Less than a month after two missiles significantly damaged the Ghazanchetsots Cathedral in the Armenian town of Shusha last October, Hovik Hovsepyan and Mariam Sargsyan stood at the cathedral’s altar and became married amid the rubble.
International News
Indian Jesuits Brace for Fallout After U.S. Military Leaves Afghanistan
Indian Jesuits in Afghanistan are not sure what is in store for them as the strife-torn nation slips into conflict as the United States winds down operations after almost 20 years of war.
For Iraqi Christians, Scenes of Both Horror and Hope
As Iraqis sort through the rubble of the latest terrorist attack Tuesday, an attack on a busy market in downtown Baghdad that left at least 30 people dead, one Catholic priest in Iraq says it’s important not just to focus on the horror of life in the country but also the hope.
Pope Offers his Solidarity in Letter to Cartel-afflicted Mexican Diocese
Pope Francis sent a letter of encouragement to residents of a Mexican diocese afflicted by battling drug cartels, a conflict that has cast attention on the lawlessness covering wide swaths of Mexico and the government’s inability to pacify the country.
Local Haitian Clergy Await Answers About Assassination As New Government Takes Over
Haiti-born clergy in Brooklyn kept their emotions in check as a transfer of power in their homeland was completed Tuesday, July 20, following the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse.
Cardinal Implores Saint’s Intercession to Overcome Lebanon’s Crisis
Cardinal Bechara Rai, the Maronite patriarch, pleaded for the intercession of Lebanon’s beloved St. Charbel Makhlouf as the beleaguered country spirals deeper into collapse, further roiled by the resignation of the prime minister-designate.
As Pope Francis Prays For Cuba, Cubans Who Heard Him Voice Anguish
Pope Francis, Sunday, expressed closeness to Cuba in his traditional noontime Angelus address, and he voiced the hope that the country will become more just and fraternal. While those words may elicit only quiet reaction within Cuba itself, a band of Cuban expatriates who gathered in St. Peter’s Square didn’t disguise their anguish.
First-Person Accounts of Religious Repression Punctuate Summit
Many people may not think about religious repression since it doesn’t happen in the United States. For those who may argue that it does, then it doesn’t happen on the scale and terror of those living in countries with authoritarian regimes.
COVID Made Bad Situation For Immigrants Worse, Catholic Survey Finds
One of the main findings of the survey was that the demand for Catholic institution’s services from the immigrant community throughout the COVID-19 pandemic significantly increased. And those Catholic institutions responded with a number of new services, the survey found. These included: financial assistance, COVID-19 testing, education, contact tracing, and quarantine services, mental health services, grief support and assistance with funeral expenses, and delivery of food and sanitation supplies for infected and other homebound persons.
Priests Join Emergency Response to Catastrophic Flooding in Germany
In Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler, a particularly hard-hit area south of Bonn, one priest, Father Joerg Meyrer, helped in the emergency response. He told the German Catholic news agency KNA that the area was completely without fresh water and electricity.