Catholic News

The bishop of the Diocese of Savannah, Georgia, the host diocese for the beatification of the Georgia Martyrs, encouraged Catholics to take inspiration from the martyrs by being "joyful witnesses" to the faith.

In an April 16 interview on "EWTN News Nightly," Bishop Stephen D. Parkes shared about the upcoming beatification of the five Spanish Franciscan friars, who are collectively known as the "Georgia Martyrs." The beatification will take place on Oct. 31 and will be celebrated by Cardinal Francis Leo of the Archdiocese of Toronto.

"People are very excited about this because it is so unique in the life of a diocese," Parkes told "EWTN News Nightly." "This is not something that happens very often."

The beatification will be "the first in the South," according to Parkes.

Plans for the beatification are still in progress, and a venue has not yet been set — but hailing from Savannah, nicknamed the Hostess City of the South, Parkes said he looks forward "to welcoming many visitors."

"A lot goes into planning because there are some questions about how many people will actually come," Parkes said. "We've been looking for a venue that will be large enough to accommodate thousands and we want to be very welcoming."

From martyr to 'blessed'

Parkes described the 16th-century martyrs as "men who gave their lives for our faith in defense of the sacrament of marriage."

"They were Spanish missionaries who came here to our country in order to help to evangelize the Native peoples," Parkes said. "And, obviously, they fell into some challenges with the evangelization process."

In September 1597, Father Pedro de Corpa, Father Blas Rodríguez, Father Miguel de Añon, Brother Antonio de Badajóz, and Father Francisco de Veráscola were killed for defending the sanctity of marriage at a mission in present-day Georgia.

The cause for canonization of the Georgia Martyrs officially began in 1950 but ramped up in the 1980s. Beatification is a significant step toward sainthood in the Catholic Church.

In January 2025, Pope Francis recognized the five Franciscans as martyrs for Christ who were killed for their faith. Parkes called this a "milestone" for the cause.

"When Pope Francis gave approval for the beatification to take place, it was significant because we knew that we would be able to move forward with this now," Parkes said. "It was accepted by the Church."

"They will be known as Blessed Pedro de Corpa and Companions — also known more commonly as the Georgia Martyrs," he said. "In our process towards sainthood and canonization, this is a huge milestone."

What can Catholics learn from the Georgia Martyrs?

When asked what lessons Catholics can take away from the martyrs, Parkes said that "we have to be joyful witnesses."

"We are called to be witnesses of faith, most especially in this world that we live in today," he said. "I don't think we're always understood as Catholics, but we have to be courageous witnesses."

"We need to continue to promote marriage and family life as a priority for our country, for our communities, for our society," Parkes said.

"When people see that and see the incredible foundation that we have in faith — we have something solid to believe in — I believe people are looking for that today in a world where so much is fleeting and so many things are temporal," he continued.

"In this kind of way, look at how we are able to celebrate these men who lived centuries ago, and they were defending something that still exists today and that we lift up today," Parkes said.

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Chicago Public Schools (CPS) has reinstated funding for students with disabilities at Catholic schools, reversing a decision to cut special services after pushback from the Archdiocese of Chicago.

"We are delighted to announce that Chicago Public Schools will be restoring special education instructional services to students in Chicago Catholic schools beginning Monday, April 20. Services will be provided through the Friday before Memorial Day, May 22, as had originally been planned," the archdiocese said in an April 16 statement.

"We appreciate the efforts of CPS CEO Dr. Macquline King and her staff to restore these important services," the archdiocese said. "We also appreciate the outpouring of support we heard from parents and others in recent days. The archdiocese looks forward to working with CPS in the months ahead to ensure that students with disabilities receive the academic support they need and deserve, whether they attend public or nonpublic schools."

The news comes after the archdiocese said in an April 10 statement that Chicago Public Schools abruptly terminated its funding for services provided to students with disabilities under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) more than a month before the end of the school year. The archdiocese said CPS informed them of the funding suspension without warning during Holy Week after having verbally confirmed the funding would continue through the end of the year "as recently as March 25."

Impacted services would have included academic support services such as tutoring in math, reading, and writing for students with learning disabilities. 

The archdiocese said in a previous statement that repeated efforts to reach "an amicable solution" with King had "not yielded a response." It also said CPS had only terminated IDEA funding for Catholic schools.

Cardinal Blase Cupich condemned the sudden suspension of the program, which he described as a "shocking and possibly discriminatory action by CPS" and an "affront to Catholics."

"For more than 175 years, our schools have helped lift families out of poverty and produced well-prepared and civically engaged graduates," Cupich said. "We do so at a cost far below that of other systems and are proud of our students and the teachers who work every day to serve them. We owe them every effort to right this offense by CPS."

King's office did not immediately respond to a request to comment.

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The Vatican has halted the cause for sainthood of Father Walter Ciszek, a Pennsylvania-born Jesuit priest who ministered to fellow prisoners while enduring more than 20 years of imprisonment in Russia.

Ciszek (1904–1984) is known for his spiritual writings "He Leadeth Me" and "With God in Russia," which he wrote after surviving torture by the Soviet secret police and hard labor during his imprisonment from 1941–1963.

The Vatican first approved the advancement of Ciszek's cause in 2012. Over the several decades that the cause was in progress, the Jesuits had gathered witness testimonies, writings of Ciszek, and more than 4,000 archival documents from the Jesuits and the Russian archives.

Monsignor Ronald Bocian of the Walter Ciszek Prayer League, the group advocating for Ciszek's cause, said in an April 9 letter that "the formal canonization process has been stopped."

"The diocese has been informed that the documentation relating to his cause does not support advancing his cause for beatification or sainthood," Bocian said.

"The development comes after years of careful study and discernment at the level of the Holy See, which bears the responsibility of evaluating each cause with thoroughness, integrity, and fidelity to the Church's norms," Bocian continued.

"While this news may understandably bring disappointment to many who have been inspired by Father Ciszek's example of heroic faith and have prayed for his cause, it does not diminish the enduring spiritual value of his life, witness, and legacy," Bocian said.

This is the second sainthood cause this month that the Vatican has closed. The Vatican also halted the cause of Argentinian bishop and servant of God Jorge Novak earlier this month. The Diocese of Quilmes, Argentina, said the decision expresses "no moral judgment regarding the life, virtues, and pastoral ministry" of the bishop but that it was due to him not carrying out "a possible canonical procedure" as a priest.

According to the letter from Bocian, the Prayer League advocating for Ciszek's canonization will become the "Father Walter J. Ciszek Society." Bocian said the society will "remain committed to honoring his memory, sharing his message, and encouraging devotion to the profound spiritual insights he left to the Church."

"Even as the formal canonization process has been stopped, the grace flowing from his witness remains alive in the hearts of the faithful," Bocian said.

The Diocese of Allentown, Pennsylvania, confirmed the news in a statement to EWTN News, acknowledging the "disappointment" while encouraging the faithful to remember the grace of Ciszek's life.

"This development comes as the Church evaluates each cause with thoroughness, integrity, and fidelity to its norms," read the statement from the Diocese of Allentown, which paralleled Bocian's letter.

Who was Father Walter Ciszek?

Ciszek was born in 1904 in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania. He entered the Jesuit novitiate in 1928 and was ordained in 1937 after being trained to say Mass in the Russian rite. After two years in Poland, he used the chaos of World War II as cover to enter the Soviet Union so that he could minister to Christians who lived under communist persecution.

Soviet authorities arrested him in 1941, believing him to be a spy. Over his decades in prison, he endured solitary confinement, torture, and years of hard labor near the Arctic Circle. Despite the dangers, he said Mass in secret and heard the confessions of other prisoners.

President John F. Kennedy negotiated the prisoner swap that led to his release in 1963. Ciszek went on to write about his spiritual insights and experience in Russia. He died at Fordham University in New York on Dec. 8, 1984. In 1990, Ciszek was declared a servant of God.

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For more than a quarter-century, popes have periodically visited Islamic mosques as part of official voyages and papal visits.

The tradition began with Pope John Paul II, who in 2001 became the first pope in history known to have entered a mosque when he visited the Great Mosque of Damascus in the capital of Syria.

The subsequent Popes Benedict XVI, Francis, and Leo XIV have all paid visits to mosques to hold ecumenical dialogues and host diplomatic meetings.

Yet the practice is not without some controversy. Indeed, Leo XIV's visit to the Great Mosque of Algiers on April 13 drew some backlash on social media by critics incredulous over the leader of the Catholic Church visiting a major Islamic holy site. (This was Leo's second visit to a mosque; he also visited the famed "Blue Mosque" in Istanbul in late 2025.)

So why do popes make visits to mosques, courting controversy and criticism for making a point to go to holy sites of another religion?

'We can live together in peace'

Pope Leo XIV himself addressed criticism directed toward him on April 15 on board the papal plane after leaving Algiers bound for Cameroon.

"I think the visit to the mosque was significant [and showed] that although we have different beliefs, we have different ways of worshipping, we have different ways of living, we can [still] live together in peace," the Holy Father said. 

"I think that to promote that kind of image is something which the world needs to hear today," he said, arguing that such visits show that "together we can continue to offer in our witness as we continue on this apostolic voyage."

Gabriel Said Reynolds, a theology professor at the University of Notre Dame who has written multiple works on the Quran and its relationship to Christianity, told EWTN News that interpreting papal visits to mosques should include an understanding of "the Church's vision of God in the world."

"What is God's relationship to the world? That's been important to all of the recent popes," he said.

Reynolds pointed out that an Islamic mosque is "fundamentally different from a church."

"A Catholic church is a sort of temple in which God is present in the tabernacle — body, blood, soul, and divinity," he said. "It's a sacred space in the deepest sense of the word."

"What Muslims would say of a mosque is fundamentally different," he said. "A mosque is for communal prayer, but the communal prayer that takes place in a mosque is no different than the ritual prayer that's more often done at home."

He likened a mosque to a "gathering place" with just a few features that set it apart as a distinct site — such as a pulpit for occasional sermons and an alcove that denotes the direction of Mecca to which Muslims orient themselves during prayer.

Reynolds said popes visit mosques in no small part as a "pastoral concern" for Christians living in majority-Muslim countries, such as Algeria.

"Algerian society is thoroughly Islamic," he said. "It's not generally marked by notions of rights and responsibilities and citizenship in the same way the U.S. is. Cultivating positive relationships with Muslim leaders is absolutely essential for Christians."

Reynolds said the Church's view about human dignity has "fundamental implications with its relationship toward non-Christians." He pointed out, for instance, that the pope "could show up at an atheist convention and meet the people there and have dialogue with them."

"John 3:16 says God loves the world," he said. "It's not that God loves believers and doesn't love the unbelievers. All people are children of God, according to Catholic teaching."

The declaration Nostra Aetate, meanwhile — issued by the Second Vatican Council in 1965 to address Catholicism's relationship with non-Christians — affirmed that the Church "regards [Muslims] with esteem."

The document points out that although Muslims "do not acknowledge Jesus as God," they still "adore the one God" and "revere [Jesus] as a prophet" while giving honor to the Virgin Mother as well.

The Second Vatican Council acknowledged that "in the course of centuries not a few quarrels and hostilities have arisen" between Christians and Muslims, but the document "urge[d] all to forget the past and to work sincerely for mutual understanding."

It further called on religious adherents to "preserve as well as to promote together for the benefit of all mankind social justice and moral welfare, as well as peace and freedom."

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ROME — It is "intolerable" that Christians are being targeted for persecution in Nigeria, said U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See Brian Burch during an event in Rome on Friday.

The group Solidarity with the Persecuted Church (SPC) and the Embassy of the United States to the Holy See organized the April 17 conference at the embassy on threats to religious freedom in Nigeria.

Burch spoke to EWTN News on the sidelines about the stance of the U.S. on religious violence in Nigeria. He described the current situation as a "conflict between radical Islamic groups and Christians because of their faith."

"The United States is the greatest friend of religious liberty," Burch said. "The purpose of this event is to call attention to the plight of Christians who are being targeted and killed in Nigeria. Unfortunately, there are extremist Islamic groups that have been targeting Christians specifically in their churches and their homes, and the scale and size of the persecution of Christians there is intolerable."

Asked about the denial by some Nigerian government officials that Christians specifically are being targeted, Burch insisted that the current violence against Christians is alarming, citing U.S. President Donald Trump, who designated Nigeria as a country of particular concern in 2025.

"The president has said that Christians face an existential crisis in Nigeria, and thanks to his leadership, he is now acting to bring an end to this. We have called on the Nigerian government to take necessary steps to protect Christians, and the United States government is now working in partnership with the Nigerian government to assist them in doing just that," he said.

Steven Wagner, president of SPC, underscored the importance of Nigeria for Christianity in Africa and the need for the Holy See to be involved in raising awareness.

"As Nigeria goes, so goes Africa. More Christians are martyred for their faith in Nigeria than in any other country on earth. There is a huge crisis of internally displaced persons. We are calling on the Vatican to increase public awareness of the problem and to continue to encourage the government of Nigeria to make progress in protecting its people," Wagner said.

Burch responds to Trump's comments on the pope

In his opening remarks at the conference, Burch commented for the first time on the recent tensions between Trump and Pope Leo XIV. He emphasized their difference in approach to armed conflicts and their shared goal of eliminating evil.

"In recent days, President Trump and Pope Leo have exchanged, shall we say, sharp words. We must not pretend there is no disagreement. But both men are driven by an unshakable belief in protecting the innocent. One leads with the sword and shield of American power, the other with the cross of sacrificial love. But both are saying in their own languages, 'Evil must not triumph and innocents must not be abandoned,'" Burch said.

Papal trip in Africa

The pontiff is currently on his first apostolic journey to Africa — visiting Algeria, Cameroon, Angola, and Equatorial Guinea.

Archbishop Fortunatus Nwachukwu, secretary of the Dicastery for Evangelization and a presenter at the conference, described the trip as a moment of profound unity for all Africans.

"This is Africa, and much of the divisions, according to countries in Africa, are artificial divisions that were imposed on the continent," Nwachukwu told EWTN News. "Africans quite often feel united even beyond the boundaries. So the pope's message to these churches and these populations will also be a message to the population in Nigeria and to the Church in Nigeria."

Many of the issues the pope is addressing on his trip "are shared in common in Nigeria," Burch added. The Holy See and the United States "certainly share this deep, fundamental commitment to religious liberty."

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The U.S. Coast Guard has agreed to a slate of religious protections for service members, including committing to individualized reviews of personnel who request religious accommodations for Coast Guard policies.

The Thomas More Society, a Catholic law firm that focuses on religious liberty and civil rights, said on April 16 that it had settled a lawsuit with the Coast Guard in an agreement that "permanently reforms how the Coast Guard evaluates, trains on, and reports religious accommodation requests."

The yearslong case was first filed in September 2022 as a federal class action lawsuit, one that claimed the Coast Guard was in violation of both the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act for "categorically denying virtually all religious accommodation requests from the Coast Guard COVID-19 vaccine mandate."

That mandate has since been rescinded, but the settlement announced on April 16 still serves as a "model for every branch of the military," attorney Peter Breen said.

One of the provisions in the settlement includes a requirement that the Coast Guard intensively review religious accommodations requests and, in cases where a request is denied, show that granting it would "seriously harm a critical military interest."

The Coast Guard will also institute "command-wide training" in leadership courses and chaplain instruction. The branch must also publicly affirm its commitment to religious liberty as well as post public data about religious accommodations on its website for three years.

The primary plaintiffs in the suit were Lts. Alaric Stone and Mack Marcenelle as well as Boatswain's Mate First Class Eric Jackson.

Marcenelle in the announcement said the team had been "wrongly accused of violating lawful orders" but that the settlement "sets things right once and for all and recognizes the lawful religious freedoms of all Coast Guard service members."

The government will also pay $750,000 in attorney's fees and expenses as part of the settlement, the Thomas More Society said.

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ROME — Catholic students in Rome on Thursday bore witness to the Eucharist during a solemn procession to commemorate 25 years of its student-led adoration program.

During the April 16 procession on the campus of the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas — "the Angelicum" — students and clergy offered visible testimony to faith in the Real Presence.

Cardinal Dominique Mamberti, prefect of the Apostolic Signatura, led the procession. In his homily beforehand, Mamberti referenced the soon-to-be Blessed Archbishop Fulton Sheen, calling adoration an experience that "mysteriously transforms our heart." He later spoke to EWTN News about the need for such practices to be developed in the wider Church.

The cardinal said it is beautiful when youth gatherings dedicate a part of their time to adoration of the Lord in the Eucharist. "We recognize him as truly present, under the Eucharistic species, and this is an integral part of our faith," he said. "Otherwise our faith is in vain … Because if Christ is not present in the bread and in the Eucharist and in the wine of the Eucharist, it means that he is not resurrected, as St. Paul says."

Faith amid challenges

Amid challenges in Eucharistic faith, Dominican Father Thomas Joseph White, rector of the Angelicum, described the procession as indicative of a revival among the young. The Angelicum established student-led adoration in 2001 in response to the teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas and St. John Paul II.

"Eucharistic adoration has become more prominent in at least areas of the Church in recent decades. Some of that had to do with initiatives at the time of the pontificate of John Paul II when [student adoration] began here," White said.

"St. Thomas understood this mystery [of the Eucharist] deeply; he contemplated it, he wrote about it, and studying his thinking about the Eucharist here leads our students into a deeper appreciation of the Eucharist," the priest said. It also helps students to pray more deeply "and explain the mystery of the Eucharist to the world today as missionaries of the 21st century."

Impact of program on students

Marcia Vanderstraaten, who is from Singapore and studying for a theology licentiate (similar to a master's degree), described the student adoration program as a blessing, giving students the opportunity to pray between classes.

Students "take great comfort in being able to see Jesus during their breaks, praying and reflecting. Having the Eucharistic presence in the midst of our community is something that really matters to a lot of us," she said.

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YAOUNDE, Cameroon — Pope Leo XIV on Friday encouraged Catholic university students in Cameroon to let their study be informed by "the light of faith, joined to the truth of love" as St. John Henry Newman taught.

"Professors and students are called to embrace as both their aim and their way of life the common search for truth, for, as St. John Henry Newman wrote, 'All true principles run over with God, all phenomena converge to him,'" the pope said during an encounter at the Catholic Academic Institution of Central Africa (UCAC) in Yaoundé, Cameroon's capital.

UCAC, founded following an agreement between the Holy See and the Republic of Cameroon in 1989, serves more than 2,000 students from the six countries of central Africa: Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Congo-Brazzaville, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, and Chad.

To mark the pope's visit April 17, the university inaugurated a square on campus, naming it after St. Augustine in honor of Leo.

Plans are also underway for the construction of a university hospital dedicated to the pope: It will become the Leo XIV Catholic University Center.

Upon Pope Leo XIV's arrival, songs of joy and jubilation filled the air. A celebration of music and chanting erupted as the pope arrived at the campus, where many of the young people were wearing yellow and green T-shirts, the colors of Cameroon. Authorities say 8,000 people were in attendance.

In his address, the pontiff responded to the concerns of many young people, emphasizing that universities — Catholic universities in particular — can become "true communities of life and research," introducing "students and professors alike to a fraternity in knowledge."

Through knowledge — which above all means dialogue — it becomes possible to set aside individualism, superficiality, and hypocrisy: "The university stands out as a privileged place of friendship, cooperation, and, at the same time, of interiority and reflection," Leo underscored.

What makes a university truly significant, he recalled, is the shared search for truth. Quoting from Pope Francis' encyclical Lumen Fidei, he said, faith, in this way, succeeds in "illuminating" the gaze of science: "Faith encourages the scientist to remain constantly open to reality in all its inexhaustible richness. Faith awakens the critical sense by preventing research from being satisfied with its own formulae and helps it to realize that nature is always greater."

Speaking about the African continent, he added: "Today, moreover, there is an urgent need to think about faith within the framework of contemporary cultural contexts and present challenges, so that its beauty and credibility may emerge in diverse settings, especially in those most marked by injustice, inequality, conflict, and both material and spiritual degradation."

AI and a new humanism

"Christians, and especially young African Catholics, must not be afraid of 'new things,'" the pope said, a reference to Pope Leo XIII's encyclical Rerum Novarum.

He invited African youth to become pioneers of "a new humanism in the context of the digital revolution."

"While the African continent is well acquainted with its alluring aspects, it also knows the darker side of the environmental and social devastation caused by the relentless pursuit of raw materials and rare earths," Leo said. "Do not look the other way: This is a service to the truth and to all humanity. Without this demanding educational effort, passive adaptation to dominant paradigms will be mistaken for competence, and the loss of freedom for progress."

He said the spread of artificial intelligence systems, "like every great historical transformation," call for not only "technical competence but also for a humanistic formation."

He warned against superficial misunderstandings of this new digital tool: "When simulation becomes the norm, it weakens the human capacity for discernment. As a result, our social bonds close in upon themselves, forming self-referential circuits that no longer expose us to reality. We thus come to live within bubbles, impermeable to one another."

"Feeling threatened by anyone who is different, we grow unaccustomed to encounter and dialogue," he said. "In this way, polarization, conflict, fear, and violence spread. What is at stake is not merely the risk of error but a transformation in our very relationship with truth."

Hence, he invited Catholic universities to "assume a responsibility of the highest order. For it does not merely transmit specialized knowledge but shapes minds capable of discernment and hearts ready for love and service."

One of the many challenges facing Cameroon is the "understandable tendency to migrate — which may lead one to believe that elsewhere a better future may be more easily found," the pope said.

The Holy Father instead invited young people "to respond with an ardent desire to serve your country and to apply the knowledge you are acquiring here to the benefit of your fellow citizens."

This, he said, is the very reason for the existence of a major African university like the one he is visiting today.

Addressing the university's faculty and leadership, he said: "Spiritual and human accompaniment constitutes an essential dimension of the identity of the Catholic university."

"Whatever our role or our age, we must always remember that we are all disciples — that is, fellow learners with one Teacher, who so loved the world that he gave his life," the pope concluded.

This story was first published by ACI Stampa, the Italian-language sister service of EWTN News. It has been translated and adapted by EWTN News English.

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A Catholic composer has lost his copyright infringement lawsuit against a fellow songwriter and a publishing company after a jury found that he did not prove that his work had been unlawfully copied by either defendant. 

Jury documents obtained by EWTN News show that a jury found Vincent Ambrosetti did not "prove by a preponderance of the evidence" that Bernadette Farrell and Oregon Catholic Press had copied his 1980 song "Emmanuel" with the 1993 hymn "Christ Be Our Light."

The suit was originally filed in 2020 but dismissed in March 2024, with U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut arguing that Ambrosetti had not shown that the defendants had had "access" to his song prior to writing their own song or that there was a "striking similarity" between the two works.

An appeals court, however, revived the suit in August 2025. The appeals court noted that in 1985, Oregon Catholic Press then-publisher Owen Alstott allegedly met Ambrosetti at a convention, where Ambrosetti gave Alstott a copy of "Emmanuel." Alstott would go on to meet and eventually marry Farrell.

In March, a jury was played selections of both songs, while New York University music professor Lawrence Ferrara said in a court filing that there was "strong objective musicological evidence of copying" between the two songs.

Yet the jury found otherwise, ruling in favor of both Farrell and of Oregon Catholic Press and against Ambrosetti's claim of infringement.

In a status report filed after the jury's verdict, Ambrosetti urged the court to "enter a judgment based on the verdict returned by the jury," after which he said he would "proceed from there," suggesting he may intend to appeal the case.

The jury debated for less than a day before returning its verdict against Ambrosetti's claims.

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On April 16, the Vatican released a message from Pope Leo XIV on the occasion of the Second National Meeting of Local Representatives for the Protection of Minors and Vulnerable Adults of the Italian Bishops' Conference being held in Rome April 16–18 under the theme "Forming Authentic Relationships."

In his message, addressed to Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, president of the Italian Bishops' Conference, and signed by Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, the Holy Father warned that a lack of respect for and recognition of the dignity of every person "may cause serious harm."

He clarified that respect is "a demanding form of charity, expressed in safeguarding others without possessing them, accompanying them without dominating them, and serving them without humiliating them."

He pointed out that the protection of minors and vulnerable adults "cannot be understood merely as a set of rules to apply or procedures to follow" but instead requires a wisdom "that shapes the style of communities, the exercise of authority, the formation of educators, vigilance over contexts, and transparency of behavior."

For the Holy Father, the presence of the youngest and most vulnerable "challenges the conscience of the Church and measures its ability to express authentic care."

Leo XIV urged that special attention be paid to those who have suffered abuse. "Their wounds," he noted, "call for sincere closeness, humble listening, and perseverance in seeking what is right and possible for repair."

The pope emphasized that a Christian community lives out evangelical conversion "when it does not shield itself from the pain of those who have suffered but allows itself to be questioned by it; when it does not minimize evil but acknowledges it; when it does not become closed in on itself in fear of scandal but accepts the demanding paths of truth, justice, and healing."

According to the pontiff, the meeting being held in Rome reminds the Church of the need "to grow in a culture of prevention that is, above all, a culture of evangelical care."

Finally, he encouraged the participants to continue their work with confidence, "that communities may grow in which the most fragile are welcomed, protected, and loved."

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, the Spanish-language sister service of EWTN News. It has been translated and adapted by EWTN News English.

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