The off-Broadway musical "Night Side Songs" is performed at the Lincoln Center's Claire Tow Theater in 2026. (Marc J. Franklin)

Off-Broadway show about cancer invites audience into healing liturgy

Culture

How do we mourn the people we have lost? Live with the wounds we've endured? Face the specters of mortality that haunt us? In "Night Side Songs," the Lazours reveal how much can be accomplished together, and in song.

The Latest

Mike Ditka dies at 86: A life of football, fire and Catholic faith

John Knebels, OSV News
Vatican News

Pope Leo names Archbishop Viola new archpriest of St. Peter's Basilica

Courtney Mares, OSV News

28th Sunday in Ordinary Time: God's banquet for all

Editors' Choice

Pope Leo XIV

In Focus

Pope Leo lays groundwork for future conclave by naming Filipino cardinal as dean of cardinals

Pope Leo XIV took a first step Friday to lay the groundwork for the eventual conclave that will elect his successor: He appointed Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle as the new dean of the College of Cardinals, elevating his profile as a papal contender in the process.

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Vatican News

#1
Pope Leo seeks status update of Francis' divisive opening to divorced and remarried Catholics

Church leaders will meet in Rome next week to understand how "The Joy of Love", Pope Francis' 2016 document on divorced and civilly remarried Catholics, has been implemented.

ByNicole Winfield, The Associated Press
The tomb of St. Francis of Assisi in Assisi, Italy, is seen as it is accessible to pilgrims year-round. (OSV News/Courtesy of Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi)
Guest Voices

#2
St. Francis teaches us about death, 800 years after his own

Just as God loves us and sustains us in this earthly, bodily life, so too does God love us and sustain us as we transition from this state of life to the next. 

ByDaniel P. Horan
Bishop Robert E. Barron of Winona-Rochester, Minnesota, gives the keynote address during the USA National Jubilee Pilgrim Gathering at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls in Rome, July 30, 2025. (CNS/Lola Gomez)
NCR Voices

#3
Bishop Barron swings and misses, again

"Barron is correct to insist he is not a 'member of the Trump administration' but his selective treatment of the church's teachings convicts him as an apologist for the president," Michael Sean Winters writes.

ByMichael Sean Winters

#4
Opening boxes of the soul with Jesus in prayer

#5
Bishop Mariann Budde to resign, will remain in post during lengthy replacement process

#6
Hegseth announces 'Office of Religious Affairs' in speech on Pentagon policy

Opinion

Pete Hegseth would like you to watch a public execution

Guest Voices

10 years of 'Amoris Laetitia': What Chapter 8 changed

Guest Voices
A voter walks toward his polling place in Cary, North Carolina, during his state's primary election March 3, 2026, to choose candidates for the November midterm elections. (OSV News/Reuters/Jonathan Drake)

Blue wave is rising in Senate races

NCR Voices

"The blue wave is rising, and while it may not lift all boats, it is apparently lifting some. And religion is part of the story," Michael Sean Winters writes.

Podcast: 'Beatitudes should be part of our DNA,' says Pax Christi's Sr. Wamuyu Wachira

Guest Voices

Leo's emerging style of pastoral leadership

NCR Voices
The tomb of St. Francis of Assisi in Assisi, Italy, is seen as it is accessible to pilgrims year-round. (OSV News/Courtesy of Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi)

St. Francis teaches us about death, 800 years after his own

Guest Voices

Just as God loves us and sustains us in this earthly, bodily life, so too does God love us and sustain us as we transition from this state of life to the next. 

Vatican

Archbishop Vittorio Francesco Viola, former secretary of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, has been named as the new archpriest of St. Peter's Basilica. (OSV News/CPP/Alessia Giuliani)
Vatican News

Pope Leo names Archbishop Viola new archpriest of St. Peter's Basilica

The Italian prelate will oversee the daily administration of the basilica and preside over liturgies when the pope is not present. 

Pope Leo XIV holds up the book of the Gospel as he celebrates a mass in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, Thursday, Oct.8, 2026, for the annual opening of the academic year at pontifical universities, joining Rome's 22 pontifical institutions and numerous others worldwide. (AP/Gregorio Borgia)
Vatican News

Pope Leo blasts death penalty as US plans to livestream execution

The pontiff's tweet followed comments by Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state, criticizing the public firing squad execution of Nidal Malik Hasan.

ByNicole Winfield, Associated Press
Pope Leo XIV

Pope Leo lays groundwork for future conclave by naming Filipino cardinal as dean of cardinals

Pope Leo XIV took a first step Friday to lay the groundwork for the eventual conclave that will elect his successor: He appointed Filipino Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle as the new dean of the College of Cardinals, elevating his profile as a papal contender in the process.

ByNicole Winfield, Associated Press
Pope Francis speaks to members of the Synod of Bishops on synodality after they approved their final document Oct. 26, 2024, in the Paul VI Audience Hall at the Vatican. (CNS/Vatican Media)

'Synodality' was a Vatican buzzword. 5 years on, it's still changing the church.

The synodal shift "doesn't make a lot of noise, but it's something deep," said Sr. Nathalie Becquart. "There is still a lot to do, but people are more and more confident that this is the way forward." 

ByJustin McLellan

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Pope names Irish sister to lead Vatican's missionary efforts

The Leo Chronicles

The Leo Chronicles: What about Gabby?

Pope Leo urges frank reckoning with Catholic teaching on sex and marriage

EarthBeat

The Salmon River, located in the mountains of east-central Idaho (Nikolas Dahmen)

A spotted sandpiper dances as I birdwatch with Kierkegaard

The Danish Christian thinker Søren Kierkegaard envisioned birds as teachers worthy of our attention. What can birdwatching teach us about joy?

Daughters of Divine Love Srs. Mary Calisata Iwuji and Jacinta Nwankwo pose for a photo in front of the diocesan clinic in Ezza-Nkwubor Nike, a remote village in Enugu State, southeast Nigeria. (Patrick Egwu)

Nigerian sisters minister amid inaccessible roads and flood disasters

A hospital run by the Daughters of Divine Love faces challenges from heavy rains and floods, which have damaged sections of the road leading to their community.

ByPatrick Egwu

Supreme Court hears key climate change lawsuit, but procedural question remains

In the first case of its new term Oct. 5, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a lawsuit from officials in Boulder, Colorado, against two major oil companies over climate change.

ByKate Scanlon, OSV News
Jeffie Hardin teaches gardening and farming techniques at a North Carolina Title I school. She and her husband, Chris Hardin, moved from the suburbs to a farm that eventually became both a source of food and a kind of informal classroom. (Courtesy of Chris Hardin)

Farming, faith and 'real synodality': How this Catholic couple lives Laudato Si'

Chris and Jeffie Hardin, who live in North Carolina, will visit the Vatican's Borgo Laudato Si' to learn more about how to live and teach ways that honor creation. 

ByCamillo Barone

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

For nuns in war-torn Cameroon, conflict threatens hard-won climate solutions

In and around Assisi, pilgrims retrace St. Francis' footsteps to kinship with creation

Celebrating the Season of Creation as a trans Catholic living on a farm

Culture

The off-Broadway musical "Night Side Songs" is performed at the Lincoln Center's Claire Tow Theater in 2026. (Marc J. Franklin)

Off-Broadway show about cancer invites audience into healing liturgy

How do we mourn the people we have lost? Live with the wounds we've endured? Face the specters of mortality that haunt us? In "Night Side Songs," the Lazours reveal how much can be accomplished together, and in song.

JoAnn Falletta, music director for the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, will conduct "Francis: An Oratorio in Nine Scenes" Oct. 10 and 11. The oratorio brings together music composed by Richard Danielpour and a Fransiscan-inspired libretto by Franciscan Sr. Margaret Carney. (Steve J. Sherman)

St. Francis' messages shared through music at oratorio debut

Franciscan Sr. Margaret Carney wrote the libretto for "Francis: An Oratorio in Nine Scenes." Performances with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra are set for Oct. 10 and 11.

ByJulie A. Ferraro
Brandi Carlile (right) performs with Monique Ross (far left) and Chauntee Ross of SistaStrings during the 55th annual Songwriters Hall of Fame Induction and Awards Gala at the Marriott Marquis Hotel on Thursday, June 11, 2026, in New York. (AP/Invision/Evan Agostini)

Finding communion at a Brandi Carlile concert

After a Brandi Carlile concert, and with her own son learning an instrument, one mother reflects on the holiness of sharing a collective experience with other human beings.

ByBritt Luby
A crowd gathers in the square in front of the Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris on Aug. 26, 1944, awaiting the arrival of Gen. Charles de Gaulle after Paris was liberated from the Germans. (Wikimedia Commons/CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain/Préfecture de Police)

As Pope Leo heads to Notre Dame, a brief history of the cathedral's cultural relevance

When the pope visits the Cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris this week, he'll see a church that has stood as a religious and cultural French landmark for nearly 900 years. 

ByVanessa R. Corcoran

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

How Fulton Sheen paved the way for American acceptance of Catholics

Book Reviews

Stephanie Sy-Quia's debut novel paints forbidden love against Vatican II backdrop

'Sister Act' and the gift of Blackness in the church

Srs. Rocío García Villegas, Christine Masivo and Angella Rwezaula, participants in the Pentecost Project, are pictured during their communications training at the Vatican News studios in the Dicastery for Communication at the Vatican. (Courtesy of Sr. Rocío García Villegas)
Voices of Sisters

For one Catholic sister, communication becomes a missionary vocation

Horizons - "There are stories that don't seek the spotlight," writes Sr. Rocío García Villegas. "They just need someone who has the courage to stop, look at them and not walk right past them."

Sr. Alice Kasmel Vadakkethundil, member of the Daughters of Our Lady of Mercy, interacts with students at Karuna Speech and Hearing Higher Secondary School in Kozhikode, a town in the southwestern Indian state of Kerala. (George Kommattam)

Indian nuns bring hope to hearing-impaired students and their parents

At the Karuna Speech and Hearing school in southwestern India, Daughters of our Lady of Mercy create bonds with students and parents that "are forever."

By
Lisha McCormick, the CEO of Last Mile Health, delivers acceptance remarks during the June 6, 2026, ceremony at the Beverly Hilton that awarded her group the 2026 Conrad N. Hilton Humanitarian Prize. (AP Content Services for Conrad N. Hilton Foundation/Jordan Strauss)

Hilton Humanitarian Prize affirms the work of community-based healthcare

Last Mile Health received the 2026 Hilton Humanitarian Prize and $3 million for its work expanding access to lifesaving healthcare through community health workers in underserved regions of Africa.

ByChris Herlinger
Outside of Immokalee High School in Immokalee, Florida (GSR photo/Chris Herlinger)

Haitian migrants in Florida turn to Catholic sister as deportation fears grow

Returning to Haiti does not feel like a real option: "We don't have anything there to go back to. This is home."

ByChris Herlinger

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A vision for spiritual renewal of women religious in Africa

Nazareth nuns in India brave bandits to educate low caste community

Q&A with president-elect of LCWR Sr. Betsy Pawlicki on navigating change