FaithWorld

(A traditionalist priest prays during an SSPX ordination ceremony in Econe, southwest Switzerland June 29, 2009. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse)

An ultra-traditionalist Roman Catholic splinter group has provided an “encouraging” response to Vatican demands that they accept non-negotiable doctrinal principles as a condition for their full re-entry into the Church.

The Vatican said on Wednesday it had received an answer from the dissident Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX) to the Holy See’s ultimatum a month ago that the group clarify its doctrinal position or risk a painful break with Rome. “The response is encouraging, it is a step forward,” said Vatican spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi.

He said the Vatican’s doctrinal department, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, would study the response, formulate a position and pass its recommendation to Pope Benedict.

The Swiss-based SSPX, which rejects some of the reforms made at the historic 1962 Second Vatican Council, defied Rome in 1988 by illegally consecrating four bishops, triggering their excommunication by the late Pope John Paul.

(Children dressed in traditional Bavarian costumes dance for Pope Benedict XVI during the Pontiff's 85th birthday celebrations in the Clementine Hall at the Vatican April 16, 2012. REUTERS/Gregorio Borgia/Pool)

Pope Benedict marked his 85th birthday on Monday saying he is now in the “last stretch” of his life but sure that God would help him continue his mission.

Benedict, who has looked tired and drawn recently, is one of history’s oldest reigning pontiffs – and already older than his predecessor John Paul II was when he died in 2005.

(Pope Benedict XVI leaves at the end of the Sunday Angelus prayer in Saint Peter's Square at the Vatican April 15, 2012. REUTERS/Tony Gentile )

Pope Benedict marks two milestones this week and while his health appears stable, signs of frailty have again prompted speculation over whether he will be the first pontiff in seven centuries to resign.

Benedict, one of the oldest popes in history, turns 85 on Monday, and on Thursday he marks the seventh anniversary of his election as successor to the immensely popular John Paul II.

(Pope Benedict XVI looks on as he leads the Chrismal mass in Saint Peter's Basilica at the Vatican April 5, 2012. REUTERS/Max Rossi )

Pope Benedict has restated the Roman Catholic Church’s ban on women priests and warned that he would not tolerate disobedience by clerics on fundamental teachings. Benedict, who for decades before his 2005 election was the Vatican’s chief doctrinal enforcer, delivered an unusually direct denunciation of disobedient priests in a sermon at a morning Mass on Holy Thursday, when the Church commemorates the day Christ instituted the priesthood.

The pope responded specifically to a call to disobedience by a group of Austrian priests and laity, who last year boldly and openly challenged Church teaching on taboo topics such as priestly celibacy and women’s ordination. “Is disobedience a path of renewal for the Church?,” he asked rhetorically in the sermon of a solemn Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica on the day Catholic priests around the world renew their vows.

(Pope Benedict XVI meets former Cuban leader Fidel Castro in Havana March 28, 2012. REUTERS/Alex Castro )

Pope Benedict called for an end to the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba and met with revolutionary icon Fidel Castro on Wednesday as he ended a trip in which he urged the communist island to change.

He also spoke at a public Mass in Havana’s sprawling Revolution Square where the Vatican said 300,000 people gathered to hear the 84-year-old pontiff.

(Pope Benedict XVI meets former Cuban leader Fidel Castro in Havana March 28, 2012. REUTERS/Osservatore Romano)

Pope Benedict and Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro, both octogenarians, joked about their age in a brief meeting on Wednesday and then Castro popped the question: so what do you do?

The two world figures chatted for about 30 minutes at the Vatican embassy in Havana near the end of the pope’s three-day visit to Cuba, where he called for greater freedom and a bigger role for the Catholic Church in the communist-led nation.

(Pope Benedict XVI is welcomed by Cuban President Raul Castro (R) at Revolution Palace in Havana March 27, 2012. REUTERS/Tony Gentile )

Pope Benedict and Cuban President Raul Castro have met for talks on a papal trip that has sparked hopes for economic and political change, but one national leader said there would be no political reform on the communist island.

Cuban television showed the pope and Castro in the Palace of the Revolution on Tuesday at the beginning and end of an hour-long meeting, but they did not speak to the press. A Vatican spokesman said former leader Fidel Castro, who may or may not meet with Benedict, did not attend the talks.

(A car drives past a poster of Pope Benedict XVI, which reads "welcome to Cuba" in Havana March 21, 2012. Pope Benedict will visit Cuba on March 26-28. REUTERS/Enrique de la Osa )

A ghost will be following Pope Benedict at every step of his trip to Mexico and Cuba — that of his predecessor John Paul.

John Paul, who died in 2005, was a huge draw in many places. But, apart from his native Poland, nowhere was he a more towering figure than in Latin America, visiting every one of the region’s countries at least once. He drew oceanic, throbbing crowds, sloshed through swampy slums in Ecuador, challenged Maoist guerrillas in the Peruvian highlands and defended miners’ rights in Bolivia.

(Celtic cross at Ballinskelligs Priory, 18 March 2008/Ulrich Hartmann)

A Vatican report on the sexual abuse of Irish children by Catholic clergy accused Ireland’s religious leaders of negligence and called for more reforms there to avoid a similarly “shameful” scandal in the future.

Irish bishops assured Vatican investigators that they would promptly notify civil authorities of new sexual abuse cases and would make changes to Catholic education and seminary life.

“With a great sense of pain and shame, it must be acknowledged that within the Christian community innocent young people were abused by clerics and religious (nuns) to whose care they had been entrusted,” the report, released on Tuesday, said. “Those who should have exercised diligence often failed to do so effectively.”

(People wait as children are baptized near a poster of Pope Benedict in a catholic church in the village of Marti in the province of Matanzas in central Cuba, around 160 km (99 miles) east of Havana March 10, 2012. REUTERS/Desmond Boylan)

The Vatican on Friday condemned the U.S. embargo against Cuba ahead of Pope Benedict’s trip there next week and said the pontiff was willing to meet Fidel Castro.

“The Holy See believes that the embargo is something that makes the people suffer the consequences. It does not achieve the aim of the greater good,” Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said.