The 29th Kirchentag, the major annual meeting of the German Protestant Churches, was recently held in Frankfurt. We publish a report on the event and the impressions of some of its participants The fourth time for Frankfurt, the first for a German Chancellor since 1987. 100,000 participants, but many last-minute guests swelled the ranks. 2500 […]

The 29th “Day of the German Protestant Church”, which was characterized by many aspirations and appeals for Christian unity, ended with the desire for the deeper communion in the field of ecumenism that theology and liturgy still do not permit. In this regard, Helga Trösken, Protestant pastor, called it “scandalous” that “the deepest schism” should […]

“ Communicating the Gospel in a changing world”: that is the title of the Pastoral Guidelines of the Italian episcopate for the first decade of the new millennium…”. “taking a realistic look at the context in which we are called to offer our witness”: that is how Card. Camillo Ruini, President of the Italian Episcopal […]

Speaking recently in Berlin, the representative of the Catholic aid organization Misereor, Josef Sayer, criticised the policy of support for the developing countries implemented by the German Federal government. “Chancellor Schroeder, together with other heads of government, had openly committed himself last September to halving the number of poor people in the world by 2015”, […]

An “alarming drop” in the number of baptisms, confirmations, and marriages is registered in Croatia, according to the data of the statistical office of the Croatian Episcopal Conference, referring to the year 2000 and published in recent days by the Croatian Catholic news agency Ika. There are 3,837,785 Catholics, or 73% of the population. But […]

After the two draft laws on euthanasia and palliative treatment were approved by the Commissions for social affairs and justice of the Belgian Senate on 20 March, the secretary of the Belgian Bishops’ Conference, Etienne Quintiens, reviewed the situation during the meeting of the secretaries of the European Episcopal Conferences held in Prague from 21 […]

The European Council held in Göteborg on 15 and 16 June, which marked the end of Sweden’s sixth-month presidency of the EU, was the occasion for defining the future strategies and commitments of the EU, also beyond 2001. Future of Europe and it enlargement: the Fifteen, noting with satisfaction the many positive initiatives connected with […]

The European Parliament is due to meet in Strasbourg in plenary session from 2 to 5 July. Apart from the presentation of the programme of work by the Belgian Presidency (cf. the previous report), the agenda will include, among other things, the annual report of the President of the European Central Bank, Wim Duisenberg. Of […]

The Council of Ministers of employment and social affairs chaired by the Swedish Mona Sahlin reported – in the course of June – a series of important political agreements between members relating to three draft directives: respectively, equality of treatment between men and women (including sexual harassment) in matters of employment; exposure to noise on […]

Guy Verhofstadt, head of the Belgian government and next rotating President of the European Council, has released details about the composition of the team of consultants commissioned by the federal government of Belgium to contribute to the preparation of the “Laeken Declaration” on the future of the EU, the text that will serve as the […]