Asia

HONG KONG (CNS) -- Catholic media tycoon and philanthropist Jimmy Lai has been sentenced to 12 months in jail after being found guilty of unauthorized assembly.

CLEVELAND (CNS) -- Recent decisions by leading financial institutions and the world's leading economies to ease the debt burden of the world's poorest nations will help those countries respond to the economic crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic, the executive director of Jubilee USA said.

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The biggest risk Afghanistan might face with a withdrawal of U.S. troops could be civil war, said the Italian priest in charge of the small Catholic community in Afghanistan.

PARIS (CNS) -- When Laurent Thorigné went to the Philippines to work for a nongovernmental organization serving underage inmates, he initially did not know it had been set up by a French nun.

QUEZON CITY, Philippines (CNS) -- Jane Ollivier lost her parents by the age of 10. For five years, she bounced among various relatives before she entered the School of Life, a residential program for teenage girls in metropolitan Manila run by the Missionaries of Mary.

MANILA, Philippines (CNS) -- A diocese in the Philippines has launched an application, E-Pray, for spiritual accompaniment during COVID-19 isolation.

Poor countries cannot be expected to recover from the current financial crisis if the world returns to an economic model in which a small minority of people owns half of the world's wealth, Pope Francis said.

Pope Francis sent a video message encouraging Filipino Catholics to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the arrival of Christianity in their country by continuing to be faithful, generous missionaries of the Gospel.

World leaders ramp up their condemnation of the military coup leaders as Myanmar's death toll crosses the grim total.

The secretary-general of the Russian bishops' conference said new legal regulations will give state officials extra powers to intervene in church life and revive communist-era restrictions.

The March 25 announcement in Manila and at the Vatican filled the vacancy Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle left in February 2020, when he was called to the Vatican.

Pope Francis sent words of encouragement to Australians in the state of New South Wales, where some areas received two-thirds of their yearly rainfall in less than a week.

Cardinal John Dew told a royal commission of inquiry that the Catholic Church in New Zealand is ashamed and saddened that people suffered abuse while in its care.

The United Nations and human right groups have strongly condemned the worsening bloodshed in Myanmar as at least 38 people were killed in the military's crackdown on protesters March 14.

The joy of the Gospel has been an integral part of the Filipino identity since the arrival of Christianity in the Southeast Asian country five centuries ago, Pope Francis said.

Pope Francis appealed for an end to deadly violence against protesters in Myanmar, calling on the military junta to free political prisoners and let dialogue and the journey toward democracy prevail.