Rhina Guidos

Fr. Ricardo Cortez is the third priest killed in El Salvador in the last 18 months, and most of the country's bishops showed up to his funeral Mass to demand justice for the killing. 

He was surrounded by photos of fellow El Pasoans, who spent the last moments of their lives one summer evening a year ago, running for safety while shopping at superstore.

As the coronavirus pandemic commands global attention, for those working at organizations such as Catholic Relief Services, the health crisis is one in a long list of emergencies staff must tend to in its mission to help the world's poorest.

A firm that has filed previous legal complaints against former Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick and church entities added another complainant July 21 against the defrocked prelate, leveling a new accusation that he allegedly abused its new client as a boy at a beach house in Sea Girt, New Jersey, in the early 1980s.

Schools and a Catholic parish in New Jersey expressed pain but also offered prayers following the killing of 20-year-old Daniel Anderl, son of a federal judge, who was a student at The Catholic University of America in Washington.

Catholic organizations and others who fear that proposed changes by the Trump administration will all but eliminate the asylum system rushed to meet a July 15 deadline to make their voices heard. 

The Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston is asking for prayers for those who have contracted COVID-19, including its retired archbishop and its retired auxiliary bishop living in a priest retirement home of 18 residents.

Catholic organizations have joined others in protesting some of the latest immigration restrictions issued by the Trump administration, including a popular visa program now suspended until the end of the year.

A report by the Washington-based Refugees International organization charges U.S. immigration policy with helping the spread of the coronavirus in Guatemala, as federal agencies in the U.S. and Mexico have repatriated infected Guatemalans through deportations.

After calling for transparency and dialogue in the country, Cardinal Gregorio Rosa Chavez, auxiliary bishop of San Salvador, found himself under attack, including being called a "Judas" and other names via social media.

The Washington-based American Immigration Council said restrictions issued by the Trump administration during the coronavirus pandemic are being used to implement immigration limitations White House officials have sought for a long time.

Chalatenango, El Salvador, is said to have been the setting of more than 50 mass killings during the country's 12-year civil conflict, and almost all of the survivors lost family members in other attacks. 

In a remote area called Las Aradas, where the river straddles Honduras and El Salvador, more than 600 people were killed over a 12-hour period on May 14, 1980, after government forces from both countries and a paramilitary group on the Salvadoran side opened fire on an unarmed group they had surrounded.

A group of U.S. bishops expressed sorrow over disparities in infection and death rates among African Americans in U.S. communities.

On the feast of St. Joseph the Worker, the Center for Migration Studies of New York released a new report highlighting the role of 19.8 million immigrant laborers who work in "essential critical infrastructure" in the U.S. during the coronavirus pandemic.

Four U.S. Catholic bishops called on government officials to consider the role and plight of U.S. migrant farmworkers during the coronavirus pandemic and made recommendations that include free testing and care should the workers test positive for COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.

The U.S. Department of Education said federal financial relief for coronavirus for higher education is meant for U.S. citizens, prompting protests from students enrolled in colleges and universities under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA.

Catholic members of the Interfaith Immigration Coalition, a group of 55 national, faith-based organizations, joined an April 21 statement accusing the president of using a "dog whistle" against immigrants.

The country's supply of fruit and vegetables and other staples such as meats and dairy produced by the labor of farmworkers — many of them migrants — remains steady thanks to those essential workers. Yet many of them toil without basic protections, their supporters say.

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to grow in the U.S. faster than anywhere else in the world, the Catholic bishop of El Paso, Texas, is asking local authorities to release nonviolent migrants at his local U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities.