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RELIGION August 31, 2016

String of Bahraini prison sentences issued against Shiites

Courts in Bahrain have issued a string of guilty verdicts against Shiite activists and clerics, including a blogger who was sentenced to one year in prison for insulting the king and inciting hatred against the government.

Middle East August 31, 2016

Saudi Arabia sentences man to 10 years in jail and 2,000 lashes for tweeting he was atheist

A court in Saudi Arabia has sentenced a man to ten years in prison and 2,000 lashes for expressing his atheism on Twitter.

RELIGION August 31, 2016

Egypt approves law on churches despite Christian opposition

Egypt's state news agency says parliament has approved a first-ever law to regulate the construction of churches despite opposition from rights groups and Coptic Christian leaders.

Europe August 31, 2016

Pope assumes responsibility for migrants in Vatican reform

Pope Francis is showing his profound concern for refugees by assuming direct responsibility for migrant issues in a new Vatican department that merges four Vatican offices into one handling peace, the environment and human trafficking issues.

Europe August 31, 2016

Uzbek PM leads national celebration; president still ill

Uzbekistan's prime minister is leading the nation's Independence Day celebration in the capital of Tashkent amid reports of President Islam Karimov's illness.

Europe August 31, 2016

Pope applauds Colombia peace deal but sidesteps truth panel

Pope Francis has praised Colombia's peace deal but has declined an invitation to have a Vatican envoy help select judges for the proposed truth and justice commission.

Europe August 31, 2016

Mother Teresa: A saint despite spiritual 'darkness'

When Pope Francis canonizes Mother Teresa on Sunday, he'll be honoring a nun who won admirers around the world and a Nobel Peace Prize for her joy-filled dedication to the "poorest of the poor." He'll also be recognizing holiness in a woman who felt so abandoned by God that she was unable to pray and was convinced, despite her ever-present smile, that she was experiencing the "tortures of hell." For nearly 50 years, Mother Teresa endured what the church calls a "dark night of the soul" — a period of spiritual doubt, despair and loneliness that many of the great mystics experienced, her namesake St. Therese of Lisieux included.

RELIGION August 31, 2016

El Salvador judge orders ex-attorney general remain in jail

A judge in El Salvador has ordered that the country's former attorney general remain in jail on new charges that he divulged intercepted telephone conversations in prosecuting a Roman Catholic priest from Spain in 2014.

Europe August 30, 2016

What next? Opaque Uzbekistan faces transition anxieties

Whether Uzbekistan's president is at death's door or has already passed through is unclear, but that may not be the greatest uncertainty facing the country — it's what comes after his death.

Europe August 30, 2016

Germany's Cologne Cathedral gets new St. John Paul II relic

Cologne's famous cathedral will soon be getting a new relic of a saint, with the gift of a drop of Pope St. John Paul II's blood from Krakow Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz.