Nation/World

Pope Francis asked Catholics to get ready for the jubilee journey with a Year of Prayer and now, a few months after the year was officially announced, a kind of prayer prep-school is in session.

Supreme Knight Patrick E. Kelly said the need for lay Catholics to take part in the church’s evangelization is “especially urgent in our time” and is one of the three main duties that laypeople have in carrying out the Church’s mission.

Photos featured this week include a National March for Life in Warsaw, Poland, an immigration conference at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. and more.

Pope Francis and his international Council of Cardinals continued their discussions about the role of women in the church, listening to women experts, including a professor who spoke about how culture impacts women’s roles and status.

Photos featured this week include a candlelit procession in memory of the six crewmen who died in the Baltimore bridge collapse, on-going restoration at Notre Dame Cathedral  and more.

In the nation’s capital — where stress, anxiety and mental health challenges sometimes impact the lives and work of those in government service, in legal and other professions, and individuals and families — St. Joseph Church on Capitol Hill hosted a “Come as You Are” Holy Week Prayer Service for Mental Health.

“Dignitas Infinita” (“Infinite Dignity”) recounts the biblical and magisterial basis for the Catholic Church’s understanding of human dignity as inherent, since it ultimately flows from the human person’s creation “in the image and likeness of God” and redemption in Christ.

The president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops announced recently that participants in the National Eucharistic Congress and related National Eucharistic Pilgrimage now have opportunities to receive plenary indulgences.