Article Archive
Please click below to view any of the articles in our archive.
Bishop Stephano Lameck Musomba of the Diocese of Bagamoyo in Tanzania has denounced the killings connected to the country's disputed Oct. 29, 2025, general elections. / Credit: Radio Maria TanzaniaACI Africa, Nov 14, 2025 / 12:24 pm (CNA).The bishop of the Diocese of Bagamoyo in Tanzania has denounced the extrajudicial killings connected to the country's disputed Oct. 29 general elections, stressing that those suspected of breaking the law should be allowed to go through legal processes instead of being killed unlawfully.In his homily during a Eucharistic celebration on Tuesday that was held in honor of the victims of the election-related violence, Bishop Stephano Lameck Musomba underscored the need to uphold justice and due process when handling individuals suspected of any criminal wrongdoing."Some of those who were shot were participating in demonstrations, others were at home, on their way to work, or in their shops. They were struck by bullets and lost their lives," said t...
Father Ernesto Baltazar Hernández Vilchis. / Credit: Courtesy of Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish/ScreenshotPuebla, Mexico, Nov 14, 2025 / 13:04 pm (CNA).The Catholic Church has confirmed the discovery of the body of Father Ernesto Baltazar Hernández Vilchis, a priest of the Diocese of Cuautitlán in Mexico who had been missing for more than two weeks.In a message, Bishop Efraín Mendoza Cruz of the Diocese of Cuautitlán expressed his gratitude "for the life and ministry of Father Ernesto, for his generous dedication to the Gospel, and for his pastoral service, which is a fruitful seed that will continue to bear fruit in the Church."He also urged the authorities to conduct investigations "that lead to the clarification of the facts of the case and to the justice that every human life deserves."The diocese also joined "the outcry of so many families suffering from violence and disappearances in our country, and we ask that this painful reality, which afflicts the lives of our communit...
Cardinal Timothy Dolan is among the New York prelates who condemn the deportations of migrants who are seeking refugee status in the United States and criticize the government's actions to strip some asylum seekers of temporary protected status in a Nov. 14, 2025, statement. / Credit: U.S. Department of Justice/ScreenshotWashington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 14, 2025 / 13:58 pm (CNA).The Catholic bishops of New York issued a joint statement that condemns the deportations of migrants who are seeking refugee status in the United States and criticizes the government's actions to strip some asylum seekers of temporary protected status."We do not support the sweeping revocation of the temporary protected status that was granted to many migrants who arrived in this country to escape the horrors occurring in their own, and who have justifiably relied upon the legal protections our government offered to them," the statement said."Such persons should not be subject to the arbitrary cancellatio...
U.S. Border czar Tom Homan defended the morality of the Trump administration's enforcement policies. / Credit: "The World Over with Raymond Arroyo"/ScreenshotWashington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 14, 2025 / 15:13 pm (CNA).Border czar Tom Homan strongly opposed the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' (USCCB) "special message" on immigration, saying the statement would encourage people to make a dangerous trek to the United States.Homan told EWTN News on Nov. 14 that the "Catholic Church is wrong. I'm sorry. I'm a lifelong Catholic. I'm saying it as not only a border czar. I'll say it as a Catholic. I think they need to spend time fixing Catholic Church in my opinion."The bishops approved the message on immigration at the 2025 Fall Plenary Assembly in Baltimore on Nov. 12. "We oppose the indiscriminate mass deportation of people," the message said.More than 95% of the American bishops voted to support the message. The bishops said in the message they "are bound to our people b...
Pope Leo XIV gives his apostolic blessing at the end of the general audience in St. Peter's Square on Nov. 12, 2025. / Credit: Daniel Ibanez/CNAVatican City, Nov 13, 2025 / 15:54 pm (CNA).Pope Leo XIV during an address at the Vatican on Thursday called for the "prudent" evaluation of supernatural phenomena to avoid falling into superstition."To avoid falling into superstitious illusion, it is necessary to evaluate such events prudently, through humble discernment and in accordance with the teachings of the Church," the Holy Father said to participants in a Nov. 13 meeting organized by the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints that reflected on the relationship between mystical phenomena and holiness of life.The conference focused on the theme "Mysticism, Mystical Phenomena, and Holiness." Upon receiving the participants at the Vatican, the pope noted that, through constant commitment, the magisterium, theology, and spiritual writers have provided "criteria for distinguishing authe...
Pope Leo XIV and Bishop Rolando Álvarez, bishop of Matagalpa and apostolic administrator of Estelí, Nicaragua. / Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/EWTN NewsACI Prensa Staff, Nov 13, 2025 / 18:06 pm (CNA).Pope Leo XIV on Nov. 13 received Rolando Álvarez, the exiled bishop of Matagalpa and apostolic administrator of Estelí in Nicaragua. Álvarez is in forced exile after being deported by the dictatorship of President Daniel Ortega and his wife and vice president, Rosario Murillo, in January 2024."The Holy Father received in audience this morning His Excellency Bishop Rolando José Álvarez Lagos, bishop of Matagalpa (Nicaragua)," the Vatican Press Office reported, without providing further details.From Chicago, Father Erick Díaz, an exiled Nicaraguan priest, said that Pope Leo XIV's meeting with Álvarez is "an audience of hope and ecclesial communion" as well as "a significant moment for our Nicaraguan Church, marked by challenges, fidelity to the Gospel, and hope in the Lord."After offeri...
A person detained is taken to a parking lot on the far north side of the city before being transferred to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Chicago on Oct. 31, 2025. / Credit: Jamie Kelter Davis/Getty ImagesWashington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 13, 2025 / 18:26 pm (CNA).The Catholic advocacy organization CatholicVote has released a report examining the Trump administration's immigration enforcement efforts, concluding Christians must balance charity toward the immigrant with the common good of the receiving state.The report, titled "Immigration Enforcement and the Christian Conscience," comes on the heels of the special message on immigration released by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) at its fall plenary meeting this past week. "A faithful Catholic approach to immigration begins not with politics but with people. Compassion, hospitality, and solidarity with the poor are not optional virtues," CatholicVote President and CEO Kelsey Reinhardt said i...
Mercy Health Perrysburg Hospital in Perrysburg, Ohio. / Credit: Wikimedia CommonsCNA Staff, Nov 13, 2025 / 13:20 pm (CNA).Catholic hospitals in the United States are explicitly forbidden from carrying out transgender-related surgeries on individuals who believe themselves to be the opposite sex, the U.S. bishops said this week.The prelates, gathered at the plenary of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) in Baltimore, voted on Nov. 12 to direct hospitals to "preserve the integrity of the human body" when treating individuals with gender dysphoria.Such individuals often seek surgery to make their bodies conform to that of the opposite sex. But in updated guidance, the bishops said that while Catholic health care providers must employ "all appropriate resources" to mitigate the suffering of such patients, they can use "only those means that respect the fundamental order of the human body."The new rule makes into explicit USCCB policy what the bishops expressed in a doct...
Paul Scherz briefs bishops about artificial intelligence at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' (USCCB) Fall Plenary Assembly in Baltimore on Nov. 12, 2025. / Credit: Tessa Gervasini/CNABaltimore, Maryland, Nov 13, 2025 / 13:50 pm (CNA).The U.S. bishops received a briefing on the benefits and risks of artificial intelligence (AI) from Paul Scherz at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' (USCCB) Fall Plenary Assembly in Baltimore.Scherz, a theology professor at the University of Notre Dame, has studied the ethics of AI. At the Nov. 12 meeting, Scherz highlighted some of his findings and shared how the bishops should approach the technology within their dioceses.AI technologies "have great potential to contribute to human flourishing and the common good," Scherz said. "But note that it would be a mistake to describe these programs as intelligent in the same way that humans are.""They lack consciousness and any kind of subjective relationship to the world...
null / Credit: Wirestock Creators/ShutterstockCNA Staff, Nov 13, 2025 / 07:00 am (CNA).According to a new survey, engagement among U.S. adults who identify as Catholic is strong, especially among the youngest adults, and there is growing trust in the Church after the fallout of the clergy sexual abuse crisis of the early 2000s.In July, Leadership Roundtable commissioned a polling firm to conduct a national survey of Catholics in the U.S. in order to inform Church leaders of problems as well as strengths within the Catholic Church since the sexual abuse crisis came to national attention in 2002 and the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People was composed to address it.Researchers composed a 72-question survey and divided respondents into three groups: the Faithful (1,541 respondents), the Occasional (472 respondents), and the Disengaged (1,020). The Faithful said they attend Mass at least monthly, the Occasional said they go a few times a year, and the Disengaged...
