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December 6, 2014
NEW YORK - Was there a secret plot to elect Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio at the papal conclave last year? Did Bergoglio — who became Pope Francis at that conclave — give the go-ahead to such a plan? And does that campaign call his election, and his papacy, into question?
VATICAN CITY - A top Vatican official emphasized religious freedom worldwide and a peaceful solution to the conflict in eastern Ukraine as urgent priorities for Europe's main security organization.
December 7, 2014
INDIANAPOLIS - The Second Vatican Council brought about renewal to many aspects of the life of the church. But for many Catholics, the most noticeable developments appeared 50 years ago. On Nov. 29, 1964, parts of the Mass began for the first time to be prayed in English, priests started facing the congregation, and the approach to liturgical music sounded a different note.
TORONTO - If every Catholic is supposed to go to Mass on Sunday, Pope Francis wants every one of them to be well and truly welcomed when they get there — including the ones who randomly shout, rock back and forth in the pew, moan or unexpectedly laugh.
Something Other Than God: How I Passionately Sought Happiness and Accidentally Found It by Jennifer Fulwiler (Ignatius Press, hardcover, 248 pages, $25.95). When God answered Jennifer Fulwiler’s prayers, she was upset. It was just another confirmation for the former, self-proclaimed militant atheist that God does in fact exist.
December 8, 2014
VIENNA - Pope Francis called on world leaders, activists and people of faith to pull together to rid the world of the threat of nuclear weapons.
MANCHESTER, England - Young Africans are being seduced into modern slavery by the promise of a dream that never comes true, an English cardinal told a conference on human trafficking.
ROME - In the heart of Rome's high-end shopping district, sparkling with Christmas lights and shiny baubles in the windows of famous designers, Pope Francis prayed that people would spend time in silence and in service as they prepare to celebrate Jesus' birth.
VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis said the Catholic Church must find new ways to integrate the divorced and civilly remarried in the life of the church and to make it easier for Catholic families to accept their homosexual members.
NAIROBI, Kenya - Some church leaders are criticizing a British musicians’ charity group raising funds for the West African Ebola crisis, saying its new single reinforces negative stereotypes of Africa.
MANILA, Philippines - Tropical Storm Hagupit dumped heavy rain as it slunk its way to the Manila area Dec. 8, after passing across the northern half of the central Philippines at typhoon strength.
December 9, 2014
Members of Right to Life New Brunswick are demanding a vote in the provincial legislature on the Liberal government’s plans to make it easier to procure an abortion in the province.
The Rose of Durham continues to bloom in new and different ways. What began in 1988 with parish-based pro-life activism to help young mothers through crisis pregnancies and the hardship of single motherhood is becoming a professional resource ready to help young mothers up to the age of 25.
VATICAN CITY - Gay marriage was never on the agenda at the recent Synod of Bishops on the Family and the subject “did not cross our minds,” Pope Francis said in a new headline-grabbing interview.
OTTAWA - Catholic apologist Tim Staples used to love stumping Catholics with Bible verses in the days he was a Pentecostal, until he met a Catholic who stumped him.
VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis recognized the miracles needed for the canonization of two Palestinian nuns and of a French woman who founded a religious order.
MANILA, Philippines - Initial assessments by Catholic emergency responders showed significant damage to coastal areas of an island province in the east-central Philippines, where a powerful typhoon first made landfall Dec. 5, but Church officials said in some parts, chapels that were used as shelters held their own.
VATICAN CITY - The Vatican City prosecutor has opened an investigation into possible embezzlement by two former top officials at the Institute for the Works of Religion, more commonly called the Vatican bank.
VATICAN CITY - A new kind of ghetto needs the church's presence and people's solidarity: the "digital slum" where cyberbullying and online pornography and abuse run rampant, said speakers at a Vatican news conference.
To help set the agenda for the 2015 Synod of Bishops on the family, the Vatican is sending the world's Catholic bishops' conferences a list of questions on a range of topics, including matters of marriage and sexuality that proved especially controversial at the 2014 family Synod.