In an official edict May 9, Pope Francis described his vision for the 2025 Jubilee as a year of hope. He asked for gestures of solidarity for the poor, prisoners, migrants and Mother Nature.
Noted Czech theologian Fr. Tomas Halik helped lead a Vatican gathering for some 200 parish priests about the ongoing synod process. He told NCR he was encouraged by the open and frank discussions that took place.
The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith will publish its new norms for the discernment of apparitions and other supernatural phenomena May 17, the Vatican press office said.
The spiritual practice of reparation "may be somewhat forgotten or wrongly judged obsolete" today, but it is essential for the promotion of justice and healing, including on behalf of those who have suffered abuse in the church, Pope Francis said.
Pope Francis signed a letter on synodality in the presence of parish priests and urged them to be "missionaries of synodality," said several of the priests present.
In a meeting at the Vatican on May 2, Pope Francis received assurances from Jordan's King Abdullah II that Christian and Islamic holy sites in Jerusalem will be protected amid the Israel-Hamas war.
"Here, then, is the great enemy of faith: it is not intelligence, it is not reason, as, alas, some continue obsessively to repeat," Francis said. The enemy is "simply fear."
Loretto Sr. Jeannine Gramick recently wrote to Pope Francis to express disappointment with a new Vatican document that condemned "gender ideology." Francis told Gramick: "Transgender people must be accepted and integrated into society."
Pope Francis has now established 10 working groups to study some of the most controversial issues that have emerged in the Synod of Bishops. Theologians say it is difficult to assess what their impact might be.
