Pope Benedict XVI on May 11, 2010. / Credit: Mazur/www.thepapalvisit.org.uk Rome Newsroom, Dec 29, 2023 / 16:30 pm (CNA). One year after the death of Pope Benedict XVI, scholars, experts, and friends of the late pontiff will meet in Rome on Dec. 30–31 in the Benedict XVI Hall of the Campo Santo Teutonico at the Vatican to discuss his legacy.EWTN, the Fundatio Christiana Virtus Association, and the Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI Vatican Foundation have partnered to hold the conference, which will air on EWTN throughout the day on Dec. 31 beginning at 6:30 a.m. ET (see schedule below).Serving as moderators will be Father Vincent Twomey and Father Federico Lombardi, former director of the Holy See Press Office, who will discuss the topic “Benedict XVI, Memory and Legacy.”Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller and Matthew Bunson, EWTN vice president and editorial director, will later discuss “The Center of Benedict XVI’s Theology: Jesus Christ.”Discussion about “The Death of Benedict XVI in the Light of Eternal Life” will be led by Cardinal Kurt Koch and Father Ralph Weimann.On Dec. 31, Archbishop Georg Gänswein, who served as personal secretary to Pope Benedict XVI from 2005–2022, will preside over Mass at the Altar of the Chair in St. Peter’s Basilica to mark the first anniversary of the death of Benedict XVI.The conference will conclude with a final session in which Gänswein will offer reflections on the last years of Benedict XVI’s life and his legacy in the Benedict XVI Hall of the Campo Santo Teutonico. EWTN will broadcast the “Remembering Benedict XVI: Life, Teaching, Legacy” conference at the following times on Sunday, Dec. 31:6:30 a.m. ET: “Benedict XVI, Memory and Legacy”9:30 a.m. ET: “The Center of His Theology: Jesus Christ”Noon ET: “Holy Mass in Remembrance of Pope Benedict XVI”4 p.m. ET: “His Death in the Light of Eternal Life”6 p.m. ET: “His Last Years”

Pope Francis meets with Cardinal Raymond Burke on Dec. 29, 2023, at the Vatican. / Credit: Vatican Media CNA Staff, Dec 29, 2023 / 09:20 am (CNA). Pope Francis on Friday had an audience with Cardinal Raymond Burke, the Vatican said, several weeks after a flurry of reported controversy involving the pontiff and the 75-year-old U.S.-born prelate.A release from the Holy See Press Office briefly mentioned that the pope had met with Burke in an audience on Friday morning. No reason was given for the meeting, nor were details of the audience shared by the press office. The cardinal on Friday declined to comment on the meeting.The meeting comes weeks after reports that Pope Francis had stripped Burke of his Vatican housing and salary privileges, with the Holy Father allegedly claiming that Burke was a source of “disunity” in the Church and that he was using the privileges afforded to retired cardinals against the Church.Pope Francis meets with Cardinal Raymond Burke on Dec. 29, 2023, at the Vatican. Credit: Vatican MediaFrancis at the end of November reportedly confirmed that he was planning to take away the prelate’s apartment and salary. The Holy Father at that time allegedly denied that he referred to Burke as his “enemy.”Papal biographer Austen Ivereigh had written in late November that Pope Francis had told him the news concerning Burke wasn’t meant to be a public announcement but that it had been leaked to the press. Burke has been known for his periodic disputes with some of Francis’ decisions and directives. In 2021 the cardinal released a 19-point statement regarding Pope Francis’ motu proprio Traditionis Custodes in which Burke called the Holy See’s restrictions on the Traditional Latin Mass “severe and revolutionary” and questioned the pope’s authority to revoke use of the rite.Burke was also among the five cardinals who sent a list of dubia to the pope expressing concerns and seeking clarification on points of doctrine and discipline ahead of the October Synod on Synodality at the Vatican. The prelates had submitted a previous version of the dubia to Francis in July, but the pope responded in full answers rather than in the customary form of “yes” and “no” replies, which prompted the cardinals to submit a revised request for clarification. The responses “have not resolved the doubts we had raised, but have, if anything, deepened them,” they said at the time. Burke later stressed the dubia were not meant as an attack on Francis himself, stating that the queries were concerned “exclusively with the perennial doctrine and discipline of the Church, not a pope’s agenda.”

“Christ Carrying the Cross” by Titian (1490–1576). / Credit: Titian, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons Rome Newsroom, Dec 29, 2023 / 07:00 am (CNA). Attention Catholic artists: The Vatican has announced an art competition in which your paintings can be displayed inside of St. Peter’s Basilica along with the works of Renaissance masters Michelangelo and Gian Lorenzo Bernini.The contest winner will get to showcase an original set of paintings of the Stations of the Cross for a temporary exhibition in the basilica during Lent 2026 and a cash prize of 120,000 euros (about $131,000).The competition is free and open to artists from anywhere in the world. Artists are free to choose the style and technique but are required to paint the traditional 14 Stations of the Cross.How to enter?To enter, the Vatican asks that candidates fill out an online application form between Jan. 8 and Jan. 31, 2024.The form will require the submission of a PDF containing a selection of no more than 10 previous original works of art accompanied by brief captions and relevant technical information. Artists will also need to send in a brief curriculum vitae in English or Italian. The application form will be available on the official website of St. Peter’s Basilica starting on Jan. 8.Selected candidates will be notified if they have been accepted into the Vatican art competition by March 15, 2024.Artists will then be asked to submit a framed original sketch of the 12th Station, “Jesus Dies on the Cross” measuring 50x50cm, as well as a second sketch in a clip frame of another Station of the Cross freely chosen by the artist. The two sketches must be delivered to the Vatican either in person or by courier by July 15, 2024, to the following address:Fabric of St. Peter in the Vatican Largo della Sagrestia, s.n.c. 00120 Vatican CityThe submitted sketches will be presented in a private exhibition at the Vatican and judged by a board appointed by the “Fabric of St. Peter,” the office responsible for the conservation and maintenance of St. Peter’s Basilica. More details and the contest rules can be found here.The winner will be announced on Sept. 30, 2024, on the St. Peter’s Basilica website.After being awarded the commission, the winning artist will have more than a year to complete the 14 paintings (each on a 4-foot by 4-foot canvas) of the Stations of the Cross by Dec. 31, 2025.The winner’s paintings will be temporarily displayed in St. Peter’s Basilica for the liturgical season of Lent starting on Feb. 18, 2026.

Pope Benedict XVI. / Credit: Vatican Media CNA Staff, Dec 27, 2023 / 13:00 pm (CNA). The Vatican will publish the previously uncirculated “private” homilies of the late Pope Benedict XVI in the coming year, the Holy See has announced. The Vatican Publishing House said Dec. 23 that it intends to release “a book of some 130 homilies given by the late Pope Benedict XVI at private Sunday Masses,” according to Catholic News Service (CNS).The homilies comprise “30 given while [Benedict] was pope and more than 100 given to members of his household once he retired,” CNS reported.The homilies were reportedly transcribed by members of Memores Domini, a lay association that lived with Benedict, the news service said. Four female members of the organization worked in Benedict XVI’s papal household and also moved with him to the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery after his retirement.Neither the Vatican nor the Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI Vatican Foundation, who also announced the publication of the homilies last week, gave a date for when the writings would be fully published. The Vatican City newspaper L’Osservatore Romano and the German newspaper Die Welt published the first of the homilies earlier this month. That homily was a meditation on St. Joseph, according to CNS. In it, Pope Benedict observed that “the danger is that if the word of God is essentially law, it can be regarded as a sum of prescriptions and prohibitions, a package of norms, and the attitude, therefore, would be to observe the norms and thus be correct.”“But if religion is like that, if that is all it is, there is no personal relationship with God, and man remains within himself, seeks to perfect himself, to be perfect,” the late pope said, observing that it is difficult to love a God “who presents himself only with rules and sometimes even threats.”Christians, Benedict noted, face “the same temptation, the same danger that existed in the Old Testament: even a Christian can arrive at an attitude in which the Christian religion is regarded as a package of rules, of prohibitions and positive norms.”The late pope passed away on Dec. 31, 2022, having retired in 2013. He was the first pope to voluntarily resign since Celestine V in 1294. Last year, Ignatius Press published the book “The Divine Project: Reflections on Creation and Church,” which collected six lectures of Benedict XVI that had been recorded on audio cassettes but then misplaced for 30 years and forgotten. Benedict, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, delivered that series of lectures in 1985.

Pope Francis delivers his annual “urbi et orbi” address on Christmas from the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica on Dec. 25, 2023. / Credit: Vatican Media Vatican City, Dec 25, 2023 / 08:33 am (CNA). On the birthday of the Prince of Peace, Pope Francis called for an end to war in the Holy Land and throughout the world as well as the arms trade that fuels it. Delivering his annual “urbi et orbi” Christmas blessing while seated on the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica, the pope contrasted the “endless peace” that Christ brings with the work of the “prince of this world,” who “sows the seeds of death” and “plots against the Lord.” “So saying ‘yes’ to the Prince of Peace means saying ‘no’ to war, and this with courage: saying no to every war, to the very mindset of war, an aimless voyage, a defeat without victors, madness without excuses,” Pope Francis said to those gathered in the square at Roman noon on Dec. 25.Pope Francis delivers his annual “urbi et orbi” address on Christmas from the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica on Dec. 25, 2023. Credit: Vatican MediaInstead of war and conflict, the pope reflected on Isaiah’s prophecy about a day “when a nation shall not lift up sword against nation” but instead “beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks.” “With God’s help, let us make every effort to work for the coming of that day!” the pope said in his urbi et orbi address, which is given “to the city [of Rome] and the world” each year on Christmas, Easter, and other solemn occasions. Pope Francis said the coming of Christ gave mankind “the hope of being born for heaven” and lit “an undying flame” that is even still detectable “amid the deep shadows” of war covering the Holy Land today. “Rejoice, you who have abandoned all hope, for God offers you his outstretched hand,” the pope said. “He does not point a finger at you but offers you his little baby hand in order to set you free from your fears, to relieve you of your burdens, and to show you that, in his eyes, you are more valuable than anything else.”Pilgrims gather in St. Peter’s Square for Pope Francis’ annual “urbi et orbi” Christmas address and blessing on Dec. 25, 2023. Credit: Vatican MediaThe pope also frequently connected the events surrounding Christ’s birth with crises in the world today. For instance, he spoke of modern “massacres of the innocents,” including “in the mother’s womb, in the routes of the desperate in search of hope, in the lives of many children whose childhood is devastated by war.” “They are the little Jesuses today,” Francis said. The pope also spoke out forcefully against the arms trade — a frequent target of his criticism. Noting that the human heart is “weak and impulsive,” the pontiff said that “if we find instruments of death in our hands, sooner or later we will use them.” Pope Francis gives his annual “urbi

Pope Francis gives his Angelus address on Dec. 24, 2023. / Vatican Media CNA Staff, Dec 24, 2023 / 11:40 am (CNA). On Christmas Eve, Pope Francis urged Christians not to confuse Christmas with consumerism but to celebrate the birth of Christ by sharing with those who are lonely and in need.Speaking to the crowd in St. Peter’s Square from the window of the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace, the pope offered his greetings for a Christmas holiday full of “warmth, affection, and moderation.”“And allow me to make one recommendation: Do not confuse celebration with consumerism,” Pope Francis said on Dec. 24.“We can — and as Christians we must — celebrate in simplicity, without waste, and by sharing with those who lack necessities or lack companionship.”A crowd gathers in St. Peter's Square to pray the Angelus with the pope on Christmas Eve, Dec. 24, 2023. Vatican MediaThe pope said that we are called to reflect God’s kindness to others by “welcoming, protecting, and respecting others,” especially “those who are marginalized and who are far from the joy of Christmas these days.”“And so, on Christmas Eve, let us ask ourselves: ‘Do I desire to allow myself to be enveloped by the shadow of the Holy Spirit, by the gentleness and meekness of God, by the kindness of the God, making room for him in my heart, drawing near to his forgiveness, to the Eucharist?’”The pope also asked people to think of which lonely or needy people could be comforted by their friendship during the Christmas season.Pope Francis gives his Angelus address on Dec. 24, 2023. Vatican MediaPope Francis encouraged Christians to remember all who suffer from war, particularly in the Holy Land and Ukraine. “We also think of those who suffer from misery, from hunger, from slavery,” he added.He prayed for the Lord “ to infuse humanity into the hearts of men” in the midst of war.Pope Francis’ Angelus address in St. Peter’s Square marked the fourth Sunday of Advent, which falls on Christmas Eve this year. Catholics are asked to attend Mass twice between Dec. 23–25 this year for both Sunday and the solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord.The pope will preside over a Christmas Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica on Dec. 24 at 7:30 p.m. Rome time, which will be broadcast live on EWTN.

Pope Francis takes a figure of the Christ child in his arms at the end of the Vatican's Mass for the Nativity of the Lord on Dec. 24, 2023. / Vatican Media CNA Staff, Dec 24, 2023 / 16:31 pm (CNA). In his Christmas homily, Pope Francis shared a message for anyone who may be feeling discouraged with a reminder that the Lord was born to save the world and to give us a hope that is greater than all of our problems.“Dear brother, dear sister, to God who changed history … you are not a number but a face. Your name is written on his heart,” Pope Francis said on Dec. 24.“Leave behind the prison of your sorrows and embrace the tender love of the God who became a child. … Cast your cares on him and he will care for you (cf. Ps 55:22). He became flesh; he is not looking for your achievements, but for your open and trusting heart. In Him, you will rediscover who you truly are: a beloved son or daughter of God.”Pope Francis presided over Mass for the Nativity of the Lord in St. Peter’s Basilica on Christmas Eve.The Mass began with a cantor chanting the traditional Kalenda Proclamation of the Birth of Christ from the Roman Martyrology. Children from Mexico, India, South Korea, the Ivory Coast, and Italy then placed flowers before a figure of the Christ child enthroned in front of the altar.Children place flowers before a figure of the Christ child enthroned in front of the altar of St. Peter's Basilica. Vatican Media“Tonight, our hearts are in Bethlehem, where the Prince of Peace is once more rejected by the futile logic of war, by the clash of arms that even today prevents him from finding room in the world,” Pope Francis said, calling to mind the war in the Holy Land and the ongoing violence in the place of Jesus’ birth.The pope underlined that God “revolutionizes history by becoming a part of history.” The Lord “does not eliminate pain, but transforms it,” he said. “He does not remove problems from our lives, but grants us a hope that is greater than all our problems.”“God so greatly desires to embrace our lives that, infinite though he is, he becomes finite for our sake. In his greatness, he chooses to become small; in his righteousness, he submits to our injustice,” Pope Francis said in his homily.“Brothers and sisters, this is the wonder of Christmas: not a mixture of sappy emotions and worldly contentment, but the unprecedented tenderness of a God who saves the world by becoming incarnate.”The pope urged people to “rediscover worship” by learning from the Blessed Virgin Mary, Saint Joseph, the shepherds, and the Magi who “stood gazing upon Jesus with their hearts set on him.”In his homily, Pope Francis quoted a letter that J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of "The Lord of the Rings," wrote to his son in 1941: “‘I put before you the one great thing to love

Christmas Mass in St. Peter's Basilica on the night of Dec. 24, 2023. / Vatican Media Vatican City, Dec 24, 2023 / 18:00 pm (CNA). Below is the full text of Pope Francis’ homily for the Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord, delivered on Dec. 24, 2023, in St. Peter’s Basilica.“A census of the whole earth” (cf. Lk 2:1). This was the context in which Jesus was born, and the Gospel makes a point of it. The census might have been mentioned in passing, but instead is carefully noted. And in this way, a great contrast emerges. While the emperor numbers the world’s inhabitants, God enters it almost surreptitiously. While those who exercise power seek to take their place with the great ones of history, the King of history chooses the way of littleness. None of the powerful take notice of him: only a few shepherds, relegated to the margins of social life. The census speaks of something else. In the Scriptures, the taking of a census has negative associations. King David, tempted by large numbers and an unhealthy sense of self-sufficiency, sinned gravely by ordering a census of the people. He wanted to know how powerful he was. After some nine months, he knew how many men could wield a sword (cf. 2 Sam 24:1-9). The Lord was angered and the people suffered. On this night, however, Jesus, the “Son of David”, after nine months in Mary’s womb, is born in Bethlehem, the city of David. He does not impose punishment for the census, but humbly allows himself to be registered as one among many. Here we see, not a god of wrath and chastisement, but the God of mercy, who takes flesh and enters the world in weakness, heralded by the announcement: “on earth peace among those whom he favors” (Lk 2:14). Tonight, our hearts are in Bethlehem, where the Prince of Peace is once more rejected by the futile logic of war, by the clash of arms that even today prevents him from finding room in the world (cf. Lk 2:7). The census of the whole earth, in a word, manifests the all-too-human thread that runs through history: the quest for worldly power and might, fame and glory, which measures everything in terms of success, results, numbers and figures, a world obsessed with achievement. Yet the census also manifests the way of Jesus, who comes to seek us through enfleshment. He is not the god of accomplishment, but the God of Incarnation. He does not eliminate injustice from above by a show of power, but from below, by a show of love. He does not burst on the scene with limitless power, but descends to the narrow confines of our lives. He does not shun our frailties, but makes them his own. Christmas Mass in St. Peter's Basilica on the night of Dec. 24, 2023. Vatican MediaBrothers and sisters, tonight we might ask ourselves: Which God do we believe in? In the God of incarnation or

Papal almoner Cardinal Konrad Krajewski. / lvivadm via Wikimedia (CC BY 3.0). CNA Staff, Dec 22, 2023 / 12:32 pm (CNA). Pope Francis has sent Cardinal Konrad Krajewski to the Holy Land for Christmas as his personal representative to bring solidarity to people suffering amid the war.The Polish cardinal, who serves as the papal almoner, will spend Christmas in Jerusalem, where he will join the local Christian community in praying for peace.“The Holy Father really wanted me to be in the Holy Land to represent him, to pray, and be close to people who are suffering greatly,” Krajewski said in an interview with Vatican Radio.“So I will spend these days in prayer in this place, so dear to all Christians,” he said.The Vatican Dicastery for the Service of Charity announced Krajewski’s visit on Dec. 22 as a “concrete sign” of solidarity with all who “experience firsthand the consequences of war in this Christmas season.”“Pope Francis, grieving over the ‘third world war in pieces’ that afflicts the world, prays daily for peace, pleading aloud for an end to the conflicts that stain the earth with blood: in battered Ukraine, in Syria, in many countries in Africa and now in Israel and Palestine,” it said.The pope has asked the cardinal to pray for peace together with the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, and the entire local Catholic community as they “celebrate the birth of Jesus, the prince of peace and the only hope for the world.”Last year, Krajewski spent Christmas in Ukraine with refugees and volunteers in the town of Fastów at the pope’s request.Pope Francis has sent Krajewski to Ukraine six times since Russia invaded the country nearly two years ago. On one of Krajewski’s prior trips, the cardinal was shot at as he delivered humanitarian aid near the city of Zaporizhzhia. He has also prayed beside multiple mass graves in Ukraine, including on Good Friday in 2022.

Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller, Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo, and Bishop Robert Barron. / Credit: Alan Koppschall/EWTN; ACI Africa; Courtesy of DeChant-Hughes Public Relations Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Dec 21, 2023 / 16:51 pm (CNA). More Catholic bishops have publicly declared their opposition to the Vatican’s Fiducia Supplicans document, which permits nonliturgical blessings of homosexual couples, while others have come forward to express support for the new guidance.Some, including Cardinal Gerhard Müller and several bishops in Africa, have firmly denounced the Vatican’s document, which was published by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith and signed by Pope Francis, and have taken steps to either prohibit or discourage priests from imparting any blessings of homosexual couples.Others, like the German Bishops’ Conference and several Austrian bishops, have welcomed the document, while the Central Committee of German Catholics, an influential lay Catholic group supported by some German bishops, has since gone a step further and moved forward with proposals for formalized blessings of same-sex couples.Still others, including many U.S. bishops, have taken a middle approach, welcoming the document’s reaffirmation of Church teaching on marriage between one man and one woman but cautioning priests to avoid giving any impression of celebrating a so-called “gay wedding” or condoning homosexual behavior in any way.Who is opposing the document?  In addition to the bishops in Kazakhstan, Malawi, and Zambia, who said they would refuse to implement the Vatican declaration, a few more bishops have since condemned the new guidance.Cardinal Gerhard Müller, who previously led the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith from 2012 to 2017, published a lengthy response on Thursday in which he said that any priest blessing a homosexual union would be committing a “sacrilegious and blasphemous act against the Creator’s plan and against Christ’s death for us.”“Blessing a reality that is contrary to creation is not only impossible, it is blasphemy,” Müller said. “God cannot send his grace upon a relationship that is directly opposed to him and cannot be ordered toward him … if this blessing were given, its only effect would be to confuse the people who receive it or who attend it. They would think that God has blessed what he cannot bless. This ‘pastoral’ blessing would be neither pastoral nor a blessing. It is true that Cardinal Fernandez, in later statements to Infovaticana, said that it is not the union that is blessed, but the couple. However, this is emptying a word of its meaning, since what defines a couple as couple is precisely their being a union.”“According to the criterion of this type of blessings,” Müller said, “one could even bless an abortion clinic or a Mafia group.”Müller also said that allowing the blessing of same-sex couples directly contradicts earlier guidance published by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith in 2021 and is entirely unprecedented and not based on any Church doctrine, biblical teaching, or any writings by Church Fathers or doctors of the Church.Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo, president of the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM), sent a letter to all