The body of Father Jules Bontone Nkaa Yulu, “killed shortly after mediating a conflict in a nearby village, was found headless on a road regularly used by locals,” according to the report. “The province of Maï-Ndombe has been plagued by insecurity for over three years due to the activities of the Mobondo militia, in the conflict between the Yaka and Teke communities.”

“Churches and mosques should be centers of compassion, peace, and love,” said Archbishop Joseph Arshad of Rawalpindi-Islamabad. The shared practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, he added, are “a powerful testament to the fact that faith is not a source of division but rather a means of mercy, solidarity, and unity.”

Islam is the official religion of the South Asian nation of 257 million (map), the fifth most populous in the world. 95% of Pakistan’s people are Muslim, 2% are Christian, and 1% are Hindu.

Cardinal Polycarp Pengo, one of Africa’s leading prelates during the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, died on February 19 at the age of 81.

The General Secretariat of the Synod announced the establishment of an Eastern Canonical Commission to propose revisions to the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches in light of the synod on synodality.

The Vatican newspaper marked the World Day of Social Justice by publishing four economists’ reflections on Dilexi Te, Pope Leo XIV’s apostolic exhortation on love for the poor.

A Franciscan friar who oversees 18 schools in the Holy Land described continued widespread suffering in Gaza, four months after the signing of the Gaza peace plan.

Pope Leo XIV fielded questions from four priests of the Diocese of Rome during his February 19 meeting with them in Paul VI Audience Hall. In addressing one of the questions, he urged priests to avoid AI in preparing homilies.

In 2010, there were 143 adult baptisms in Belgium; in 2015, 180; in 2020, 305.

The Western European nation of 12 million (map) is 61% Christian (58% Catholic) and 9% Muslim.

Cardinal Dolan also offered strong praise for his successor (Archbishop Ronald Hicks) and said that it is time to “move on” from the emphasis on synodality.

“The thought of holding thousands of families in massive warehouses should challenge the conscience of every American,” Bishop Brendan Cahill of Victoria, Texas, said in his February 20 statement. “Whatever their immigration status, these are human beings created in the image and likeness of God, and this is a moral inflection point for our country.”

“We implore the Administration and Congress to lead with right reason, abandon this misuse of taxpayer funds, and to instead pursue a more just approach to immigration enforcement that truly respects human dignity, the sanctity of families, and religious liberty,” he added.

In releasing Bishop Cahill’s statement, the USCCB said that the expense “amounts to nearly fifty times the annual budget for the entire immigration court system and almost five times the funding provided this year to operate the federal prison system.”

“The plan partly entails opening eight ‘mega‑centers,’ each of which would be capable of detaining 7,000 to 10,000 people,” the USCCB added. “Aside from the internment camps used to incarcerate Japanese Americans in the 1940s, such facilities have no precedent in American history.”