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Louisiana State Police are investigating senior officials of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans suspected to have shielded predatory priests for decades. A search warrant, served in April 2024, seeks to enable the state police to look into the archdiocese’s history of covering up for abusive priests. It will allow the police to access communications between local church leaders and the Vatican and investigate priests for alleged sex trafficking of children. Over the past few years, several investigations by state attorneys general, including reports from Illinois and ...

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It was daunting when the Rev. Brandon Thomas Crowley, at age 22, replaced a beloved pastor who had ministered to one of suburban Boston’s most famed Black churches for 24 years. It was more daunting — at times agonizing — to reach the decision six years later, in 2015, that God wanted him to tell his congregation that he was gay. To his relief, most of the worshippers at Myrtle Baptist Church in Newton, Massachusetts, embraced him. Crowley’s career has flourished, and he has now written a book — “Queering the Black Church” — that he hopes can serve as a guide for ...

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VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican crossed a key milestone Thursday in the runup to its 2025 Jubilee with the promulgation of the official decree establishing the Holy Year. It’s a once-every-quarter-century event that is expected to bring some 32 million pilgrims to Rome and has already brought months of headaches to Romans. Pope Francis presided over a ceremony in the atrium of St. Peter’s Basilica for the reading of the papal bull, or official edict, that laid out his vision for a year of hope: He asked for gestures of solidarity for the poor, prisoners, migrants and Mother ...

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NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Authorities have expanded an investigation of clergy sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church in New Orleans to include senior church officials suspected of shielding predatory priests for decades and failing to report their crimes to law enforcement. Louisiana State Police carried out a sweeping search warrant last week at the Archdiocese of New Orleans, seeking a long-secreted cache of church records and communications between local church leaders and the Vatican about the church’s handling of clergy sexual abuse. The search signaled a new phase of the ...

The Path Forward

“Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” — John 12: 24 Dear neighbors and friends, the season of gardening is almost upon us. When I was a child, my mother would ...

Cisco Systems joins Microsoft, IBM in Vatican pledge to ensure ethical use and development of AI

ROME (AP) — Tech giant Cisco Systems on Wednesday joined Microsoft and IBM in signing onto a Vatican-sponsored pledge to ensure artificial intelligence is developed and used ethically and to benefit the common good. Cisco Systems chief executive Chuck Robbins signed the document, known as the Rome Call, and met privately with Pope Francis, the Vatican said. The pledge outlines key pillars of ethical and responsible use of AI. It emphasizes that AI systems must be designed, used and regulated to serve and protect the dignity of all human beings, without discrimination, and their ...