Russian soldiers who die in the line of duty in Ukraine have all of their sins forgiven, the patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church proclaimed in a sermon, comparing their sacrificial death to that of Jesus.
McLEAN, Va. (AP) — Student activists held school walkouts across Virginia on Tuesday to protest Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin's proposed changes to the state's guidance on transgender student policies, revisions that would roll back some accommodations.
For months, Catholic Charities of Southeast Texas has had to waitlist families hoping to join a food pantry program, as the nonprofit and other charities have struggled to meet soaring demand amid rising food prices and the end of federal pandemic relief aid.
SALVADOR, Brazil (AP) — Off a byway outside Salvador, past an evangelical church and down a short path, Thiago Viana was preparing a celebration. Two new members of his temple would soon emerge from months of seclusion, marking initiation into his Afro Brazilian faith, Candomble.
SALVADOR, Brazil (AP) — Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro has been waging an all-out campaign to shore up the crucial evangelical vote ahead of Oct. 2 elections.
When her teenage daughter came out as a lesbian several years ago, one of the first things Caroline Joyce did was to Google, “Can you be gay and be a Christian?”
The family was attending a conservative Southern Baptist church in the Greensboro, North Carolina, area that considered homosexual activity to be sinful.
TOKYO (AP) — Japan's assassinated hawkish former leader, Shinzo Abe, was given a rare state funeral Tuesday that was full of military pomp and surrounded by throngs of mourners as well as by widespread protests, with thousands taking to the streets in opposition.
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Rescuers in northern Bangladesh on Tuesday found more bodies from an overcrowded boat with Hindu pilgrims that capsized in one of the country's worst recent river disasters, pushing the death toll to 66, officials said.
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — A defense lawyer for an alleged Central African Republic rebel told International Criminal Court judges Tuesday that prosecution evidence that led to him being charged with seven counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes is unreliable and “built on a biased and sketchy narrative.”
HAVANA (AP) — Cubans have approved a sweeping "family law” code that will allow same-sex couples to marry and adopt as well as redefining rights for children and grandparents, officials said Monday, though opposition in the national referendum was unusually strong on the Communist Party-governed island.
DOHA, Qatar (AP) — Youssef al-Qaradawi, an Egyptian cleric who was seen as the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and became the Islamist “voice of revolution” during the popular uprisings around the Arab world more than a decade ago, died Monday at the age of 96.
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — An alleged senior leader of a predominantly Muslim rebel group that ousted the president of Central African Republic in 2013 pleaded not guilty Monday to seven counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court.
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Rescuers recovered 17 more bodies on Monday from a boat that capsized while carrying about 100 Hindu pilgrims in northern Bangladesh, raising the confirmed death toll to 41, police and news reports said.
HONG KONG (AP) — A 90-year-old Catholic cardinal and five others stood trial in Hong Kong on Monday for allegedly failing to register a now-defunct fund set up to assist people arrested in the mass anti-government protests in the city three years ago.
TOKYO (AP) — A rare state funeral for Shinzo Abe, the former prime minister who was assassinated in July, has split Japan.
HAVANA (AP) — Cuba held a rare referendum Sunday on an unusually contentious law — a government-backed “family law” code that would allow same-sex couples to marry and adopt, as well as outlining the rights of children and grandparents.
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — A boat carrying about 100 Hindu pilgrims capsized Sunday in a river in northern Bangladesh, leaving at least 24 people dead, police said.
The overcrowded boat overturned in the afternoon while returning from a Hindu temple on the other side of the River Karatoa at Boda area in Panchagarh district, said local police chief S.M.
UMAN, Ukraine (AP) — Thousands of Hasidic Jewish pilgrims flocked to central Ukraine to mark the Jewish new year Sunday, ignoring international travel warnings as Russia struck more targets from the air and mobilized its citizens to stem losses in the war that has entered its eighth month.
MATERA, Italy (AP) — Pope Francis traveled to southern Italy on Sunday to close out an Italian church congress that coincided with Italy’s national election, and delivered a message that hit on key domestic campaign issues including immigration.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Stores are selling winter clothes from last season in the middle of summer. Repair shops lack spare parts for appliances. There's a waiting list to buy a new car.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The way President Joe Biden sees it, the overturning of Roe vs. Wade was not just about whether a woman has a right to obtain an abortion.
NEW YORK (AP) — The tears come quickly to Masih Alinejad when she talks about the messages she's received in recent days from women in Iran protesting against their government after a young woman died in police custody over a violation of the country's strict religious dress code.
CHAMBERSBURG, Pa. (AP) — Doug Mastriano, the Republican nominee for governor in Pennsylvania, is perhaps best known as an election denier who was at the U.S.
ASSISI, Italy (AP) — Pope Francis, visiting Assisi, the birthplace of his namesake saint who was close to nature, called on Saturday for “courage” in abandoning fossil fuels and lamented that older generations didn't know how to protect the planet and secure peace,
HOMEWOOD, Ala. (AP) — To the world, Harper Lee was aloof to the point of being unknowable, an obsessively private person who spent most of her life avoiding the public gaze despite writing one of the best-selling books ever, “To Kill a Mockingbird.” To Wayne Flynt, the Alabama-born author was his friend, Nelle.
LONDON (AP) — Hilary Mantel, the Booker Prize-winning author who turned Tudor power politics into page-turning fiction in the acclaimed “Wolf Hall” trilogy of historical novels, has died, her publisher said Friday.
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — A bargain hunter who went to an estate sale in Maine to find a KitchenAid mixer, a bookshelf or vintage clothing walked away with a 700-year-old treasure.
Instead of a kitchen appliance, Will Sideri stumbled upon a framed document hanging on a wall.
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — A car bomb went off Friday as worshippers were leaving a Kabul mosque, killing at least seven people and wounding 41, including several children, a Taliban official said.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing, the latest in a steady stream of attacks since the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan just over a year ago.
VATICAN CITY (AP) — A plain white helmet like the pope’s skullcap.
The Holy See’s crossed keys seal stamped on his white and yellow jersey over his heart.
TOKYO (AP) — Several hundred protesters demanded the cancellation of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s state funeral as they shouted slogans and waved banners Friday in a Tokyo park.
“Abe’s policies supported war,” demonstrator Mayumi Ishida said, noting Abe consistently sought to raise defense spending.
SAN SALVADOR, Puerto Rico (AP) — President Joe Biden said Thursday the full force of the federal government is ready to help Puerto Rico recover from the devastation of Hurricane Fiona, while Bermuda and Canada's Atlantic provinces prepared for a major blast from the Category 4 storm.
TOKYO (AP) — The Unification Church, whose close ties with Japan's governing party have emerged after the assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, acknowledged Thursday that it had accepted “excessive” donations from the suspect's mother, and that it would need to consider it seriously if that led to the killing.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists said Thursday that a Republican-led proposal to ban abortion nationwide after 15 weeks would endanger the health of women and have severe consequences for physicians.
Actions by Facebook and its parent Meta during last year's Gaza war violated the rights of Palestinian users to freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, political participation and non-discrimination, a report commissioned by the social media company has found.
JERUSALEM (AP) — A Palestinian man was shot and killed Thursday by an off-duty policeman after stabbing a pair of Israeli motorists at an intersection in central Israel, Israeli officials and media said.
HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — Dozens of women holding babies rushed to take their places on wooden benches at a clinic in Zimbabwe while a nurse took a separate group of anxious mothers and their children through a back door and into another room.
ISLAMABAD (AP) — An explosion in Afghanistan's capital has killed at least three people and wounded 13 others, a Taliban official said on Wednesday.
According to Khalid Zadran, the Taliban-appointed spokesman for the Kabul police chief, the blast occurred in a restaurant in the city's western Dehmazang neighborhood.
The Southern Baptist Convention's top administrative body voted to cut ties with two congregations on Tuesday — an LGBTQ-friendly church in North Carolina that had itself quit the denomination decades ago and a New Jersey congregation it cited for “alleged discriminatory behavior.”
MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Survivors of torture and other atrocities under Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos on Wednesday marked his martial law declaration 50 years ago by pressing their demand for justice and apology from his son — now the country’s president in a stunning reversal of fortunes for the once reviled family.