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Pope Invites Tony Blair To Vatican Summit To Discuss Church's Fears That Politics Is Losing Its Religion By Nick Pisa November 2009 Catholic convert Tony Blair is among several world leaders being invited to attend a top level summit with Pope Benedict XVI to discuss the role of the Church in politics. The two-day summit will be held at the Vatican and will include other Catholic politicians from all over the world, including German chancellor Angela Merkel, U.S. vice president Joe Biden, former Spanish PM Jose Maria Aznar, and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. Church officials have been quietly working...

ROME (CNS) -- Dissident theologian Father Hans Kung criticized Pope Benedict XVI for his recent opening to discontented Anglicans, charging the pope was "fishing" for the most conservative Christians to the detriment of the larger church. Father Kung said the invitation to traditionalist Anglicans to join the Roman Catholic Church went against years of ecumenical work on the part of both churches, calling it instead "a nonecumenical piracy of priests." The pope's basic message is: "Traditionalists of all churches, unite under the dome of St. Peter's!" Father Kung wrote in an editorial Oct. 28 in the Rome daily La Repubblica....

David Gibson's head appears to be spinning over at The Washington Post: When Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was elected pope in April 2005, all the world rejoiced -- or recoiled -- with the certain knowledge that the cardinals had settled on the one man who would be more conservative than John Paul II. <snip> Thus far, Benedict's papacy has been one of constant movement and change, the sort of dynamic that liberal Catholics -- or Protestants -- are usually criticized for pursuing. In Benedict's case, this liberalism serves a conservative agenda. But his activism should not be surprising: As a sharp...

Pope Benedict has sure gotten the ball rolling and it seems others want to get into the ecumenical action! Thanks to A Catholic Knight on this one: A Bulgarian Orthodox prelate told Benedict XVI of his desire for unity, and his commitment to accelerate communion with the Catholic Church. At the end of Wednesday's general audience, Bishop Tichon, head of the diocese for Central and Western Europe of the Patriarchate of Bulgaria, stated to the Pope, "We must find unity as soon as possible and finally celebrate together," L'Osservatore Romano reported. "People don't understand our divisions and our discussions," the...

Santiago, Chile, Oct 22, 2009 / 01:03 pm (CNA).- In an interview with the Chilean daily, “El Mercurio,” the Superior General of the Society of St. Pius X, Bernard Fellay, acknowledged that the Vatican is considering the possibility of converting the Lefebvrist group into a personal prelature as part of the discussions aimed at bringing about reconciliation. Fellay, who visited members of the SSPX movement in Chile, is one of four bishops whose excommunication was lifted by Pope Benedict XVI last January. Asked about the speculation that the Society of Pius X could be made into a personal prelature similar...

from Damian Thompson: The Vatican has announced that Pope Benedict is setting up special provision for Anglicans, including married clergy, who want to convert to Rome together, preserving aspects of Anglican liturgy. They will be given their own pastoral supervision, according to this press release from the Vatican: “In this Apostolic Constitution the Holy Father has introduced a canonical structure that provides for such corporate reunion by establishing Personal Ordinariates which will allow former Anglicans to enter full communion with the Catholic Church while preserving elements of the distinctive Anglican spiritual and liturgical patrimony.”

Vatican efforts to reduce incense emissions have proven largely unsuccessful.

Berlin, Sept 29 (CTK) - Pope Benedict XVI has won great respect in the atheist Czech Republic, the German daily Die Welt wrote Tuesday commenting on the Pope's visit to the country on September 26-28.Public Czech Television's (CT) cameras followed almost every move by Benedict XVI during his three-day visit to the Czech Republic, the daily says.The Pope managed to raise enthusiasm among young people and he even won respect of Czech President Vaclav Klaus, Die Welt wrote."Judging by the space provided by Czech Television to the coverage of Benedict XVI's visit it could seem that the Pope visited a...

Pope Benedict XVI sought to reach out to the heavily secular people of the Czech Republic on Saturday, decrying the "wounds" left by atheistic communism and urging them to rediscover their Christian roots. ...Benedict said Christianity has an "irreplaceable role" to play in their lives. The Czech Republic is one of the most secular countries in Europe, with nearly half the country professing to be non-believers.... Vatican organizers are hoping for a crowd of up to 200,000 people for the pope's Sunday Mass in Brno, in the Catholic heartland of the Czech Republic.... The [papal vespers] service was held in...

Pope Benedict XVI is to visit the UK in January 2010, the BBC has learned. It will be the first papal visit to Britain since 1982, when Pope John Paul II's six-day tour drew huge crowds. Then, masses were held in cities including Cardiff, London.... and Edinburgh.

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI's second volume on the life of Jesus is likely to be completed sometime next spring, a Vatican spokesman said. The book is expected to cover Christ's childhood, passion, death and resurrection. The first volume, the best-selling "Jesus of Nazareth," was published in 2007. The spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi, told Catholic News Service Sept. 13 that next spring was a "realistic" target date for completion. He added that readying the manuscript for publication and translating it into other languages could add to the timeline, however. The pope has been working on the volume over...

St. Augustine of Hippo Rome, Italy, Sep 4, 2009 / 10:08 am (CNA).- In a letter he sent Thursday to Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity,  Pope Benedict XVI has underscored that the teachings of St. Augustine are a path seeking unity with the Orthodox. The message from the Pope was sent to Cardinal Kasper as the 11th Inter-Christian Symposium gathered in Rome. The meeting was organized by the Franciscan Institute of Spirituality of the Pontifical University Antonianum and the Aristotle Orthodox Theological Faculty of Thessalonica.In his message, the Holy Father expressed his gratitude...

Castel Gandolfo, Italy, Aug 30, 2009 / 11:14 am (CNA).- At Sunday’s Angelus prayer in the courtyard of Castel Gandolfo’s apostolic palace, Pope Benedict XVI recalled the previous week’s liturgical memorial of St. Monica, mother of St. Augustine of Hippo and model and patron of Christian mothers. “Much is recounted about her in her son’s autobiography ‘The Confessions,’ a masterpiece among the most read works of all time,” Pope Benedict said. “There, we understand that St. Augustine imbibed the name of Jesus with maternal milk and was educated in the Christian religion by his mother, the principles of which...

If a Latinist were asked to translate the phrase caritas in veritate into English without more information, he would almost certainly reply "love in truth." In the German translation, caritas becomes simply Liebe [love] . However, in the English version of this encyclical, caritas is rendered "charity." The English word is derived from the Latin, but the use of one for the other is a choice that seems to me to require a little explanation. Caritas, like "charity" as that word is used in theology, is not so much an emotion as an operation of the intellect. "Love" can cover...

The Catholic Medical Association has sent a pointed message to the Federal government: Back off and start over in planning for the future of health care in America. In a statement released earlier this week (http://www.cathmed.org/issues_resources/publications/press_releases/statement_on_health_care_reform/), the CMA said that “health-care reform encompasses both individual rights and the common good, ethical issues surrounding life and death, and economic issues ranging from taxes and property to economic competitiveness.” According to CMA’s analysis, all legislation now being considered will make things substantially worse in each of these areas, while doing essentially nothing to improve medical care, even for the poor. Insurance and...

"Whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the Body and of the Blood of the Lord... For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the Body of the Lord" - 1 Corinthians 11:27,28 Pope Benedict to Catholics: Kneel and Receive on the Tongue Only Pope Benedict XVI does not want the faithful receiving Communion in their hand nor does he want them standing to receive Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. According to Vatican liturgist, Monsignor Guido Marini, the pope is trying to set...

Pope defrocks priest over 'visions' of the Virgin Mary The Pope has defrocked the priest at the centre of claims that the Virgin Mary has been appearing in the Bosnian town of Medjugorje. The Vatican stripped Father Tomislav Vladic of his priest status after an investigation into growing concerns over the alleged apparitions. Father Vlasic was named as the 'creator' of the phenomenon by Pavao Zanic, the local bishop at the time the apparitions began in 1981.

July 16, 2009 (InsideCatholic.com) - In the late afternoon of July 10, President Obama met privately with Pope Benedict XVI for just over 30 minutes. According to official Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi, S.J., "The president explicitly expressed his commitment to reducing the numbers of abortions and to listen to the church's concern on moral issues."   On July 13 in a Senate committee hearing, Sen. Barbara Mikulski was forced to admit under persistent questioning by Sen. Orrin Hatch that the new health-care bill includes abortion coverage. Planned Parenthood's Guttmacher Institute estimates government funding of abortion increases abortion by 20 to...

Brian Griffiths, Lord of Fforestfach and vice-chairman of Goldman Sachs International, says Pope Benedict's Caritas in Veritate offers the single best analysis of the current global economic crisis. The language may be dense, but the message is sufficiently rewarding. The encyclical analyses modern capitalism from an ethical and spiritual perspective as well as a technical one. As a result it makes the Government’s White Paper on financial reforms published two days later look embarrassingly one-dimensional and colourless.It is highly critical of today’s global economy but always positive. Its major concern is how to promote human development in the context of...

  Benedict's Third Encyclical: A Summary t | t | t | t     by Dr. Jeff Mirus, July 9, 2009 Pope Benedict’s new encyclical, Caritas in Veritate (Charity in Truth), may not be the kind of encyclical that everybody needs to read. It is an incremental addition to the Church’s social teaching with the stated purposes of observing the fortieth anniversary of Pope Paul VI’s great social encyclical, Populorum Progressio, and of bringing it up to date with respect to global developments since the 1960’s. Unlike her dogmas of Faith, the Church’s social teaching operates at the...

Chatter abounds around the web about a paragraph calling for a “world political authority� in Pope Benedict’s new encyclical, Caritas in Veritate. John Zmirak writes that it is the only paragraph that he finds troubling. George Weigel concludes that this section and...other statements he finds unacceptable are the result of...the influence of the supposedly ideology-driven Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. Weigel suggests that statements influenced by PCJP (as identified by “those with advanced degrees in Vaticanology�) are inconsistent with the rest of the “Benedictine� text. The implication is that we can ignore passages some might find troublesome, such as the...

President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama meet with Pope Benedict XVI, Friday, July 10, 2009, at the Vatican.(AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari)

A Capitalist or Anti-Capitalist Encyclical? Vatican Aides Present "Caritas in Veritate" VATICAN CITY, JULY 7, 2009 (Zenit.org).- "This is not an anti-capitalist encyclical," affirmed one of the Vatican aides who presented "Caritas in Veritate" today, but it does "condemn capitalism when it becomes totalitarian." That was the estimation offered by Stefano Zamagni, an economics professor from the University of Bologna and a consultor to the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, during a press conference to present today Benedict XVI's third encyclical. The text, Zamagni explained, "looks at capitalism in its historical situation" and reiterates that no economic system is...

Because of the good progress of the last few years with the SSPX, His Holiness has now taken the next, logical step. Pope Benedict has now implemented what he said he would do concerning the ad hoc Pontifical Commission "Ecclesia Dei".  He has fused it into the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, making the Prefect of the CDF, ex officio, the Commission’s President and retaining the office of a Secretary and giving it also staff. The Pope did this by means of a new Motu Proprio, Ecclesiae unitatem, signed on the anniversary of the establishment of the PCED...

Pope Benedict XVI's third encyclical -- Caritas in Veritate -- arrived today containing 30,468 words: an introduction, six chapters, conclusion, and 159 footnotes. It's not thrilling reading, even by encyclical standards, but as the latest papal statement on the Church's social teaching, "Love in Truth" will be a work of lasting significance.   Those who dig through the document to see whether it leans left or right will be disappointed: There is something here for everybody. For the Left, anxious to set the scene for President Barack Obama's meeting with Benedict in a few days, there are plenty of...

Two major wire services- AP and Reuters- cherry picked excerpts from Pope Benedict XVI’s latest encyclical (a teaching document of the Catholic Church) on Tuesday to support left-wing economic and political positions, and all but ignored the pontiff’s traditional stances on the family, bioethics, and the environment. The AP also went so far to bring up “the state of the Vatican’s own [financial] books.” Both Philip Pullella, who regularly writes about the Pope and the Vatican for Reuters, and the AP’s Nicole Winfield zeroed in on paragraph 67 of the encyclical, which is titled “Caritas in Veritate,” or “Charity in...

Vatican City, Jul 7, 2009 / 08:56 am (CNA).- Pope Benedict XVI's highly anticipated social encyclical, titled “Love in Truth,” takes on the complex issue of what the global economy should look like. In his analysis, real development can be achieved by seeking to convert individual people, and not the economy, which is only an instrument. The global financial crisis places on display the “pernicious effects of sin,” the Holy Father said as he began the third chapter of his new encyclical. At the root of the current meltdown, the Pope explained that he finds three false convictions: that man...

... to the world at large. Today, at the noontime Angelus, which followed this morning's Pallium Mass, Pope Benedict XVI announced that he had signed his third encyclical, "Charity in Truth." Some apparent excerpts have already been leaked by an Italian newspaper. The encyclical is expected to be released on July 6th or 7th, shortly before President Obama is scheduled to meet with the Holy Father on the afternoon of July 10th. Already there is growing discussion of how the encyclical will play with "liberals" and "conservatives." Such discussion is understandable to some degree, but I'm willing to bet it...

An ultraconservative group plans to ordain 13 Roman Catholic priests in Minnesota — even though their elevations likely won't be recognized by the Vatican. The St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary, part of the Society of St. Pius X, will host the ordinations of 12 U.S.-based priests and another from France in Winona on Friday. The Vatican says ordinations by the society aren't legitimate, even though Pope Benedict XVI recently lifted the excommunications of its leaders. The society was founded by those opposed to the liberalizing reforms of the Second Vatican Council and especially its outreach to Jews and other religions. The...

June 18, 1859 -- Bl. Pius IX, beholding the inexorable march across all Italy of the anticlerical forces of the Risorgimento, addressed the Encyclical Qui Nuper to the entire hierarchy of the Catholic Church, in which we find the following, still relevant words: In the midst of such turmoil We sent you the present letter in order to seek some consolation in Our sorrow. Moreover, on this occasion We also exhort you to make it your concern to do what we read that Moses prescribed once to Aaron, the high priest of the Hebrews (Nm 16): "Take the censor, fill...

ROME, JUNE 11, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI is warning of a "serpentine secularization" that penetrates the Church and is manifested in "formal and empty Eucharistic worship." The Pope celebrated the feast of Corpus Christi today in Rome, presiding over Mass in the Basilica of St. John Lateran and then processing with the Blessed Sacrament to the Basilica of St. Mary Major. In his homily, the Holy Father illustrated the importance of faith in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, telling the thousands of pilgrims that this faith "cannot be taken for granted." "Today there arises the risk of...

Let's just imagine that you're the Pope. For months now you've been working on an encyclical about Catholic social teaching. The expected publication date has been pushed back several times; evidently you haven't been happy with the early drafts. Just when the project finally seemed near completion, the world economy went into a nosedive, and since the encyclical is devoted largely to a discussion of the global economy, you realized that you'd need to work over the draft once again, to provide some responses to the questions that everyone is now asking. Now at last the encyclical is near completion--...

On March 22, a number of the world’s media outlets reported something along the lines of “ Far-right youths carrying placards reading ‘leave my Pope alone’ clashed with left-wing activists outside Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris after the latter had thrown condoms on the square as worshippers were leaving Sunday mass.” The Associated Press, AFP and Reuters were among the news-wires which used the term “far right” to describe the young people protesting in favour of the Pope. A group of about 30 demonstrators belonging to a group called Act Up had chosen a major Sunday Mass at Notre Dame Cathedral...

VATICAN - Pope concludes Month of Mary in the Vatican Gardens: “In Mary's school we too learn to recognize the Holy Spirit's presence in our life, to listen to his inspirations and to follow them with docility.” Vatican City (Agenzia Fides) – On the evening of Saturday, May 30, in the Vatican Gardens, there was a procession with the recitation of the Holy Rosary, to conclude the Month of May, Month of Mary. At the end of the celebration. At the close of the celebration, which was presided by Cardinal Angelo Comastri, Vicar General of His Holiness for Vatican City...

In a St Peter’s Basilica, draped in red – flowers, vestments, altar – Benedict XVI celebrated mass for the feat of Pentecost, which commemorates the gift of the Holy Spirit to the apostles and May gathered in the Upper Room. Lending greater solemnity to proceedings was the presence of the choir from Cologne Cathedral and the city’s Kammerorchester, whose 200 members, together with the Sistine Chapel choir, preformed the Harmoniemesse, one of Joseph Haydn’s last masses, marking two hundred years since the composers’ death. In thanking them, the Pope described the work as “a sublime symphony of God’s glory”. Of...

China has held off on ordaining bishops without Vatican approval, but government interference in the state-backed Chinese church is still a concern, Hong Kong's cardinal — a key adviser to the pope_ said Monday. Beijing and the Vatican don't have diplomatic relations, and the power to appoint bishops is a major sticking point between them. China forced its Roman Catholics to cut ties with the Vatican in 1951, shortly after the officially atheist Communist Party took power. Worship is allowed only in state-backed churches, which recognize the pope as a spiritual leader. They name their own priests and bishops, but...

US President Barack Obama may meet with Pope Benedict XVI in July when he is in Italy for a Group of Eight summit, the ANSA news agency reported Sunday, without citing its sources. It would most likely take place as the G8 leaders wrap up their July 8-10 summit to be held in L'Aquila, the Italian town devastated by an earthquake in April that killed some 299 people, the agency said. ANSA added that "the most likely date would be July 10, although there has been no official confirmation." It would the first meeting between the pope and the US...

Attacks Against Christians Trouble Pontiff Notes Concern When Greeting India's Ambassador ROME, MAY 29, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI expressed his desire that everyone should enjoy religious freedom in a message written for the new ambassador from India, where Christians were the object of a wave of violence last year in the eastern state of Orissa. The Pope said this today in a written statement he gave to Chitra Narayanan. The Pontiff received the envoy in an audience together with seven other ambassadors representing Mongolia, Benin, New Zealand, South Africa, Burkina Faso, Namibia and Norway. He addressed the eight as...

Vatican City, May 30, 2009 / 04:46 pm (CNA).- During a festive meeting with missionary children at the Vatican on Saturday, Pope Benedict XVI said that he never thought about becoming the Pope, and that even today he still has a hard time getting used to the fact. “My name is Letizia and I would like to ask you a question.” a little girl said to the Pope. “Dear Pope Benedict XVI, what did the motto ‘the children help the children’ mean to you when you were a boy? Did you ever think of becoming the Pope?” another Italian...

The former Prime Minister is flying to Italy on Frdiay to stay with Carla Powell whose husband Charles was her foreign policy adviser at Downing Street. Lady Powell, who lives in a villa on the outskirts of Rome, arranged the meeting with Pope Benedict XVI which will take place in the Vatican on Wednesday. The meeting will come more than 30 years after Lady Thatcher first travelled to the Vatican, as Leader of the Opposition, to meet Pope Paul VI. In November 1980 she met Pope John Paul II, the former Polish Cardinal, who agreed to put pressure on the...

Pope Benedict XVI's outreach tour of the Middle East this week failed to placate critics still smarting from his riot-inciting comments in a 2006 speech at Germany's Regensburg University. The pontiff at that time quoted 15th-century Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Paleologus who said: "Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." The pope said he regrets any hurt feelings, but some Muslims want more contrition. Sheik Yusef Abu Hussein, mufti of Karak in Jordan, said, "We...

Saint John’s Gospel has left us an evocative account of the visit of Peter and the Beloved Disciple to the empty tomb on Easter morning. Today, at a distance of some twenty centuries, Peter’s Successor, the Bishop of Rome, stands before that same empty tomb and contemplates the mystery of the Resurrection. Following in the footsteps of the Apostle, I wish to proclaim anew, to the men and women of our time, the Church’s firm faith that Jesus Christ “was crucified, died and was buried”, and that “on the third day he rose from the dead”. Exalted at the...

It's a pity that the Palestinian Authority's (PA) chief Islamic judge Tayseer Rajab Tamimi will be criticized for rudeness rather than incitement to genocide. And the whole political context of Tamimi's statements shouldn't be missed either: he is an appointee of the PA. When he demands that Israel be wiped out either he's speaking for his bosses or if not they should fire him. Of course, they won't because in large part he is. The Syrian regime was even more open with its antisemitism during the Pope's Middle East trip, trying to foment Christian hatred of the Jews quite openly....

Dear Mr. President, On April 6, you named Harry Knox to your Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. You claim to have created this Council, among other things, to “bring everyone together – from both the secular and faith-based communities.” Harry Knox is the hate-filled antithesis of this noble objective. Knox is a virulent anti-Catholic bigot, and has made numerous vile and dishonest attacks against the Church and the Holy Father. He has no business on any Council having to do with faith or religion. We do not know if you or members of your Administration were aware of...

Those who object to the idea that Islam was spread by the sword are not at war with Pope Benedict but with history. What are now called Muslim lands used to be Christian, Jewish and Zoroastrian lands.

Vatican stumbles in defense of Pope Benedict A spokesman, stung by criticism of the pope during his Holy Land trip, inaccurately says Benedict never belonged to the Hitler Youth. Benedict presses ahead with his visit, calling for peace. By Richard Boudreaux May 13, 2009 Reporting from Jerusalem -- Pope Benedict's pilgrimage to the Holy Land veered Tuesday into controversy over his past when the Vatican, stung by Israeli criticism, denied and then acknowledged his membership in the Hitler Youth during World War II. The conflicting accounts came in response to Israeli leaders who faulted the German pontiff for not mentioning,...

JERUSALEM (JTA) -- Pope Benedict XVI .... calling for more understanding between Christians and Muslims. He encouraged Christians and Muslims to oppose terrorism. "Muslims and Christians, precisely because of the burden of our common history, so often marked by misunderstanding, must today strive to be known and recognized as worshippers of God, faithful to prayer, eager to uphold and lift by the almighty decrees,"... ...At the mosque, in a meeting with Muslim leaders, he called for a "trilateral dialogue" including the Church to help bring Jews and Muslims together to discuss peace

As controversy surrounds the Pope's shoes in a mosque in Amman, a Vatican spokesman insists that it would be "absolutely wrong to make a problem" out of the issue. The controversy was sparked when Pope Benedict XVI kept on his shoes during a keynote address to Muslim leaders in a Jordan mosque. However, Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said the Pope meant no disrespect to Islam when he entered the Al-Hussein mosque.

AMMAN, Jordan, May 9 (UPI) -- Pope Benedict XVI prayed Saturday at the King Hussein Mosque in the Jordanian capital Amman, Vatican officials said. The trip to the mosque, the largest in Jordan, marked the second day of the pope's visit to the Middle East, the BBC reported. Afterwards, Benedict addressed local Muslim leaders, observers said. Earlier in the day he visited Mount Nebo, which, according to the Bible, is where Moses saw the Promised Land before he died. Vatican analysts said the pope is anxious to mend relations with Muslims and Jews on his eight-day sojourn to Israel and...

Jordanian clerics expressed disappointment that Pope Benedict XVI in an address to Muslim leaders on Saturday failed to offer a new apology for remarks seen as targeting Islam. "We wanted him to clearly apologise," Sheikh Yusef Abu Hussein, mufti of the southern city of Karak, told AFP after the pope's address in Amman's huge Al-Hussein Mosque. "What the pope said (in 2006) about the Prophet Mohammed is untrue. Islam did not spread through the power of sword. It's a religion of tolerance and faith," Hussein said.