With the COVID-19 pandemic still underway and with restrictions on gatherings still in place in some countries, the Vatican has again extended the period of time when people can earn a plenary indulgence for visiting a cemetery and praying for the souls of the faithful in purgatory.

Ahead of President Joe Biden’s Oct. 29 meeting with Pope Francis, panelists in a webinar offered mostly praise for Biden’s sincerity and what they said is his commitment to his Catholic faith.

Pope Francis is willing to travel to Canada as part of “the long-standing pastoral process of reconciliation with Indigenous peoples,” the Vatican press office said.

Almost 60 years have passed since a Catholic president of the United States visited a pope at the Vatican.

Pope Francis denounced the “inhuman violence” waged against migrants, refugees and other displaced peoples in Libya, and called for an end to sending people back to unsafe countries.

As Haitians seek to rebuild their country, “it is imperative that the international community take a shared and concrete interest in their plight,” the Vatican’s U.N. nuncio said during an informal meeting of the Security Council on Haiti’s dire situation.

Retired Pope Benedict XVI has hinted at his death in a condolence message for a former colleague who was a professor in Regensburg, Germany.

Pope Francis said he knows “it often annoys people” when he promotes Catholic teaching on social issues like poverty, migration and ecology, but he is going to keep doing so because the Gospel demands it.

All health care professionals have a right to conscientious objection, just as they have a right to denounce unjust harm inflicted on innocent and defenseless life, Pope Francis said.

With the news that Pope John Paul I would soon be beatified, Twitter and other social media were filled — again — with the question: Has being pope become a shortcut to canonization?