Vatican

Pope Francis is opening a big meeting on the future of the Catholic Church. Progressives are hoping it will lead to more women in leadership roles.

The ceremony took place days before Francis opens a big meeting of bishops and lay Catholics on charting the church’s future, where issues such as women’s roles in the church, LGBTQ+ Catholics and priestly celibacy are up for discussion.

Pope Francis has arrived in Mongolia to encourage one of the world’s smallest and newest Catholic communities.

Conservative sectors in the church are criticizing the appointment of Archbishop Victor Manuel Fernández to lead the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith over his 1995 book “Heal Me with Your Mouth: The Art of Kissing.”

Emanuela Orlandi vanished June 22, 1983, after leaving her family’s Vatican City apartment to go to a music lesson in Rome. Her father was a lay employee of the Holy See.

Pope Francis has been discharged from the Rome hospital where he had abdominal surgery nine days earlier to repair a hernia and remove painful scarring.

The Vatican says Pope Francis has had a second good night in the hospital recovering from surgery to remove intestinal scar tissue and repair a hernia in his abdominal wall.

The Vatican said that Pope Francis will not see visitors until June 18 after undergoing abdominal surgery.

Pope Francis went to the hospital on Wednesday for surgery on his intestine, two years after he had 33 centimeters (13 inches) of his colon removed because of an inflammation and narrowing of the large intestine.

Scaffolding in a niche of the Vatican Museums’ Round Hall conceal from view the work of restorers who are removing centuries of grime from the largest known bronze statue of the ancient world: the gilded Hercules Mastai Righetti.

Pope Francis has publicly defended St. John Paul II, slamming as “offensive and baseless” what he called recent insinuations about the late pontiff.

Pope Francis led the first of two major Holy Thursday ceremonies, presiding at Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica as he continues his stamina-testing Holy Week appointments days after battling bronchitis in the hospital.

Francis, 86, has been receiving antibiotics to treat his bronchitis since being hospitalized Wednesday. Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said the pope will be discharged Saturday and is expected to be in St. Peter’s Square for Palm Sunday Mass.

The Vatican says Pope Francis has spent his second night in a Rome hospital serenely as he receives antibiotics intravenously to treat bronchitis.

Pope Francis showed a “marked improvement” Thursday after being given intravenous antibiotics for a bronchitis infection and could be released from the hospital in the coming days, the Vatican and his doctors reported.

In a statement, the Vatican said Pope Francis has a respiratory infection that is not COVID-19.

Pope Francis was hospitalized with a respiratory infection Wednesday after experiencing difficulty breathing in recent days and will remain in the Rome hospital for several days of treatment, the Vatican said.

Pope Francis has a bad cold and has opted to skip speeches he was set to deliver Thursday to visiting groups of priests and scientists, the Vatican said.

The Vatican is allowing the public to visit the new tomb of Pope Benedict XVI under St. Peter’s Basilica.

Pope Francis joined tens of thousands of faithful in bidding farewell to Benedict XVI at a rare requiem Mass Thursday for a dead pope presided over by a living one, ending an unprecedented decade for the Catholic Church that was triggered by the German theologian’s decision to retire.