Retired Bishop Lucas Van Looy of Ghent, Belgium, asked Pope Francis to withdraw his nomination, and the pope agreed.

Donations from the United States led charitable giving to the annual Peter’s Pence collection, which supports the work of the Roman Curia and funds the charitable activity of the pope.

Pope Francis said “superficial” marriage preparation programs leave many couples at risk of having invalid marriages or unprepared to cope with the struggles that arise in every marriage.

The pope continues to express his desire to visit Ukraine, but remains cognizant of political and practical limitations to this objective.

“With a heart shattered over the massacre at the elementary school in Texas, I pray for the children and adults who were killed and for their families,” the pope said.

Granting an exception to canon law, Pope Francis said men’s communities that are made up of both priests and brothers can choose one of the brothers to be a provincial superior or even the superior general.

Pope Francis will meet members of Canada’s Indigenous communities in late July, visiting the cities of Edmonton, Quebec, and Iqaluit in Nunavut, the country’s most northern region.

A $5 million donation is going to help launch the Catholic Sisters Cognitive Impairment-Alzheimer’s Global Initiative, a project to help religious orders care for sisters with dementia.

“When liturgical life is a bit of a banner of division, there is the odor of the devil, the deceiver,” the pope said on May 7.

The head of the Ukrainian Catholic Church asked Pope Francis to scrap plans to have a Ukrainian woman and a Russian woman carry the cross together during the pope’s Way of the Cross service.