Christians in the Holy Land are marking Good Friday this year amid signs the coronavirus crisis is winding down, with religious sites open to limited numbers of faithful but none of the mass pilgrimages usually seen in the Holy Week leading up to Easter.
The rebuilding of the Temple in Ezra 3, as seen in photos of Pope Francis leading worship at the site of churches destroyed by the Islamic State at Hosh al-Bieaa Church Square, in Mosul, Iraq.
Standing in the Assyrian Catholic cathedral in Baghdad where 50 worshippers, clergy, and policemen were killed in a 2010 terrorist attack, Pope Francis on Friday made an appeal for “forgiveness, reconciliation, and rebirth” in the struggling Middle Eastern nation.
Pope Francis arrived in Iraq on Friday in a first-ever papal visit to the country that is expected to raise awareness about the challenges facing Iraqi Christians, who are a dwindling minority in the nation.
Pope Francis says the Christmas season provides reason for hope amid the difficulties of the coronavirus pandemic. During his Sunday blessing, Francis noted that the Vatican’s Christmas tree had gone up last week in St. Peter’s Square, and that work is underway to build the life-size
Pope Francis is supporting demands for racial justice in the wake of the U.S. police killing of George Floyd and is blasting COVID-19 skeptics and media organizations that spread their conspiracies in a new book penned during the Vatican’s coronavirus lockdown.
It’s not exactly divine intervention, but even the pope considers the U.S. presidential race over. President-elect Joe Biden, a lifelong Roman Catholic, spoke to Pope Francis on Thursday, despite President Donald Trump refusing to concede.
Mexico’s president published an open letter to Pope Francis Saturday (Oct. 10) calling on the Roman Catholic Church to apologize for abuses of Indigenous peoples during the conquest of Mexico in the 1500s.
Pope Francis says the coronavirus pandemic has proven that the “magic theories” of market capitalism have failed and that the world needs a new type of politics that promotes dialogue and solidarity and rejects war at all costs.