As images of desperate Afghan refugees flooded the news last week, I felt overwhelmed by my own inadequacy. Then I saw an Amazon wishlist of refugees’ concrete needs — and logged on to Twitter.

In this special deep dive episode of “Inside the Vatican,” host Colleen Dulle unpacks Pope Francis’ decision, the history behind it, and how it has affected devotees of the old Latin Mass.

America’s major religions and denominations, often divided on other big issues, have united behind the effort to help receive an influx of refugees from Afghanistan following the end of the United States’ longest war.

Our words might seem to offer so little to those whom we love. Yet because they are spoken in Christ, because they are taken up into the sound, clarity and truth of his voice, they have their effect.

Let us ask for the wisdom always to be aware of God’s love for us and to turn away the fundamentalists who propose to us a life of artificial asceticism.

“I don’t know where they got it from last week that I was going to resign.... It didn’t even cross my mind,” Pope Francis said in the first interview since his July 4 operation.