The Vatican is facing mounting questions after the publication of a leaked audio recording in which Monsignor Jordi Bertomeu, an official of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith and the Vatican’s commissioner overseeing the suppression of Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, acknowledges that the Holy See was aware of an ongoing FBI investigation into suspected money laundering tied to the group.

Pope Leo XIV arrived in Ankara on Thursday at the start of a six-day visit to Turkey and Lebanon, his first journey abroad since his election earlier this year.

At first glance, the papal itinerary resembles the familiar arc of modern papal travel: state visits in Ankara, a call for peace, gestures of goodwill toward Muslims, and pastoral stops among the vulnerable. But there is much more going on here.

Stepping off the plane on 27 November, the Pope was greeted by Turkish officials before travelling to the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, where he laid a wreath and prayed silently for the country’s peace and prosperity.

William F. Buckley Jr was born 100 years ago this week. The renaissance man of American conservatism. Editor, broadcaster, novelist, wit, polemicist, bon viveur, one-time CIA agent, New York mayoral candidate, accomplished harpsichordist – and a devout Catholic. To Margaret Thatcher, “He shaped a generation not only in America, but wherever the defence of liberty was required.” Ronald Reagan praised him, writing, “you rolled back the Red Sea and made it dry land for the march of freedom.”

The Vatican has issued a new doctrinal note presenting monogamous marriage as a gift rooted in human dignity and divine grace, released only a month after the dicastery’s reflection on Marian titles drew international reaction.

The fresh document, Una Caro. In Praise of Monogamy, was approved by Pope Leo XIV on 21 November and published on 25 November by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith. It describes marriage as an “exclusive union and mutual belonging,” insisting that such unity is neither a cultural leftover nor a moral burden but a reality that “opens to eternity.”

Father Richard Thomas, the Jesuit who spent four decades serving the poor along the United States–Mexico border, has taken a significant step toward canonisation after the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops voted to advance his cause.

The decision, made at the bishops’ meeting in Baltimore, draws national attention to a priest whose radical simplicity, intense spirituality and tireless charity marked him out as a distinctive presence in one of the poorest regions of the continent.

Pope Leo XIV has issued a new Apostolic Letter urging Christians to recover the unity of faith first expressed at the Council of Nicaea 1,700 years ago.

Released on the 23rd for the feast of Christ the King, In unitate fidei comes just days before the Pope begins his first foreign journey, a highly symbolic visit to Türkiye, where he will mark the anniversary at the site of the ancient council.

The document, running to twelve sections, takes the Nicene Creed as the starting point for a renewed call to communion among Christians.

Archbishop Paul Coakley has stressed that the plight of migrants remains at the heart of the American bishops’ agenda in a wide-ranging interview.

In an interview with Vatican News following his election as president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), he identified immigration as “a burning issue” for the Church in the United States.

He recalled that the country is a nation “built on migration experience” and insisted the bishops must accompany and support immigrant communities as they face fear and uncertainty.

Pope Leo XIV has publicly expressed his endorsement of a landmark “Special Message” on immigration issued by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).

Speaking outside his summer residence at Castel Gandolfo on 18 November, the Pope urged Catholics of good will to heed its call for humane treatment and respect for the dignity of every person.

His Holiness said, “I appreciate very much what the bishops have said. I think it is a very important statement. I would invite especially all Catholics, but people of good will, to listen carefully to what they said.”

Catholic Vice President J. D. Vance strongly signalled his intention to run for the White House in 2028 but only after the crucial mid term elections of 2026.

Speaking to Sean Hannity on Fox News, Vance said, “I would say that I have thought about what that moment might look like after the midterm elections, sure.” He added, “But I also, whenever I think about that, I try to put it out of my head and remind myself the American people elected me to do a job right now and my job is to do it.”

The first US pontiff met filmmakers at the Vatican on Saturday 15 November and described cinema as "a workshop of hope”. Hours later in London's Coliseum, the English National Opera's play Dead Man Walking demonstrated exactly what the pontiff meant.

Yet for all the five-star reviews and sold-out houses, critics are missing the deeper story: what makes this work so powerful isn't just the performances or Jake Heggie's gospel-infused score, but how it reveals the fundamental disconnect – and potential reconciliation – between Catholic witness and contemporary secular culture.

The University of Notre Dame has removed its long-standing expectation that staff should “understand, accept and support” its Catholic mission.

In a press release, the University of Notre of Dame explained that it was removing its Catholic mission statement for staff. It will be replaced with a streamlined set of secular values that no longer makes explicit reference to the religious character of the institution.

The change was unveiled during staff town-hall-type meetings held on 29 and 30 October, where new organisational principles were presented as part of a wider refresh of internal culture at one of America’s most prominent Catholic universities.

Pope Leo XIV paid a quiet visit to a new outpatient clinic that has been built beneath the colonnade of St Peter’s Square.

On 14 November, coinciding with the World Day of the Poor, the Pope visited the new San Martino Outpatient Clinic. Established by the Office of the Papal Almoner in collaboration with the Health and Hygiene Directorate of the Governorate of Vatican City State, the new clinic has been equipped to expand the range of medical care available to people living on the margins in Rome.

The Pope has had an audience with the only bishop in the world whose pastoral ministry is exclusively dedicated to the Traditional Latin Mass.

On 15 November, the Holy Father received Bishop Fernando Arêas Rifan, titular of Cedamusa and apostolic administrator of the personal apostolic administration of Saint John Vianney, according to the Holy See Press Office.

A US Catholic pressure group has lodged a petition in Rome after accusing Bishop Vittorio Francesco Viola, Secretary of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, of advancing a position on the jurisdiction of marriage that the group claims contradicts established Catholic teaching.

Mary’s Advocates, a lay organisation that upholds marriage against no-fault divorce, focusing particularly on Catholic marriage, and which defends spouses who oppose a civil divorce, argues that the bishop’s stance involves an error historically condemned as an “anathema”.

Pope Leo XIV has urged the Church and wider society to confront the risks posed to young people by artificial intelligence (AI), warning that children are increasingly exposed to powerful digital systems capable of shaping their choices without their knowledge.

Addressing delegates at a Vatican conference on the dignity of children in the age of AI, he insisted that “safeguarding minors’ dignity cannot be reduced to policies” and argued that proper formation in the digital realm is becoming essential for families and educators.

“What I really need is a course on how to raise my son.” This phrase is not only common, it’s commonly genuine.

Think about the stages that lead up to this point. The wedding bells ring, the lights go out, and nine months later the nurse is watching you take a human away to strap into your car. Skip ahead another 12 years and all of a sudden your pride and joy has found his way to the Internet’s less enriching pages. But he’s only 12?!

Archbishop Alexander Sample has been elected chairman of the US bishops’ Committee for Religious Liberty after an unusual tie in the conference vote.

The plenary meeting of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops delivered an unexpected moment when the routine election of a committee chair ended in an extraordinary stalemate.

The vote for the leadership of the bishops’ religious liberty committee produced a deadlock, with Archbishop Alexander Sample of Portland and Bishop Michael Sis of San Angelo each receiving 111 votes. What followed was a rare display of procedural uncertainty and personal restraint before the assembly.

Like many young converts, my first experience of Catholic worship was through the Traditional Latin Mass. It was grand, puzzling, and at times bewildering. Few besides the lady up front in the mantilla seemed particularly confident about when to stand and when to kneel. And yet the following week – and every Sunday since – I have been drawn back. Not, as some presume, in hopes of stumbling upon the grand robes-and-sandals Christianity beloved by certain Catholic corners of X, but out of a curious desire to experience what Dr Peter Kwasniewski refers to as a “prolonged courtship of the soul”.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has elected Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City as its next president and Bishop Daniel E. Flores of Brownsville, Texas, as vice president, following a vote at the bishops’ plenary assembly in Baltimore this week.

Archbishop Coakley was elected president on the third ballot after receiving 128 votes to Bishop Flores’s 109 in a run-off. Bishop Flores was then chosen as vice president on the first ballot from the remaining nine candidates.

Both bishops will begin their three-year terms at the conclusion of the plenary meeting on Thursday, succeeding Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio of the Military Services and Archbishop William E. Lori of Baltimore.

‘My enemy’s enemy is my friend,’ so the ancient proverb goes. This was certainly true in the run-up to the 2024 US presidential election, when libertarians, Zionists, America-first absolutists and fed-up ‘anti-woke’ Democrats saw it as their mission to win Trump four more years. Now, one year on from their historic victory, as the MAGA alliance begins to fall apart, it would seem the real battle has begun: the battle to define the future of the American right.

The significance of this breakdown occurring now, not only on the anniversary of the election but also two months since the tragic assassination of Charlie Kirk, cannot be overstated. As a clear leader and potential future presidential candidate, Kirk’s death both intensified the bitterness felt towards those on the left and left a void between the various coalition parties he was in many ways holding together. The result has been the latest and most dramatic culmination of infighting among conservatives, with both old and new players competing to dictate the right’s future.