Associated Press

A U.S.-based group that tracks how the Catholic hierarchy deals with allegations of sexual abuse by clergy says Pope Francis made a "troubling" choice in appointing an Argentine prelate to a powerful Vatican office that handles such cases.

Pope Francis has set up a special commission tasked with identifying those he calls the "new martyrs" of the 21st century — Christians who have been slain in some cases simply for attending Mass or for helping the poor.

A former Catholic priest with a lengthy career at parishes across New Mexico has been arrested on criminal charges of coercion and enticement of a minor to engage in sexual activity through text messages, federal law enforcement authorities announced June 29.

The Supreme Court on June 29 used the case of a Christian mail carrier who did not want to work Sundays to solidify protections for workers who ask for religious accommodations.

Former Catholic Cardinal Theodore McCarrick is not competent to stand trial on charges accusing him of sexually assaulting a teenage boy in Massachusetts decades ago, an expert for the prosecution says, raising doubts about the future of the criminal case against the 92-year-old.

 Italy’s Parliament is poised to open a bicameral commission of inquiry into the disappearance of the teenage daughter of a Vatican employee, the third new investigation launched in the four decades since Emanuela Orlandi vanished on the streets of Rome.

More than half a million people formally left the Catholic Church in Germany last year, significantly higher than the previous record as the church wrestles with a long-running scandal over abuse by clergy and with calls for far-reaching reform.

German police and prosecutors searched Catholic Church properties on June 27 in connection with a probe of the archbishop of Cologne in western Germany over perjury allegations, authorities said.

Cabrini University has announced that it will close at the end of the 2023-24 school year, with Villanova University assuming ownership of the nearby land in the Philadelphia suburbs where the fellow Roman Catholic university is located.

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva offered June 22 to help try to gain the release of a Roman Catholic bishop imprisoned in Nicaragua.

Exactly 40 years after the teenage daughter of a Vatican employee disappeared, the Vatican said June 22 that new leads "worthy of further investigation" had surfaced hopes of finally getting to the bottom of one of the Holy See’s enduring mysteries.

Pope Francis said June 22 he was short of breath and still feeling the effects of anesthesia from abdominal surgery two weeks ago.

A cross bequeathed by the late Pope Benedict XVI to a parish in his German home region of Bavaria has been stolen from the church where it was exhibited, police said June 20.

The head of a religious art and culture center founded by a disgraced Jesuit priest came to his defense June 17 after he was expelled from the Jesuit religious order following allegations of sexual, spiritual and psychological abuse against adult women.

After weeks of controversy, LA Dodgers honor the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence during their Pride Night, while Catholics for Catholics protested.

Pope Francis was discharged from the Rome hospital where he had abdominal surgery nine days earlier to repair a hernia and remove painful scarring, with his surgeon saying the pontiff is now "better than before" the hospitalization.

Pope Francis visited the children's cancer ward of Rome's Gemelli hospital on the eve of his expected discharge following abdominal surgery, the Vatican said June 15.

Pope Francis’ Jesuit religious order said Thursday it has expelled a prominent Slovenian priest from the congregation following allegations of sexual, spiritual and psychological abuses against adult women.

A court on June 13 ordered a German diocese to pay 300,000 euros ($323,000) in compensation to a former altar boy who was repeatedly abused by a Catholic priest in the 1970s, a ruling that a victims' association said was the first of its kind in Germany.

Pope Francis was "progressively improving" and sitting in an armchair working June 9, following surgery to remove intestinal scar tissue and repair a hernia in his abdominal wall, the Vatican said.