IMAGE: CNS photo/Sam Lucero, The Compass By Sam Lucero BEAR CREEK, Wis. (CNS) — Food, music and games are all essentials for a successful parish festival but at St. Mary Parish, another key ingredient is the smell and taste of sauerkraut. Since 1965, this farming community has been home to …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Alessandro Bianchi, Reuters By Carol Glatz VATICAN CITY (CNS) — The upcoming Synod of Bishops on the Amazon is an "urgent" gathering, not of scientists and politicians, but for the church whose main focus in discussions will be evangelization, Pope Francis said in a new interview. However, the …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Rich Kalonick, courtesy Catholic Extension By CHICAGO (CNS) — Catholic Extension will be helping families left without their main financial supporter in Mississippi, where families lost their breadwinner after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement carried out massive raids Aug. 7. Federal authorities said they arrested 680 people at …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Tyler Orsburn By Mark Pattison WASHINGTON (CNS) — Three mass shooting incidents in the United States in the span of a week are now showing that "their emotional impact is resonating, understandably, across the nation," said Bishop Shelton J. Fabre of Houma-Thibodaux, Louisiana, chairman of the U.S. bishops’ …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Paul Haring By Carol Glatz VATICAN CITY (CNS) — With the anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, the bishops of Japan are renewing calls and prayers to build peace by abolishing nuclear weapons worldwide and promoting integral human development. They also expressed …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Callaghan O’Hare, Reuters By Carol Zimmermann WASHINGTON (CNS) — When Father Michael Lewis, parochial vicar at St. Pius X Parish in El Paso, Texas, first heard about the shooting that took place a mile and a half from his parish, he said he would do whatever was needed. …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Bryan Woolston, Reuters By Don Clemmer Nick Cardilino thought he understood solidarity and the human family. Then he woke up to the news Aug. 4 of the mass shooting at a bar in Dayton’s Oregon District and remembered that his son had been a few blocks away, at …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Knights of Columbus By MINNEAPOLIS (CNS) — As residents of El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, mourned the loss of 31 people in mass shootings Aug. 3 and Aug. 4, the Knights of Columbus honored a teen who died in May trying to save the lives of his …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Gregory A. Shemitz By Beth Griffin JAMAICA, N.Y. (CNS) — As the Catholic chaplain at John F. Kennedy International Airport ambled through Terminal 4 on a hot summer afternoon, security personnel, airport employees and flight crews shouted a cheery hello or stopped for a quiet word. "That’s my …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Adnan Abidi, Reuters By NEW DELHI (CNS) — Catholic churches and institutions in flood-hit Mumbai opened their doors to accommodate thousands of people stranded in the city by heavy rain and flooded streets. Cardinal Oswald Gracias of Mumbai, India, and Syro-Malabar Bishop Thomas Elavanal of Kalyan, India, asked …