An April 21 news release from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops reported that 548 men are slated to be ordained to the priesthood in the U.S. this year. That number is slightly down from 595 in 2015, but up from 477 in 2014. The same report that notes the total number …

IMAGE: CNS photo/courtesy RTE By Nick Bramhill DUBLIN (CNS) — An Irish Catholic street cleaner, who was filmed by a TV documentary crew as he temporarily swapped his job in the Irish capital for the poverty-stricken Philippines, has pledged to spend the rest of his life helping the struggling family …

IMAGE: CNS/Paul Haring By Cindy Wooden VATICAN CITY (CNS) — To ignore the suffering of another person is to ignore God, Pope Francis said. And going to church does not automatically make someone love their neighbor, the pope said April 27 as he reflected on the Gospel parable of the …

By Cindy Wooden VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Clericalism is a danger to the Catholic Church not only because on a practical level it undermines the role of laity in society, but because theologically it “tends to diminish and undervalue the baptismal grace” of all believers, whether they are lay or …

IMAGE: CNS/Nancy Wiechec By Carol Glatz VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Pope Francis named Archbishop Juan Garcia Rodriguez, who has worked quietly to help rebuild the Cuban church, physically and spiritually, to be the new archbishop of Havana. He succeeds 79-year-old Cardinal Jaime Ortega Alamino of Havana, whose retirement was accepted …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Jose Jacome, EPA, Reuters By QUITO, Ecuador (CNS) — Catholic agencies are beginning to build temporary shelters for thousands of families in Ecuador made homeless by the South American country’s worst natural disaster in nearly seven decades. As the death toll continues to climb following a magnitude-7.8 earthquake, …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Tony Gentile, Reuters By Junno Arocho Esteves VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Sharing and celebrating the joy of faith with thousands of Catholic teenagers from around the globe was a rare moment that not many people are able to experience, a U.S. teen said. “It was a different atmosphere …

IMAGE: NS photo/Gregory A. Shemitz By Chaz Muth WASHINGTON — The recent update in the sainthood cause for American Catholic icon Dorothy Day is welcome news to many of her friends and associates who believe her understanding of Catholic social teaching should be held up as a church value. The …

IMAGE: CNS photo/L’Osservatore Romano via Reuters By Junno Arocho Esteves VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Happiness “is not an ‘app’ that you can download on your phones nor will the latest update help you become free and great in loving,” Pope Francis told thousands of teenagers. Youth from around the world …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Tyler Orsburn By Carol Zimmermann WASHINGTON (CNS) — People who closely follow the Supreme Court know it’s a waiting game. There’s the wait to see if a case makes it to the court, the wait for a seat in the courtroom if it does, and then the wait …