David Agren

"I'm worried about the tone of the country, because it goes far beyond the campaign," Cardinal Fernando Chomali of Santiago said after meeting candidates prior to the first round of voting in November. "I'm worried about the tone on social media, I'm worried about the tone in the streets."

Pope Leo XIV has called for dialogue and peace in Venezuela as the United States amps up pressure on the South American country — where relations between the socialist regime and Catholic officials have become tense.

The Mexican bishops' conference has condemned the murder of a mayor, who was assassinated after pleading for federal assistance in combating drug cartels — which extort avocado growers in his municipality in western Michoacán state.

Bolivia has elected Rodrigo Paz as president, picking a centrist politician with a history of amicable church ties.

The body of Fr. Bertoldo Pantaleón Estrada was discovered Oct. 6 in the municipality of Mezcal in Guerrero state, some 150 miles south of Mexico City, according to the Diocese of Chilpancingo-Chilapa.

"He was the most consistent voice after the death of the Jesuits," said Juan Melendez, country director for the Netherlands Institute of Multiparty Democracy.

Attacks on the Catholic Church in Nicaragua have fallen in 2025, but a report on church persecution in the Central American county attributes the decline to few priests and religious reporting the crimes and harassment committed against them and church property.

Nicaragua's ruling Sandinista regime has seized a prominent Catholic school, claiming without proof that it had operated a "torture" center during past protests and renaming the education facility for a slain partisan.

Twenty days into his papacy, Pope Leo XIV’s appointment style remains largely unknown — but his years leading the Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru, may offer clues. There, he prioritized lay leadership, promoted synodality and worked across ecclesial factions.

The Mexican bishops' conference has condemned a massacre of seven young people — including minors — at a parish festival, while urging action on the part of authorities amid rising violence and warning the population to avoid indifference in the face of recurring atrocities.

Peruvians have expressed pride and surprise in one of their own becoming pontiff. Augustinians in the country have expressed similar surprise — recalling Leo as an unassuming prelate, who prioritized the poor, sought unity in the Peruvian church and came to embrace the country.

Thousands of Catholics packed the plaza outside the Cathedral of Santa Maria de Chiclayo in this northern Peruvian city to celebrate a Mass of thanksgiving for an adoptive son: Pope Leo XIV.

Thousands gathered for a massive Mass outside the Metropolitan Cathedral in Buenos Aires to remember the life and legacy of Pope Francis, whose ministry as archbishop in the Argentine capital of taking the church to the peripheries and prioritizing the poor became a template for his pontificate.

Masses were celebrated around the country March 23 as Catholics prayed for the victims of the attack, which claimed eight lives and left five injured, in the city of Salamanca in western Guanajuato state March 16.

Argentines working in humble barrios, or neighborhoods, and the people they serve, prayed for the health of Pope Francis at one of the country's most important Catholic shrines.

The Mexican bishops' conference reiterated a call for unity as the country deals with threats from U.S. President Donald Trump, who promises to impose 25% tariffs on Mexican exports if migrants continue crossing the U.S. border and fentanyl is not stamped out.

The Feb. 8 statement from the foreign ministry of the regime accused the Vatican of using its "websites and platforms" to transmit statements "that constitute an insulting aggravation for the Sovereignty and Dignity of the Nicaraguan State."

"I invite you to join me in prayer for the Church and people of Nicaragua, who celebrate the Purísima" — as the Nicaraguan celebration of the Immaculate Conception is known — "as Mother and Patroness," and lift to her "a cry of faith and hope," Francis said during his Angelus prayer on Dec. 8.

Catholic leaders in Central America expressed alarm over the idea of repealing a national prohibition on extractive activities in El Salvador — putting the church in opposition to the country's popular president.

In a moving letter, Pope Francis expressed his closeness with the people of Nicaragua as Central American bishops called for a day of prayer for the country on the feast of the Immaculate Conception amid constitutional changes that will lead into an even darker dictatorship.