VATICAN CITY - The Christmas tree and Nativity scene in St. Peter's Square will be set up and unveiled earlier than usual this year to be ready for the opening of the Year of Mercy.

ROME - An Italian investigative journalist spoke out against what he called a “medieval” Vatican law that might result in a jail sentence of up to eight years for publishing confidential Holy See documents.

VATICAN CITY - Patients have a right to a diagnosis that includes the possible causes of their illness, not just treatment addressing the symptoms, said a doctor invited to a Vatican-sponsored congress.

VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis will visit Rome's synagogue and meet with the city's Jewish community Jan. 17, the Vatican announced.
Invited by Rome's Chief Rabbi Riccardo Di Segni, Pope Francis will be the third pope to visit the synagogue; St. John Paul II made his landmark visit in 1986 and Pope Benedict XVI visited in 2010.

VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis raised the specter of a World War III “in pieces,” Muslims issued statements of condemnation, while evangelical Christians in America debated whether to speak of a “war with Islam.”

ROME - On the evening of Nov. 16, 1965, quietly alerted to the event by word-of-mouth, some 40 Roman Catholic bishops made their way to celebrate Mass in an ancient, underground basilica in the Catacombs of Domitilla on the outskirts of the Eternal City.

VATICAN CITY - Italian Bishop Luigi Bettazzi is the last surviving bishop of the 42 members of the Second Vatican Council who celebrated a Mass Nov. 16, 1965, in the Catacombs of Domitilla and signed a pact promising to live simply and close to the poor.

MEXICO CITY - Pope Francis is exploring the possibility of visiting the previously problematic border city of Ciudad Juarez, where a battle between drug cartels during the past decade cost more than 10,000 lives in a four-year period.

VATICAN CITY - A family that chooses to watch TV or play with their smartphones rather than talk at the dinner table is "hardly a family," Pope Francis said.