Luis Andres Henao

Religion and politics frequently overlap in Reading, an old industrial city in one of the most pivotal swing states of this year’s presidential election.

The 1959 Castro-led revolution installed an atheist, Communist government that sought to replace the Catholic Church as the guiding force in the lives of Cubans. But 65 years later, religion seems omnipresent in Cuba, in dazzling diversity.

"Cachita" is etched in tattoos, street murals, cartoons and other artwork on the island. She is revered in makeshift home altars, songs — and at her shrine some 500 miles (805 kilometers) east of Havana.

Most Latin Americans are Christian, and Catholicism remains the dominant religion; about two-thirds of Argentina's 45 million people identify as Catholic. But the church's influence has waned. There's discontent following clergy sex abuse scandals and opposition to the church's stances against abortion and LGBTQ rights.

A new study finds most adults in the U.S. consider the Earth sacred and believe God gave humans a duty to care for it. But highly religious Americans are far less likely than other U.S. adults to express concern about global warming.

The top leader of Ukrainian Catholics in the US and Ukraine's ambassador to the nation made an appeal to the world for more weapons to fight against Russia's invasion and aid to address the worsening humanitarian crisis.

According to a survey released Dec. 14 by the Pew Research Center, the group commonly known as the "nones" — the religiously unaffiliated — now constitute 29% of American adults. That's up from 23% in 2016 and 19% in 2011.

The movement fighting climate change knows no denominational boundaries. Faith leaders see it as part of their mandate to care for communities most vulnerable to climate change and preserve what they see as a divinely given environment.

Fr. Joseph Dutan estimated that dozens of St. Brigid's parishioners have been infected and said that at least three have died from COVID-19 complications since the death of Fr. Jorge Ortiz, his mentor and the first Catholic priest in the United States to die from the novel coronavirus.

One is a Roman Catholic church in Queens; the other, a Lutheran church in Manhattan. But the COVID-19 pandemic has united the two Hispanic congregations in grief.