Catholic News Service

Pope Francis has appointed Vincenzo Buonomo, 57, rector of Rome's Pontifical Lateran University. He will be the first layperson to hold the job.

Jesus asks all Christians to prepare a place for him, not in "exclusive, selective places" but in uncomfortable places that are "untouched by love, untouched by hope," Pope Francis said.

After meeting with Pope Francis for more than four hours, a Chilean priest who suffered abuse and a priest who ministers to survivors said they felt comforted and hopeful for the church's future.

A new Vatican document cautions against the dangers of highly competitive children's sports, political and economic pressures on athletes to win '"at all costs" and fans' violent behavior.

The Catholic Church does not have "a product to sell, but a life to communicate: God, his divine life, his merciful love, his holiness," Pope Francis told national directors of the Pontifical Mission Societies.

As the Supreme Court prepares to wrap up its current term by the end of June, Catholic Church leaders are paying particular attention to several of the 30 upcoming decisions.

The official tally of 64 deaths on the island of Puerto Rico attributed to 2017's powerful Hurricane Maria has been disputed for some time, but in late May, a study in a respected scientific journal said that figure may have underestimated the island's fatalities by the thousands.

Since the administration announced a "zero tolerance" policy for illegal border crossings, resulting in family separation, 2,000 more minors have entered U.S. custody.

A Catholic priest involved in the sainthood cause of a Polish cardinal has rejected claims the cardinal fostered anti-Semitism and refused help for endangered Jews.

Franciscans of the Order of Friars Minor in six of the order's U.S. provinces voted May 30 to form one new organization to reinvigorate Franciscan life in this country.

Pope Francis has named as apostolic visitor to Medjugorje the Polish archbishop he had initially sent to the town to study the pastoral needs at the site of the alleged Marian apparitions.

The Supreme Court's decision May 29 not to hear a case against an Arkansas abortion law, thus letting the state's restrictions on abortion-inducing drugs stand, will have broad impact.

The murder of a socially poor Dalit Catholic man who had married a woman belonging to an upper-caste Syrian Christian family has fueled protests across India's southern state of Kerala.

The Church of Christ the Redeemer was built with Panama's hot and humid weather in mind. There are no walls on the building. Its tall round roof is supported by cement columns spread far apart so that a good amount of breeze can make its way down the church's aisles.

Pope Francis asked Catholics to recognize and be thankful for the undeserved gift of the Holy Spirit they received with the sacrament of confirmation.

Everyone has "a stake in this fight" for religious freedom, said the U.S. ambassador at large for international religious freedom, Sam Brownback.

Cardinal Charles Bo of Yangon, Myanmar, has joined other faith leaders in declaring their commitment to peace initiatives in the strife-torn southeast Asia country, a move welcomed by State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi.

A life of holiness isn't defined by having visions or performing extraordinary feats of devotion, but by living with the hope of salvation promised by Christ, Pope Francis said.

Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople called on Christians to work together to build a culture of solidarity in the face of growing economic inequality and a lack of respect for the human dignity of the poor and of migrants.

Continuing his occasional series of "Mercy Friday" visits, Pope Francis surprised the students at a school renamed in March in honor of a student who died of leukemia at the age of 11.