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Bridget Ryder is a freelance writer based in Spain.
Spanish Legionnaires carry a large image of the crucified Christ in the rain April 18, 2019, outside a church in Málaga, Spain, during a Holy Week ceremony. (CNS photo/Jon Nazca, Reuters)
FaithDispatches
Bridget Ryder
Spain’s confraternities often make headlines in the foreign press as their Holy Week processions have become a tourist attraction, demonstrating the complex reality of their fame.
Co-leaders Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla of the Alternative for Germany party hold a press conference in Berlin Sept. 2, 2024, after state elections in the Saxony and Thuringia regions of eastern Germany. (OSV News/Lisi Niesner, Reuters)
Politics & SocietyDispatches
Bridget Ryder
German Catholic bishops say that even where the party has not tipped into extremism, it has failed to reform itself of such tendencies. They charge that a nationalism incompatible with Christianity has become the AfD’s animating ideology.
People protest against a law to legalize euthanasia as the Spanish Parliament prepares to vote on it in Madrid in this Dec. 17, 2020, file photo. On March 18, 2021, Spain's parliament legalized physician-assisted suicide. (CNS photo/Susana Vera, Reuters)
Politics & SocietyDispatches
Bridget Ryder
“Just don’t open the door. They can’t enter without a court order,” Ms. Castellanos recalled her advice to Maricarmen. “If she had opened the door that day her daughter would be dead.”
United States Vice-President JD Vance delivers a speech during the Artificial Intelligence Action Summit at the Grand Palais in Paris, France, Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press via AP)
Politics & SocietyDispatches
Bridget Ryder
E.U. regulations on artificial intelligence may not be global in scope, but they affect 450 million consumers and companies will have to implement E.U. rules and adopt them for other territories for cost-saving reasons.
The bell of the historic Torre del Micalet, or El Miguelete, the bell tower of Valencia Cathedral in Spain. iStock.
Arts & CultureDispatches
Bridget Ryder
Bell ringing has a rich history, integrated into daily and liturgical life year-round, a tradition being rediscovered and appreciated by anthropologists, academics, musicians and an increasing number of ordinary people.
French President Emmanuel Macron, center, and his wife Brigitte Macron, second right, visit the restored interiors of the Notre-Dame de Paris cathedral on Nov. 29, 2024, in Paris. (Christophe Petit Tesson/Pool via AP)
FaithDispatches
Bridget Ryder
Notre-Dame, and many churches in France, are owned by the state and merely used by the church. That gave the French government, and President Macron, a big voice in the restoration project.
Pope Francis greets a Christian family from Syria at the nunciature in Brussels Sept. 28, 2024. As refugees, they had reached Belgium thanks to the help of the Rome-based Community of Sant'Egidio and its "humanitarian corridors." (CNS photo/Vatican Media)
Politics & SocietyDispatches
Bridget Ryder
Many Syrians would return voluntarily to their homeland, Father Benedict Kiely believes, “but it’s a question of what they are returning to.”
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni applauds Pope Francis during a meeting about families and Italy's declining birthrate May 12, 2023, in Rome. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)
Politics & SocietyDispatches
Bridget Ryder
Pope Francis has condemned surrogacy as a form of “false compassion.” Now, in Italy, engaging in surrogacy in another country, even where it may be legal, will be a criminal offense for Italian citizens.
Resting at Castillo del Romeral beach after dozens of migrants arrived on Spain's Gran Canaria Island on Oct. 16, 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic. (CNS photo/Borja Suarez, Reuters)
Politics & SocietyDispatches
Bridget Ryder
On Spain’s Canary Islands, arrivals of unaccompanied migrants are on track to reach a historic high this year, and caring for the migrant youth has become politically contentious.
The world's tallest cross dominates the scene above a Spanish Civil War cemetery and memorial in the Valley of the Fallen (renamed the Valley of Cuelgamuros) near Madrid, pictured in October 2019. (CNS photo/Emilio Naranjo, pool via Reuters)
Politics & SocietyDispatches
Bridget Ryder
Spanish media reports that the ministry of culture is drafting a law that will expel monks. But that task will not be easy. The 21 monks do not wish to leave their monastery.