portugal

Fatima: 90th anniversary of the apparitions and the meeting of Churches

Ceremonies marking the “October commemoration” ended at Fatima on 13 October, as part of the year of celebrations for the 90th anniversary of the apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Presided over by the new bishop of Leiria-Fatima, the Right Rev. Antonio Marto, this year’s ceremonies were attended by thousands of pilgrims. “I don’t condemn […]

di Redazione

england

Burnt-out youth?

High levels of alcoholism and violence, unwanted pregnancies as a result of widespread sexual freedom, huge debts accumulated already during the years at university: judging from the statistics, youth in England and Wales seems really in crisis. But that is not the picture painted of youth today by Helen Bardy, director of Catholic Youth Services, […]

di Redazione

Switzerland: bishops for Peoples’ Day

Peoples’ Day will be celebrated in all the Catholic parishes of Switzerland on 12 November. To mark the occasion the bishops have issued an appeal against fear of immigrants and repeated their disappointment about the result of the referendum of 24 September that approved the laws on asylum and on foreigners. News of the appeal […]

di Redazione

England: stop to the arms trade

Three Catholics Bishops, Terence Brain of Salford, Thomas McMahon of Brentwood and Patrick O’ Donoghue of Lancaster, and 27 Christian leaders have asked for the closing down of DESO, the agency of the British government that exports weapons throughout the world. The campaign of boycotting the DESO is being promoted by the Christian Churches, pacifist […]

di Redazione

Scotland: Catholics discriminated against

A worrying increase of attacks against Scottish Catholics has prompted Cardinal Keith O’Brien to write to the senior Scottish law officer, the Lord Advocate, Colin Boyd, asking him for measures to curb the abuses. According to statistics recently published by the Scottish government, a Catholic is six times more likely to suffer violence than a […]

di Redazione

Hungary: life and prayer of 800 Catholic roma

Some 800 Hungarian Catholic roma (gipsies) recently took part in a meeting with the title “Prayer in our life” organized by the Office for Migrants of the Hungarian Bishops’ Conference and held at the St. Stephen’s University at Gödöllo, in central Hungary. The meeting was opened with a liturgy officiated by Monsignor Szilárd Keresztes, Greek-Catholic […]

di Redazione

front page

The face turned to the world

The history of Portugal is “a European history” that deserves to be better known, also for the perspectives it offers. It is well known that as a result of the authoritarian regime to which the country was subjected till 1974, Portugal was sidelined from the construction of the European Community. Once the regime had fallen, […]

di Pedro Vaz Patto Portugal

Aids: Europeans still negligent

Disinformation, lowering of the guard, Eastern European youth at risk: these are the findings that emerge from a recent survey conducted by Eurobarometer on Aids/HIV, on the level of awareness of its risk among the EU population and how they behave in relation to the epidemic. The risks are there, in spite of the good […]

di Redazione

Less bureaucracy, more agriculture

“A simpler CAP, a challenge for everyone”: that was the theme of a pan-European conference recently held in Brussels by the General Directorate of Agriculture of the Commission and dedicated to the simplification of the Common Agricultural Policy. During the conference the delegates discussed an action plan of twenty proposals to reform and “simplify the […]

di Redazione

Solidarity for Darfur

During an official visit to the troubled Sudanese region of Darfur, the President of the European Commission José Manuel Barroso and the Commissioner for Development Louis Michel announced the allocation of a supplementary package of 40 million euros for emergency food aid in the bid to prevent the death by famine of hundreds of thousands […]

di Redazione