VATICAN CITY – Despite a serious drop in the value of the U.S. dollar, the Vatican’s 2006 budget closed with a surplus of more than $3.2 million, said Cardinal Sergio Sebastiani, head of the Vatican’s general accounting office.Read More

DUBLIN – A group representing more than 400 of Ireland’s 4,500 priests has made an urgent plea to the country’s bishops to postpone the introduction of the new English translation of the missal for at least another five years.Read More

On June 28, representatives from nine Southwest Baltimore businesses announced the expansion of a community partnership, Caton Corners, which was founded in 2004. Caton Corners will now include five local businesses to work together to improve the working and personal lives of the residents who live in the neighborhoods of Southwest Baltimore.Read More

As a State Senate committee prepares to consider a bill legalizing same-sex marriage, leaders of the Maryland Catholic Conference (MCC) are urging Catholics throughout the state to speak up in defense of traditional marriage.Read More

WASHINGTON – Calling the failure to provide health insurance for every child in the nation “a glaring moral failure,” the president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association said President George W. Bush’s opposition to the expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program was “profoundly” disappointing.Read More

VATICAN CITY – It is “unacceptable” to evangelize without addressing the urgent problems of poverty, injustice and oppression, Pope Benedict XVI said.Read More

LONDON – In ancient mythology, the chimera was a fire-breathing creature made up of the parts of various animals. Typically, it was portrayed with the head of a lion, the body of a goat and the tail of a serpent.Read More

WASHINGTON – Sitting on the floor in a side chapel in the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Lillian Zhao knew that what she was part of was unlike anything she had ever seen in her native China.Read More