Word: vatican
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...shares and is trying to encourage in Europe, where SSPX is strongest. But almost simultaneous with the Pope's announcement, a Swedish-TV interview surfaced in which SSPX bishop Richard Williamson matter-of-factly denied the existence of the Nazi gas chambers. The ensuing international outcry forced the Vatican to release a generalized condemnation of Holocaust denial--though it didn't rule out Williamson's return as a Roman Catholic bishop...
Then an unlikely figure entered the fray: Angela Merkel. German Chancellors don't usually weigh in on church matters, she said. But when the Vatican gave "the impression that it could be possible to deny that the Holocaust happened," she felt compelled to demand that the Pope repudiate the idea, lest it affect relations with "the Jewish people as a whole." In essence, Merkel (a Protestant) was tutoring the German Pope on his responsibilities to the Jews...
...Benedict arrives in Israel during an eight-day visit to the Holy Land, his first since becoming Pontiff. The trip is a near carbon copy of one made by his predecessor John Paul II in 2000. The Vatican hopes to use the trip to build on its 44-year rapprochement with the world's Jews after centuries of conflict and persecution. During his papacy, John Paul became the first modern Pope to visit a synagogue, recognize the state of Israel and apologize for the role Christians played in the Holocaust...
...When reporters at Catholic News Service, the official news agency of the USCCB, talked to Vatican officials just prior to the Inauguration, they found the Holy See mostly focused on economic issues and Middle East politics. "Asked about pro-life issues, on which Obama and the Catholic Church have clear differences, Vatican officials took a wait-and-see attitude," the news agency reported...
...starkly different responses of some U.S. bishops and the Vatican could just be a matter of pure politics. As Obama's European tour last month showed, the Pope would hardly be the only head of state eager to start off on the right footing with the new Administration. In addition, Obama is broadly popular among American Catholics, 67% of whom gave him a positive approval rating in a recent Pew poll. At a time when the U.S. Catholic Church is losing members - a separate Pew study found that for every American who joins the Catholic Church, four others leave - Benedict...