Behind (almost) every tattoo is a story. The church should start listening to them.

The report landed on French Catholics like a bomb. French bishops had never considered sexual abuse a serious problem. “We have been in denial for 20 years,” Father Goujon said. “The bishops said that [that kind of abuse] could never happen here.”

It is horrifying to think that some people would believe we are living in a simulation. But even more horrifying is the reality that we all actually spend most of our lives behaving like we are.

Akash Bashir, a 20-year-old volunteer security guard who was killed by a suicide bomber in 2015, is the first Pakistani to be given the title “servant of God,” an initial step on the path to sainthood.

Since the end of U.S. military involvement in Afghanistan, much of the world has turned its attention away from geopolitical conflicts in the region. But these issues have not disappeared.

“For some priests, it would be better if they were married—not just for sexual reasons, but because it would be better for their life and they wouldn’t be lonely,” Cardinal Reinhard Marx said in a newspaper interview.

Bishop George L. Thomas said he would not ask priests to police the Communion line but asked pro-choice politicians to voluntarily “refrain from the reception of Holy Communion while holding public office.”

St. Thomas never wrote again, though much has been penned about this great theologian’s descent into silence before his death in 1274. What should we make of it?

Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich said it was time for a fundamental revision of church teaching, and the way Pope Francis had spoken about homosexuality in the past could lead to a change in doctrine.

Italy’s Catholic military chaplain has pushed back strongly against calls by a former Vatican ambassador to resist Covid-19 vaccine mandates, saying the ambassador’s “conspiracy theories” were a source of confusion and disinformation.

In his Wednesday audience, Pope Francis spoke about the communion of saints, which he said does not include just those who are perfect, but also “the community of saved sinners.”

As soon as he finished his prayer, Pope Francis told the people in the hall that the man had a problem: “I don’t know if it is physical, psychological or spiritual, but he is our brother with a problem. I would like to finish by praying for him.”

Mercy Sister Janet Mead, who earned gold records for her 1974 hit version of the Our Father, died Jan. 26 in her native Adelaide, Australia. She was 84 and had been battling cancer.

The news that Maus, a graphic novel about the Holocaust, had been removed from school curricula was a reminder of one of our nation’s favorite pastimes: book bans.

A meeting at the Vatican between Pope Francis and Indigenous people who were abused at church-run boarding schools in Canada has been rescheduled for late March and early April after being postponed due to the pandemic.

Pope Francis encouraged religious sisters and consecrated women to continue to show courage amid difficulties, even if it means pushing back against the church they serve faithfully.

My little family is living proof of the fact that change is possible. My grandparents went from fury to admiration of my parents’ love, and from shame to pride in their mixed race grandchildren.

Cardinal Charles Maung Bo of Yangon assesses the future in Myanmar one year after a coup turned back a decade of democratic progress, calling for dialogue, the end of violence and the release of political prisoners.

Hispanic educators bring powerful and necessary voices and gifts that are essential to sustain the mission of Catholic schools in the United States.