Carol Glatz

Pope Francis said the challenges facing humanity and the Earth are so urgent and important that he has invited world leaders, educators and young people to come to the Vatican next spring to launch a global alliance for building a new, more humane future.

Having gone to Africa as a pilgrim of peace and hope, Pope Francis said he hoped the seeds planted there by his visit would bear abundant fruit for everyone.

The pope's own Jesuit astronomers are a "Men in Black" of a spiritual kind.

Cardinal Roger Etchegaray, a longtime Vatican official and papal envoy who was sent to some of the world's most wounded and challenging places, died in France Sept. 4. He was 96.

Medical advancements do not help if they treat people as objects or when they are applied only to those people who are not considered a burden and "deserve" to be helped, Pope Francis said.

Christians must not be hypocrites, Pope Francis said.

Mary's assumption into heaven calls people to put aside all those insignificant, mundane and petty concerns competing for their attention and instead be drawn to God and his greatness, Pope Francis said.

The upcoming Synod of Bishops on the Amazon is an "urgent" gathering, not of scientists and politicians, but for the church whose main focus in discussions will be evangelization, Pope Francis said in a new interview.

With the anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, the bishops of Japan are renewing calls and prayers to build peace by abolishing nuclear weapons worldwide and promoting integral human development.

The appointment comes as the Vatican is in the process of setting up its own reporting system about potential cases of abuse and cover-up within the Vicariate of Vatican City State.

During a search for the remains of a young Italian woman missing for more than 30 years, workers discovered an enormous number of bones inside two ossuaries in a building next to a Vatican cemetery.

Pope Francis urged Syrian President Bashar Assad to put an end to his country's eight-year-long conflict and seek reconciliation for the good of the nation and its vulnerable people.

After current supplies run out, Vatican City State will no longer be selling any single-use plastic items on its tiny territory.

The world must act immediately to mitigate global warming and avoid committing "a brutal act of injustice" on the poor and future generations, Pope Francis told a group of energy and oil executives and global investors.

Pope Francis advanced the sainthood cause of Fr. Augustus Tolton, who was the first African American diocesan priest in the United States and founder of the first black Catholic parish in Chicago.

In a world of conflict and division and a culture of insult, people need to live filled with the Holy Spirit, who is the only one capable of bringing harmony and unity to diversity, Pope Francis said.

Announcing his desire to visit Iraq in 2020, Pope Francis called for a peaceful resolution to crises in the Middle East.

The former head of the Pontifical Academy for Life, Cardinal Elio Sgreccia, died June 5, just one day shy of his 91st birthday.

People need to walk together in harmony to build a more fraternal world, Pope Francis said, reflecting upon his recent trip to Romania

The Italian ministry for culture has revoked a license it granted to the Dignitatis Humanae Institute to manage a state-owned historic monument south of Rome, citing irregularities in the bidding process and a breach of contract.