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The catholic Left will turn on Pope Francis when they finally realize that he is not going to conform to their liberal and heretical notions and agenda. The cracks are already appearing. Most liberals have been gushing about him since his election, because they took his folksy style and lack of papal decorum as a sign that he is a fellow traveller. But this Pope is not going to, for example, give approval to the ordination of women. He is not going to smile on gnostic ravings. He is not going to give the nod to moving beyond Jesus.And so...

A Christian pilgrim walks from the courtyard of St. Catherine Church where a poster for next weekend's visit of Pope Francis to the Holy Land is displayed in the West Bank town of Bethlehem. (CNS/EPA) By Francis X. RoccaCatholic News Service VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- On Pope Francis' first trip to the Holy Land, May 24-26, his agenda will focus on the search for Christian unity, particularly between the Catholic and Orthodox churches. But inevitably, in a region so rich in history and so fraught with conflict, he will address other urgent issues, including dialogue with Jews and Muslims,...

<p>Pope Francis is shunning bulletproof vehicles during his trip to the Middle East this month, insisting that he use a normal car and be allowed to be as close to people as possible, the Vatican said on Thursday.</p> <p>The Vatican, briefing reporters on the trip, also confirmed that a rabbi and an Islamic leader will accompany Pope Francis on his trip to the Middle East in a gesture of the importance he attaches to inter-religious dialogue.</p>

Pope Francis is due to arrive in Israel on May 25, but Councilman Aryeh King has made clear that he will not be among the Jerusalem officials welcoming the Catholic leader. Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat is expected to greet the Pope on Mount Scopus during the visit, and Barkat's office has sent messages to members of the city council inviting them to join in welcoming the Pope. King, chairman of the "United Jerusalem" faction, responded by mail to Barkat's office and the other council members, declaring that he will not join them. "I won't come, unless (the Pope) will bring...

Pope Francis would absolutely baptize an alien from Mars, if one showed up at the Vatican and asked for it. During his weekly homily on Monday, Franics said that aliens — which he imagines could be "Green, with that long nose and big ears, just like children paint them" — should be baptized just like anyone else who asks for it, because it's not up to any human to decide who should receive the Holy Spirit. In other words: if God prompts some Martians to come to Earth, find the Pope, and say "we want in on this Catholicism thing."...

24-hour visit to the capital on May 25 has been planned by the Vatican to fit in a plethora of visits to landmarks, religious institutions and private meetings.

VATICAN CITY — A darling of liberal Catholics and an advocate of inclusion and forgiveness, Pope Francis is hardly known for fire and brimstone. Yet, in his words and deeds, the new pope is locked in an epic battle with the oldest enemy of God and creation: The Devil. After his little more than a year atop the Throne of St. Peter, Francis’s teachings on Satan are already regarded as the most old school of any pope since at least Paul VI, whose papacy in the 1960s and 1970s fully embraced the notion of hellish forces plotting to deliver mankind...

Pope Francis has close ties with liberation theology, the prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the body that once condemned the movement, has said. In a lengthy interview in the German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ), Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller said Pope Francis “is not so much a liberation theologian in the academic sense, but as far as pastoral work is concerned, he has close ties with liberation theology’s concerns. What we can learn from him is the insight that there is no pastoral work without profound theology and vice versa”. In the 1980s the...

Today Pope Francis addressed a delegation of the UN – which I remind you is a principle agent for promoting abortion world-wide.Below please find the full text of Pope Francis’ address to the United Nations Agencies, Funds and Programmes on Friday, led by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.There is some blah blah at first, but keep reading. My emphases and comments.NOTE: A lot of this is simply warmed up John Paul II and Benedict XVI. There isn’t much new here, apart from the terrible wording about the State and redistribution. But we can, for the most part, say “Ho hum!...

VATICAN CITY (AP) - Pope Francis called Friday for governments to redistribute wealth to the poor in a new spirit of generosity to help curb the "economy of exclusion" that is taking hold today. Francis made the appeal during a speech to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the heads of major U.N. agencies who met in Rome this week. Latin America's first pope has frequently lashed out at the injustices of capitalism and the global economic system that excludes so much of humanity, though his predecessors have voiced similar concerns. On Friday, Francis called for the United Nations to promote...

The latest speech from Pope Francis is leading Drudge and the Twittersphere, and for good reason. Any time a world leader talks about “legitimate redistribution” in regard to economic policy, it raises eyebrows, if not hackles. In the case of this pontiff, the highlight of that phrase provokes heightened scrutiny. However, the longer context of Francis’ remarks this morning to UN leadership provides a much more nuanced picture of Francis’ view of economic policy — although probably not nuanced enough for libertarian ears: With this in mind, I would like to remind you, as representatives of the chief agencies of...

Brent Budowsky, a liberal writer who once worked for former Democratic Vice-Presidential candidate Lloyd Bentsen, has a hillarious column about Hillary Clinton. Budowsky claims that if Hillary runs in 2016 she “could well carry 45 states.” I don't know what political universe Budowsky lives in, but no presidential candidate, Democrat or Republican, could carry 45 states in 2016. He goes on to claim that the former Secretary of State “addresses the nation as a whole in tones reminiscent of Pope Francis.” I'm surprised that Budowsky didn't nominate Hillary for sainthood.

Do you remember the scene in Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited when Rex Mottram is being given his catechism lessons before he can marry Julia? The priest and Rex have this exchange: “Yesterday I asked [Mottram] whether Our Lord had more than one nature. He said: ‘Just as many as you say, Father.’ Then again I asked him: ‘Supposing the Pope looked up and saw a cloud and said ‘It’s going to rain’, would that be bound to happen?’ ‘Oh, yes, Father.’ ‘But supposing it didn’t?’ He thought a moment and said, “I suppose it would be sort of raining spiritually,...

VATICAN CITY (AP) -- Pope Francis called Friday for governments to redistribute wealth to the poor in a new spirit of generosity to help curb the "economy of exclusion" that is taking hold today.

(Barcelona / Rome) Does the Congregation of Religious suffer from a villainous portrait of tradition? This question has hung in the air since last weekend. The Franciscan José Rodriguez Carballo, for a year secretary of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, participated in a Conference of Religious of Catalonia. In his speech he delivered last Saturday without directly mentioning the Order by name, gave a first official hint as to why the Franciscans of the Immaculate have been reprimanded by his Congregation. The reason implied much to the young religious Order, and is of...

VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis plans to address all the heads of United Nations agencies on May 10 in what some are viewing as a crucial opportunity to help turn the U.N.’s satellite institutions away from their radical anti-life agenda.He is also scheduled to meet U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon next week. The meeting would be the Pope’s second with the U.N. leader since his election.The U.N. System Chief Executives Board for Coordination — the longest-standing and highest-level coordination forum of the U.N. — will be received in private audience by the Holy Father at the end of its...

ROME (CNS) -- The Orthodox bishop who is coordinating the upcoming pilgrimage to Jerusalem by Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople said he hopes the patriarch's May 25 meeting with Pope Francis will give new impetus to efforts for Christian unity. But he also said the two leaders are likely to discuss a range of common concerns, including the predicament of Christians in the Middle East, conservation of the natural environment, and defense of the traditional family. "We hope that this will not just be a meeting like others, but we hope that this will give a new horizon for the...

ROME -- Rome is "the eternal city," and it's eternally an inspiration, particularly this year during Holy Week and the run-up to the canonization of not one but two new Roman Catholic saints, both of them popes. The Romans are the blithe spirits, noted for mixing up the secular and spiritual in their appreciation of faith and life. There's always an awareness of pagan exuberance flowing through its contemporary Christian culture. A taxi driver, eager to impress an American visitor with his proficiency in English and a knowledge of her pop culture, launches into a description of a famous scene...

A Knesset Member said Thursday that Chief Sephardic Rabbi Yitzchak Yosef told him that the Prime Minister's bureau contacted him and asked to grant halakhic permission for Israel to hand over the Tomb of David to the Vatican. The startling news was revealed by the Knesset Member during a tour of the Tomb of Daid by four MKs – Yoni Chetboun of the Jewish Home, who initiated the tour, Moshe Feiglin (Likud-Beytenu), Nissim Ze'ev (Shas), and Meir Porush (United Torah Judaism – UTJ). The MKs were unanimous in declaring that they intend to do everything within their power to forestall...

The Papacy in Scripture – More Than Matthew 16 In an earlier blog post, I made the point that the role of St. Peter and his successors is made remarkably clear in Matthew 16:18-19 and its immediate context:And I tell you, you are Peter (Gr.—petros—‘rock’), and on this rock (Gr.—petra—‘rock’) I will build my church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.Jesus...