The Bishops who lead the Bishops’ Conference’s work on the Holy Land have condemned Israel’s move to expand settlements into the E1 neighbourhood of Ma’ale Adumim. The project seeks to link settlements and separate the West Bank from East Jerusalem, effectively killing off any hope of a contiguous Palestinian State. Bishop Nicholas Hudson, Chair of the Department for International Affairs, and Bishop Jim Curry, Lead Bishop for the Holy Land, in line with the position of the Holy See, assert that a Two-State Solution is the only viable option to bring security and peace to Israelis and Palestinians. Read more.
At the end of August, as a key contribution to the Jubilee Year in the Catholic Church, a national walking pilgrimage will take place that will trace an enormous sign of the Cross that spans England and Wales. The ‘Pilgrimage of Hope’ offers four main routes, or ‘Ways’ – north, south, east and west – that converge in Nottingham at the city’s Cathedral of St Barnabas on Saturday, 13 September 2025. Read more.
Listen to Dr Phil McCarthy, project lead for the ‘Hearts in Search of God’ initiative, talk about the national pilgrimage.
The ‘World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation’, celebrated on 1 September, is the official start of the ‘Season of Creation’, a time of sustained prayer and action which lasts a month and four days. During this season we are encouraged to pray and engage in community events in order to deepen our relationship with God, our neighbour and the earth we share, being ever more attentive to the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor. This year also marks the ten-year anniversary of Pope Francis’s encyclical on care for creation, Laudato Si. Read more.
On the feast day of Edith Stein, St Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster and President of the Bishops’ Conference, has expressed his sorrow and condemnation after Israel’s security cabinet approved a plan to take control of Gaza City. “There must be a better way,” he said. “One that does not heap yet further suffering and misery on so many people who are not combatants but defenceless in face of the perpetrators of violence in their midst. Already too much innocent blood has been shed; too many lives destroyed; too much hunger and starvation. This war must be ended not increased.” Read more.
Pope Leo XIV will officially declare Saint John Henry Newman, the most recently canonised saint from England and Wales, the 38th Doctor of the Church. Read more.
We have a useful section of articles explaining exactly what a ‘Doctor of the Church’ is and why Saint John Henry Newman’s teaching and wisdom not only resonated with his contemporaries, but still illuminates, instructs and inspires us today. Articles available:
What is a Doctor of the Church?, Faith, Reason, Conscience and Truth, Development of Doctrine, Sensus fidelium: Newman and the people of God, Education: Moral and intellectual ‘under one roof’, Scripture, the Fathers and Ecumenism, and Newman and Ecclesiology.
Pope Leo XIV highlights how migrants and refugees in a special way can become witnesses of hope and tenacity amidst adversity and calls for a future of peace and respect for human dignity, in his Message for the 111th World Day of Migrants and Refugees, released on Friday, 25 July. Read more.
The Department for Social Justice of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales has published a document on taxation called Render Unto Caesar. It offers perspectives on taxation from Catholic social thought and teaching. Read more.
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