The meeting will take place in the afternoon of June 10, according to the Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said earlier that a meeting between Putin and Pope Francis was in the works.
#AceNewsServices – ROME (Vatican City) – September 20 – Retired Israeli President Shimon Peres has proposed a new global peace initiative to Pope Francis: A “United Nations of Religions,” given that most wars today have religious, not nationalistic, undercurrents according to Fox News in their report.
‘ The Holy Roman Empire and European Union ‘ (United Nations of Europe)
The Vatican said Peres pitched the initiative during a 45-minute audience Thursday in the Apostolic Palace. The two men last met when Francis invited the then-Israeli president and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to pray for peace together in the Vatican gardens on June 8.
A few weeks later, war broke out in the Gaza Strip.
Peres told the Catholic publication Famiglia Cristiana that the U.N. is ill-suited to handle today’s conflicts and that a “‘U.N. of Religions’ is the best way to fight terrorists who kill in the name of God.”
Francis promised the Vatican’s attention to the proposal.
#AceWorldNews UNITED STATES(Chicago)- September 20 – Pope Francis on Saturday appointed Bishop Blase Cupich, a moderate who has called for civility in the culture wars, as the next archbishop of Chicago, signalling a shift in tone in one of the most important posts in the U.S. church.
‘ Bishop Blase Cupich ‘
Cupich, of Spokane, Washington, will be installed in the Archdiocese of Chicago in November, succeeding Cardinal Francis George, according to an announcement by the papal ambassador to the U.S.
The archdiocese has scheduled a news conference for Saturday morning which Cupich is expected to attend. George, 77, has been battling cancer and has said he believes the disease will end his life.
In 2012, during the run-up to the Washington state referendum that ultimately recognized gay marriage, Cupich repeatedly underscored church teaching that marriage should be between a man and a woman.
But he also wrote at length to parishioners about the suffering of gays and lesbians because of anti-gay prejudice, and he condemned violence and bullying that has led some gay teens to suicide.
“I also want to be very clear that in stating our position, the Catholic Church has no tolerance for the misuse of this moment to incite hostility toward homosexual persons or promote an agenda that is hateful and disrespectful of their human dignity,” Cupich wrote.
In a letter last year on the Obama administration’s birth control coverage rule for employers, Cupich said faith-affiliated groups should never be forced to provide services that the church considers morally objectionable.
However, he condemned threats by some U.S. church leaders that they would shut down social service agencies over the Affordable Care Act.
#AceWorldNews – ROME – September 14 – Pope Francis has presided over marriages for 20 Italian couples, including those who already have lived together and had children.
“The people getting married on Sunday are couples like many others,”the diocese of Rome said in a statement.
“Some already live together, some already have children.” The ages of the brides and grooms ranged from the youngest being 25 to the oldest being 56.
This is his first wedding ceremony performed by Pope Francis.
”The Church under the leadership of Pope Francis has welcomed and embraced us,” said Gabriella, one of the brides who had a grown-up daughter.
No idea how much truth there is to this, interesting however
The Catholic Church has enough money to end global starving
The global economic system is near collapse, according to Pope Francis.
An economy built on money-worship and war and scarred by yawning inequality and youth unemployment cannot survive, the 77-year-old Roman Catholic leader suggested in a newly published interview.
“We are excluding an entire generation to sustain a system that is not good,” he told La Vanguardia’s Vatican reporter, Henrique Cymerman. (Read an English translation here.) “Our global economic system can’t take any more.”
The pontiff said he was especially concerned about youth unemployment, which hit 13.1 percent last year, according to a report by the International Labor Organization.
“The rate of unemployment is very worrisome to me, which in some countries is over 50 percent,” he said. “Someone told me that 75 million young Europeans under 25 years of age are unemployed. That is an atrocity.”
That 75 million is actually the total for the whole world, according to the ILO, but that is still too much youth unemployment.
Pope Francis denounced the influence of war and the military on the global economy in particular:
“We discard a whole generation to maintain an economic system that no longer endures, a system that to survive has to make war, as the big empires have always done,” he said.
“But since we cannot wage the Third World War, we make regional wars,” he added. “And what does that mean? That we make and sell arms. And with that the balance sheets of the idolatrous economies — the big world economies that sacrifice man at the feet of the idol of money — are obviously cleaned up.”
Pope Francis is gaining a reputation for pointed comments on the global economy. In April, amid feverish media coverage of French economist Thomas Piketty’s bombshell book on income inequality, he made clear his stance on the widening wealth gap with a tweet saying: “Inequality is the root of social evil.”
Fittingly, the pope commemorated Thursday’s kick-off game of the World Cup – a global tournament that has so far cost host nation Brazil at least $15 billion and sparked violent protest by the country’s disenfranchised poor – with this message to his 4.14 million Twitter followers:
#AceWorldNews – ISRAEL – May 29 – Israeli President Shimon Peres and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will meet at the Vatican on June 8 to unite in prayers for peace, the Vatican stated on Thursday.
Pope Francis invited the pair as he took part in a three-day tour of the Middle East, visiting the Holy Land last week.
The surprise invite was issued after a mass in Bethlehem.
Pope Francis said he hopes it will aid in the creation of an atmosphere conducive to peace talk resumption.
The pope has admitted it as a “Satanic Mass”
Pope Francis has likened the sexual abuse of children by priests to a “satanic Mass” – and announced his first meeting with a group of victims at the Vatican. Speaking to reporters on the plane taking him back from his Middle East trip, he also said he was in favour of celibacy for priests but that the “the door is always open” to change. In arguably his toughest statement on a crisis which has beset the Church for more than a decade, he said he would show zero tolerance for anyone who abused children. Asked about his approach to bishops who were accused of sexual abuse, he said “there will be no daddy’s boys”, adding that three bishops were currently being investigated. “Sexual abuse is such an ugly crime … because a priest who does this betrays the body of the Lord,” he said.
“It is like a satanic Mass.”
The pope met senior rabbis during his trip to the Holy Land
He said he would hold a meeting with around eight victims of sexual abuse at the Vatican early in June. It would be attended by Cardinal Sean Patrick O’Malley of Boston, who is leading a commission set up to study ways of dealing with the issue. Asked whether the Catholic Church could some day allow priests to marry as they can in some other Christian churches, he said: “Celibacy is not a dogma. “It is a rule of life that I appreciate very much and I think it is a gift for the Church but since it is not a dogma, the door is always open.” The Pontiff went on to reveal he would travel to Sri Lanka and the Philippines in January 2015. He also suggested he may follow in emeritus Pope Benedict XVI’s footsteps and retire if he felt he no longer had the strength to do the job.
Pope Francis waves to the crowd in Manger Square from his popemobile
Pope Francis has made a plea for peace at the start of a pilgrimage to Bethlehem, saying the prolonged Israel-Palestinian conflict had become unacceptable.
On the second leg of a three-day visit to the Middle East, Pope Francis referred directly to the “state of Palestine”, giving support for its bid for full statehood recognition.
However Pope Francis, speaking at an official reception in the Palestinian-run city in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, made clear that a negotiated accord was needed.
He called on leaders from both sides to show the necessary courage to forge a deal.
Pope Francis meets Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Bethlehem
“The time has come for everyone to find the courage to be generous and creative in the service of the common good, the courage to forge a peace which rests on the acknowledgement by all of the right of two States to exist and to live in peace and security within internationally recognised borders,” he said.
US-backed negotiations aimed at ending the conflict collapsed last month, with the Israelis accusing Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas of sabotaging the talks by agreeing a unity deal with Hamas Islamists who run Gaza.
Standing alongside Mr Abbas, Pope Francis pointedly referred to him as “a man of peace and a peacemaker” before heading to Bethlehem’s Manger Square, close to where Christians believe Jesus was born, to celebrate an open-air Mass.
Pope Francis flew by helicopter to Bethlehem, becoming the first pontiff to travel directly to the West Bank rather than enter via Israel, in another nod to Palestinian statehood aspirations.
He is due to travel to Israel later in the day for several meetings, before returning home tomorrow.
8,000 police officers have been deployed in Jerusalem to guarantee his security.
via Ahmad Haddad
#AceNewsServices – BETHLEHEM – May 25 – updated 15:34
By Laura Smith-Spark, Ivan Watson and Delia
Bethlehem, West Bank (CNN) – Pope Francis extended an invitation Sunday to the leaders of Israel and the Palestinian Authority to travel to the Vatican for a “peace initiative,” after earlier calling for a two-state solution to the intractable conflict.
The pontiff’s remarks came at the end of an outdoor Mass in Bethlehem’s Manger Square on the second day of his three-day trip to the Middle East.
“In this, the birthplace of the Prince of Peace, I wish to invite you, President Mahmoud Abbas, together with Israeli President Shimon Peres, to join me in heartfelt prayer to God for the gift of peace,” Francis said.
“I offer my home in the Vatican as a place for this encounter of prayer.”
He added, “Building peace is difficult, but living without peace is a constant torment. The men and women of these lands, and of the entire world, all of them, ask us to bring before God their fervent hopes for peace.”
The Palestinian side has accepted the invitation and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas will go to the Vatican, a Palestinian Legislative Council member, Hanan Ashrawi, told CNN.
The Israeli President’s office said that he welcomed the invitation. “President Peres has always supported, and will continue to support, any attempts to progress the cause of peace,” his office said.
Pope Francis then traveled on to Tel Aviv, where in remarks on the airport tarmac to Peres and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he again issued an invitation to pray for peace at the Vatican. He also reiterated the Vatican’s support for Israel’s right to exist in peace and security.
Looking bad for the accused!
I am on this story, have been a while, this court case against the Vatican and the Queen of the UK. It is getting bad for the accused. But don’t expect main stream media to go near this! From Brussels and the Canada case
The International Tribunal into Crimes of Church and State
Our Mandate: (1) To legally prosecute those people and institutions responsible for the exploitation, trafficking, torture and murder of children, past and present, and (2) To stop these and other criminal actions by church and state, including by disestablishing those same institutions.
http://shaunynews.com/2014/05/16/vatican-and-royalty-cult-said-to-schedule-child-sacrifice-5-judges-issue-arrest-warrants/
http://shaunynews.com/2014/04/29/court-witnesses-testify-eyewitnesses-confirm-that-pope-francis-raped-killed-children/
http://shaunynews.com/2014/04/20/vatican-facing-united-nations-showdown-on-sex-abuse-records/
Kevin Annett: Vatican rumors Pope Francis health/resignation to avoid Satanic murder evidence
Video via myself
Amidst rumours that Pope Francis, Jorge Bergoglio, may step down from his office because of his public prosecution for child trafficking and murder, one of his fellow defendants has just done so. Jesuit Superior General Adolfo Nicolas Pachon announced suddenly this week that he will resign from his office at the next General Congress of the Jesuits.
Along with Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, Bergoglio and Pachon are primary defendants in an historic criminal lawsuit being conducted by the International Common Law Court of Justice in Brussels that commenced on April 7, 2014. Several eyewitnesses who have given their deposition to the Court claim they witnessed Welby, Bergoglio and Pachon participate in child rape and sacrifice rituals connected to the notorious Jesuit-run Ninth Circle cult, during 2009 and 2010. In a statement generally unreported by the world media, Pachon announced on May 20 that he was stepping down from his office without giving a reason. The Italian TV news agency Rome Reports called Pachon’s resignation “unusual … for one of the leading prelates in the church”.
Pachon is the third top Vatican official to resign while in office after being prosecuted by the ICLCJ for crimes against humanity. Former Pope Benedict, Joseph Ratzinger, abdicated on February 11, 2013, barely two weeks before the ICLCJ jury found him guilty of complicity in child trafficking and murder. Another primary defendant in the same case, Vatican Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone, also resigned after the verdict. ITCCS Field Secretary Kevin Annett commented today from Canada, “This is yet another huge admission of guilt by some of the most powerful men in the papacy. Obviously they are not untouchable, and their whole corrupt criminal syndicate is coming down. We should all take hope from this, and see that the law in the hands of the people can topple the worst tyrants.”
#AceWorldNews – JERUSALEM – May 09 – Vandals sprayed anti-Christian graffiti on a Jerusalem church on Friday, despite Israeli police stepping up security around religious sites ahead of a visit by Pope Francis later this month.
“Price tag… King David for the Jews… Jesus is garbage” was spray-painted in Hebrew on the wall of St George’s, a Romanian Orthodox church near an ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighbourhood.
An Israeli policeman walks past graffiti on the wall of a church reading in Hebrew “King David king of the Jews and Jesus is garbage, Price tag” on May 9, 2014 in Jerusalem near the ultra-Orthodox neighbourhood of Mea Sharim. (Photo: AFP – Thomas Coex)
Police said that “Death to Arabs” was found written on a house in the Old City in east Jerusalem, and swastikas were scrawled on the wall of a west Jerusalem apartment.
The Roman Catholic church has demanded Israeli action after Hebrew graffiti reading “Death to Arabs and Christians and to everyone who hates Israel” was daubed on its Notre Dame complex in Jerusalem on Monday.
“The bishops are very concerned about the lack of security and lack of responsiveness from the political sector, and fear an escalation of violence,” the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem said.
The attacks on Christian property come amid a rise in anti-Arab property crimes. Israeli ministers held an emergency meeting on Wednesday, pledging to enforce harsh measures against perpetrators.
Ace Related News:
1. Briebart – May 09 – http://tinyurl.com/mg8oo22
#AceWorldNews – May 02 – JERUSALEM – A visit to Israeli-occupied Jerusalem by the patriarch of the Lebanon-based Maronite church to greet Pope Francis would be a “historic sin,” a leading secular newspaper said Saturday.
Patriarch Beshara al-Rai, whose church is the largest Christian denomination in Lebanon, told AFP on Friday he would travel to the Holy Land to welcome the pontiff during his brief May 24-26 visit.
In doing so, he would be the first patriarch to do so since the 1948 Nakba.
In response, the leading Arab nationalist daily As-Safir ran a critical piece headlined “Historic sin: Rai goes to Israel.”
#AceWorldNews – ROME – April 27 – Pope Francis met Robert Mugabe on Sunday during a ceremony in Rome to make saints of Popes John XXIII and John Paul II
The ageing Zimbabwean president, who was with his wife Grace, was among a number of heads of state to attend the ceremony.
He is barred from entering the European Union because of alleged human rights abuses and vote rigging at home, but the ban does not apply to Vatican City, which is not a member of the EU.
President Mugabe, who describes himself as a committed Catholic, also attended Pope Francis’s inaugural Mass last year, following his election by cardinals in the secret conclave held in the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel.
He also came to Rome for Pope John Paul’s funeral in 2005 and for his beatification in 2011.
Last year, the EU suspended sanctions against 81 officials and eight firms in Zimbabwe, following what it described as a “peaceful” referendum on a new constitution.
However, sanctions remain in place against Mr Mugabe himself, partly at Britain’s insistence.
Ace Related News:
1. Telegraph – April 27 – http://tinyurl.com/ojhtqvg
#AceWorldNews – ROME – April 20 – Pope Francis has delivered a passionate plea for peace in his first Easter Sunday message since being elected.
Francis used his “Urbi et Orbi” address to call for peace in Africa, Asia, the Middle East and across the globe.
“Urbi et Orbi
He singled out “dear Syria”, saying: “How much blood has been shed! And how much suffering must there still be before a political solution is found?”
Easter is the most important festival in the Christian calendar and pilgrims have attended church across the world.
In Iraq, Catholics flocked to churches amid tight security. Some 200 worshippers celebrated Mass at St Joseph Chaldean Church in Baghdad
In South Africa, many congregations included ailing former President Nelson Mandela in their prayers
In a message for Easter.
UK Prime Minister David Cameron praised the “incredible role” played by Christian churches and organisations in Britain and around the globe.
Vatican – BBC – News Services Worldwide
I did two blogs already on this story:
http://shaunynews.wordpress.com/2014/04/11/peadophile-bishops-pass-vatican-backed-rule-that-child-molestation-does-not-have-to-be-reported/
http://shaunynews.wordpress.com/2014/04/04/historic-breaking-news-canada-vatican-crown-guilty-of-genocide/
For me this is too little, too late. They are Animals. Some could say “Well done” for saying Sorry, but it doesn’t take away the fact thousands of kids were attacked in a sexual way and abused and killed by people they trusted, supposed men of God. For me many people wo are in the Catholic Church are evil, you can’t be human and do this. Don’t forget the 4,000 reported sexual attacks on kids to the Vatican in the last 10 year or so, I ask how high is this number really. I chatted with a Catholic early this morning about this who, to be fair was more annoyed at me than the TRUTH! He says “This happens all over the World” Basically he was trying to defend this from the Catholic Church. I am all for people having faith, but how can you have faith on a Peadophile ring that is in parts of the Catholic Church?
Pope Francis has asked for forgiveness for the damage done by Roman Catholic priests who abused children.
According to Vatican Radio, the Pope told members of a children’s rights group he felt “compelled… to personally ask for forgiveness for the damage they have done for having sexually abused children”.
He said that members of the clergy who had molested young children were “quite a few in number”.
The Pope said: “The Church is aware of this damage.”
He added: “It is personal, moral damage carried out by men of the Church and we will not take one step backward with regards to how we will deal with this problem and the sanctions that must be imposed.
“On the contrary, I think we must be even stronger. You don’t play around with the lives of children.”
The Vatican says the Church has begun enforcing prevention and detection measures to eradicate abuse, however the success of these measures is said to vary widely between countries.
Thousands of abuse claims, dating back decades, have come to light in recent years.
The Church’s handling of the allegations has been a subject of controversy with frequent reports of cases being covered up.
Pope Francis has also faced personal criticism for not taking a tough enough stand on the issue.
In February a UN committee released the findings of a month-long investigation into clerics “involved in the abuse of tens of thousands of children worldwide”.
It raised concerns that sexual abusers were moved from parish to parish or across borders and that there was a “code of silence” among the clergy.
The UN committee urged the Holy See to share information on all cases of abuse, amid reports the Vatican had declined to provide any data relating to the scandal.
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/pope-asks-forgiveness-abuse-scandal-115442864.html
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/pope-asks-forgiveness-church-evil-priest-sex-abuse-scandals-article-1.1753341
http://www.lbc.co.uk/pope-asks-for-forgiveness-for-abuse-scandal-88799
#AceWorldNews – ROME – April 10 – Pope Francis has denounced human trafficking as a crime against humanity after meeting with four women who were forced into prostitution.
Francis attended a Vatican conference Thursday of church workers, charity representatives and police chiefs from 20 nations, who pledged greater cooperation to encourage victims of trafficking and slavery to come forward (AP)
Francis told the conference that trafficking is “an open wound on the body of contemporary society.” He met privately with four freed sex slaves from his native Argentina, Chile, Hungary and the Czech Republic.
Francis has made combating human trafficking and slavery a priority of his papacy.
#AceNewsServices – ROME/SYRIA – April 09 – Pope Francis spoke on Wednesday of his deep grief over the assassination of the Dutch Jesuit priest Frans van der Lugt in Syria and made a renewed appeal for an end to the violence.
“May the weapons fall silent! No more war, no more destruction,” Pope Francis said, SANA reported.
“He was loved and valued by both Christians and Muslims,” the Pope told some 45,000 faithful assembled on the famous Vatican piazza.
“It filled me with profound pain and made me think of all the people who suffer and die in the martyred country,” he said.
A terrorist group on Monday shot dead the priest Frans van der Lugt in his monastery in Bustan al-Diwan neighbourhood in Homs city.
Incident Details: BY CAROL KURUVILLA NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Tuesday, April 8, 2014, 1:46 PM – A Dutch priest was beaten and shot to death in the garden of his monastery in the embattled Syrian city of Homs on Monday, after refusing to seek refuge in a safer place.
Rev. Frans Van Der Lugt, a 75-year-old Jesuit priest, was dragged outside his home and shot twice in the head by a single masked gunman.
Rev. Ziad Hillal, one of the 24 Christians who lived in the monastery, said that the violence was a “premeditated act” that specifically targeted the beloved, elderly priest http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/dutch-jesuit-priest-shot-dead-syria-refusing-flee-besieged-city-article-1.1749611
#AceWorldNews – ROME – March 27 – Barack Obama will meet Pope Francis for the first time Thursday for talks on a shared agenda to fight inequality which the US President hopes will help boost support at home.
The talks between the first Latin American pope and the first African-American US president will focus on tackling the gap between rich and poor, but could spill over into thornier issues such as abortion, contraception and gay rights.
“The Holy Father has been an inspiration to people around the world, including me,” Obama said in an interview with the Italian daily Corriere della Sera published on Thursday.
“It does not mean we agree on every issue,” he added.
#AceWorldNews – ROME – March 26 – The Vatican has accepted the resignation of a German Roman Catholic prelate known as the ‘bishop of bling’, Reuters said.
Bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst of Limburg, who reportedly spent 31 million euro of Church funds on his residence, was ordered to leave his diocese last October and offered his resignation at the time.
The investigation was completed, and an apostolic administrator, Mons. Manfred Grothe was appointed to run the diocese for the time being. Tebartz-van Elst will be offered another position.
Pope Francis has asked the faithful of the diocese of Limburg to accept the decision “with docility” and to work to restore a “climate of charity and reconciliation,” according to the statement.
Italian Press and Reuters
#AceWorldNews – VATICAN CITY – Pope Francis announced the initial members of a commission to advise him on sex abuse policy Saturday, tapping lay and religious experts – and an Irish woman assaulted as a child by a priest – to start plotting the commission’s tasks and priorities.
The eight members were announced after Francis came under criticism from victims’ groups for a perceived lack of attention to the abuse scandal, which has seriously damaged the church’s reputation around the world and cost dioceses billions of dollars in legal fees and settlements.
AP
