Advertisement

We need your help now

Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.

You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.

If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.

Former Pope Benedict XVI retreating after his final general audience in St Peter's Square as pontiff in February of last year.

Former Pope Benedict makes second secret trip outside Vatican

The former pope, who promised on retirement to “live hidden from the world”, made excursion to visit brother in hospital.

FORMER POPE BENEDICT XVI secretly left his residence in the Vatican to visit his brother in hospital in Rome, La Stampa daily said yesterday.

The 85-year-old, who promised on his retirement to live “hidden from the world”, was escorted in a car with blacked-out windows for an hour’s visit with Georg Ratzinger in the Policlinico Gemelli hospital in the Italian capital.

Ratzinger, 89, who is a priest, was admitted to hospital after travelling to the Vatican from Germany to spend Christmas with the former pontiff, the daily said, without providing any further details.

The visit was Benedict’s second excursion since he retired to the former monastery within the Vatican gardens in May, where he has kept a very low profile.

His first trip was to attend a concert in August at Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer residence where he stayed for two months following his resignation in February last year, the paper said.

- © AFP, 2014

Benedict to move back to Vatican, two months after resignation>
How should Pope Francis do his job? He wants you to tell him>

Author
View 22 comments
Close
22 Comments
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ian McNally
    Favourite Ian McNally
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 4:52 PM

    Shane on every Irish MEP who voted down these amendments, I’d wager all of their salaries none of them can adequately explain what they were voting on, the possible consequences of the vote or even why they voted how they did

    135
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ian McNally
    Favourite Ian McNally
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 4:51 PM

    *Shame

    52
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute KevJ
    Favourite KevJ
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 4:53 PM

    I doubt half of them even read the whole bill.

    71
    See 5 more replies ▾
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Richard Sweeney
    Favourite Richard Sweeney
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 5:20 PM

    How can we find out who voted and what way they voted?

    40
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute shane o'donnell
    Favourite shane o'donnell
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 8:10 PM
    13
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute John Moylan
    Favourite John Moylan
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 8:21 PM

    …they didn’t read it cos Fidelma forgot the Whiffy code. again….

    18
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Stephen Devlin
    Favourite Stephen Devlin
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 8:40 PM

    After she was R/Fraped on Facebook

    12
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute family guy
    Favourite family guy
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 11:19 PM

    As long as I can still see the sexy ladies tis grand!!

    3
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Watcher-on-the-Wall
    Favourite Watcher-on-the-Wall
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 5:21 PM

    Laying the groundwork for TTIP…

    77
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute JohnAbbs
    Favourite JohnAbbs
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 5:38 PM

    You certainly hit the nail on the head with that one.

    The US just signed the Cisa Cybersecurity bill yesterday …27 October

    Cisa would “allow ‘voluntary’ sharing of heretofore private information with the government, allowing secret and ad hoc privacy intrusions in place of meaningful consideration of the privacy concerns of all Americans,” the professors wrote.

    The data in question would come from private industry, which mines everything from credit card statements to prescription drug purchase records to target advertising and tweak product lines. Indeed, much of it is detailed financial and health information the government has never had access to in any form. The bill’s proponents said the data would be “anonymized”.

    http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/27/cisa-cybersecurity-bill-senate-vote

    37
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute niall mullins
    Favourite niall mullins
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 10:44 PM

    I think we’ll all end up partying like it’s 1984 sooner than anyone could imagine.

    10
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Peter Buchanan
    Favourite Peter Buchanan
    Report
    Oct 28th 2015, 4:54 PM

    Sounds like the Eurocrats really thought this one through….not

    45
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Mark Maken-Finlay
    Favourite Mark Maken-Finlay
    Report
    Oct 29th 2015, 12:23 AM

    The internet was bad enough with a small number of companies buying up everything in site but its rightly f##cked now. This only favours big business. Just a few fig leaves thrown in to make it seem reasonable.

    3
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Killian Forde
    Favourite Killian Forde
    Report
    Oct 29th 2015, 3:53 PM

    Amazing the admission from MEPs that they voted for full package as they were so keen to get the, voter popular, roaming free charges in place. Incredibly short sighted, as for the comment from KevJ that it would be amazing if “half of them read the bill” – not a hope in hell. From experience the number of those MEP who read the bill would be somewhere in the region of a dozen or so.

    Most of the MEPs would have been handed a sheet from their EP political groups. On the sheet is the title of the legislation being voted on then a series of numbers (indicating the amendment) and ‘guidance’ from the parties on whether to Yes, No or Abstain.

    1
Submit a report
Please help us understand how this comment violates our community guidelines.
Thank you for the feedback
Your feedback has been sent to our team for review.
JournalTv
News in 60 seconds