Catholic News Service

The Mexican bishops' conference has pledged to avoid promotion of any parties or candidates in the country's upcoming midterm elections. The bishops also issued a statement May 6 calling on citizens to vote and support candidates promoting the common good.

Amid thousands dying daily of COVID-19 in India, the pandemic has taken a heavy toll on church leaders. Dozens of priests, scores of nuns and hundreds of laypeople have died since mid-April.

An 1822 Vatican law described the new smallpox vaccine as a gift "put in place by divine providence" as a sign of God's "paternal love to save his children."

After international outcry following moves that consolidated power over El Salvador into the hands of the president, the Central American country's Catholic bishops expressed worry and urged lawmakers to guide citizens into a "truly democratic state."

The Biden administration's May 5 announcement that it supports waiving intellectual property protections for COVID-19 vaccines — as a means to expand the vaccine's production and distribution — is a move the Vatican has been suggesting.

As countries become more culturally and ethnically diverse, their Catholic communities become more "catholic" and their societies can increasingly reflect the fact that all people are brothers and sisters, Pope Francis said.

"The Eucharist must never be instrumentalized for a political end, no matter how important," said Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego in a May 5 essay published on the website of America magazine.

As India faces a massive surge in new infections and deaths caused by COVID-19, Pope Francis said he was praying for all those affected by the huge health emergency.

An expert witness testified to the "illegal" presence of a high-ranking U.S. military adviser who may have known about the plot to kill nearly 1,000 civilians who perished in El Mozote, El Salvador, nearly 40 years ago.

At the 51st annual Washington Conference on the Americas, May 4, U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said four migrant families who remained separated under a Trump administration policy would be among the first to be reunited in early May by the Biden administration.

Contemplative prayer transforms and purifies the human heart, Pope Francis said.

Organizers had hoped to attract more than 100,000 visitors to Frankfurt May 13–16 for Germany's third ecumenical convention, but with the COVID-19 pandemic continuing, plans have changed.

"We cannot watch this catastrophe unfold and not share the heartbreak and feel the need to help," Msgr. Vaccari wrote in an appeal to donors.

The Biden administration announced April 30 it would stop paying for construction projects along the southern border between Mexico and the U.S., which were being funded with money originally designated for the military.

Lawmakers aligned with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele voted May 1 to get rid of five of the country's top judges and attorney general, giving Bukele, in essence, absolute power over the three branches of government.

Catholic chaplains in parishes across Germany plan to invite lesbian and gay couples to participate in "blessing services for lovers" on and around May 10.

The sainthood causes of seven men and women — including the hermit Blessed Charles de Foucauld and the Indian martyr Devasahayam Pillai — cleared their final hurdle May 3.

Pope Francis is scheduled to open a meeting discussing the challenges posed by Italy's low birthrate. "For more than a decade, Italy has become an increasingly elderly and less populated country, suffering from structural and legislative shortcomings at the fiscal, economic and social level," which have all exacerbated a drop in births, according to a press release about the meeting.

Under the gaze of a seventh-century icon of Mary, Pope Francis launched a monthlong, global recitation of the rosary, pleading for Mary's intercession for the end of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Pope Francis accepted the resignation of Bishop Francis Malooly — President Joe Biden's 77-year-old bishop in Delaware — on April 30 and named Msgr. William Koenig of the Rockville Centre Diocese to succeed him.