Pope Francis urged Syrian President Bashar Assad to put an end to his country’s eight-year-long conflict and seek reconciliation for the good of the nation and its vulnerable people.
In the light of “a worrying negative prejudice” against the Catholic Church, Pope Francis has recently ordered the publication of a document affirming the absolute secrecy of everything said in confession and calling on priests to defend it at all costs, even at the cost of their lives.
With “overwhelming joy”, Bishop Daniel Jenky of Peoria has this week announced that Pope Francis had approved a miracle attributed to the intercession of Archbishop Fulton Sheen.
Millions of Catholics live their faith through their association with lay movements and Catholic groups, but some also have lost their faith when they were sexually abused in those groups and felt they had nowhere to turn.
As a small group of witnesses silently looked on, the mortal remains of Archbishop Fulton Sheen were interred at St Mary’s Cathedral in Peoria late in the afternoon of 27June, completing a transfer from St Patrick’s Cathedral in New York that began early that morning.
Pope Francis will declare Blessed John Henry Newman, the 19th-century British Cardinal, a saint on 13 October.
Announcing the themes for the next three World Youth Day celebrations, Pope Francis called on young men and women to meditate on the path of Christian life that God has called them to walk.
The Catholic Church must find ways to reach indigenous Catholics deprived of the sacraments in the most remote areas of the Amazon rainforest, and that may include ordaining married elders, said the working document for the Synod of Bishops on the Amazon.
Catholic schools must help parents teach young people that biological sex and gender are naturally fixed at birth and part of God’s plan for creation, said the Congregation for Catholic Education.
Pope Francis said that he continues to visit retired Pope Benedict XVI, 92, who is “like a grandfather” who continues to encourage him and give him strength.