2021

A statue of the Virgin Mary that had been desecrated by the Islamic State was present at Pope Francis’ Mass in Erbil on Sunday.

Full transcript of Pope Francis’ in-flight press conference from Baghdad, Iraq, to Rome, Italy on 8 March 2021.

On his flight to Rome from Baghdad today, Pope Francis said that Iraq’s top Shiite cleric is a “humble and wise man,” and their 6 March meeting had a “universal message” about the importance of fraternity.

Pope Francis returns a historic prayer manuscript to Immaculate Conception Church in Bakhdida, Iraq, March 7, 2021. Credit: Vatican Media. During his trip to Iraq, …

Pope Francis met yesterday with a father who lost his wife and two children in a shipwreck as Syrian war refugees.

Abdullah Kurdi was one of the thousands of people in the crowd at the pope’s stadium Mass in Erbil, Iraq yesterday.

A tattoo artist has restored the Stations of the Cross at a church in Belarus at the invitation of the local pastor. 

Julia Kulba — known in the tattoo business as Pipetka — applied her skills to the 14 bas-relief Stations of Cross at the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Adamovichi, a village in the northwestern Grodno Region.

Pope Francis, celebrating an open-air Mass at the Franso Hariri football stadium in Erbil, heralded the Church in Iraq for proclaiming the wisdom of the Cross by “spreading Christ’s mercy and forgiveness.”

Standing in the newly-reconstructed Church of the Immaculate Conception, the largest Christian Church in Iraq, Pope Francis praised the people of Qaraqosh who suffered so much under the tyranny of the so-called Islamic State.

On Sunday morning, the last full day of his historic visit to Iraq, Pope Francis arrived at the Hosh al-Bieaa centre in Mosul where he prayed, amidst the ruins and along with the people of Iraq, for all the victims of war in the country and throughout the entirety of the Middle East.

Iraq’s Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi has announced that 6 March will become a ‘National Day of Tolerance and Coexistence’ in Iraq. The announcement came after the historic encounter in Najaf between Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani and Pope Francis and the interreligious meeting in the ancient city of Ur later that day.

The first celebration of Holy Mass of Pope Francis’s historic visit to Iraq focused on the need to live a life shaped by the Beatitudes – the eight teachings of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount that fulfil God’s promise to Abraham and his descendants.

Pope Francis met with leaders and representatives of religions at Ur, the ancient Iraqi city believed to be the birthplace of the prophet Abraham.

Cardinal Nichols and Maulana Syed Ali Raza Rizvi explain the importance of the Pope’s meeting with the leader of the Shia community in Najaf, Iraq

Statement by the Director of the Holy See’s Press Office regarding the visit of Pope Francis to Grand Ayatollah Al-Sistani in Najaf

On Saturday morning, 6 March 2021, in Najaf, the Holy Father met Grand Ayatollah Sayyid Ali al-Husayni al-Sistani.

Pope Francis, speaking in the Syro-Catholic Cathedral of Our Lady of Salvation in Baghdad where 48 worshippers were killed in a terrorist attack in 2010, acknowledged that daily hardship is a reality for Iraq’s Christians.

Pope Francis has arrived in Baghdad to start an historic four-day visit to Iraq – the first of any Pope to the country.

On Easter Monday, the Catholic Church celebrates what’s called “Monday of the Angel.” In many countries in Europe and South America, this day, also known as “Little Easter,” is a national holiday.

For the second time, the Shroud of Turin will be exposed for veneration on social media and websites on Holy Saturday, the archbishop of Turin has announced.

Cardinal Mario Grech told Irish bishops that embarking on a “synodal process” could lead to an “ecclesial springtime.”