Catholic News Service

Guatemalans took to the street to demand the ouster of the Central American country's president and attorney general over the firing of an anti-impunity prosecutor whose work caused discomfort for President Alejandro Giammattei. Guatemala's bishops also backed the demonstrations — and the included calls for a national strike — while priests and religious have participated in protests.

Two Catholic organizations issued statements in July urging against imposing a coronavirus vaccine mandate without conscience, religious or medical exemptions.

Catholic and Protestant churches plan an ecumenical service to remember the at least 160 people who have died in the flooding.

Proof of vaccination will not be required for people going to Mass in Italy, but will be necessary for access to church-run museums, conferences and for wedding receptions and other festivities held in a church hall, the Italian bishops' conference said.

French Cardinal Albert Vanhoye, a well-known New Testament scholar and the world's oldest cardinal, died in Rome July 29, just five days after celebrating his 98th birthday.

Catholic bishops in Japan called for the prohibition of nuclear weapons as they announced a 10-day prayer program marking the anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings.

The Boston Globe reported July 29 that police in the Boston suburb of Wellesley have charged former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick with three counts of indecent assault and battery on a person over age 14 in a criminal complaint filed by Wellesley Police in a district court in nearby Dedham, Massachusetts.

The political, economic and social crisis in Nicaragua "is reaching a flashpoint" and "is more than likely to lead to more violence and destabilization in the country," Rafael Estrada said at a recent hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. The Central American country's "constant persecution of political opponents and independent journalists is unprecedented," said Estrada, who is president of the Nicaraguans for Security and Prosperity Foundation. He was one of several witnesses at a July 21 hearing sponsored by the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission on President Daniel Ortega's government and its political prisoners, which the committee described as "the human cost of repression in Nicaragua."

On the first day of his trial at the Vatican, Cardinal Angelo Becciu announced a lawsuit against an old foe: Francesca Immacolata Chaouqui. The move added an unforeseen twist worthy of a modern-day court drama or soap opera.

Reconciliation between Canadian society and the country's Indigenous communities is possible, say two new national Indigenous leaders. While they come at reconciliation with Canada's Indigenous people from two different vantage points -- one is the first female leader of the Assembly of First Nations and the other is the first Indigenous governor general, representing the British monarchy in Canada -- both are new to their roles and say reconciliation will be at the forefront of their efforts going forward.

Catholic bishops in Northern Ireland warned that unilateral moves by the British government to force Northern Ireland's Department of Health to introduce abortion services threaten the region's peace process.

When Father Anthony Li Hui was ordained a bishop July 28 in the cathedral of the Diocese of Pingliang, China, he became the fifth Chinese bishop appointed under the terms of a Vatican-China agreement signed in 2018 and renewed in 2020, the Vatican press office said.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced July 26 it would begin "expedited removal" proceedings, or fast-tracking deportations, of some immigrant families who entered the U.S. illegally and do not qualify for asylum. 

On the first day of a Vatican trial involving alleged financial crimes and abuse of office, lawyers for the 10 defendants questioned the Vatican's jurisdiction and insisted on more time to prepare their defense.

Retired Pope Benedict XVI has criticized representatives of the Catholic Church in his home country, Germany. "As long as only the ministry, but not the heart and the spirit, speak in official church texts, the exodus from the world of faith will continue," he told the magazine Herder Korrespondenz.

Defrocked priest Fernando Karadima, at the heart of a sexual abuse case that rocked Chile's Catholic Church, died of natural causes July 25. He was 90. 

It is a 'scandal' that 'we produce enough food for all people, but many go without their daily bread,' Pope Francis says in message to U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization.

With a surge in the first few months of 2021 of minors entering the United States without a parent or guardian, figures from fiscal year 2020 already have surpassed the total of unaccompanied minors who made border entries during the previous year.

On the eve of a trial for financial malfeasance connected to the Vatican's purchase of a property in London, the office that handles most of the Vatican's investment portfolio, including real estate, made public a summary of its annual budget for the first time. 

The Vatican reported the Roman Curia had a $78 million deficit in 2020, and on the same day, the Administration of the Patrimony of the Holy See, which administers Vatican properties and investments, made a summary of its annual budget public for the first time.