Kateri Tekakwitha will become the first Native American to be canonized by the Vatican.

The decision came after a young boy was able to recover from flesh-eating bacteria after his parents prayed to the 17th-century woman. Researching the boys 2006 recovery the Vatican called it a miracle and quickly decided to canonize the 17th-century woman who herself had survived smallpox as a girl in upstate New York, a disease that left her alive but disfigured.

Speaking to MSNBC.com the boys mom said:

“There is no doubt in me or my husband’s mind that a miracle definitely took place,” while adding, “There were far too many things that could have and should have gone wrong with his illness. The doctors went through every avenue they could to save his life and he survived. It’s a miracle that all of the other things that could have gone wrong, didn’t.”

At this time the date of canonization has not been announced, the Vatican is expected to provide a canonization date in the coming months.

Do you believe canonizing people of different nationalities and backgrounds is an important part of spreading the churches message or has the Vatican jumped too quickly in the canonization of Kateri Tekakwitha?

Vatican Prepares To Canonize First Native American Saint is a post from: The Inquisitr

Gabriele Amorth, a Vatican exorcist specialist who claims to have banished evil spirits from 70,000 people is now claiming that the practice of Yoga is the work of the devil.

According to Amorth yoga automatically leads to the belief in Hinduism and he tells the Telegraph “all eastern religions are based on a false belief in reincarnation.”

During a speech at a local film festival the priest revealed that yoga was just as evil as the “Harry Potter books” which he says promoted the use of black magic. As Amorth puts it:

“In Harry Potter the devil acts in a crafty and covert manner, under the guise of extraordinary powers, magic spells and curses.”

Gabriele was at the festival to promote the American exorcism movie The Rite starring Anthony Hopkins as a Jesuit priest.

It’s not just children’s book and exercise that Amorth was attacking, he also revealed that the devil exists inside the catholic church, blaming his evil work for the churches sex scandals.

When he’s not busy attacking children’s literature and yoga he can be seen watching his favorite movie, The Exorcist.

I’m not sure whether to be very scared or laugh at the absurdity of Father Amorth’s statements. Do you think Harry Potter and Yoga are the work of the devil?

Vatican Exorcist Specialist Says Yoga Is The Devil’s Exercise is a post from: The Inquisitr

Mood: Holy.

His Popiness, Pope Benedict XVI, has urged Catholic priests to go forth and blog in an effort to connect with more people and ultimately get more asses in pews. The 265th Pope is no stranger to the internet, as the Vatican launched a YouTube channel last year to get the word of God out to the digitally connected masses.

Citing the “broad new vistas for dialogue, evangelization and catechesis” presented by social media, Big Pope-a quoted the scripture in his plea for priests to get out and evangelize:

Such is the lofty dignity and beauty of the mission of the priest, which responds in a special way to the challenge raised by the Apostle Paul: “The Scripture says, ‘No one who believes in him will be put to shame … everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’ But how can they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in him of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone to preach? And how can people preach unless they are sent? (Rom 10:11, 13-15).

His Holiness gently reminded priests who might be neglecting the opportunities presented to reach potential churchgoers that Jesus is totally watching them and their reticence makes him kind of sad:

Responding adequately to this challenge amid today’s cultural shifts, to which young people are especially sensitive, necessarily involves using new communications technologies. The world of digital communication, with its almost limitless expressive capacity, makes us appreciate all the more Saint Paul’s exclamation: “Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel” (1 Cor 9:16) The increased availability of the new technologies demands greater responsibility on the part of those called to proclaim the Word, but it also requires them to become become more focused, efficient and compelling in their efforts. Priests stand at the threshold of a new era: as new technologies create deeper forms of relationship across greater distances, they are called to respond pastorally by putting the media ever more effectively at the service of the Word.

Ooh, Word? Capitalized? Bill Gates might like a word with you about that, Father.

And, says the Pope, no half assing. In what actually may have been the first time I’ve felt like adding an “Amen” in my entire Catholic life, Pope Benedict says that it’s not enough to fill the web with content, it must be meaningful and relevant and worth reading.

The spread of multimedia communications and its rich “menu of options” might make us think it sufficient simply to be present on the Web, or to see it only as a space to be filled. Yet priests can rightly be expected to be present in the world of digital communications as faithful witnesses to the Gospel, exercising their proper role as leaders of communities which increasingly express themselves with the different “voices” provided by the digital marketplace. Priests are thus challenged to proclaim the Gospel by employing the latest generation of audiovisual resources (images, videos, animated features, blogs, websites) which, alongside traditional means, can open up broad new vistas for dialogue, evangelization and catechesis.

In all honesty, it’s definitely a step in the right direction for the Vatican to get priests out and preaching the word of God via blogs, Facebook and Twitter. Maybe since the Catholic Church, which is literally older than Jesus, has embraced the changing market and new challenges presented therein, the music and book publishing industries will follow suit.

Pope urges priests to embrace social media, start blogging is a post from: The Inquisitr

The Vatican has joined the YouTube revolution with an official YouTube channel.

Pope Benedict welcomed viewers to this “great family that knows no borders” and said he hoped they would “feel involved in this great dialogue of truth.”

Vatican Radio described the launch as “a day that writes a new page in history for the Holy See.”

Church officials said that it hoped to broaden and unite the Pope’ audience with the YouTube channel, while giving the Holy See better control over the Pope’s Internet image.

Bizarrely though, all videos on the channel have embedding disabled, so you can watch, but never share the message.

You can follow the Pope on YouTube at www.youtube.com/vatican

(via Huffington Post)

The Vatican launches YouTube Channel is a post from: The Inquisitr

A newspaper published by the Vatican has claimed that the contraceptive pill is polluting the environment and is responsible for male infertility.

The report in L’Osservatore Romano claims the Pill is responsible for releasing tons of hormones into nature through female urine, polluting the environment and causing unknown damage to the world around us.

But it gets better: these free ranging female hormones are also causing men to become infertile as well. The paper quotes studies by the WHO related bodies that some estrogen in the environment in large doses has carcinogenic properties, then matches them to male infertility.

The Vatican’s solution: natural methods of contraception, or to be more precise: not having sex (apologies for the translation):

The sad thing in all this is that if it is to regulate fertility, these are not the product required. The natural means of regulating fertility ( “NFP” or Natural Family Planning) are equally effective and also respect the kind of person.

But why stop there when you can cite the Universal Deceleration of Human Rights:

In this sixtieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights can be said that the means of contraception violate at least five important rights: the right to life, the right to health, the right to education, the right to (their spread occurs to the detriment of the natural resources) and the right to equality between the sexes (the burden of contraception falls mostly on women).

Not surprising, a number of experts disagree with the Vatican on the matter.

Vatican Claims Contraceptive Pill is Bad for the Environment, Sperm is a post from: The Inquisitr