International

Dear friends, your founder, the Buddha also heralded a message of nonviolence and peace. He encouraged all to “Overcome the angry by non-anger; overcome the wicked by goodness; overcome the miser by generosity; overcome the liar by truth.” (Dhammapada, no. XVII, 3).

Seen in this light, every new tragedy that occurs in the world’s history can also become a setting for good news, inasmuch as love can find a way to draw near and to raise up sympathetic hearts, resolute faces and hands ready to build anew.

 "We will reach out to those who for several reasons feel estranged from the church… including people who are divorced, those civilly remarried and cohabiting partners,"...

When we honor the Mother of God under the title “Immaculate Conception”, we recognize in her a model of purity, innocence, trust, childlike curiosity, reverence, and respect, living peacefully...

Four Years after Ratzinger’s Renunciation of the Petrine Ministry, the Former Director of the Vatican Press Office Explains that the Relationship between Benedict XVI and Francis is an ”Example of Union in the Church”

The theme of this year’s celebration is “Amazement at what God has accomplished: ‘The Almighty has done great things for me….’” (Lk 1:49).

God our Father, in Jesus you gave us the one who died for all. He lived our life and died our death. You accepted his sacrifice and raised him to new life with you.

The traditional period in the northern hemisphere for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity is 18-25 January.

Many of them had lost their houses, livelihoods and friends or family members in the largest earthquakes which reduced parts of many towns and villages to piles of rubble.  

On the morning of New Year’s Day, in St. Peter’s Basilica, Pope Francis celebrated Mass to mark the Solemnity of Mary, Most Holy Mother of God.

As always, to coincide with the end of the year, the Prefecture of the Papal Household has published a note summing up the participation of the faithful during meetings and audiences...

Pope Francis has visited the Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, to convey to him his Christmas greetings.

During his flight from Baku, Azerbaijan to Rome on Sunday, Pope Francis gave a press conference to the journalists aboard the the papal plane. He reflected on his trip to Georgia and Azerbaijan, marriage and divorce, and homosexuality and gender identity.

Pope Francis says God loves each and every one of us, He is totally extraneous to the “throwaway culture” of today and like the good shepherd he does not want a single person to be lost.

The Pope told the thousands of 13 to 16 year olds gathered in St Peter’s Square that “love, was the Christian’s identity card, the only valid “document” identifying us as Christians.

Love is nurtured by trust, respect and forgiveness.  Love does not happen because we talk about it, but when we live it: it is not a sweet poem to study and memorize, but is a life choice to put into practice!  How can we grow in love?

Pope Francis sent a video message to the thousands of teenagers gathered in Rome’s Olympic Stadium on Saturday evening to celebrate the Jubilee for Teens.

The Holy Father administered the Sacrament of Reconciliation to 16 teenage boys and girls gathered in St. Peter's Square for the Jubilee for Teens.

 "All of us are sinners, so many times we fall into the temptation of hypocrisy, believing that we are better than the other”... “through faith in Christ, we too have received the forgiveness of our sins and the new life of grace.”

Pope Francis this week presided over the first meeting of the XIV Ordinary Council of the General Secretariat of the Synod of Bishops.

Christians who harden their hearts and refuse to be drawn towards Christ are like orphans, without a father. That was Pope Francis message on Tuesday as he reflected on the daily readings during his homily at Mass in the Vatican’s Santa Marta chapel.

Each one of you refugees who knock on our doors has the face of God and is the body of Christ. Your experience of pain and hope reminds us that we are all strangers and pilgrims on this Earth, welcomed by someone with generosity and without any merit.

The Pontiff’s conclusion: “Christian life is this simple! Jesus is the door. He leads us on the path and we recognize his voice in the Beatitudes, in the works of mercy and when he teaches us to say ‘Father’”.

Pope Francis celebrated the World Day of Prayer for Vocations by ordaining eleven men to the priesthood at St Peter’s Basilica on Sunday.

The Holy Father Francis, along with all those who accompany him in his visit to Lesbos - entourage and journalists send Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI the most affectionate and cordial greetings on the occasion of his 89th birthday,...

The Pontifical Academy of Sciences is holding a symposium this week to mark twenty five years since the publication of Saint John Paul II's social encyclical “ Centesimus Annus".

A beautiful prayer asking for this docility, the Pope revealed, we may find in the First Book of Samuel, the prayer which the priest Eli suggests to the young Samuel, who during the night heard a voice calling to him: "Speak Lord, your servant is listening."

We too are living in a time of martyrdom, and in the midst of a culture so often hostile to the Gospel. I urge you to have that same selfless spirit as your predecessors did. Love Jesus above all things!

God’s Word is “like a scalpel” which deeply penetrates us in order to “free us from the evil which lurks in our lives.”

There are two types of persecution against Christians, the Pope said on Tuesday morning, 12 April, during Mass at Santa Marta. There is the explicit kind — to which he related the martyrs killed at Easter in Pakistan — and the sort of persecution that is “polite, disguised as culture, modernity and progress”...