Catholic Church

By Paul Smeaton, LifeSiteNews - Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican Secretary of State, has informed Catholic media that he is responsible for arranging both a 50 million Euro loan to help the Vatican purchase a scandal-ridden Italian hospital and for requesting a subsequent $25 million grant from a US-based Catholic foundation in order to cover that loan. He made no reference, however, to evidence that the request for the $25 million grant was originally linked to a request coming from Pope Francis.

By Dr. Jeff Mirus, Catholic Culture - Sede vacantism is the theory that the See of Peter is vacant, and that this explains current problems in the papacy and the Church. The attraction of the theory is that it relieves us of the burden of obedience to the alleged pope, who (according to the theory) is not really a pope at all… I thought I had treated this thoroughly in the past, but when I looked back, I found I had only touched the surface of the problem in my 2013 essay, Sede Vacantism: A Conspiracy to Waste Your Time. Since the theory has cropped up again in certain circles—for the fifth time in my lifetime alone!—perhaps I should apply the coup de grace.

By Dr. Kevin Vost, Catholic Exchange - All sins remove our gaze from God and place it on ourselves in one way or another… Through lust we fixate on people’s bodies and remain blind to the souls within them, made in the image and likeness of God… Through gluttony we live to eat, rather than eating to live. Through greed we obsess about obtaining worldly things. Through anger we lash out at those who keep us from our sensuous and worldly goals. Through envy we are saddened by the thought that others may have more things or more fun than we do. Through pride we most directly and deliberately shift our goal from serving God to serving ourselves, doing everything our way.