Pope Francis

Pope Francis has canceled a meeting with a Jewish delegation that was to be held on June 30, 2022, because of a flare up of his knee pain. The Vatican press ...

Nevertheless, his progress will be scrutinized in view of the long trip to Canada from July 24 to 30. During one audience, he said to pilgrims from Slovakia that he was offering up the “humiliation” for them. A Vatican source believes that the Pope may have overexerted his knee on this occasion. We don’t have the strength of youth! After the handing over of the pallium to the archbishops, during which he remained seated as required by the rite, the Pontiff walked a few meters with difficulty to go and collect himself in front of the tomb of St. Peter with the members of the Orthodox delegation, already present. However, the Pontiff has regularly replaced his wheelchair with a simple cane during his most recent public appearances.

The papalization of the church reached its most robust form in the first half of the 20th century, but it might be seeing its twilight under Pope Francis.

It did so in several ways, most notably by teaching the collegial relationship between the college of bishops and the bishop of Rome and its description of the church as “the people of God.” The process is essentially collegial and, as Francis specifies it, radically rooted in the teaching that the church is the whole people of God. He was thus a witness to the faith of the church but not a proactive and seemingly independent teacher of it. By then it had sidelined and almost obliterated the synodal and collegial aspect of the church’s structure in favor of the hierarchical, top-down aspect. As Catholics know, the First Vatican Council (1869-70) defined that the pope was infallible when under certain conditions he taught that a teaching was of divine and apostolic origin and thus an essential element in the deposit of faith. It can be argued, therefore, that in “Pastor Aeternus” the council confirmed the authority the pope had already claimed for himself. It sometimes referred to bishops and on occasion even to the bishop of Rome, yet it gained no prominence. Here are three of its 27 headings: “That the pope may be judged by no one”; “That the pope is the only one whose feet may be kissed by princes”; and, most important, “The pope has the authority to depose emperors.” Although Gregory tried to find precedents for that last claim, he was unconvincing. The church in the West became the papal church, and Catholics became papists. The development signified a more exclusively top-down and hierarchical mode of church, in contrast to the more synodal and collegial earlier mode. Pope Gregory took that aspect of the reform to its ultimate limits by twice deposing Emperor Henry IV of the Holy Roman Empire; these actions ended in bitter conflicts that finally drove the pope into exile from Rome and led to the worst sack of the city in its history. To achieve that goal, the reform tried to restrict the authority of secular rulers to choose prelates.

Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, grants an interview to Vatican Media to explain the goals of the document ...

We followed a path of study and reflection that led us to see the issues of bioethics in a new light, starting with the role of discernment and the formed conscience of the moral agent. It is certainly a process that reflects the synodal breath and climate in which Pope Francis wishes the Church to operate. Note well, however, that the truth of the moral good is not about consensus; it is about the reality of each person who is open to communion and who finds fulfillment through love, openness to others and a true ethics of otherness. Some specific issues, such as the environment and life (including animal life) on the planet, responsible generation and procreation, care of a dying person, and new technologies are addressed as testing ground for the overall approach set forth in the previous chapters. At the end of the book, the fundamental eschatological horizon disclosed by revelation is outlined, which is crucial for a proper understanding of human life and its meaning, and unfortunately is rarely present in Christian preaching today. I can answer this question by taking a look at the various chapters of the book (there are 12 chapters in all). The starting point is a summary of the most relevant aspects of Pope Francis' speeches and documents. As already mentioned, but it is worth emphasizing, we not only sought dialogue between different fields of knowledge, but also between theological perspectives and models that develop a sapiential and pastoral intelligence of faith: in order to highlight the richness of Christian theology, its Catholic diversity. The backbone of this text is a theological anthropology inspired by ecclesial faith in close dialogue with contemporary culture. From there we move on to consider the teaching on life in the Bible in light of the Christological event. So, our perspective was to render a service to the Magisterium by opening up a space for dialogue that makes research possible and encourages it. The initiative takes its cue from the many solicitations Pope Francis is making to theologians in his speeches and documents. It was clear to me from the very beginning that a climate of research, dialogue and discussion among the participants was essential.

What's more, one of the pope's choices would send what NCR columnist Michael Sean Winters called "an unmistakable sign" to the U.S. church. San Diego Bishop ...

The photos of the encounter paint a lovely scene: Rohr, a Franciscan and globally respected spiritual writer long held at arms' length by church hierarchs for his interreligious and dialogical approach, meeting the very leader of the global church. Rohr, nearly 80, was in his brown habit, carrying a cane; Francis, 85, was in his wheelchair. What's more, one of the pope's choices would send what NCR columnist Michael Sean Winters called "an unmistakable sign" to the U.S. church. "This morning, the Holy Father Francis received in audience Fr. Richard Rohr," it said. Thanks to a new apostolic constitution, a host of once impossible things are now possible. Policy decisions begin to tend toward the moderate, initial attempts at innovation morph into efforts at consolidation, and surprises disappear, replaced by schedules that have been carefully vetted for all contingencies.