Though American Catholics are used to receiving their ashes from thumb to forehead on Ash Wednesday, this year, ashes will be sprinkled on their heads. The gesture and practice of sprinkling ashes, however, has a longstanding history within Jewish and Catholic traditions.
Before he became guardian and commissary of the Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land in Washington in 2013, Franciscan Father Larry Dunham made his first trip to the Holy Land, where his order has cared for the most sacred shrines of Christendom for centuries.
The largest Syriac Catholic congregation in the world is preparing physically and spiritually for Pope Francis’ upcoming visit to Qaraqosh, Iraq.
Less than three weeks from Pope Francis’ highly anticipated trip to Iraq, the local government on Feb.14 announced new restrictions to try to curb the spread of COVID-19, which includes the closure of all houses of worship until the last day of his March 5-8 visit.
U.S. President Joe Biden ordered new sanctions against the military regime in Myanmar to prevent six generals from accessing $1 billion in Myanmar government funds in the United States.
Groups across a wide spectrum reacted with dismay and concern to passage of a law in the Australian state of Victoria to ban “conversion” practices. Some called it an attack on freedom of religion and speech.
A leading Catholic aid agency has condemned what it calls “cyclical violence and continuing human rights abuses targeting civilian populations in North Kivu and Ituri Provinces” of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
After the “massacre of the elderly” due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Vatican is calling for the world to re-think the way it cares for old people.
Koningshoeven Abbey in the Netherlands has launched an online platform for aspiring monks: eNovice. This digital novitiate is a world first, according to the Dutch Trappists.
Pope Francis said Monday that the COVID-19 pandemic shows there are parts of the world that are “seriously ill,” not as a result of the virus but in its natural environment, its economic and political processes, and even more so in in its human relationships.
