Religion News Service

With its dwindling rates of attendance at religious services and rising numbers of churches shuttered or sold, Western Europe seems to be the region of the world where the outlook for faith is bleakest.

The overwhelming vote in Ireland in favor of allowing access to abortion shows that the pro-life movement needs a new strategy. 

At a dinner last year with prominent evangelical Christians in the Blue Room of the White House, Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, invited their table mates to discuss the issues most important to them.

According to some Catholic thinkers, the sheer size, influence and global reach of the Catholic Church, combined with the popularity of Pope Francis, position it to play an outsized role in shaping future conversations about AI. 

Two prominent Democratic U.S. senators, both possible presidential hopefuls, addressed a gathering of pastors this week, pairing religion with politics in an unusually direct appeal to left-leaning Christians.

Soon, Pope Francis will have chosen almost half the men who will pick his successor. On June 29, he will create 14 new cardinals, continuing to break tradition by passing over the archbishops of large European and American archdioceses. 

Signs of the Times: The pope acknowledges that living the Beatitudes means "going against the flow" of the world. Francis urges us to let the Lord's words "unsettle us, to challenge us and to demand a real change in the way we live."

Tony Perkins, the head of the conservative Christian lobbying group Family Research Council, has been appointed to a U.S. government commission dedicated to "defending the universal right to freedom of religion or belief abroad."

Under sweltering 94-degree heat in front of the General Assembly building, a hardy group of progressive activists gathered to revive the 40-day Poor People's Campaign.

Signs of the Times: As a spiritual guide to those seeking to be better Christians, Pope Francis recognizes that many are tempted to follow the wrong paths to holiness. These are not bad people following the path of sin, but good people getting lost in the woods without a map.

The project showcases artwork made in Israel by African women seeking asylum in that country. They are part of Kuchinate, a collective that helps migrant women, including many victims of sexual violence, earn a living, receive counseling and find healing through art.

Militants killed a Roman Catholic priest this week in Bangui, Central African Republic where Catholic and other faith leaders had made headway recently mediating between factions.

From Washington to Wyoming, well-known clergy and grass-roots people of faith plan to gather Thursday (May 3) for the annual National Day of Prayer.

President Trump plans to unveil a new initiative that aims to give faith groups a stronger voice within the federal government and serve as a watchdog on religious liberty issues.

Most religious groups now support same-sex marriage being legal, according to a study released May 1 from the Public Religion Research Institute.

James H. Cone, the scholar known as the "founder of black liberation theology," died April 28, Union Theological Seminary announced.  He was 79.

Before he was pope, before he was archbishop of Buenos Aires, Francis spent much of his Jesuit life as a spiritual guide to young Jesuits. He was not a great theologian, although he was well read in theology. 

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom cited more than two dozen countries as main contributors to an "ongoing downward trend" in religious liberty worldwide.

A new Pew Research survey finds that a slim majority of Americans believe in the God of the Bible, while about one-third of Americans believe in another higher power or spiritual force.

The tables have turned under Pope Francis. And a new type of Catholic has formed: the conservative dissenter.  In the past, conservatives prided themselves on loyalty to the pope and being in lockstep with all papal teachings, while progressives called for limits to papal power.