NAIROBI, Kenya - Pope Francis’ visit to the Kenyan capital of Nairobi Nov. 25–27 will bring healing and reconciliation to the East African nation that has suffered key setbacks in the recent past, senior bishops here say.

MEXICO CITY - Pope Francis will visit Mexico in February, marking the pontiff's first trip to the heavily Catholic country, said Cardinal Norberto Rivera Carrera of Mexico City.

VATICAN CITY - Despite ongoing violence in the Central African Republic, Pope Francis said he hopes to be able to visit the country in late November and to anticipate the Year of Mercy by opening the Holy Door of the cathedral in Bangui, the nation's capital.

Pope Francis says God can only love and not condemn and that love is His weakness and our victory. He said we are so closely bound to God’s love that nothing can sever us from it. That was the message at the heart of the Pope’s homily delivered on Thursday (29th October) at the Santa Marta residence.

VATICAN CITY - One of the most repeated themes during the Synod on the Family was the need for a more biblically based approach. The original working document for the Synod — the Instrumentum Laboris — came in for repeated and severe criticism for taking as its starting point sociological data rather than the Word of God.

The Synod is not over. Synod delegates may have returned home after three weeks of intense work that produced 94 paragraphs of advice to Pope Francis, including three vaguely worded paragraphs concerning communion for divorced and civilly remarried Catholics and what sort of welcome the Church extends to gay Catholics. But that’s not the last word.

VATICAN CITY - If the Catholic Church did more to recognize and promote women it could help their status across society, said the Synod of Bishops on the Family.

VATICAN CITY - The first task of the Church “is not to hand down condemnations or anathemas, but to proclaim the mercy of God,” Pope Francis said in a blunt address to delegates at the Synod of Bishops on the Family.

VATICAN CITY - The world expects all people of religious faith to work with everyone for a better future, Pope Francis told representatives of major religions.

VATICAN CITY - As the death toll from an earthquake in Pakistan and Afghanistan continued to rise, Pope Francis called for prayers and concrete aid for survivors.

VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis called on the international community to find a way to bring peace to Iraq and the Middle East and prayed that Christians there would no longer be forced to flee their homes.

OXFORD, England - Religious leaders in the Central African Republic have predicted the Pope's upcoming visit could reconcile opposing factions, three years after a Muslim-led rebellion plunged the country into civil war.

Sunday 25 Oct. Lines of faithful spiraled around St. Peter's Square from early on Sunday awaiting their chance to enter St. Peter’s Basilica for the closing Mass of the Synod on the Family. The Mass, presided over by Pope Francis, marked the end of the second gathering of the Synod of Bishops to discuss "The Mission and Vocation of the Family in the Church and Contemporary World."

Pope Francis delivered the homily at Mass being offered on Sunday morning, the 30th Sunday in Ordinary Time, to mark the close of the XIV Ordinary Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, who have been gathered in Rome for the past three weeks to reflect on and discuss the vocation and mission of the family in the Church and in the contemporary world.

VATICAN CITY - The first task of the Catholic Church "is not to hand down condemnations or anathemas, but to proclaim the mercy of God," Pope Francis told members of the Synod of Bishops on the family.