Cindy Wooden, Catholic News Service

Cindy Wooden, Catholic News Service

VATICAN – Truly celebrating Easter means allowing Jesus to triumph over personal fears and give life to hope, creativity and care for others, Pope Francis said.
VATICAN – Reminding bishops, pastors and Catholics around the world that all Latin-rite Catholics should celebrate the feast of Mary, Mother of the Church on the Monday after Pentecost this year, Cardinal Robert Sarah said the celebration should take precedence over any other possible liturgy that day.
VATICAN – Young people want to know they are valued members of the Catholic Church and that their questions and struggles are taken seriously enough that someone will spend time with them discussing issues rather than simply repeating "prefabricated" responses, said delegates to a meeting in Rome.
VATICAN – If Catholic morality in the past seemed so obsessed with preventing sexual sin that it ignored sins of injustice, today "we have gone to the opposite extreme," seemingly concerned only with how people treat others, not with how they treat the gift of their bodies, the papal preacher said.
VATICAN – Pope Francis seems to be fixated on the wounds of Christ. And he has suggested that other Catholics might want to be as well.
VATICAN – After a very public controversy involving the use of a letter by retired Pope Benedict XVI, Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Msgr. Dario Vigano as prefect of the Vatican Secretariat for Communication.
VATICAN – Pope Francis once again will celebrate the Holy Thursday Mass of the Lord's Supper in a prison and will wash the feet of 12 inmates.
VATICAN – Celebrating the feast of St. Joseph, Pope Francis ordained three new bishops who will serve as papal nuncios, or ambassadors.
ROME – The Catholic Church needs the enthusiasm, daring and hope of young people so that it can preach the Gospel energetically and respond to the questions men and women raise today, Pope Francis told some 300 young adults.
VATICAN – Liberating the poor, the oppressed and the persecuted is an integral part of what God wants his church to do, Pope Francis said.