EDMONTON – Mike Paonessa visits the Edmonton Remand Centre every week to pray the rosary with inmates, and drives around the inner-city Boyle Street neighbourhood to provide coffee and food to the needy.

One of the iconic churches in Ontario’s north, Church of the Infant Jesus, was destroyed last month after a grass fire spread. The church, 300 kilometres north of Thunder Bay on the side of the Trans-Canada Highway, had been abandoned since 1997. After the fire, the local newspaper, the Anishinabek News, looked back on what the church had once meant for the community.

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OTTAWA – A majority of Canadians oppose the government making repeated apologies for the Indian residential schools, according to a new survey that indicates the country is deeply divided on the issue.

VATICAN – The Catholic Church must discover new ways to provide the Eucharist and pastoral support to the people of the Amazon, especially indigenous people threatened by forced displacement and exploitation, a new document said.

LIMA, Peru – More than 1,000 young pilgrims will share their cultures, joys and struggles at a gathering of indigenous youth in a small town in Panama just before World Youth Day in January.

OTTAWA – In a rare show of unanimity, the House of Commons has overwhelmingly supported a motion to call on Pope Francis to apologize on Canadian soil for abuses that occurred at church-run residential schools.

OTTAWA – Canada’s bishops’ conference is pushing back against “inaccuracies” in a proposed Parliamentary motion that will call on them to formally invite Pope Francis to apologize for the Church’s role in residential schools. 

Prince Albert Bishop Albert Thevenot will host a prayer vigil in his diocese April 17 to remember the Indigenous people who have gone missing and their families who have been left behind.

Pope Francis won’t be coming to Canada to personally apologize for the suffering endured by Indigenous Canadians at residential schools, a decision that has prompted disappointment from several corners, including the prime minister.

VATICAN – Pope Francis has chosen the theme and appointed members of the preparatory council for the Synod of Bishops for the Amazon region, which will take place in Rome in October 2019.

VANCOUVER, B.C. – Father Larry Lynn was wrapping up a visit to the Northwest Territories, interviewing aboriginal survivors of residential schools about their experiences, when he thought to ask his tour guide about her life.

Despite several invitations and considerable speculation, a papal visit to Canada seems no closer today than it was 2 1/2 years ago when the topic first surfaced.

OTTAWA – Regardless of whether Pope Francis comes to Canada, Indigenous relations remain a top priority to the bishops, said the newly-elected president of the Canadian bishops’ conference.

BOGOTA, Colombia - Pope Francis urged Colombians to put aside prejudice and pursue peace through social inclusion, fighting inequality and paying attention to the plight of the country's most marginalized populations, such as campesinos, Afro-Colombians and indigenous peoples.

Sorrow, regret and apologies are the natural outcome of the Church’s dedication to the truth whenever it confronts its history with Indigenous people, says a Brazilian bishop whose diocese includes more than 20 Indigenous territories and endangered cultures.