Catholic bishops in Ethiopia’s have welcomed the election of the nation’s first female president, Sahle-Work Zewde, and said they were pleased that women are getting their rightful place in the country.

The Catholic Church in Ethiopia is optimistic that Zewde’s election will inspire women and girls to reach their full potential as influential actors in society, Vatican News reported.

Zewde, 68, had earlier served as Ethiopia’s representative to the United Nations, and as director-general of the U.N. offices in Nairobi met Pope Francis in 2015. “The Ethiopian Catholic Church believes that President Sahle-Work Zewde, who has years of impressive diplomatic experience, will further strengthen the leading role Ethiopia is playing in the region and further enhance the soft power of the country at an international level,” according to a statement from the Ethiopian Catholic Secretariat.

Life is for loving, not amazing possessions, Pope Francis said. In fact, the true meaning and purpose of wealth is to use it to lovingly serve others and promote human dignity, he said on Nov. 7 during his weekly general audience. The world is rich enough in resources to provide for the basic needs of everybody, the Pope said.

“And yet, many people live in scandalous poverty and resources – used without discernment – keep deteriorating. But there is just one world! There is one humanity.”

“The riches of the world today are in the hands of a minority, of the few, and poverty – indeed, extreme poverty, and suffering – are for the many,” he told those gathered in St Peter’s Square.

The Pope continued his series of talks on the Ten Commandments, focusing on the command; “You shall not steal,” which reflects respect for other people’s property.

However, he said, Christians should also read the commandment in the light of faith and the church’s social doctrine, which emphasizes the understanding that the goods of creation are destined for the whole human race.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that the “primordial” universal destination of goods does not detract from people’s right to private property, he said.

However, the need to promote the common good also requires understanding and properly using private property.

“No one is the absolute master over resources,” he said, which reflects the “positive and wider meaning of the commandment, ‘Do not steal.’

“Owners are really administrators or stewards of goods, which are not to be regarded “as exclusive to himself but common to others also, in the sense that they can benefit others as well as himself,” the Pope said, citing the catechism.

Pope Francis arrives to celebrate a Mass for late cardinals and bishops at St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican on Nov. 3.

For every Christian, but especially for those called to ministry, God’s gift of life is a call to serve others, Pope Francis said at a memorial Mass for bishops and cardinals who have died in the past year.

“The meaning of life is found in our response to God’s offer of love. And that response is made up of true love, self-giving and service,” the Pope said on Nov. 3 during Mass at the Altar of the Chair in St Peter’s Basilica.

The memorial Mass is an annual fixture on the Pope’s calendar for November, the month the church dedicates to remembering the dead.

The Vatican said that over the last 12 months some 154 bishops and nine cardinals, including U.S. Cardinal Bernard F. Law, have passed away.

“As we pray for the cardinals and bishops who have passed away in this last year,” the Pope said in his homily, “let us beg the intercession of all those who lived unassuming lives, content to prepare daily to meet the Lord.” For the gospel reading, he chose the parable of the 10 bridesmaids and their oil lamps from Matthew 25.

The Catholic archbishop of Kampala has requested the Ugandan government to deduct 10 percent from the salary of all Catholic government workers and forward the funds to the Church

The issue of tithing, namely the financial contribution of a tenth of the income of a member of the faithful, is often debated in African churches.

Archbishop Cyprien Kisito Lwanga of Kampala has now requested the Ugandan government to deduct 10 percent from the salary of all Catholic government workers and forward the funds to the Church as a means of ensuring its financial autonomy.

Pope Francis holds a Mass for the cardinals and bishops who have died over the course of the year at St Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican on Nov. 3. He says people must reject pride and rivalry.

World peace must begin in individuals’ hearts and in their families by saying “no” to pride and rivalry, Pope Francis says.

“When we read news about wars — think about the starvation of children in Yemen, which is a fruit of war — ‘it’s far away, poor babies,’ but why don’t they have anything to eat?” the Pope asked during his homily on Nov. 5 during Mass in the chapel of his residence in the Vatican City.

The Mass was celebrated just days after news media reported the death of 7-year-old Amal Hussain, a Yemeni girl whose photo by Tyler Hicks in The New York Times in mid-October brought renewed attention to the devastating impact the war in Yemen is having on innocent civilians.

“The same war that we make in our homes, in our institutions” by engaging in rivalry and gossip grows exponentially and leads to real wars that kill people, the Pope said at his morning Mass.

“So,” he said, “peace must begin there: in the family, in the parish, in institutions, at the workplace by always seeking unanimity and agreement and not one’s own interests.”

In the day’s gospel story from St Luke, Jesus tells a leading Pharisee that when he hosts a banquet he should not invite his friends and relatives, who will feel obliged to repay him, but invite the poor and needy.

“Blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you,” the Pharisee says. Jesus’ point, the Pope said, is to avoid acting only out of one’s self interest and choosing friends only based on the benefits they can bring.

Thinking only of how a relationship can be a benefit is a form of selfishness, he said, while Jesus preached the exact opposite: gratuity, which “broadens one’s horizons because it is universal.”

In fact, he said: “Jesus came to us not to collect things or form an army. No, no. He came to serve us, to give us everything freely.” In the day’s first reading, the Pope said, St Paul advised the Philippians to be “of the same mind, with the same love, united in heart,” because choosing one’s friends based on what one can gain always divides a community.

“Rivalry and vainglory,” or excessive pride, are the two things that always run counter to harmony and agreement in a family or community, the Pope said.

In families and even in parishes, he said, gossip often is born of rivalry because people think the easiest way to grow in importance in the eyes of others is to “diminish someone else through gossip.”

The Bishops Conference of France (CEF) has devoted several working sessions of its latest plenary assembly, which concludes on Nov. 8, to discussing its current system of organization with a view of simplifying its national level operations and strengthening those at the provincial level.

How is it possible in a single program to evaluate meetings organized by the bishops’ conference in Paris, consultations at the “provincial level” and the ongoing work in each diocese?

These are the growing tensions that the French bishops are currently facing. As a result, the bishops have now established a small working group tasked with proposing a new schema of organization for the work of the conference.

“The objective is to restore provincial level structures, which were neglected by the previous reform, and which the bishops now feel are relevant to enable consultations to take place in a simpler manner,” said one assembly participant.

“It is clear that the work of the various episcopal commissions and councils is functioning badly and is actually just eating up time,” he said.

On the other hand, bishops generally agree that the smaller dioceses – and even certain provinces – cannot do without “national” support.