BROCKTON -- Firefighter Peter Reardon played bagpipes on the stage as students, teachers, and parents entered the Cardinal Spellman High School auditorium on Nov. 8. Greeters handed out programs, bracelets, and prayer cards with pictures of community members' relatives who are veterans. The stage was framed with banners, one on top saying "Freedom is never free," and two on the sides saying, "We stand as one."

BRAINTREE -- Planning for the archdiocese's annual trip to participate in the 2020 March for Life in Washington, D.C. is already well underway. This year, the Archdiocese of Boston is offering two options, called "tracks," for people who want to participate in the Witness to Life Pilgrimage to attend the march.

BOSTON -- On Nov. 4, 16 corporate teams gathered at State Street's One Lincoln Street office to raise money for the Inner-City Scholarship Fund (ICSF) through the sixth Annual Corporate Trivia Challenge. The hosting sponsor, State Street Corporation, has supported the work of the ICSF for nearly 30 years and has been the lead sponsor of this event for five years. Through sponsorships and live fundraising at the event, $40,000 was raised to provide scholarships to at-risk young people.

BOSTON -- The Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Boston's Board of Trustees Nov. 7 announced the appointment of Catholic Charities Board Chair Kevin M. MacKenzie as interim president upon President and Chief Executive officer Deborah Kincade Rambo's Nov. 30 retirement. MacKenzie has served Catholic Charities as chair of the board since January of 2019 and a member of the board since 2013.

BALTIMORE (CNS) -- An experimental program to address chronic homelessness is guiding people into permanent housing while saving millions of dollars in health care costs, the president of Catholic Charities USA told the U.S. bishops.

BALTIMORE (CNS) -- The executive director of the Catholic Legal Immigration Network, known as CLINIC, told U.S. Catholic bishops Nov. 13 that the government is violating international and U.S. law when it denies asylum-seekers at the border entry into the U.S.

BALTIMORE (CNS) -- During their Nov. 11-13 meeting in Baltimore, the U.S. bishops elected new officers and discussed challenges in the church and the nation. They spoke of their renewed efforts to help immigrants, youth and young adults, pregnant women and the poor as well their steps to combat gun violence and racism.

NEW YORK (CNS) -- A U.S. District Court judge's Nov. 6 ruling that halts a Trump administration conscience protection rule for health care professionals leaves them "vulnerable to being forced to perform, facilitate or refer for procedures that violate their conscience," said the senior counsel for the First Liberty Institute.

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The chief communications officer for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops criticized a new book on Pope Francis' papacy for perpetuating "an unfortunate and inaccurate myth" that Pope Francis is facing resistance from the leadership and staff of the bishops' conference.

LIMA, Peru (CNS) -- Chile's bishops called for national dialogue and an end to the violence that has wracked the country for the past month. Their pleas to end the violent protests came in two messages after demonstrators sacked the Assumption of Mary Parish in Santiago, the Chilean capital, Nov. 8, burning pews and statues. Other parishes also were attacked, including one in the southern city of Valparaiso.

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Bishops from New England shared with Pope Francis some of the joys, challenges and sufferings of the church in the Northeast and, really, throughout the United States, three of the bishops said.

BALTIMORE (CNS) -- In a brief presentation Nov. 11 to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Boston's Cardinal Sean P. O'Malley told the bishops gathered in Baltimore the Vatican may publish what it knows about the ascent to power of now-disgraced former U.S. Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick by Christmas, or perhaps the New Year.