Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida met with Pope Francis and top Vatican officials in talks about the need for “a world free of nuclear weapons,” the Vatican said Wednesday.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban met with Pope Francis at the Vatican on Thursday as the war in Ukraine cast a shadow over two leaders who have long sought closer ties with Russia.
Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI turned 95 this past weekend, a significant milestone on its own but even more given he has now been a retired pope longer than he was a reigning one.
On what is supposed to be Christianity’s most joyful day, Pope Francis made an anguished Easter Sunday plea for peace in the “senseless” war in Ukraine and in other armed conflicts raging in the world, and cited the “troubling” risk of nuclear warfare.
Pope Francis has celebrated Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica to mark Holy Thursday, hours before he was expected at an Italian prison to perform a foot-washing ritual for a dozen inmates in a gesture of humility.
A close associate of Pope Francis on Wednesday defended the Vatican’s decision to have a Russian woman and a Ukrainian woman carry the cross together during a Good Friday procession that will be presided over by the pontiff.