Pope Francis will open a Lenten prayer and penance initiative at a Rome parish March 17 rather than in St. Peter’s Basilica as in past years.

Speaking to some 25,000 visitors gathered to pray the Angelus in St. Peter’s Square March 5, the pope reflected on the day’s Gospel reading from St. Matthew of Jesus’ Transfiguration, in which he appears to the disciples in radiant glory.

Human traffickers must be stopped from risking the lives of migrants traveling in search of a better future, Pope Francis said.

The number of Catholics and permanent deacons in the world rose in 2021, while the number of seminarians, priests, and men and women in religious orders declined, according to Vatican statistics.

In the first Lenten reflection for the Roman Curia delivered by Cardinal Raniero Cantalamessa March 3, the Capuchin friar said that Vatican II showed the church how “to walk through history, alongside humanity, trying to discern the signs of the times.”

For the month of March, the pope dedicated his prayer intention for the victims of abuse. Child Abuse Prevention Month is observed in April in the United States.

Along with the Our Father sung at the end of his weekly general audience or his Sunday Angelus in St. Peter’s Square, Pope Francis has added to these public events for the last year his own heartfelt prayers for the martyred people of Ukraine.

Pope Francis praised the late Auxiliary Bishop David G. O’Connell of Los Angeles for his “profound concern for the poor, immigrants and those in need” in a telegram following his murder.

As Pope Francis prepares to mark the tenth anniversary of his pontificate in March, one hallmark of his papacy has been to make both sides of the American political aisle “uncomfortable,” panelists, including Washington’s Cardinal Wilton Gregory, said at a Feb. 28 event hosted by Georgetown University’s Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life.

The work of journalists is to listen and convey the truth of what was really said, Pope Francis told a Catholic weekly magazine.