is the true Read more
Immediately after his election on 13 March 2013, Pope Francis told himself, “Jorge, do not change, continue being yourself, because to change at your age would be ridiculous.” He revealed this interesting personal detail in a wide-ranging 50 minute, exclusive interview with Elisabetta Piquè, for La Nacion, the main Argentine newspaper, published today, December 7 Read more
Hubert Wolf, Professor of Church History at the University of Münster, is calling for a clearer distinction between “pope” and “pope emeritus”. According to Wolf, there are fears that “around Francis and Benedict XVI two competing power centres could come into being in the curia, with pope and antipope at the top of each.” The Read more