LIVE UPDATES: NCYC 2025 — Pope Leo XIV’s historic first digital encounter with young U.S. Catholics
The encounter in Indianapolis will feature opening remarks by Pope Leo XIV, youth representatives, and a live Q&A. / Credit: EWTN News
CNA Staff, Nov 21, 2025 / 09:10 am (CNA).
The 2025 National Catholic Youth Conference will feature prayer, community, evangelization, and service among Catholic teenagers from Nov. 20–22 in Indianapolis. Follow CNA’s live coverage of the event here.
Watch the historic discussion with Pope Leo XIV live from the Vatican now on EWTN YouTube:
Teens at NCYC 2025 excited for faith, fun, sacraments, friends
Lucy Snipes, Anne Young, and Presley Hilderbrand from Columbus, Georgia tour exhibits during the first night of NCYC 2025 on Nov. 20, 2025, at the Indiana Convention Center in Indianapolis. / Credit: Tessa Gervasini / CNA
Indianapolis, Indiana, Nov 21, 2025 / 08:00 am (CNA).
Teenagers piled into the Indiana Convention Center and Lucas Oil Stadium on Thursday in Indianapolis to start the 2025 National Catholic Youth Conference (NCYC).
Young Catholics from across the country have traveled to Indianapolis to take part in NCYC for three days of prayer, community, evangelization, catechesis, and service. The 2025 theme is “I Am,” and the conference mission is for participants to encounter Christ and form discipleship.
On the evening of Nov. 20 exhibits opened to help students gain a deeper understanding of the sacraments and to encourage them to interact with one another. Teens with themed hats packed into the convention center and began to exchange the caps as a way to meet new people at the start of the weekend.
Exhibits open
The interactive exhibits opened Thursday night with themes based on the seven sacraments. Aaron Frazita, the director of the interactive exhibits for NCYC, shared with CNA how they wanted to help the teens “think in a new way, and in a very practical way.”
“About a year and a half out from every NCYC, we have a small group of folks that have gotten together for the better part of 20 years. And we brainstormed some ideas with themes, and this year we really wanted to connect what was going on in the interactive exhibit with the whole of what was going on with the main stage,” he said.
“This year we decided to really focus on the sacraments,” Frazita said. “So we added a few of our own sacraments, like being joyful with games and things like that.”
“The whole idea with all the interactive places we put together is to create crafts and games and conversation and catecheses, really trying to help young people engage with them and meet them where they are,” he continued.
“We have so many young people who maybe just started faith journeys, who are really deep in their experience,” he said. The team created games, service projects, and exhibits on ideas including discernment and vocations to “really engage” the students.
Teens anticipate NCYC activities
As teens began to play the games with one another, look at exhibits, and meet with students from other cities, they shared with CNA what they are looking forward to most during the NCYC experience.
Miriam Stebel, Catherine Downer, and Addi Kandel from the Diocese of Cincinnati told CNA they are looking forward to growing in their faith. Stebel said she hopes to “get a better understanding of the Church and the Catholic faith.”
She added: “I also think it’s pretty cool that the pope is deciding to connect with the youth more and I think it’s a good opportunity to get everyone engaged.”
“I am hoping to meet new people and just be able to talk to other young people,” Downer said. “I’m excited to learn more about Catholicism and to understand it on a deeper level.”
She said she is also looking forward to the daily breakout sessions. “There’s a few about missions and learning your faith plan,” Downer said. “So I’m excited to go and learn more about what I’m being called to do.”
Kandel, meanwhile, said she hopes to learn what she can work on in her own life.
"One big thing I also want to do is learn more about Scripture and how to interpret it and understand it, and just how I can deepen my relationship with the Lord," she said.
Lucy Snipes, Anne Young, and Presley Hildenbrand are all high school students from Columbus, Georgia. Snipes told CNA she came to NCYC to “meet new people and see how Catholicism has changed and inspired people.”
She is looking forward to “seeing everyone all together, doing concerts, and praising together.”
“Adoration here is also always the best thing ever,” said Snipes, who is returning for her second time to NCYC. “It’s always so nice to be around a lot of other people that are feeling the same things as you.”
Young added she’s looking forward to the daily Masses for the same reason.
Hildenbrand said she is looking forward to being around other teens while they get to hear Pope Leo XIV speak. “I think it’s really cool to hear from the pope, especially since he’s the first American pope and he’ll talk in English.”
Amelia Horner and Maeve Wendiger showed up in their Indianapolis 500 race car hats to represent the famed racing city.
“It is really nice just being with so many young Catholics that are here,” Wendiger said. “And it has been really nice to reconnect with a lot of people from my middle school.”
Horner has never been to NCYC but said she’s “heard a lot of talk about it, and people who have so much in common can come together and just be who they are.” She said she is very excited to lean into the 2025 theme of “I Am.”
The girls said they were “shocked” the event was going to be in their own backyard. While sometimes they feel big events don’t come to their hometown, they said: “Indiana is special.”
‘The pope is traveling to a wounded country,’ Lebanese priest says
The city of Tyre, in southern Lebanon, has been bombed several times by the Israeli armed forces. / Credit: Shutterstock
ACI Prensa Staff, Nov 21, 2025 / 07:00 am (CNA).
The upcoming visit of Pope Leo XIV to Lebanon, scheduled for Nov. 30 to Dec. 2, comes as a new wave of Israeli bombings have shaken several towns near the southern border.
“We have been experiencing continuous attacks like this for almost two and a half years. But we have never evacuated, we have never left our village,” said Maronite parish priest Father Tony Elias from the border village of Rmeich, a Christian village located just a few meters from Israel.
Rmeich, he explained, is one of the largest Christian villages in southern Lebanon. “We cannot leave, because if we did, there would be no one to rebuild, no one to protect our village,” he said in an interview with ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner.
The situation in neighboring villages confirms his fears: “The villages to the right and left are completely destroyed. Missiles were launched from there, and they were razed in retaliation.”
Rmeich, on the other hand, only suffered some structural damage during the recent attacks: “Some houses have been hit, projectiles have fallen on cars and roofs… but thank God we managed to protect our village,” he said.
The Lebanese still retain in their collective memory the devastation of the 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel. That conflict, which lasted six weeks, left 1,300 Lebanese and 165 Israelis dead and destroyed entire villages and several neighborhoods of Beirut.
In October of last year, another Israeli siege in Lebanon resulted in hundreds of people crushed under the rubble.
In this climate of uncertainty, Pope Leo XIV’s visit to Lebanon — scheduled before this upturn in violence — will be like a balm for the Christian community and for the entire country, Elias said.
‘This first apostolic journey of the pope will be a sign of peace’
“I am convinced that this first apostolic journey of the pope will be a sign of peace for the whole world, giving a voice back to Christians and the Lebanese people, whose reality is often blurred or manipulated by politics,” he said.
Although the priest said the tension is constant, he insisted that the community is trying to maintain a certain degree of normalcy: “The roads to Beirut are open; we can get in and out. We’re not like in 2006, when they were completely blocked for weeks.”
Several chartered buses will take Catholics from the south to the events the pope has scheduled during his apostolic visit to the country, such as the meeting with young people in the square in front of the Maronite Patriarchate in Bkerké or the Mass at the Beirut Waterfront.
“Every parish has organized buses to attend the Mass and to greet the pope along the way. The schools are also mobilized,” confirmed Father Raffaele Zgheib, national director of the Pontifical Mission Societies in Lebanon.
Zgheib, who lives in the port city of Jounieh, 11 miles north of Beirut, and is part of the team organizing the papal visit, does not deny that there is “fear that the violence could ruin the pope’s visit.”
“We hope that the visit will be a call for dialogue instead of escalation, but I don’t deny that there is a real fear of a new war in southern Lebanon,” he said.
Last-minute preparations
Despite the limited time available, all Christian communities in the country have thrown themselves into the preparations. “All components of the local Lebanese Church, along with all the Eastern Churches in the country, are preparing to welcome the Holy Father,” Zgheib said.
This visit to Lebanon is “very important because Pope Leo XIV is coming in continuity with Pope Francis, who always wished to travel to Lebanon, although his health problems prevented him from doing so,” he continued.
The trip confirms, Zgheib pointed out, the value that the Holy See attributes to the country as a link between East and West, and as a place — currently fragile — of religious coexistence. Furthermore, the Holy Father will arrive in a country going through a difficult period with a rampant economic crisis.
“The pope is traveling to a wounded country. The last six years have been terrible. We lost all our savings in the banks, then came the pandemic, then the Beirut port explosion, and now there is also the war in southern Lebanon,” Zgheib explained.
“The pope is coming to a country that has been greatly weakened by all these crises,” he noted, but said the pontiff’s visit has awakened much hope: “All Lebanese people want it to be the beginning of a lasting and just peace in the Middle East.”
This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.
One-third of recent Catholic priests in England are Anglican converts, report shows
The ordination of Jonathan Goodall (former Anglican bishop) to the Catholic priesthood in Westminster Cathedral, London, March 12, 2022. / Credit: Mazur/CBCEW.org.uk
London, England, Nov 21, 2025 / 06:00 am (CNA).
A new report reveals that significant numbers of Anglican clergy have converted to Catholicism in the United Kingdom since 1992.
The report, “Convert Clergy in the Catholic Church in Britain,” released Nov. 20, shows that approximately 700 clergy and religious of the Church of England, Church in Wales, and Scottish Episcopal Church have been received into the Catholic Church since 1992. The number includes 16 former Anglican bishops. This equates to approximately a third of all Catholic priests ordained in England and Wales during this period.
Speaking to CNA, co-author Stephen Bullivant, professor of theology and the sociology of religion at St. Mary’s Catholic University, London, said he was “really quite surprised” by the high numbers, “especially the [convert] ordinations as a proportion of all ordinations.”
“The numbers,” Bullivant added, “are much larger than most people would imagine. It was a much bigger phenomenon than a lot of people thought.”
He called the “steady stream” of former Anglican clergy converting “a very major source of Catholic vocations.”
Bullivant, who is also director of the Benedict XVI Centre for Religion and Society at St. Mary’s, identified two “big waves” as major factors in pushing Anglican clergy to convert.
First was the Church of England’s general synod vote in 1992, which enabled women to be ordained as vicars, and second the visit of Pope Benedict XVI to Britain in 2010. This high-profile visit was preceded by the apostolic constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus, which permitted the creation of “personal ordinariates for those Anglican faithful who desire to enter into the full communion of the Catholic Church in a corporate manner.”
The figures show a spike in the numbers after these events: Over 150 clergy entered into full communion with the Catholic Church in 1994, and more than 80 in 2011, the year after the papal visit, when the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham was formally introduced. This ordinariate enabled former Anglicans to retain their Anglican heritage and customs when entering into full communion with the Catholic Church.
Explaining the moves prompted by these major events, Bullivant said: “You get this kind of big thing that forces the issue. There’s then strength in numbers because if there’s suddenly other people doing it, then it’s much easier to make it feel possible.”
The report was published by the St. Barnabas Society, which exists to support former clergy and religious of other Christian denominations and other world faiths. Its focus is on the numbers and experiences of former Anglican clergy who have become Catholic over the last 30 years.
The numbers were found by referring to “extensive records” from Monsignor John Broadhurst, a Catholic priest and former Anglican bishop, as well as Bullivant and his team interviewing 36 clergy and religious converts, which included three former bishops.
Responding to the numbers in the report, Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, said: “It is fascinating reading, not only in its collating of facts and figures, but also in so many personal testimonies and insights.”
Nichols highlighted the experience of Anglicans entering into full communion with the Catholic Church as “not so much a turning away or rejection of their rich and precious Anglican heritage but an experience of an imperative to move into the full visible communion of the Catholic Church, in union with the See of Peter.”
The report contains accounts of clergy who have made the decision to become Catholic, which is described as “a step into the unknown.” Many have received practical help from the St. Barnabus Society. Bullivant said: “If it hadn't been for the St. Barnabas Society, [the conversions] couldn’t have happened.”
He also emphasized that the former Anglicans he interviewed were “very grateful for their Anglican period,” for the “background and what they learned from it and what it gave them.” He added: “They’ve looked at British Christianity from both sides now.”
“A lot of them are seeing [that] God had a plan for them. And part of that plan was for them to do this.”
He also highlighted the “substantial ongoing contribution to Catholic life made by convert clergy/religious in this country.”
What do we know about the presentation of Mary?
Alessandro Allori, “The Presentation of Mary,” 1598. / Credit: Public domain
National Catholic Register, Nov 21, 2025 / 04:00 am (CNA).
It’s easy to conceptualize the presentation of the Lord because we find it in Scripture. Luke’s Gospel tells of the Holy Family’s journey to the Temple when Jesus was 8 days old. According to Jewish custom, Jesus was to be circumcised and Mary purified.
There Mary and Joseph meet the prophets Anna and Simeon, who recognized the child as the Messiah who would bring about the fall and rise of many and become a sign of contradiction and the cause of a sword that would one day pierce Mary’s heart. We celebrate the feast of the Presentation of the Lord annually on Feb. 2.
The presentation of Mary, however, is not found in Scripture. Instead, we learn about Mary’s presentation from accounts that have come to us from apostolic times. What we know is found mainly in Chapter 7 of the “Protoevangelium of James,” which has been dated by historians before the year A.D. 200.
The “Protoevangelium of James” was ostensibly written by the apostle of the same name. It gives a detailed account in which Mary’s father, Joachim, tells his wife, Anna, that he wishes to bring their daughter to the Temple and consecrate her to God. Anna responds that they should wait until Mary is 3 years old so that she will not need her parents as much.
On the agreed day for Mary to be taken to the Temple, Hebrew virgins accompanied the family with burning lamps. The Temple priest received Mary, kissed her, and blessed her. According to James’ writing, the priest then proclaimed: “The Lord has magnified thy name in all generations. In thee, the Lord will manifest his redemption to the sons of Israel.”
After that, Mary was placed on the third step of the Temple and danced with joy. All the House of Israel loved Mary, and she was nurtured from then on in the Temple while her parents returned to their Nazareth home, glorifying God.
The celebration of the feast of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary grew slowly over the years.
On Nov. 21, 543, Emperor Justinian dedicated a church to Mary in the Temple area of Jerusalem. Many of the early Church Fathers celebrated this feast day, such as St. Germanus and St. John Damascene. In 1373, it was formally celebrated in Avignon, France, and in 1472, Pope Sixtus IV extended it to the universal Church. The Byzantine Church considers Mary’s Presentation one of the 12 great feasts of the liturgical year.
In 1974, Pope Paul VI wrote about this feast in his encyclical Marialis Cultus, saying: “Despite its apocryphal content, it presents lofty and exemplary values and carries on the venerable traditions having their origins in the Eastern Churches.”
The memorial of the Presentation of Mary has been noted in the Church since its early years and yet is easily forgotten or misunderstood.
Since it’s classified as a memorial and not a solemnity or holy day of obligation, it doesn’t draw much attention to itself other than a special opening prayer in the Mass. With this memorial, we celebrate the fact that God chose to dwell in Mary in a unique way. In response, she placed her whole self at his service. By our baptism, God invites us, too, into his service.
But there’s more to celebrating the presentation of Mary.
This feast gives us cause for great joy since Mary is truly our mother, given to us by Christ as he hung dying on the cross. Because we are part of her Son’s body, she loves us with as much devotion and tenderness as she loves Jesus. When we celebrate Mary’s presentation, we are giving Mary the honor she deserves and witnessing to her perfect purity as the virgin of Nazareth, the mother of God, and our mother.
Sts. Joachim and Anne surrendered their only daughter to God so that she would be completely free to follow his holy will. Although they loved her dearly, they knew that in the Temple Mary would always be near the Holy of Holies, surrounded by an atmosphere of godliness and grace. She would be instructed in Scripture and the history of the Jewish people. She would be under the guardianship and tutelage of the holy women of the Temple who had given their lives to God. One of them, Scripture scholars believe, was Anna — the woman who prophesied at the presentation of Our Lord. In the Temple, Mary would be completely focused on God and well prepared for becoming the mother of the Savior and mother of the body of Christ.
When we celebrate the presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, we remember the tremendous sacrifice Sts. Joachim and Anne made for our sakes. We give honor and respect to the Virgin, who is an example for all of us in our struggle for holiness. It is a privilege and an opportunity to express our gratitude for the gift of a pure, tender, and always-loving mother.
This story was first published by the National Catholic Register, CNA's sister news partner, on Nov. 21, 2023, and has been adapted and updated by CNA.
China’s ‘assault on religious freedom’ threatens U.S., congressional commission told
This photo taken on Jan. 15, 2024, shows a Chinese flag fluttering below a cross on a Christian church in Pingtan, in China’s southeast Fujian province. / Credit: Photo by GREG BAKER/AFP via Getty Images
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 20, 2025 / 17:30 pm (CNA).
The Chinese Communist Party’s “ongoing assault against religious freedom” has national security implications for the U.S., according to co-chairs of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC).
Former Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kansas, who served as ambassador at large for international religious freedom in the first Trump administration, told the commission Nov. 20 that the United States needs to treat China’s religious freedom violations as a national security threat.
Brownback cited a report listing 10 Catholic bishops detained by the Chinese government. “Ten Catholic bishops,” he said with emphasis, adding: “Do people even know they’re in prison?” Brownback called for China to be sanctioned by the Trump administration, pointing out the regime “has not paid a dime” for its religious freedom violations despite having been designated a country of particular concern (CPC).
Bob Fu, ChinaAid founder and president, told the panel about his experience advocating for religious freedom in China since immigrating to the U.S, revealing that in 2020 his home in Texas was surrounded by Chinese Communist Party agents who threatened his family and children, threatening him to stop his ministry with ChinaAid.
Grace Jin Drexel, the daughter of Pastor Ezra Jin, who was arrested at an underground church last month, recalled her father’s detention, expressing concern for her father’s health and calling on the Chinese government to release him and fellow detainees immediately and unconditionally.
Since 2018, Drexel’s father has been under an exit ban from China, separated from family in the U.S. for more than seven years, she said, noting his church grew to the largest it has ever been, reaching tens of thousands of people per year who are under persecution prior to his arrest.
A bipartisan group of senators, including Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Jeff Merkley, D-Oregon, are urging the Trump administration to act on behalf of Pastor Jin.
Adherents to underground churches in China are not trying to subvert the state, Drexel said, but rather are “merely asking to be free from the Communist Party” in the context of worship, where God is at the center.
Drexel also recalled her own experience of transnational harassment for her advocacy on behalf of her father, saying she received a threatening phone call from someone pretending to be a U.S. federal agent and has been followed and harassed by the CCP throughout Washington, D.C.
Visibly emotional, she said: “Do not signal defeat of this trampling of human rights with your silence.”
Testifying before the commission led by Rep. Chris Smith, R-New Jersey, and Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, other witnesses included Ismail “Ma Ju” Juma, a Hui Muslim human rights advocate, and Bhuchung Tsering, who leads the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) Research and Monitoring Unit.
Protecting U.S. religious freedom
Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Massachusetts, a member of the commission, emphasized the constitutional importance of religious freedom and the need for the U.S. to protect it. McGovern, who is Catholic, said the U.S. needs to protect religious freedom at home first for its position to carry real weight.
He cited the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts and its effect on the migrant community in the U.S. Catholic Church. He further cited the bishop of San Bernardino, who this past summer granted a Sunday Mass dispensation to migrants in his diocese who feared deportation. “
“Our voice would have more effect,” he said, “if the U.S. protected the religious freedom of people living in the U.S.”
European Parliament discusses harms of surrogacy after EU condemns the practice
Reem Alsalem (right), the United Nations special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, opposes surrogacy at an Oct. 9, 2025, U.N. event hosted by the Italian government. / Credit: ADF International
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 20, 2025 / 17:00 pm (CNA).
The European Parliament and the United Nations have officially condemned the practice of surrogacy following reports of human rights violations against women and babies.
Experts gathered on Nov. 19 for a meeting at the European Parliament that included U.N. Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls Reem Alsalem and Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) International’s Carmen Correas, who discussed the harms of surrogacy on women and children, according to an ADF press release.
The event, “Surrogacy: An Ethical and Political Challenge for Europe,” followed the release of a landmark report by Alsalem that highlighted widespread human rights violations globally as a result of surrogacy. The event also came after a resolution that stated the EU “condemns the practice of surrogacy … [and] calls on the [EU] Commission to take measures to support ending this phenomenon.”
Italian European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) Party Member of the EU Parliament Paolo Inselvini said at the event it has become clear that “a determined European front exists, committed to stopping reproductive exploitation across the globe.” He further emphasized the EU’s commitment to “abandon all ambiguity” and designate surrogacy as “a universal crime.”
“Surrogacy treats women and children as commodities,” Correas said. “The European Union has taken an important step in acknowledging its inherent harms. We urge policymakers to move swiftly toward a clear, coordinated legal prohibition that protects the dignity and rights of all involved.”
Alsalem’s report was based on nearly 120 submissions in addition to video consultations with 78 people including commissioning parents, surrogacy agencies, and surrogate mothers. Alsalem called for member states to establish a universal ban on surrogacy, criminalizing the practice in all its forms.
Through her consultative process, the U.N. expert found surrogate mothers, who are most often from low-income and vulnerable backgrounds, and their children increasingly endure physical, emotional, and financial exploitation as well as violence and human trafficking.
The report further highlighted the experience of surrogate mothers being pressured into abortions by commissioning parents, including beyond 12 weeks of gestation, “through coercive tactics such as financial incentives, threats of legal action, or the withdrawal of support to both the mother and baby.” This often occurs when the child is found to have a disability, the report said.
In cases where the surrogate becomes pregnant with multiple children at once, commissioning parents may “also enforce a selective reduction,” or the killing of one or more of the undesired babies in utero.
Retired Army general, Notre Dame professor to serve as president of Belmont Abbey College
Mary Help of Christians Basilica on the campus of Belmont Abbey College. / Credit: Rnrivas, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 20, 2025 / 16:30 pm (CNA).
Here’s a roundup of the latest Catholic education news in the United States:
Retired Army general, Notre Dame professor to serve as president of Belmont Abbey College
Belmont Abbey College in North Carolina announced that Jeffrey Talley, a retired three-star lieutenant general in the U.S. Army and former tenured professor at the University of Notre Dame, will serve as its new president.
In a Nov. 18 press release announcing the appointment, Talley said the school has a “unique opportunity” to “help young men and women get a rigorous academic experience in a faith-filled environment that’s strong in its Catholic identity so they can go forth in a world that’s become so challenging, so complex, so difficult.”
Talley will assume the position of the college’s 21st president on Jan. 2, 2026. The chair of Belmont Abbey College’s board of trustees, Charles Cornelio, said in the release that the appointment comes after a seven-month search.
Talley “is a person of deep Catholic faith who understands the mission of the college and will live it,” Cornelio said, highlighting the general’s decades-long history as a Benedictine oblate.
“Leaders who are balanced both morally and professionally are in greater need than ever before. For this purpose, Belmont Abbey College exists,” Talley said. “I thank God for the opportunity to become part of the Belmont Abbey College family, where together we can bear the light of Christ in the world today.”
Notre Dame professor attempts to distribute contraceptives, Plan B on campus
A professor of gender studies at the University of Notre Dame attempted to use university space to facilitate the distribution of contraceptives and Plan B, according to a Nov. 19 report published by the student-run paper the Irish Rover.
Pamela Butler, who is the director of undergraduate studies for the school’s gender studies department, has reportedly been reserving rooms in violation of university code for the group “Irish 4 Reproductive Health,” according to the Rover.
School guidelines grant the use of university buildings and grounds for “recognized student groups.” The “reproductive health” group — which stated in the report it was “not affiliated with the university in any official capacity” — has been distributing free “resource bags” with condoms, Plan B, and information on abortion services for students in the university’s DeBartolo Hall.
The group also openly advertises the distribution of contraception on Instagram as well as “workshops” hosted on campus on “exploring the principles of pro-choice Catholicism, how Catholic teaching supports reproductive justice, and how these ideas inform advocacy.”
Minnesota Catholic institutions, including schools and universities, hit by pension deficit
The pension fund covering multiple Catholic schools and universities across Minnesota has been hit by an $800 million deficit, threatening retirement resources for thousands of current and former workers.
The pension manager, Christian Brothers Services, is asking employers to make increased contributions to compensate for the massive shortfall, according to a report in the Minnesota Star Tribune, which cited “a big loss in a hedge fund that cratered a few years ago” in 2020 as reason for the deficit.
Christian Brothers Services is a nonprofit organization that operates a church pension plan, one that is not bound by federal pension regulations, meaning pensioners are not eligible for federal payouts if their plans fail, according to the IRS.
The Chicago-based organization manages the pensions of over 40 schools across the Dioceses of New Ulm, Crookston, and St. Cloud, as well as lay workers, and workers at St. Mary’s University in Winona and Minneapolis.
Two schools have since pulled from the plan, according to the local report, while two others are planning to do so.
Pope Leo XIV prays at tomb of St. Francis of Assisi
Pope Leo XIV visits the tomb of St. Francis in Assisi, Italy, on Nov. 20, 2025. / Credit: Vatican Media
Vatican City, Nov 20, 2025 / 16:00 pm (CNA).
Pope Leo XIV traveled to Assisi on Thursday to meet with Italian bishops and pay homage to St. Francis in a visit marked by silence and prayer, part of the celebrations for the eighth centenary of the death of the “saint of the poor.”
According to Vatican News, the pontiff traveled from the Vatican by helicopter and arrived in the Italian city shortly after 8 a.m. local time. He landed at the Bastia Umbra stadium and from there traveled by car to the heart of Assisi, where St. Francis was born in 1182.
Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio adopted his name upon becoming pope, while it was St. John Paul II who named St. Francis of Assisi the patron saint of ecology in 1979.
Despite the rain and cold, a number of people waited for the Holy Father and greeted him with applause and cheers of “Long live the pope!”
His first stop was the Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, the burial place of the founder of the Franciscan order. Leo XIV was received by the president of the Italian Bishops’ Conference (CEI by its Italian acronym), Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, and the custodian of the Sacro Convento (Franciscan friary) Friar Marco Moroni, who accompanied him to the crypt where the relics of St. Francis are kept.
Once in front of the tomb of the “Poverello” (“Little Poor Man”), the Holy Father paused for a few minutes in prayer. There he spoke his first public words of the day: “It is a blessing to be able to come to this sacred place today. We are approaching the 800th anniversary of the death of St. Francis; this occasion allows us to prepare to celebrate this great saint, humble and poor, while the world seeks signs of hope,” he said.
He also recalled the enduring legacy of St. Francis: “His witness continues to speak to us today, inviting us to keep hope alive and to look to the future with confidence.”
Afterward, Pope Leo XIV traveled to the Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli (Our Lady of the Angels) where he met with the bishops of the CEI, who are holding their 81st general assembly.
According to the Vatican Press Office, at the conclusion of the meeting with the bishops of the CEI, Pope Leo XIV traveled to the city of Montefalco, where he celebrated Mass in the monastery of the Augustinian nuns, which was erected in the 13th century.
It is one of the oldest and most significant spiritual centers in the Umbria region. It is linked to the figure of St. Clare of Montefalco (1268–1308), also known as St. Clare of the Cross, an Augustinian mystic whose contemplative life left a profound mark on the spiritual tradition of the Church. The pontiff had lunch there before returning to the Vatican by helicopter.
This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.
How to watch Pope Leo XIV’s historic live digital encounter with American youth
Pope Leo XIV waves to pilgrims gathered at his general audience on Oct.25, 2025. / Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/EWTN News
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 20, 2025 / 15:30 pm (CNA).
Pope Leo XIV will hold a historic live digital conversation with American teenagers at the National Catholic Youth Conference (NCYC) on Friday. The faithful across the globe can also tune in to watch the encounter.
The Holy Father will hold the digital discussion with young Catholics amid the Nov. 20–22 NCYC, hosted by the National Federation for Catholic Youth Ministry.
The pope will speak at 10:15 a.m. ET on Nov. 21 and enter into dialogue with a group of high school students.
People attending NCYC in Indianapolis at Lucas Oil Stadium can watch the encounter at the event, but others across the world are able to join online from homes, schools, and parishes.
The exchange will be broadcast via a livestream available on EWTN YouTube. Viewers can also watch through the EWTN app or on EWTN’s cable channel.
This marks the first time that a pope will directly engage with U.S. youth in a live digital encounter at NCYC. More than 40 teens have participated in the dialogue planning process, and five of them will get the chance to speak directly with the Holy Father.
For other news about the pope’s discussion and NCYC, the faithful can stay informed on CNA’s live updates page.