WASHINGTON – The head of the U.S. military archdiocese June 20 expressed sorrow for the lives lost in "the tragic ship collision" involving the USS Fitzgerald off the coast of Japan.

BEIRUT – Bishop Joseph Absi was elected the new Melkite patriarch of Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem and All the East during the Melkite Catholic Synod at Ain-Traz, Lebanon.

RUTENG, Indonesia – A group of priests in Indonesia's Ruteng Diocese appealed to the Vatican to intervene and resolve a dispute with their bishop, whom they accuse of misappropriating more than $100,000 in church funds.

MANILA, Philippines – Instead of material gifts, a priest and employees of the Archdiocese of Manila gifted Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle with their blood.

BEIRUT – Lebanese Cardinal Bechara Rai commended Lebanon's political parties for ratifying a new electoral law.

LONDON – An English cardinal has condemned an attack against Muslims who had gathered close to a London mosque.

HANOI, Vietnam – Police have looked the other way as groups of youths have terrorized a Catholic community in northeast Vietnam.

TURIN, Italy – Inside a copper teapot in a kitchen cupboard, Italian police found the relic of St. John Bosco that had been stolen two weeks earlier from the basilica erected at his birthplace.

JAKARTA, Indonesia – Dozens of Indonesian priests have quit their posts after accusing a bishop on the Catholic majority island of Flores of embezzling more than $100,000 of church funds for personal use.

YAOUNDE, Cameroon – Catholic bishops in Cameroon said a bishop whose body was pulled from a river in early June did not commit suicide, but was murdered.