Catholic News Service

Pope Francis offered prayers for the victims of Hurricane Eta, which deluged Central America, claimed at least 50 lives and caused widespread flooding and property damage.

The reprieve for Pervis Payne was granted "due to the challenges and disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic," Gov. Lee said. Payne, a 53-year-old Black man, has always claimed his innocence in the 1987 murder of a mother and daughter, for which he was convicted and sentenced to death.

 The Knights of Malta have elected Fra' Marco Luzzago, a native of Brescia, Italy, and a member of the order since 1975, as its interim head.

Vigano, who served as apostolic nuncio to the United States from 2011 to 2016, published his testimony in August 2018 calling on Pope Francis to resign, claiming the pope knew about McCarrick's sexual misconduct and yet eased restrictions on McCarrick's ministry and travel.

Fr. Michael Joncas was watching President-elect Joe Biden's victory speech Nov. 7, but not even he was expecting Biden to quote from his well-known hymn "On Eagle's Wings."

The bishop of the Delaware Catholic diocese where Joe Biden has worshipped for decades offered congratulations and his hopes that voters heed the Gospel's call for unity.

When the death of Alex Trebek — beloved longtime host of "Jeopardy!" — was announced, celebrities and fans around the country took to social media to express their grief.

After armed men abducted Cardinal Christian Tumi along with a dozen other people in the northwest region of Cameroon Nov. 5, local reports said he was released Nov. 6.

The Election Day defeat of Rep. Collin Peterson, D-Minnesota, will shrink the number of pro-life Democrats in the House of Representatives by two when the 117th Congress is seated in January.

In Italy, a person's support for — or opposition to — Pope Francis has a stronger connection to their political affiliation or worldview than to their faith, a recent survey concluded.

Questions have been raised about how the church should determine whether a lay movement should be reformed or dissolved when there is abuse or corruption.

A Catholic bishop in Belarus accused President Alexander Lukashenko of "insult and slander" after Lukashenko charged the church's exiled archbishop with planning to "destroy the country" and called for a bar on foreign clergy.

Cardinal-designate Felipe Arizmendi Esquivel, 80, was among the 13 churchmen named to the College of Cardinals Oct. 25. Arizmendi's project of building a native church in a mostly indigenous diocese caused conflict with the church hierarchy and land-owning elites, but has found new appreciation since the election of Pope Francis.

The Supreme Court seemed willing to find a compromise about a Catholic social service agency shut out from Philadelphia's foster care program for not accepting same-sex couples as foster parents. 

Churches in the Philippines opened their doors to offer shelter to some of the hundreds of thousands of people who fled their homes to avoid the wrath of Super Typhoon Goni that struck the Bicol region in southern Luzon. Some of the victims were buried alive by mudslides around a volcano.

Caritas, the church's charitable agency, was responding to Hurricane Eta, which hit Nicaragua Nov. 3 and threatened to provoke devastating flooding and destruction as it moved through Central America.

Prayer has the power to take all those things in life that seem like a condemnation and turn them into something good, Pope Francis said.

As COVID-19-related deaths in Italy reached their highest daily level since early May and Italy began enacting new restrictions to slow the spread, the Vatican decided it will once again close its museums to the public.

Bishops who want to establish a religious order in their dioceses must first obtain the written permission of the Holy See, Pope Francis said.

A lack of oversight and control over the Vatican Secretariat of State's investment activities may have facilitated some bad property deals, said Bishop Nunzio Galantino, president of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Holy See.