MILAN, Italy (RNS) – Amid a growing public rift between Pope Leo XIV and President Donald Trump — arguably the two most influential American-born figures in the world — Secretary of State Marco Rubio visited the Vatican on Thursday seeking to highlight common ground between the Holy See and the Trump administration. Rubio’s meeting with…
The MV Hondius is sailing towards Spain’s Canary Islands where all passengers will be evacuated, after being anchored for three days near Cape Verde. Three people have died either on board or after travelling on the ship after a hantavirus outbreak. The cruise set off from Argentina a month ago. The cruise ship will dock…
British passengers onboard a cruise ship hit with a deadly outbreak of hantavirus will be asked to self-isolate in the UK for 45 days, a health official has suggested, as two passengers who left the vessel continue to isolate at home in Britain. Neither of the two Britons who left MV Hondius at Saint Helena…
After days of discussions, info sharing and strategizing among nearly 60 nations on ways to wean the world from fossil fuels, Catholics who attended the first-of-its-kind summit in Colombia left encouraged by the promise the conversations represented. Even if they were, as advertised, a first step. “Church advocacy does not end here: it begins here,”…
Federal agents and local police officers conducted several raids at homes and businesses around Los Angeles on Wednesday in a drug enforcement operation that the authorities said was targeting a network of fentanyl and methamphetamine dealers concentrated in the MacArthur Park area near downtown. The operation resulted in 18 arrests, including two people believed to…
In the outpouring of community grief that followed Guardian Australia’s story about Bikram Lama, a comment by a colleague really hit home: double quotation markThe reality is that, even if I met Bikram right now, I still couldn’t guarantee him a way off the street. And it’s true. Despite the genuine sadness and goodwill behind…
Jack Smith, the special counsel who twice indicted President Trump, accused the Justice Department of having been “corrupted” by Trump loyalists he claimed were demolishing its credibility and seeking to undermine the rule of law. Mr. Smith’s remarks, made last month in a private discussion at the Cosmos Club in Washington, represented his sharpest criticism…
(RNS) — Shortly after Pope Leo XIV was elected last May, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, himself a Catholic, was asked about his thoughts on the newly minted pontiff’s comments signaling deep concern for immigrants. After defending President Donald Trump’s mass deportation efforts — which Pope Leo would end up publicly criticizing — Rubio, the…
(RNS) — There’s a brilliant scene in the film “The Devil Wears Prada” in which a villainous high fashion editor berates her new, plainly dressed assistant for thinking she is above the dictates of the fashion world when the fact is that even the discount items she buys have trickled down from the upper echelons…
Pope Leo XIV surprised 13 priests from southern Lebanon, near the border with Israel, by joining a video call from Rome on Wednesday, telling them they were in his prayers and that he hoped peace would soon prevail along the tense frontier. The Lebanese Catholic and Maronite priests were asked to attend an online morning…
