John Kerry, Biden’s special envoy for climate, gave a keynote address at the Vatican and will have a private meeting with Pope Francis.

Cardinal Bo expressed his immense joy, and that of the 750,000 Catholics in this majority-Buddhist country of 52 million people, that Pope Francis has decided to celebrate Mass for peace in Myanmar on Sunday, May 16, in St. Peter’s Basilica.

The pope encouraged all government efforts for helping families’ real needs, saying, “if families are not the focus of the present, there will be no future.”

It’s the second time Francis and Fernandez have met and added yet another wrinkle in the Argentine pope’s sometimes strained relationship with the governments of his native country.

Christian prayer, like all Christian life, is not a “walk in the park.”

The lay ministry of catechist, the pope said, gives recognition to “those lay men and women who feel called by virtue of their baptism to cooperate in the work of catechesis.”