Soon after being shoe-horned into the top ranks of Zimbabwe’s ruling party, the wife of aging leader Robert Mugabe has gained a PhD in orphanages, seen as the latest sign that she may be destined for high office.
In a country where the path to power is paved with academic letters, analysts said the timing of the first lady’s surprise qualification was no coincidence. Continue reading ‘Gucci Grace’ poised to lead post-Mugabe Zimbabwe
Independent Catholic News
By: Claire Bergin
The bishop of one of the largest dioceses in Ireland, has put on hold plans to introduce the Permanent Diaconate, after consulting with Pastoral Leadership groups, several of whom had protested that many functions of the proposed deaconate are already being performed by laywomen – who cannot apply to become deacons. Continue reading Irish Bishop halts plan for Permanent Diaconate after women protest
Action takes direct aim at center of global capitalism to call for complete paradigm shift to save planet from climate chaos
Just hours after roughly 400,000 packed the streets of New York City for the People’s Climate March, a flood of people marched to the city’s financial district to target what they say is the root of the climate crisis: capitalism itself. Continue reading #FloodWallStreet: Protesters Stage Mass Action to Confront Climate Profiteers
SAO PAULO (CNS) — Rayfran das Neves Sales, the convicted killer of U.S. Sister Dorothy Stang, was arrested Sept. 19. He was accused of being involved in the murders of three people in the northern state of Para. Sales served a little less than eight years of a 27-year sentence for shooting Sister Dorothy, a member of the Notre Dame de Namur Sisters who had U.S. and Brazilian citizenship. Sales had been under house arrest since June 2013 due to good behavior in prison. Sister Dorothy, 73, at the time of her death in 2005, was born in Dayton, Ohio. She had lived in the Amazon region for nearly four decades, working closely with the Brazilian bishops’ Pastoral Land Commission in favor of land rights for the poor and for sustainable development in the region.
The Peruvian government says it will investigate illegal logging along the Peru-Brazil border following the murder of four indigenous leaders.
The leaders were killed in early September, allegedly by loggers.
The Peruvian President of the Council of Ministers, Ana Jara Velasquez, announced a commission which she said would have powers to stop the logging. Continue reading Peru creates new anti-logging commission after murders
By Suvendrini Kakuchi
TOKYO, Sep 18 2014 (IPS) – Fifty-four-year-old Marlyn Maeda, an unmarried freelance writer living in Tokyo who never held a permanent job, is now watching her dream of aging independently go up in smoke.
“I work four jobs and barely survive,” said the writer, who disclosed only her penname to IPS. Her monthly income after writing articles, working at a call centre, selling cosmetics five days a week and working one night at a bar hovers at close to 1,600 dollars. Continue reading Can ‘Womenomics’ Stem the Feminisation of Poverty in Japan?
Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation 