A Reflection for Monday of the Thirty-second Week in Ordinary Time, by Molly Cahill

Host Colleen Dulle and veteran Vatican correspondent Gerard O’Connell dig into three eye-catching Vatican stories this week.

Following the listening phase of the Synod on Synodality, a mix of religious, clergy and lay people gathered in Frascati, Italy, to synthesize reports from around the world. Austen Ivereigh took part and gives this insider’s account.

Media, especially those calling themselves Catholic, “must strive not to spread hate, but rather to promote a non-hostile communication,” Cardinal Pietro Parolin told employees of EWTN and its affiliated outlets.

Tania Tetlow said she will refuse complacency and “what is easy,” instead putting the university’s efforts into addressing its difficulties.

Modern Catholic Pilgrim, the company organizing these pilgrimages, aims to reform the culture of the American Church—and even secular society—through the spiritual practices of hospitality and pilgrimage.

This summer, amid a growing debate about gender identity in the United States, America asked two professors of theology to revisit the 2019 Vatican document on “‘gender theory in education.”

Catholics must be careful, he said, because “both the ‘progressivism’ that lines up behind the world and the ‘traditionalism’ that longs for a bygone world are not evidence of love, but of infidelity,” the pope said.

In an exclusive interview, Joe Donnelly, U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See, discusses his diplomatic work with the Vatican—including on the war in Ukraine—with America associate editor Colleen Dulle.

As a large voting bloc that is “split down the middle,” Catholics have an outsized role in determining this year’s election results. Will they focus on abortion, the economy or some other political issue?