Pope Francis visits Venice in first trip outside of Rome in seven months
CBSN
Pope Francis made his first trip out of Rome in seven months on Sunday with a visit to Venice that included an art exhibition, a stop at a prison and a Mass.
Venice has always been a place of contrasts, of breathtaking beauty and devastating fragility, where history, religion, art and nature have collided over the centuries to produce an otherworldly gem of a city. But even for a place that prides itself on its culture of unusual encounters, Francis' visit on Sunday stood out.
Francis traveled to the lagoon city to visit the Holy See's pavilion at the Biennale contemporary art show and meet with the people who created it. But because the Vatican decided to mount its exhibit in Venice's women's prison, and invited inmates to collaborate with the artists, the whole project assumed a far more complex meaning, touching on Francis' belief in the power of art to uplift and unite, and of the need to give hope and solidarity to society's most marginalized.
If you catch yourself laughing at something Bill Maher has said lately on HBO's "Real Time," his Friday night perch for the past 21 years, just be careful: next time, the joke could be on you. No one is spared Maher's humor, or as he sees it, truth-telling – not the right ("If you're gonna turn over your party to a foreign power, at least pick the right one. Russia? Are you kidding? It's like the Republicans looked over all the companies they could merge with and picked Sears!"), nor the left ("You call yourself the resistance? Then fight behind enemy lines. That's what a 'resistance' does. That's the difference between blowing up a tank and tweeting about it. Get out of your echo chamber and infiltrate theirs!").
This story originally aired on May 20, 2023. "The only thing I can say is an apology to the victim. My actions have altered her life cruelly. She should never have had to take on the pain and suffering I inflicted. She did not deserve what happened to her, and it was entirely my fault. All I can do is wake up each day guided by my unforgiveable actions, and act with the dignity my 16 year old self did not possess. I am sorry for everything."