Catholic News Service

The "appalling sexual abuse" of children as young as 7 was covered up in two leading Benedictine-run schools in England to protect the reputations of predatory monks, a government-backed investigation concluded.

Members of the Catholic Church sin and give scandal, it's true, Pope Francis said, but it is up to each Catholic to live the faith as authentically as possible and witness to the world the love of Jesus.

"Tonight's execution of Billy Ray Irick was unnecessary. It served no useful purpose," Bishop J. Mark Spalding of Nashville and Bishop Richard Stika of Knoxville said in a statement after Irick was executed at Riverbend Maximum Security Institute in Nashville.

A group of young Catholics has urged the U.S. bishops to "take clear action" by conducting an independent investigation of who knew what and when about actions by Archbishop Theodore McCarrick, who has been accused of sexual abuse.

The Diocese of Greensburg unveiled Aug. 9 a document about safeguards and procedures in place to protect children, as the state of Pennsylvania gets ready to release a grand jury report about past claims of sexual abuse of children involving hundreds of priests and other church workers at six of the state's eight dioceses. 

A Jesuit priest who has been on the frontline of advocating for survivors of clerical sexual abuse said the crisis unfolding, again, in the United States is a summons to a new way of envisioning the church and taking responsibility for it.

An initiative to identify and properly treat children living with HIV has gained new momentum as international organizations and pharmaceutical companies respond to a Vatican push to look past profit to doing the right thing.

Following a 15-hour debate, the Argentine Senate voted 38-31 against a bill that would have decriminalized abortion during the first 14 weeks of pregnancy.

A last-minute round of legal maneuvering to keep some names from appearing in a grand jury report detailing a months-long investigation of clergy sex abuse claims in six Pennsylvania dioceses may have kept the document from being made public Aug. 8 -- the earliest date given for its possible release.

A top Vatican official urged young people at a local World Youth Day gathering to protect the planet and actively live the teachings of Pope Francis' encyclical on the environment.

Like the ancient Israelites, Christians today also can fall into the temptation of creating their own idols when difficulties and uncertainties arise, Pope Francis said.

A judge has postponed a mid-August trial for a priest accused of embezzling more than $5 million from a parish in Okemos, in central Michigan, part of the Diocese of Lansing.

After the bishops of Chile issued a formal apology for failing to listen to clerical abuse victims and drew up national guidelines for responding to abuse allegations, Pope Francis sent them a handwritten letter of thanks.

A federal judge in Washington Aug. 3 ordered the Trump administration to restore a program that helped young adults brought into the country illegally as minors, saying reasons calling for its demise were not justified.

The Greensburg Diocese said July 31 that in 2016 when it received an allegation of abuse against Fr. John Sweeney, a priest of the diocese, his priestly faculties were immediately revoked, and he was placed on administrative leave.

Once it is released, a grand jury report on a months-long investigation into abuse claims in six Pennsylvania dioceses covering a 70-year span "will be a sad and tragic description of events that occurred within the church," Pittsburgh Bishop David Zubik said Aug. 4.

Lincoln Bishop James Conley apologized Aug. 4 for failing to be more transparent about a pastor removed from ministry and sent to treatment last year because the priest had developed "an emotionally inappropriate, non-sexual relationship with a 19-year-old male which involved alcohol."

Chile's bishops acknowledged they had "failed to fulfill our duty by not listening, believing, attending or accompanying the victims of grave sins" after a five-day meeting to discuss the clergy sexual abuse crisis.

Doing God's will means first of all believing in Jesus and allowing love for him to translate into love for one's neighbors, Pope Francis said.

The social action arm of the Philippine Catholic bishops' conference is doubling efforts to promote the use of renewable energy to light up poor communities around the country.