In the letter, Francis reveals that Benedict was the first to inform him of the sad news.

The late-evening statement signaled the Vatican’s wish to let the whole world know that it fundamentally disagrees with any annexation.

Could the ruling really mark the end of Blaine amendments?

"We see with increasing urgency the need for a state intelligently existing and dialoguing with the community to respond to the emergency produced by the pandemic," they said.

The Vatican announced that Pope Francis has appointed a special commissioner to modernize and reorganize those same administrative and technical offices, improve transparency, and update their statutes.

During an online discussion on faith and racism sponsored by the American Jewish Committee, Archbishop Wilton Gregory of Washington, D.C., said "if we do not know each other...we make it possible for hatred to grow."

"The suspension offers the Bishop an opportunity for pastoral discernment for the good of the diocese and for the good of Father Rothrock.”

This week on “Inside the Vatican," Colleen Dulle speaks with Phyllis Zagano about the church’s history not only of ordaining women deacons, but also the conversation around ordaining them again.

"If right and proper words were considered against their law, I will endure all the suing, trials and arrests. Numerous predecessors have endured similarly," the 88-year-old cardinal said.

Msgr. Georg Ratzinger, the older brother of Benedict XVI, died on July 1 at the age of 96.

Vatican officials said the Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon aims to be “an effective channel for taking up, from within the territory, many of the proposals that emerged” at the Pan-Amazonian synod.

Polish Catholics have appealed to Pope Francis for help in "rebuilding" the Polish church amid the continuing controversy over that country's episcopate mishandling of the sex abuse crisis.

Sister Helen Prejean, a long-time advocate of abolishing the death penalty, has said that the Supreme Court has "abdicated its legal and moral responsibilities" in allowing executions to proceed in various cases.

A Federal judge has ruled that the restrictions on how many people may gather for church services in New York state cannot be enforced as it presently stands as it is far more stricter than the protocols for comparable secular gatherings.

There has been a huge overall surge in allegations over the past three years as dioceses faced unprecedented pressure to address the decades-old problem of clergy sex abuse.

In 2015, some people objected to the canonization of the Spaniard, like critics did of his beatification in 1988, because of questions about how Father Serra treated the native peoples of California and about the impact of Spanish colonization on native peoples throughout the Americas.

The court upheld a Montana scholarship program that allows state tax credits for private schooling.

Since the establishment of the first Catholic newspapers in the United States, the pope said, local communities have relied on the ever-expanding forms of media "to share, to communicate, to inform and to unite."

In this article from the Dec. 5, 1931, issue of America, J. Desmond Gleeson laments the economic devastation of the Great Depression, noting that it came about without warning.

Peter and Paul, Pope Francis noted, provide valuable role models to encourage us toward unity and prophecy.