BOSTON -- The restoration of the Cathedral of the Holy Cross continues on schedule, according to Michael Kieloch, the cathedral's director of communications. The goal is to complete the project by Palm Sunday in 2019, so the building can be used during Holy Week.
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NORWOOD -- Four generations of women, some accompanied by their husbands and children, gathered at Four Points by Sheraton on Dec. 8 for the annual Women Affirming Life Mass and Breakfast. The theme for this year's Mass was "Mary in Advent: Model for All Women Affirming Life." The celebrant was Father David Pignato, director of human formation at St. John's Seminary.
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HINGHAM -- This year, the juniors at Notre Dame Academy had a new set of class options: they could take subjects offered in the two-year format of the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme, a rigorous European curriculum that emphasizes critical thinking, communication, collaboration, and creativity.
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BOSTON -- On Dec. 5, Christmas came a little early for students and faculty at Immaculate Conception (IC) School in Revere. These members of the IC School community were given the opportunity to attend "A Company Christmas at Pops," an evening featuring dinner at the Fairmont Copley Plaza Hotel, fun activities, a visit from Santa Claus and a raffle, all followed by a concert at Symphony Hall.
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On Friday, I went to the IBEW Hall in Dorchester for the Labor Guild's annual Cushing-Gavin Awards Dinner. We are proud of the work that has been done by the Labor Guild, which is one of the initiatives begun by Cardinal Cushing. Historically, the Church in the United States, since the time of Cardinal James Gibbons, has been very supportive of our labor unions and the right of workers to collective bargaining. In these days of apparent prosperity in our country, income inequality continues to grow. Part of this is because workers do not have a strong voice in their economic future -- this is where unions play an important role.
Read moreVATICAN CITY (CNS) -- When Pope Francis travels to the United Arab Emirates Feb. 3-5, he will meet with the international Muslim Council of Elders, participate in an interreligious meeting and celebrate Mass for the local Catholic population, the vast majority of whom are foreign workers.
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WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Pope Francis' repeated invitations to practice mercy and charity have become the focus of efforts to defuse the widespread polarization that has wracked society and has crossed into Catholic circles.
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SAO PAULO (CNS) -- A gunman opened fire inside a Brazilian church, killing four people and injuring four others before turning the gun on himself, police said. The shooting occurred Dec. 11 just as parishioners from Our Lady of the Conception Cathedral in Campinas, near Sao Paulo, were leaving a midday Mass.
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Los Angeles, Calif., Dec 11, 2018 CNA.- The two religious sisters accused of embezzling from a California Catholic school face a criminal investigation, and will not be defended by their religious community.
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Mexico City, Mexico, Dec 11, 2018 CNA/EWTN News.- It would be virtually impossible to travel to Mexico without seeing the colorful, star-cloaked, Satan-snake-crushing image of Our Lady of Guadalupe on street corners, in private homes, on restaurant walls, and certainly in church chapels.
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MELBOURNE, Australia (CNS) -- Australian Cardinal George Pell reportedly has been found guilty on five charges related to serious sexual misconduct involving two boys at St. Patrick's Cathedral in Melbourne in the 1990s.
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WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The chairmen of two U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' committees welcomed a new explanation from the Treasury Department that relaxed rules on the payment of taxes by churches and nonprofits that offer employee parking.
Read moreVATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Three members of Pope Francis' Council of Cardinals have officially ended their service as papal advisers on the reform of the Roman Curia. In September, the council members had asked the pope for a reflection on "the work, structure and composition of the council itself, also taking into account the advanced age of some of its members."
Read moreSANTA CLARA, Calif. (CNS) -- To find Catholics who have left the church, start looking at the faces in the pews, according to a recent report. A 2018 study on young adults leaving the Catholic Church found people stopped identifying as Catholics at a median age of 13, long before they ceased attending a parish. The report adds to the picture of a church that more people are leaving and that fewer ever want to return to.
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VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- God sends his consolation to those in need of reassurance, even when they are facing death, Pope Francis said. Just like the early Christian martyrs, who sang as they marched to their deaths in the Colosseum, today's martyrs still give witness to that same joy in the midst of suffering, the pope said in his homily Dec. 11 during morning Mass at Domus Sanctae Marthae.
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WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Pro-life leaders said they were disappointed the U.S. Supreme Court declined Dec. 10 to hear appeals from Kansas and Louisiana on lower court rulings that have stopped the states from blocking Medicaid funds going to Planned Parenthood.
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WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The incorrupt heart of St. John Vianney, the patron saint of parish priests, "reminds us God uses instruments to be ministers of his grace and mercy," said Archbishop Christophe Pierre, apostolic nuncio to the U.S.
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WASHINGTON (CNS) -- President Donald Trump has signed into law the Iraq and Syria Genocide Relief and Accountability Act of 2018, which will provide humanitarian relief to genocide victims in Iraq and Syria and hold accountable Islamic State perpetrators of genocide.
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WASHINGTON (CNS) -- What a long, strange trip it's been. Not walking the 500 miles in a pilgrimage from southern France to Santiago de Compostela, Spain, that Lydia B. Smith first did a decade ago. Not even making a documentary about "the Camino," as the pilgrimage is called, when she returned a year later with a camera and film crew.
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MANILA, Philippines (CNS) -- After more than a century, the United States government has returned three church bells swiped by American forces as war booty from the central Philippine town of Balangiga.
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Catholic representatives worked to keep negotiations on track for a comprehensive deal to address global warming as the U.N. climate change conference entered its second and final week in Katowice, Poland.
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ROME (CNS) -- Pope Francis made surprise visits Dec. 7 and 8 to people receiving medical care far from their homes, to a dozen intellectually challenged young people and to the staff of a major Rome newspaper.
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Edinburgh, Scotland, Dec 8, 2018 CNA/EWTN News.- Both Catholics and Protestants in Scotland are lamenting a shopping center's decision not to include a nativity scene in its Christmas display. Thistles Shopping Centre in Stirling, fewer than 40 miles northwest of Edinburgh, said it will it not include a nativity scene in its Christmas display this year, noting the mall “prides itself on being religious and politically neutral,” according to The Scotsman, an Edinburgh daily.
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VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The lives of 19 religious men and women martyred during the Algerian civil war are a testament to God's plan of love and peaceful coexistence between Christians and Muslims, Pope Francis said.
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ROME (CNS) -- In the heart of Rome, near streets of fancy shops already blinged out for Christmas shopping, Pope Francis prayed for Romans struggling to survive and for families in the city and around the world who face the same lack of welcome that Mary and Joseph experienced.
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