Catholic News
- It is 'terrible to earn with death': Pope denounces weapons factories (Vatican Press Office (Italian))
At the conclusion of his May 1 general audience, Pope Francis renewed his appeal for peace and denounced the manufacture of arms. “Let us not forget to pray for peace: let us pray for the peoples who are victims of war,” he said. “War is always a defeat, always. Let us think about tormented Ukraine, which suffers so much. Let us think about the inhabitants of Palestine and Israel, who are at war. Let us think about the Rohingya, about Myanmar, and ask for peace. We ask for true peace for these peoples and for the whole world.” “Unfortunately today the investments that generate the most income are arms factories,” he continued. “Terrible, to earn with death. We ask for peace, for peace to go forward.” The Pontiff’s appeal for peace and condemnation of weapons factories were omitted from the Vatican’s English translation of his remarks. - Bishop named for troubled Nigerian diocese (Vatican Press Office)
Pope Francis has named Bishop Simeon Nwobi, CMF—since October the auxiliary of the apostolic administrator of Ahiara—as the new bishop of the troubled Nigerian diocese. Founded in 1987 and located in the Mbaise region of Imo State in southern Nigeria, the diocese was governed by Bishop Victor Chikwe from its inception until his death in 2010. In December 2012, Pope Benedict appointed Father Peter Okpaleke, a priest of the Diocese of Awka in neighboring Anambra State, as the diocese’s new bishop. 400 priests, angered that a Mbaise priest was not appointed, protested the decision. Father Okpaleke was ordained bishop of Ahiara in 2013, but the ordination took place at a seminary in another diocese amid heavy security. He was unable to carry out his episcopal ministry, even after Pope Francis warned of the suspension of priests who resisted the new bishop. Okpaleke resigned in 2018, and since that time, the see has been vacant. In 2020, Pope Francis named Okpaleke the bishop of a different diocese (Ekwulobia, in Anambra State), and in 2022, the Pontiff named Okpaleke to the College of Cardinals. - Pope to speak at event on Italy's record-low birth rate (CNA)
The director of the Holy See Press Office announced that Pope Francis will take part in “The General State of the Birth Rate,” a May 7 conference in Rome organized by the Forum of Family Associations and the Foundation for Births. Births in Italy have fallen for 15 consecutive years and now stand at a record low, according to recently released statistics. - Papal encouragement of Marian entrustment, prayer for peace during May (@Pontifex)
At the beginning of the month of May, long dedicated to the Virgin Mary, Pope Francis tweeted, “During this month of May, may we entrust to the Blessed Virgin Mary our personal and family matters, as well as the suffering of those who fall victim to war.” “Let us prayer together for the Church, all nations, and for peace in Ukraine and the Middle East,” he added. - Pope Francis writes to world's parish priests, encourages 'synodal and missionary' Church (Vatican Press Office)
Pope Francis has written a letter to the world’s parish priests emphasizing the importance of becoming a “synodal and missionary” Church. “I ask you first to live out your specific ministerial charism in ever greater service to the varied gifts that the Spirit sows in the People of God,” he wrote in his May 2 letter. “With all my heart, I suggest that you learn to practice the art of communal discernment, employing for this purpose the method of ‘conversation in the Spirit,’ which has proved so helpful in the synodal journey and in the proceedings of the synodal Assembly itself,” the Pope continued. “Finally, I would like to urge you to base everything you do in a spirit of sharing and fraternity among yourselves and with your bishops.” The Pope wrote to the world’s parish priests at the conclusion of Parish Priests for the Synod. The four-day Vatican meeting was announced in February amid criticism that parish priests were insufficiently included on the Synod on synodality. - Pope says society must accept transgender people (National Catholic Reporter)
“Transgender people must be accepted and integrated into society,” Pope Francis wrote in a letter to Sister Jeannine Gramick. The Pontiff wrote to Sister Gramick—one of the founders of New Ways Ministry, whose advocacy for homosexuals drew a caution from the Vatican and, in 2010, from the US bishops’ conference—after she had written to complain about the condemnation of gender ideology in Dignitas Infinita. Responding quickly to the complaint, the Pope said that the Vatican document’s negative judgement “refers not to transgender people but to gender ideology, which nullifies differences.” - Vatican announces 37 jubilee events (USCCB)
The Vatican has announced 37 events for the 2025 jubilee year. Since the 15th century, it has been customary for the Church to celebrate a jubilee every 25 years. The theme of the 2025 jubilee is “Pilgrims of Hope.” The first of the 37 listed events is for the world of communications (January 24-26); the last is for prisoners (December 14). - Theologian critiques Cardinal Fernández's theology of charity (Communio )
Father José Granados, formerly vice president and professor of dogmatic theology at the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family, has written a lengthy analysis and critique of the theology of charity in the works of Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, who was appointed prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith last July. “We can conclude that Fernández is right to focus on the virtue of charity,” writes Granados. However, “the charity described by Fernández lacks articulation with the moral order, the doctrine of faith, and the sacramentality of salvation in the Church. These are essential dimensions that make charity concrete and incarnate in our life. Without them, charity lacks an architecture and thus loses its capacity to build up the people of God.” The critique appeared in the winter 2023 issue of Communio, which arrived in American subscribers’ mailboxes in May 2024. - Anglican primate signs AI ethics statement backed by pontifical academy (Rome Call for AI Ethics)
Archbishop Jutin Welby of Canterbury, the Anglican primate, has signed the Rome Call for AI Ethics. The Rome Call, which dates from 2020, was first signed by leaders of the Pontifical Academy for Life, Microsoft, IBM, and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. It was later signed by Jewish and Muslim representatives and, more recently, by the CEO of Cisco. “I am delighted to support the Rome AI Call, which emphasizes the dignity of every human being amid technological change,” said Welby. “Let us all work to ensure that the dignity of every human being, created by God, not for profit or productivity, is central to all we do.” Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, said that “we are very pleased that, with the inclusion of our Anglican brothers and sisters, the Rome Call may experience a further step of growth. When reflection and dialogue on issues of technological development meet in a spirit of fraternity, it is possible to find shared paths and effective solutions to build peace and the common good.” - Papal video: 'Every vocation is a diamond in the rough' (The Pope Video)
In a video message in which he commented on his May prayer intention (for the formation of religious and seminarians), Pope Francis said that “every vocation is a diamond in the rough that needs to be polished, worked, shaped on every side.” “A good priest, sister or nun, must above all else be a man, a woman who is formed, shaped by the Lord’s grace, people who are aware of their own limitations, and willing to lead a life of prayer, of dedicated witness to the Gospel,” he continued. “Beginning in the seminary and the novitiate, their preparation must be developed integrally, in direct contact with the lives of other people. This is essential.” “There’s also preparation to live in community—life in community is so enriching, even though it can be difficult at times,” the Pope added. “Living together is not the same as living in community.” - Ecumenical Patriarch issues Easter encyclical (Orthodox Times)
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, who holds a primacy of honor among the Orthodox churches, has released an encyclical for Easter, celebrated this year on May 5 according to the Julian calendar. “Orthodox spirituality does not recognize the utopianism of a Resurrection without Crucifixion, nor the pessimism of the Cross without the Resurrection,” he writes. “For this reason, in the Orthodox experience, evil does not have the final word in history, while faith in the Resurrection serves as the motivation for the struggle against the presence of evil and its consequences in the world, acting as a powerful transformative force.” - Papal tribute to classic Fellini film (Vatican News)
Pope Francis has sent a brief video message to participants in a conference marking the 70th anniversary of La Strada, a movie by Italian filmmaker Federico Fellini. “As a boy, I watched many of Fellini’s films, but La Strada has stayed in my heart,” said the Pope, who was 17 when the movie was released. “The film begins with tears and ends with tears; it starts at the seashore and ends at the seashore. But above all, the scene with the fool and the pebble has stayed in my heart, which gives meaning to that girl’s life.” La Strada was included in the Pontifical Council for Social Communications’ 1995 list of 45 important films. CatholicCulture.org’s Thomas Mirus and James Majewski have discussed the film on Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast. - Pope seeks 'patient' ecumenical dialogue with Anglicans (Vatican News)
At a May 2 meeting with leading Anglican clerics, Pope Francis called for a “patient and fraternal dialogue” on the question of papal primacy. The Pontiff acknowledged that “the role of the Bishop of Rome is still a controversial and divisive issue among Christians.” He said that the papal role must be understood as “a service of love for all.” In his meeting with the Anglican leaders—including the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Justin Welby—the Pope did not mention other issues that have become impediments to unity, including the Anglican acceptance of homosexuality and ordination of women. - USCCB committee chairman criticizes requirement to perform transgender procedures (USCCB)
The chairman of the US bishops’ Committee for Religious Liberty criticized the Biden administration for announcing regulations which, the bishops’ conference noted, “generally require health care workers to perform ‘gender transition’ procedures in the name of nondiscrimination.” “The same core beliefs about human dignity and the wisdom of God’s design that motivate Catholics to care for the sick also shape our convictions about care for preborn children and the immutable nature of the human person,” said Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana. Bishop Rhoades said that the Department of Health and Human Services’ final regulations implementing a section of the Affordable Care Act offered modest improvements over draft regulations issued in 2022. “We appreciate that the final rule does not attempt to impose a mandate with regard to abortion,” he said. The final regulations, according to the bishops’ conference, “make modest improvements to the proposed regulations’ protections for the exercise of conscience, religious belief, and clinical judgment.” - New Orleans archdiocese is target of child sex-trafficking inquiry, officials say (The Guardian)
A week after Louisiana state police obtained a warrant to search for documents in the files of the New Orleans archdiocese pertaining to the handling of sex-abuse complaints, a courthouse clerk released a copy of the warrant. The warrant stated that “previous archbishops, the highest-ranking official in the archdiocese, not only knew of the sexual abuse and failed to report all the claims to law enforcement, but spent archdiocese funding to support the accused.” The warrant also contended that “multiple victims” were transported “outside of Louisiana where they were sexually abused”; that some victims were brought to the seminary to swim in the nude before being “sexually assaulted or abused”; and that “in some instances, ‘gifts’ were given to abuse victims by the accused with instructions to pass on or give the gift to certain priests at the next school or church. “It was said that the ‘gift’ was a form of signaling to another priest that the person was a target for sexual abuse,” the document continued. - Father Rupnik's alleged victims rue upcoming mosaic dedication at world's 2nd-largest church (Our Sunday Visitor)
Alleged victims of Father Marko Ivan Rupnik, the Slovenian priest and artist accused of sexually abusing dozens of women, criticized the upcoming dedication of Rupnik mosaics on the southern facade of the Basilica of Our Lady of Aparecida, the Brazilian shrine that is the second-largest Catholic church in the world. “In Rupnik, the sexual dimension cannot be separated from the creative experience,” said one former member of Rupnik’s religious community. “In portraying me, he explained that I represented the eternal feminine: his artistic inspiration stems precisely from his approach to sexuality.” “Today’s mosaics have their roots in the time when he used women as models and half an hour later abused them,” added another former member, who is now a diocesan hermit. In October, amid an outcry, the Pope waived the statute of limitations in the Rupnik case, allowing the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith to investigate multiple charges of sexual abuse against the former Jesuit. The priest in now a priest in good standing in a Slovenian diocese. In March 2020, Father Rupnik was invited to take the place of the Preacher of the Papal Household in preaching a Lenten sermon to the Roman Curia—despite Rupnik’s canonical conviction, two months earlier, of the offense of absolving an accomplice in a sexual sin. Rupnik was subsequently excommunicated, and the excommunication was swiftly lifted. - Federal court upholds forced resignation of Indiana teacher who declined to use preferred pronouns (Religion Clause)
A federal district court has upheld an Indiana school district’s decision to force the resignation of an orchestra teacher who declined to use transgender students’ preferred pronouns. The Brownsburg Community School Corporation (BCSC) at first granted a religious accommodation to John Kluge, an orchestra teacher, that permitted him to refer to students by their last names. The school district, located in a small city of 30,000, then withdrew the accommodation and forced him to resign. Siding with the school district, Judge Jane Magnus-Stinson, an Obama appointee, ruled that the school district “could either support its transgender students in pursuit of its mission and comply with the law, or accede to Mr. Kluge’s accommodation and risk harm to students and the learning environment.” Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which forbids discrimination on the basis of race, sex, religion, or national origin, “does not require BCSC to continue an accommodation that actually resulted in substantial student harm, and an unreasonable risk of liability, each sharply contradicting the school’s legally entitled mission to foster a supportive environment for all,” Judge Magnus-Stinson added. - Trump gaining among Catholic voters, poll shows (CNA)
Former President Donald Trump has opened a lead of more than 10 percentage points over President Joe Biden among Catholic voters, according to a new Pew poll. Pew finds Trump favored by Catholic voters by a 55%—43% margin. In 2020 the two candidates were virtually equal among Catholic voters, with Trump winning by just a 1% margin. The Trump surge with Catholic voters is due primarily to a major shift among Hispanic Catholics. In 2020, a pre-election Pew poll found Biden winning Hispanic Catholics by a huge 69%-26% margin. In April 2024 the numbers were nearly even, with Biden ahead by 49% to 47%. - Holy Land prelate mystified by US campus protests (Crux)
Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin-rite Patriarch of Jerusalem, expressed dismay about the campus protests in the US about the war in Gaza, in remarks to reporters during a visit to Rome. Cardinal Pizzaballa, who was in Rome to take formal possession of the titular church assigned to him when he was made a cardinal, spoke about the suffering of the people in the Holy Land, and his hope that “something will start to change.” But he said of the campus protests: I confess that I struggle to understand it. Universities are places where cultural engagement, even heated, even harsh, must be open 360 degrees, where engagement with strong ideas that are completely different, must be expressed not with violence, not with boycotts, but knowing how to engage. - Florida bishops' conference 'pleased' by public school chaplains (CNA)
A spokeswoman for the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops welcomed a new state law authorizing volunteer chaplains at public schools. “We recognize the good that chaplains can do in schools by helping students to address their spiritual and emotional needs,” said Michelle Taylor, associate director of communications. “We are pleased that parents will determine the services their children will receive in districts that choose to establish chaplaincy programs.” Under the law, parental consent is required for students to take part in a chaplain’s programs. - More...