U.S. Vice President JD Vance will be in Rome April 18 and has meetings planned with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and with Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state, his office said.

Pope Francis personally thanked the health care workers and medical staff who cared for him in Rome’s Gemelli hospital for 38 days while he recovered from respiratory infections.

The Vatican inaugurated a nursery school for children of Vatican employees April 14.

A new bronze sculpture installed in St. Peter’s Square, near the showers and medical clinic the Vatican runs for people in need, invites visitors to reflect on the sacredness of welcoming others, especially the marginalized.

The Gospel contains a great message of hope, “because it tells us that wherever we are lost and however we are lost, God always comes looking for us!” said the text for Pope Francis’ weekly general audience.

Pope Francis has raised the status of the Vatican’s diplomatic academy to an institute of higher learning that will issue academic degrees while also strengthening its focus on evangelization.

Pope Francis has ordered the suppression of the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, a Peru-based lay movement active across Latin America and the United States, and three related lay movements following decades of abuse allegations and internal investigations.

Pope Francis is going without supplemental oxygen for longer periods and is continuing therapy to recover his voice and to recover his physical strength, the Vatican press office said, but he also is increasing the number of private meetings he is holding with the heads of Vatican offices.

Catholic faithful do not “buy” Masses, but when a priest accepts an offering and promises to celebrate a Mass for that person’s loved one or other special intention he must do so, the Vatican said.

Pope Francis advanced the sainthood causes of one woman and five men, including Antoni Gaudí, the Spanish architect who designed the Sagrada Familia Basilica in Barcelona, Spain.