News/International

PARIS - Europe’s refugee crisis has inspired faith communities across the continent to open their doors to the newcomers and advocate for more state and private help, but the urgency of their calls and the depth of responses to them vary from country to country.

OKLAHOMA CITY - The Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics briefly used its official Facebook page on Aug. 26 to debate marijuana and the Bible. After two commenters posted references to the Bible in response to a story about the detrimental effects of marijuana on the brain, a bureau employee engaged them in a theological argument.

TORONTO - The Catholic Patriarch of Antioch, the most senior Catholic bishop in Syria, says the West must share responsibility for the fate of three-year-old Alan Kurdi, the Syrian toddler pictured drowned on a Turkish beach on newspaper front pages worldwide.

JERUSALEM - As Israeli students began their second week of classes Sept. 6, thousands of students and teachers from Christian schools converged in front of the Israeli prime minister's office to protest government budget cuts to their schools.

JERUSALEM - Israel’s 47 Christian schools are entering the second week of an open-ended strike to protest ongoing cuts in government allocations, which they attribute to government discrimination against minority religious groups.

GUATEMALA CITY - Mass at the Divine Providence Parish, celebrated shortly after polls closed in this country's recent elections, included intentions. The parishioners prayed for the "people and pastors" of Guatemala, along with the country itself -- where citizens, protesting peacefully for months, forced a president accused of corruption to resign in the days prior to the Sept. 6 vote.

SAN DIEGO - A ministry focusing on the excitement and friendship that can come from athletic competition is bringing young people together in faith.

Families are one great reason why Pope Francis is coming to America.

NEW YORK - New Yorkers and tourists in midtown Manhattan have been gazing up at a smiling Pope Francis at one of New York's busiest intersections.

OXFORD, England - Catholic aid agencies have urged Europeans not to turn against migrants seeking refuge from Syria and other countries, in what media reports describe as the continent's greatest refugee movement since the Second World War.