Warning of “the increasingly concrete threat of a world war,” Pope Francis called for “the diplomacy of hope” in his address to the ambassadors of the 184 countries that have diplomatic relations with the Holy See.

Pope Francis broke one of the Vatican’s “stained-glass ceilings” on Monday by appointing an Italian sister as the prefect of a Vatican dicastery for the first time. Here’s what you need to know.

“This is a very significant beginning,” Archbishop Rino Fisichella, the chief Vatican organizer of the Jubilee Year, said in a statement.

In a groundbreaking decision, Pope Francis has appointed the Italian missionary nun, Simona Brambilla, M.C., as prefect of the Dicastery for Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life.

In this episode of Inside the Vatican, Colleen Dulle and Gerard O’Connell discuss the 2025 Jubilee Year, beginning on Christmas Eve 2024 and ending in January 2026.

In Francis’ 12th Christmas address to the Roman Curia, he reminded them, “An ecclesial community lives in joyful and fraternal harmony to the extent that its members walk the path of humility.”