world news
Oregon’s fire: Most churches safe, for now, offering shelter
While the foothills of Oregon’s Cascade Mountains have been ablaze, creating red apocalyptic skies and leaving five small towns in ashes, most of the churches in the Archdiocese of Portland have not burned and many have offered shelter to thousands of evacuees.
Common good, not greed, must motivate search for vaccine, pope says
The common good — and not political or economic gain — should be at the heart of the race to find a vaccine for COVID-19, Pope Francis said.
New U.K. survey: 4 percent of Catholics will not return to church after pandemic
Only a small minority of British Catholics said they would not return to worship in church when the coronavirus pandemic is fully over, according to a new survey.
Report abuse learned in confession or go to jail, says Australian state
A new law requires priests in the state of Queensland to break the seal of confession to report child sex abuse to police or face three years in jail.
St. Damien’s relatives speak up against criticism of saint’s statue in U.S. Capitol
Upset by the suggestion raised by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-New York, that St. Damien was a white supremacist colonizer, two of the saint’s Belgian relatives, representing his extended family, wrote her an open letter Aug. 20.
Virtual pilgrimage, concrete donation: Holy Land Catholics ask for help
Franciscan Father Francesco Patton, custos of the Holy Land, asked Catholics around the world to make a virtual pilgrimage to the Holy Land and make a real donation to support the church in the region.
Gossip is tool of the devil to divide the church, pope says
Gossip is “a plague worse than COVID,” Pope Francis said, asserting that while speaking ill of others comes almost naturally, it is a tool of the devil to divide the church.
Pope accepts resignation of bishop-designate of Duluth, following accusation
Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Father Michel J. Mulloy — who had been appointed but not installed as bishop of Duluth, Minnesota — after an allegation of sexual abuse was raised against him from the 1980s when he was a priest in South Dakota.
Pope will sign new encyclical in Assisi Oct. 3
Pope Francis will travel to Assisi Oct. 3 to sign an encyclical on the social, political and economic obligations that flow from a belief that all people are children of God and therefore brothers and sisters to one another.
Profit over safety, especially in pandemic, ‘unjust,’ says Labor Day statement
Given the “somber” realities imposed by the coronavirus pandemic, for companies to put profits over safety is “unjust,” said Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City, chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, in the U.S. bishops’ annual Labor Day statement.