The planned destruction of the families, languages, cultures and traditions of the Indigenous communities of Canada through the residential school system was “genocide,” Pope Francis said.

On a stage designed to evoke a qammaq — a traditional Inuit summer home built of whale ribs, sod and stone — Pope Francis again apologized to the Indigenous communities of Canada for Catholics’ complicity in breaking up their families and suppressing their languages.

“Critical” anti-trafficking legislation overwhelmingly approved by the House in a bipartisan vote July 26 “will go a long way toward protecting so many vulnerable people from exploitation while providing tremendous support and resources to victims,” said one of it is sponsors, Rep. Chris Smith, N.J.

In his first public comments since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned its nearly 50-year-old decision that legalized abortion, Justice Samuel Alito said writing the ruling was an “honor.”

When Pope Francis apologized to Canadian Indigenous for the ways in which many members of the church and of religious communities cooperated in projects of cultural destruction and forced assimilation at residential schools, Native Americans, like many Canadian Indigenous, said forgiveness was hard — despite their Catholic faith.

Ukrainians will fight for their statehood to the last and will not stop until they liberate the last meter of Ukrainian land, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a video address for Ukrainian Statehood Day July 28.

While commentators, politicians and survivors discussed whether Pope Francis’ apology for the Catholic Church’s role in running residential schools was enough, the pope insisted reconciliation requires faith, action and the courage to move forward.

Among the many environmental issues Pope Francis is concerned about, the one that “has shocked me the most,” he once said, is the way resources are increasingly being consumed faster than they can be regenerated.

In a British-built fort on the highest hill in Quebec City, Pope Francis spoke to Canadian government and cultural leaders about the never-ending challenge of multiculturalism.

The chairmen of four U.S. bishops committees said July 27 that proposed regulations from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services on abortion, transgender services and other procedures threaten the Catholic Church’s ability “to carry out our healing ministries” and others’ ability “to practice medicine.”