IMAGE: CNS photo/Tyler Orsburn By Carol Zimmermann WASHINGTON (CNS) — When Kris Jenkins got the ball with the score tied in the final seconds of the NCAA men’s basketball championship game April 4, his former high school coach had no doubt that the Villanova junior would make the shot. The …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Oscar Rivera, EPA By Ezra Fieser SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic (CNS) — Heroin and painkillers plague the streets of U.S. cities and small towns. Mexican drug cartels have turned swaths of that country into battle zones. In South Africa, young people are getting hooked on a drug made …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Jim Lo Scalzo, EPA By Dennis Sadowski WASHINGTON (CNS) — Citing a moral obligation to care for the natural world and all inhabitants of the earth, 30 Catholic and faith-based institutions filed an amicus brief with a federal appeals court in support of the Clean Power Plan. The …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Jeffrey Arguedas, EPA By VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Pope Francis often speaks against “the scourge of drug trafficking” and its effects. Here are some examples: “The scourge of drug-trafficking, which favors violence and sows the seeds of suffering and death, requires of society as a whole an act …

IMAGE: CNS/Paul Haring By Cindy Wooden VATICAN CITY (CNS) — As discussions continue between Vatican officials and leaders of the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X, Pope Francis met at the Vatican with Bishop Bernard Fellay, head of the society. The Vatican press office confirmed April 4 that the meeting …

IMAGE: CNS By Dennis Sadowski WASHINGTON (CNS) — Pro-life advocates expressed dismay with new Food and Drug Administration guidelines that effectively expand how pregnant women can use RU-486, a drug that induces abortion. The new rules, announced March 30, allow a woman to use RU-486 — known generically as mifepristone …

By Cindy Wooden VATICAN CITY (CNS) — When people do not want to say “yes” to God, they usually do not say “no,” they just hide like Adam and Eve did after they sinned, Pope Francis said. “Today is the feast of ‘yes,’” the pope said during his early morning …

IMAGE: CNS/Paul Haring By Cindy Wooden VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Pope Francis asked Catholic dioceses around the world to set up a permanent memorial of the Year of Mercy by establishing a hospital, home for the aged or school in an under-served area. Celebrating Divine Mercy Sunday with an evening …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Joshua Roberts, Reuters By Carol Zimmermann WASHINGTON (CNS) — Immediately after the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Zubik v. Burwell March 23 challenging the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive requirement, the second-guessing began about how the court will rule. The 108-page transcript of the arguments was gleaned for …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Joshua Roberts, Reuters By Carol Zimmermann WASHINGTON (CNS) — Immediately after the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Zubik v. Burwell March 23 challenging the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive requirement, the second-guessing began about how the court will rule. The 108-page transcript of the arguments was gleaned for …