COVID-19

“This can be a time for blessings,” Sister Maria Elena Romero said. “But you have to take advantage of it, to see the good side of it, and then it can be a blessed time, a time to ask for mercy, to give thanks, to think about others, to reflect.”

In an effort to stem the pandemic of COVID-19, bishops’ conferences and dioceses around the world began suspending public Masses.

The Church of All Saints in Bergamo — located in a cemetery in Italy’s hardest-hit Lombardy region — has had to open its doors to dozens of coffins containing the remains of people who died of COVID-19.

The timeline of the spread of the coronavirus in Italy moved from hand washing and distancing from one another to closings and stay at home.

Dioceses worldwide are taking precautions to guard against the spread of the coronavirus and reminding parishioners to take common sense steps related to hygiene in their personal lives.

As the number of people testing positive for the coronavirus in Europe continued to grow, the French Shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes announced that pilgrims were still welcome, but the pools the sick bathe in hoping for healing would be closed temporarily.

Amid concerns over the current outbreak of the coronavirus, several U.S. Catholic colleges and universities have canceled their international programs in Italy this semester or are closely monitoring the situation and prepared to cut programs short if necessary.

The Chinese government has temporarily closed all of the country’s places of worship in an effort to contain the COVID-19 respiratory coronavirus that has now killed almost 3,000 people, with more than 80,000 around the world verified with infections.