Popes lead the Catholic Church as successors to Saint Peter, guiding over a billion followers worldwide through faith, ...

Broadway review by Adam Feldman . Elmer McCurdy wanted to be somebody. Born out of wedlock to a teenage mother in late-19th-century Maine, he grew up dreaming of infamy. (“I’m ...

If you look at Vatican TV live right now, you’ll see a queue of people lining up inside St Peter’s basilica to visit the ...

For centuries, popes have been laid to rest in three nested coffins, each one symbolic, sacred, and deeply rooted in history.

Many of the traditions that will dictate Pope Francis’s funeral date back more than 2,000 years. They are compiled in a tome ...

Dead bodies on display in a coffin are regarded nowadays as in rather ... Our lot don’t want a memento mori, that medieval symbol of death to remind us that this life is passing away.

Never mind Hawthorne and Thoreau— the women of mid-19th century New England had their own ambitions for writing and life.

Mary Moody Emerson wore shroudlike garments by day and slept on a bed shaped like a coffin—her nightly memento mori. The members of Mr. Fuller’s quintet had a surefire way of alienating their ...