Patriarch Bartholomew meets with Trump during U.S. visit, talks Middle East, Ukraine
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Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I. / Credit: President.gov.ua/Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)CNA Staff, Sep 16, 2025 / 12:24 pm (CNA).Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople met with President Donald Trump this week during a visit to the United States, with the leaders discussing world affairs including ongoing strife in the Middle East and Ukraine.A press release on the patriarch's website said Bartholomew, considered the first among equals in the Orthodox Church, met with Trump in a "very cordial atmosphere" and congratulated the U.S. leader "on his initiatives and overall efforts to promote peace in the world, and particularly in Ukraine."The leaders "also discussed the situation of Christians in the Middle East."Also present at the meeting were numerous other Orthodox leaders as well as U.S. Vice President JD Vance. Bartholomew's office said the patriarch also "offered his condolences to [Trump] for the murder of his friend and colleague Charlie Kirk."Kirk, a promine...
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I. / Credit: President.gov.ua/Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
CNA Staff, Sep 16, 2025 / 12:24 pm (CNA).
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople met with President Donald Trump this week during a visit to the United States, with the leaders discussing world affairs including ongoing strife in the Middle East and Ukraine.
A press release on the patriarch's website said Bartholomew, considered the first among equals in the Orthodox Church, met with Trump in a "very cordial atmosphere" and congratulated the U.S. leader "on his initiatives and overall efforts to promote peace in the world, and particularly in Ukraine."
The leaders "also discussed the situation of Christians in the Middle East."
Also present at the meeting were numerous other Orthodox leaders as well as U.S. Vice President JD Vance. Bartholomew's office said the patriarch also "offered his condolences to [Trump] for the murder of his friend and colleague Charlie Kirk."
Kirk, a prominent conservative activist, was shot and killed by an assassin on Sept. 10. Trump has publicly mourned Kirk's death.
In his first visit to the U.S. in about four years, the patriarch will stay for nearly two weeks.
Bartholomew's tenure, which began in 1991, has been marked by overtures of reconciliation between the Eastern church and Rome on several centuries-old disputes.
In March of this year the patriarch offered a hopeful historical assessment of the traditional 1054 date for the "Great Schism" between Rome and Constantinople, suggesting that those tensions developed gradually over time and "are not insurmountable."
During a meeting with Orthodox leaders in June, Pope Leo XIV stated his intention to "persevere in the effort to reestablish full visible communion between [the] churches."
The Holy Father said that goal can only be achieved "with God's help, through a continued commitment to respectful listening and fraternal dialogue."
Amid numerous visits scheduled for his trip in the U.S. this month, Bartholomew is scheduled to receive the Templeton Prize on Sept. 24.
The John Templeton Foundation said in April that the patriarch was being awarded the prestigious recognition "for his pioneering efforts to bridge scientific and spiritual understandings of humanity's relationship with the natural world, bringing together people of different faiths to heed a call for stewardship of creation."
Bartholomew has been hailed as the "Green Patriarch" for his promotion of environmental values and causes. The leader has called for the faithful to "protect life on earth from the worst consequences of human recklessness."
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Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts. / Credit: Jack Haskins/EWTN NewsWashington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 16, 2025 / 08:20 am (CNA).Exactly one week before the assassination of Turning Point USA Founder Charlie Kirk, CNA interviewed Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts for its new "CNA Newsmaker Interview" series, which will feature periodic in-depth interviews with Catholic leaders in diverse fields.In the wake of the attack, Roberts wrote in a social media post that "we must never, never, never, never, never, never stop fighting to build the America that [Charlie Kirk] helped make possible."Kirk, he said, "restored optimism about the American future for millions of Americans."This same optimism for the future of America, alongside an equally shared passion with Kirk for the restoration of family life across the country, is central to Roberts' work at Heritage. America, according to Roberts, has "arrived at that moment" where it has reached "an understanding in t...
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A group of students at Chesterton Academy of the Holy Family in Lisle, Illinois, in 2024. The Chesterton School Network is a network of "joyfully Catholic classical high schools where students grow in faith, virtue, and friendship." / Credit: Photo courtesy of Chesterton Academy of the Holy Family, Lisle, IllinoisCNA Staff, Sep 16, 2025 / 09:20 am (CNA).In a suburb of Minneapolis in 2008, a small school named after the Catholic author G.K. Chesterton opened its doors.Seventeen years later, the school has grown into the wide-reaching Chesterton Schools Network, with schools sprinkled across the United States. And this school year, the network is going international.The president of the Chesterton Schools Network said there is no other word for it but "miraculous.""The growth has been simply astounding," said Dale Ahlquist, who is also president of the Society of Gilbert Keith Chesterton, which operates the network.But why are the schools a hit? Ahlquist credits the Holy Spirit.S...
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Vice President JD Vance hosts a podcast episode of "The Charlie Kirk Show" on Sept. 15, 2025, in Washington, D.C., following the assassination of the show's namesake on Sept. 10. / Credit: Doug Mills-Pool/Getty ImagesNational Catholic Register, Sep 16, 2025 / 10:21 am (CNA).While serving as the guest host of Charlie Kirk's podcast Monday, Vice President JD Vance vowed that the Trump administration will seek to "dismantle" left-wing organizations that he said promoted the violence that led to the conservative activist's assassination last week."Charlie was gunned down in broad daylight, and well-funded institutions of the Left lied about what he said so as to justify his murder. This is soulless and evil," Vance said.The two-hour broadcast of "The Charlie Kirk Show," produced by the organization Kirk founded, Turning Point USA, was livestreamed from Vance's ceremonial office in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. It featured appearances from White House aides and administr...
