Each year on Aug. 5 the church liturgical calendar commemorates the dedication of St. Mary Major (in Italian, Santa Maria Maggiore), one of the five great ancient basilicas in Rome, and ...

A 4 c. BC Greek fresco bearing striking similarities to the traditional portrayals of the Virgin Mary has been discovered in ...

Jesus Christ on the cross is not only a story of total surrender and eternal redemption. It is also a tale of all-embracing obedience on the part of St. John.

Pope Francis died on Easter Monday, April 21, 2025, at 88 after battling pneumonia and bronchitis; his cause of death was ...

But the Virgin Mary received faith and joy when the angel ... His advent by the spotless and God-bearing (theotokos) Mary in the way of birth and growth, and the manner of His life and ...

A change in popes is a complicated process. Here are the need-to-know terms — some of them in Latin — to help make sense of news in the coming days.

A good example is her analysis of the virgin birth. It yields a less sanctified Mary, but by highlighting darker currents in the text perhaps obscured by tradition, Pagels imbues the young mother ...

commemorates the presentation of the Blessed Virgin as a child by her parents in the Temple in Jerusalem. Before Mary's birth, her parents received a heavenly message that they would bear a child.

including an icon of the Virgin Mary holding the baby Jesus attributed to Saint Luke. It also holds pieces of wood believed to have been from Jesus's crib. The basilica's website says recent studies ...