By Steven Ertelt, LifeNews – Vice President J.D. Vance will headline the March for Life next Friday in Washington, D.C., continuing his support for the pro-life cause in his second consecutive year addressing the annual event… The March for Life, one of the largest human rights demonstrations in the world, is scheduled for Friday, January 23… Held each year near the anniversary of the infamous Roe v. Wade decision, the event defends unborn children from abortion.

By M.D. Kittle, The Federalist – On Thursday, the roundup included perps convicted of sexual abuse of children, sexual exploitation of a minor, and aggravated assault, according to the latest Department of Homeland Security report exclusively provided to The Federalist… “Yesterday, our law enforcement arrested monsters who sexually abused and raped children. These are the type of sickos we are getting OUT of our neighborhoods,” said DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin in a statement to The Federalist.

By Tessa Gervasini, EWTN News – The annual Religious Freedom Index (RFI) by the Becket Fund found increases in support for religious liberty, including instances of school choice and protections of Catholic priests in confession… An online poll surveyed 1,002 U.S. adults. The survey screened a sample that is representative by gender, age, ethnicity, race, and region matching U.S. Census figures, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1%, researchers said… In 2024, about 54% of Catholics reported they felt accepted as people of faith, specifically 19% said they feel “completely” accepted …

By Nancy Flanders, Live Action News – Key Takeaways: The Senate HELP Committee met on Wednesday to discuss the regulation of mifepristone, the first drug of the abortion pill regimen… Sen. Bill Cassidy, committee chair, opened the hearing with statistics on injuries caused by mifepristone as well as stories of the traumatic experiences of women who took the drug… Pro-abortion witness, Dr. Nisha Verma, claimed that injuries are the result of pro-life laws, not the drug… The hearing ended similarly to how it began. Pro-lifers continue to push for stricter regulations on telehealth and online abortion pill access. …

By Brandy Perez, The Daily Signal – As of January 2025, approximately 1.4 million foreign nationals in the United States were shielded from removal under the program… The Trump administration decided to terminate TPS for several countries, with Somalia as the most recent. That choice is the right step in a long-overdue course correction for an immigration program that previous administrations exploited far past its statutory purpose.

Patriot Post – “It behooves you, therefore, to think and act for yourself and your people. The great principles of right and wrong are legible to every reader; to pursue them requires not the aid of many counselors. The whole art of government consists in the art of being honest. Only aim to do your duty, and mankind will give you credit where you fail.” —Thomas Jefferson (1775)

Author Don Schwager, Servants of the Word – Mark 2:13-17 – 13 He went out again beside the sea; and all the crowd gathered about him, and he taught them. 14 And as he passed on, he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax office, and he said to him, “Follow me.” And he rose and followed him. 15 And as he sat at table in his house, many tax collectors and sinners were sitting with Jesus and his disciples; for there were many who followed him. …

By Franciscan Medi, January 17 – The life of Saint Anthony of Egypt will remind many people of Saint Francis of Assisi. At 20, Anthony was so moved by the Gospel message, “Go, sell what you have, and give to [the] poor” (Mark 10:21b), that he actually did just that with his large inheritance. He is different from Francis in that most of Anthony’s life was spent in solitude.

By Craig Bannister, MRC NewsBusters – Democrat Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey … In addition to being outnumbered five-to-one, Minneapolis police officers are unable to fight federal law enforcement on the street because they have to fight crime in the city, Frey said: “The 600 police officers that we have are charged on any given day with investigating crime, stopping homicides from taking place, preventing carjackings – that is the work of a police officer in the city.”… “Meanwhile, we have ICE agents throughout our city and throughout our state who, along with Border Control, are creating chaos,” Mayor Frey said, vilifying federal agents enforcing federal immigration law.

By Richard Clements, Catholic World Report – What is man?… Carl Trueman argues that this is the most pressing question we face today. Paul Kingsnorth seems to agree; in his recently published book, Against the Machine, Kingsnorth asserts that “We have forgotten who we are, or we don’t like who we are, or somehow both.”… Yes, somehow both. And some of us don’t like who we are because we have forgotten who we are.

By Fr. Ignatius John Schweitzer, OP, Catholic Exchange – The Gospel this Sunday recalls Jesus’ Baptism but also His manifestation as the Lamb of God… As the Gospel of John makes clear, John the Baptist’s whole existence is that of being a witness to Jesus (1:7-8). He is a finger pointing to Him. John decreases so Jesus and His glory may increase (Jn. 3:30). John’s witness unfolds in a further epiphany of Jesus to the world in our Gospel this Sunday, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (1:29) …

By Thomas Gallatin, Patriot Post – Is it better for a candidate to challenge election laws before or after the election takes place? That was, in essence, the question in the case of Bost v. Illinois Board of Elections, on which the U.S. Supreme Court has handed down a decision… The case was brought by Republican Representative Michael Bost, who filed a lawsuit challenging Illinois’s mail-in ballot law. However, the justices weren’t really ruling on the merits of Bost’s case, but rather on whether a candidate has standing to challenge an election law prior to an election.

By Jonah McKeown, National Catholic Register – On the question of political affiliation — Republican or Democrat, liberal or conservative — how do American Catholics compare with other religious denominations? And what could it mean for the country as a whole when people start choosing churches based on politics instead of faith?… Ryan Burge, a widely-cited researcher of religion and religious trends and a former Protestant pastor in the American Baptist Church, explores these questions and more in his new book, “The Vanishing Church: How the Hollowing Out of Moderate Congregations Is Hurting Democracy, Faith, and Us”. 

By Newsmax Wires, Newsmax – President Donald Trump on Thursday urged Congress to pass what the White House is calling the “Great Healthcare Plan,” a sweeping proposal aimed at lowering healthcare costs, reducing prescription drug prices, and cutting insurance premiums… “This proposal locks in the massive discount on prescription drugs that my administration is achieving through our most-favored-nations drug pricing agreement,” Trump said in the release. “It’ll bring down drug prices 80, 90% in some cases.”

By Elise Winland, Catholic Vote – Why did HHS release the funds?… Explaining the administration’s decision, CatholicVote Director of Government Affairs Tom McClusky said federal officials were forced to choose between restoring the money or risking a court loss that could undermine broader efforts to defund Planned Parenthood… “The administration had two choices before them,” McClusky told CatholicVote: “Give up the money and be able to stop any future grants, or fight it out in the courts, where they would lose and also tie up other efforts to defund the abortion giant as a lawsuit went forward.”