Following last Sunday’s heartfelt appeal for continued prayer for peace in the Holy Land, this morning the Holy Father Francis personally telephoned President Shimon Peres of Israel and President Mahmoud Abbas of Palestine to share his very serious concerns regarding the current situation of conflict involving in particular the Gaza Strip which, in a climate of growing hostility, hatred and suffering for the two populations, is claiming many victims and giving rise to a serious humanitarian emergency…

Pope Francis has expressed his appreciation for the work being done by all the Vatican’s media services in enhancing their presence and participation in the digital world. The Pope’s words came on Monday as he was given a personal viewing of the new updated version of  “The Pope App”, developed by the Pontifical Council for Social Communications. 

Council President Archbishop Claudio Celli, accompanied by project coordinator, Thaddeus Jones, met with the Pope to demonstrate features of the app, which was released in the iTunes and Google Play stores on July 4th…

“Now, Lord, help us! Grant us peace, teach us peace, guide us toward peace. Open our eyes and our hearts and grant us the courage to say: ‘no more war!’; ‘with war all is destroyed’!. Instill in us the courage to perform concrete actions to build peace…. Make us willing to listen to the cry of our citizens who ask that our arms be transformed into instruments of peace, our fears to trust and our tensions to forgiveness”…

On Saturday, 12 July, Pope Francis met with the participants of an international conference which took place in the Casina Pio iv at the Vatican, on the theme of “For an ever more inclusive economy”, which was proposed in his Apostolic Exhortion, Evangelii gaudium. In his off-the-cuff address, the Pontiff criticized the reigning “anthropological reductionism”. “I believe that this moment is the most powerful time of anthropological reductionism”, he stated and then asked: When man loses his humanity, what awaits us? …

• Pope Francis has sent a message to the “Mexico/Holy See Colloquium on Migration and Development”, urging protection for tens of thousands of unaccompanied children who are migrating North from Central America and Mexico in increasing numbers. 

  The Holy Father’s letter was read to conference participants by Apostolic Nuncio Christophe Pierre.  The conference was also attended by the Vatican’s secretary of state Cardinal Pietro Parolin. 

In his message Pope Francis writes that globalization has rendered migration a “hallmark” of society today.  Despite this it is still seen as an emergency or as a circumstantial phenomenon…