CASTEL GANDOLFO (CNS) -- In a fractured world threatened by war, Christians can strengthen their bonds of unity to show the world that peace is possible, Cardinal Blase J. Cupich of Chicago said.

Leaders in the Catholic Church also "need to make sure people understand what's at stake when we opt for war and the consequences that result," he told Catholic News Service March 2.

"I think that church leaders need to pastor our people, giving them a voice about what are the principles from a moral dimension when it comes to pursuing peace, and what should be kept into consideration as we see conflicts in some way trying to be resolved by acts of war, wars that seem to be a choice rather than something that is a matter of necessity," he said.

Cardinal Cupich spoke to CNS during a special visit to the papal farm and the Borgo Laudato Si' center in the papal gardens in Castel Gandolfo. He was taking part in an ecumenical pilgrimage together with Metropolitan Nathanael, who presides over the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Chicago, to celebrate the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea. 

The two Christian leaders traveled from the Windy City to Istanbul to meet with Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople and then on to Rome to visit key Christian sites and to meet with Pope Leo XIV. 

"There'll be three people from Chicago: the pope, Cardinal Cupich and myself," Metropolitan Nathanael told CNS. "We will have a lot to talk about when we meet," though he was unsure about admitting to the pope -- a White Sox fan -- that he is a Yankees fan.

Before meeting the pope March 4, Cardinal Cupich and the metropolitan spent half a day March 2 at the papal gardens and the Borgo Laudato Si' zero-environmental-impact complex devoted to promoting Pope Francis' teachings on caring for creation.

The trip offers an opportunity "to strengthen the bonds of unity between our churches," especially at a time when the world seems to be so fractured by war and conflict, and "to announce to the world that peace is something we should all embrace," Cardinal Cupich said.

"It's an opportunity for us as well to double down on the importance of working together so that humanity can all flourish in a world in which there is peace," he said, adding that coming together at the Vatican-run center dedicated to promoting integral ecology, sustainability and a circular and generative economy was a good place to emphasize that call. 

At Borgo Laudato Si', he said, "we see firsthand how we are one with all of God's creation, and that we live on this tiny speck of cosmic dust called Earth, in which we all are responsible for making sure it is a place that's a home, a common home for all of us."

Metropolitan Nathanael said, "Looking around the beauty of the grounds, we see what can occur when there's synergy, not only between God and human beings, but amongst human beings."

The Greek Orthodox leader, who is based in Chicago, presides over 58 parishes and two monastic communities in six U.S. states.

"I want to encourage all of our people -- Catholic, Orthodox and even nonbelievers -- to do all they can to find common ground among ourselves as children of God, to love God with all our heart and all our mind and all our soul, and to also love our neighbor," he said. "It's important for us to not just coexist, but to find ways to come closer to God and to one another."

Born in Thessaloniki, Greece, the metropolitan said he felt at home during a tour of the papal farm and saw the donkeys -- which provide milk to pediatric patients -- and four horses leisurely munching on a hill of clover. 

While one chestnut horse happily bonded with the metropolitan, the purebred white Arabian horse named "Proton" skittishly avoided his orbit.

Cardinal Cupich and Metropolitan Nathanael also brought freshly-cut flowers grown at the papal farm with them to leave and pray at the tomb of Pope Francis in Rome's Basilica of St. Mary Major.

Pope Leo visited and inaugurated the center in Castel Gandolfo Sept. 5, 2025. U.S. Father Manuel Dorantes, a Chicago priest, has been the administrative-management director of the Laudato Si' Center for Higher Education since Dec. 1, 2024, when Pope Francis appointed him to a four-year term.

VATICAN CITY (CNS) --The Catholic Church is both a community made up of fragile and limited human beings and a divine reality, Pope Leo XIV said at his weekly general audience.

The pope continued his series on the Second Vatican Council March 4 in St. Peter's Square, emphasizing one of its principal documents, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, "Lumen Gentium," which examines the nature and identity of the Church. 

He said the Church is "a community of men and women who share the joy and struggle of being Christians, with their strengths and weaknesses, proclaiming the Gospel and becoming a sign of the presence of Christ who accompanies us on our journey through life."

However, he added, it also has a "divine dimension." Its divine nature "does not consist in an ideal perfection or spiritual superiority of its members, but in the fact that the Church is generated by God’s plan for humanity, realized in Christ," he said. 

As proof of this coexistence, Pope Leo pointed to the life of Jesus Christ to illustrate the two dimensions of the Church. People were moved by his humanity, the sounds of his voice, as well as his message.

"Those who decided to follow him were moved precisely by the experience of his welcoming gaze, the touch of his blessing hands, his words of liberation and healing," the pope said. "At the same time, however, by following that man, the disciples opened themselves to an encounter with God. Indeed, Christ’s flesh, his face, his gestures and his words visibly manifest the invisible God."

It is through this humanity, through the struggles and fragility of the faithful that Christ's presence is manifested, the pope said.

"This is what constitutes the holiness of the Church: the fact that Christ dwells in her and continues to give himself through the smallness and fragility of her members," he said.

Pope Leo said this dichotomy is quintessential of God's love, making himself visible through the weakness of his creation and "continuing to manifest himself and to act." The faithful are called to act through communion and charity among all.

"Let us strive to be authentic witnesses of the love of Christ so that all can recognize in us and among us the charity that characterizes true Christians and builds up the Church," the pope said in his greetings to English-speakers.

As violence intensifies in Lebanon, hundreds of thousands of people are being displaced around the country, prompting humanitarian organizations to respond urgently to growing needs for shelter, food, and psycho-social support.

Read all

 

The abbot of the German-speaking Benedictine Abbey of the Dormition in Jerusalem describes the monks' reaction to the outbreak of the war with Iran.

Read all

 

The International Union of Superiors General (UISG) calls for "prayer, fasting, and action for an unarmed and disarming peace" to take place on Friday, March 6, at 3:30 pm (Rome time). The event will be livestreamed and open to the faithful and all people of goodwill.

Read all

 

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- When millions of visitors flock to the Sistine Chapel each year, their seemingly invisible breath and sweat are slowly leaving a mark on this Renaissance masterpiece, according to Vatican Museums officials.

After 30 years since the chapel's last big renovation, the director of the Vatican Museums, Barbara Jatta, said the impact of five to six million visitors a year has created a white film over different surfaces in the chapel. The largest damage was found on Michelangelo's famous fresco of the Last Judgment.

She said the increased accumulation of residue from human sweat and breath on the artwork may be linked to climate change, as Italy has experienced warmer temperatures in recent years. 

"Every day, we check the Sistine Chapel, but last year, we realized that there is a layer of salt," she told the press invited to the chapel Feb. 28. "It's something that probably is due to the presence of the people, even if we have a very sophisticated climate system" meant to mitigate their impact.

Spread across the entire back wall, greeting visitors as they walk into the chapel, Michelangelo's Last Judgment depicts the second coming of Christ at the moment before delivering his final verdict, surrounded by saints and angels as the blessed rise to heaven and the damned are dragged to hell. 

Jatta said the film is "nothing too serious" and the work is a simple maintenance project. Restorers have been gently brushing deionized water over layers of Japanese paper pressed against the fresco, preserving the underlying pigment while gradually removing the calcium lactate film. 

Every January and February, the museum carries out minor patch repairs on the fresco surrounding the chapel, including removing the whitish film from certain sections, Jatta said. Most of the time, this maintenance can be done quickly with mobile scaffolding. During previous inspections, calcium lactate was found in smaller spots, including on the so-called "Quattrocento paintings." These paintings by several Florentine artists were commissioned by Pope Sixtus IV for two side walls. 

This year, staff found the residue throughout the Last Judgment. Jatta said it was more effective to address the issue by setting up scaffolding rather than use multiple temporary setups. So Feb. 23, the Vatican Museums erected scaffolding concealed by a full-scale image of the Last Judgment fresco on a screen, allowing visitors to continue touring the Sistine Chapel as staff work to delicately remove the residue from the artwork and refresh the mural. 

The scaffolding and screen are expected to remain in place until Holy Week, Jatta said. 

In order to preserve the artwork, Jatta said they have already reduced the number of visitors allowed in the chapel at any one time and extended museum hours. Museum officials plan to add climate control to the upper and lower galleries by the end of 2026 to reduce the effects of visitors' perspiration and breath, she said.

The maintenance work is meant to ensure the vibrancy of Michelangelo's iconic work remains visible to tourists. Staff performed some cleanings last year, "and we realized that it's much better," Jatta told reporters. 

"The colors and the incredible and magnificent fresco of Michelangelo will be back," she said.

Completed between 1536 and 1541, the Last Judgment was essentially painted only by  Michelangelo. Fabrizio Biferali, curator of the museums' department of 15th–16th century art, said the cleaning process has allowed them to uncover new technical details of his work. 

Speaking with reporters on the scaffolding, Biferali pointed to visible revisions in the fresco, explaining how the artist adjusted his figures directly on the wall. 

Biferali drew attention to what are called “pentimenti" or "changes of mind,” where Michelangelo repainted a figure after realizing “the foreshortening wasn’t perfectly effective from below.” Sometimes he even left areas of plain plaster exposed instead of adding a layer of pigment so that “the light plaster itself supplies the highlight.” 

The most recent major restoration of the Last Judgment was completed in 1994, removing a layer of smoke and wax buildup, the Vatican Museums said in a press release.

The Florida Chapter of the Patrons of the Arts in the Vatican Museums covered restoration costs, and Jatta said the museums are very grateful for their support over the years. 

Timothy Lisenbe and Diane Lisenbe, a couple visiting from the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, said that while it's not the full experience to see Michelangelo's work during the maintenance project, the Sistine Chapel remains a sight to behold. 

"I've been hearing about this since I was in grade school. Now I'm 64 years old, and it's still fresh on my mind what the teachers told us in school," he told Catholic News Service Feb. 28. "It's really something to see it in real life."

The Lisenbes said they understand that restorations are necessary. She said she also visited the Sistine Chapel during its first major modern-day restoration project and found it ironic that her second visit was again hampered by scaffolding. 

"That means we will have to come back," she said to her husband.

 

WASHINGTON - On the weekend of March 14-15, Catholics in many dioceses across the United States will be asked to help some of the most poor and vulnerable people. The U.S. bishops’ annual Catholic Relief Services Collection helps those in need in the United States and worldwide by benefiting six agencies and offices affiliated with the Catholic Church, including the U.S. bishops’ flagship international relief and development agency, Catholic Relief Services. Gifts are also accepted online at https://www.igivecatholic.org/story/USCCB-CRS.

“The Church in the United States was built on ministry among immigrants. We help all who are marginalized, including victims of war and disaster overseas. The Catholic Relief Services Collection combines all these kinds of assistance,” said Bishop Daniel H. Mueggenborg of Reno, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Committee on National Collections. “Our Lord tells us to love our neighbors – those we know, those we don’t and those we think are very different from us. The Catholic Relief Services Collection is one way that we show that love. Today it is more vital than ever.”

Of nearly $13.5 million distributed from The Catholic Relief Services Collection in 2024, nearly $8 million went to Catholic Relief Services for international relief and development efforts in places affected by war and natural disaster.

The other recipients are:

• The Catholic Legal Immigration Network (CLINIC): Provides training and support to a dedicated network of more than 400 Catholic and community-based immigration law providers in 49 states.
• USCCB Secretariat of Migration (formerly the Department of Migration and Refugee Services): Assists dioceses in carrying out their ministries to newcomers, publishes educational resources, and promotes policies that affirm the life and dignity of immigrants and refugees.
• Two initiatives of the USCCB Secretariat of Cultural Diversity in the Church: pastoral ministries to migrant workers, travelers, and seafarers through its Subcommittee on the Pastoral Care of Migrants, Refugees, and Travelers, and its Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Island Affairs, which helps the Church address the unique pastoral needs across many boundaries of language and tradition.
• USCCB Secretariat of Justice and Peace: Engages in advocacy on behalf of the poor around the world and works with policymakers and government officials to end violent international conflicts through its International Justice and Peace program.
• Holy Father’s Relief Fund: Helps Pope Leo XIV rush aid to areas of the world in crisis.

“Together, these agencies help victims of war and natural disaster, support sustainable economic development overseas, advocate for international peace and human rights, help refugees and immigrants in the United States to obtain legal support, offer pastoral support to a wide variety of people who migrate for work and build cross-cultural understanding,” Bishop Mueggenborg said.

For more information on The Catholic Relief Services Collection please visit www.usccb.org/catholic-relief.

### 

WASHINGTON - As reports emerge regarding the escalation of hostilities in the Middle East, Archbishop Paul S. Coakley, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, urgently called upon the United States, Iran, and the broader international community to return to dialogue and pursue every avenue toward a just and lasting peace.

Echoing the heartfelt appeal of Pope Leo XIV to halt the spiral of violence before it becomes “an unbridgeable chasm,” Archbishop Coakley emphasized the critical need for restraint and for all parties to take concrete steps to end the conflict, work for peace and protect innocent lives. His full statement follows:

“The growing conflict risks spiraling into a wider regional war. As the Holy Father has warned, we are faced with the possibility of a tragedy of immense proportions. My brother bishops and I unite our voice with our Holy Father and make the heartfelt appeal to all parties involved for diplomacy to regain its proper role. We ask for a halt to the spiral of violence, and a return to multilateral diplomatic engagement that seeks to uphold the ‘well-being of peoples, who yearn for peaceful existence founded on justice.’ All nations, international bodies, and partners committed to peace must exert every effort to prevent further escalation.

“At this critical moment, I invite Catholics and all people of goodwill to continue our ardent prayers for peace in the Middle East, for the safety of our troops and the innocent, that leaders may seek dialogue over destruction, and pursue the common good over the tragedy of war. We implore the intercession of our Blessed Mother, Mary, Queen of Peace, to pray for our troubled world and for a lasting peace.”

###

ROME (CNS) -- Life is a journey that requires trust and reliance on Jesus, who sometimes asks his disciples to leave everything behind, Pope Leo XIV said.

While it may be tempting to flee from the uncertainty of heading into the unknown, it is precisely in this "dizzying vertigo" that people of faith will find God's promise of unexpected greatness, he said in a homily during a Mass celebrated at a small parish in Rome March 1.

While it is normal to try to have everything under control, he said, "we miss the opportunity to discover the true treasure, the precious pearl, as the Gospel teaches us, which God has surprisingly hidden in our field."

Pope Leo was visiting the Church of the Ascension of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the working-class neighborhood of Quarticciolo for the second Sunday of Lent as part of a series of parish visits in the run-up to Easter. 

The neighborhood has experienced an increase in crime and drug-dealing. The church and local community, however, have been active in building initiatives to create job opportunities and strengthen essential services and solidarity. 

"You are signs of hope," he told the parishioners in his homily.

Faced with so many complex problems, he said, "you are entrusted with the pedagogy of the gaze of faith, which transfigures everything with hope, putting passion, sharing and creativity into circulation as a cure for the many wounds of this neighborhood."

It is easy to become discouraged and doubt efforts make any sense when so many things are not right in the world, he said. "Instead, it is precisely in the face of the mystery of evil that we must bear witness to our identity as Christians, as people who want to make the Kingdom of God perceptible in the places and times in which we live."

Life, he said, "is a journey that requires trust; it requires reliance on the Word of God, who calls us and sometimes asks us to leave everything behind."

For example, he said, Abraham's journey began with the loss of his homeland, but he was led to a new land with many descendants and "where everything becomes a blessing."

"If we allow ourselves to be called by faith to walk the path, to risk new decisions in life and love, we, too, will cease to fear losing something, because we will feel ourselves growing in a wealth that no one can steal," the pope said. 

Another example, he said, is Jesus' "Eucharistic gesture," that is, his willingness to offer his body as bread to eat and to live and die to give life.

In fact, Sunday is a chance to take a moment during the journey to gather together around Jesus, who "encourages us not to stop and not to change direction" and to know there is "no more precious treasure than to live in order to give life!"

"Listen to Jesus!" Pope Leo said. "He travels with us, even today, to teach us in this city the logic of unconditional love, of abandoning every defense that becomes an offense."

"Let us enter into his light to become light of the world, beginning with the neighborhood where we live," he said, because "the whole life of the parish and its groups exists for this: it is a service to light, a service to joy." 

Pope Leo is the third pope -- after St. John XXIII in 1963 and St. John Paul II in 1980 -- to visit the church, which is overseen by the Congregation of the Priests of the Sacred Heart, also known as the Dehonians.

During the late afternoon visit, the pope met with children and young people active in the Jesuits' MAGIS program. The young adults gave the pope a soccer ball and the black and gold jersey of their local soccer team, the Lions.

The pope also met with vulnerable members of the community, including the elderly, the ill and parents whose children's drug addictions led them to incarceration. He also spoke with members of the parish's pastoral council and priests.

ROME (CNS) -- Eight hundred years after his death, the bones of St. Francis of Assisi have been placed on public display for the first extended public viewing in history, drawing hundreds of thousands of pilgrims to the hilltop town.

Following Pope Leo XIV's approval and blessing of this exposition, St. Francis' skeleton was exhumed from the sarcophagus where it normally rests and placed on a specially prepared table in the crypt of the Basilica of Saint Francis of Assisi Feb. 21. His remains will be on display until March 22, when Cardinal Matteo Maria Zuppi, archbishop of Bologna and president of the Italian bishops’ conference, is to preside over a closing celebration. 

As of the opening day Feb. 22, more than 370,000 people had registered to venerate the remains, according to the Franciscan community at the Sacred Convent of Assisi. The majority have been Italian pilgrims, though the second-highest number of registrations have so far come from the United States.

The friars at the Sacred Convent in Assisi described the exposition as "an invitation to rediscover the legacy of Francis, a man whose message of peace and fraternity continues to resonate deeply with humanity.”

For some, the sight of a saint’s bones inspires devotion. For others, it may provoke discomfort or morbid curiosity about why the Catholic Church displays the physical remains of its holy men and women.

According to Catholic tradition, the physical remains of a saint are known as first-class relics. They are venerated not as magical objects, but as tangible reminders that holiness touches both body and soul.

Elizabeth Lev, a U.S. art historian who teaches in Rome, said relics serve as "a concrete reminder that the blessed or saint’s body is here on earth and his or her soul is with God.”

"It feels like you’ve got almost like a hotline into heaven,” she told Catholic News Service in 2011. The relic is "something we can see and touch, and it becomes our portal to a world we cannot see and cannot touch."

Relics, she emphasized, are not charms or spiritual talismans. 

"God controls what he’s going to do and how he’s going to do it," she said. 

The object itself has no power; it is understood as a channel through which believers direct their prayers.

Even in a secularized age, relics continue to draw large crowds. Tours of saints’ remains in Europe and the United States in recent decades have attracted hundreds of thousands of visitors, including many who might not otherwise attend church regularly. 

Assisi also holds the remains of the first millennial saint, St. Carlo Acutis, who was canonized last year. His body can be found at the Church of St. Mary Major, where more than 620,000 individuals visited in the first eight months of 2025, according to the Diocese of Assisi.

While in Paris, an estimated 2-3 million annual visitors go to see St. Catherine Labouré's preserved body. Next to the altar, she lies in a glass shrine in the Chapel of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal, where she is reported to have seen the Virgin Mary in 1830. 

The body of St. Thérèse of Lisieux went on a tour of the United States last year, attracting an estimated one million visitors across more than 30 stops. Her permanent shrine in Lisieux brings more than 600,000 visitors annually. 

Lev suggested that the enduring appeal may reflect a deeper hunger.

"An over-secularized world that rejects the divine and embraces the finite and man-made leaves a void in people,” she had said. Relics, and the traditions surrounding them, offer a reminder that death does not sever the bonds between the living and the dead in the Christian imagination.

At the Basilica of Saint Francis in Assisi, the friars said in the press release that they invite the faithful to be inspired by the mortal remains of St. Francis, that death can bear fruit. 

"This awareness, eloquently expressed through the mortal remains of St. Francis, serves as an invitation to view one’s personal life in a similar light: like Francis, each person is called to give themselves generously in relationships, becoming a living tree of fraternity that continues to bear fruit in the history of the Church and the world," the convent's press release said.

The monthlong exposition includes a vigil with members of the Italian Parliament, a youth gathering titled "Sister Death: An Experience to Embrace,” and a theological conference exploring St. Francis’ understanding of death not as an end, but as a passage.

Though he died 800 years ago, St. Francis is still reminding the faithful that death should be viewed as a transition. During his life, he was known for his love of nature, renounced his wealthy upbringing to live as a beggar, and restored several chapels. He viewed death not with fear, but as a sibling, calling it "Sister Death." For the saint, death was not the end, but a peaceful transition to eternal life with God.