(VATICAN CITY) — On the heels of a bold call by Amazon region bishops for married men to become priests, Pope Francis is urging openness to new ways, and in a possible slap at conservative critics who fear he is weakening the Catholic church’s foundations, he cautions faithful against entering the “swampy waters of ideologies.”

At Mass Sunday in St. Peter’s Basilica to conclude a weeks-long Vatican meeting on the special needs of Catholics in that South American region, Francis thanked the bishops for their candor.

In follow-up remarks to faithful in St. Peter’s Square, he didn’t cite the vote a day earlier by a majority of the synod’s bishops to ordain married men in special circumstances in the region, where some faithful who want to attend Mass and receive the Eucharist don’t see priests for months, even years.

But Francis said he and other participants at the gathering, known as a synod, felt encouraged to “leave comfortable shores” in seeking new ways to carry out the church’s ..

ISIS Leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed by U.S. special forces in a “daring nighttime raid” in northwest Syria, President Donald Trump announced Sunday morning.

“He died after running into a dead-end tunnel, whimpering and crying and screaming all the way,” Trump said. He added that al-Baghdadi had “dragged” three young children with him as he reached the end of a tunnel in the compound he was in. They died, along with al-Baghdadi, when the terrorist leader detonated a suicide vest, Trump said. Two wives of al-Baghdadi also died, he noted. He said they were both wearing suicide vests that had not detonated.

Al-Baghdadi’s body was mutilated by the blast but an on-site DNA test confirmed his identity, Trump said.

The President said no American personnel were lost or injured in the operation with the exception of one dog. Eleven young children had been moved out of the compound and were uninjured.

The operation began two weeks ago and, once complete, the special forces landed safe..

(LONDON) — Two British opposition parties on Sunday proposed an even earlier election date than Prime Minister Boris Johnson has offered, trying to force his government to delay a final decision on its European Union divorce deal.

The chess move by the Liberal Democrats and Scottish National Party reflects the volatile political landscape now in Britain.

The ruling Conservatives desperately want a new election to bolster their numbers in Parliament, but they face resistance from the main opposition Labour Party, which fears the country will be unwittingly tricked into crashing out of the European Union without a deal.

The latest election proposal is an effort to force Johnson to delay debate in Parliament on his Brexit withdrawal bill until after any election, depriving him of a possible victory on his trademark issue going into the campaign. It makes Johnson’s government choose between holding an election to improve its position in Parliament and its goal of securing Brexit before ..

As the Trump administration pulls American troops away from Syria’s northern border, the President has repeatedly insisted that the region’s oil has been “secured,” even going so far as to suggest the United States is now responsible for the fate of the oil.

“We’ve secured the oil and, therefore, a small number of U.S. troops will remain in the area where they have the oil,” Trump said during an Oct. 23 press conference. “And we’re going to be protecting it, and we’ll be deciding what we’re going to do with it in the future.”

Indeed, further complicating an already confusing shift in Washington’s Syria strategy, U.S. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper said Thursday that an unspecified number of American troops and materiel are being sent to defend oil fields in eastern Syria held by Kurdish forces. They were key U.S. allies in the fight against ISIS, but the American withdrawal opened the door for Turkey, which views the main Kurdish militia in Syria as a threat, to launch an offensive ..