The Christmas season can be challenging for those in addiction recovery, but sacramental grace and practical strategies can keep those seeking sobriety on track, pastoral experts told OSV News.

FBI Director Christopher Wray sparred with Republicans during testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee Dec. 5 about a leaked and withdrawn memo from the bureau’s Richmond, Virginia, field office about political extremism in some Catholic groups.

The victims are urging world leaders to immediately disburse loss and damage funds while they meet at the U.N. Climate Change Conference, or COP28, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, from Nov. 30 to Dec. 12.

This December, when Catholic villagers in northern Ivory Coast are preparing for Christmas, many will be organizing Advent food and supplies for the nearly 42,000 refugees who have fled into their country from the Sahel, said the head of the Commission of Integral Human Development for the bishops of Ivory Coast.

The University of Notre Dame has selected a new president who said he hopes to position the school as an “ever-greater engine of insight, innovation and impact.”

As Catholics across the New York metropolitan area were given the opportunity to light their first candle of the Advent season the weekend of Dec. 2-3, a flame drawn from a source that dates back 1,000 years arrived at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens.

In the face of Nicaragua’s authoritarian regime, “the prophetic voice of the Catholic Church cannot be underestimated,” said an opposition leader recently exiled to the U.S., who joined fellow speakers at a Dec. 1 presentation on the church’s role in preserving democratic freedom.

The world needs people to build alliances that are not against others, but are in favor of everyone, Pope Francis told faith leaders at the U.N. Climate Change Conference being held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

The end of the temporary cease-fire agreement between Israel and Hamas “means death, destruction, misery,” Pope Francis said.

A deadly bomb that exploded during a Mass Dec. 3 killed at least four people and injured dozens at a university in a predominantly Muslim city in southern Philippines.