Worldcrunch
MINYA — Anba Makarios, a bishop in the governorate with Egypt’s highest number of violent sectarian incidents, does not employ the usual appeasing rhetoric of Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox church. He is a man who makes his voice heard but avoids being seen, expressing himself through official statements and brief phone calls to television talk shows. […]
-OpEd- BOGOTÁ — Father Jorge, dear Pope Francis, less than a month remains before your visit to Colombia. Before Sept. 6, you still have time to make your excuses and cancel. Believe me, you really needn’t expose yourself to a trip that wil inevitably be both a failure and a risk. Colombia is irredeemable. We […]
PARIS — Five days ahead of the showdown between Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen in France’s crucial presidential elections, Worldcrunch has asked Camille Langlade, a political reporter at the 24-hour French news channel BFMTV to share her experiences covering the non-stop action of national political campaigns, and more. This is the first installment in […]
-Analysis- Buenos Aires, 2013. At the ripe age of 76, Jorge Mario Bergoglio seems destined to wind down an illustrious career in the Catholic hierarchy as the widely respected and mostly beloved Archbishop of the Argentine capital. But the Holy Spirit (and the College of Cardinals) was destined to intervene, sending the Jesuit prelate to […]
As his words and public gestures confirm, Francis is a people’s pope, not a populist, and as genuine as he is popular with ordinary folk.
SPOTLIGHT: PANAMA PAPERS & POLITICS, FROM PAKISTAN TO ICELAND It’s been more than six months since a massive leak first exposed vast networks of offshore financial dealings linked to a Panama-based law firm. But the reverberations of the so-called “Panama Papers” continue to show up in unlikely places. Pakistan’s opposition party announced today that two […]
At first, most thought it was another earthquake. But the 5.3-magnitude rumble coming from the northeastern corner of North Korea was a potentially much more frightening event: Pyongyang had set off its most powerful nuclear weapon test ever. World leaders were quick to react to this latest act of defiance. South Korea denounced Pyongyang leader […]
La Nazione, Oct. 21, 2015 In what it characterizes as an international scoop, Italian daily La Nazione reports that Pope Francis has a curable brain tumor, which the Vatican no doubt has been trying to keep secret. “The Pope Is Sick,” is the newspaper’s front page headline Wednesday, the same day the Vatican characterized the […]
Since the gradual reduction of subsidies from Rome to diocese in the Democratic Republic of Congo, vicars have turned to the faithful to ensure survival of parish churches.
Two priests have recently accused a secret and vindictive “gay lobby” of undermining the Church, from the inside.
Libération, June 17, 2015 “Thou Shall Not Pollute” is written in stone on the front page of Libération, as the world awaits tomorrow’s release of the final version of Pope Francis’ much-anticipated environmental encyclical. The Pope will call for changes in energy consumption, according to a draft version of the encyclical which leaked four days […]
BOSSEY — Her elegance dazzled the world’s most powerful men. When she stood next to her late husband Félix Houphouët-Boigny, Ivory Coast’s first president who served from 1960 to 1993, it was impossible not to notice the graceful Marie-Thérèse. “Everywhere I went, I would transcend,” says the former first lady, now 84. “Besides, he did […]
The words that made news around the world.
This nun walking under St. Peter’s Square’s colossal colonnades was looking at copies of L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican’s official newspaper founded in 1861. Zooming in, I was able to see that the front page was about Pope John XXIII’s encyclical Mater et Magistra on the topic of Christianity and social progress — written four years […]
It has been one year since Pope Francis was elected to the head of the Catholic Chuch. It was virtually instant stardom for the Argentine-born Pope, and magazines around the world couldn’t get enough of the supremely humble 266th pontiff. UNITED STATES ARGENTINA: BRAZIL: PERU: ITALY: POLAND: PORTUGAL: GREAT BRITAIN/IRELAND: FRANCE: GERMANY: SWITZERLAND: GREECE: NIGERIA: […]
BERLIN — Purple is intense like no other color. It is opaque, disturbing and seductive. It is also the color of 2014. So says the Pantone Color Institute, which has named “Radiant Orchid” this year’s preeminent hue. Red and blue combine to make it: hot and cold, fire and water, the male and female elements […]
In a rare sit-down with a reporter, Argentine pontiff responds to a wide range of questions from La Stampa’s Vatican correspondent about Marxism, divorce and the meaning of suffering.
Two farewells for a pair of towering figures in world history: the 2005 funeral of Pope John Paul II and Tuesday’s mass public ceremony to mark the death of Nelson Mandela. Not since the global public outpouring in Rome more than eight years ago to pay respects to the Polish pontiff has the world come […]
VATICAN CITY — There’s a joke going around St. Peter’s Square: Next thing you know, to comply with his ecclesiastical vows of poverty, the pope is going to put the Vatican up for sale! That day hasn’t yet arrived, but the idea speaks as much to Pope Francis’ unpredictability as to his now famous acts […]
Take a tour of what the world has been saying this week…
RIO DE JANEIRO – This modern pilgrimage through the heart of South America began last Friday at the Metropolitan Cathedral of Buenos Aires. The church, where the current Pope used to preside, was jam-packed with 500 young people from a dozen different parishes, their parents, priests and friends, as Jorge Bergoglio’s successor Archbishop Mario Aurelio […]
VATICAN CITY – The Holy See has opted for silence, following the uproar provoked by the comments attributed to Pope Francis that there is a “gay lobby” inside the Vatican. The leaders of the Latin American and Caribbean Confederation of Clerics, have condemned the publication of the transcript of their meeting with Pope Francis, which […]
In modern China, some go to great lengths to look or sound like they hail from the West. One of the quickest, and quirkiest, ways to do this is to give yourself an English name. Scott Kronick, president of Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, had some fun with this phenomenon in a piece for the The […]
LA STAMPA (Italy), THE CHRISTIAN TIMES, MENA (Middle East News Agency) Worldcrunch ROME – Pope Francis has accepted an invitation from the Coptic Pope Tawadros II to visit Egypt. The date of this visit has not been set yet, but it will be the first papal visit to the largest Middle East country since John […]
He was Benedict XVI’s right-hand man, and now runs daily operations for Francis, but it’s still not clear where German-born Georg Ganswein fits into other power struggles in Rome.
BUENOS AIRES – Expectations for Argentina’s Holy Week were already pretty high after the election of the first Argentine pope, anticipating a strong wave of domestic religious tourism. But the “Francisco Effect” has gone beyond expectations, creating huge demand among Catholic pilgrims from across the region. With occupation rates of around 80% and many hotels […]
MOSCOW – Catholics aren’t the only ones who have noted the significance of Pope Francis’ name choice. Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev, Metropolitan of Volokolamsk and head of the Russian Orthodox Church“s Department of External Relations, says the Argentine pontiff’s decision to honor Saint Francis of Assisi puts “service to the poor” at the top of the […]
CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE (U.S.), CLARIN (Argentina), VATICAN RADIO (Vatican) Worldcrunch VATICAN CITY– The inauguration of Pope Francis took place Tuesday morning in St. Peter’s Square before a sea of simple faithful and heads of state from around the world. Babies were kissed, flags were flown, and the Vatican rolled out its open-top white papal jeep. […]
Pope Francis will preach humility and fraternity in the spirit of his namesake St. Francis of Assisi. Can he make it relevant in the 21st century?
And a Peronist to boot!
-Analysis- VATICAN CITY – As it turned out, there was a hidden candidate right there in front of us. This explains the rapidity of the conclave, which was almost as fast as the one that elected Joseph Ratzinger eight years ago. When he took the floor last week during the pre-conclave General Congregation meetings, sources […]
Worldcrunch Masses of Catholics and non-Catholics alike tuned in for the announcement and appearance of Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio as the 266th Supreme Roman Pontiff. It was a singular media moment that was watched, listened to, shared, tweeted — and won’t soon be forgotten. There is still much to learn about the 76-year-old Argentine, and […]
The new Pope and Argentine President Cristina Kirchner have faced off over gay marriage. But tensions date back to the presidency of her deceased husband President Nestor Kirchner.
VATICAN CITY– After the surprise resignation of Benedict XVI, the calls to find a strong administrator to reform the governance of the Church, days of speculation and two rounds of black smoke…the white smoke came after the cardinals chose a new leader for the Catholic Church known for his humility, and notably the first pontiff […]
Worldcrunch VATICAN CITY – White smoke rose from the Sistine Chapel and the bells of St Peter’s Basilica pealed, on Wednesday, heralding the election of a new pope. Watch live feed from St Peter’s Square: Click here for Worldcrunch’s special papal coverage.
Reforming a broken Vatican is important, but the true job of the Roman pontiff is to proclaim the Gospel. Is Pope Francis, the Argentine-born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, that man?