Ad Maoirem De Gloriam

Pope Francis issued a message of thanks on Sunday during his Regina Coeli address, following the canonization Mass of Saints John XXIII and John Paul II. The Pope thanked all of the pilgrims and the official delegates who traveled to Rome for the occasion. He also thanked the Italian authorities for their generous work and collaboration in preparing for this event. He greeted the pilgrims from the home dioceses of the new saints—Bergamo and Krakow—exhorting them to “honour the memory of these two holy Popes by following their teachings faithfully”. He also issued a special greeting “for the sick and the aged, to whom the new saints were particularly close.” Read the full text of the Pope’s address below : Dear brothers and sisters, Before concluding this celebration of faith, I wish to greet and thank all of you! I thank my brother cardinals and the many bishops and priests from every part of the world. My appreciation goes to the official delegations from many countrie...

John Paul II was ever obedient “to the Gospel of Jesus, and for this, he was loved”. Cardinal Angelo Comastri, Archpriest of the Vatican Basilica, emotionally recalled this, on Monday morning, 28 April, at the Mass of Thanksgiving for the Canonization. Thousands of faithful, many from Poland, filled St Peter's Square for the Mass at which the Cardinal. In his homily the Archpriest recalled the great moments of the Pontificate of Karol Wojtyła.  He began by pointing out various teachings which came out of John Paul II's holiness, especially his courage “to speak openly of faith in Jesus in an age of 'silent apostasy from the satisfied man who lives like God does not exist'”. Cardinal Comastri also spoke of his boldness “in defending the family which is God's plan, written clearly in the book of life”. The Mass of Thanksgiving for the Canonization of John XXIII was celebrated in the Church of Santi Ambrogio e Carlo al Corso, where Angelo Giuseppe Ronca...

Blessed John Paul II was the first Roman Pontiff ever to allow the world to scrutinise him so closely in his physical failings. Perhaps the key to this lack of fear in the face of suffering lay in his great faith. Already in New Zealand back in 1986 he gave us a clue of this firmness in faith while meeting with some of the frailer members of society when he said : " It was the suffering and death of Christ which displayed the works of God most eloquently ". Five years before he pronounced these words this Polish Pope, once an energetic sportsman brimming with health, had suddenly closed ranks with these frailer members of society. It's a well- known story, one sprung on us, on a sunny and relaxed Spring afternoon in May 1981. The Pope stands Samson like and agile in his white cassock on a white jeep, in a crowded Saint Peter's Square, athletically reaching out to make physical contact with as many pilgrims as possible, when out of the blue gun shots...

Vatican City, 26 April 2014 (VIS) – Karol Jozef Wojtyla, known as John Paul II since his October 1978 election to the papacy, was born in the Polish town of Wadowice, a small city fifty kilometres from Krakow, on 18 May 1920. He was the youngest of three children born to Karol Wojtyla and Emilia Kaczorowska. His mother died in 1929. His eldest brother Edmund, a doctor, died in 1932 and his father, a non-commissioned army officer died in 1941. A sister, Olga, had died before he was born. He was baptised on June 20, 1920 in the parish church of Wadowice by Fr. Franciszek Zak, made his First Holy Communion at age 9 and was confirmed at 18. Upon graduation from Marcin Wadowita high school in Wadowice, he enrolled in Krakow's Jagiellonian University in 1938 and in a school for drama. The Nazi occupation forces closed the university in 1939 and young Karol had to work in a quarry (1940-1944) and then in the Solvay chemical factory to earn his livi...

ROME, ITALY, January 10 (CNA) .- The much criticized 12-foot bronze sculpture of Blessed John Paul II that stands outside of Rome's main train station will be revamped. "I made a design for the sculpture that wasn't executed well in the foundry," explained the creator of the artwork, Italian sculptor Oliviero Rainaldi. "It is not that we have come up with a new statue," he told CNA on Jan. 10. "We're correcting those details that weren't executed well" so that "it will be more faithful to my original idea." The redesign will involve replacing the head, modifying the Pope's cape and touching up the outer coating of paint, since the bronze has oxidized to a light shade of green. The statue will also be raised 15 inches on a new platform, and its lighting will be improved. When the statue was first unveiled last May, the Vatican's newspaper L'Osservatore Romano criticized it for bearing "little resemb...