Rory McIlroy, of Northern Ireland, hits from the pine straw on the 18th hole during the final round of the Masters golf tournament at the Augusta National Golf Club, Sunday, April 12, 2026, in Augusta, Georgia. (AP photo/Gerald Herbert)

I went to Augusta to watch the Masters. I came home with a spiritual experience.

Culture

At the Masters, writer Stephen Copeland experienced the contemplative nature of golf.

The Latest

Fourth Sunday of Easter: To smell of the sheep

Juliet Mousseau

Where belonging doesn't exist, we can create it

Yolanda Chávez

Diocese 'hires' AI fundraising staffer in pilot program. Meet 'Maria'

Gina Christian, OSV News

Editors' Choice

Pope Leo XIV speaks to journalists aboard a flight returning to Rome April 23, 2026, at the conclusion of his 11-day apostolic journey to Africa. (OSV News/Andrew Medichini, pool via Reuters)

In Focus

Pope Leo: 'I cannot be in favor of war,' talks migration, same-sex blessings, in press conference

"As a pastor, I cannot be in favor of war," Pope Leo XIV said about the war in Iran during his airborne press conference upon his return trip to Rome.

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Most Read Stories

A composite image features the book "He Leadeth Me" by Jesuit Fr. Walter Ciszek and a photo of Ciszek. The Polish American priest ministered for years in Soviet captivity. (OSV News photo/Megan Marley/A.D. Times)

#1
Vatican ends canonization cause for Jesuit Fr. Walter Ciszek

The decision about the Polish American priest who ministered for years in Soviet captivity "does not diminish the enduring spiritual value of his life, witness, and legacy," the Diocese of Allentown, Pennsylvania, said. 

ByGina Christian, OSV News
Cardinal Cristóbal López Romero of Rabat, Morocco, speaks during a briefing about the assembly of the Synod of Bishops at the Vatican Oct. 17, 2023. (CNS/Lola Gomez)
Vatican News

#2
During Leo's Algeria visit, North African cardinal says Christians must 'learn how to be a minority'

 "It is a good fortune to be a small church in service of the kingdom of God," said Cardinal Cristóbal López Romero of Rabat, Morocco.

ByJustin McLellan
U.S. Vice President JD Vance speaks during the 53rd annual March for Life rally in Washington Jan. 23, 2026. (OSV News photo/Aaron Schwartz, Reuters)
Vatican News

#3
Vance questions the pope on just war theory hours after Leo honored its founder

The vice president responded to a post on the pope’s X account in which he wrote that God is "never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs.”

ByJustin McLellan

#4
Pope Leo named one of Time magazine's '100 Most Influential People of 2026'

#5
Catholic leaders appeal to end Russia's religious persecution in Ukraine

#6
Far from Rome, Pope Leo's missionary instincts take center stage

Opinion

In conversation, US bishops are learning new insights on LGBTQ+ Catholics

Guest Voices

Podcast: Black feminist professor Melanie Harris speaks of seeding peace

Guest Voices
President Donald Trump, right, meets with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on the sidelines of the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Jan. 21, 2026. (AP/Evan Vucci)

Trump's attack on NATO is the worst self-inflicted defeat of his tenure

NCR Voices

President Donald Trump is tossing around the idea of pulling the United States out of NATO. It comes as no surprise that a narcissist like Trump fails to grasp how an alliance works.

Truth, mission and a vision toward the future of NCR

NCR Voices

In reversal of nation's anti-Catholic past, Pope Leo defends US ideals against Trump

Guest Voices
Bishops from around the country gather at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Baltimore Nov. 10, 2025, for the opening Mass of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' fall plenary assembly. (OSV News/Catholic Review/Kevin J. Parks)

US bishops can't be judged by political timing

Guest Voices

Catholic bishops' authority is moral and doctrinal, grounded in continuity of teaching. To judge that authority by political timing is to substitute immediacy for principle and alignment for independence.

Vatican

Protesters opposed to the death penalty are pictured in a file photo demonstrating outside a Georgia state prison for men in Jackson. (OSV News/Reuters/Tami Chappell)

Justice Dept. adopts firing squads same day Pope Leo backs death penalty abolitionists

Leo expressed his support for Pope Francis' 2018 decision to change authoritative church teaching to say that the death penalty is "inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person." 

Pope Leo XIV answers questions from journalists during a news conference aboard the plane flying back to Rome after leaving Equatorial Guinea, April 23, 2026. (CNS/Lola Gomez)
Vatican News

Asked about same-sex blessings, Leo says other issues will take priority

"I think that the topic can cause more disunity than unity, and that we should look for ways to build our unity on Jesus Christ and what Jesus Christ teaches," Pope Leo XIV told journalists on the flight back to Rome from Equatorial Guinea.

ByJustin McLellan
Pope Leo XIV speaks to journalists aboard a flight returning to Rome April 23, 2026, at the conclusion of his 11-day apostolic journey to Africa. (OSV News/Andrew Medichini, pool via Reuters)
Vatican News

Pope Leo: 'I cannot be in favor of war,' talks migration, same-sex blessings, in press conference

"As a pastor, I cannot be in favor of war," Pope Leo XIV said about the war in Iran during his airborne press conference upon his return trip to Rome.

ByJustin McLellan

Pope tells inmates 'you are not alone' during Equatorial Guinea prison visit at end of Africa tour

Pope Leo XIV told inmates at one of Equatorial Guinea's notorious prisons on Wednesday that they are not alone, as he delivered a message of hope during a visit that drew attention to prison conditions, human rights abuses and injustices that campaigners have denounced for years here.

ByNicole Winfield, Associated Press

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Pope Leo's trip targets major obstacle to Catholicism's spread in Africa: Sorcery

Mass at Basilica of St. Mary Major marks first anniversary of Pope Francis' death

In Equatorial Guinea and across Africa, Pope Leo sharpens the church's social message

EarthBeat

Members of Apache Stronghold protest outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington Sept. 11, 2024. An Indigenous coalition filed an updated lawsuit in federal district court on April 22, 2026, their latest attempt to stop a land transfer including their sacred site at Oak Flat, Ariz., from destruction by a copper mining giant.

Indigenous coalition continues challenge to mining project on religious liberty grounds

An Indigenous coalition filed an updated lawsuit in federal district court in Phoenix on April 22, their latest attempt to block a land transfer including their sacred site at Oak Flat, Arizona, and protect the site from destruction by a copper mining giant.

Franciscan Sr. Consuelo Peset Laudeña shows one of the Spanish Giant rabbits the cloistered community breeds at the Convent of St. Anthony of Padua in Central Spain. The rabbits are at risk of extinction. (Lissette Lemus)

At a Spanish convent, nuns fight to preserve rare giant rabbit species

"We have to protect creation," Sr. Consuelo Peset Laudeña said. "We are Franciscans. St. Francis is the patron saint of veterinarians, and that is the source of the love we feel for the Spanish giant rabbit."

By
Stefani Danes stands on the Rachel Carson EcoVillage's construction site. The building with a high tower in the background is the Sisters of Divine Providence's 100-year-old convent, now part of La Roche University. (Jennifer Szweda Jordan)

EcoVillage sustainable housing finds a place to build with Pittsburgh sisters

The Rachel Carson Ecovillage needed land, and the Sisters of Divine Providence near Pittsburgh were trying to sell 8 acres. As the sustainable housing project got underway, the two groups became partners in mission.

ByJennifer Szweda Jordan
Guwahati, Assam, India (Unsplash/Bhargav Keot)
Columns

Nature teaches me to celebrate Earth Day as my birthday

Mother Earth is creative, and just as she evolves, every human body and spirit also requires growth — this is part of the very nature of nature.

By

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

New ecological program trains US diocesan leaders to build Laudato Si' momentum

Pope Leo donates $100K to CRS clean water project in El Salvador

As drought reshapes pastoral life, Maasai communities in Kenya find new resilience

Culture

Rory McIlroy, of Northern Ireland, hits from the pine straw on the 18th hole during the final round of the Masters golf tournament at the Augusta National Golf Club, Sunday, April 12, 2026, in Augusta, Georgia. (AP photo/Gerald Herbert)

I went to Augusta to watch the Masters. I came home with a spiritual experience.

At the Masters, writer Stephen Copeland experienced the contemplative nature of golf.

Longtime NCR contributor Jason Berry is pictured with Mississippi politician Charles Evers in 1971. "Conversations with Jason Berry," published by University Press of Mississippi as part of their Literary Conversations series, compiles 23 interviews in which Berry reflects on the forces that have shaped his work. (Courtesy of Jason Berry)

Jason Berry reflects on journalism career in new book of interviews

Jason Berry's goal in writing books about the Catholic clergy abuse scandal was to create "three-dimensional profiles, and a narrative line on people's lives in a clash with injustice and religious power."

ByJason Berry
Adi Madden Cabrera, left, and McKenna Tuckett play Catholic school outcasts who start a punk band in "Edie Arnold is a Loser." (Katrina Wan PR)

Punk rock meets Catholicism in 'Edie Arnold Is a Loser'

Visually inventive and pulsating with youthful, vivacious energy, the film "Edie Arnold Is a Loser" might just be the first Catholic coming-of-age punk rock story.

ByZachary Lee
A blue laundry basket filled with clothes (Unsplash/Annie Spratt)
Book Reviews

New book offers fresh perspective on work through a Catholic social teaching lens

NCR Book Club: Kate Ward's Making a Life expands commonly held understandings of work and reevaluates worker justice, looking at the whole person, not merely person-as-employee.

ByKen Homan

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Book Reviews

Liz Bucar explores why the wellness industry has failed spiritual seekers

The Black Catholic woman whose defiance on a bus predated Rosa Parks' action

Just how faithful is Fox's 'The Faithful: Women of the Bible'?

The third-century Good Shepherd fresco is seen in the Catacomb of Priscilla in Rome. (Newscom/ABACA/Vandeville Eric)
Columns

Fourth Sunday of Easter: To smell of the sheep

Theologians' Corner - It is unsurprising that Jesus chose the shepherd as an image of his care for his people. Those who heard it would know how important the shepherd is for the well-being of the entire community.

A view of Earth, partially hidden by the moon, is photographed through the Orion spacecraft window on April 6, 2026, during the Artemis II crew's flyby of the moon. (OSV News/NASA handout via Reuters)
Columns

Easter calls us to practice resurrection in a fractured world

Horizons - How do we go forward from the high of Easter Sunday to where we are right now? I believe the answer lies in courageously speaking (and living) the mission of the Gospel.

By
Sr. Francis Dominici Piscatella, right, a Sister of St. Dominic of Amityville, N.Y., who is recognized as the world's oldest nun, chats with Sr. Joanne Walters before attending Mass on her 113th birthday at the Dominican Sisters' motherhouse in Amityville April 20, 2026. (OSV News/Gregory A. Shemitz)

At 113, Dominican sister named world's oldest nun for second year

Sr. Francis Dominici Piscatella has been a religious sister for 95 years.

ByGSR Staff
Pope Leo XIV prays in front of a statue of Mary and the Christ Child as he celebrates the final Mass of his apostolic journey to Africa at Malabo Stadium in Equatorial Guinea April 23, 2026. (OSV News/Vatican Media/Matteo Pernaselci)

As Pope Leo leaves Africa, nuns say harder task begins: Turning his message into reality

Across Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, Angola and Algeria, Catholics weigh whether the pope's call for justice and dignity will translate into real change.

ByDoreen Ajiambo

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Nature teaches me to celebrate Earth Day as my birthday

EcoVillage sustainable housing finds a place to build with Pittsburgh sisters

Q&A with Sr. Paulina Melite, national coordinator of India's pro-life movement