The University of Notre Dame is investigating anonymous allegations of abuse posted online regarding a campus rector of a women’s residence hall.

The waters of the Straits of Mackinac between Lake Huron and Lake Michigan present themselves in beautifully variegated blues. Dark indigo, rich cobalt and bright turquoise greet the passenger ferries as they sail toward the pebbled shoreline of Mackinac Island. As the boats near the docks, the well-kept, sloping green lawn of Marquette Park comes into view.

Francisco Bocel remembers the night three assassins forced him to bring them to Father Stanley Rother. Bocel shared how he still carries that traumatic moment with him — one of many being featured — in an upcoming documentary on the life of the slain priest.

A new mosaic of Our Lady of Gietrzwald was inaugurated in the Vatican Gardens in a June 30 ceremony attended by Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, and Archbishop Tadeusz Wojda, president of the Polish bishops’ conference, who said the installation could deepen ties between Poland and the Holy See.

Ahead of an upcoming hearing on his nomination to lead the Department of Justice, a national pro-life group urged Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche to side with states challenging a federal policy permitting mifepristone, sometimes called the abortion pill, to be dispensed through the mail.

In a decision described as a brave and generous witness of fidelity to his little flock, Bishop Yunan Tombe Trille Kuku Andali is staying on in the Sudanese city of El-Obeid, even as organizations warned that the North Kordofan’s state capital was increasingly being encircled by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, and its allies.

Preparations are underway in Norway to open a canonization cause for the Nobel Prize-winning novelist Sigrid Undset, Bishop Fredrik Hansen of Oslo announced July 8.

In Canada’s province of Québec, Bill 21, officially known as “An Act Respecting the Laicity of the State,” prohibits public servants in positions of authority — such as teachers, police officers, and government lawyers and judges — from wearing religious symbols at work. The law also extends the ban to staff at subsidized day cares, private schools and professional development centers.

Father Mike Schmitz entered the green room of the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale with his characteristic warm smile — and an extra bounce in his step.

Promising to “guard the deposit of faith pure and entire” and to “encourage the holy people of God and to guide them in the way of salvation,” Bishop Gary R. Studniewski and Bishop Robert P. Boxie III were ordained July 7 as auxiliary bishops of the Archdiocese of Washington.