As 2024 begins, lawmakers continue efforts to protect minors from transgender procedures
null / Credit: Shutterstock CNA Staff, Feb 5, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA). After a year of major efforts to prohibit irreversible and untested transgender operations on young children, lawmakers across the U.S. are continuing the push to protect chil… […]
How Julian of Norwich’s writings on suffering have helped me as a cancer patient
A theologian reflects on his cancer diagnosis and the beginning of treatment: “If we come to understand that God suffers alongside us as one who truly knows what it means to suffer, our anger morphs into love and our suffering mysteriously becomes a means of transformation.”
A little-known Jesuit’s battle for racial justice in the Deep South
How Louis J. Twomey, S.J., overcame his own prejudice to become one of the most outspoken white allies of New Orleans’s Black community.
Child tax credit increase passed by House seen as a modest step forward to aid families
Even in a politically divided country, the reduction of child poverty in America — reported by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2022 as 16.3% nationally, or more than 11 million children living in persistent want of adequate food, clothing, shelter and utilities — can typically be embraced as a bipartisan, pro-family and pro-life goal. And […]
Belarus bishops decline approval for same-sex blessings (Catholic.by (Belarusian))
The Catholic bishops of Belarus have announced that they will not approve the blessing of couples in irregular unions, as suggested by Fiducia Supplicans. The bishops’ statement indicated that priests should give blessings to individuals on request, but must avoid giving the impression that they are blessing a “civil marriage,” same-sex partnership, or other irregular […]
Two more Nigerian priests kidnapped; banks’ role in ransom payments eyed (Fides)
Two Claretian missionary priests—Father Ken Kanwa and Father Jude Nwachukwu—were kidnapped on February 1, as the rash of kidnapping continues in Nigeria. Catholic clerics are not the only victims of the kidnapping epidemic. Nigerian media reports count more than 3,000 kidnappings in the past year. With criminal gangs relying on ransom payments, investigators are looking […]
Council of Cardinals meeting this week (Vatican Press Office)
The Council of Cardinals is holding its first meeting of 2024 in Rome this week, with Pope Francis participating in the discussions. The Vatican has not disclosed the topics for discussion at the cardinals’ meeting. The last meeting of the College of Cardinals, in December, focused on the role of women in the Church.
Paris archdiocese unveils plans for reopening Notre Dame (Vatican News)
The Archdiocese of Paris has outlined plans for a major celebration when the basilica of Notre Dame is reopened on December 8, following extensive renovations to repair the damage done by a devastating fire in April 2019. In a pastoral letter released on February 2, Archbishop Laurent Ulrich said that the celebration will being 15 […]
Zayed Award winners and judges share joy and gratitude
Representatives of the two Indonesian organizations that won the 2024 Zayed Award tell Vatican News that the honour provides a renewed impulse to persevere in interreligious dialogue and support others. Read all
Senegal’s Archbishop of Dakar saddened by postponed presidential election.
The Archbishop of Dakar: “I am just as disturbed as all Senegalese about the vote postponement.” Read all