News Briefs

A group of more than 100 Palestinian Christians, Muslims, internationals and some Jewish supporters managed to breach the tight security separating Bethlehem and Jerusalem on Palm Sunday in a demonstration demanding the right of movement between the two cities. • Vatican historical documents, including material regarding the role of the church during World War II, are now online and available for consultation on the official Vatican Web site. • The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Office of Migration and Refugee Services was the recipient of the University of Dayton’s 2010 Archbishop Oscar Romero Human Rights Award on March 29. • Top officials of the Legionaries of Christ acknowledged on March 26 that the order’s founder, the late Marcial Maciel Degollado, sexually abused young seminarians, and they asked forgiveness for failing to listen to his accusers. • Welcoming news of a new U.S.-Russia treaty to reduce nuclear weapons stockpiles, Joseph Cirincione, president of Ploughshares Fund, said, “This vision of a world without the Damocles sword of nuclear weapons hanging over it...is one whose time has come.”