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Chinese bishop remains in detention one year on

A Vatican-approved Chinese bishop remains in detention more than one year after his arrest for allegedly violating the communist country’s repressive regulations on religious affairs. Bishop Joseph Zhang Weizhu of Xinxiang in Henan province was arrested on May 21 last year. His arrest came a day after police arrested 10 priests and an unknown number […]

Pakistan: ‘I spent 8 years on death row falsely accused of blasphemy’

In July 2013, Shagufta and Shafqat Emmanuel, a Catholic couple in Mian Channu, a small town 155 miles south of Lahore, Pakistan, were arrested on false charges of blasphemy. After eight years on death row, separated from each other and from their four children, they were finally released on 3 June 2021 by the Lahore […]

Hoping for divine intervention to save the Philippines

It has been five decades since the late Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos imposed martial law on Sept. 21, 1972. In this 50th year since the iron fist of repression was imposed, his son, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., will soon be the country’s head of state. Sara Duterte, daughter of outgoing president Rodrigo Duterte, will serve […]

21 new cardinals created by Pope Francis: Abp Filipe Neri Ferrão of Goa and Anthony Poola, of Hyderabad Cardinals, First Dalit cardinal

There will be 16 cardinals under the age of 80 elevated at the next consistory, to be held Aug. 27. This will be the eighth consistory of Pope Francis’ pontificate, and the first of his to be held in August. The last time a cardinal was made in August, a torrid month in Rome when […]

Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate) declares its ‘full independence’

A council of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate) on May 27 resolved on its “full self-sufficiency and independence,” distancing the Church from Russian Orthodoxy. The decision comes amid the third month of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which has been prominently supported by Patriarch Kirill of Moscow. “The Council adopted relevant amendments and additions […]

Chinese Christians denied passports amid pandemic

Christians in eastern China who wish to travel abroad for various reasons including emigration and studies are facing hard times as authorities have denied them passports, citing travel restrictions due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Christians from several families in Zhejiang and Jiangsu provinces said immigration officials questioned the purpose of their passport applications and later […]

Pope Francis highlights danger of staid liturgies that ‘deny Vatican Council II’

Pope Francis is pushed in a wheelchair by his aide, Sandro Mariotti, as he leaves an audience with students and professors of Rome’s Pontifical Institute of Liturgy at St. Anselm, May 7 at the Vatican. The Pope said that the celebration of the liturgy and the study of it should lead to greater unity in […]

Pope authorizes non-clerics to be Major Superiors in certain cases

Pope Francis has authorised the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated and Societies of Apostolic Life to grant dispensations that would allow non-clerics to hold the office of Major Superior in some cases. The Holy Father did so in a rescript promulgated on May 25, concerning the possibility of a dispensation from Canon 588 §2 of […]