Catholic News Service

People's hearts and the entire church must be wide open to wonder and devotion to Christ and ready to embrace everyone — sinner and saint alike, Pope Francis said.

Pope Francis told a group of priests studying in Rome that if they do not want to be pastors, spending time with the faithful, they should request dismissal from the priesthood and concentrate on academics instead.

The House of Hansen, an unassuming small business in Chicago in business for over 100 years, makes and supplies vestments and liturgical wear — like bishops' mitres and zucchettos — to clergy locally and around the country.

New canon law provisions approved by Pope Francis are expected to help the Catholic Church safeguard against abuse.

The United States added Vatican City State to its list of countries that conform to international standards regarding the verification of the identity of persons conducting financial transactions through its institutions, including the so-called Vatican bank.

An Indonesian archbishop in Christian-majority Papua province says he was twice targeted this year by Islamic militants who planned to meet with him and blow themselves up.

On the final day of a historic meeting of bishops and international Catholic organizations gathered at Mundelein Seminary outside of Chicago, they discussed the challenges the church faces even while trying to get Catholics to understand church teaching on migrants.

"God is always with us, in good and beautiful times and in difficult times, when we are happy or when we have a sadness," Archbishop José H. Gomez of Los Angeles told unaccompanied immigrant children at a Mass May 30.

Based on responses to a questionnaire sent to all U.S. dioceses, the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate estimates there are about 19,000 deacons in the United States today. The number, though, is dropping, mirroring trends seen in religious life and the priesthood for the past half-century.

Ahead of a May 30 ecumenical prayer service to recall the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921, Bishop David A. Konderla said it was important "to pause and reflect on how such an unspeakable horror could take place so that we can avoid any such evil in our own day."

Bishops in Baltimore and Washington announced June 2 they would lift the dispensation of the Sunday and holy day Mass obligation that was granted at the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020.

The recent arrest of a Vatican-approved bishop, priests and seminarians in north-central China came as a shocking development, if not surprising, as religious persecution in the communist-led country has continued to intensify under President Xi Jinping.

"Even if our prayers were only mutterings, if they were compromised by a wavering faith, we must never stop trusting in him," the pope said June 2 during his weekly general audience.

"This present moment invites a bold response from the church, grounded in the spirit and in fidelity to the Gospel," said Bishop Seitz. "No more than we can close our eyes to the evil of abortion, can we close our eyes to the suffering of our immigrant brothers and sisters and the disregard for their human rights."

Pope Francis offered his condolences and prayers after the death of Cardinal Cornelius Sim of Brunei, who had been created a cardinal only six months earlier.

Bishop Barber was not injured but was very shaken up. The Oakland Police Department is investigating the incident.

Reaching the finish line of a monthlong rosary marathon, Pope Francis again turned to Mary, asking her to untie specific knots that have individuals and the whole world tangled in suffering and difficulty, either because of the COVID-19 pandemic or people's selfish reactions to it.

The executive director of the Catholic Legal Immigration Network Inc. said she hopes to see the Biden administration use the U.S. vice president's forthcoming trip to Mexico and Guatemala as opportunity to correct historic wrongs in the region.

Water is indispensable for health of humans and ecosystems, but dry weather and contamination threaten supplies in California.

Typically, Memorial Day is intended as a time to honor those soldiers who have made the ultimate sacrifice for their country, though any veteran who served in a military branch for at least two years is eligible for a military funeral.