A lobby of hyper-Marianists sees signs that Benedict XVI is open to declaring the dogma that the BVM “corempetrix” of humanity with her Son–that’d be Jesus Christ. From the Vatican, RNS’ Francis X. Rocca reports this week: At least 7 million Catholics from more than 170 countries, including hundreds of bishops and cardinals, have reportedly…

A banner week for Latino Catholics, and Barack Obama. The new U.S. ambassador to the Holy See (replacing Mary Ann Glendon) is a Cuban-born, 45-year-old associate professor of theology at St. John’s College in Collegeville, Minn. As Fr. Jim Martin at America magazine notes, he’s also a Rahner scholar, which means he and Benedict XVI…

Conservatives are honing strategies to take down Sonia Sotomayor, and are coming up with some of the usual beauts: After several conference calls to talk strategy with other conservative leaders, Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, said they would be “aggressively” looking into Judge Sotomayor’s record, encouraged in part by the last-minute disclosures…

That is the judgment of the editor of L’Osservatore Romano, Gian Maria Vian, whose paper’s rather neutral (neutered, to some) coverage of Obama has been in decided contrast to segments of the American church–and no small cause of consternation to such segments. The Vatican editor’s verdict comes in an interview with an Italian journalist, Paulo…

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