Aleteia - Catholic News

When Matthew McConaughey met Pope Leo at the Vatican earlier this month, he didn’t arrive short of conversation topics. The Oscar-winning actor had some pretty weighty issues on his mind, from the place of religion in today’s world to the extraordinary questions being raised by artificial intelligence. Now McConaughey has shared a little more about

Lebanon voted to abolish capital punishment this week, and will become the first Arab country to legally end the practice. The majority of Parliament voted to replace the death penalty with life imprisonment and hard labor. Notably, the Hezbollah voting bloc voted against the measure. A small Middle Eastern country – smaller than the U.S.

The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary has occupied a central place in the religious, cultural, and historical identity of the Maltese Islands for centuries. Although the doctrine of Mary’s Assumption into Heaven was formally proclaimed a dogma of the Catholic Church by Pope Pius XII on November 1, 1950, belief in this mystery is far older. Christians

Father Benedict Chao, the oldest Trappist monk in the world and the last survivor of the Chinese Trappist community that endured Maoist persecution, died on July 31, 2026, at the Abbey of Our Lady of Joy on Lantau Island, Hong Kong. He was 108 years old. He had been a monk for 79 years and

Pope Leo XVI sent a video message to the Leadership Conference of Women Religious in the United States, urging them to “seek ways to introduce [young people] to your way of life, and help them to hear the voice of the Lord, who speaks to us in the depths of our hearts.” The message marked the