Meeting with superiors general of women’s religious orders, Pope Francis arrived in a wheelchair — the first time he has used one publicly at the Vatican.

Sister Thea Bowman, one of six Black Catholics known as a “Servant of God” now that their sainthood causes are being advanced, has plenty of lessons to impart from her life to Catholics today, said panelists at a Georgetown University dialogue May 4 that featured not only personal perspectives but was also peppered with song.

Crowds arrived in Washington shortly after the online news site Politico published a report late May 2 from a leaked draft opinion signaling that the majority of Supreme Court justices seem set to overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 legal decision that legalized abortion in the country.

Warning that the Russian Orthodox patriarch should not “turn himself into Putin’s altar boy,” Pope Francis also said he would like to go to Moscow to meet Vladimir Putin in an attempt to end the conflict in Ukraine.

The Supreme Court appears set to overturn its Roe v. Wade decision, which legalized abortion for nearly 50 years, according to a leaked initial draft of a court opinion obtained by Politico and published online the evening of May 2.

Pope Francis has given his safeguarding commission a “very clear” mandate to encourage and supervise the world’s bishops’ conferences in establishing survivor support centers and services, said Cardinal Seán P. O’Malley of Boston, president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors.

Catholic leadership should not neglect climate change in favor of social issues including abortion, a Georgetown University panel concluded April 27 in an online discussion about how to apply Pope Francis’ 2015 encyclical “Laudato Si’, on Care for Our Common Home.”

Families play an important role in a society’s development when ideologies are not imposed upon them, Pope Francis said.

Pope Francis asked his safeguarding commission to provide an annual audit of what the church is doing to protect minors and what needs to change, as well as to urge bishops’ conferences to set up special “centers” where victims can be heard and find accompaniment toward “healing and justice.”

Nearly 700 superiors general — 520 attending in person — will participate in the UISG plenary assembly May 2-6 in Rome under the theme, “Embracing Vulnerability on the Synodal Journey.”