Catholic News Service

The Catholic Church will endure, despite the frailty and sins of its members, because it is God's project, Pope Francis said.

Cokie Roberts, a broadcast journalist and political commentator who spoke publicly about her Catholic faith and her admiration for the Sacred Heart sisters who taught her, died Sept. 17 due to complications from breast cancer. She was 75.

Pope Francis' call for church of missionary disciples who go to the peripheries to listen and accompany those most in need may have seemed radical and new at the start of his pontificate.

Acknowledging evidence that "for several generations" the Catholic Church has not sufficiently taught its core truths, Bishop Daniel R. Jenky has called for all ministries of the Diocese of Peoria to be "intentionally centered" on the Real Presence in the holy Eucharist.

A new private independent program set up to compensate victim-survivors of child sexual abuse by priests was rolled out Sept. 16 in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and five other participating Catholic dioceses in California.

Cardinal George Pell, the most senior Catholic cleric to be convicted of child sexual abuse offenses, has lodged an application with Australia's High Court to appeal his guilty verdict.

Sentencing someone to life in prison without the possibility of parole is "not the solution to problems, but a problem to solve," Pope Francis told Italian prison guards, prison chaplains and officials from the Ministry of Justice.

Members of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors meeting in Rome said there was a continued need to make safeguarding consistently part of the life of the church around the world.

God forgives sins so that joy, not sadness, can flourish once again in one's heart, Pope Francis said.

A large part of the exhibit at a Washington museum known as The Phillips Collection, focuses on the emotional toll as well as the dangers of such immigration journeys, and one experienced in modern times by a record 70.8 million around the world, fleeing war, persecution and conflict.

South African bishops called for action to end violence against women after a spate of killings and rapes sparked outrage in a country with one of the world's highest murder rates.

The Australian Catholic Church could face tens of millions dollars in compensation claims after the Diocese of Ballarat in Victoria state admitted, for the first time, it knew of the behavior of a pedophile priest yet continued to move him around from parish to parish.

A retired bishop already facing a Vatican trial for allegations that he sexually abused minors years ago is facing three new accusations of abuse, said the Diocese of Cheyenne, Wyoming.

A priest and a nurse working at a Catholic school in India's eastern state of Jharkhand have been held in custody after being charged with sexually abusing a 9-year-old girl.

The Supreme Court issued an unsigned order late Sept. 11 that will temporarily allow the Trump administration to enforce its new rule preventing many Central American migrants from seeking asylum in the United States, while the legal battle over this issue continues to work its way through the courts.

New bishops need to prepare for a life filled with God's surprises, with daily plans that change at the last minute and, especially, for a life dedicated to spending time with God and with the people, Pope Francis said.

The Synod of Bishops for the Amazon will help the Catholic Church make its presence felt and voice heard in a region that is dangerously approaching "a point of no return," said the special secretaries of the synod.

Pope Francis said the challenges facing humanity and the Earth are so urgent and important that he has invited world leaders, educators and young people to come to the Vatican next spring to launch a global alliance for building a new, more humane future.

The Field Hospital: When Bishop Lucius Hre Kung of Hakha, Myanmar, visited St. Barnabas Parish in Indianapolis two years ago, a mere six families comprised the parish's Hakha Chin Catholic refugee community.

Archbishop Bernard Hebda of St. Paul and Minneapolis will oversee an investigation of Bishop Michael Hoeppner of Crookston for allegedly thwarting a police or canonical investigation of clerical sexual misconduct.