By Christopher Lamb, CNN

(CNN) — On Saturday May 3, 2025, one week after the funeral of Pope Francis, President Donald Trump posted an AI-generated image of himself dressed in the white cassock and miter of a pope. The image appeared on his Truth Social platform and was re-shared by the White House’s official X account. Within seconds it had gone viral. A few days earlier, when asked by reporters who he would like to see elected as Francis’s successor, the president had quipped, “I’d like to be pope. That would be my number one choice.”

The reaction from Catholics around the world varied from disquiet to outrage. The AI image, as is so often the case with Trump’s posts, was both tongue-in-cheek and provocative. For Catholics, it was, at the very least, disre-spectful. Nor did the image go unnoticed by the cardinals who had started gathering in Rome ahead of the conclave set for May 7 – the election process that would decide the new pontiff. Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David – an outspoken Filipino prelate who had received death threats when he had criticized President Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal drug war – replied to Trump on Facebook saying, “Not funny, sir,” which he translated into ten different languages. Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York, who was known to be friendly with Trump, said the image “wasn’t good,” but when asked by Reuters if an apology was needed, replied, “Who knows?”

Trump’s post only seemed to intensify the media interest in the papal election proceedings. More than 4,000 reporters were descending on the Vatican to cover the event and the cardinals found themselves mobbed as they walked to meetings. The public’s interest, too, was unusually high because of the popularity of the 2024 movie “Conclave,” a thriller that depicted the worldly ambitions of men in vying to become pope.

During his pontificate, Francis had shaken up the College of Cardinals – the body that would appoint his successor. He had made its membership more international and diverse to reflect the fact that the Church was changing. For years its axis had been shifting away from Europe and the West to encompass the growing numbers of Catholics in Africa and Asia… The conventional wisdom had always been that the cardinals would not choose an American pope. Given the enormous power of the United States politically, culturally, and economically, the cardinals were unlikely to elect a pope from that country. But something had changed since the election and re-election of Trump on an America First agenda. There was a distinct sense that the role of the US in the world was shifting.

A few days before the conclave started, I interviewed Cardinal Oswald Gracias, the retired archbishop of Bombay and a hugely respected figure across the Church in Asia. Could there be an American pope, I asked? In the past, he said, this was “unthinkable.” But then he paused and said, “There could be an American pope… why not?”

There was in fact an American name on my shortlist of “papabili,” someone who could become pope: Cardinal Robert Prevost. I knew him as the leader of the Vatican’s powerful office for the department for bishops, which played a crucial role in appointing bishops and in holding them to account. And I had recently been hearing his name mentioned…

I had met Prevost on one occasion in Rome. He had struck me as thoughtful and a good listener. A low-key figure who didn’t give interviews, someone who seemed at peace with himself. And, intriguingly, although he had been born in Chicago, he had spent decades of his life working as a missionary and bishop in Peru. He was, you could say, “an un-American American.”

As the cardinals prepared to enter the conclave in early May, the fierce criticisms some of them had had of Francis melted away. The focus now was on how the next pope could continue his predecessor’s reforms and, crucially, exhibit a prophetic spirit which

By Julia Buckley, CNN

(CNN) — Since Italy became a country in 1861, there has been a surefire way to know who is and isn’t an Italian citizen: look at their parents.

The first page of the civil code, published in 1865 as the rulebook to Europe’s newest country, declared that a child born to an Italian citizen was an Italian citizen.

This founding tenet of the Bel Paese now looks set to change — ending diaspora dreams of returning to the mother country, and meaning that Italians who move abroad risk denying citizenship to their descendants.

On Thursday the Constitutional Court said it would rule in favor of the government and its controversial 2025 law that restricted citizenship for those born abroad. The law — issued last March via emergency decree — had been challenged by four judges, who questioned its constitutionality.

Now, after the first of four hearings was held on Wednesday, a statement issued by the court indicates it will support the government’s position.

“The Constitutional Court has declared the questions of constitutional legitimacy raised by the Turin court partially unfounded and partially inadmissible,” the court announced. It is expected to release a detailed verdict within the coming weeks.

The announcement will be a devastating blow for those who believed the court would uphold Italy’s 160-year history of citizenship by descent, or ius sanguinis.

“It was an extremely clear, harsh intervention, so I had a hope that it would be judged in breach of some constitutional points, but that wasn’t recognized by the court,” professor Corrado Caruso, one of the lawyers who made a case against the new law, told CNN.

Italy’s citizenship rules have been bound up with its diaspora since the country was formed.

Previously, Italians who moved abroad could pass citizenship to their children as long as they didn’t renounce or lose it, often by acquiring another nationality. What many now see as the country of the “dolce vita” was once an impoverished nation that, between 1861 and 1918, saw 16 million citizens emigrate for a better life.

Many who left out of necessity rather than volition considered themselves Italian for life, and chose to retain their citizenship while living and working abroad — meaning that citizenship, along with cultural traditions, was passed down the generations.

Established in 1865, the principle of ius sanguinis was confirmed in Italy’s first targeted citizenship law in 1912, which added a clause stipulating that Italians born and residing abroad would retain their citizenship, and then again in a law in 1992.

However, a law introduced on March 28 last year by emergency decree states that only those with a parent or grandparent born in Italy will be recognized as citizens. It also effectively outlaws dual citizenship for the diaspora, as that parent or grandparent must have held solely Italian citizenship at the time of their descendant’s birth, or at their own death if it came earlier.

‘It was politically huge’

There have long been complaints on both sides about foreign-born descendants acquiring citizenship.

For those born abroad, obtaining recognition is a long and costly process. They must source birth, marriage and death certificates from their ancestors’ hometowns (which can take years, at a cost of up to 300 euros per document), prove that nobody in their ancestral line lost their citizenship, then win an appointment at their local consulate, where waiting lists can stretch to 10 years — if they are able to get a spot on it.

Hiring a lawyer to sue the government can speed up the process, but costs can run to the tens of thousands of euros for a family.

What’s more, women were not able to transmit cit

The post Helicopter Crash at Santa Ynez Airport Leaves One with Minor Injuries appeared first on edhat.

SANTA MARIA, Calif. (KEYT) – Santa Maria Police are investigating a fatal car crash involving a pedestrian at the Fesler and Broadway intersection.

Preliminary investigation indicates that a 30-year-old woman pushing her 1-year-old child in a stroller tried crossing Broadway on the west side of the intersection, according to the SMPD.

An 18-year-old Santa Maria driver then stopped in the eastbound number two lane, attempting a right turn before hitting both the mother and child, according to the SMPD.

The child died from major injuries at Marian Regional Medical Center, and the mother's full extent of condition is unknown after her own major injuries in the crash, according to the SMPD.

The driver cooperated in the investigation and drugs and alcohol do not appear to be contributing factors in the crash at this time, according to the SMPD.

The investigation remains ongoing and Your News Channel will have more information on the crash as it becomes available.

The post Santa Maria Police investigate fatal crash against pedestrian appeared first on News Channel 3-12.

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