Quotes and news

The Vatican won the 2008 Euro Solar Prize for turning the football field-sized roof of its Paul VI audience hall into a giant solar-power generator. A European association promoting renewable energy presented the award to Cardinal Giovanni Lajolo, president of the commission governing Vatican territory.

The association's president, Hermann Scheer, said he hoped the Vatican's new solar-panel roof, which will produce some 300,000 kilowatt-hours of power per year, will inspire more governments, businesses and individuals to promote and support renewable energy.

New bioethics document

Catholic News Service said the Vatican plans to issue a new document on bioethics on December 12 that addresses human cloning, stem-cell research and other issues, according to its sources. The document has been designed to examine current scientific developments in this area in the light of Catholic moral teaching.

Moving the sign of peace

Cardinal Francis Arinze, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, told the official Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano on Friday that Pope Benedict is consulting with the world's bishops about moving the sign of peace given during Mass.

The proposal to move the sign of peace to the offertory would permit a more recollected atmosphere before the reception of Holy Communion, Cardinal Arinze said.

Japanese martyrs beatified

One-hundred-and-eighty-eight Japanese martyrs were beatified during Mass in Nagasaki, Japan. The 17th-century martyrs were tortured and killed in several cities between 1606 and 1639 after the Japanese government outlawed Christianity.

Vatican Radio reported more than 30,000 people attended the ceremony in the city's baseball stadium to celebrate the beatification of Jesuit Peter Kibe Kasui and 187 companions.

Rabbi defends Pius XII

Another Jewish Rabbi came to the defence of Pope Pius XII. Rabbi Eric Silver of Temple Beth David wrote his pro-Pius comments in the latest edition of Connecticut's weekly Jewish newspaper. Rabbi Silver said "We studied the documents in the Vatican's archives and had eyewitness interviews, and what we learned was truly world-shaking. There is nobody who did more to rescue Jews than Pius." He added that Holocaust architect Adolf Eichmann was frustrated by the Pope.