“Scandal” is a word often heard used in recent months by U.S. bishops regarding the best ways to provide pastoral care and communicate authentic church teaching to pro-choice politicians who identify as Catholic.

The discovery of the unmarked graves of First Nations' children led to renewed calls for a papal apology in Canada to respond to the legacy of residential schools and revived questions about the church’s role in colonialism in Canada.

The appointment of Bishop Lazzaro You Heung-sik as the new prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Clergy is another major surprise in the Francis papacy.

The news follows the May 30 announcement by the Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation of the discovery of 215 bodies buried on the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School in Kamloops, British Columbia.

Cardinal Reinhard Marx’s offer to resign as archbishop of Munich and Freising hit the church in Germany and Rome like an earthquake. And while survivors welcomed the move, not everyone agrees with the cardinal’s analysis of the abuse crisis.

“A prayer that is alien from life is not healthy. A prayer that alienates itself from the concreteness of life becomes spiritualism, or worse, ritualism.”