The chair of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on International Justice and Peace told OSV News he was heartened by a United Nations move to approve President Donald Trump’s plan to end the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip by installing international transitional governance and military forces there.

On Dec. 7, 1965, Pope Paul solemnly promulgated the Second Vatican Council’s Declaration on Religious Freedom, known by its Latin incipit (opening words) as Dignitatis Humanae. The Council thereby turbocharged the Catholic Church’s transformation into the world’s premier institutional defender of basic human rights.

It’s hard to imagine the pitch session at which the premise of the would-be psychological thriller “The Carpenter’s Son” (Magnolia) was presented for approval. “Drawing on a 2nd-century apocryphal text,” the summary might have run, “why don’t we turn Jesus’ teenage years into the basis for a horror film?”

Rage is the predominant emotion in “The Running Man” (Paramount), the second screen version of Stephen King’s eponymous 1982 novel. As directed and co-written by Edgar Wright, it’s an anger-fuelled action film that’s bitter in mood as well as morally ambivalent.

Those of us still on earth can actively strive for a deeper sense of conversion and detachment from sin, but the souls in purgatory can no longer help themselves in this way and are dependent on our prayers and penances.