Cardinal Mario Grech, secretary-general of the Synod, has named Bishop Daniel E. Flores of Brownsville, Texas, and six others to be members of the preparatory commission for the general assembly of the Synod of Bishops in October.

Carlos Medina was charged with one count of murder “and a special allegation that he personally used a firearm,” according to a news release from the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office.

“Today, I join Christians worldwide in observing Ash Wednesday,” Biden wrote on Twitter. “The Lenten season is a time for reflection and discernment and an opportunity to recommit ourselves to God and to one another.”

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.

The Catholic Church in Germany has so far paid more than $43.5 million (40 million euros) to victims of sexual abuse, German Catholic KNA agency has reported.

“As I heard the chant ‘Cardinal Pell should go to Hell,’ I thought, ‘Ah ha! At least they now believe in the afterlife!’ Perhaps this is St. George Pell’s first miracle,” former Prime Minister Tony Abbott said.

Dolores R. Leckey, who was founding director of the U.S. bishops’ Secretariat for the Laity in 1977 and at the time one of the highest ranking women in the U.S. Catholic Church, died peacefully of natural causes Jan. 17 in her home in Arlington.

“The recent shootings in Monterey Park and now in Half Moon Bay remind us of how fragile human life is, but also how precious human life is.”

Sister André, a Catholic convert raised in a Protestant family, was born Lucile Randon Feb. 11, 1904. She lived through the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic and through 10 pontificates.