NATION/WORLD

The Vatican's chief prosecutor said Pope Francis has given him free rein to investigate the 1983 disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi, a 15-year-old Vatican resident.

Sharing the Gospel requires literally "going out," witnessing to the joy of faith in person and not just sitting at home, being "keyboard warriors" who argue with others online, Pope Francis said.

The women disciples, who were the first to meet the risen Jesus, offer a lesson to all Christians: "We encounter Jesus by giving witness to him," Pope Francis said.

On a bright spring morning, Pope Francis prayed that Christians would experience the joy of Easter and allow Christ's resurrection to be "the light that illumines the darkness and the gloom in which, all too often, our world finds itself enveloped."

Easter is the time "to roll away the stone of the tombs in which we often imprison our hope and to look with confidence to the future, for Christ is risen and has changed the direction of history," Pope Francis said as he celebrated the Easter Vigil Mass.

Instead of presiding over the nighttime Way of the Cross seated atop a hillside overlooking Rome's Colosseum, Pope Francis followed the service from his Vatican residence, spiritually united in prayer with the 20,000 people gathered outside the ancient amphitheater April 7.

Jesus never abandons anyone; he has come to save, serve and accompany everyone, Pope Francis told young inmates.

Priests "anointed" by the Holy Spirit should be authentic agents of harmony rather than "instruments of division," Pope Francis said.

Wanting to meet potential partners through dating apps like Tinder is "normal," and the church's teaching on sex is "still in diapers," Pope Francis said in a conversation with a group of young people gathered in Rome.

During Lent this year, residents of the Domus Sanctae Marthae, where Pope Francis lives, decided to clean out their closets and give away things other people could use. "You can't imagine how much stuff there was," the pope said.