Catholic Church

New Hampshire's landscape includes many old houses of worship, and while some are being restored, while others are being adapted for new use, as homes, businesses, or meeting spaces.  We examine the importance of these structures to communities, and the debate around what their future should be. 

For nearly two decades, the Furniture Masters of New Hampshire have been leading a program at the state men's prison in Concord. They teach a woodworking skill to inmates in the hobby shop, and return a month later to check on the progress.

For some inmates, these workshops have opened the door to mastering the craft of furniture making; and to a changed perspective on the world.

On this week's episode, we hear from these inmates, and from a UNH professor and woodworker wants to bring the same skills to incarcerated women.

The attorney general’s office made waves Thursday night in announcing its plans to launch a criminal investigation into St. Paul’s School over its handling of sexual assaults on school grounds.

While the investigation is still just in its beginning stages, some are already starting to draw parallels to a time when the state took on another powerful institution over its handling of sexual abuse: the Catholic Church.

Pope Francis has dismissed a New Hampshire priest from the clergy.

Monsignor Edward Arsenault was the public face of the Diocese of Manchester during the Catholic sex abuse scandal in the mid-2000s.

Arsenault later pleaded guilty to stealing $300,000 from a hospital, a bishop and the estate of a deceased priest.

Father George DeLaire, vicar for canonical affairs for the diocese, says Arsenault has been unable to repay the money he embezzled.