Below, please find the full English text of the Holy Father’s prepared remarks. Dear Brother Cardinals, The cardinalate is certainly an honour, but it is not honorific. This we already know from its name – “cardinal” – from the word “cardo”, a hinge. As such it is not a kind of accessory, a decoration, like ...read more

By Thomas Cardinal Collins, February 10, 2015 “For my life is spent with sorrow, and my years with sighing; my strength fails because of my misery, and my bones waste away.” Psalm 31 In our days, as in the days of the psalmist, so many years ago, people can suffer grievously during their journey through ...read more

This week was bursting at the seams with things happening inside Vatican walls. Several key meetings were lined up back to back. The Council of Cardinals, known colloquially as “the C9”, met again this week to continue their work towards a reformed curia. This time they had a more immediate task: presenting the fruit of ...read more

By Lise Alves Catholic News Service SAO PAULO, Brazil (CNS) — Cardinal-designate Julio Duarte Langa, retired bishop of Xai-Xai, Mozambique, is best known for staying close to his congregation and always looking out for the poorest in his community. “He is a true pastor,” said Auxiliary Bishop Joao Hatoa Nunes of Maputo, Mozambique. “While others ...read more

By David Agren Catholic News Service MEXICO CITY (CNS) — Cardinal-designate Luis Hector Villalba of Tucuman, Argentina, was watching the Angelus prayer from the Vatican on television Jan. 4 when he heard Pope Francis — an old colleague and countryman — read his name as one of 20 new cardinals. He then went to the ...read more

It’s always difficult to say something about a subject that has not affected you in a particularly personal way. Nevertheless, death is a subject that is before us these days as a community of faith and as a society as a whole, and therefore warrants some reflection. I’d like to comment on two recent events ...read more

By David Agren Catholic News Service. MEXICO CITY (CNS) — Cardinal-designate Daniel Sturla Berhouet of Montevideo, Uruguay, was ministering in a working-class barrio when he learned of his elevation to cardinal — circumstances not lost on Uruguayan church officials. The Jan. 4 announcement that the archbishop was one of 20 men who would be elevated ...read more

By Catholic News Service BANGKOK (CNS) — When Cardinal-designate Francis Xavier Kriengsak Kovithavanij of Bangkok learned he would be elevated to cardinal, there was no formal announcement, no courier from Rome to tell him the news. Instead, a friend called to say he read a report on the Internet, reported the Asian Catholic news portal ...read more

Welcome to S+L’s Weekly News Round-Up. As the Director of Marketing and Communications here at S+L, many interesting Catholic news stories and articles come across my desk on a daily basis. Some of them we’ll cover on our different television programs and others I’d like to share with you on this blog. This blog column ...read more

By Patrick Downes Catholic News Service HONOLULU (CNS) — When Tonga’s future cardinal came to Hawaii as a priest in 2005 for the ordination of his cousin, one of the Tongan Catholic women hosting him wanted to buy him a pair of shoes. Then-Father Soane Mafi politely turned down the offer, preferring instead the sandals ...read more