The terrorist attacks in France aren’t just about “religion” – they also involve a whole series of intricate historical, geopolitical and economic factors
The involvement of women is “an important and determining element in the construction of the Church”, insists Bishop José Ornelas
Bishop José Ornelas of the Setúbal diocese takes aim at businesses and politicians “unremorseful in using suffering and confusion to draw political and economic dividends”
Anyone familiar with the ritual called the State of the Union is also familiar with the fact it invariably ends with the exhortation “God bless America.”
Portuguese Catholics have blasted a cardinal and a bishop for their “disappointing and undesirable conservatism”.
In the US, opposition is growing to a Catholic award for Attorney General William Barr, who directed the July 2020 restart of federal executions after a 17-year moratorium.
German Catholic women have declared that the far-right AfD political party is “not compatible” with Christian values.
“It is clear” that current opportunities for women in the Church are “not enough”, Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich has lamented.
In an open letter organised by the ‘Faith in Public Life’ network, over 150 Catholics including theologians, religious and former staffers at the US Catholic Bishops’ Conference have accused Donald Trump of a “fundamental contempt for what it means to be a Christian”, denouncing that the US president “defiles the Gospel in his words and policies”.
In a new book length interview, Pope Francis has given a sneak peek of his forthcoming third encyclical, railing against the “savage market economy” and “violent social injustice”.
Turkey is showing disregard towards Christian cultural heritage and failing to fulfil its promise to maintain free access to Hagia Sophia, Nikolay Balashov, an archpriest of the Russian Orthodox Church, told Sputnik on Friday, addressing Ankara’s latest decision to convert another former church into a mosque.
German Catholics are appealing to citizens not to vote for the “right-wing extremist” AfD or ‘Alternative for Germany’ political party, denouncing that the group has no place in a mature democracy.
Ever since the reversion of Hagia Sophia back into a mosque, the Muslim call to prayer has been resounding from its minarets.
On 10 July, in a speech to the nation, President Erdoğan announced that the ancient Basilica of Hagia Sophia, a UNESCO World Heritage site, would be reopened for Muslim worship on 24 July.
Since its origins in the sixth century A.D, the Hagia Sophia has served as a church, a mosque, and, since 1934, a museum.
Islamic prayers were held on Friday in Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia basilica for the first time in 86 years.
The Greek president has lobbied Pope Francis to pressure Turkey to backtrack on Hagia Sophia.
Cardinal Christoph Schönborn has said he dreams of Hagia Sophia becoming a “centre for the encounter of religions”.
The Serbian Orthodox Patriarch has launched a last-minute appeal for joint Muslim-Christian worship in Hagia Sophia, in what would be, on his judgment, a sign of “historical symbiosis, tolerance and trust”.
COMECE, the Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European Union, has labelled Turkey’s decision to reconvert the Istanbul monument of Hagia Sophia into a mosque “a blow to interreligious dialogue”, as CEC, the Conference of European Churches, has warned the move could “potentially create fertile ground for religious hatred and subsequent violence”.
On 10 July, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ordered the conversion of Hagia Sophia into a mosque, after a court ruled that the site’s secularisation was unlawful.
By turning Hagia Sophia from a museum into a mosque, Turkish authorities have fixed a historical mistake made in 1934, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters on Tuesday.
The Vicar Apostolic of Anatolia has recalled that most Turks want Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia to be a mosque, and as such the decision to reconvert the monument was “not the whim of the president”.
A Vatican advisor has denied that “Islamic aggression” is behind Turkey’s decision to reconvert Hagia Sophia into a mosque, recalling that “Istanbul is not Mecca”.
On Friday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan confirmed that he had signed a decree converting Istanbul’s historic Hagia Sophia into a mosque which will open for Muslim prayers on 24 July.
The history of the Church shows us how the instrumentalisation of Christianity by politics has been a recurring fact.
In the midst of the statue iconoclasm sweeping the US and other countries around the world, a semi-official Vatican journal has extolled the virtues of “national repentance”.
In the midst of the global COVID-19 pandemic and antiracist protests, US President Donald Trump, whom scholars and journalists alike are finally coming around to openly discuss as fascist, declared that the United States “will be designating ANTIFA as a Terrorist Organization.”
A group linked to populist icon and former chief strategist to Donald Trump, Steve Bannon, has won back control of an Italian monastery, only to now face criminal prosecution over its application for the lease on the property.
The COVID-19 crisis “is nothing compared to the difficulties that will be caused by climate change”, Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich has warned.