VATICAN CITY (RNS) — Pope Francis delivered his Easter message and blessing in an empty St. Peter’s Basilica on Sunday, sending a message of hope for those affected by the coronavirus and challenging world leaders to work together for the common good while addressing the pandemic.

“Dear brothers and sisters, indifference, self-centeredness, division and forgetfulness are not words we want to hear at this time,” Francis said after the morning Easter Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica on Sunday (April 12).

“We want to ban these words forever!” he added.

In his message, the pope described a world currently faced “with epochal challenges and now oppressed by a pandemic severely testing our whole human family.”

He called for a “contagion of hope,” inspired by the Christian faith in the Resurrection of Christ.

Francis spoke directly to world leaders, who are charged with enacting policies to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus. 

“I encourage political leaders to work actively for the common good, to provide the means and resources needed to enable everyone to lead a dignified life and, when circumstances allow, to assist them in resuming their normal daily activities,” he said.

Francis mentioned the most vulnerable, the sick and the elderly as the first concern for global leaders in his address. He asked that the poor, the outcast, the refugees and the homeless…

Numerous crosses atop churches in China were recently removed by the Chinese Communist government which asserted that religious symbols cannot be raised “higher” than the Chinese national flag, The Christian Post reports.

Religious liberty magazine Bitter Winter has reported on numerous cross removals across China over the years. In mid-March, the outlet pointed out that crosses were removed from multiple churches in the eastern provinces of Jiangsu and Anhui and in the neighboring Shandong, the prefecture-level city of Linyi.

Churches approved by the Chinese government are not exempt.

In February, officials removed a cross from a government-approved Three-Self church in Hexi village. In 2007, the church was built in compliance with state regulations, implementing the four requirements of the government’s religion “sinicization” campaign.

Despite canceled church gatherings because of COVID-19, churches were still removed.

“The government does not provide enough help during the epidemic but instead demolishes crosses,” a local believer told Bitter Winter.

In December, additional crosses from Three-Self churches were removed in Hegang, out in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang.

One church member in the city’s Dongshan district told Bitter Winter that a local official threatened to close down the church if the cross was not removed because “it was higher…

Since 1876, London’s Royal Choral Society has performed the Hallelujah chorus each Good Friday at the local Royal Albert Hall – a tradition that was broken only twice during World War II due to Nazi Germany’s bombing of the city.

Thanks to the wonders of technology, the society kept the tradition alive during this year’s COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 82 members of the chorus filmed themselves singing their portion of the song in their homes. The videos then were stitched together in a YouTube video that premiered Good Friday on the Royal Albert Hall website.

The YouTube video has received more than 250,000 views.

Conductor Richard Cooke conducted the virtual chorus from his garden, while organist Richard Pearce provided accompaniment. The Hallelujah chorus is the most popular song in Handel’s Messiah.

“We are all saddened not to be performing Handel’s Messiah in person this year, and we’re particularly sorry that our audience members have been denied their annual performance of this magnificent work,” said Richard Cooke, music director at the Royal Choral Society. “… But we’re proud to be able to present this special video, which we hope goes some way to preserving this tradition.

“It’s not perfect – but then Royal Choral members were singing alone at home, rather than within the comfort of a 120-strong choir accompanied by the RPO [Royal Philharmonic…

A California county has banned churches from featuring singing and the use of wind instruments in their online services during the COVID-19 pandemic unless the performance is done at the individual’s residence.

Mendocino County in Northern California released the order April 10, saying the referenced rules run through at least May 10 and apply to churches, concert halls, auditoriums, temples and playhouses. Any recording or live-streamed event must be limited to four individuals at the venue, with all social distancing rules being practiced.

The county’s order targets churches with multiple people on stage singing and playing instruments. 

“No singing or use of wind instruments, harmonicas, or other instruments that could spread COVID-19 through projected droplets shall be permitted unless the recording of the event is done at one’s residence, and involving only the members of one’s household or living unit, because of the increased risk of transmission of COVID-19,” the order says.

Seminary president Albert Mohler criticized the order in a column Monday.

“[T]o be clear, authorities can and should require that churches respect and maintain physical distancing between all the very limited participants in a streamed worship service,” wrote Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky. “The worship leader, the other musicians, and…

More than 30 people are dead after severe storms that spawned tornados, ripped through Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, North and South Carolina, Arkansas and Texas earlier this week

According to the Associated Press, a string of storms developed on Easter Sunday, setting loose tornadoes and causing flooding and mudslides. 

More than 60 tornadoes are reported to have ripped through the southern states over two days wrecking countless homes and businesses, The Weather Channel reports.

The intensity of the storms caused Alabama’s Governor, Kay Ivey, to temporarily suspend social distancing orders put in place to slow the spread of the coronavirus, so that citizens, some of whom were adorned with personal protective equipment, could huddle together in storm shelters to take refuge.

The storms, which raged on into Monday, also dropped at least six inches of rain on the Tennessee Valley and according to the National Weather Service, downed hundreds of trees and handfuls of powerlines across the region.

According to poweroutage.us, by Monday, the storm had initially caused power outages for more than 1.3 million people from Texas to Maine. At the time of this writing, however, only 202,000 people are still without power.

USA Today reports that the two-day spree of tornadoes is the nation’s deadliest tornado outbreak since late April in 2014. From April 25 to April 28, 2014, tornadoes in…

Nic Brown, who became the first confirmed COVID-19 patient from his eastern Ohio county, nearly lost his life while isolated in a window-lined ICU unit at Cleveland Clinic. For Brown, it was the window to his world.

“I don’t know that I’ve ever seen such selfless people in my life,” said Brown, a 38-year-old IT executive, according to CBN News.

“I really saw the love of God through these people. I truly believe faith made the difference and the power of prayer and the people behind me just pouring over me the prayers that they were giving me.”

In all, Brown spent 18 days in two hospitals, seven of those on a ventilator. At one point, on full life support, doctors warned Brown’s wife—forced to wait at home because of shelter-in-place orders—he might not survive.

“You really don’t understand the vulnerability of the human body until you face something like this,” Brown said in a Cleveland Clinic patient profile.

“There was a time during this process where the hospital reached out to my wife and had to have the discussion about end-of-life-options. My message is for everyone to take more seriously what the impact of this can have on a person.”

Like coronavirus patients across the country, Brown fought for his life also isolated from his three children. Nurses, limited in their access to their COVID-19 patient, began penning daily goals…

JOS, Nigeria, April 14, 2020 (Morning Star News) – Muslim Fulani herdsmen in Nigeria decapitated two Christians in Benue state on Monday (April 13), and another group of herdsmen in Plateau state on Saturday (April 11) shot a Christian farmer dead, sources said.

In Benue state, residents of Ologba village, Agatu County told Morning Star News that herdsmen ambushed two members of a Catholic church in the village at about 8 a.m. on Monday.

“Oche Alaade and his friend who had visited the village were traveling out of the village on their way back to Obagaji town where they reside when they were ambushed by the Fulani herdsmen and their heads cut off,” area resident Louis Oguche told Morning Star News in a text message.

Oyaje Sule, uncle of Oche Alaade, confirmed the killings in a statement issued to local press on Monday evening.

“My nephew, Oche Alaade, and his friend had come to the village for a visit and were returning to Obagaji town today in the morning where they reside, when they were ambushed by armed Fulani herdsmen, who killed them by cutting off their heads,” Sule said. “And because of the nature of their death, the two of them have been buried without their heads.”

The murders follow a herdsmen attack on two Christians the previous week who are receiving hospital treatment for their wounds, Sule said.

Agatu, a predominantly Christian area in the north-central state…