Christians are called to help world find peace, reconciliation, Pope says
Pope Leo XIV, in a message read at the 100th anniversary of the Universal Christian Conference on Life and Work in Stockholm, urged Christians to pursue visible unity through dialogue, shared worship, and collective witness to human suffering. He emphasized that peace is both a divine gift and a Christian duty, calling believers to be “artisans of reconciliation” in a fractured world marked by conflict and spiritual disconnection. Though the Catholic Church was absent from the original 1925 gathering, the pope affirmed its current commitment to ecumenism, rooted in the Second Vatican Council’s Unitatis Redintegratio. He highlighted the enduring significance of the Council of Nicaea (325 AD), which unified Christians through a shared Creed affirming Christ’s divinity, serving as a model for overcoming division through common faith. CNS (edited).
Pope Leo XIV Calls Christians to Prophetic Action amid Global Injustice
In a message to the 2025 Meeting at Rimini, Pope Leo XIV urged Christians to be prophetic voices in a world where governments often fail to uphold peace, justice, and development. He emphasized the need to reach out, embrace novelty, and build a new from the suffering and cries of history’s victims, migrants, refugees, and creation itself. Held August 22-27 in Rimini, Italy, the event organized by the Communion and Liberation Movement-drew inspiration from T.S. Eliot’s The Rock: “In the vacant places we will build with new bricks.” The theme reflects a desire to create spaces of truth, goodness, and justice amid historical turmoil. A key exhibit honors Bishop Pierre Claverie and 18 others, including the Trappist monks of Tibhirine, martyred during Algeria’s
civil conflict (1993-1996). Cardinal Pietro Parolin, writing on behalf of the Pope, praised their witness as a model of deep communion and peaceful coexistence across religious and cultural divides.-CNS (edited).
How a Simple Request Sparked a Literary Masterpiece
St. Paulinus, former governor of Campania, left his Roman privileges for a life of prayer with his wife Therasia. In his spiritual journey, he corresponded with bishops like St. Jerome and St. Augustine. Hoping to learn more about St. Alypius, Paulinus asked him for a personal biography. Alypius, too humble to write about himself, passed the request to Augustine. Augustine responded with a heartfelt letter that not only described Alypius but also wove in his own spiritual journey. This resulted in Augustine’s Confessions one of the earliest and most influential autobiographies in Western history. What began as a modest inquiry became a cornerstone of Christian literature, thanks to Paulinus’ curiosity and Augustine’s eloquence. Aleteia (edited)
St. John Henry Newman to be declared a doctor of the Church
On July 31, 2025, the Holy Father Leo XIV confirmed the affirmative opinion of the Plenary Session of Cardinals and Bishops, Members of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints, regarding the title of Doctor of the Universal Church that will soon be conferred on Saint John Henry Newman, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, Founder of the Oratory of Saint Philip Neri in England. Declared venerable in 1991, beatified in 2010, and canonized in 2019, Newman will become the 38th doctor of the Church. Newman’s works on theology (An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent) and liberal education (The Idea of a University) have long been viewed as masterpieces, as have his autobiographical Apologia Pro Vita Sua and his “Dream of Gerontius,” later set to music by Sir Edward Elgar. Newman’s sermons, both before and after his 1845 conversion from Anglicanism to Catholicism, have also been treasured as models of eloquence. Pope Leo XIII created Newman a cardinal early in his pontificate, in 1879, a year after the papal election, much as Pope Leo XIV is declaring Newman a doctor of the Church early in his own pontificate.
Catholic Culture
Seventh century Christian cross found on UAE Island
Archaeologists in the UAE have uncovered a plaster cross in a 7th-century Christian monastery on Sir Bani Yas Island, located 110 miles southwest of Abu Dhabi, offering new insight into early Christianity in the Persian Gulf. The stucco artifact, found during fresh excavations of monastic dwellings, confirms the site’s ties to the Church of the East, which once spanned the Gulf and Mesopotamia. The monastery, active in the 7th and 8th centuries, housed monks devoted to solitude and prayer. Maria Magdalena Gajewska, an archaeologist with Abu Dhabi’s Department of Culture and Tourism, said: “We now have proof that the houses surrounding the church were indeed part of a Christian settlement, inhabited by monks devoted to prayer and spiritual discipline.” This discovery affirms the region’s history of religious coexistence and aligns with the UAE’s modern efforts to promote interfaith harmony, including Pope Francis’s 2019 visit where he signed the Document on Human Fraternity with Sheikh Ahmed el-Tayeb, the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar a landmark gesture of friendship between Christians and Muslims. For Catholics, finds like this are a reminder of the Church’s deep roots in the Middle East, a region often associated only with Islam and Judaism. The cross stands as a quiet testament to spiritual lives once lived in the Gulf’s remote corners. Sir Bani Yas monastery once formed part of a wider network of Christian sites that stretched across modern-day Kuwait, Iran, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia. For centuries, Christian
communities in the Gulf thrived alongside other faiths, engaged in trade, and preserved distinctive traditions of worship. Aleteia (edited).
A new Missal in the Assam language
A Missal for celebrating the liturgy in Assamese, the language spoken by millions of people in Northeast India is the sign of hope presented this Jubilee Year by Msgr. Albert Hemrom, Bishop of the diocese of Dibrugarh in the state of Assam. It was presented at the annual Regional Pastoral Conference of Northeast India, in Guwahati on the theme “Pilgrims of Hope.” The initiative, aims to address the need to use the local language in liturgies, a fundamental step in the process of inculturating the faith, in order to effectively reach the faithful. The Assamese Missal, initially prepared by a group of priests, has been carefully revised and refined in collaboration with several professors of this local language, under the guidance of Fr. Timothy Saldanha. To promote its use, Bishop Hemrom has introduced a twice-monthly liturgical celebration in which he personally uses it. He has also encouraged all priests working in Assam to adopt this initiative and integrate the Missal into their liturgical practice. During the presentation event, Bishop Hemrom invited Archbishop John Moolachira, president of the local Bishops’ Conference, to present the first copy of the Missal in Assamese to his predecessor, Msgr. Thomas Menamparampil, who served as bishop of Dibrugarh before becoming Archbishop of Guwahati. Assamese is the official language of Assam, but also serves as a lingua franca in other parts of northeastern India. It is the native language of approximately 15 million people, but another 8.3 million use it as a secondary language. It has its own alphabet and its roots are ancient: linguists believe it was spoken as early as the 7th century AD. Last year, the Union government in New Delhi recognized it as a classical Indian language, by virtue of its antiquity and literary traditions.