Rome and the world: Pope Francis will defend the confessional seal

Il Messaggero, Italian 

"The seal of the sacrament of confession is sacred and inviolable. It will remain firm and inalienable: I am ready to put my full magisterial authority into defending it." Franca Giansoldati, Vatican correspondent of the Italian newspaper Il Messaggero, refers these words of the Pope, during the last meeting of the heads of dicasteries of the Vatican.

A very delicate topic that this time pits the Holy See and France against each other, although France is only the latest country in which a popular movement in favor of erasing the confessional seal has surfaced.

Le Monde, French

Some representatives of victims' associations are urging Emmanuel Macron to put this subject on the table during his meeting with the pontiff on November 26 in Rome.

"If we wait, the Pope will do nothing", fears François Devaux, co-founder of the now dissolved association La Parole Libérée, whose action largely contributed to the creation of the Independent Commission on Sexual Abuse in the Church (or Ciase, or Sauvé Commission). The twenty-two members of the Sauvé Commission will meet, for their part, the head of the Catholic Church, on December 9, in Rome.

Cruxnow.com, English

According to Bishop Daniel Flores of Brownsville, Texas, the Catholic Church shouldn’t “shouldn’t be captive to one party or another.”

Flores, who was recently elected to lead the doctrine committee of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, emphasizes: “The church has to have an independent voice to say we agree when we can agree, and when we can’t agree we’re going to say something. And that’s the way it works. I mean, the church is free to speak, and we shouldn’t be captive to one party or another”.

Fides, English

"Perpetuating the sanctions against Syria means condemning many people to death". Bishop Georges Abou Khazen, Apostolic Vicar of Aleppo for Catholics of the Latin rite, chooses clear and unequivocal words in describing the effects that the sanctions imposed by Western countries against the Bashar al Assad regime have on the daily lives of millions of Syrians. 

In recent days, the United States and the European Union have confirmed and extended the sanctions as a pressure method against Syria's current political leadership.  "The situation", according to the bishop, "is all the more unbearable when one has the impression that the badly hidden aim of the sanctions is precisely to increase the suffering of the population".

Reuters, English 

A Nicaraguan presidential decree affecting the papal nuncio in the Central American country appears to be retaliation for comments made by the local Church leadership criticizing the government's slide away from democracy, diplomats said.

President Daniel Ortega's decree last week stripped the Vatican's nuncio in Managua, Archbishop Waldemar Stanislaw Sommertag, of his title and role as dean of the diplomatic corps, reports Reuters Vatican correspondent Philip Pullella. 

Emirates News Agency, English

General Sheikh Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan,  United Arab Emirates's Minister of Interior and Deputy Prime Minister, has visited the Bambino Gesù Children's Hospital of the Vatican, on November 20th.

Sheikh Saif toured the hospital's departments, which is a vital center for treating children across the world. He was briefed on the hospital's initiatives and health projects.