- Written by: Jean Riordan
The Lineamenta - or preparatory document - for the 2014 extraordinary general session of the Synod of Bishops on the family gives more information on the Vatican meeting that will examine the "Pastoral Challenges to the Family in the Context Of Evangelization".
Questions to consider before answering the online survey- Written by: Jean Riordan
Thank you to everyone who attended and sent apologies for the conference. A conference report and photos to follow. A special thanks to those who travelled from Scotland to be with us.
- Written by: Eugenio Scalfari
INTERVIEW WITH POPE FRANCIS
BY THE FOUNDER OF ITALIAN DAILY "LA REPUBBLICA"
by L'Osservatore Romano, Weekly ed. in English, n. 41, 9 October 201
The light we bear in our souls
Interview with Pope Francis as it appeared in ‘La Repubblica’ on 1 October.
By Eugenio Scalfari
Pope Francis said to me: “The most serious evils currently afflicting the world are unemployment among the young and the solitude in which the elderly are left. The elderly need care and companionship; the young need work and hope. However, they have neither the one nor the other, and the trouble is that they are no longer seeking for them. They have been crushed by the present. Tell me: can one live crushed by the present? Without any memory of the past or any desire to look to the future by building a project, a future, a family? Is it possible to continue in this way? This, in my opinion, is the most urgent problem facing the Church”.
- Written by: Hans Kung
The Catholic Church has been nearly destroyed by its resistance to change, censured for its abuses. Pope Francis has promised reform: radical theologian Hans Küng here presents what Catholics have long been yearning for: modern responses to the challenges of a modern world.
In 1962 the Second Vatican Council met in the hope they could, in the words of Pope John XXIII, ‘open the windows of the Church and let some fresh air in.’ Hans Küng and Joseph Ratzinger, the future pope, were both there.
In Can We Save the Catholic Church? Kung relates how after fifty years the Church has only grown more conservative. Refusing to open dialogue on celibacy for priests; the role of women in the priesthood; homosexuality; or the use of contraception even to prevent AIDS, the Papacy has lost touch. Now, amid widespread disillusion over child abuse, the future of Catholicism is in crisis.
Pope Francis seems sincere in his wish for a more compassionate Church. The time is ripe for reform, and here Küng calls for a complete renewal of the Church. As grassroots support grows Can We Save the Catholic Church? makes an inspiring and compelling case for offering a new Catholicism to the modern world.
- Written by: Antonio Spadaro, S.J
A Big Heart Open to God 
A Big Heart Open to God
http://www.americamagazine.org/pope-interview
The exclusive interview with Pope Francis