Nicole Winfield

A screenshot taken on Thursday Feb.7, 2019 from an online fashion outlet shows a Gucci turtleneck black wool balaclava sweater for sale. The sweater was pulled from Gucci's online and physical stores for its resemblance to racist blackface caricatures. (AP Photo)

February 7, 2019, 8:01 pm

Gucci pulls ‘blackface sweater’ from stores after complaints

Criticism of wool sweater with oversized collar comes after series of other blunders by European fashion houses

By Nicole Winfield and Colleen Barry

Pope Francis blesses a boy during a Mass at the Sheikh Zayed Sports City in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, Tuesday, February 5, 2019. (AP Photo/Kamran Jebreili)

February 5, 2019, 12:24 pm

Pope Francis celebrates historic Mass in Arabian Peninsula

Largest-ever gathering of Catholics in region where public displays of non-Islamic faith are restricted signals new effort to inculcate tolerance in UAE

By Nicole Winfield and Aya Batrawy

Pope Francis is welcomed by Abu Dhabi's Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, upon his arrival at the Abu Dhabi airport, United Arab Emirates, on February 3, 2019. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, Pool)

February 3, 2019, 11:16 pm

Pope Francis arrives in UAE for historic trip to Gulf

Pontiff makes first-ever trip to Arabian peninsula, calling for Yemen relief and seeking to improve Christian-Muslim ties in Abu Dhabi

By Nicole Winfield

Pope Francis, left, celebrates a holy mass as part of the 23rd World Day for Consecrated Life on February 2, 2019, at St. Peter's basilica in the Vatican. (Tiziana Fabi/AFP)

February 3, 2019, 2:20 pm

Pope calls for Yemen relief as he heads to Emirates

On his way to an interfaith conference, Francis backs ceasefire, urges aid for Yemen’s people suffering the world’s worst humanitarian crisis

By Nicole Winfield

Pope Francis holds a candle as he arrives to celebrate Mass with members of religious institutions on the occasion of the celebration of the XXIII world day of consecrated life in St. Peter's Basilica, at the Vatican, February 2, 2019. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

February 3, 2019, 10:20 am

Pope seeks dialogue on first papal trip to Arabian Peninsula

Francis to join interreligious conference initiated by grand imam of Egypt’s Al-Azhar, and speak to 130,000 Catholic foreign workers in UAE

By Nicole Winfield

Nuns are silhouetted in St. Peter's Square at the Vatican, April 1, 2018. (Andrew Medichini/AP)

December 9, 2018, 7:03 pm

Battle of wills: A tiny order of French nuns takes on the Vatican

Little Sisters of Marie, Mother of the Redeemer, threaten to renounce vows if superior is removed by Rome, where officials say she is too authoritarian

By Nicole Winfield

In this Wednesday, Oct. 20, 2010 file photo, Archbishop Donald Wuerl prays as he celebrates Mass at the Cathedral of Saint Matthew the Apostle in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

October 12, 2018, 11:40 pm

Pope accepts resignation of Washington DC cardinal amid sex-abuse scandal

Cardinal Donald Wuerl is accused of helping to protect some child-molesting priests while he was bishop of Pittsburgh; critics say move not enough

By CLAUDIA LAUER, Nicole Winfield and David Crary

Pope Francis kisses a child as he arrives with the popemobile in St.Peter's Square to held his weekly general audience at the Vatican, Wednesday, Oct. 10, 2018. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

October 11, 2018, 4:08 am

Pope compares abortion to hiring a hit man

Francis makes comments during a weekly audience dedicated to the commandment exhorting the faithful not to kill

By Nicole Winfield

Pope Francis delivers his message as he celebrates Mass at the Santakos Park, in Kaunas, Lithuania, Sunday, Sept. 23, 2018. Francis paid tribute Sunday to Lithuanians who suffered and died during Soviet and Nazi occupations on the day the country remembers the near-extermination of its centuries-old Jewish community during the Holocaust. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)

September 23, 2018, 4:43 pm

Honoring Holocaust victims, Pope warns Lithuanians against anti-Semitism

Marking destruction of Vilna Ghetto, Pontiff cautions 100,000 gathered for mass against the reappearance of “pernicious attitudes” leading to genocide

By Nicole Winfield

Pope Francis speaks during his weekly general audience at Aula Paolo VI (Paul VI Audience Hall) at the Vatican on August 1, 2018. (AFP PHOTO / Andreas SOLARO)

August 2, 2018, 7:07 pm

Pope changes death penalty teaching, says it is now ‘inadmissible’

Head of Catholic Church praised by Amnesty International for supporting the anti-death penalty movement

By Nicole Winfield

Pope Francis arrives to host a daylong prayer for peace in the Middle East with an unprecedented gathering of Orthodox patriarchs and Catholic leaders in Bari, southern Italy, Saturday, July 7, 2018 (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

July 7, 2018, 2:06 pm

Pope denounces ‘complicit silence’ on Mideast attacks against Christians

Francis and Orthodox patriarchs pray for peace in region ‘covered by dark clouds of war, violence and destruction’

By Trisha Thomas and Nicole Winfield

A tourist visits the tomb of World War II-era head of Poland's Catholic Church, Cardinal August Hlond, in St. John's Arch-Cathedral in Warsaw, Poland, June 16, 2018. (Alik Keplicz/AP)

July 4, 2018, 5:54 pm

Accusations of anti-Semitism mount against Polish priest set for sainthood

In 1936 pastoral letter, Cardinal August Hlond called Jewish people ‘the vanguard of godlessness, Bolshevism and subversion,’ but also prohibited attacks on Jews

By MONIKA SCISLOWSKA and Nicole Winfield

Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini, center, attends a local election rally in Cinisello Balsamo, near Milan, Italy, June 17, 2018 (Matteo Bazzi/ANSA via AP)

June 19, 2018, 3:52 am

Italy’s hard-line interior minister takes aim at Roma people

Matteo Salvini calls for registry of community members, drawing immediate condemnation and warnings that Italy has a ‘terrible’ history with its Fascist-era census of Jews

By Nicole Winfield

This picture kept in the Archivio Storico San Pietro in Vincoli in Rome and taken on Tuesday, April 17, 2018 shows an undated photo of Father Pio Maria Mortara, third from left, with some of his brothers. It’s an incident that has stained the Vatican for 160 years: a 6-year-old Jewish boy taken from his family by papal police and brought to Rome to be raised Catholic after church authorities learned his housekeeper had secretly had him baptized. Now the case has reared its head again, with new evidence that memoirs the boy wrote as an adult were altered to take the edge off his anti-Semitic views and enhance details favorable to the Catholic Church. (AP Photo)

April 20, 2018, 7:31 pm

Memoir of secretly baptized Jewish boy kidnapped by Vatican under fresh scrutiny

New evidence in 160-year-old affair shows that Edgardo Mortara’s memoir was altered to take the edge off his anti-Semitic views and enhance details favorable to the Catholic Church

By Nicole Winfield

FAO, United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, Director General Graziano Da Silva, left, shakes hands with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres as he arrives to attend a United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, UNRWA, conference, in Rome, March 15, 2018. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)

March 15, 2018, 4:57 pm

UN gets $100m in new funds for Palestinian aid after US cuts

UNRWA still faces $350 million shortfall to provide services for estimated 5 million refugees and their descendants

By Nicole Winfield and TOI staff