Amid the “dark hour” besetting Nicaragua — with the imprisonment of a bishop, the expulsion of over 200 political prisoners and ongoing human rights violations — Nicaraguans’ “courageous hope, charity and solidarity are bearing witness” to their enduring faith, said the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Even in an emergency, non-ordained laypeople are not able to confer absolution; nor can Catholic deacons, even though they are ordained.

Major-Archbishop Shevchuk and Archbishop Gudziak have borne a powerful global witness to the truths of Catholic faith amidst a moral monster’s genocidal assault on the people of Ukraine.

Diocesan bishops must have Vatican authorization to allow the celebration of the pre-Vatican II Mass in a parish church, to establish a new “personal parish” for devotees of the old Mass or to allow its celebration by a priest ordained after July 2021 when Pope Francis issued rules restricting the celebration, he said.

Mark Houck, a pro-life activist and leader of The King’s Men, a nationwide Catholic men’s ministry, stood before 1,200 Catholic men Feb. 18 at a conference at East Central High School in St. Leon in southeastern Indiana.