The historic meeting was held the evening before the Latter Day Saints dedicated a new temple in Rome.

Although the Vatican has declined to comment about the meeting with Nelson and the 14 elders who make up the leadership of the church, the Latter Day Saints leaders have shared their views.

"We had a most cordial, unforgettable experience. His Holiness, he was most gracious and warm and welcoming," Nelson said.

"What a sweet, wonderful man he is, and how fortunate the Catholic people are to have such a gracious, concerned, loving and capable leader.

"We talked about our mutual concern for the people who suffer throughout the world and want to relieve human suffering.

"We talked about the importance of religious liberty, the importance of the family, our mutual concern for the youth [and] for the secularisation of the world and the need for people to come to God and worship Him, pray to Him and have the stability that faith in Jesus Christ will bring in their lives."

Another Latter Day Saints leader present at the 33-minute meeting was President M. Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.

Ballard said they spoke of the close relations the two faiths have in working together on humanitarian projects.

"We explained to His Holiness that we work side by side, that we have projects with Catholic Relief Services all over the world in over 43 countries. [We've] been shoulder to shoulder as partners in trying to relieve suffering. He was very interested in that."

Since becoming the church's leader in 2018, Nelson has often engaged with Catholic prelates in the United States.

Source

• Crux Now
• Newsroom
• Image: The Salt Lake Tribune

President Macri had sent 16,666,000 Argentine pesos for Scholas Occurentes, an educational charity the Pope supports.

In a note to the charity's office, the Pontiff said "I don't like the 666".

The number is associated with the Antichrist.

A spokesman for President Macri denied the sum was intended as an affront to the Pope.

The spokesman said the charity asked for that amount.

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Writing in the National Catholic Reporter, Mrs Clinton stated as "a person of faith, a mother, and a grandmother, I am deeply moved by Pope Francis's recent teachings on climate change — to reflect and above all to act".

"I'm grateful — as so many Americans are — for the Pope's teachings.

"And as president, I hope to follow his example. I will make combating climate change a top priority of my administration."

The Democratic Party presidential contender noted the Pope's reference to the Earth as "our common home".

"As a Methodist, I was taught that we have a sacred duty to care for God's earth," Mrs Clinton wrote.

"All creation is the Lord's," say the Methodist social principles, "and we are responsible for the way we use and abuse it."

"Pope Francis is right," Mrs Clinton added, "All countries and all people are responsible for preventing the worst impacts of climate change."

"But countries like the United States have a particular role. We are rich, powerful, and blessed with many advantages. We must lead the charge."

"For the first time in history, we are within reach of eradicating hunger and extreme poverty. But climate change threatens that progress."

The former US Secretary of State praised Pope Francis for "bringing his extraordinary moral leadership to the fight".

She urged all Americans to heed Pope Francis's call to become good stewards of the Earth.

Climate change "threatens the health, happiness, and future of every one of our children", she wrote.

She also hit out at climate change deniers who, in spite of overwhelming scientific consensus, are "intent on obstructing progress".

"There is no Planet B," she wrote.

"We need to develop an ethic of stewardship, of responsibility and sustainability."

Sources

• National Catholic Reporter
• Image: Valley News Live

"He so quickly got us," said Andrew Lyke, a participant in the meeting who is now the director of the Chicago Archdiocese's Office for Black Catholics.

The group succeeded in inserting its priorities into the congress's plan for churches, Mr Lyke said, and "Barack Obama was key in helping us do that."

By the time of that session in the spring of 1987, Mr Obama — himself not Catholic — was already well known in Chicago's black Catholic circles.

He had arrived two years earlier to fill an organising position paid for by a church grant, and had spent his first months here surrounded by Catholic pastors and congregations.

In this often overlooked period of the president's life, he had a desk in a South Side parish and became steeped in the social justice wing of the church, which played a powerful role in his political formation.

On Thursday, Mr Obama met with Pope Francis at the Vatican after a three-decade divergence with the church.

By the late 1980s, the Catholic hierarchy had taken a conservative turn that de-emphasised social engagement and elevated the culture wars that would eventually cast Mr Obama as an abortion-supporting enemy. Continue reading.

Source: The New York Times

Image: Joe Wrinn, Harvard University/AP Photo

He replaces the late president Tuikilakila Waqairatu who passed on Tuesday. He will preside over this year's annual conference when a new president is expected to be elected.

Ratabacaca was elected at the church's standing committee meeting last Thursday. He is currently Divisional Superintendent of the Church's Nabua Division previously served as president of the Methodist Church in Fiji from 2002 to 2004.

He said the church must continue the work started by Dr Waqairatu in terms of unity both in the church and the nation, and strengthening the moral fibre of society, especially in respect of women and children.
Source

• Fiji Times
• Image: FijiLive

Ernst von Freyberg is currently chairman of the Blohm+Voss Group, a Hamburg-based company that builds and repairs yachts and ocean liners.

The multilingual von Freyberg is active in the Knights of Malta, a lay Catholic religious order and a worldwide humanitarian network offering free medical care and other services. He is also a co-leader of an association that organises pilgrimages to Lourdes.

At the announcement of the appointment, Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi was caught off-guard when a reported pointed out that the Blohm+Voss Group is part of a consortium that is currently building frigates for the German navy.

The firm's website also lists frigates, destroyers and patrol boats designed in the past for the navies of Nigeria, Argentina, Portugal and Germany.

Later a Vatican statement said von Freyberg had nothing to do with the military part of Blohm+Voss.

Von Freyberg replaces Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, who was forced out as president of the bank — formally known as the Institute for Religious Works — last May for incompetence.

He assumes the leadership of an institution that has been the focus of considerable controversy in recent months. European banking authorities have charged that the bank does not maintain adequate safeguards to prevent money-laundering.

In July, a European anti-money laundering committee said it failed to meet all its standards on fighting money-laundering, tax evasion and other financial crimes.

The report by Moneyval, a monitoring committee of the 47-nation Council of Europe, found the Vatican passed nine of 16 "key and core" aspects of its financial dealings.

Sources:

Vatican Radio

Catholic News Service

National Catholic Reporter

The meeting came one day after he met the interim leader of Egypt's Coptic Orthodox Church, which makes up the vast majority of the roughly 8 million Christians in the country.

The new president of Egypt gained 51.7% of the votes against Ahmed Shafiq, the last prime minister under ousted President Hosni Mubarak, in the country's freest elections since 1952.

Morsi's election had fed fears among Christians and more liberal Muslims that the Islamists will use their political mandate to impose conservative restrictions on dress and behaviour, Catholic News Service reported.

Seeking to fulfil a promise of inclusive government, Morsi has resigned as head of the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party and said he would name a woman and a Christian among his six vice-presidents.

Father Rafic Grieche, spokesman for the Egyptian Catholic Bishops' Conference, noted that Egypt's Christians had lived under Islamic regimes for 1400 years.

"We hope Morsi will be a just ruler," he said. "Mubarak's time was not fair, and I do not think Morsi could be worse.

"At the same time, the people of Islamic tendencies will be working to Islamicise the society. You don't need laws to do this. It can happen in day-to-day life," he said, explaining, for example, that an employer might opt to hire a woman wearing a veil rather than one who did not.

Sources:

Vatican Radio

AsiaNews

News.va

Vatican Insider

Image: Worldcrunch

Known as the ‘Red Bishop' because of his support of the Liberal Party which uses a red flag, Bishop Santos hopes that the Pope will allow him to run as a candidate of a progressive faction of the Liberal Party, whose last president, Manuel Zelaya, was deposed in a 2009 coup.

The Bishop has been a supporter of those opposed to the government since the coup. This has made him at odds with Tegucigalpa Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga, who backed the coup.

However, not everyone supports his move.

"The decision of the bishop to get involved in politics after stepping down as bishop does damage to the church and damage to politics," said Jesuit Father Ismael Moreno, director of Radio Progreso, a station closely identified with the Honduran left.

"Politics here is historically closely linked to clericalism. So when a bishop or priest decides to participate in partisan politics, that doesn't help us move toward a political culture of citizenship," said Father Moreno.

"And it would damage the church because he's not a bishop of unity, rather, he has fostered confrontation. So it would divide Catholics even more than they're divided now, and not in the name of the struggle of the poor, but rather in the name of party politics. That would harm those in the church who are struggling to serve the community without being interested in achieving quotas of power. It would make a lot of the rest of us look like we're participating in social movements because we're interested in personal power," Father Moreno said.

Bishop Santos rejects the notion that church leaders should remain outside partisan politics.

"It's very convenient for the rich that the church remains outside of politics, because that way they can mistreat and steal from the poor without the church protesting. They're happy because no priest will complain. And if one does, they label him a communist," Bishop Santos said.

"Why do I get involved in politics? Because it is politics that has screwed the poor," the bishop said.

Full Article: National Catholic Reporter

Image: National Catholic Reporter

A rift between President Bingu wa Mutharika and the Catholic Church increased in August when Bishop Joseph Mkasa Zuza of Mzuzu in northern Malawi, gave a public speech in front of the president.

The pledge, written and supported by the Susan B. Anthony Fund, has been signed by other presidential hopefuls including Mitt Romney, Jon Huntsman and Hermain Cain.

The Susan B. Anthony Fund plans to raise US$14 million this election and will use it to promote anti-abortion candidates and legislation that will block funding for Planned Parenthood.

Perry also recently became the latest Republican presidential candidate to sign a pledge saying, if elected, he will defend marriage as a union between one man and one woman.

Perry joins Michele Bachmann, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum adding his name to the pledge written by the National Organisation for Marriage.

The Texas governor's decision to endorse the marriage pledge came weekes after he stirred controversy when he said New York's decision to legalise same-sex marriage was "their business" and "fine with me."

Perry later clarified his "fine with me" view to mean "it's fine with me that a state is using their sovereign rights to decide and issue. Obviously gay marriage is not fine with me. My stance hasn't changed."

Sources

• Catholic Online
• Christian Post
• Image: The Atlantic Wire