“I echo the thoughts and concerns of the Holy Father: we must stop now, while there is still time. This escalation could spiral out of control, with consequences no one can foresee,” the cardinal said.

Cardinal Parolin declined to respond directly to the announcement that the International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, charging him with war crimes against the people of Gaza. He said:

The Pope has expressed the position of the Holy See, which is that these matters must be thoroughly studied because there are technical criteria for defining the concept of genocide.

The German cardinal charges:

Factions with ulterior motives have hijacked the traditional principle of synodality, meaning the collaboration between bishops (collegiality) and between all believers and shepherds of the Church (based on the common priesthood of all those baptized into the faith), to further their progressive agenda.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, the two list potential cuts in the federal budget, including “nearly $300 million to progressive groups like Planned Parenthood.”

The ADLV, which represents 1,000 lay workers, complained that the union had not been informed about the latest studies of the pension fund. The statement reasoned that “since we pay with our contributions, the accounts should be available for all to see.”

The union went on to say that lay workers, “exhausted by cuts and above all by the lack of responses to their legitimate request to be heard,” are worried that they will face further belt-tightening, while Vatican financial consultants still receive healthy payments for their studies of the pension fund.

In a November 21 letter to the College of Cardinals and the prefects of the Roman Curia, the Pope said that proper funding for pensions had long been a matter of concern, but recent studies have underlined the urgency of the problem, and reforms “can no longer be postponed.”

Putting the pension fund on a sustainable basis will involve tough decisions ‘that will require particular sensitivity, generosity and willingness to sacrifice on the part of all,” the Pope warned. He asked the prelates for “special cooperation in facilitating this new and inescapable path of change.”

Pope Francis has given Cardinal Farrell, the prefect of the Dicastery for Laity, Family, and Life, a steadily more important role in handling Vatican financial affairs. In 2019 the Pontiff appointed him as the camerlengo, the official who supervises the material goods of the Holy See during a papal interregnum. In 2020 he was named president of the Pontifical Commission on Confidential Matters, and in 2022 he became the president of the Pontifical Commission on Investments.

Born in Ireland, the future cardinal was ordained as a priest of the Legionaires of Christ in 1978. In 1984 he left the Legionaires to become a priest of the Archdiocese of Washington, DC, where he rose to become vicar general, serving under then-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick. He was named Bishop of Dallas in 2007, then appointed to his current post in the Roman Curia by Pope Francis in 2016, and raised to the College of Cardinals soon thereafter.

In a November 20 letter, William Quinn and Michael Moses described the regulation as ambiguous and wrote that it could be interpreted to require so-called gender-affirming care.

“We are concerned that, for health programs and services, the requirement of nondiscrimination on the basis of gender identity could be construed to require the provision of so-called ‘gender-affirming care’ and the exclusion of all other forms of treatment for gender dysphoria, especially in minors,” they wrote.

“Even if the Department rejects this recommendation, at a minimum it should acknowledge in the final acquisition regulation that it lacks a general police power to regulate the health professions, and that its nondiscrimination requirements do not mandate or bar the provision of any specific type of treatment or care,” they added.

CCHD had $7,284,574 in revenue and $18,696,903 in expenses in 2023, leading to an operating deficit of $11,412,329. CCHD’s net assets, which stood at nearly $8.5 million at the beginning of 2023, stood at negative $2.3 million at the end of 2023.

In his letter introducing the annual report, Bishop Timothy Senior of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, the chairman of the US bishops’ CCHD subcommittee, made no reference to the deficit, but instead discussed how “CCHD is designed to put Catholic social teaching into action, helping the poorest of the poor use the gifts that God has given them to improve their communities and care for those around them.”

Ralph McCloud, who became director of CCHD in 2008, resigned from his position in April and is now a fellow at NETWORK, a Catholic sisters’ political advocacy group.

“Our world does not need automatons that simply repeat what has already been said and done; it needs new choreographers, new interpreters of our rich human resources, new social poets,” the Pope said on November 21.

“Educational models that aim merely to produce ‘results’ are useless in the absence of a cultural vision capable of forming persons prepared to help the world change gears by eliminating inequality, endemic poverty and exclusion,” he continued, lamenting that “some 250 million children and adolescents do not attend school. We are morally obliged to change this situation.”

The Pontiff added:

We have no reason for fear. First, because Christ is our guide and travelling companion. Secondly, because we are guardians of a cultural and educational heritage that is greater than ourselves.

We are heirs to the profound thought of Augustine. We are heirs to the poetry of Ephraim the Syrian. We are heirs to the medieval cathedral schools and the founders of the first universities. Heirs to Thomas Aquinas and Edith Stein, and to those who commissioned the works of Fra Angelico and Mozart, and more recently of Mark Rothko and Olivier Messiaen. We are heirs to the innumerable artists inspired by the mysteries of Christ. Heirs to great scientists and thinkers like Blaise Pascal. In a word, heirs to the passion for education and culture of countless saints and holy men and women.

“This is the vocation of the baptized person,” the Pope continued: “to see God, to see Him in the world, in the brother, to have ‘Christified’ eyes and with them a compassionate, welcoming, merciful gaze ... a look that conveys the joy that overflows our hearts.”

Referring to “the joy of the disciples after their encounter with the Risen One, which they cannot contain and which impels them to set out on their journey,” the Pope said that “the Holy Spirit works this wonder in us and puts in us the words to speak to God (Rm 8:14) and to men (Mt 10:19).”

In his message, dated November 9 and released November 21, the Pontiff also upheld the Blessed Virgin Mary as “a model of evangelization to offer Christ to all humanity ... Imitating her example of self-giving and sustained by her maternal and provident care, let us always be her missionary disciples to the ends of the earth.”

Father Bryan Coffey “was not employed by the Diocese or engaged by the Diocese as an independent contractor,” the High Court ruled. “[A] relationship of employment has always been a necessary precursor in this country to a finding of vicarious liability, and it has always been necessary that the wrongful acts must be committed in the course or scope of the employment.”

“The people of Guinea-Bissau are tired of division, fighting, violence, threats, and brutality,” Father Davide Sciocco, the vicar general of the Diocese of Bissau, preached during Mass in the diocesan cathedral.

“There is a lot of hunger,” added Father Lucio Brentagani, administrator of the Diocese of Bafatá. “On this day of prayer and fasting for Guinea-Bissau, let us call on our governors, politicians, military, magistrates, and police forces not to close their eyes and their ears to the cry of help coming from poor people, from so many families who do not have enough to eat.”

The West African nation of 2.1 million (map) is 46% Muslim, 40% ethnic religionist, and 13% Christian (9% Catholic).

“Fantastic meeting with His Holiness Pope Francis during which we discussed the challenges of climate action and the role of UNOPS in helping populations in situations of conflict, namely, Ukraine, Gaza, Lebanon, Sudan, Yemen, Myanmar, Afghanistan, Haiti, Mozambique,” Moreira da Silva tweeted after the audience.

DeGioa said that he needed time to rest and recover after suffering a stroke.

Bishop Gyamfi went on to warn that individuals who knowingly profit from the illegal mining of precious minerals may be barred from Communion. The bishops urged their people to reject any involvement in mining operations that damage the environment.

Following the audience, her department tweeted, “The Minister underlined the importance of the Catholic Church for cohesion in Germany: ‘We need the voice of the churches internationally for peace and humanity.’”

“First, on day one, make clear that unlawful religious discrimination won’t be enforced in federal programs,” said Nicole Stelle Garnett and John Meiser. “The executive branch is charged with taking care that federal law and the Constitution are faithfully executed. It should do so by making clear that federal programs conform to the First Amendment.”

“Second, root out all instances where religious discrimination is on the books,” they continued. “This treatment is so widespread because it has crept into federal law quietly and incrementally, across administrations, over many decades. The president could direct every department to conduct an audit of the programs they administer to unearth discriminatory provisions.”

The Pope said that all Catholics should study the history of the Church, to help them understand “the imperfect and wounded world in which she lives.” Remembering the problems of the past, he said, “is not an obstacle to progress but a foundation for justice and harmony.”

In his letter Pope Francis argued strongly against any partisan approach to history?particularly the “cancel culture”?and insisted that the study of the past should not be motivated by ideological goals in the present.

Blessed Carlo Acutis will be canonized during the Jubilee for Teenagers, which is scheduled for April 25-27. The ceremony is expected to be held in St. Peter’s Square on April 27.

Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati will be canonized during the Jubilee for Youth, scheduled for July 28 to August 3.

The dates for the two canonizations were released on November 20, at the conclusion of the weekly papal audience, after Pope Francis announced plans for a celebration of a World Meeting on Children’s Rights in February.

The US bishops’ Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, in effect since 2002, provides that “for even a single act of sexual abuse of a minor? whenever it occurred?which is admitted or established after an appropriate process in accord with canon law, the offending priest or deacon is to be permanently removed from ministry and, if warranted, dismissed from the clerical state.”

In contrast, the new Book VI of the Code of Canon Law, promulgated by Pope Francis in 2021, states that a cleric who sexually abuses a minor is “to be punished with deprivation of office and with other just penalties, not excluding, where the case calls for it, dismissal from the clerical state” (Canon 1398)?thus allowing some clerics who have sexually abused minors to resume active ministry in a different office.

(See also CWN editor Phil Lawler’s commentary, “Here’s why the ‘zero tolerance’ policy is going nowhere.”)

“I am grateful to His Holiness for his prayers for peace for Ukraine,” she tweeted after the meeting. “I hope that the authority of the Holy See will help save more innocent lives that have the right to be safe in their native land.”

“It was a very positive and serene moment,” said Andrii Yurash, Ukraine’s ambassador to the Holy See, said after the meeting. “This was another significant opportunity to strengthen our friendship with the Vatican. Relations have never been this robust.”