Some teenagers and young adults jumped at the chance to attend World Youth Day in Portugal for the excitement and experience of being abroad. Others described an interior restlessness that drew them to Lisbon. Here are some vignettes from the world's Catholic youth festival.
Pope Francis has agreed with a recommendation by the Dicastery for Laity, the Family and Life to postpone by one year the next gatherings of the World Meeting of Families and World Youth Day.
With a small procession down the vast and empty central nave of St. Peter's Basilica, Pope Francis began the first of a series of Holy Week liturgies celebrated without the presence of the faithful from the general public.
In the past few decades, Brazil has experienced an unexpected Jewish resurgence fueled by the descendants of Portuguese and Spanish Jews forced to convert to Christianity in colonial times.
