The White House is preparing for an “extraordinary” programme for Holy Week, with President Trump taking part in a series of events to honour the lead up to Easter and Easter itself with “the observance it deserves”. 

The Holy Week schedule has been devised by the new “White House Faith Office”, which was founded to “assist faith-based entities, community organisations, and houses of worship in their efforts to strengthen American families, promote work and self-sufficiency, and protect religious liberty”.

“The newly created White House Faith Office is grateful to share that President Trump will honour and celebrate Holy Week and Easter with the observance it deserves,” Jennifer Korn, faith director of the White House Faith Office, told Fox News Digital. 

ROME – When Pope Francis was discharged from the hospital three weeks ago, officials broadly said that a new era of his papacy was being ushered in, following a harrowing 38-day battle with double pneumonia.

For the first two weeks after his discharge from Rome’s Gemelli Hospital on March 23, what exactly Francis’s papacy would look like going forward was largely a mystery, as he settled back into his residence and appeared to be astutely adhering to a doctor-mandated two-month period of rest.

During his weeks of convalescence, Francis is in theory supposed to avoid group gatherings and too much exposure to environments where he could pick up more germs.

On Saturday afternoon, Pope Francis – despite the Vatican’s repeated insistence that he is observing a two-month period of rest – made his fourth surprise outing in a week to pray at his favourite Roman basilica.

According to a Vatican statement issued on April 12, Pope Francis ventured out that afternoon to the Basilica of Saint Mary Major, his preferred church among the Roman basilicas. This marked what is believed to be his first departure from the Vatican since returning from hospital three weeks ago.

Francis had been admitted to Rome’s Gemelli Hospital on February 14 for treatment of a complex respiratory infection and double pneumonia. He was discharged on March 23 and instructed by doctors to observe a two-month period of rest, avoiding contact with groups.

In Sunday’s Gospel, St Luke records that the soldiers mocked Jesus shortly after his Crucifixion by giving him sour wine. This was the drink of slaves and soldiers—an insult to one who claimed to be a king.

But the other three Evangelists each describe sour wine, or vinegar, being given to Jesus around three hours later.

St John implies that on this occasion it was an act of mercy rather than mockery. Jesus said, “I thirst,” and someone offered him refreshment (19:28-29).

St Mark, however, adds more details: “Some of the bystanders hearing it said, ‘Behold, he is calling Elijah.’ And one ran and, filling a sponge full of vinegar, put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink, saying, ‘Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down’” (15:35-36).

The moment a nation’s debt exceeds its GDP, the economic situation moves into banana-republic territory. This ought to cause deep alarm—but equally concerning is the realisation that we are presented with only one side of the argument in the public space. 

These are two serious causes for concern for all of us.

President Trump has proposed a radical reform of America’s trading relationships to rescue its economy. Astonishingly, however, the world’s media appears to have moved into panic mode over Trumpian tariffs.

The assumption in the commentary is that all sensible people should position themselves somewhere on a scale between outrage and panic. Yet Catholic social teaching may offer some balm for a disturbed Western economic digestion, partly because it prioritises protecting the poor.

ROME – Though in theory observing a two-month period of rest, Pope Francis Thursday made his third surprise appearance in a week, showing up inside St Peter’s Basilica in the middle of the afternoon, without his usual papal attire.

In videos and photos circulating on social media, the Pope, wearing black pants and a white undershirt with a poncho covering his torso from the front, came to the basilica at around 1pm local time and prayed for about 10 minutes in front of the tomb of Pope Pius X.

The veil of St. Veronica, best known to many Catholics as an intangible element of the Sixth Station of the Cross, known as “Veronica Wipes the Face of Jesus”, was displayed to pilgrims at St. Peter’s Basilica earlier this week. The holy relic shows an image that is said to be the Holy Face of Jesus Christ.

Speaking about the 6 April veneration, a Vatican official and spokesman for St. Peter’s Basilica said the ancient tradition of devotion to Veronica’s Veil and to the Holy Face of Jesus is a sign of hope, and an invitation to return to the essentials in a world constantly connected and on the move.

The Veil of Veronica became an ancient Christian devotion to what is believed to be the divine imprint of Jesus’s face onto the veil of a widow named Veronica, who is said to have used it to wipe Christ’s face as he was carrying the cross to Mount Golgotha, where he was crucified.

President Donald Trump’s nominee to serve as Vatican ambassador for the US responded to a range of important Catholic-related questions during a Senate confirmation hearing on April 8.

The issues covered during the hearing included religious persecution, USAID cuts and the relationship between the Vatican and the Chinese Communist Party, reports US-based media CatholicVote.

Before his nomination for the ambassadorial role, Brian Burch as president of the pro-Republican CatholicVote website oversaw its heavy support for Trump during the latter’s re-election campaign in 2024. Burch’s nomination by Trump for the Holy See role is seen as a reward in some quarters.

The average Catholic under 25 has no societal pressure to remain Catholic. If anything, there is greater pressure from peers, professors, parents and sometimes even from our own priests to become increasingly lax around Catholic truths; to be less “rigid”, less traditional and less “uptight”.

However, my experience within my university “CathSoc”, or Catholic Society for those not up to date with the lingo, is that what young Catholics desire is, if not tradition, then at the very least, theological orthodoxy.

This truth resonated profoundly with me a few weeks ago when our CathSoc accidentally advertised an Anglican “Eucharistic Adoration” service – an oxymoron if I have ever heard one. This issue was raised to me by several friends, while acknowledging that no Catholic could possibly attend such an event in good faith.

Pope Francis has resumed calling Gaza’s Catholic parish after a hiatus forced by his hospitalisation and recovery.

Father Gabriel Romanelli, pastor of Gaza’s Holy Family parish, confirmed the resumption of the calls, while also issuing some choice words regarding the proposal by US President Donald Trump to turn the Gaza Strip into a luxurious beach resort.

“When he called, we were at the door of the rectory, inside the compound, and the children and young people started shouting, ‘Long live the Pope!’ in Arabic and in Italian,” Romanelli said, adding that the members of the parish thanked the Pope for his repeated appeals for peace.

ROME – Pope Francis is sending four ambulances to Ukraine filled with medical supplies for Easter, as the Vatican attempts to engage both Ukrainian and Russian officials amid ongoing efforts to securing a ceasefire.

In an April 7 communique, the Papal Almoner’s Office said that in keeping with the pope’s continued prayers for peace in Ukraine, he is again sending his Almoner, Polish Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, to Ukraine “to donate four ambulances”.

These ambulances will be “equipped with every medical instrument necessary to save human lives,” and will be sent directly to war zones, the statement said.

ROME – Despite making a surprise public appearance over the weekend and resuming some work meetings, Pope Francis continues to observe a doctor-mandated time of rest and is still undergoing various therapies.

“Pope Francis continues his convalescence according to doctors’ orders,” the Vatican press office said Tuesday, following the pope’s public appearance during Mass Sunday.

Pope Francis Sunday, April 6, made a surprise visit to St. Peter’s Square at the end of a Mass for the Jubilee for the Sick and Healthcare Workers.

The American government has expressed disappointment over the conviction of a British Christian woman who held up a sign outside a Bournemouth abortion clinic saying: “Here to talk, if you want.”

The U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labour said on X, the social media platform, that it was “disappointed with the UK court’s conviction of Livia Tossici-Bolt for violating a designated buffer zone at an abortion clinic.”

It said: “Freedom of expression must be protected for all”.

ROME – Pope Francis Sunday made his first public appearance since leaving the hospital two weeks ago, coming into St. Peter’s Square at the close of a Mass for the Jubilee of the Sick and Healthcare Workers.

The pope came out in his wheelchair and was receiving oxygen through nasal tubes, but still managed to speak, telling faithful in a breathless and weak-sounding voice, “Happy Sunday to everyone, thank you so much!” The pope was accompanied by his personal nurse, Massimiliano Strappetti.

Francis came out for the final blessing of an April 6 Mass celebrated by Italian Archbishop Rino Fisichella, pro-prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization and responsible for organizing the 2025 Jubilee of Hope, on the occasion of the Jubilee for the Sick and Healthcare Workers.

I remember the first time I heard about then-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick sharing a bed with young seminarians. 

It was 2002, and I was working at the Vatican. A co-worker told me how he had taken part in a weekend retreat with McCarrick years earlier, when he was a seminarian and McCarrick was a bishop. It was two to a bed in the house, and he was assigned to share with McCarrick.

He said McCarrick only placed a hand on his shoulder before falling asleep, but he also said he had heard stories of more “intimate” encounters between McCarrick and others in similar circumstances.

It was then I learned that McCarrick’s nickname was “Uncle Ted”.

In Sunday’s Gospel (John 8:1–12), Jesus writes on the ground in response to the Pharisees’ question of whether an adulterous woman should be stoned. Had he agreed, they would have accused him to the Romans for illegally promoting the Jews’ right to execute wrongdoers; had he refused, they would have charged him with disobedience to the law of Moses.

His silent response is mysterious, but it could evoke a verse from Jeremiah: “Those who turn away from thee shall be written in the earth, for they have forsaken the Lord, the fountain of living water” (Jeremiah 17:13). Jesus perhaps writes the names of those Pharisees in the dust because they have rejected him by setting their trap. He has just presented himself as “a fountain of living water” in the previous chapter (John 7:37–38): “If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water.’”

The Christian woman at the centre of the free speech row between the United States and the UK was today convicted of breaching abortion clinic “buffer zone” rules.

Dr Livia Tossici-Bolt was prosecuted after she refused to pay a fixed penalty notice as a punishment for holding up a sign outside an abortion clinic in Bournemouth which read: “Here to talk, if you want.”

The 64-year-old Bournemouth doctor was found guilty at Poole Magistrates’ Court after District Judge Orla Austin ruled that council officers had a reasonable belief that she was in violation of the Public Spaces Prohibition Order (PSPO).

This year is a big one for anniversaries in the Church, with the 20th anniversary of the death of Pope St. John Paul II this week, and the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea starting next month.

2025 is also the 65th anniversary of Irene Garza’s murder by the hands of a Catholic priest in McAllen, Texas.

On Saturday, 16 April 1960, Garza – a 25-year-old elementary schoolteacher who lived with her parents – said she was going to Confession at Sacred Heart Church in McAllen. It was the day before Easter. When she didn’t return home, her parents originally thought she stayed at the church for the Vigil.

A Catholic leader from the Holy Land has appealed to UK parliamentarians to bring about peace.

At a packed cross-party meeting in the UK Parliament, Bishop William Shomali, Patriarchal Vicar for Jerusalem and Palestine, described the impact of the violence since 7th October 2023 on the lives of people in the Holy Land, especially the West Bank and Gaza.

Bishop Shomali said: “My intention is not to advocate for one side against the other or to discuss the injustices and crimes committed in this land called holy.”

A story has come to light about a teenage girl and her family in the United States who are crediting the intercession of Blessed Solanus Casey for the sudden disappearance of two tumours that the girl was suffering from.

The potential miracle could have an impact on the canonisation process for the humble Capuchin friar who worked for two decades as a porter at St. Bonaventure Monastery on Detroit’s east side during the first half of the 20th century.

Mary Bartold, 16, of DeWitt, Michigan, was diagnosed in May 2024 with a pair of tumours on her ovaries, reports the Detroit Free Press.

There was a 7.3-cm tumour on her left ovary, and a 1.5-cm tumour on her right ovary. As a result, she was at risk of losing her ovaries, along with other serious health complications.