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With testimony from 90 witnesses and dozens of documents, letters, and transcripts from Vatican and U.S. Catholic church archives, the 460-page document offers a remarkable reckoning by an institution known for its secrecy, portraying a man long able to convince superiors of his innocence.

On Aug. 19, as she accepted the Democratic nomination for vice president of the United States, Harris quoted 2 Corinthians 5:7 expressing her commitment “[t]o the Word that teaches me to walk by faith, and not by sight. And to a vision passed on through generations of Americans ... of our nation as a Beloved Community — where all are welcome, no matter what we look like, where we come from, or who we love.”

Preliminary exit polling indicates that religious voters maintained many of the political allegiances they have kept for the past several decades — with one possible exception: white Catholics. About two-thirds, or 68 percent, of voters who identify as Christian cast their ballots for President Donald Trump while 31 percent voted for Joe Biden, according to the latest numbers from Edison Research, which conducts a national exit poll for the news media.

After President Donald Trump falsely claimed victory in the presidential election at 3 a.m. on Wednesday, he continued to share unsubstantiated claims about dumped ballots, mysteriously found votes, and an effort to rig ballot counts.

Hundreds of faith leaders and organizations have released statements in the last week demanding that every vote be counted and expressing their peaceful commitment to the democratic process.

The Electoral College has racist origins. Southern states were granted votes for three-fifths of their slave populations, even though those enslaved people were themselves unable to vote. This effectively gave white southerners an outsized influence on the electoral process until the end of the Jim Crow era. Today, the system favors voters in a small group of battleground states at the expense of most Americans and over-represents white voters while ignoring many voters of color. A growing chorus of legal and policy experts, along with the majority of Americans, believe it should change. However, the Electoral College’s racist legacy has also impacted efforts to change it.

According to a recent survey, nearly 70 percent of people in the U.S. are worried voters will be harassed or intimidated on Election Day; the same survey found that more than three-quarters of Americans worry there will not be a peaceful transition of power after the election. But community leaders and clergy are determined to avoid a violent outcome.

Some religious leaders believe the national protests are capable of helping to strengthen Nigeria’s democratic institutions. “If the international community is seeing this, they would see it as a people who are trying to rediscover themselves,” he said. “Our democracy is not perfect; it’s still developing. And this will help hasten the elements that would in the long run improve our democratic credentials.”