OSV News

Bishop Clyde Harvey of St. George's in Grenada arrived by boat to the island of Carriacou July 12 to find a traumatized community and at least two diocesan churches that suffered catastrophic damage from Hurricane Beryl.

On July 16, the youth staged more demonstrations across the country, with police using tear gas to break up the marches. The Kenyan youth protests ignited in June in opposition to a controversial tax law dubbed a finance bill for 2024. But after protesting for nearly a month, the youth have since expanded their demands to more reforms in the political, governance and economic sectors, while rejecting government calls for dialogue.

Both the American and British open letters came after a traditionalist website, Rorate Caeli, said June 17 that opponents of the traditional Mass, "especially in the United States and France," were seeking a "wide, final and irreversible" ban in a document under preparation by the divine worship dicastery, although the claim was contested by other Catholic news media saying that no such document was under preparation in Rome.

In an interview with NC Catholics ahead of the Tekakwitha Conference, Father David Miller, chaplain to the Native American Catholic community in the Raleigh Diocese, said the annual gathering is an important event for faith, culture and awareness and is for all "friends," Native American and non-Native American.

Apache Catholics at a New Mexico parish told OSV News more questions than answers remain after two pieces of art belonging to the community were suddenly removed from their church, then returned to tribal offices a few days later after public outcry — with no clear explanation from diocesan personnel, the now-former pastor and other individuals apparently connected to the matter.

Former President Donald Trump on July 15 named Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, a Catholic, as his running mate on the Republican ticket in November.

Bishop David A. Zubik of the Diocese of Pittsburgh, which includes Butler, said in a statement, "Let us join together in prayer for the health and safety of all, for healing and peace, and for an end to this climate of violence in our world."

The Nicaraguan government closed the country's most prominent Catholic radio station as the Sandinista regime continues to persecute the church and increasingly infringe on citizens' religious freedom and the ability to worship.

Mexico's Interior Ministry has requested the participation of priests in courses promoting "civic values" in the aftermath of the ruling Morena party's massive electoral victory and disquiet from the country's episcopal conference over social peace in the deeply divided country.

Russian forces have driven out all Greek and Roman Catholic clergy from the occupied areas of Ukraine, said the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church.

Catholic aid organizations in the Galveston-Houston Archdiocese confirmed they cannot get to work just yet because of the power outage that left about 2.5 million people in the dark following Hurricane Beryl's landfall July 8 that cut a damaging path through eastern Texas and left at least eight people dead. Weather officials said "exceptionally warm ocean temperatures" were effectively rocket fuel for Beryl's rapid development.

The heroic work and witness of the Eastern churches in some of the world's most conflict-ridden regions was highlighted at the annual Catholic Media Conference held in Atlanta in June.

Catholic groups working with migrants traversing the treacherous Darién Gap have expressed skepticism over a joint U.S.-Panama plan to deport people passing through the thick jungle between Colombia and Panama on journeys toward the U.S. border. The groups called for governments to attend to the needs of migrants instead and deal with issues such as organized crime, which controls access to the Darién Gap. They also argue that migrants are not easily deterred, making it likely they would seek out new but risky routes instead.

God is present in the "dark corners" of local communities and in people's lives, Pope Francis said. "His presence reveals itself precisely in the faces marked by suffering and where degradation seems to triumph," the pope said in his homily at Mass in the northern Italian city of Trieste July 7.

Gov. Jeff Landry said that he vetoed the funds for the largest homeless shelter in Lafayette, Louisiana, because its operator, Catholic Charities of Acadiana, works with migrants. The governor, a Catholic, alleged Catholic Charities facilitates illegal immigration, a charge the agency denied.

In his first public address since Hurricane Beryl visited the Caribbean's Lesser Antilles region as the earliest formed Category 5 hurricane on record, the bishop of St. George's in Grenada took to social media to offer a spiritual message of hope and resilience following the July 1 landfall there.

St. Mary's Cathedral in Linz made headlines around the world as a controversial sculpture of Mary displayed inside the church was beheaded July 1 by unknown vandals. The sculpture, depicting the Virgin Mary giving birth to Jesus designed by Austrian artist Esther Strauss, was scheduled to be exhibited in the cathedral for three weeks. The work has drawn criticism from some Catholics who said it was blasphemous.

For unspecified reasons, an Indigenous image of Jesus Christ was "taken in the middle of the night," says a parishioner of St. Joseph Apache Mission, located on tribal land in Mescalero, New Mexico.

A state judge denied Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton's effort to shut down Annunciation House in El Paso, Texas, a Catholic nonprofit serving migrants.