St. Mary's Church

Tanto cristianos como musulmanes han sido masacrados en Nigeria, donde hay actividad terrorista por cuestiones económicas, dijo el Papa León XIV a los periodistas al salir de su residencia de Castel Gandolfo la tarde del martes.

El Papa León XIV afirmó que se debe tratar a los inmigrantes con dignidad y alentó a todas las personas en Estados Unidos a escuchar el mensaje de sus obispos sobre inmigración.

El Papa León XIV se pronunció sobre la investigación en curso respecto a una denuncia contra el Obispo de Cádiz y Ceuta (España), Mons. Rafael Zornoza, por presuntos abusos.

El Papa León XIV se manifestó hoy “encantado de viajar”, y aseguró que quiere ir a los santuarios marianos de Fátima, en Portugal, y Guadalupe, en México. También dijo que “por supuesto” que quisiera volver a Perú y visitar Argentina y Uruguay.

El movimiento Comunión y Liberación organiza el primer Encuentro Buenos Aires, un espacio de diálogo y amistad que se llevará a cabo del 22 al 24 de noviembre con el lema “Hay un bien a punto de nacer en el límite de nuestro horizonte humano”. 

Castel Gandolfo, Italy, Nov 18, 2025 / 15:56 pm (CNA).

Pope Leo XIV said immigrants must be treated with dignity, and he encouraged all people in the United States to heed the bishops’ message on immigration.

“No one has said that the United States should have open borders. I think every country has a right to determine who and how and when people enter,” Pope Leo XIV said Nov. 18 outside the papal villa of Castel Gandolfo before returning to Rome after a daylong stay there.

“But when people are living good lives, and many of them for 10, 15, 20 years, to treat them in a way that is extremely disrespectful, to say the least — and there’s been some violence, unfortunately — I think that the bishops have been very clear in what they said. I think that I would just invite all people in the United States to listen to them.” 

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) on Nov. 12 overwhelmingly opposed the indiscriminate mass deportation of immigrants who lack legal status and urged the government to uphold the dignity of migrants.

Speaking in English, the first U.S.-born pope responded to a journalist’s question asking whether the pope could take credit for the bishops’ statement on immigration because U.S. bishops believe the pope has “got their back” on immigration. The pope replied that immigrants must be treated with dignity even if they lack legal status.

“I think we have to look for ways of treating people humanely, treating people with the dignity that they have. If people are in the United States illegally, there are ways to treat that. There are courts, there’s a system of justice. I think there are a lot of problems in the system,” the pope said.

In October, the pope used the word “inhuman” to refer to the immigration crackdown in the United States.

When journalists asked about a Chicago-area immigration facility where detainees have been barred from receiving Communion, Pope Leo said: “I would certainly invite the authorities to allow pastoral workers to attend to the needs of those people.” 

U.S. bishops met in Baltimore on Nov. 12 to approve a special message on immigration.

“I appreciate very much what the bishops have said. I think it’s a very important statement. I would invite, especially all Catholics, but people of goodwill to listen carefully to what they said,” the pope said.

CNA Staff, Nov 18, 2025 / 15:35 pm (CNA).

A rising number of New Yorkers are reportedly converting to the Catholic Church, with the spike in converts coming as the U.S. bishops say increasing numbers of men and women are coming into the faith in this country. 

The New York Post found that multiple New York City Catholic churches have year-over-year double or even triple the number of adults signing up to become Catholic through the Order of Christian Initiation of Adults (OCIA). 

At one parish, St. Joseph’s Church in Greenwich Village, interest in OCIA tripled since last year, with about 130 people signing up, according to the paper. At St. Vincent Ferrer on the Upper East Side, numbers have doubled to nearly 90 participants.

Sign-ups at the Basilica of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral also doubled to about 100, according to the report.

Many converts reportedly cited the Sept. 10 assassination of Charlie Kirk as a motivator for their conversions. In addition to his political activism, Kirk, an evangelical Protestant, often spoke about the importance of faith in God.

This report follows a trend of rising OCIA numbers throughout the U.S.

The National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news partner, reported in April on rising conversions across dioceses. Many new Catholics cited immigration, evangelization, and the National Eucharistic Revival as reasons they found their way into the Catholic Church last Easter.   

The U.S. bishops last week during their annual fall assembly in Baltimore also noted these rising numbers in a discussion about the National Eucharistic Revival as they approved the next National Eucharistic Congress for 2029.

Bishop Andrew Cozzens of Crookston, Minnesota, who spearheaded the most recent congress, said during a session on Nov. 12 that the revival was “a time of great grace for the Church in the United States.”

His diocese, he said, had its largest OCIA class in 20 years.

During the session, the bishops offered a show of hands of those who had large numbers of OCIA participants in their dioceses, with many bishops indicating rising numbers of converts. 

“Praise God. Let’s hope that this trend continues,” Cozzens said at the time.

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 18, 2025 / 15:05 pm (CNA).

Officials at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) encouraged clergy and religious volunteers to coordinate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to ensure detainees have access to holy Communion and religious services.

In an exclusive statement to EWTN, federal authorities affirmed that ICE facilitates religious services at all locations designed to hold detainees for more than 72 hours. Processing facilities that hold detainees for shorter periods may not qualify, according to DHS, although the constitutional right of access to pastoral care is at issue in a lawsuit involving people detained at an Illinois facility.

Although federal authorities said the Broadview ICE facility near Chicago was designed to hold people for 12 hours, detainees have testified in court that this is not always the reality in practice. A detainee said he was there for six days.

DHS alleged that “widespread misinformation and the news media” stoked confusion about the pastoral care policy and “turned religious services at ICE facilities into a political prop, threatening the safety of volunteers and detainees alike.”

Earlier this month, CNA and other outlets reported that Catholic clergy were denied access to the Broadview ICE facility near Chicago despite repeated attempts to get approval through the agency’s processes to provide detainees with Communion.

DHS said Broadview is not a detention facility but rather a field office and ICE cannot accommodate those requests. It said: “Illegal aliens are only briefly held there for processing before being transferred to a detention facility.”

Pastoral care at detention facilities

The DHS statement said religious volunteers are “highly encouraged” to contact any detention facilities meant to hold migrants for more than 72 hours “to provide services to detainees.”

“[ICE] welcomes religious and pastoral visits at its regular detention facilities and encourages religious volunteers to reach out to those facilities,” the statement said.

DHS provided a link to about 120 detention facilities for religious leaders to contact. Volunteers must meet the standard visitation requirements for approval, which includes advanced notice, identification, and a background check.

Every over-72-hour detention facility has chaplains and religious service coordinators, according to the statement, and detainees of all faiths “should be provided reasonable and equitable opportunities to practice their religious faith.” Access may be limited if there is a documented threat to safety, security, or orderly control of facility operations.

“We are diligent in making sure that those who we have in detention have access to that pastoral care [and] those religious services that they need, within reason, under the First Amendment,” Nate Madden, principal deputy assistant secretary for communications at DHS, told CNA.

“We welcome religious sisters, religious brothers, and friars and priests and everybody who can to go through those proper channels, fill out the appropriate paperwork, provide the proper notice, and work with us to make sure that these detainees have their religious needs met,” he said.

Ongoing concerns with Broadview

The DHS statement said it was “not within standard operating procedure” for religious services to be held at Broadview because it is not designed to hold detainees for long periods. Threats to safety have also made accommodation difficult, it said.

“ICE staff has repeatedly informed religious organizations that due to these ongoing threats and Broadview’s status as a field office, they are unable to accommodate requests for religious services,” the statement read.

According to DHS, rioters have assaulted and opened fire at law enforcement, destroyed vehicles, and thrown tear gas cans in Chicago. Protests at the ICE facility have become commonplace, and an alliance of more than 100 faith leaders of various denominations have come to the Broadview facility to push back on “Operation Midway Blitz,” a federal effort in Illinois to round up hundreds of immigrants lacking legal status since September. Among them was unarmed pastor David Black of the First Presbyterian Church in the Woodlawn neighborhood who was hit in the head with ICE pepper balls.

DHS’ Madden said: “Our ICE officers are facing a thousand-percent increase in assaults on the job and an 8,000% increase in death threats. And law enforcement is a dangerous business.” 

Even if pastoral workers were given access to Broadview in the past, Madden said law enforcement is “dealing with danger on the inside” and “dealing with danger on the outside. He said: “As part of our Catholic faith, we understand that we have to make prudential decisions when it comes to protecting safety and human life and dignity and everything else.”

Madden, who wears a Benedictine ring, urged people to “fulfill your Christian duty to come visit those in prison, visit those who are in detention.”

“Take Communion, take what you need,” he said. “Just go through the process, work with us, not against us. And we’ll figure out a way to do this so that everybody’s dignity is respected and that everybody gets what they need.”

In court filings, detainees have not only alleged that they are being kept at Broadview much longer than 12 hours but have also alleged unsanitary conditions, inadequate food and water, and a lack of personal hygiene products. They also alleged overcrowding, although the number of detainees at the facility has drastically declined in recent weeks, according to WTTW.

A judge issued a temporary restraining order to require the government to address the concerns, and a status hearing in the case is set for Nov. 19. Madden said the allegations about overcrowding and poor conditions are false.

“ICE runs these facilities to the highest standards possible and they respect the dignity of the human person for every single detainee that comes into their area of responsibility,” he said. “And they maintain that throughout the entire time that they are in ICE custody, all the way through from entrance to exit.”

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a special pastoral message on immigration Nov. 12 expressing concerns about mass deportations and the government’s treatment of migrants.

“We feel compelled now in this environment to raise our voices in defense of God-given human dignity,” the statement said, in part.

La Manzana Jesuítica de Córdoba, hito arquitectónico e histórico de Argentina, celebra el 25° aniversario de su declaración como Patrimonio de la Humanidad por la UNESCO. 

Los admiradores de Ruth Pakaluk, conversa al catolicismo y antigua atea, dicen que, aunque muchas de sus actividades pudieran parecer ordinarias —esposa, madre, voluntaria—, las vivió de un modo extraordinario.