On the first pastoral visit of his papacy, Pope Francis shunned protocol and politics on a visit to the tiny island of Lampedusa off the coast of Sicily to pray for refugees and migrants lost at sea.

Pope Francis said on Friday that migrants who risk drowning at sea "must be rescued" because doing so was "a duty of humanity" and that those who impede rescues commit "a gesture of hate".

Pope Francis on Sunday urged politicians to address the "open wound" of migrant deaths in the Mediterranean, saying he had been praying for the 41 people who died in a shipwreck earlier this month.

Pope Francis urged Catholic priests on Sunday to guard against spiritual groups that stoke political divisions, speaking during a one-day visit to Corsica, the first by a pontiff to the French ...

Pope Francis blasted the "fanaticism of indifference" that greets migrants seeking a better life as he arrived Friday in the Mediterranean port of Marseille.

Left: Pope Francis sits in the popemobile near the statue of Ajaccio's Patron Saint, Madunnuccia, during his apostolic journey in Ajaccio, on the French Mediterranean island of Corsica, France ...

Pope Francis boards an airplane at Rome's Fiumicino airport as he leaves for his one-day visit to Ajaccio on the French island of Corsica, on Dec.15.

Pope Francis said in a speech, “There are those who work systematically and with every means possible to repel migrants. And this, when done with awareness and responsibility, is a grave sin.” ...

During a press conference on the papal plane from Lisbon, Portugal, Pope Francis reiterated his message that the church is open to everyone including LGBTQ people and all marginalized groups.

The pope has been deeply critical of the collective European response to the ongoing migration crisis on the Mediterranean, which he grimly predicted in 2014 would become “a vast cemetery ...