OSV News

Costa Rica has declared a state of emergency due to the unprecedented flow of migrants transiting the Central American country -- a plan Catholic relief officials described as coming after a slow response to the growing "humanitarian crisis."

In Brazil, 12 million families -- up to 60 million people -- live in slums, known as "favelas" in Portuguese, and 55 million people do not have access to a sewage system.

Advocates say getting rid of the statute of limitations for victims of child sexual abuse is a matter of moral justice, but the Archdiocese of Boston says the move will hurt its own efforts to help sexual abuse victims.

Auxiliary Bishop Kevin M. Birmingham of Chicago, former secretary to Chicago Cardinal Blase J. Cupich, died unexpectedly Oct. 2 at age 51. He was just a few days shy of his 52nd birthday.

The Archdiocese of Mobile, Alabama, has launched its own investigation regarding disgraced priest Fr. Alex Crow, who fled his pastoral assignment in July and traveled to Italy with a recent female graduate of an archdiocesan high school, and who remains with her in that country.

A pair of priests have been reported abducted from their parishes in Nicaragua as the country's increasingly totalitarian regime continues cracking down on the Catholic Church and silencing all dissenting voices.

The chairman of the U.S. bishops' migration committee commended President Joe Biden for increasing the number of refugees eligible to enter the U.S.

Despite Pope Francis' advocacy for caring for creation, U.S. Catholics are no more likely than other Americans to view climate change as "a serious problem," according to new data from the Pew Research Center.

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1992 in the "Year of the Woman" and broke gender barriers throughout her long career in local and national politics, died Sept. 28 at age 90. 

More than 66,000 people -- over half of the total population of 120,000 -- have fled Nagorno-Karabakh as of Sept. 27, abandoning the historic Armenian enclave (known in Armenian by its ancient name, Artsakh) located in southwestern Azerbaijan and internationally recognized as part of that nation.

Imprisoned Nicaraguan Bishop Rolando Álvarez has been nominated for the European Parliament's top human rights award, reflecting the international attention the prelate has received for defending religious freedom and becoming the face of resistance in an increasingly totalitarian country.
 

At the beginning of the 10th month of 2023, Florida might execute its sixth death-row inmate of the year; a person whose lawyers and death penalty foes say has suffered from intellectual disabilities and carries a deep sense of remorse.

The 2023 Farm Bill should prioritize food security measures both in the United States and abroad, Catholic activists said.

A surge in migration through Mexico during the month of September has provoked a "migratory crisis," according to Catholics who are working with migrants, as shelters strain to handle increasing flows of people heading for the U.S. border -- with even more continuing to pour into the country from points south.

The Biden administration has made a bid to support both clean energy and jobs for young people with the creation of the American Climate Corps. The announcement was greeted with "excitement and hope" by Kayla Jacobs, program manager of youth mobilization at Catholic Climate Covenant. "Initiatives like this are one of many steps that are needed for a sustainable and just future," she said.

A U.S. Ukrainian Catholic archbishop was honored by Ukraine's president for his decades-long efforts to foster that nation's development.

The United Nations held its first-ever "Climate Ambition Summit" Sept. 20 — a conference that included 41 countries, but excluded both the United States and China because the U.N. invited only leaders from nations with concrete plans to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions.

Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett discussed the importance of academic freedom and offered career advice in remarks to law students at The Catholic University of America Columbus School of Law in Washington Sept. 21.

Iraq's Chaldean Catholic Cardinal Louis Sako said he would like more Vatican support as he tries to regain formal recognition as the Chaldean patriarch in the country.

Grim developments on the southern U.S. border and the "frustrating" lack of immigration reform were on the minds of some 1,500 Southern California Catholics at the annual Mass in Recognition of All Immigrants Sept. 17 at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels.