St. Clement Catholic Parish

null / Credit: New Africa/Shutterstock

CNA Staff, Dec 19, 2025 / 12:54 pm (CNA).

Massachusetts will no longer require prospective foster parents to affirm gender ideology in order to qualify for fostering children, with the move coming after a federal lawsuit from a religious liberty group. 

Alliance Defending Freedom said Dec. 17 that the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families “will no longer exclude Christian and other religious families from foster care” because of their “commonly held beliefs that boys are boys and girls are girls.”

The legal group announced in September that it had filed a lawsuit in U.S. district court over the state policy, which required prospective parents to agree to affirm a child’s “sexual orientation and gender identity” before being permitted to foster. 

Attorney Johannes Widmalm-Delphonse said at the time that the state’s foster system was “in crisis” with more than 1,400 children awaiting placement in foster homes. 

Yet the state was “putting its ideological agenda ahead of the needs of these suffering kids,” Widmalm-Delphonse said.

The suit had been filed on behalf of two Massachusetts families who had been licensed to serve as foster parents in the state. They had provided homes for nearly three dozen foster children between them and were “in good standing” at the time of the policy change. 

Yet the state policy required them to “promise to use a child’s chosen pronouns, verbally affirm a child’s gender identity contrary to biological sex, and even encourage a child to medically transition, forcing these families to speak against their core religious beliefs,” the lawsuit said. 

With its policy change, Massachusetts will instead require foster parents to affirm a child’s “individual identity and needs,” with the LGBT-related language having been removed from the state code. 

The amended language comes after President Donald Trump signed an executive order last month that aims to improve the nation’s foster care system by modernizing the current child welfare system, developing partnerships with private sector organizations, and prioritizing the participation of those with sincerely held religious beliefs. 

Families previously excluded by the state rule are “eager to reapply for their licenses,” Widmalm-Delphonse said on Dec. 17.

The lawyer commended Massachusetts for taking a “step in the right direction,” though he said the legal group will continue its efforts until it is “positive that Massachusetts is committed to respecting religious persons and ideological diversity among foster parents.”

Other authorities have made efforts in recent years to exclude parents from state child care programs on the basis of gender ideology.

In July a federal appeals court ruled in a 2-1 decision that Oregon likely violated a Christian mother’s First Amendment rights by demanding that she embrace gender ideology and homosexuality in order to adopt children.

In April, meanwhile, Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly vetoed legislation that would have prohibited the government from requiring parents to affirm support for gender ideology and homosexuality if they want to qualify to adopt or foster children.

In contrast, Arkansas in April enacted a law to prevent adoptive agencies and foster care providers from discriminating against potential parents on account of their religious beliefs. 

The Arkansas law specifically prohibits the government from discriminating against parents over their refusal to accept “any government policy regarding sexual orientation or gender identity that conflicts with the person’s sincerely held religious beliefs.”

Bishop Edward Scarfenberger. / Credit: Photo courtesy of the Diocese of Albany

National Catholic Register, Dec 19, 2025 / 12:24 pm (CNA).

A retired New York bishop has filed for personal bankruptcy protection in federal court after a state jury verdict found him, along with other officials, personally liable for the collapse of a Catholic hospital pension fund that left about 1,100 retirees without the lifetime monthly payments they were expecting.

It’s not clear whether a Catholic bishop in the United States has ever previously filed for personal bankruptcy protection.

Bishop Edward Scharfenberger, 77, who served as bishop of Albany from April 2014 until his retirement in October, is seeking protection from creditors for his assets valued at between $100,001 and $500,000, according to a filing Tuesday in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of New York.

The seven-page filing does not list the bishop’s assets but states that he has between 100 and 199 creditors and debts totaling between $1,000,001 and $10 million.

Last week, a jury found Scharfenberger 10% liable in a $54.2 million judgment in a civil lawsuit over the failed pension plan once provided by St. Clare’s Hospital in Schenectady, a Catholic hospital that operated from 1949 until 2008, according to The Evangelist, the diocese’s newspaper.

The verdict and judgment, issued Dec. 12, cover compensatory damages — the amount a court finds is owed to plaintiffs for harm they have suffered — but not punitive damages, which may be added in cases of recklessness, malice, or fraud. The bankruptcy filings by the bishop and another defendant in the state lawsuit over the pension plan failure forced a pause in a punitive damages hearing earlier this week, according to WNYT Channel 13 in Albany.

The National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news partner, was unable to reach Scharfenberger before the publication of this story. A lawyer representing the bishop acknowledged a request for comment Dec. 17 but did not immediately provide one.

A rare personal bankruptcy

In recent decades, bankruptcies have occurred regularly in the Catholic Church in the United States. Between 2004 and November 2025, 39 of the country’s dioceses have filed for bankruptcy, almost all to protect assets from clergy sex-abuse lawsuits, as the Register reported last month. One of those is the Diocese of Albany, which filed for bankruptcy in March 2023. 

But those diocesan cases were filed under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, which allows a corporation, partnership, or sole proprietorship to reorganize and continue operating while developing a court-approved plan to repay creditors.

Scharfenberger filed under Chapter 13, which allows an individual with regular income who cannot pay debts to keep certain assets while working out a repayment plan. 

“The rules in Chapter 13 permit a debtor to keep property and confirm a plan with payments to creditors based on the debtor’s ‘disposable income,’” said Marie Reilly, a bankruptcy expert and law professor at Penn State Dickinson Law, in an email. “If the debtor commits his disposable income to paying creditors for the term of a three- to five-year plan, he gets a discharge (forgiveness) of the unpaid balance.”

Reilly, who has researched several dozen diocesan bankruptcies for The Catholic Project, a lay initiative of The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., told the Register that the bankruptcy filing does not necessarily solve all of the bishop’s money problems.

“There are exceptions — some debts don’t get discharged. Creditors can object to the plan if it does not meet the statutory requirements,” Reilly said. “And, it is possible that the pension fund creditor may move to dismiss the bishop’s Chapter 13 case as having been filed ‘in bad faith.’”

$50 million shortfall 

St. Clare’s Hospital was originally run by the Franciscan Sisters of the Poor. The Diocese of Albany maintains that it never owned the hospital and that the bishop of Albany merely provided “canonical oversight” to make sure the hospital met “its mission to serve all in accord with Catholic moral standards,” according to an August 2025 statement from the diocese.

Last week, the jury found that the Diocese of Albany has no liability for the pension failure, instead holding the hospital corporation and certain officers and board members accountable. 

In addition to Scharfenberger, the jury found two deceased employees of the diocese liable, according to The Evangelist: Former Albany Bishop Howard Hubbard (1938–2023), who led the diocese from 1977 to 2014, was found 20% liable; and Father David LeFort, a former vicar general of the diocese who died in August 2023, was found 5% liable. 

Also found liable were St. Clare’s Corporation (20%), St. Clare’s president Joseph Pofit (25%), and former St. Clare’s president Robert Perry (20%), according to The Evangelist.

The judgments stem from a pension plan that operated for about 60 years. 

In 1959, the hospital began offering employees a defined-benefit plan that provided a lifetime monthly pension after retirement.

Church plan exempt from ERISA

Like most plans operated by Catholic institutions, the pension plan had a religious exemption from the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (known as ERISA), which sets minimum funding requirements for most nonreligious pension plans and also enables the federal government to step in and make payments to retirees of failed plans, using a fund financed by covered pension plans.

When the hospital closed in 2008, the officers of St. Clare’s “determined that the corporation would continue to exist for purposes of administering the pension plan,” according to a complaint filed in state court in Schenectady County by the New York attorney general’s office in May 2022. 

“They also chose to continue treating the pension plan as a ‘Church plan’ — which it could do only if the corporation’s former employees and pensioners were designated as employees of the Church. This was all in order to avoid the contribution and insurance requirements of ERISA, and the duties imposed by ERISA upon corporation directors and trustees as fiduciaries,” the complaint states.

The bishop of Albany was automatically a member of the hospital’s board and served as its honorary chairman, and had authority to appoint most of the directors on the board, according to the state attorney general’s complaint.

The attorney general’s office alleged that St. Clare’s Corporation failed to make contributions to the pension fund “for all but three years from 2001 to 2019” and concealed from retirees “the insolvency of the pension plan.”

In 2018, the St. Clare’s board terminated the pension plan effective Feb. 1, 2019, because of an approximately $50 million shortfall. More than 1,100 employees lost retirement benefits, including about 650 who lost all pension payments and about 450 who received a lump-sum payment “equal to 70% of the value of their vested pension,” the complaint states. The retired employees include “nurses, lab technicians, social workers, EMTs, orderlies, housekeepers, and other essential workers” who worked at the hospital “between 10 and 50 years,” the complaint states.

Testimony and reaction

On Dec. 9 during the civil trial, Scharfenberger testified that during his tenure no boards he sat on ever discussed the hospital’s pension plan, according to The Times-Union of Albany. 

In a written statement issued in August, when Scharfenberger still led the Diocese of Albany, the diocese said the bishop “has actively sought ways to help the pensioners” while denying that the diocese ever “exercised any control over St. Clare’s Hospital operations or its pension.” 

“He hosted a listening session with pensioners at Siena College to identify issues and consider ways to help those in need. He also reached out to the Mother Cabrini Foundation to try to secure funding for the pensioners, but that effort was unable to move forward once the pensioners filed the lawsuit,” the statement said. 

“The diocese is eager to see the case move forward and promptly resolved,” the August statement continued. “Our prayers continue for all who are struggling in any way, and as we stated previously, our offer to connect those in need with services that can help, stands. No one should walk alone.”

His successor, Bishop Mark O’Connell, who was installed as bishop of Albany on Dec. 5, told reporters shortly before the verdict was announced last week: “I care deeply about their hurt [and] not having their pensions,” according to The Evangelist.

During the Dec. 12 press conference, when a reporter asked O’Connell what the diocese would do if the jury found the diocese liable for the pension fund collapse, the bishop noted that the diocese is already in the midst of a bankruptcy process.

“If we are liable, then we’ll do what we can to make amends, given that they are one creditor as a group among many people accusing the Diocese of Albany,” O’Connell said, according to WAMC Northeast Public Radio. “And that’s what bankruptcy process is. We obviously cannot pay a billion dollars. Right? So that’s what Chapter 11 is all about, to figure out what’s fair. And since you have a bankruptcy judge and mediators, it’s not up to us.”

Later that day, the jury found the diocese not liable in the pension fund collapse lawsuit. The diocese issued a written statement, according to The Evangelist, that said: “As grateful as we are for the jury’s informed decision, we are still very much aware of the hurt felt by the St. Clare’s pensioners who cared for the sick and the poor throughout the long history of St. Clare’s Hospital. This does not mean that we will turn our backs to the pensioners, for as Bishop O’Connell has noted, they are a part of our flock; they are still in need of healing.”

That same day, lead plaintiff Mary Hartshorne, who worked in the hospital’s radiology department for about 28 years, told WNYT Channel 13 in Albany that she and other hospital retirees were pleased with the jury’s verdict but did not feel they would be made whole.

“We’ve been playing this game for seven and a half years, and I think my question I ask everybody is: How do you get that back? You don’t,” she said.

This story was first published by the National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news partner, and has been adapted by CNA.

Colorado state capitol in Denver. / Credit: Shutterstock

CNA Staff, Dec 19, 2025 / 11:52 am (CNA).

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, a coalition of Catholic families, and numerous other advocates are petitioning the U.S. Supreme Court to rule in favor of Catholic schools seeking to be included in Colorado’s universal preschool funding program. 

The religious liberty law group Becket said in a Dec. 18 release that the Catholic schools’ advocates — including numerous religious groups, legal organizations, and public policy groups — are urging the high court to rule against Colorado’s “discriminatory exclusion” of the faith-based schools. 

The Archdiocese of Denver and a group of Catholic preschools asked the Supreme Court in November to allow them to access the Colorado program after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit ruled in September that the state may continue to exclude the preschools from the education fund. 

The state has barred those schools from the funding pool because they require teachers and families to sign a pledge promising to uphold their religious mission, including teachings on sexuality and gender identity.

In an amicus filing this week, the U.S. bishops said the Colorado rule “denies Catholic preschools access to a state-run tuition assistance program solely because those schools adhere to Catholic doctrine about human sexuality.”

Allowing the rule to stand will offer a “roadmap” for other governments to violate the First Amendment rights of religious Americans around the country, the bishops argued. 

Permitting the schools’ exclusion “will impair the ability of Catholic organizations and other faith-based service providers to partner with state and local governments to serve the public,” the prelates said, arguing that the “resulting harm to the nation’s social support infrastructure would be immense.”

In another filing, a coalition of Catholic families said it regards Catholic schools as “essential partners” in their mission to impart the Catholic faith to their children. The Colorado rule, however, would force the Catholic schools to operate in a manner “inconsistent with their religious beliefs and mission.” 

Multiple families in the filing — all of whom have four or more children — testified to the formative role that Catholic preschools have played for them. The families said they “want their children to embrace the Catholic Church’s teachings on the nature of the human person” and that the state rule impedes their ability to do so through Catholic schools. 

Numerous other amicus filers include the Thomas More Society, the Center for American Liberty, and Concerned Women for America as well as religious groups representing Lutherans, Evangelicals, Jews, and Muslims.

Archdiocese of Denver School Superintendent Scott Elmer said via Becket that the archdiocese is “humbled” by the showing of support. 

“Our preschools aren’t asking for special treatment, just equal treatment,” he said, expressing hope that the Supreme Court “takes this case and upholds the promise of universal preschool for every family in Colorado.” 

The Supreme Court has not yet ruled on whether it will hear the case. Becket said the high court will likely decide whether or not to hear it “in early 2026.”

A new animated film titled “David” tells the story of King David — from his humble beginnings as a shepherd boy to his battle against Goliath. / Credit: Sunrise Animation Studios

CNA Staff, Dec 19, 2025 / 10:00 am (CNA).

A new animated film called “David” tells the story of King David, from his humble beginnings as a shepherd boy to his battle against Goliath. Created by Sunrise Animation Studios, the film aims to bring the story of David to life for both children and adults. 

Released in theaters Dec. 19, the film features popular Christian singers including Phil Wickham and Lauren Daigle. 

Brent Dawes, the writer and director of the film, told CNA in an interview that the inspiration for the film came 30 years ago when the founders of Sunrise Animation Studios first created the studio. 

“The studio was started by a guy and his wife, Phil and Jacqui Cunningham, and one of the reasons they started a studio was because Phil had a desire to make a movie on David over 30 years ago,” said Dawes, who has been working with the Cunninghams for 25 years. “So it’s been a vision for more than 30 years for him.” 

Originally planned to be a live-action film, Cunningham approached Dawes 11 years ago about making the film animated instead. 

He said he thought making the film this way would “open the audience up hugely because families can watch it, kids can watch it, and it just allows so many more people to access it.”

“David, as you might know, is not the most PG-friendly story in the Bible. So if you’re going to do a live-action version it’s going to be pretty R-rated and pretty much for adults,” Dawes explained. “So, making it an animation allowed us to sort of turn it back a little bit, still tell the story authentically, but tell it in a sort of gentler way so it meant it could just reach a much wider audience, which is wonderful.”

Dawes pointed out that faith-based media, such as films like this one, are important to make, especially for children, because “Hollywood doesn’t tell stories from the heart anymore, and it tells it from a board room. Also, so many movies are told with an agenda, whether it’s political, whether it’s belief, all sorts of things.”

He added: “So telling a story like this, obviously we’re coming from a Christian point of view, but it was important for us that we tell this movie for a world audience. We also don’t want to alienate people who don’t believe. We believe this is a truly accessible story, whether you believe or not.”

“We’re not telling the audience, ‘You have to believe what our character believes,’ but our story is based 3,000 years ago, and this is what he believed, and this is how he lived his life. So, let us tell you that story. And however you want to engage with that, that’s up to you.”

Dawes shared that during all the time working with the story of David, he has learned several things from the famous king, specifically that “when a challenge comes up, it’s something to be faced with confidence, not with nervousness or fear — like David when he faced Goliath … He had a faith and a confidence and a childlike faith at that.”

Dawes said he hopes viewers will not only be entertained but also left inspired. He hopes the  film “speaks to each individual where they are in their life.”

Palm Beach Bishop-designate Manuel de Jesus Rodriguez. / Credit: Photo courtesy of Diocese of Palm Beach

CNA Staff, Dec 19, 2025 / 07:30 am (CNA).

The Holy See said on Dec. 19 that Pope Leo XIV had made two new episcopal appointments in the United States, with the Vatican announcing a new bishop for the Diocese of Palm Beach, Florida, as well as an auxiliary bishop for the Diocese of Phoenix.

Father Manuel de Jesus Rodriguez will lead the Palm Beach Diocese after the resignation of Bishop Gerald Barbarito, the Vatican said. At 75, Barbarito has reached the customary age at which bishops retire.

Bishop-designate Rodriguez is currently a priest in the Diocese of Brooklyn, where he serves at Our Lady of Sorrows Church in Queens.

Born Jan. 15, 1974, in the Dominican Republic, Rodriguez studied at the Pontifical University Madre y Maestra in that country, receiving philosophy and law degrees there before obtaining several other degrees and certificates, including a doctorate in legal studies from the Pontifical Salesian University in Rome and a licentiate in canon law from The Catholic University of America.

Admitted to the Salesians of Don Bosco in 1993, he made his final profession to that religious order in 2002 and was ordained on July 3, 2004. He was incardinated in the Diocese of Brooklyn in 2012.

Rodriguez became a U.S. citizen in 2018. He has served multiple roles in Brooklyn, including as pastor and administrator of several churches as well as defender of the bond at the diocesan tribunal. The bishop-designate speaks English, Spanish, Italian, and French. 

Outgoing Palm Beach Bishop Barbarito said in a Dec. 19 statement that the diocese will be ”greatly blessed” by Rodriguez’s ministry and that he has “shown himself to be a deeply spiritual and exceptional priest.”

Vicar for clergy appointed auxiliary bishop in Phoenix

The Holy See also announced on Dec. 19 that Pope Leo XIV has appointed Monsignor Peter Dai Bui as an auxiliary bishop of the Diocese of Phoenix. 

Bishop-designate Bui is currently the diocesan vicar for clergy for the Phoenix Diocese. A native of Vietnam, he entered the Legion of Christ novitiate in 1989 and made his first profession in 1991. He attended the Pontifical Athenaeum in Rome, where he earned degrees in philosophy and theology and a licentiate in philosophy.

He was ultimately ordained for the Legionaries of Christ on Dec. 24, 2003. 

Bui served for several years as the chaplain of a private Catholic school in Venezuela, where he organized international mission trips. Incardinated in the Phoenix Diocese in 2009, he has served as pastor at multiple parishes and since 2022 as the vicar for clergy. 

The bishop-designate speaks English, Vietnamese, Spanish, Italian, and German.

Bui said in a Dec. 19 statement that he was “honestly in shock” when Apostolic Nuncio Cardinal Christophe Pierre called him with the news. 

“I even forgot he couldn’t see me nodding through the phone!” he joked. He expressed a “profound gratitude to God” for the appointment. 

“I just want to be a good priest, now called to serve in a new way,” he said. 

Phoenix Bishop John Dolan, meanwhile, said he was “deeply grateful” to the pope for the appointment. 

“As one of the largest and most rapidly growing dioceses in the nation, Phoenix faces increasing pastoral and administrative complexity, and Bishop-elect Bui’s experience in governance, his deep care for priests, and his commitment to accompaniment will be invaluable,” the bishop said.

The archbishop of New York, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, speaks to EWTN News on Friday, April 25, 2025, at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls in Rome. / Credit: Screenshot/EWTN News

CNA Staff, Dec 19, 2025 / 07:00 am (CNA).

Now that the Vatican has announced that Archbishop-designate Ronald Hicks will succeed Cardinal Timothy Dolan as archbishop of New York, what comes next for the cardinal?

“I’ll always keep working,” Dolan told Father Dave Dwyer, a Paulist priest, executive director of Busted Halo Ministries, and cohost of “Conversation with Cardinal Dolan,” during a discussion of his retirement plans earlier this year. 

“For a priest, your life is your work,” he said, indicating that he hopes to continue preaching retreats, which he said he loves, and teaching. 

“But I won’t have an appointment. I won’t have administrative duties. Yippee!” Dolan quipped.

The cardinal said he is looking forward to having “more choices, instead of waking up in the morning and being handed a schedule.”

“Should I read? Should I take a longer walk than usual? Should I spend a longer time in my prayer?” he mused.

Dolan said his brother bishops told him years ago to “make sure you have hobbies you can engage in on a day off,” and that advice has helped and will continue to help him in retirement.

The cardinal told Dwyer whatever he does, he will have to ask the permission of his successor. “I’ll be one of his priests,” Dolan said, laughing. “I will ask him: ‘Your Excellency, would it be OK if I…?” 

In addition, in an interview with Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business this week Dolan revealed that he has received requests to teach at universities, to write a book, and to help with a documentary on the Catholic Church in the United States.

“I’m going to appreciate the chance to set my own schedule,” said Dolan, who has led the Archdiocese of New York since 2009.

null / Credit: Joe Belanger/Shutterstock

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Dec 19, 2025 / 06:00 am (CNA).

Here is an overview of some of the religious freedom developments and news in the United States and abroad in 2025:

White House started the Religious Liberty Commission

President Donald Trump established the White House Religious Liberty Commission in May to report on threats to religious freedom in the U.S. and seek to advance legal protections. 

The commission and advisory boards include members of various religions. Catholic members on the commission include Cardinal Timothy Dolan and Bishop Robert Barron. Catholic advisory board members include Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone, Bishop Thomas Paprocki, Bishop Kevin Rhoades, and Father Thomas Ferguson.

Lawmakers condemned persecution of Christians

Rep. Riley Moore, R-West Virginia, and Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri, introduced a joint resolution condemning the persecution of Christians in Muslim-majority countries across the world.

The measure called on the Trump administration to leverage trade, security negotiations, and other diplomatic tools to advocate for religious freedom. 

Court blocked law that would require priests to violate the seal of confession

Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson signed a state law in May that would require priests to report child abuse to authorities even if they hear about it during the sacrament of confession. Catholic bishops brought a lawsuit against the measure. A federal judge blocked the controversial law.

Trump announced federal guidelines to protect prayer at public schools

President Donald Trump announced the U.S. Department of Education will issue federal guidelines to protect prayer at public schools during a Sept. 8 Religious Liberty Commission hearing. He said the guidelines will “protect the right to prayer in our public schools and [provide for] its total protection.”

The president said he sought the guidelines after hearing about instances of public school students and staff being censored and facing disciplinary action for engaging in prayer, reading the Bible, and publicly expressing their faith.

Report found most states fail to safeguard religious liberty 

About three-fourths of states scored less than 50% on Napa Legal Institute’s religious freedom index, which measures how well states safeguard religious liberty for faith-based organizations. The October report was part of Napa’s Faith & Freedom Index that showed Alabama scored the highest and Michigan scored the lowest.

Lawmakers urged federal court to allow Ten Commandments display

First Liberty Institute and Heather Gebelin Hacker of Hacker Stephens LLP filed an amicus brief in December on behalf of 46 United States lawmakers urging the federal court to allow the Ten Commandments to be displayed in public schools.

Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Mike Johnson, R-Louisiana; Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas; and Sens. Ted Cruz and John Cornyn, R-Texas, were among the lawmakers who supported the cause after federal judges blocked Texas and Louisiana laws requiring the display of the commandments.

Supreme Court ruled on religious freedom cases 

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of a group of Maryland parents who sued a school district over its refusal to allow families to opt their children out of reading LGBT-themed books. 

In a 6-3 decision on July 27 in Mahmoud v. Taylor, the court ruled the Catholic, Orthodox, and Muslim parents “are likely to succeed on their claim that the board’s policies unconstitutionally burden their religious exercise.” 

In July, the Supreme Court ordered the New York Court of Appeals to revisit Diocese of Albany v. Harris, which challenged a 2017 New York state mandate requiring employers to cover abortions in health insurance plans.

In October, a Native American group working to stop the destruction of a centuries-old religious ritual site in Arizona lost its appeal to the Supreme Court.

Religious liberty abroad: Religious freedom diminished in Afghanistan

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) said in a report that “religious freedom conditions in Afghanistan continue to decline dramatically under Taliban rule.”

The USCIRF wrote in an Aug. 15 report examining the Taliban’s Law on the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice one year after its enactment: The morality law “impacts all Afghans” but “disproportionately affects religious minorities and women, eradicating their participation in public life and systematically eliminating their right to [freedom of religious belief].”

Chinese government banned Catholic priests from evangelizing online

In September, the State Administration for Religious Affairs in China banned several forms of online evangelization for religious clergy of all religions, including Catholic priests.

The Code of Conduct for Religious Clergy was made up of 18 articles including one that said faith leaders are banned from performing religious rituals through live broadcasts, short videos, or online meetings. 

U.S. commission said China should be designated as a country of particular concern

The USCIRF reported China tries to exert total control over religion and said the U.S. Department of State should redesignate China as a “country of particular concern” (CPC) regarding religious freedom.

USCIRF said in September that China uses surveillance, fines, retribution against family members, imprisonment, enforced disappearance, torture, and other forms of abuse to control the Catholic Church and other religious communities in the nation.

In its annual report, USCIRF also recommended Afghanistan, Burma, Cuba, Eritrea, India, Iran, Nicaragua, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam be designated as CPCs.

Mass at Arizona State University’s Newman Center chapel. / Credit: Courtesy of Father Bill Clements, director of ASU Newman Center

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Dec 18, 2025 / 17:48 pm (CNA).

Encouraging participation in Mass and making the sacraments more accessible can deepen fulfillment among Catholics and therefore help to keep Catholics in the faith, experts say.

A recent Pew Research Center report, “Why Do Some Americans Leave Their Religion While Others Stay?”, examined the religious switching of U.S. adults. It looked into the reasons why people stay or leave their childhood faith.

The report revealed many U.S. adults (35%) have left the religion they grew up in, but the majority of Americans (56%) still identify with their childhood religion. The survey reported that Catholics specifically continue to identify with the faith because “their religion fulfills their spiritual needs” (54%) and “they believe in the religion’s teachings” (53%).

To better understand why Catholicism fulfills spiritual needs and which teachings are most important in that process, “it’s crucial that we pay attention to what’s working,” Tom Nash, a contributing apologist for Catholic Answers, told CNA.

He highlighted a June Pew study that found practicing Catholics believe “having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ” (90%) and “receiving the Eucharist” (83%) are the most essential aspects of their faith.

The study “tracks with the Church’s teaching that the sacrifice of the Mass is ‘the source and summit of the Christian life’ (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1324), and provides insight regarding how the Church best fulfills someone’s spiritual needs and, relatedly, which teachings are most important,” Nash said.

“Through his one paschal sacrifice of Calvary — which encompasses his passion, death, resurrection, and ascension into heaven — Jesus has redeemed the world. In addition, Jesus enables us to offer anew sacramentally and partake of his one sacrifice in the Mass, which is the New Covenant Passover Communion sacrifice,” Nash said.

Receiving the sacraments

Since the majority of Catholics say the faith fulfills their spiritual needs and they believe in the religion’s teachings, it’s “best” to highlight what meets those aspects, Nash said. Specifically, he suggested making the sacraments accessible to Catholics.

“When we make sacramental encounters more available with Our Lord Jesus Christ, an increase in Sunday Mass participation will follow accordingly,” Nash said. 

Not only is receiving the Eucharist at Mass “fundamental,” but so is “communing with our Eucharist Lord Jesus spiritually through Eucharistic adoration,” Nash said. This allows Catholics to have “a deep relationship with Our Lord; and they thus form the bedrock of Catholic belief, because they enable us to have increasing divine intimacy with Jesus, and through him with the Father and the Holy Spirit.”

“For practicing Catholics, those who are not participating in weekly Mass, and people in general to whom Christ’s Great Commission is also addressed, we need to ‘Open the doors wide to Christ. To his saving power,’” as St. John Paul II said in his inauguration Mass.

The best and most convenient way to “open the doors” is “to give Catholics and non-Catholics alike the opportunity to draw near to our Eucharistic Lord Jesus in Eucharistic adoration,” Nash said. “With the help of parish deacons and laymen, every parish in the country can open its doors for adoration several nights a week for two to three hours.”

This will allow people to “draw near to the Lord in intimate spiritual communion, whether with our Eucharistic Lord exposed in a monstrance or reposed in the tabernacle. And also open the doors on a morning or two to accommodate those who work evenings.”

“A lot of people — inactive Catholics and non-Catholics alike — are not likely to come to Mass. But if you give them an opportunity to quietly spend time with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament when it’s more convenient for them, they will draw near,” he said.  

The sacrament of confession is also necessary. Nash suggests making confession “available five to 10 hours every week at every parish.”

“It’s not by accident that two of the most demonically oppressed priests in the last two centuries are renowned priest confessors: St. John Vianney and St. Padre Pio,” Nash said. “The devil knows the power of this great sacrament and acts accordingly in opposing it. In this way, we can ironically take a lesson from Lucifer, who despite his being ‘the father of lies’ (Jn 8:44) can’t help but tell the true in expressing his unvarnished hatred of Our Lord Jesus Christ and his Catholic Church.”

Catholics must be ‘equipped’ and ‘formed’

Among all former Catholics whom the new study looked at, it found “the most commonly cited reasons for leaving include no longer believing in the religion’s teachings, scandals involving clergy or religious leaders, or being unhappy about the religion’s teachings about social and political issues,” said Becka Alper, senior researcher at Pew Research Center, in a Dec. 17 interview with “EWTN News Nightly.”

The study reported most former Catholics are now Protestants. They reported they switched because they stopped believing in the Church’s teachings (46%), “assuming they understand them well to begin with, and because they now believe in the distinctive teachings of Protestantism of one type or another,” Nash said.  

If Catholics are equipped “to explain the faith well in a joyful manner, we can stanch the hemorrhaging from the Church,” Nash said. This will also help “remove stumbling blocks for former Catholics and never-Catholic Christians regarding the nature of the Mass, Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist, and that he also provides us to encounter him in his merciful love through the sacrament of confession.”

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Dec. 18, 2025, that eases federal marijuana regulations amid support from the cannabis industry but opposition from some Catholic and conservative groups. / Credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Dec 18, 2025 / 17:18 pm (CNA).

President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order to ease federal marijuana regulations amid support from the cannabis industry but opposition from some Catholic and conservative groups.

Trump’s Dec. 18 executive order directs the attorney general to reclassify marijuana from a Schedule I drug to a Schedule III drug as quickly as federal law allows. This process began under President Joe Biden’s administration and is being continued under Trump.

Schedule I, which includes marijuana, is reserved for drugs that have “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse,” according to the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). Schedule III is a lower classification, which is for drugs “with a moderate to low potential for physical and psychological dependence” and less abuse potential than Schedule I.

Rescheduling marijuana does not end a federal ban on both recreational and medical use, which would still be in place. However, it would reduce criminal penalties, open the door for medical research, and potentially be a step toward further deregulation and normalization.

Right now, 40 states have medical marijuana programs and 24 legalize recreational use, in contrast to the federal law.

In a news conference, Trump said rescheduling marijuana will help patients who seek the drug for medical use “live a far better life.” He said the executive order “in no way sanctions its use as a recreational drug.”

“Young Americans are especially at risk, so unless a drug is recommended by a doctor for medical reasons, just don’t do it,” the president said.

“At the same time, the facts compel the federal government to recognize that marijuana can be legitimate in terms of medical applications when carefully administered,” he said. “In some cases, this may include the use as a substitute for addictive and potentially lethal opioid painkillers.”

Kelsey Reinhardt, president and CEO of CatholicVote, criticized the decision. The group had launched a campaign to discourage the president from rescheduling the product. 

“Every argument pushed by the cannabis lobby has now been exposed as false by real-world data and medical science,” Reinhardt said in a statement.

“We were told marijuana was safe, nonaddictive, and would reduce crime — none of that turned out to be true in my home state of Colorado or in other states that are now working to repeal,” she said. “Instead, we’re seeing higher addiction rates, emergency-room spikes, impaired driving, heart risks, mental-health damage, and lasting harm to young people,” Reinhardt said.

Reinhardt called the executive order “disappointing” and said it “repeats the same reckless mistakes we made with Big Tobacco and puts ideology ahead of public health.” She said CatholicVote will work with federal agencies to “minimize the damage” and urged Congress to take action to reverse the executive order. 

The Catechism of the Catholic Church does not directly mention marijuana but teaches “the use of drugs inflicts very grave damage on human health and life.” It calls drug use a “grave offense” with the exception of drugs used on “strictly therapeutic grounds,” such as medical treatment.

In spite of concerns from some Catholics, some Catholic hospitals have done research into medical marijuana. Some of that research has looked into medical marijuana as potentially a less risky and less addictive alternative to opioids for pain management.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has not taken a position on the matter. Pope Francis said he opposed the partial legalization of so-called “soft drugs,” stating in 2014 that “the problem of drug use is not solved with drugs.” In June, Pope Leo XIV referred to drugs as “an invisible prison” and encouraged law enforcement to focus on drug traffickers instead of addicts. 

null / Credit: Carl DMaster/Shutterstock

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Dec 18, 2025 / 16:48 pm (CNA).

Here is a roundup of recent pro-life and abortion-related news:

Advocates push for EPA to include chemicals from abortion drugs on list of drinking water contaminants

Students for Life of America (SFLA) is calling on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to add the abortion drug mifepristone to a list of drinking water contaminants tracked by public utilities. “It’s a problem only the EPA can fully investigate,” SFLA reported.

In two letters over the last several sessions of Congress, legislators have called on the EPA to find out the extent of the damage of abortion drug water pollution. Multiple pro-life and pro-family organizations joined together to ask the EPA to look into the chemicals.

“The EPA has the regulatory authority and humane responsibility to determine the extent of abortion water pollution, caused by the reckless and negligent policies pushed by past administrations through the FDA [Food and Drug Administration],” said Kristan Hawkins, president of SFLA.

“Take the word ‘abortion’ out of it and ask, should chemically tainted blood and placenta tissue, along with human remains, be flushed by the tons into America’s waterways? And since the federal government set that up, shouldn’t we know what’s in our water?” she said.

Ireland votes not to restore bill that would remove three-day waiting period for abortions

The Dáil, the lower house and main chamber of the Irish Parliament, has voted against restoring an abortion bill that would have decriminalized abortion up until birth and removed the three-day waiting period for an abortion. The legislation previously passed the second stage in the Dáil, but Parliament members decided in a 73 to 71 vote to reject it.

The legislation would have allowed abortion on request before “viability” and on grounds of a fatal fetal abnormality that would likely lead to the death of the baby before birth or within a year of birth. 

Missouri senator launches new pro-life initiative

U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri and his wife, Erin Hawley, announced they are launching a new effort to advocate for families and the unborn called the Love Life Initiative. The effort is intended to “remind Americans that life is sacred, life is good, and life is worth protecting.”

The Love Life Initiative was “born out of the recognition that pro-life victories in the courtroom is not enough,” according to the initiative’s website. 

At the time of the Dobbs ruling, 49% of Americans identified as pro-choice and 46% as pro-life, Love Life reported. Today, 53% identify as pro-choice and only 39% identify as pro-life. The initiative plans to work to reverse this trend through “thoughtful, far-reaching advertising campaigns that promote the sanctity of life, advance referendums that protect life, and identify and defeat harmful proposals in statehouses across the nation.”