#pope-francis-continuity

#pope-francis-continuity

The law says consent cannot truly be given in those circumstances due to the power imbalance, and it also applies to a professor and a student, or a boss and an employee, or a therapist and a client.

On Ash Wednesday, 2026, two Roman Catholic priests and a religious sister entered an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, Illinois, to celebrate Mass with detainees inside. It might seem like a simple, routine event: a religious service to mark the start of Lent. But the Mass represented a legal win for the Coalition for Spiritual and Public Leadership, based in Chicago.

On Feb. 28, 2013, Benedict XVI became the first pope in 600 years to resign, ending an eight-year pontificate. (Benedict was succeeded the following month by Pope Francis.)

Catch up quick: President Trump created the White House Faith Office by executive order on Feb. 7, 2025, placing it within the Domestic Policy Council and moving it into the White House complex. The move was designed to signal a "direct line" between people of faith and the executive branch. Unlike the versions under prior administrations, which were often situated in agencies or outside the immediate West Wing orbit, this office is central to Trump's "religious freedom" agenda.

Mr Boland told the Irish Independent it was "an extraordinary honour" to meet with the Pope, who he said expressed empathy across the range of topics they discussed. "I met a very human Pope, a very human person, a person who seriously cares about people in disadvantage," he said. "He clearly had empathy with my mandate, which is to bring civil society to the heart of Europe in terms of policy making."

"Overly affectionate chatbots, besides being ever-present and readily available, can become hidden architects of our emotional states, thereby invading and occupying the sphere of people's intimacy," the first-ever US-born pope wrote. "All stakeholders - from the technology industry to policymakers, from creative businesses to academia, from artists to journalists and educators - must be involved in building and implementing a conscious and responsible digital citizenship," the pope wrote.

BBC Jodie was surrounded by smiling faces at her 21st birthday party, but most were people she had not known for more than a month. The party had been organised for her by the London International Christian Church - a Bible-based non-denominational church, according to their website - into which she had recently been baptised. She was told by her "discipler", or church mentor, she says, that she could not invite any friends from outside the church - only a handful of family members.

ROME -- Pope Leo XIV met with Venezuelan opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado in a private audience at the Vatican on Monday. The meeting, which hadn't been previously included in the list of Leo's planned appointments, was later listed by the Vatican in its daily bulletin, without adding details. Machado is touring Europe and the United States after she reemerged in December after 11 months in hiding to accept her Nobel Peace Prize in Norway.

There are some things that defy explanation. When the loathsome House Speaker Mike Johnson recently took it upon himself to explain the Bible to Pope Leo XIV, the Bishop of Rome, the spiritual leader of over a billion Catholics, and a person who has truly earned his Jesus stripes, it just confirmed what a sanctimonious idiot Johnson is. This bizarre Bible babble from one of the most unholy people on Earth went beyond being absurd because the very idea that the narcissistic Johnson really thought he knew more about the Bible than the humble Leo is ... well, inexplicable.

Cardinal Blase Cupich, 76, is one of the leading voices of the progressive sector of the U.S. Catholic Church at a time when the conservative arm, emboldened by the Donald Trump administration, is rapidly gaining ground in a heavily politicized country. Except he doesn't see himself in that way, nor the church. I always try to be faithful to what the doctrine of the Church is on social issues, and that is my guide.