Religious Freedom

In the 25 years since the U.S. International Religious Freedom Act became law, “restrictions on religious freedom have been steadily increasing for several years” around the globe, said the chairmen of the U.S. bishops’ religious liberty and international policy committees.

Plans for the “Casa USA” campus — with backing from other Catholic health care organizations, individuals and the patronage of Lansing Bishop Earl A. Boyea — call for duplicating Padre Pio’s hospital complex for the first time outside of Italy, including an exact replica of the original friary church of the Capuchin Franciscan who is also known as St. Pius of Pietrelcina.

A U.S. lawmaker and a Catholic bishop are calling for action to end a months-long blockade that has left some 120,000 ethnic Armenians at risk of what he and other experts are calling “genocide by starvation.”