Catholic groups welcomed an announcement by the Biden administration confirming the May 23 end of a public health measure put in place at the start of the coronavirus pandemic that has kept asylum-seekers out.
Expressing "sorrow and shame" for the complicity of Catholics in abusing Indigenous children in Canada and helping in the attempt to erase their culture, Pope Francis pledged to address the issue more fully when he visits Canada.
Christians who truly imitate Jesus are more inclined to forgive and be merciful than those who, under the pretense of holiness, point fingers and condemn others, Pope Francis said.
Learning that his mother’s health had deteriorated in his native Ukraine, Yuri Ivan, music director at St. Constantine Ukrainian Catholic Church in Minneapolis, caught “the first plane” he could March 18 as he sought to cross the border into the country Russia had invaded only weeks before.
Bishop Jaime Soto of Sacramento, California, asked people to "invest" in being good neighbors and help restore peace after six people were fatally wounded in the worst mass shooting in California's sixth largest city, which also left at least 12 people injured April 3.
Videos of dead Ukrainian civilians, many apparently executed by Russian troops, are further evidence that "the struggle of Ukraine is a spiritual struggle against evil, against the devil and his servants," said Ukrainian Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk of Kyiv-Halych.
Pope Francis has named Cardinal Peter Turkson the new chancellor of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, two groups of top-level scholars and experts who promote studies on issues of concern to the Vatican.