Religion News Service

To learn his new role, Smith connected with the Catholic Labor Network, a nonprofit that promotes the cause of workers and Catholic social teaching in labor unions and parishes. 

While borrowing Catholic tropes to take whacks at the church is "nothing new," he noted, others have done it better.

"I agree online church is an intriguing idea to include families and individuals affected by disability," I said, leaning back in my chair. "But I don't think it can work."

Bishop Joseph Strickland of the Diocese of Tyler, Texas, has become well-known for challenging advocates for abortion rights and those who want to make the COVID-19 vaccines mandatory. But last month, he took a step that defied usual protocol: He challenged his fellow bishops.

Thomas Reese: Too many Catholic prelates clearly failed when they put the themselves, their priests or the institution ahead of the lives of children. How badly they sinned, I will leave to God, but there is no doubt that they need to apologize.

The U.S. Catholic bishops are frequently at odds with President Joe Biden, the second Catholic president in U.S. history. They unite with Republicans and evangelical leaders in fighting him on abortion and the application of LGBTQ rights to religious institutions. However, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops did not hesitate to acknowledge Biden’s win. 

Book interview: Susan Dunlap holds a weekly prayer service at a shelter for people without homes. Her book Shelter Theology describes their spiritual lives. Dunlap speaks about her ministry and her book in this interview.

The liberal group Catholics for Choice staged a protest outside the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception the evening of Jan. 20, projecting messages in support of abortion rights onto the building's walls as an anti-abortion vigil was in progress inside.

 Pope Francis "hit out at 'cancel culture,'" as one headline put it. But the pontiff wasn't complaining about how the twitterverse had banished Ellen DeGeneres or urged a boycott of Dr. Seuss.

Phyllis Zagano: Francis and Vatican officials have repeatedly refuted claims that COVID-19 vaccines are morally tainted. That so many lay Catholics and clerics are ignoring church teachings demonstrates a large leak in the barque of Peter.

Sir Sidney Poitier changed the film world on the way to changing the larger world. Before Poitier's movies, "Black characters were jolly statuary — hoisting luggage, serving food, tending children — meant to decorate a white American's dream."

Beginning this week and continuing until Lent, Catholics will be listening to the Gospel of Mark at weekday Eucharists.

Southern Ohio is home to more than 70 earthworks constructed by the Indigenous Adena and Hopewell cultures. But the mounds have also taken on significance for other spiritual groups, who say they should be open to all.

In a paper published in December, Elizabeth Schrader and Joan Taylor argue that Magdalene, instead of referring to Mary's town of origin, may be an honorific from the Hebrew and Aramaic roots for "tower" or "magnified."

Jesuit Fr. Thomas Reese: Recent scientific discoveries about the universe suggest it may be time to update our theological imaginations about humanity's, and Earth's, place within it.

As Democrats struggle to revive talks over the stalled Build Back Better bill, Sen. Joe Manchin is facing pushback from religious groups frustrated by his support for work requirements for the child tax credit.

The Vatican’s Pontifical Academy for Life defended the COVID-19 vaccine and called out those who spread “malinformation” to discredit the vaccine as peddling “pure nonsense.”

Community is more than gathering; it is more than numbers. Community is about belonging to self and other, a kind of democratized space and place that creates conditions for radical flourishing.

As a pandemic continues to beset the world, the economy blindsides us, and our cultural and political polarization worsens, we need someone like Cohen to help us answer: How did we get here?

The Catholic Diocese of Discord — where they "discuss theology, troll Protestants, play Minecraft, and pray the rosary" — may be the only U.S. Catholic community that has attracted most of its members through internet memes.