Associated Press

A University of Notre Dame professor has filed a defamation lawsuit against a student-run publication over news coverage of her abortion-rights work. The case is raising questions about press freedom and academic freedom at one of the nation's preeminent Catholic institutions of higher education.

Two key Vatican investigators have begun an audit in Peru’s capital of a secretive Roman Catholic society with chapters across South America and in the U.S. following allegations that its founder sexually molested young recruits.

The Vatican prosecutor asked a court July 26  to convict 10 people, including a cardinal, of a range of financial crimes, sentence them to three to 13 years in prison and order the confiscation of some 415 million euros ($460 million) to pay the Holy See back for bad investments and financial losses over the past decade.

The Jesuits said that a famous artist priest is definitively expelled from the religious order for sexually, spiritually and psychologically abusing women, and lamented they couldn't prosecute him more vigorously under the Vatican's internal procedures.

The Vatican prosecutor insisted July 18 that his indictments of 10 people, including a cardinal, for alleged financial crimes held up under two years of testimony, criticism and defense motions, as he began closing arguments in a trial that exposed the unseemly financial underbelly of the Holy See.

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Ogdensburg in northern New York said July 17 that it was filing for bankruptcy protection as it faces more than 100 lawsuits alleging sexual abuse.

The longtime secretary to the late Pope Benedict XVI won't be given a permanent job in the German archdiocese where he has settled, but will lead regular services at Freiburg's cathedral and can take on "individual assignments" such as confirmations, church authorities said July 17.

The young cardinal in charge of Mongolia’s tiny Catholic community said July 17 that Pope Francis' upcoming visit to a country with just 1,450 Catholics is evidence of his willingness to travel to the farthest corners of the globe to minister to even a handful of the faithful.

Pope Francis’ peace envoy was traveling to Washington on July 17 as part of the Holy See's peace initiatives for Ukraine, hoping to support humanitarian operations especially concerning children, the Vatican said July 17.

Three decades ago, the man named by Pope Francis to be the Catholic Church's new guardian of doctrinal orthodoxy wrote a short book about kissing and the sensations it evokes. Some conservatives are using the volume to criticize the appointment of Cardinal-designate Victor Manuel Fernández to lead the Vatican's Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Archbishop Victor Manuel Fernández, chosen by Pope Francis to head the Vatican office that ensures doctrinal orthodoxy, conceded July 9 he made mistakes in handling a 2019 case of a priest accused of sexual abuse of minors.

Hong Kong’s newly named Roman Catholic cardinal said July 10 that he hopes for reconciliation and wants the city to give young people more hope following the economic downturn and a campaign to crush a pro-democracy movement.

Pope Francis travels to the periphery of Roman Catholicism later this summer when he becomes the first pontiff to visit Mongolia, a Central Asian nation squeezed between Russia and China with just 1,500 Catholics.

A U.S.-based group that tracks how the Catholic hierarchy deals with allegations of sexual abuse by clergy says Pope Francis made a "troubling" choice in appointing an Argentine prelate to a powerful Vatican office that handles such cases.

Pope Francis has set up a special commission tasked with identifying those he calls the "new martyrs" of the 21st century — Christians who have been slain in some cases simply for attending Mass or for helping the poor.

A former Catholic priest with a lengthy career at parishes across New Mexico has been arrested on criminal charges of coercion and enticement of a minor to engage in sexual activity through text messages, federal law enforcement authorities announced June 29.

The Supreme Court on June 29 used the case of a Christian mail carrier who did not want to work Sundays to solidify protections for workers who ask for religious accommodations.

Former Catholic Cardinal Theodore McCarrick is not competent to stand trial on charges accusing him of sexually assaulting a teenage boy in Massachusetts decades ago, an expert for the prosecution says, raising doubts about the future of the criminal case against the 92-year-old.

 Italy’s Parliament is poised to open a bicameral commission of inquiry into the disappearance of the teenage daughter of a Vatican employee, the third new investigation launched in the four decades since Emanuela Orlandi vanished on the streets of Rome.

More than half a million people formally left the Catholic Church in Germany last year, significantly higher than the previous record as the church wrestles with a long-running scandal over abuse by clergy and with calls for far-reaching reform.