Roman mayor Ignazio Marino has said the city has become too “overcrowded”, as it is now a major destination for the thousands of migrants flowing into the country from beyond the Mediterranean. One fifth of all migrants entering Italy now end up
Adding to Rome’s worst July heat wave in recorded history is a series of delays on public transportation due to strikes, along with no union agreement for the upcoming Jubilee Year in which some 33 million pilgrims are expected to visit the Eternal City.
Despite repeated threats, local police seem powerless to stop tourists from taking a plunge into Roman fountains in one of Rome’s hottest summers on record.
A city ordinance banning the use of horses to pull the traditional carriages around Rome went into effect Thursday, in response to a wave of 100+ degree weather that is said to threaten the horses’s lives.
Early Wednesday morning, an anti-mafia squad seized possession of a well-known restaurant in Rome’s historic district, a block from the Pantheon, believed to be owned and operated by the Italian mafia.
A crazed Brazilian man dressed in black ran along the main road outside the Roman Colosseum Monday afternoon, brandishing a butcher knife with an 8-inch blade and screaming “Allah is great,” according to eyewitnesses.
Despite a torrential downpour, an estimated 500,000 people gathered Saturday in Rome under the banner of “Family Day,” protesting gender ideology and LGBT programs in schools and reaffirming the nature of marriage as the lifelong union of one man and one woman.
Parents from the north of Italy have organized a massive demonstration against gender ideology in schools called “Defend Our Children,” to be held this Saturday in the Saint John Lateran Square in Rome. The demonstrators will be protesting Italian educational programs that are meant to blur the sexual identity of children.
The immigration crisis affecting Italy reached boiling-point yesterday. A build-up of asylum-seekers at major train stations in both Rome and Milan led to clashes with police and calls from angry politicians demanding EU assistance. AFP reports that over the course of the week
Russian President Vladimir Putin used his trip to Italy to attempt to persuade Italian officials to end the sanctions against his country, which he claims hurt Italian businesses. He also snuggled close with disgraced politician Silvio Berlusconi.
A subway train bumped into another one ahead of it at a station in southern Rome on Friday, throwing passengers to the floor and injuring a dozen people. Passengers emerging from the station reported feeling the impact, seeing sparks and
Members of the Islamic State have been circulating disturbing photos of well-known Roman sites such as the Colosseum with handwritten cards held up in front claiming that ISIS is already present in Italy’s capital.
This past March, Pope Francis issued a surprise proclamation of a special Jubilee year of mercy to begin in December 2015, which may be dampened—planners fear—by a steady rise in predatory crimes on the streets of the Eternal City.
ROME, Italy– Throngs of marchers took to the streets of Rome on Mother’s Day to commemorate Italy’s fifth annual March for Life, a pro-life event affirming the universal right to life in opposition to state-sanctioned abortion.
Anti-government riots and violence increase in Burundi; Concerns over an all-out crisis civil war in Burundi are misplaced; Fears grow in Central Asia of an ISIS-Taliban alliance in Afghanistan
The stories vary regarding how a 20-year-old University of Iowa student fell from a bridge in Rome last January 14. What is tragically clear is that Andrew Mogni died on Easter Sunday at Northwestern Memorial Hospital from complications due to the injuries he suffered there.
Amidst the enthusiasm for the upcoming Jubilee year of 2016 proclaimed by Pope Francis, Cardinal Camillo Ruini has added a sobering note of caution. “Terrorism is the greatest threat looming over the Jubilee proclaimed by Pope Francis. You cannot ignore it after what has happened in Tunisia,” he said in an interview this weekend with the Italian daily La Repubblica.
Recent years have seen an increasing reluctance on the part of the Vatican to speak of the traditional “Just War Doctrine,” as Church officials have urged the exhaustion of diplomatic solutions before even considering the use of force. This reluctance seems now to be giving way to a grittier realism in the face of a relentless enemy with whom constructive, rational dialogue is impossible.
In an exclusive interview Wednesday, the second anniversary of his election to the papacy, Pope Francis spoke on a wide range of topics, many of which revolved around Mexico. He said that “the devil doesn’t forgive Mexico because there [the Virgin Mary] revealed her Son,” referring to the appearances of the Virgin of Guadalupe.
Two young tourists from California reportedly used a coin to engrave their initials into a brick wall inside the first floor of Rome’s Coliseum and then proceeded to snap a selfie with a cell phone. Not long after, the two were apprehended by security and taken to the police station.
Italy may be preparing for military action in Libya following reports that ISIS may use the coastal North African country to stage attacks.
While Italy’s government gears up for serious confrontation following ISIS threats to “conquer Rome,” putting the country on high alert and upping security at “sensitive targets,” the Italian rank and file are responding in a typically Italian way: with ridicule.
ROME, Italy– Rome has dramatically stepped up its security in the wake of last weekend’s slaughter of Christians in Libya and the Islamic State’s overt threat to the city. Outside of Rome’s US embassy on Via Veneto, increased security has been stationed, and machine guns have appeared in the hands of guards. A special security taskforce has been convoked to plan Rome’s response to escalating ISIS threats.
An ISIS report, recovered by Libyan media in January, reveals that the Islamic State would be aiming at Libya “to get to Europe,” overrunning it with migrants to “turn it into hell.” According to the report, ISIS considers “illegal immigration” to be a privileged channel of access to the Old Continent.
The Vatican has announced a new program of giving free haircuts, showers, and even a shave to Rome’s homeless population, a report says. This month the new services were added to last year’s announcement that church officials were adding showering facilities in
Riccardo Pacifici, the president of Rome’s Jewish community, had an eerie and awful experience when visiting Auschwitz with a TV crew to commemorate the liberation of Auschwitz: he found himself locked inside the camp.
Pope Francis announced his list of fifteen new cardinals-to-be Sunday, concentrating on developing nations, some of whom have never had a cardinal before. They will be made cardinals at Saint Peter’s Basilica on February 14. The Pope’s picks for the
