OSV Newscast

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Maggie Murray of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for August 11, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

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1. Pope Leo XIV offered prayers and condolences after a magnitude 7.4 earthquake killed at least 132 people in Colombia, as bishops called on citizens to respond as "one family" through prayer and support for rescue efforts.
2. Massachusetts bishops condemned Governor Maura Healey's signing of a new law removing legal restrictions on abortion after 24 weeks as "a radical measure which is gravely immoral."
3. Catholic experts told OSV News that recent AI security disclosures from Anthropic and OpenAI reinforce the Church's warning that human responsibility cannot be transferred onto technology.
4. Pro-life organizations led by Advancing American Freedom pressed newly confirmed Attorney General Todd Blanche to follow through on his promise to review a Biden-era policy permitting mifepristone by mail.
5. The Vatican announced Pope Leo XIV's 2027 World Day of Peace message will focus on "disarming technology," building on his encyclical to warn against AI's role in military decisions.

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Maggie Murray of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for August 10, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

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1. As preparations accelerate for World Youth Day 2027 in Seoul, organizers are preparing to welcome young Catholics from around the world for a gathering centered on hope, hospitality, solidarity and Korea’s rich Catholic heritage. 
2. The Diocese of Wichita is opening St. Philip Neri Seminary after more than 20 years of planning, with Church leaders describing the new institution as a major investment in forming holy, joyful and faithful priests. 
3. A bankruptcy judge has allowed abuse survivors to pursue legal action seeking to include Vermont Catholic parishes and schools in claims against the Diocese of Burlington, while stressing that the ruling does not make those entities automatically liable. 
4. Thirty-five years after Fathers Michal Tomaszek and Zbigniew Strzalkowski were murdered by Peru’s Shining Path guerrillas, their fellow Franciscan says their decision to remain with vulnerable communities continues to witness to missionary courage, prayer and service. 
5. Thousands of Catholics gathered in Denver to venerate relics of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, whose devotion to the Sacred Heart was symbolically joined with the legacy of Julia Greeley, a Denver Catholic known for charity and devotion to the Sacred Heart.

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Maggie Murray of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for August 7, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

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1. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche signaled on a private call that the Trump administration is preparing policies to stop mifepristone distribution by mail, though the Justice Department later said his comments had been "mischaracterized."
2. The Archdiocese of Chicago dedicated "At Peace," believed to be the first suicide loss memorial garden created by a U.S. Catholic archdiocese, offering grieving families a place to encounter God's love and peace.
3. Catholic Scouting America launched a year-long "Novena Prayer for America" honoring the nation's 250th anniversary, with intentions mirroring the priorities of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
4. OSV News learned that 22 previously undisclosed letters from Slovenian women allegedly abused by Father Marko Rupnik add new documentation to his ongoing Vatican canonical trial.
5. The Vatican released the full itinerary for Pope Leo XIV's September visit to France, including a private meeting with abuse victims alongside stops in Paris, Lourdes and Metz.

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Maggie Murray of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for August 6, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

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1. Pope Leo XIV challenged 2,500 young people gathered in Assisi for the Jubilee Year of St. Francis to become the "new saints" the world needs, urging them to embrace the Gospel with the freedom of Christ.
2. Renewed Israeli strikes in Gaza are casting doubt on the White House's peace plan, with a Notre Dame scholar disputing claims of real progress even as Catholic bishops call for intense prayer for the negotiations' success.
3. Bishop Daniel Garcia marked the 61st anniversary of the Voting Rights Act by calling for reflection on full democratic participation, echoing Pope Leo XIV's affirmation that democracy reflects citizens' God-given dignity.
4. A week after a massive migrant surge overwhelmed Ceuta, Spanish Catholic groups continued providing aid while local Catholics processed Our Lady of Africa through the enclave's streets as a sign of hope amid ongoing humanitarian concerns.
5. Acutis AI co-founder Peter Cooney unpacked Pope Leo XIV's encyclical "Magnifica Humanitas" at a Washington conference, explaining the pope's call to engage AI's dangers with hope rather than fear.

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Gina Christian of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for Aug. 5, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

Read the stories in this episode:

• Pope Leo XIV will make the first apostolic journey of his pontificate to South America Nov. 6-17, visiting 10 cities across Uruguay, Argentina and Peru.
• Returning to his weekly general audiences after a monthlong summer break, Pope Leo XIV urged Catholics to embrace the Liturgy of the Hours more fully in their daily lives, saying the church's public prayer is an antidote to a world shaped by technology, consumerism and an efficiency-driven mindset.
• Pope Leo XIV mourned the death of Cardinal Júlio Duarte Langa, bishop emeritus of Xai-Xai, Mozambique, who died Aug. 3 at age 98 while receiving treatment in a Maputo hospital.
• At "an unprecedented moment" in U.S. immigration policy, Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller of San Antonio is assuring migrants in a new pastoral letter, released Aug. 3, that the Church "will come to you."
• Jason Adkins, executive director and general counsel of the Minnesota Catholic Conference, has been elected president of the National Association of State Catholic Conference Directors, or NASCCD, and will serve a two-year term through August 2028. 

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Maggie Murray of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for August 4, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

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1. Bishop Thomas Daly of Spokane called for prayer as wildfires displaced more than 65,000 people across Washington state, with at least one of the three Spokane Complex fires believed to be human-caused.
2. Notre Dame law professor Rick Garnett called Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier's letter demanding Catholic schools adopt vaccine religious exemptions or lose voucher funding "a glaring and dangerous government overreach" that violates First Amendment protections.
3. Catholic groups nationwide, including a Kentucky parish ministry aiming for 1,000 rosaries, are crafting World Mission Rosaries to distribute to pilgrims at Archbishop Fulton Sheen's September 24th beatification in St. Louis.
4. A new University of Notre Dame report offers 12 recommendations for improving seminarian formation, emphasizing psychological services, special needs support, and fostering healthy chastity and celibacy among future priests.
5. Scholars identified two previously unknown sermons by St. Augustine in a 12th-century manuscript in Pelplin, Poland, revealing his openness to multiple interpretations of difficult biblical passages and his emphasis on God's mercy.

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Gina Christian of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for Aug. 3, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

Read the stories in this episode:

• The Diocese of El Paso, Texas, has shut down its long-running legal aid ministry to unaccompanied child migrants, as the Trump administration withholds almost $1 million in funding for work already performed. 
• Police in northern Nigeria are investigating the murder of a Catholic priest killed in an apparent roadside ambush in Kogi state.
• A Spanish missionary priest has been appointed to lead the Archdiocese of Rabat following abuse allegations against its leader, Cardinal Cristóbal López Romero.
• Cardinal Ernest Simoni, 97, returned to Albania’s former Spaç prison camp, where he secretly celebrated Mass during 18 years of forced labor, to publicly celebrate Mass July 31 and honor those who suffered and died there.
• Pope Leo XIV is inviting Catholics to pray "for evangelization in the city" as his August prayer intention, asking the Lord to accompany millions searching for meaning amid the noise and haste of urban life. 

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Gina Christian of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for July 31, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

Read the stories in this episode:

• A federal judge temporarily shielded on July 30 four orders of women religious and Catholic healthcare ministries from enforcement of a New York state law allowing physicians to aid terminally ill adults in dying by suicide.
• A Catholic-supported hospital in Gaza City sustained damage after an Israeli airstrike hit a nearby residential apartment late July 29, according to the Catholic Near East Welfare Association's Pontifical Mission in Lebanon and Syria.
• The Hillbilly Thomists are in the midst of a 10-city U.S. tour, scheduled to end Aug. 8 -- the feast of St. Dominic -- in Nashville for Dominican Fest at the Dominican Campus, home to three schools run by the Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia. 
• The Diocese of Cádiz and Ceuta is offering emergency assistance to civil authorities after more than 60,000 migrants crossed from Morocco into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, creating the largest migration crisis in the territory's history.
• As an estimated 350,000 Haitian immigrants in the United States face losing Temporary Protected Status, church leaders are calling for prayer and action.

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Maggie Murray of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for July 30, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

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1. Bishop Daniel Flores expressed relief that Sister Leticia Ugbaoja, a Nigerian-born nurse and religious sister detained by ICE en route to Mass, can remain in the US while her immigration case proceeds, though the ultimate outcome remains uncertain.
2. Jennie Bradley Lichter announced she is stepping down as president of the March for Life effective July 31st to become a full-time mother, leaving the organization to seek new leadership amid key pro-life policy battles.
3. Catholic immigration advocates including CLINIC condemned a new Trump administration rule, issued without public comment, that could push nearly 445,000 asylum seekers directly into deportation proceedings.
4. UK Catholic leaders praised Prime Minister Andy Burnham's commitment to strengthening palliative care ahead of a September vote on assisted dying legislation, while urging him to also act on overseas aid, homelessness and child poverty.
5. Pope Leo XIV reflected on music's power to draw people toward God after Andrea Bocelli led 164 young singers in a Jubilee concert at Castel Gandolfo marking the 800th anniversary of St. Francis of Assisi's death.

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Maggie Murray of OSV News catches you up on the Catholic news of the day for July 29, 2026. Tune in and visit us online at osvnews.com.

Read the stories in this episode:

1. Police detained a Polish suspect in the Medjugorje vandalism attack as workers restored the damaged statue and altar, while a Catholic filmmaker who knew the man urged restraint over online condemnation ahead of the shrine's annual youth festival.
2. President Trump marked the 45th anniversary of Blessed Stanley Rother's martyrdom, honoring the Oklahoma-born priest as the first American-born martyr beatified by the Catholic Church for his sacrificial service in Guatemala.
3. Florida executed two death row inmates in a single day for the first time since 1964, just one day after the state's Catholic bishops issued a pastoral letter condemning capital punishment as part of "a culture of death."
4. Bishop Manuel de Jesús Rodríguez told attendees at a Palm Beach event that clergy sexual abuse threatens "faith itself" by destroying the credibility of those entrusted to preach the Gospel, drawing on his own doctoral research into canon law protections for victims.
5. Oslo's Bishop Fredrik Hansen described Nobel laureate Sigrid Undset's post-conversion life as reflecting the heroic virtues required for sainthood, noting strong interest from American Catholics helped prompt his diocese to formally begin exploring her canonization cause.