Catholic leaders in Central America expressed alarm over the idea of repealing a national prohibition on extractive activities in El Salvador — putting the church in opposition to the country’s popular president.

To a packed St. Dominic Church Nov. 29, Cardinal Wilton D. Gregory of Washington delivered a homily focused on the Catholic tradition of honoring the dead and on the legacy of St. Thomas Aquinas.

In a beautiful way, the church’s law in this area echoes the words of Jesus himself: “Let the children come to me, and do not prevent them; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these” (Mt 19:14).

Despite a few high-profile delays in recent years, the canonization of Venerable Fulton J. Sheen — the popular, scholarly archbishop and 20th-century pioneer of Catholic broadcasting — is “inevitable,” said the head of the foundation supporting his cause.

Artist and psychologist Tetiana Myalkovska of Ukraine used her art therapy techniques to work with children who have special needs and with her country’s traumatized soldiers returning from the conflict when Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014.