A Catholic Nobel Peace Prize winner who was unexpectedly freed from jail in Belarus has paid tribute to supporters who helped secure his release, while warning that over a thousand political prisoners still languish in his country’s penal colonies.

Christmas is a reminder that people can encounter God in ordinary, everyday places, Pope Leo XIV said.

Two gunmen targeted Jewish beachgoers at an event celebrating the first day of Hanukkah in an apparent terror attack at Sydney’s Bondi Beach, New South Wales police said.

The Nativity scene and the Christmas tree are signs of faith and hope, Pope Leo XIV said.

Even in difficult situations and harsh places, like prisons, when people focus on caring for one another, respecting each other and offering forgiveness, “beautiful flowers spring forth from the ‘hard ground’ of sin and suffering,” Pope Leo XIV said.

Hong Kong’s prominent Catholic, media tycoon and pro-democracy campaigner Jimmy Lai has been convicted of national security offenses under the city’s controversial national security law.

Condemning the attack on Jews celebrating Hanukkah in Sydney, Pope Leo XIV said, “Enough with these forms of antisemitic violence! We must eradicate hatred from our hearts.”

Bishop Bruce A. Lewandowski of Providence offered prayers for “all affected by this tragedy” in the wake of a Dec. 13 shooting at Brown University that left two students dead and nine others injured.

Across the street from the B.H. Whipple Federal Building at Fort Snelling along the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, people gathered with paintings of Our Lady of Guadalupe on her feast day, Dec. 12, for a special prayer service for those detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

As Advent unfolds in the far north, Bishop Erik Varden says the season’s power lies not in cheerfulness but in hope—”light shining at the darkest point of the night.”