As Pope Leo XIV visits, Africa’s often interrelated crises of armed conflict, poverty and displacement have been worsened by the withdrawal of development and humanitarian aid by the United States and other donor nations.
Politics & Society
Posted inDispatches
Does just war theory justify the Iran war? Catholic voices debate
At Regis High School’s inaugural Deo et Patriae Dialogue, alumni Phil Klay and Father Gerald Murray advanced opposing positions on what Catholic social teaching tells us about the war in Iran.
Posted inThe Weekly Dispatch
On immigration and war, the U.S. bishops are echoing Oscar Romero
Decades after his martyrdom, Romero’s insistence that the laws of God stand above law created by humankind and the edicts and commands of political and military leaders has been repeated by bishops in the United States, speaking against war-making and mass deportation.
Posted inThe Weekly Dispatch
What the Middle East needs: Not more bombs, but ‘hard, focused diplomacy’
Lebanon stands to become the hardest-hit collateral casualty of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran. After years of economic turmoil, ineffectual governance, refugee crises and a devastating port explosion, this latest conflict between Israel and Hezbollah fighters pushes Lebanon closer to collapse or, worse, a return to civil war.
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Bishop Seitz urges ICE agents not to follow illegal deportation orders
In a pastoral letter on March 15, Bishop Mark Seitz urged immigration enforcement agents not to follow illegal orders and denounced the “grave moral evil” of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign.
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Catholicism in Ireland has been declining for decades. Are young people coming back?
After years of bad news and declining numbers, is Catholic Ireland experiencing a revival—particularly among young men?
Posted inThe Weekly Dispatch
Archbishop Warda on Iran war: A refuge for Christians in Iraq is now under threat
A painful irony today is that Erbil—once a refuge for displaced Christian families—has become one of the Iraqi cities most frequently exposed to missile and drone attacks as war between U.S.-Israel and Iran continues.
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Ten years after her murder, indigenous leader Berta Cáceres remains a beacon of hope in Honduras
“It seems that there are powerful groups who are preventing justice from prevailing,” Bishop Jenry Ruiz said at the celebration of life for Berta Cáceres on March 1.
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Cardinals McElroy and Cupich denounce Iran war: ‘War now has become a spectator sport.’
“A real war with real death and real suffering being treated like it’s a video game—it’s sickening,” Cardinal Blase Cupich said.
Posted inThe Weekly Dispatch
A Catholic guide to understanding the war with Iran
The church’s just war tradition has been challenged by contemporary theologians as insufficient and outdated, yet it remains a worthy filter through which to judge the moral defensibility of a turn to war-making.