Nearly 50% of Lebanese are living below the poverty line, and unemployment has reached 35% of the working population, according to the government.

As they move forward in this ministry, the priests will quarantine themselves, either alone or with other priests on the team, and will pull back from parish ministry. In some cases, they will temporarily change residences.

Italian Catholics will be able to attend Mass in public beginning on May 18, provided certain norms are respected.

It would be a powerful outward sign of unity in the church if the pope emeritus and those who advise him sought to avoid situations in which his public comments will be inevitably misused to suggest a division that Benedict has never wanted.

Cardinal Pell was formerly Pope Francis’ finance minister and at one time the third-highest ranking cleric in the Vatican.