World

During the coronavirus crisis, Pope Francis has become a 21st century “prisoner of the Vatican” — as one of his predecessors was once known — robbed of the crowds, foreign travel, and visits to the peripheries that so defined and popularized his papacy.

Two significant, global religious bodies on Thursday (Aug. 27) called on Christians to band together to fight “sins” laid bare or aggravated by the pandemic, including racism and economic injustice.

Throughout Latin America, evangelical churches have flouted public health guidelines by holding in-person services, or have personally ministered to church members in homes and other settings. In at least two countries, evangelical pastors have died in alarming numbers during the pandemic.

After the massive explosion on Aug. 4 in Beirut, Lebanon, some mental health professionals have offered to help those grappling with the shock and trauma of a blast that devastated a people wearied by severe economic turmoil and the coronavirus pandemic and related hardship.

Pope Francis on Wednesday warned against any prospect that rich people would get priority for a coronavirus vaccine. He also said it would be scandalous if all the economic assistance in the works, most of it using public funds, ends up reviving industries that don’t help the poor or the environment.

A quarter century after Israeli spies, a Canadian activist, and a Syrian rabbi smuggled nine rare medieval Jewish manuscripts out of Damascus, an Israeli court decided the books will remain under the National Library’s custodianship for their preservation.

A conservative South Korean pastor who has been a bitter critic of the country’s president has tested positive for the coronavirus, health authorities said Monday (Aug. 17), two days after he participated in an anti-government protest in Seoul that drew thousands.

Zimbabwe is embroiled in an economic and political crisis marked by human rights abuses, said the country’s Roman Catholic bishops, who were then criticized by the government as “evil” and trying to promote genocide.

On Thursday (Aug. 13), U.S. President Donald Trump announced Israel and the United Arab Emirates agreed to diplomatic relations. But while many applauded the move as a step toward peace, others criticized it as another effort that undermines Palestinian hopes for sovereignty.

When the first COVID-19 cases hit Brazil in March, the government agency in charge of protecting the country’s Indigenous peoples ordered all civilians to leave the Indigenous reservations. But a new law made an exception for one group: Christian missionaries. And some people aren’t happy.