A group of Buddhist monks walking thousands of miles across the country in a call for peace and unity arrived in Gwinnett County on Wednesday, drawing crowds of supporters along their route.

Pope Leo XIV on Thursday urged Catholics to pray for peace, “first, among nations bloodied by conflict and suffering,” and also “within our homes, in families wounded by violence or pain,” during the Angelus address on the first day of 2026.

The group of Buddhist monks traveling across the country received a powerful show of support Monday as they walked through Fayette County.

Mr. Trump met with Mr. Zelensky at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida to discuss a revised 20-point peace plan. Mr. Zelensky said that the latest proposal developed by Ukraine and the United States was nearly complete, and both leaders stressed that the lengthy peace talks would continue.

Donald Trump is in the running for this year's prize and, if chosen, will become the fifth U.S. president to claim the honor.

As we enter 2026, each of us has the power to carry on the holiday spirit of peace and charity. As President Dwight Eisenhower once remarked during a Christmas/New Year event “when the trees come down and the lights are put away — as they always are — then we have a true testing of the spirit.

Is peace worth having if it's unjust? Is justice worth pursuing if it prolongs war? Those are questions as troubling as they are old. Ceasefires built on coercion or exhaustion inevitably fail because they do not resolve the conflict's causes.

In 2025, Trump made several assertions claiming that he had helped end multiple wars across the world during his time in office. He often said he had brought peace to conflicts that others considered “unendable.