Redazione

Austria" "

“Sozialwort”, the official position of the Ecumenical Council of the Austrian Churches (Örkö) on the social services, was presented in Vienna on 27 November. Fourteen Churches have supported the project; they include the Anglican, Apostolic Armenian, Roman Catholic, Coptic Orthodox, Evangelic (of both Augsburg and Helvetic confessions), Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, Serbian Orthodox and Syro-Orthodox […]

“Abstinence and monogamy are the only weapons against Aids”: that is the line expressed, on behalf of the Dutch bishops, in their first pronouncement on the subject, by Cardinal Adrianus Simonis, president of the Dutch Bishops’ Conference and Bishop W.J. Eijk, delegate for questions of medical ethics, in an editorial published in the Dutch daily […]

“10-27.com” (from the verse of Luke’s Gospel) is the title of the project proposed by the Catholic Youth Service, by Caritas Social Action and Time for God to English young people aged from 18 to 27: it consists of being willing to dedicate 9 or 12 months of their own life to volunteer service in […]

European Churches" "

“The cultural secularization of our society affects not only those alien to any religious belief, but also the formally Catholic part of the population”. Although the latter “belong to the Church through baptism”, they “no longer grasp the meaning nor hear the call of the Gospel, thus aligning themselves with the principles of general conduct […]

towards WYD" "

Preparations are in full swing for the 20th World Youth Day (WYD) to be held in Cologne in 2005 (see also page 1). More particularly, the days of meeting and preparation in the German dioceses will take place from 11 to 15 August 2005, while the real culmination of WYD is planned from 16 to […]

IGC" "

The European summit of Foreign Ministers held in Naples last weekend resolved some of the still outstanding problems of the Intergovernmental Conference (IGC). But it still left open the thorny question of how to calculate the majority within the Council, in other words the weighting that each member state has in the EU when it […]

islam and christianism" "

Can Christians and Muslims pray together? The joint “Islam in Europe” Committee, including members of the Council of European Bishops’ Conferences (CEEC) and Conference of European Churches (CEC), has tried to give an answer to this question, proposing in a study paper a series of reflections on the difficulties and problems that common prayer gives […]

“Peace I leave with you” ( Jn 14:27). The next Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, planned from 18 to 24 January 2004, will be inspired by the theme of peace. In Italy the theme of the event was presented by a message signed by leaders of the Christian Churches: Msgr. Giuseppe Chiaretti for Catholics, […]

The joint assembly of the two Protestant Churches of Alsace and Lorraine (Church of the Augusburg Confession and Reformed Church) has formally pledged to seek union between them. Meeting in Colmar on 15 and 16 November, the assembly, by a large majority, gave a mandate to a joint Council to formulate, by 31 March 2004, […]

ECUMENISM" "

“Firm opposition” to the proposal to grant EU funds to research on human embryos, voted by the European Parliament on 19 November, was expressed by the Holy Synod of Greece on the eve of the Council of Ministers, which met in Brussels on 27 November to decide whether or not to ratify the proposal. “The […]