LAGOS, Nigeria – Nigeria's bishops condemned repeated killings of innocent Nigerians by suspected ethnic militias in northeastern Nigeria and said President Muhammadu Buhari should resign if he could not keep the country safe.

LAGOS, Nigeria – Nigerian religious leaders condemned the killing of about 19 people during a morning Mass in Benue state.

MEXICO CITY – Yet another Mexican Catholic priest has been murdered in his parish -- the second such lethal attack against clergy in the country in less than a week.

HA TINH, Vietnam – A court in central Vietnam has jailed a Catholic activist after convicting her of subverting the communist state, ucanews.com reported.

Carl Hétu has watched the disappearance of Christians in the Middle East by the thousands. Lately, he’s begun to wonder if he’s seeing it begin in Canada, too.

QUETTA, Pakistan – Four members of a Catholic family were killed in a militant attack in southern Pakistan a day after the minority community celebrated Easter.

MANILA, Philippines – There will be no Holy Week observance this year in Marawi almost a year after extremist gunmen occupied the southern Philippine city.

HONG KONG – China's ruling Communist Party has further stepped up control over all religions, dissolving its long-standing State Administration for Religious Affairs bureau and handing its functions to the party's United Front Work Department.

OTTAWA – A court ruling that has upheld the rights of religious freedom and expression in the so-called Easter Bunny case seems to support those who will to take the federal government to court over the controversial Canada Summer Jobs application, said lawyer John Carpay.

It is a frightening world when those with power assume they can dictate to those without how they must think and what they must say.

BHOPAL, India (CNS) -- Suspected Hindu extremists demolished the wall of a Catholic mission hospital and manhandled staff, including nuns, in the latest incident in Madhya Pradesh state, considered a hotbed of anti-Christian violence in central India.

VATICAN – Christians in the Middle East, particularly those who have been forced from their homes by violence and persecution, need the support of the Catholic Church, a Vatican official said.

ROME – Rome's Colosseum, long a symbol of the persecution of early Christians, was bathed in red light late Feb. 24 as a reminder of and a prayer for the thousands of Christians being persecuted for their faith today.

VATICAN – The Catholic Church in China registered 48,556 baptisms in 2017, reflecting the vitality and missionary strength of the Catholic communities there, according to a report by Fides, the news agency of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples.

WASHINGTON – If Christians in the Middle East are going to be "honest" with their Muslim dialogue partners, said Chaldean Archbishop Bashar Warda of Irbil, Iraq, Muslims will have to acknowledge that the persecution of Christians in the region did not start with the Islamic State's rise to power in 2014.