At the July 6 gathering, bishops who minister in Ukraine discussed the challenges that stem from the Russian invasion. Bishops elsewhere in Europe discussed “integrating newcomers into parish life, providing pastoral care in their new communities, maintaining Ukrainian identity, and educating the younger generation,” while North and South American bishops highlighted “secularization, assimilation, a shortage of vocations, and the need to reconsider pastoral models.”

Ordained in 2012, Father Nowak was suspended in 2019 amid allegations of harassment of a seminarian and inappropriate contact with children. Father Nowak denied the allegations and has remained on administrative leave.

Bishop Hansen said that Undset “lived a faithful Christian life in a world of turmoil. She stood firm in the Catholic faith. She challenged Nazism and strove for Norwegian freedom.”

Undset, a convert to Catholicism, won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1928. Best known for the trilogy Kristin Lavransdatter, she also wrote lives of saints.

“We need a society that works to eliminate corruption, sin, crime, discrimination, and all those things that weigh us down and degrade our earthly dreams,” Archbishop Charles Brown said during a July 8 homily in Ozamiz Cathedral, as the nation’s bishops gathered for their summer meeting, and the faithful witnessed the crowning of an 18th-century Marian image, the Blessed Virgin of the Fort.

In Africa, however, the number of priests soared by 35.8% between 2013 and 2024, and in Southeast Asia, the number of priests increased by 23.2%. In contrast, the number of priests in Europe declined by 17.2%, and the number of priests in North America (classified as the United States and Canada) declined by 14.2%.

In 2024, Europe had 20.2% of the world’s Catholic population, 37.5% of the world’s priests, and only 11.7% of the world’s major seminarians. Africa, with 20.3% of the world’s Catholics, had 13.9% of the world’s priests, but 34.5% of the world’s major seminarians.

The event will take place at Borgo Laudato Si’.

“When the Church places the most vulnerable people at the center, it makes the Gospel visible and bears witness that no one is on the margins of God’s heart,” said Archbishop Luis Marín de San Martín, O.S.A., prefect of the Dicastery for the Service of Charity.

Father Tadeusz Rozmus, S.D.B., also spoke about the emotion felt by the town’s residents as a result of Pope Leo’s decision to return to Castel Gandolfo. Since 1626, the popes have customarily spent at least part of their summers there. Pope Francis abandoned the custom after 2013; Pope Leo resumed it last year.

Robust governance is “a prerequisite for ensuring that technological progress is meaningfully oriented towards a broader horizon, at the service of all humanity, while respecting the inalienable God-given dignity of all persons and the common good,” Archbishop Ettore Balestrero, apostolic nuncio and Permanent Observer to the United Nations and other international organizations in Geneva, Switzerland, said on July 7.

“Good governance requires the responsible use of AI, in a way that does not involve outsourcing or surrendering responsibility to an algorithm,” the prelate added. “Therefore, every critical choice made by an automated system must be subject to human oversight.”

Drawing on a blog post from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the Vatican newspaper devoted the most prominent front-page article in its July 8 edition to UNICEF’s work in Venezuela.

“There is no doubt that social media is beneficial in many aspects of life,” Major Archbishop Raphael Thattil wrote in a wide-ranging letter for the Feast of St. Thomas the Apostle, the Syro-Malabar Church’s patron saint. “Yet it has also become a platform where falsehood, hatred, and defamation are deliberately disseminated.”

The Major Archbishop added:

When messages that malign others, harm the innocent, and spread falsehood are created or shared indiscriminately, the fifth commandment, “You shall not kill,” is violated, for such actions can wound a person’s dignity, reputation, and well-being.

Today, more than ever, we need the prudence and vigilance to examine carefully what we encounter, to verify what we do not know, to refrain from promoting what is untrue, and to courageously oppose falsehood wherever it appears.

Based in India, the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church (CNEWA profile) is among the Eastern Catholic churches in full communion with the Holy See.