Pope Francis urged the world to let the light of Christmas pierce the “darkness in human hearts” that leads to religious persecution, social injustice, armed conflicts and fear of migrants.
The Vatican on Tuesday accused ultra-conservative Catholic social media of fomenting hate, a day after militants stole statues they considered pagan idols from a church and dumped them in the Tiber river.
A Brazilian diplomat said last week that the administration of President Jair Bolsonaro doesn’t fear the Synod of Bishops for the Amazon taking place this month at the Vatican, but that the Catholic bishops “involuntarily reinforce the campaign of the European lobbies, who are very afraid of the competition of Brazilian agriculture.”
The Vatican's latest leaks scandal claimed its first victim on Monday, as Pope Francis' chief bodyguard resigned over the leak of a Vatican police flyer identifying five employees who were suspended as part of a financial investigation.
Deep in the Amazon forest, young couples looking to wed or baptize children often turn to Sister Alba, who fills in where Catholic priests cannot be found. But in many remote areas, there are not even enough nuns to go around, and it is laywomen who play a key role in the evangelization of indigenous people.
The pastor's voice bellows through an old converted cinema in a rundown Buenos Aires barrio and hundreds of hands reach out in prayer. Though not a typical place of worship, Evangelical churches like this one are sprouting up all over Pope Francis' former archdiocese, as once staunchly Catholic Argentina battles an economic crisis that has plunged more than one-third of the nation into poverty.
A shortage of Catholic priests in the Amazon is eroding the church's influence in the remote region, bishops in Brazil and Peru warn, ahead of a Vatican synod dedicated to the rainforest. Wilmar Santin, one of the scores of Brazilian bishops set to attend the Oct 6-27 gathering, says the church is ceding ground to more nimble Evangelical rivals and needs to lift its game.
An image of Argentina's saint patron, the Virgin of Lujan, which was carried to the Falklands during the 1982 conflict, and remained unaccounted for during years, will be returned by the United Kingdom. In retribution, the Argentine military bishop will hand a replica of the image to the head of British military chaplains in a ceremony to take place next month in the Vatican with Pope Francis blessing the images.
The Organization of American States, OAS, will have a new Permanent Observer, from the Vatican, Monsignor Mark Gerald Miles, who on Monday presented his credentials to Secretary-General Luis Almagro.
Pope Francis said on Tuesday he was “not afraid” of a schism in the Roman Catholic Church, in reference to attacks by conservative cardinals who frequently take aim at his papacy.