by Massimo Introvigne

Note : Massimo Introvigne is a widely respected Italian scholar whose research focuses on the "new religious movements" of our time. He is director the Centro Studi sulle Nuove Religioni (Center for the Study of the New Religions, or CESNUR), founded…

What does holiness mean? What do we mean by the word “holy”?

It’s a serious question, just as serious as saying what do we mean by other words, like rain, or snow, or sunsets, or matter, or energy, or money, or…

by Delia Gallagher

When the Director of the Vatican newspaper, Gian Maria Vian, declared a few weeks ago that “Obama is not a pro-abortion president,” a comment that came after an editorial which on balance spoke positively of the US President’s…

By Andrew Rabel , reporting from Rome

Pope Benedict XVI one year ago ago called an American, Archbishop Raymond Burke , to head the Apostolic Signatura, the office which oversees the correct administration of justice in the Church. Here, after one year at…

By Andrew Rabel

Editor’s note: From time to time, Inside the Vatican publishes interviews with key figures in Rome, both in and out of the Roman Curia.

Some of these figures are in the large diplomatic community in Rome, for the "Eternal…

The new Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, Kirill, 62, has met Pope Benedict XVI, who turned 82 a few days ago, three times already — but that was before Kirill became Patriarch.

Now, after nearly 100 days in office,…

By Andrew Rabel

I am here late in the evening in the office of Inside the Vatican in Rome, and I have just learnt this fabulous news— that the former US Ambassador to the Holy See, the Catholic professor of law at…

By Robert Mauro

Father Stanley Ladislas Jaki, OSB (1924-2009), Distinguished Professor of Physics at Seton Hall University, New Jersey, since 1975 and one of the world’s leading historians of science and its relationship with religion, died in Madrid on April 7,…

By Andrew Rabel

On April 26 in St. Peter’s Square, Pope Benedict XVI will canonize a Portuguese national hero who toward the end of his life became a Carmelite monk and served the poor, Nuno de Santa Maria Àlvares Pereira , O.…

Urbi et Orbi (”to the City [of Rome] and to the World”) was a standard opening of Roman proclamations. The term is now used to denote a papal address and Apostolic Blessing that is addressed to the City of Rome…