Mercedes Hernandez Valdez is a volunteer with Caritas Cubana and runs a soup kitchen in San Agustin parish in Havana. CRS works in Cuba through Caritas Cubana to tend the needs of the most vulnerable. Photo by Robyn Fieser/CRS By Robyn Fieser With 18 percent of its 11 million people over the age of 60, [...]
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By Robin Fieser The Pope arrives in Havana on Tuesday and the old city’s cobblestone streets are teeming with camera-toting tourists eagerly awaiting his arrival. Hotel lobbies are bustling, restaurants are hopping, and a fleet of 1950s American cars cruises up and down Havana’s main streets shuttling tourists from one sight to the next. Far [...]
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Pope Benedict XVI arrives in Benin to a joyous reception. The Holy Father spoke about his affection for Africa. Photo by Helen Blakesley / CRS By Helen Blakesley “God is neither absent nor irrelevant” as Pope Benedict arrives in Benin As the Papal plane touched down onto the sun-baked tarmac of Cotonou airport, the ‘press [...]
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Photo by Josh Estey for CRS Dear Brothers and Sisters, The Lenten period, which leads us to the celebration of Holy Easter, is for the Church a most valuable and important liturgical time, in view of which I am pleased to offer a specific word in order that it may be lived with due diligence. [...]
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From Vatican Information Services: VATICAN CITY, 12 JAN 2011 (VIS) – The Holy Father has written the following Message to mark today’s first anniversary of the earthquake in Haiti. The Message was read out by Cardinal Robert Sarah, president of the Pontifical Council “Cor Unum”, during a commemorative Mass held in Haiti today. “In order [...]
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January 1 is the World Day of Peace. The following are excerpts from Pope Benedict’s annual message: RELIGIOUS FREEDOM, THE PATH TO PEACE At the beginning of the new year I offer good wishes to each and all for serenity and prosperity, but especially for peace. Sadly, the year now ending has again been marked [...]
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Excerpts from Pope Benedict XVI’s World Day of Peace message: If you want to cultivate peace, protect creation: The environment must be seen as God’s gift to all people, and the use we make of it entails a shared responsibility for all humanity, especially the poor and future generations. (2) + Our present crises – [...]
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“No friend of the Israelis and the Palestinians can fail to be saddened by the continuing tension between your two peoples. No friend can fail to weep at the suffering and loss of life that both peoples have endured,” said Pope Benedict on the last day of his pilgrimage to the Holy Land. In Jerusalem, [...]
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Young massgoers in the crowd as Pope Benedict XVI celebrates Mass on Mount Precipice in Nazareth, May 14, 2009. Photo by CRS staff If earlier parts of Pope Benedict’s pilgrimage to the Holy Land had edges of tension, Thursday’s Mass in Nazareth was relatively short on controversy. Thirty thousand people strong, it had the feel [...]
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‘Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,’ the well-worn Robert Frost quote goes, and that something was me on Wednesday. Wandering around Bethlehem’s eerily empty streets in the heat, I was unable to leave the city after a day of papal events because a very large slab of concrete was blocking my way.
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