Nicaragua has released more than 200 political prisoners, including Catholic priests, students, and opponents of the regime, who were taken from detention in deplorable conditions and sent to the United States.

Pope Francis presents the good Samaritan as the prototype of the fraternity and social friendship that creates the “culture of encounter” and builds bridges of love among all.

“These are strong, courageous people of hope,” Daniel Corrou, S.J., the director of Jesuit Refugee Service/Middle East and North Africa, said. But even hope has its limits.

Six churchmen and a diocesan communicator were sentenced to 10 years in prison on conspiracy charges as Nicaragua’s increasingly tyrannical regime continues its persecution of the Catholic Church.

A Reflection for Thursday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time, by Molly Cahill

In his State of the Union address, President Biden called on Congress to codify Roe v. Wade “to protect every woman’s constitutional right to choose” while calling for national unity.

Catholic humanitarian agencies are launching emergency relief campaigns following Feb. 6’s devastating earthquakes in Syria and Turkey, which have so far killed more than 11,200 and injured upward of 40,900.

Anyone involved in choosing public policy, directly or indirectly, must consider the possibility that the wrong option will actually make a problem worse.

This week on The Gloria Purvis Podcast, Gloria speaks with Dr. Meg Chisolm, a Catholic psychiatrist, about mental illness and how should people of faith treat it.

Pope Francis hit out strongly against the way people have sought to manipulate Benedict’s death. “People who instrumentalize such a good person, [a man] of God, almost I would say a holy father of the church, have no ethics,” he said. “They are of a party, not of the church.”