In a city of about 100,000, the 13,000 parishioners at St. Francis of Assisi have become a force to be reckoned with.

Closely watched off-year elections in several states that offered the first major opportunity for voters to weigh in at the ballot box since President Donald Trump began his second term resulted in key victories for Democratic candidates.

Pope Leo XIV met Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for the first time on Thursday, and the two men discussed the urgent need to provide assistance to civilians in Gaza and to pursue a two-state solution to end the conflict in the region.

Kripalaya Special School is celebrating 25 years of providing education and life skills to children and adults with disabilities. GSR spoke with Sr. Anseena Memadathil, the school headmistress since 2008.

Pope Leo XIV has called for dialogue and peace in Venezuela as the United States amps up pressure on the South American country — where relations between the socialist regime and Catholic officials have become tense.

Election night results are in, and a pair of prominent races stand as microcosms of a youth-fueled Democratic wave that swept through the nation in an off-year temperature test amid the second Trump administration.

Saying he was deeply saddened, Archbishop Shelton Fabre of Louisville prayed for comfort, peace and healing after the deadly crash of a UPS cargo plane at Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport Nov. 4.

What cardinals inside the conclave found in Robert Francis Prevost was not a striking personality to remake the church, but a steady pastor who could carry forward Pope Francis' spirit while strengthening governance.

As leaders prepare to meet in Belém, Brazil, women living the climate emergency in Kenya and across Africa are demanding global action, gender justice and investment in local adaptation.

Twenty cardinal electors and influential cardinal non-electors spoke to NCR after Pope Leo XIV's election. In Part 2 of this series, the conclave opens and the cardinals make their crucial choice.

Barron added: "I feel that maintaining open lines of communication and engaging in dialogue with the Administration constitute the most constructive way forward."

Ahead of the United Nations' annual climate conference, two U.S. Catholic bishops and the leader of a top Catholic aid agency are calling for urgent, long-term action to safeguard both creation and humanity.

Outer space must be safeguarded for peaceful purposes and for the common good of humanity, stressed the Vatican's top diplomat to the United Nations.

The Mexican bishops' conference has condemned the murder of a mayor, who was assassinated after pleading for federal assistance in combating drug cartels — which extort avocado growers in his municipality in western Michoacán state.

Cardinal Robert McElroy, head of the Archdiocese of Washington and an outspoken advocate for Catholic social justice, has been diagnosed with a "non-aggressive" cancer that will be surgically removed Nov. 13.

A Pennsylvania bishop has condemned a local Catholic school's use of a prominent Nazi symbol on a float in a community Halloween parade.

Pope Leo XIV appealed for greater consideration for the "spiritual rights" of migrants in the United States, saying church ministers should be allowed to provide pastoral care to detained people who have often lived peacefully for years.

"Next time we meet, we might be the Consecrated Religious of the Americas," said LCWR executive director Carol Zinn at the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation's Catholic Sisters Initiative Convening in Mexico City Oct. 29-31.

After spending a month in India around temples, mosques and Catholic churches, theologian Consuelo Vélez reflects on the cultural and spiritual experience and the common challenge of expressing faith.

In a public letter, the bishops say they "consider this law to be contrary to justice, as it encourages impunity for crimes against humanity, including forced disappearances, extrajudicial executions, rape, and torture."

Off-year elections can sometimes be over-interpreted, but this year's three major contests were conducted in the shadow of Trump. The results can be properly interpreted as a referendum on the president.

After Pope Leo XIV's election, NCR spoke with cardinal electors and influential cardinal non-electors who witnessed the inner dynamics of the conclave and the pre-conclave days. They shared what ultimately led them to Leo.

"We can try to help our leaders understand that these people should not be pawns on their political chessboard," said Deacon Kevin Sartorius. "That's not fair. These are people who are in need of food."

The findings largely confirm the narrative that older clergy are far more liberal than younger. But there are still issues, less political and more theological, for further studies of U.S. priests to explore.

"The land is a gift and the sign of a divine presence," said the Fr. Diego Dalla Gassa, a Franciscan in charge of the harvest in the hermitage next to Gethsemane. The word Gethsemane is derived from the ancient Aramaic's and Hebrew's "oil press."

At the end of the episode, Baez sings the Civil Rights anthem "Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around."

A congregation of sisters in Wisconsin made history Oct. 31.

Those who attempt to politicize the pope are engaging in partisan wish-casting, and attempting to mold Pope Leo in their image just as conservatives have done to previous popes, says Digital Editor John Grosso.

Advocates say the push burdens states with duplicative verification checks and could lead people to lose coverage just for missing paperwork deadlines.

While praising devotion to Mary, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith firmly rejected moves to formally proclaim Mary as "co-redemptrix" or "co-mediatrix."

Nigeria's return to the U.S. list of countries of "particular concern" over Christian persecution has drawn mixed reactions from church leaders and triggered a heated debate in Africa's most populous nation.

In a statement that day marking the commemoration of Ireland's great famine, Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich prompted the faithful to "join (him) in prayer and remembrance" in commemorating the tragedy.

The skills that sustain interfaith marriages require the same virtues that sustain a pluralistic society.

The Episcopal Diocese of Texas announced on Saturday that one of its priests, a Kenyan national, has been detained by immigration officials despite working in the state legally.

Attorneys for the Diocese of Paterson, New Jersey, have moved to voluntarily dismiss a lawsuit they had filed against the federal government regarding visas for religious workers.

With reports of a massacre in Sudan and election-related violence in Tanzania, Pope Leo XIV pleaded for peace and dialogue.

St. Patrick Church, the last remaining Black Catholic parish in the city of Charleston, South Carolina, has received a $500,000 matching grant to preserve its historic 19th-century building.

Illinois Catholics and pro-life advocates have turned their sights on Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker's office after the state Senate in the early hours of Oct. 31 narrowly voted to legalize physician-assisted suicide.

Sr. Gloria Narváez reflects on her four years in captivity in Mali. She could not physically receive the Eucharist, but the desert became a place of prayer and devotion, despite the cruelty of her captors.

On All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day, we remember the believers who lived before us. And we can find a bit of sweetness in Rosie Grant's To Die For: A Cookbook of Gravestone Recipes, where food and death meet.

In the Gaza Strip, the fragile calm following the Oct. 13 Israel-Hamas peace deal has brought little relief to the enclave's small Christian community.

This week on "The Nonviolent Jesus Podcast," John Dear hosts legendary folk singer Joan Baez, his friend of 35 years.

Several communities of women religious in the U.S. posted photos of their participation in national demonstrations voicing discontent with the Trump administration's treatment of migrants and other communities under attack.

Becoming only the 38th doctor of the church, Bowen said, "is not about being intelligent. It's not about being bright. It's about saying something timeless about the church's teaching, putting into words something eminent, something that stands out."

A federal judge in Rhode Island on Oct. 31 blocked the Trump administration from ceasing to pay for federal food assistance during the government shutdown.

From Hagar to Mother Mary Lange, from St. Valentine to Mister Rogers, this collection finds holiness across time and space.

Yesterday's readings tell us we are capable of realizing how deeply united we are as God's creatures. We are created to live in full union with God and one another: here and hereafter, altogether, all at once.

The lives of St. John Henry Newman and of all the saints teach Christians that "it is possible to live passionately amidst the complexity of the present without neglecting the apostolic mandate to 'shine like stars in the world,' " Pope Leo XIV said.

As Lake Victoria's rising waters displace families, Catholic leaders and villagers plant bamboo to restore their land and send a message to world leaders meeting in Brazil.

"The whole party needs a collective 'Sister Souljah' moment if it wants to win elections again," NCR's Michael Sean Winters writes.