Monday, April 26th, I was dispatched to Turin, Italy to do some preview work for our coverage of Holy Father’s upcoming trip, and to write an article or two for Catholic News Service. Let’s skip the part about missing the train by two seconds, and fast forward to when I actually got to Turin. It ...read more

If you’re reading this, chances are you’re one of the 1.166 billion Catholics in the world. 1.166 billion! According to the Vatican Publishing House that is the world Catholic population. The numbers have been published in the Statistical Yearbook of the Church, and the data is based on the time period between the years 2000 ...read more

Over the weekend, Pope Benedict XVI addressed the participants of a national conference in Rome entitled “Digital Witnesses: Faces and Languages in the Cross-Media Age”. This is not the first time that the Holy Father has addressed the double-edged sword nature of the internet and social networking. The Holy Father urged his listeners to overcome ...read more

The United States Bishops’ Secretariat of Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations launched a new website yesterday promoting vocations to the priesthood and consecrated life.  Appropriately, the launch came on on Good Shepherd Sunday, which is the World Day of Prayer for Vocations. ForYourVocation.org has two goals: To help individuals hear and respond to the call ...read more

This Sunday is Good Shepherd Sunday.  As Fr. Rosica explained in this week’s Biblical Reflection, all three liturgical cycles for the Fourth Sunday of Easter offer “a passage from John’s Gospel about the Good Shepherd.”  Traditionally the Church has also identified this Sunday as the World Day of Prayer for Vocations.  Pope Benedict XVI’s message ...read more

At this week’s general audience Pope Benedict XVI discussed his Apostolic Journey to Malta.  The Holy Father recounted the events he participated in over the two-days, including his moving meeting with abuse victims: “I shared with them their suffering and, overwhelmed, I prayed with them, assuring them of the Church’s action.” He also highlighted the ...read more

The latest encounter of Nothing More Beautiful focused on the theme of “Jesus Christ: Crucified and Risen Lord.” Vancouver’s Archbishop Michael Miller provides the catechesis talk.  Ordained to the priesthood by Pope Paul VI in 1975, he became the Archbishop of Vancouver in January 2009.  In addition to working in Rome in the area of ...read more

As Pope Benedict XVI celebrates the fifth anniversary of his Papacy this week, Catholic News Service takes a look at the Holy Father as a communicator. John Thavis reports from Rome. To download Flash Player please click here ...read more

What is euthanasia really about?  Dignity?  Compassion?  Human rights?  Or is it something else altogether? We need to find the answer because the euthanasia debate is heating up again!  In an interview with the newspaper Le Devoir a few days ago, Bloc-Québécois Member of Parliament Francine Lalonde explained that the Euthanasia bill C-384 will have ...read more

The recent news on genetic manipulations coming out of Newcastle University (see article) is a poignant reminder of how far our culture is willing to go in the name of scientific progress—that is mix-and-matching human embryos to create one free from disease. Last year similar research in the United States was conducted on monkeys and ...read more