«We all feel deep pain for the atrocious terrorist attacks in London last Thursday. We pray for the persons killed, for those injured and for their dear ones. But we also pray for the attackers: may the Lord touch their hearts. To those who foment feelings of hatred and to those who carry out such repugnant actions I say: God loves life, which He has created, and not death. Stop, in the name of God! » These the words of the Pope after the Angelus of Sunday 10 July.

«The attacks of these days are not against Christianity». This is the judgment about the terrorist actions expressed by the Pope on 25 July, as he left the parish of Introd, where he met the clergy of Aosta.

On 27 July 57 year-old Monsignor Giovanni Ricchiuti, from Bisceglie in Puglia, was nominated archbishop of Acerenza (PZ). A priest since 1972, a biblical scholar, Ricchiuti was rector of the Pontifical Regional Seminary in Puglia since 1994.

«The presentation of the Compendium did not take place at a meeting with journalists in the Press Office of the Holy See, but during the liturgical celebration of Sext, in the presence of cardinals, bishops, faithful and catechists from all over the world. It is a choice that identifies the reception of the Compendium not as a primarily mediatic fact, but as an ecclesial event, that required an atmosphere of prayer and of a reception in faith of this “divine gift”». Thus wrote Archbishop Angelo Amato, secretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and of the Commission that worked on the compilation of the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, in an article for the last issue of Consacrazione e servizio, a magazine of the Union of senior superiors in Italy.

On 8 July Cardinal Marco Cé, Patriarch of Venice from 1978 to 2002, was eighty years old. On 14 July the Spanish cardinal Francisco Alvarez Martínez, archbishop of Toledo from 1995 to 2002, reached the same age. At the end of July therefore the Sacred College was composed of 181 cardinals, of whom 113 are electors. On 7 August the Madagascan cardinal Armand Gaetan Razafindratandra, archbishop of Antananarivo since 1994, will be eighty years old.

A long and complex interview on the secular-Catholic relationship given by Cardinal Angelo Scola to Corriere della Sera on 17 July set off a wide-ranging discussion. The unpredictable Marco Pannella, called on to participate in the discussion of this interview the following day, replied in his highly imaginative way: «We radicals are for the free market and against oligopolies, especially on the ethical and cultural levels. It allows me to feel the urgency of evoking the right and the freedom of conscience of the believers of the various Churches, of the Protestants, the other monotheistic religions, of believing secularists and first of all of Catholics, against whom Roman power was historically the most ferocious». And about the possibility that Catholics could contribute to the construction of the res publica, the radical leader hoped that these «could freely contribute to the formation of parliaments and governments! That Cardinal Sosa also could become, who knows, president of the Republic».

This is the title of an article written by Enzo Bianchi, that appeared in La Stampa on 23 July, in which one reads: «The worst enemies are believers themselves who think to make of it a civil religion to give a soul to modern society». In support of his thesis, the prior of Bose quotes a text of the then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, in which the Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith notes that were a «theologizing of politics,» attempted «then there would be an ideologizing of faith […] and politics does not deduce from faith, but from reason. In this sense the State must be a secular State, secular in the positive sense».

«American and Israeli secret services infiltrated the Red Brigades. Giovanni Galloni, former vice-president of the Governing Council of the Judiciary and vice-secretary of the Christian Democrats revealed yesterday evening to RAI News 24, recounting that Aldo Moro, a few days before his kidnapping, confided his preoccupation to him: “ I have for certain the news that the American and Israeli secret services have infiltrators within the Red Brigades. However we have not been told about this, had we been, we would probably have found the hideouts of the Red Brigades». Thus La Repubblica of 6 July.

On 26 July the 72 year-old Lebanese Archbishop Edmund Fahrat was nominated apostolic nuncio in Austria. A priest since 1959, archbishop since 1989, Fahrat was nuncio in Algeria, in Slovenia and Macedonia and since the end of 2001 was pontifical representative in Turkey and Turkmenistan.

«I too read with great interest the fine interview of Aldo Cazullo with Cardinal Angelo Scola, Patriarch of Venice». Thus begins the reply to a letter addressed by Signor Marco Leonardi to Sergio Romano, that appeared in Corriere della Sera on 24 July (“Lettere al Corriere” column). In commenting on the cardinal’s remarks, the former ambassador points out that, «instead of fearing the “dictatorship of relativism” (an expression used at the time by cardinal Ratzinger), Scola uses some synonyms such as “interculturation”, “plurality”, “cross-breeding of civilization”, “inevitable cross-culturalism”, “minority rights”». Romano concludes: «I had the impression, dear Leonardi, that in this structure defined by you as “oligarchic and authoritarian” [the Church, ed.] there could tomorrow be an “opposition of His Holiness” there».