Pope Francis Archives

This tiny minority of Iraqis follows an ancient Gnostic religion – and there’s a chance they could be your neighbors too

Like their ancient ancestors, contemporary Mandaeans revere John the Baptist and consider baptism the most important of their religious rituals. Hadi Mizban/AP James F. McGrath, Butler University In March 2021 Pope Francis became the first leader of the Roman Catholic Church to visit Iraq. The number of Christians in Iraq has fallen sharply in the past two decades amid mass …

Lily Hamourtziadou, Birmingham City University Recording casualties during a conflict can provide a body of evidence of how violence has affected particular communities or groups, such as the Yazidis in Iraq and the Kurds in Syria. When the Islamic State entered Iraq in 2014, they immediately started committing gross human rights violations and displayed violence of an increasingly sectarian nature …