Catholic News Agency

• Cardinal Parolin: no discussion of resignation by Pope Francis

  Cardinal Pietro Parolin speaks to EWTN News in Oslo, Norway, on Jan. 17, 2025. / Credit: Fabio Gonella/EWTN News

  Vatican City, Mar 19, 2025 / 15:15 pm (CNA).

  Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin denied that during his three recent visits to Pope Francis — who has been hospitalized at Rome’s Gemelli Hospital since Feb. 14 — they had discussed the possibility of the pope’s resignation.

  “No, no, not at all,” the cardinal replied when asked by reporters after the “Iftar: Ramadan Table” event held at the St. Regis Hotel in Rome on Monday.

  Parolin addressed the 88-year-old pontiff’s health and his ability to lead the Catholic Church.

  “I think we should go by the medical reports, because they’re the ones that tell us exactly what the pope’s condition is,” he said.

  The cardinal added that during his last visit to Pope Francis at Gemelli Hospital on March 9, he found him in better condition.

  “I saw him a week ago, so I didn’t have the opportunity to see him again. I found him better than the first time,” he related, although he emphasized that this was only his personal observation and that it is necessary to follow the official information provided by the doctors.

  Regarding the governance of the Catholic Church and the Holy Father’s role in decision-making, Parolin explained that, although they have been unable to discuss issues in depth during their conversations in the hospital due to his delicate health, the pontiff was presented with several situations that required his decision.

  “The pope gives his instructions,” Parolin emphasized.

  Concern over rearmament in Europe

  The Vatican secretary of state also expressed his concern about Europe’s rearmament plan and its possible consequences. “When you rearm, sooner or later you have to use the weapons, right?” he reflected.

  He also recalled that the Holy See has always advocated for disarmament.

  “This has always been the policy of the Holy See: to insist on controlled and across the board disarmament on the international level. So one cannot be happy with the direction things are taking,” he commented.

  Parolin also addressed the situation in Ukraine and expressed his hope that the dialogue process could move forward without obstacles.

  This storywas first publishedby ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

• PHOTOS: Romans celebrate St. Joseph’s feast day, venerate his holy cloak

  A St. Joseph’s procession winds through the streets of Rome and the surrounding neighborhood of the Parish of San Giuseppe al Trionfale in Rome on March 19, 2025. / Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/CNA

  Vatican City, Mar 19, 2025 / 14:45 pm (CNA).

  Hundreds of people in Rome joined celebrations organized by the Parish Basilica of St. Joseph al Trionfale in Rome to celebrate the March 19 solemnity of St. Joseph.

  

  Festivities began March 9 with a vigil Mass at the parish to commence the March 10–18 novena leading up to the feast day dedicated to the husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

  

  For the jubilee year, the relics of St. Joseph’s cloak and Our Lady’s veil were on display inside St. Joseph al Trionfale for public veneration for four days from March 16–19.

  

  It is believed the relics belonging to the parents of Jesus were hidden in the Basilica of Sant’Anastasia, located near the Circus Maximus, for more than 1,600 years after St. Jerome brought the relics to Rome in the fourth century.

  

  Devotion to the holy cloak of St. Joseph has expanded beyond Rome. For American visitor Gina Pribaz, the holy patron of the universal Church is an important saint for her family.

  

  “When I was expecting my first child and experiencing difficulty, I asked St. Joseph for his intercession — my daughter was born on his feast day,” Pribaz told CNA on Wednesday.

  “Being able to venerate the relic of his cloak moved me; it helped me feel close to the real man who guided and protected the Holy Family and can do the same for our families now,” she said.

  

  The 30-day Holy Cloak prayer devotion, which includes the recitation of the Litany of St. Joseph, has spread throughout the world. Each of the 30 days represents a year in the 30 years of Jesus’ hidden life — before he began his public ministry — under the protection of St. Joseph.

  

  Wednesday’s celebrations at St. Joseph al Trionfale included six Masses; an afternoon street procession with the parish’s St. Joseph statue, accompanied by the Lazio region’s band orchestra and state police; food and games for children, including St. Joseph cream puff pastries; and an evening fireworks display.

  

  

• CNA explains: What is the Catholic Church’s newly announced 2028 ‘ecclesial assembly’?

  Pope Francis prays during the Synod on Synodality closing Mass on Oct. 27, 2024, in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican. / Credit: Vatican Media

  Vatican City, Mar 19, 2025 / 14:15 pm (CNA).

  The Vatican announced on Saturday its latest plans for the Synod on Synodality’s ongoing implementation — a multiyear “accompaniment and evaluation process” leading to a Church-wide assembly at the Vatican in October 2028.

  CNA explains more about the process and why it has been initiated:

  Implementation phase

  Initiated by Pope Francis in October 2021, the Synod on Synodality was a multiyear, worldwide process of the Catholic Church focused on exploring the question “What steps does the Spirit invite us to take in order to grow in our ‘journeying together’?” 

  The synod went through diocesan, national, and continental stages in phase one, the “consultation” phase. Two global, monthlong assemblies were held at the Vatican in October 2023 and October 2024 as part of the next “discernment” phase.

  The 2024 synod gathering, which included for the first time both bishops and non-bishops as voting members, was largely focused on discussing the question “What processes, structures, and institutions are needed in a missionary synodal Church?”

  At the end of the month, Pope Francis chose to ratify the assembly’s final report rather than write his own postsynodal document, stating that “there are already very concrete indications in the document that can be a guide for the mission of the Churches, on the different continents, in the different contexts.”

  The third and final phase of the Synod on Synodality is the implementation phase, underway now.

  Study groups examining 10 areas of possible reform, based on suggestions from the 2023 assembly, are part of the implementation of the synod. Some of the study groups are expected to deliver their final reports in June.

  Accompaniment and evaluation process

  On March 15, the Vatican’s synod office announced an additional initiative of the implementation of the Synod on Synodality: an over-three-year accompaniment and evaluation process that will begin in churches and dioceses, move to national and international gatherings, and eventually culminate in a global gathering at the Vatican in October 2028.

  With the approval of Pope Francis, who signed off on the process from the hospital on March 11, the General Secretariat of the Synod sent a letter to all of the Catholic Church’s Latin-rite bishops and Eastern-rite exarchs as well as to bishops’ conference presidents explaining this next project.

  The timeline of the accompaniment and evaluation process is as follows: This May will see the publication of a support document for the implementation phase, with guidelines for its use.

  From June 2025 to December 2026 there will be implementation paths in local Churches.

  In the first half of 2027 there will be evaluation assemblies in dioceses around the world.

  The second of half of 2027 will see evaluation assemblies in national and international bishops’ conferences.

  Evaluation assemblies at the continental level will take place in the first half of 2028. 

  June 2028 will see publication of the Instrumentum Laboris, or guiding document, for the October 2028 assembly.

  Finally, in October 2028, the Vatican will host the ecclesial assembly.

  According to Cardinal Mario Grech, secretary-general of the synod and the author of the letter about the accompaniment and evaluation process, “synodal teams” made up of priests, deacons, consecrated men and women, and laypeople — accompanied by their bishops — will organize and conduct the process in each diocese.

  What is it all about?

  Grech said in his letter the implementation phase of the Synod on Synodality should be understood “not as merely the ‘application’ of directives from above but rather as a process of ‘reception’” of the suggestions made in the final documentof the October 2024 synodal assembly.

  “It is essential to move forward together as the whole Church,” the cardinal emphasized, noting the importance of “harmonizing” the synod’s reception throughout the Church.

  Pope Francis, in his final speech to synod participants on Oct. 26, 2024, said: “There are and there will be decisions to be made.” 

  “I, then, will continue to listen to the bishops and the Churches entrusted to them,” he continued. “This is not the classic way of postponing decisions indefinitely. It is what corresponds to the synodal style with which even the Petrine ministry is to be exercised: listening, convening, discerning, deciding, and evaluating.”

  “The process,” Grech explained, “will also be an opportunity to evaluate together the choices made at the local level and recognize the progress made in terms of synodality. Thanks to this process, the Holy Father will be able to listen to and confirm the orientations deemed valid for the whole Church.”

  In an interview with Vatican News, Grech provided more background to the decision to implement an “application and evaluation process” in the Church.

  He said it boils down to the need to have a synodal mentality and “simply publishing a ‘document’ is not enough for what emerged in the two phases of the synodal process to be implemented in the Church’s life.”

  Because Pope Francis adopted the final document of the 2024 assembly into his ordinary magisterium, the whole Church is “required” to live the third phase, the implementation, of the synod, he continued.

  This new process and its steps “constitute a map for the conversion and renewal of the Church in a synodal sense,” Grech said. “All the work that awaits us in these next three years is inspired by the contents of this document, which must be experimented with, in order to verify the possibility of realizing them in the life of the Church.”

• A Vatican video game? New Minecraft edition has students restore St. Peter’s Basilica

  Students try out the new Minecraft Education experience “Peter Is Here: AI for Cultural Heritage” during a press conference unveiling the project on March 18, 2025, at the Vatican. / Credit: Daniel Ibañez/CNA

  Vatican City, Mar 19, 2025 / 13:45 pm (CNA).

  Minecraft, the popular video game known for its blocky, pixelated graphics, has launched a new educational edition that challenges students to explore and restore St. Peter’s Basilica. 

  Michelangelo’s dome, Gian Lorenzo Bernini’s colonnade, and the ancient tomb of the Apostle Peter have been recreated within Minecraft’s iconic digital world of 3D cubes and retro gaming aesthetic. 

  Microsoft and the Vatican unveiled the game, “Peter Is Here: AI for Cultural Heritage,” at a press event in Rome on March 18. The project is the latest step in their collaboration on an AI-enhanced experience of St. Peter’s Basilica. 

  

  Cardinal Mauro Gambetti, the archpriest of St. Peter’s Basilica, placed the educational video game under the patronage of St. Joseph, who was “the educator par excellence of the child of God.” 

  “Those who play with St. Peter’s Basilica in Minecraft Education have the opportunity to try their hand at creative architectural interventions, to discover the history of the basilica, to restore it, and to enter into the hidden meanings that it holds,” the cardinal said. 

  Restoring the Vatican, one block at a time 

  Designed for students aged 8–18, the game allows players to take on roles of skilled craftsmen and restoration workers responsible for maintaining St. Peter’s Basilica. By completing restoration tasks, they earn golden papal key tokens while learning about the basilica’s history, art, and architecture. 

  Eleven-year-old Michael Sterpi was one of the lucky students selected to test out the game.  

  “I play Minecraft on Xbox and PC at home,” Sterpi told CNA. “This game is like really, really, cool. With each block, they made the whole Vatican!” 

  Sterpi, who has been studying the life of Blessed Carlo Acutis in school, said he thinks that Carlo “would love this game.” 

  Yet, the student from Rome’s Jesuit-run Massimiliano Massimo Institute was quick to point out that nothing can replace seeing St. Peter’s Basilica in person. 

  “The real thing is much better, obviously,” he said. 

  

  Minecraft as an educational tool? 

  The new Vatican edition is part of Microsoft’s larger effort to bring cultural and religious history to life through digital learning in Minecraft Education. 

  “Introducing complex topics to students in an immersive 3D virtual world makes challenging concepts easier to understand,” Allison Matthews, head of Minecraft Education at Microsoft, said at the game’s Rome premiere. 

  “We’ve created a lot of classroom-ready resources that educators can download to make it very easy,” she added. 

  Minecraft Education also features other religious and cultural sites, such as Syria’s Monastery of St. Elian — an ancient Christian church destroyed by the Islamic State — available in the UNESCO’s History Blocks edition of the game. A different edition lets students explore the monuments of ancient Rome. 

  

  The game’s launch comes at a time when video games are often viewed with skepticism, especially in educational settings.  

  Mauro Antonelli, the head of Italy’s technical secretariat for the Ministry of Education and Merit, acknowledged a need to “counter gaming addiction” among young people today but called the initiative an example of how technology can serve educational purposes. 

  “It is really a paradigm shift — gaming is often seen with a negative connotation,” he said. 

  The Vatican’s involvement reflects a growing interest in artificial intelligence, social media, and digital tools that engage younger generations.  

  In April, the Catholic Church is expected to canonize Carlo Acutis, a 15-year-old who loved video games, as the first computer-coding saint during a worldwide gathering of teenagers at the Vatican. 

  Franciscan Father Enzo Fortunato, the director of communications for St. Peter’s Basilica, also suggested that the Minecraft gamecould become the official game of the Vatican’s next World Children’s Day event in September 2026. 

  

  Microsoft has been working with the Vatican on digital preservation projects through its AI for Good Lab. This latest venture builds on previous efforts to create an AI-enhanced digital twin of St. Peter’s Basilica, using advanced photogrammetry techniques to map its intricate details. 

  “This partnership with St. Peter’s Basilica and the Vatican is one of Microsoft’s most cherished,” Matthews said. “We are honored to be able to use the power of AI to help preserve St. Peter’s Basilica and make it more accessible to people all around the world.” 

  How to play Minecraft Vatican edition? 

  “Peter Is Here” is available in the Minecraft Education lesson library for all licensed users. A trial version can be downloaded for free by logging in with an Office 365 or Microsoft 365 Education account. 

  The game offers two distinct modes. In “Restoration Mode,” players work on key sections of the basilica, including restoring the Vatican Obelisk, exploring St. Peter’s Tomb, reinforcing the colonnade, and repairing Bernini’s baldacchino.  

  

  After completing restoration tasks, players can switch to “Exploration Mode,” where they navigate the basilica, interact with historical figures, and uncover the history of its art and architecture. 

  Brad Smith, Microsoft’s vice chair and president, called the launch “a big step forward” in making the Vatican’s cultural and religious heritage more accessible to young people everywhere. 

  “This is the way we take this wonderful institution — the culture, the religion, the heritage — and then put it into the hands of children in every country around the world,” he said. “What could be more special than that?” 

  Archbishop Carlo Maria Polvani, the undersecretary of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Culture and Education, said he hopes that millions of young people will use the game to discover one of the world’s greatest heritage sites, especially during the jubilee year. 

• Pope Francis: Fear of change can be overcome with Jesus as our guide

  Pope Francis prays during his Wednesday general audience on Feb. 5, 2025, in the Paul VI Audience Hall at the Vatican. / Credit: Vatican Media

  Vatican City, Mar 19, 2025 / 11:55 am (CNA).

  Pope Francis on Wednesday said doubts and uncertainties are not a reason to fear for those who seek Jesus’ guidance throughout life’s journey. 

  In his prepared March 19 catechesis on “Jesus Our Hope,” published amid his lengthy stay in the hospital, the Holy Father reflected on Nicodemus’ encounter with the Son of God in St. John’s Gospel.

  “Nicodemus goes to Jesus at night: It is an unusual time for a meeting,” the pope shared. “He is a man who finds himself in the darkness of doubt, in that darkness that we experience when we no longer understand what is happening in our lives and do not see clearly the way forward.”

  Before turning to Jesus for answers, Nicodemus sensed “that something no longer works in his life,” the pope explained in his catechesis. 

  “He feels the need to change, but he does not know where to begin,” he continued. “This happens to all of us in some phases of life.”

  Emphasizing the need not to be closed in on ourselves and to accept change, the 88-year-old pontiff said Nicodemus is an example of a man who accepted the light of faith and was “reborn.”

  “Changes sometimes frighten us,” the Holy Father said. “On the one hand they attract us, at times we desire them, but on the other we would prefer to remain in comfort.”

  By choosing to embrace change and overcome inflexible habits and ways of thinking, the pope said people are able “to find a new way to love” others.

  “The Spirit encourages us to face these fears,” he added.

  Though Nicodemus was “a teacher of Israel,” the pope noted that he needed to trust Jesus’ authority and deepen his knowledge of Scripture.

  “Nicodemus is able to do it: In the end he will be among those who go to Pilate to ask for the body of Jesus (cf. Jn 19:39)!” he said. 

  “Nicodemus has finally come to the light, he is reborn, and he no longer needs to stay in the night,” he continued. 

  Praying for all people to have the ability to face their fears and doubts and be free, the pope concluded: “In him we find the hope to face the changes in our lives and be born again.”