As Ukraine enters its 11th year of confronting Russian aggression, the cross of Christ is “a tree of life (that) bears its fruit every day” in the besieged nation, said the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church.

After several months of legislative process, the French Congress, a special body composed of both chambers of parliament, revised the country’s 1958 constitution to enshrine women’s “guaranteed freedom” to abort in Article 34, making France the first country in the world to explicitly include the right to abortion in its constitution.

Security cameras, religious objects and windows were smashed in the monastery of The Grotto, the National Sanctuary of Our Sorrowful Mother, a 54-acre shrine operated by the Order of Friar Servants of Mary.

Trapped in a vortex of scandal, the Ferndale, Mich.-based Church Militant is shutting down, the concluding chapter for the online news outlet thanks to a legal drama set in motion by a fringe traditionalist group and its canon lawyer, who is accused of defaming a New Hampshire priest on the opposite side of a canonical dispute.

Crying out to God and demanding answers when one’s child dies is anything but a sign of a lack of faith, Pope Francis told a group of grieving Italian parents.

Prominent Russian Catholics have urged church members to continue condemning human rights violations after the funeral of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, despite warnings people who attended could face police reprisals.

Alabama lawmakers in both the state’s House and Senate Feb. 29 passed similar bills to implement legal protections to in vitro fertilization clinics following a ruling by that state’s Supreme Court that frozen embryos qualify as children under the state law’s wrongful death law.

Patriarchs and Heads of the Churches in Jerusalem condemned a “wanton attack” by Israeli soldiers against Palestinian civilians in Gaza City who were waiting for delivery of humanitarian aid Feb. 29. Gaza health authorities said the attack left more than 100 people dead.

Pope Francis repeated his call for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza and said the international community has a “moral duty” to pursue disarmament worldwide.

Just as Jesus drove out merchants from the temple in Jerusalem, Christians should cleanse themselves from a transactional relationship with God by developing an intimacy with him like that of a family in their home, Pope Francis said.