A spate of attacks by Jihadists - including the dramatic seizure of a port town - have left the people "terrified" of a growing campaign of insurgency, according to a leading bishop.
After the brief capture of Mocímboa da Praia - a district capital of 20,000 inhabitants, in Cabo Delgado province, north Mozambique - Bishop Luiz Fernando Lisboa of Pemba told Aid to the Church in Need (ACN)...
Fergal Keane reads from the Benedictus: Book of Blessings by John O'Donohue.
On Radio 4's Today programme, some of BBC News' best-known voices are offering favourite poems of #comfortandhope, and talking about the importance of the words in their lives.
Here, Fergal Keane recites the verse that helped sustain him as he experienced PTSD.
This link will take you thro...
A new report by Christian Solidarity Worldwide on the situation of oppressed religious communities in China is released today amid concerns that some of these groups are especially vulnerable to the spread of the coronavirus and its wider impact on freedoms in China.
The report, entitled 'Repressed, Removed, Re-Educated: The stranglehold on religious life in China,' contends that...
The Catholic Church has joined calls for the government to tackle the spread of COVID-19 in prisons by urgently releasing some people where it is safe to do.
Lead Bishop for prisons Rt Rev Richard Moth said: "The tens of thousands of women and men in our overcrowded prisons are at particular risk from this pandemic. They are no less deserving of safety and healthcare than anyone else in o...
Pope Francis has joined UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres in calling for an immediate global ceasefire as the world faces the onslaught of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Last Monday, the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, urged warring parties across the world to "lay down their weapons" in support of the bigger battle against Covid-19. "The fury of the virus illustrates the folly of war...
Fr Edwin is Director of Caritas Philippines and Director of the National Secretariat for Social Action (NASSA).
The Philippine government on March 17, 2020 declared a State of Calamity throughout the country for the period of six months due to the COVID-19 global pandemic. An Enhanced Community Quarantine covering the entire Luzon Island was imposed until April 14, 2020, requirin...
Following consultations and discussions, and having taken into account the various restrictions that have been imposed throughout Ireland over recent days, the Bishop of Clogher, Bishop Larry Duffy, has put in place a series of further guidelines for clergy and parish communities across the diocese, with immediate effect.
Bishop Duffy says that he is "saddened to have to take this course ...
Gabriela Fanucciu won Joint Third Prize Article in the Columban Competition 2020 - Tackling our Throwaway Culture. She writes:
When trying to put out the disaster of deforestation, plastic only fuelled the flames.
In 1959, a Swedish engineer inadvertently set in motion one of the most detrimental chain reactions of the last century. His invention of the plastic bag seemed ...
Gospel of 30th March 2020 - John 8:1-11 Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. At daybreak he appeared in the Temple again; and as all the people came to him, he sat down and began to teach them.
The scribes and Pharisees brought a woman along who had been caught committing adultery; and making her stand there in full view of everybody, they said to Jesus, 'Master,...
Israeli forces entered a Palestinian village in the northern Jordan Valley on Thursday and confiscated materials being used to build an emergency clinic to deal with people affected by the Coronavirus.
'Israeli Civil Administration' officials came to the village of Khirbet Ibziq with a military escort, bulldozer and two trucks equipped with cranes to demolish the community clinic and emer...
Mgr Giuseppe Ma Zhongmu Tegusbeleg, the only Mongolian bishop, died last Wednesday at the age of 101. Bishop Ma was an unofficial bishop, not recognized by the Chinese state, which considered him a simple priest. For the Holy See he was bishop of Ningxia, a diocese that includes part of the autonomous region of Ningxia, part of northern Shaanxi and part of northern Inner Mongolia.
Bishop ...
Leela Ramdeen writes:
"Preventing or delaying outbreaks, particularly among the most vulnerable, is the most important action we can take right now...coronavirus will also undoubtedly test our principles, values and shared humanity." (UNHCR)
As Michelle Bachelet and Filippo Grandi, UNHCR, have rightly said: "If our response to coronavirus is grounded in the princi...
Gospel of 29th March 2020 - John 11:3-7,17,20-27,33-45 So the sisters sent a message to Jesus, 'Lord, he whom you love is ill.' But when Jesus heard it, he said, 'This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God's glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.' Accordingly, though Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, after having heard ...
Fifth Sunday in Lent
What a difference a week makes, the whole world touched by a virus that threatens the lives of so many. I'm making no apologies for beginning on a somber note, this passage about the story of Lazarus in John's Gospel is one which at some time in the coming weeks and months every single one of us will feel, the weeping and loss are going to hit us as colleagues, friend...
