Catholic Church

October 14, 2026 11:42 AM

PM Modi wishes Pope Leo XIV speedy recovery, good health

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has wished Pope Leo XIV a full and speedy recovery and continued good health following his successful surgery. In a post on X, the Prime Minister expressed happiness over the successful procedure and extended his wishes for the pontiff’s recovery. “Happy to learn that His Holiness Pope Leo XIV’s surgery last night was successful. Wishing him a full and speedy recovery as well as continued good health,” the Prime Minister wrote. According to a medical bull...

July 3, 2026 11:52 AM

Excommunications show a Pope Leo unafraid of making firm decisions

Pope Leo said during his inaugural Mass last year that he would seek to unify the Catholic Church after years of fraught divisions and vowed he would not rule like an "autocrat" over its 1.4 billion members. But the Vatican's decision on Thursday to tell the members of a breakaway traditionalist Catholic group that they were excommunicated showed that he is also not afraid of making firm decisions, experts said. The Vatican's top doctrinal watchdog said that priests and lay Catholics who ar...

July 18, 2025 10:26 AM

Israel strikes Gaza Catholic church, killing three

An Israeli strike on Gaza's sole Catholic Church killed three people and injured several others, the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, which oversees the small parish, said on Thursday. The Patriarchate condemned "this targeting of innocent civilians and of a sacred place," saying two women and one man had died in the attack on the Holy Family Church. "This horrific war must come to a complete end," it said, adding the victims had turned to the church compound as a safe haven "after their homes...

October 29, 2024 9:22 PM

Catholic Church must do better job on compensating abuse victims, says Vatican commission

The Catholic Church must do a better job of handling compensation for the victims of clergy sexual abuse, the Vatican's child protection commission said in its first annual report on Tuesday. For decades, the Church has been shaken by scandals across the world involving paedophile priests and the cover-up of their crimes, damaging its credibility and costing it hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements. The commission said compensation went beyond money, including "a much broader spectrum...

July 1, 2024 10:34 PM

Vatican bans tattoos and body piercings for St Peter’s Basilica workers

The Vatican has banned workers at St Peter's Basilica from having visible tattoos or body piercings to maintain "decorum". The new regulation, published at the weekend, applies to the roughly 170 lay employees of the Fabbrica di San Pietro, the department in charge of the basilica. Father Enzo Fortunato, head of communications for the basilica, said on Monday that it codifies norms that "have been in place in the past in a different form". However, he denied Italian press reports indicating t...