The number of U.S. parishes without resident pastors has leveled off to about 3,400, according to the latest data from CARA—but only after dioceses have closed down thousands of churches since 1990.

At a new residential complex in North Carolina, graduate students and adults with developmental disabilities share living quarters and meet in prayer.

While the new protocols are designed to include laypeople at every stage of an investigation, lay reform groups and victim advocates say they are unsatisfied, as the new rules stop just short of requiring such involvement.

Salvadorans have high hopes for the new president’s leadership. El Salvador suffers one of the world’s highest murder rates, and a third of its population lives below the poverty line.

“Deploying 6,000 National Guard troops on the southern border is not a root solution that addresses the true causes of the migration phenomenon,” Mexico's bishops wrote. “The fight against poverty and inequality in Mexico and Central America seems to be replaced by fear of the other, our brother.”

According to the federal government, at least 8,493 people were killed during the first three months of this year. If this trend continues, the year will end with approximately 35,000 murders in Mexico—more than the already record-breaking 34,202 homicide victims of last year.