History Archives

Haunted by its history, Berlin debates restoring kaiser’s gilded cross
- Global Church, Religion News Service
- June 11, 2017
Catholic Archbishop Heiner Koch said the cross was “the sign of the good news of the Christian faith for all people” and should not become a political football. “By putting the cross on the cupola, its builders showed they had a special responsibility to be rulers accountable to God,” he said. “Even today, recalling this attitude would mean a lot for Berlin.”
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In a changing city, look back at the Irish archbishops who built the Church in New York
- Church in the US, Interviews
- March 17, 2017
Ireland has played an important role in the life of the Catholic Church in America, and nowhere is this more apparent than in New York City, where every archbishop has been of Irish heritage. A new book – ‘Sons of St. Patrick: A History of the Archbishops of New York from Dagger John to Timmytown’ – looks at this history.
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For the ex-slave who blessed Denver, a path to sainthood opens
- Catholic News Agency, Church in the US
- December 19, 2016
Archbishop Samuel J. Aquila of Denver opened a cause for the canonization of Julia Greeley during an early morning Sunday Mass at the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception. Greeley was born into slavery in Hannibal, Missouri where her life of devotion and service continues to inspire.
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Maybe Nero didn’t persecute Christians after all

December 18, 2016

Although a persecution of Christians under Nero after a fire in Rome is part of the Christian imagination, one scholar says the evidence is thin both for the persecution and even for the possibility that Romans could so early have recognized Christians judicially or religiously.

Olympics have deep religious and spiritual roots

The Olympics — both the long-gone ancient version and the modern version unspooling this month — have deep religious and spiritual roots, which, some scholars say, are in jeopardy as every host city tries to go bigger, better and more memorable than the last.

Is Catholicism being scrubbed from Ireland’s ‘Easter Rising’?

Church

April 21, 2016

2016 marks the centenary of the Irish ‘Easter Rising’ that paved the way for much of the island to win independence from Great Britain. But, commemoration of the event is exposing sharp differences in modern Ireland about how the influence of Catholicism is being marked. Whilst the uprising was a