News Briefs

In Belfast on June 27, Queen Elizabeth of Britain shook hands with Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, a former Irish Republican Army commander, in a long-awaited encounter symbolizing progress on reconciliation in Northern Ireland. • Responding to criticism of poorly handled public relations, the Vatican hired Fox News correspondent Greg Burke on June 23 as its “senior communications adviser.” • The Society of St. Pius X rejected on June 25 as “clearly unacceptable” a Vatican doctrinal document that was supposed to lay the foundation for the group’s reconciliation with Rome. • On June 22 Msgr. William J. Lynn of Philadelphia became the first high-ranking U.S. Catholic clergyman to be convicted of a crime associated with the handling of priests accused of child sexual abuse. • Facing a $17 million shortfall in 2012, Archbishop Charles J. Chaput of Philadelphia announced an administrative reorganization that will cut 40 jobs and close the 117-year-old diocesan newspaper, The Catholic Standard and Times. • Eight parish mergers, three elementary school closings and the creation of a consortium of five other elementary schools were among the proposals accepted by Omaha Archbishop George J. Lucas on June 19.