News

The Church has re-established a visible presence in Muslim-majority Somalia for the first time in almost three decades, with the building of a parish church.

The Pope’s three-day visit to Georgia and Azerbaijan that was due to begin yesterday marks the latest papal initiative to foster dialogue and understanding in the world’s troubled regions.

In Zimbabwe, the new Catholic bishop of Mutare Diocese, Bishop Paul Horan (pictured above, kneeling at his ordination), has promised to work alongside all political and religious leaders to better people’s lives.

As a brief cease-fire agreement failed and Syrian government forces returned to bombing Aleppo and fighting rebels in the city streets, Pope Francis made a forceful appeal for assistance for the thousands of innocent civilians trapped in the besieged city...

Parramatta’s Bishop Vincent Long has written in his diocesan paper Catholic Outlook of dining with Pope Francis in Rome and discussing the global refugee crisis. Throughout his papacy Francis has made appeals on behalf of refugees and migrants, while Bishop Long one of the hundreds of thousands of “boat people” who fled Vietnam’s communist regime after the Vietnam War...

The Catholic Church has strongly opposed the creation of a new government department to oversee religious affairs in Zambia, warning it risked turning the country into a theocracy and extending state control over religion...

Poland look set to commit a near total ban on abortion to law, as parliament votes overwhelming in favour of tougher legislation. On 23 September, a total of 267 members of the Polish Parliament's lower house voted in favour of a new bill that would allow terminations only if the mother’s life was at risk and increase the maximum jail term for practitioners from two years to five...

The Pope’s three-day visit to Georgia and Azerbaijan this weekend marks the latest papal initiative to foster dialogue and understanding in the world’s troubled regions. With just under 300 Catholics, a Muslim population of more than 90 per cent and a president accused of appalling human rights abuses, Azerbaijan is not an obvious location for a papal visit...