”Are we in the sacred enterprise of accompaniment and engagement and dialogue?” the cardinal said. “When you do it, you risk criticism on both sides.”

Sally Blount will lead the agency during a time of economic turmoil that some economists predict could rival the Great Depression.

The cardinal’s appearance on Fox News follows a weekend during which he praised the president on a conference call with Catholic leaders hosted by the White House.

Interviews with physicians, public health experts, priests and diocesan leaders all elicited at least one common refrain: Even when public Masses resume, parish life will not feel normal for a while.

“Some of our individual hospitals are experiencing losses upwards of $1 million to $2 million [per] day, while some of our health systems are reporting revenue losses in the range of $200-$600 million per month.”

Catholic Charities leaders say that while the government relief package signed into law on March 27 by President Trump will help meet some of the initial need, much more action is needed for charities to be able to meet the expected demand.

The roughly 2,500 Catholic hospital chaplains ministering in the United States are integrated into the medical teams at many hospitals, and they are responding to the chaos engendered by the coronavirus crisis in various ways.

Online donations may not be enough to compensate for the lack of a weekly collection plate in U.S. dioceses, writes Michael J, O'Loughlin, and Catholic charitable organizations are also being affected.

Medically, the afflictions are quite different, and AIDS in the early days appears to have been much deadlier than Covid-19 today. Socially, the stigma that affected early cases of H.I.V. and AIDS is largely absent today.

The only Democratic candidate whom a majority of poll respondents viewed as very or somewhat religious is former Vice President Joe Biden, who appeared at public events on Ash Wednesday with ashes on his forehead.