VATICAN CITY (RNS) In a sign of how much change Pope Francis may usher into the papacy, the spiritual leader of Eastern Orthodoxy will attend Tuesday’s installation Mass — for the first time in more than 1,000 years.
ROME (RNS) “With each conclave, fewer and fewer people will even remember when there was an Italian pope,” says La Stampa’s Giacomo Galeazzi.
(RNS) The last Pope Benedict to resign, Benedict IX, was an infamous rake who sold the papacy. But like his 21st-century namesake, Benedict IX forces Catholics to mind the gap between the mortal man and the sacred papal office.
(RNS) Pope Benedict XVI never inspired the deep admiration enjoyed by his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, but Americans – and Catholic Americans even more so – still look favorably upon the soon-to-be-former head of the Roman Catholic Church.
A new analysis of Catholic population shifts raises questions about the upcoming papal election.
(RNS) Not all Catholics appreciated Pope Benedict XVI’s staunch defense of Christian orthodoxy, traditional marriage and life from conception to natural death. But American evangelicals sure did.
VATICAN CITY (RNS) Pope Benedict XVI will soon become the first pope to resign since 1415, short-circuiting many of the initial stages of electing a new pope. But the Vatican says the transition to a new papacy shouldn’t be all that different from normal.
