Pope Leo XIV on Sunday will travel outside the Vatican to visit a Roman parish — the Basilica of Santa Maria Regina Pacis — in the seaside community of Ostia, about 17 miles southwest of the city’s center. A popular summer destination for tourists, Ostia will be the first of five parishes where the pope,…

Nearly half a dozen more bishops have joined the growing backlash against the University of Notre Dame over its controversial appointment of an outspoken abortion advocate to lead a university department. Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana, Bishop Kevin Rhoades on Feb. 11 issued a statement criticizing the university for appointing global affairs Professor Susan Ostermann as…

A group of senior European bishops on Friday issued an appeal urging Europe to “rediscover its soul” in response to what they described as a world “torn and polarized” by war and violence. The text, published Feb. 13, said many citizens are “anguished and disoriented” and warned that the international order is under threat. In…

The Diocese of Brooklyn will pursue a broad settlement with more than 1,000 alleged victims of Church abuse, Bishop Robert Brennan said on Feb. 12, with a well-known California judge set to help mediate the process. Unlike many U.S. dioceses that have faced hundreds of sex abuse claims and tens of millions of dollars in…

“The situation has worsened” in Nicaragua following the ban on pastoral missions in the Diocese of León and the tightening of restrictions on religious events held by the Catholic Church in Managua and other cities, according to Martha Patricia Molina, a Nicaraguan researcher in exile. The dictatorship of President Daniel Ortega and his wife and…

In his message for Lent 2026, Pope Leo XIV urges Catholics to listen more closely to God and others — and to “disarm” their language by fasting from words that wound. The Lenten season begins Feb. 18 with Ash Wednesday. In the message, released Feb. 13, the pope offers a simple definition of Lent as…