(RNS) Catholicism’s social justice teachings have often been called the church’s "best-kept secret,'' and after Thursday night’s vice-presidential debate between Joe Biden and Paul Ryan that may still be the case. A question about abortion was the only one linked directly to the candidates’ shared Catholic faith. By David Gibson.

WASHINGTON (RNS) In a rare public rebuke, Catholic bishops chided Vice President Joe Biden for his claim during the vice-presidential debate that Catholic hospitals and institutions are not being forced to provide contraception coverage to employees. By Kevin Eckstrom.

(RNS) When Joe Biden and Paul Ryan face off in the vice-presidential debate on Thursday, it will mark the first showdown of its kind between Catholics on the major party tickets. By Daniel Burke and David Gibson.

(RNS) President Obama’s support among Catholic voters has surged since June, according to a new poll, despite the Catholic bishops’ religious freedom campaign and the naming of Paul Ryan, a Catholic, as the GOP's vice-presidential nominee. By Daniel Burke. 

(RNS) God was out and now God is in. And Jerusalem wasn’t the capital of Israel and now it is. By Lauren Markoe.

(RNS) Sister Simone Campbell, who became a celebrity of sorts this summer when she led the “Nuns on the Bus” tour for social justice, challenged the GOP in a rousing speech to the Democratic convention that called the Romney-Ryan budget plan “immoral.” By David Gibson.

(RNS) Paul Ryan has been taking a lot of heat over the factual accuracy of claims he made in his prime time address at the Republican convention last week, but Wednesday night at the Democratic confab the GOP vice-presidential candidate – and practicing Catholic – was schooled by a popular nun on the moral shortcomings of his budget proposals.

(RNS) There aren't any white Protestants on the presidential ballot this year -- a first in American history. It's a situation that probably would have baffled famous evangelicals such as the late Rev. Jerry Falwell. By Bob Smietana.

(RNS) It would be an error to underestimate or write off the Protestant influence in the American political arena. But with the rapid demographic and sociological changes now underway, get ready for Hindus, Jews, Hispanics, Buddhists, Muslims, gays, women, atheists and many other groups to head up future presidential tickets. By A. James Rudin.

NEW YORK (RNS) In a move that could recast the reigning political narrative about the bishops and the election, Cardinal Timothy Dolan has accepted an invitation to deliver the closing benediction at the Democratic National Convention, a week after he gives a similar blessing to the Republicans in Tampa. By David Gibson. 

(RNS) The news that New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the nation’s most prominent Catholic prelate, will deliver the closing blessing to the Republican National Convention in Florida next week was seen as a huge coup for Mitt Romney, the presumptive nominee. But the move has promoted a sharp debate within the church over the increasingly close ties between leading bishops and the GOP. By David Gibson.

(RNS) The 2012 GOP ticket _ two Christians who are neither evangelical nor mainline Protestants _ isn't a major marker of social change, experts say, but rather a refection of today's wider, less brand-specific Christian culture. By Cathy Lynn Grossman.