“The Holy See is following the situation closely and expresses concern about any future actions that could further compromise dialogue.”

The Trump administration is permitting state and local governments to exert their traditional power to draft and enforce health and safety regulations. This has led to a variety of responses across the country and even within the same state.

On April 30, Archbishops Salvatore J. Cordileone of San Francisco and Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City and Bishop David A. Konderla of Tulsa, Oklahoma, wrote Barr to request stepped-up prosecutions.

Disallowing emergency aid to one part of an affected community and allowing it for another runs contrary to long-held social policy, Catholic education advocates said.

In the absence of irrefutable evidence, the public response has fallen, as with so much else in this era of polarization, along partisan lines.

In a troubled time in our nation's history, can we unite around shared commitments to freedom, human dignity and truth?