IMAGE: CNS photo/Agustin Marcarian By David Agren MEXICO CITY (CNS) — The Argentine Senate voted against a bill that would have decriminalized abortion during the first 14 weeks of pregnancy. Senators voted 38-31 against the measure early Aug. 9 following a 15-hour debate. The measure had been approved in June …

IMAGE: CNS/Paul Haring By Cindy Wooden VATICAN CITY (CNS) — A Jesuit priest who has been on the frontline of advocating for survivors of clerical sexual abuse and developing detailed programs to prevent abuse said the crisis unfolding, again, in the United States is a summons to a new way …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Kevin J. Parks, Catholic Review By Paul McMullen BALTIMORE (CNS) — The chalice on the center of the altar was given by the pope to the third archbishop of Baltimore nearly two centuries ago. The local welcome crew wore vests that included the outline of a Chesapeake blue …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Mike Hutchings, Reuters By Bronwen Dachs CAPE TOWN, South Africa (CNS) — The church in Zimbabwe said it is prepared to mediate between government and opposition leaders after six people were killed in violence that followed a disputed presidential election. “We have offered to mediate any election disputes …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Chilean bishops’ conference By Cindy Wooden VATICAN CITY (CNS) — After the bishops of Chile issued a formal apology for failing to listen to clerical abuse victims and drew up national guidelines for responding to abuse allegations, Pope Francis sent them a handwritten letter of thanks. “I am …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Ahmad Subaidi, Antara Foto via Reuters By JAKARTA, Indonesia (CNS) — At least 91 people have been confirmed dead after a magnitude 7 earthquake struck Indonesia’s Lombok Island on Aug. 5 a week after another powerful quake killed more than a dozen people. The country’s National Disaster Mitigation …

IMAGE: CNS photo/Alvin Baez, Reuters By Wallice J. de la Vega MAUNABO, Puerto Rico (CNS) — Although Puerto Rico’s post-hurricanes coverage has disappeared from the daily news cycles, Catholic workers have not forgotten the fact that thousands in this Caribbean island are still in dire need of a helping hand. …

By Rhina Guidos WASHINGTON (CNS) — Marcelo Perdomo didn’t think an earthly brush with holiness would take place in his native El Salvador next to the parish priest. As a young man in the early 1960s, Perdomo worked in his native city of San Miguel, El Salvador, organizing the sacristy …

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Building on the development of Catholic Church teaching against capital punishment, Pope Francis has ordered a revision of the Catechism of the Catholic Church to assert “the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person” and to …

By WASHINGTON (CNS) — The Catholic Standard, archdiocesan newspaper of Washington, published a question-and-answer interview July 31 with Washington Cardinal Donald W. Wuerl about the next steps for the archdiocese in light of the sexual abuse allegations made against Archbishop Theodore E. McCarrick, a former cardinal and retired archbishop of …