Catholic News Service

Catholic News Service

CHICAGO – When civic leaders make friendly bets on which team will win a big championship with their counterparts in another city, one winner enjoys a feast, while the loser eats some humble pie.

SAN DIEGO – An insert and article in a San Diego parish's bulletin saying Catholics were going to hell if they voted for Hillary Clinton and claiming Clinton was influenced by Satan are inappropriate and do not reflect Catholic teaching or diocesan policies, said a spokesman for the San Diego Diocese.

DES MOINES, Iowa – In response to the fatal shootings Nov. 2 of two police officers, Bishop Richard E. Pates of Des Moines said the diocese stands in solidarity with members of the local police force.

American voters are being encouraged by their bishops to weigh the issues and candidates carefully as the United States goes to the polls Nov. 8 following a bitter and divisive presidential election campaign.

BEIRUT – Cardinal Bechara Rai, patriarch of Maronite Catholics, welcomed the election of a new Lebanese president, ending a two-and-a-half-year power vacuum that had crippled the country's government institutions.

MANILA, Philippines – As Filipinos remembered their departed on All Souls' Day, the country's church leaders called on the faithful to also pray for those who fell victim in the government's all-out war against illegal drugs.

MANILA, Philippines – Close friends and associates of Cardinal-designate Anthony Soter Fernandez, retired archbishop of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, have been waiting for years for the 84-year-old prelate to receive a red hat.

MANILA, Philippines – The Archdiocese of Manila officially launched a drug rehabilitation program Oct. 23, with a heavy emphasis on spiritual formation in the wake of the Philippine government's war on drugs.

VATICAN CITY – As a military operation in northern Iraq fights to wrest control of areas held by retaliating Islamic State forces, Pope Francis criticized the "cruelty" and heinous violence waged against innocent civilians.

NEW YORK – Protecting Christianity and religious pluralism in the Middle East and respecting the rights of all would open the path to peace in the region, Supreme Knight Carl Anderson said at a dinner in New York Oct. 12.