The Church of St. Luke

Pope Francis waves to pilgrims in St. Peter's Square gathered for his weekly general audience on April 3, 2024. / Credit: Vatican Media

CNA Staff, Apr 12, 2024 / 17:00 pm (CNA).

A new Pew Research study has found that three-quarters of Catholics in the U.S. view Pope Francis favorably, though that figure has dipped 8% since 2021. 

In addition, the Pew report suggests that a majority of Catholics in the U.S. want the Church to change its teaching on a number of key issues, including the all-male priesthood, contraception, and so-called same-sex marriage. But broken down by political affiliation, significant differences in opinion emerge. 

“Regardless of their partisan leanings, most U.S. Catholics regard Francis as an agent of change. Overall, about 7 in 10 say the current pope represents a change in direction for the Church, including 42% who say he represents a major change,” the new April 12 Pew report reads. 

Francis’ approval rating among U.S. Catholics reached 90% in Pew’s 2015 survey. By September 2018 — at a time when the entire Church was reeling from fresh scandals related to sexual abuse — the pope’s approval rating stood at just 72%, the lowest of his papacy. It had ticked back up to 83% three years later, before its latest dip to 75% in February of this year.

Pope Francis’ late predecessor Benedict XVI initially had a low approval rating of 67% among U.S. Catholics upon taking office in 2005. By 2008, however, his approval rating had reached 83%, and he closed out his papacy at 74%, in 2013.

Neither Benedict nor Francis has yet achieved the lofty heights set by the saintly Pope John Paul II, who in 1990 and 1996 garnered approval from 93% of U.S. Catholics, according to Pew’s data.

Broken down by self-described party affiliation, 35% of Catholic Republicans and Republican leaners said they have an “unfavorable” view of Pope Francis, compared with just 7% of Catholic Democrats and Democratic leaners. Catholic Republicans’ views of Pope Francis have gotten more negative over the past decade, while the views of Catholic Democrats have not changed much, Pew says. 

“The partisan gap in views of Pope Francis is now as large as it’s ever been in our surveys,” Pew noted.

“Roughly 9 in 10 Catholics who are Democrats or lean toward the Democratic Party hold a positive view of him, compared with 63% of Catholics who are Republicans or lean Republican.” 

Pew asked respondents about their opinions on several hot-button issues related to the Church’s teaching and found that the Catholics most likely to be in favor of changing Church teaching largely identify as Democrats or lean Democratic (57%), and many say they seldom or never attend Mass (56%).

In contrast, Catholics who mostly say the Church should not change its teachings are predominantly Republicans or lean Republican (72%), and many say they attend Mass at least once a week (59%).

Of those surveyed, 83% said they favored a change of the Church’s teaching on contraception; 75% said the Church should allow Catholics to take Communion even if they are unmarried and living with a romantic partner; 69% said priests should be allowed to get married; 64% said women should be allowed to become priests; and 54% said the Church should recognize the marriages of gay and lesbian couples. (These findings are not markedly different from those of a decade ago, Pew says.)

Catholics who attend Mass regularly — once a week or more — are far more inclined than those who go less often to say the Church should take a “traditional or conservative” approach on questions about the priesthood and sexuality, Pew says. 

Archbishop Mario Antonio Cargnello of Salta, Argentina. / Credit: Archdiocese of Salta

ACI Prensa Staff, Apr 12, 2024 / 16:30 pm (CNA).

A civil court judge in Argentina has ruled in favor of the Carmelite sisters there in a case of alleged gender-based violence against the local archbishop.

Sophie Nélisse portrays Irena Gut Opdyke in the new film "Irena's Vow." / Credit: Quiver Distribution

CNA Staff, Apr 12, 2024 / 16:00 pm (CNA).

A new film depicting the incredible true story of Irena Gut Opdyke, a Polish Catholic nurse who risked her own life to hide Jews persecuted by Nazi Germany during World War II, debuts in theaters across the country April 15-16. 

“Irena’s Vow” is told through the eyes of strong-willed 19-year-old Irena Gut. When Gut is promoted to be the housekeeper in the home of a highly respected Nazi officer after learning that the Jewish ghetto is about to be liquidated, she makes it her mission to help the Jewish workers.

Gut decides to shelter them in the safest place she can think of — the basement of the German major’s house. Over the next two years, she uses her creativity and quick thinking to keep her friends safe until she is able to help them escape. 

Actress Sophie Nélisse portrays Gut in the film. She and Jeannie Smith, Irena’s real-life daughter, spoke to CNA about what they hope viewers will take away from the film and what it’s like for Smith to share and watch her mother’s story on the big screen.

“I immediately fell in love with Irena’s story because I felt it was just so relevant to this day, and I think there’s so much to learn from her story and a tale that brings a lot of hope, I find, despite all the horrific events,” Nélisse said. 

As a Catholic, Smith shared that her mother’s faith “100% played a role” in the work she did to save the lives of Jews. 

“She was raised that people mattered and that the differences in people did not matter,” she said. “They were all human beings and part of one human family and stood under God created by him.”

Smith added that Gut had “childlike trust.”

“[God] would open a path and she would walk in it and then it was up to him to take care of her, and her job was just to do what she was supposed to do — to follow. She kept that her whole life. It just was part of her. It wasn’t even something she had to think about,” Smith said.

Gut had no intention of ever sharing her story when she came to the United States, Smith explained. It wasn’t until she crossed paths with a “Holocaust denier” that she opened up about her experience. 

“She was faced with a Holocaust denier, over the phone, a young man who was just doing a report in school about the propaganda of it all,” Smith recalled. “That’s when she realized that if she didn’t start talking, history could easily repeat itself.”

From then on, her mother slowly began talking, but it was evident to Smith “how hard it was for her, especially that first time, and I stayed away from the subject.” 

“It wasn’t until I went with her to a school — I was almost 20, [and] I took her to a school so she could talk to kids — that I not only heard her story but saw the saw amazing reaction … and I thought, ‘Man, this story is powerful.’”

Gut received several recognitions for the work she did to protect Jews during the Holocaust, including being honored as a Righteous Among the Nations by the Israeli Holocaust Commission. This title is given to non-Jews who risked their lives to help Jewish people during WWII. She also received a Medal of Honor in a ceremony at Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, and her story is part of a permanent exhibit in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., among other recognitions.

One that particularly meant a lot to Gut was the papal blessing she received in 1995 from Pope John Paul II for her sacrifice. Smith explained that her mother had a very painful experience when she went to confession, after enduring sexual abuse and being forced to have sexual relations with the German major.

Unable to confess to her usual priest one day, Gut went to a young priest who Smith said was “more anti-Semitic and told her she didn’t have a part in the Catholic Church, which broke her heart.”

“So [there was] this papal blessing where Pope John Paul II, the Polish pope, sent a delegation from the Vatican, and we had a ceremony in a Jewish synagogue in Irvine, California,” she said. “So the mixture was amazing, and it was just coming home for her. It meant a lot.”

Nélisse pointed out that Irena Gut’s life can inspire everyone. 

“I think we as individuals think that we can’t really make a difference or that we’re too small to really have an impact, and I think that she’s the perfect example that — I mean, she obviously did heroic things — [but] by doing tiny things that seem so simple, it could be smiling to someone or helping them with a bag or complimenting them, it does have a ripple effect,” Nélisse said.

Smith added that she has heard from kids who were thinking about taking their lives by suicide, but one day someone sat with them at lunch and that changed their minds. She hopes that her mother’s story reminds people that “we are all able to do amazing things.”

“People will call my mom a hero or somebody who’s special, and she wouldn’t have liked that and I don’t either, because you label somebody that way and it gives them permission to do things that you can’t, [but] the bottom line is we are all able to do amazing things,” she said.

Jaroslaw Kaczynski (front, center), leader of the Law and Justice political party (PiS) in Poland, takes part in the voting on four draft projects on abortion rights at the Polish Parliament (SEJM) on April 12, 2024, in Warsaw, Poland. / Credit: Omar Marques/Getty Images

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Apr 12, 2024 / 15:00 pm (CNA).

Lawmakers on Friday advanced four pro-abortion bills to be considered by a special committee in the Sejm, which is Poland’s lower legislative body.

Bree Solstad, a young woman who previously produced and acted in the pornography industry, is among the adult converts who entered the Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil this year on March 30, 2024. / Credit: Miss B Converted in X

ACI Prensa Staff, Apr 12, 2024 / 14:30 pm (CNA).

Bree Solstad, a young woman who previously produced and acted in the pornography industry, is among the adult converts who entered the Catholic Church this Easter, leaving behind her life of “countless sins” and embracing the Catholic faith.

Solstad told ChurchPop that prior to her conversion, she led a life full of promiscuity and self-obsession, which spiked when a “recruiter” reached out to her.

“I was drinking more heavily and started a blog about my hedonistic behavior. The blog caught the attention of a successful sex worker, who reached out to me and essentially recruited me,” she said. “She showed me how to get set up and introduced me to some important people in the industry who could help me make as much money as possible. I had no moral compass and was all about myself anyway.”

Solstad, who now goes by Miss B Converted on X and presents herself as “a repentant sinner who converted to Christ; former porn actress and producer,” announced on Jan. 1, the solemnity of Mary, Mother of God, her decision to “quit sex work. To repent of my countless sins. To give up my life of sin, wealth, vice, and vain self-obsession.”

She shared with her followers that her decision came after a trip to Rome and Assisi in Italy, where touched by the beauty of the art she saw in the churches she visited and the theology it represented, she experienced “what can only be described as a life-altering conversion.”

“This is a humbling experience and one that I know may be mocked or questioned by many. I am giving up all my income and turning my life over to Christ. I am leaving behind my life of rampant sin, vice, pride, debauchery, vanity, and lies to — with God’s grace — live a life of truth, beauty, obedience to God’s divine will, virtue, and humility,” she wrote on X. 

Solstad, who had an account on various pornographic content platforms, said that she had been preparing for the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA) for some time and that she planned to be confirmed and receive her first Communion during the Easter Vigil this Holy Week. She made her first confession on Spy Wednesday.

“Thank you, Jesus,” she prayed on X, “for not giving up on such a wretched sinner. Thank you Blessed Mary, Mother of God, for your immense love and consolation.”

The young convert added that “God’s forgiveness and mercy is real. If someone as broken and sinful as me can be redeemed and converted, there is no doubt anyone reading this can also be saved by his divine mercy.”

The Virgin Mary and St. Clare of Assisi

Solstad was baptized as a Lutheran when she was 8 years old and considered herself at least “nominally Christian,” she explained April 5 to ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner.

However, during college she lived a life of “drunkenness, drugs, and promiscuity.” Experiencing a tragedy in her life, she prayed hard but, she said, “I felt like God had turned his back on me and so I did the same to him,” Solstad commented to ChurchPop.

In 2023 she traveled to Italy, where she always noticed the crucifixes in the churches she visited. However in Sorrento, she said, “I noticed the Virgin Mary on street corners all over the place. All of a sudden, I felt like Mary was calling me in the strangest way. Each time I entered a church, I felt compelled to seek her out.”

At Assisi, she said, “I was impressed by St. Francis, but I was moved to tears by St. Clare. I knelt by her tomb and again asked for assistance. I felt like St. Clare was actually present with me and that she was going to take all the pain and anxiety from me and somehow give it to God,” Solstad told ACI Prensa.

After that experience and returning home, “I quickly realized that I didn’t like what my life was like,” she said. “I hated my job. I felt disgusting and guilty for the work I had been doing for a decade. I couldn’t stop thinking of all the things that I had done and all the lives I negatively affected through pornography. I felt grotesque.”

Solstad soon looked for a priest and spoke with him and his secretary, who told her “God loves you,” words that were like “a waterfall of light” and made her long “to be someone better. I wanted to be clean, I wanted to be happy and a great example of God’s love.”

While in RCIA, she said, she had to overcome some anti-Catholic prejudice she inherited from the Lutheran background, but she diligently researched everything “and I always came to the realization that what the Catholic Church was teaching was true.”

“I have honestly fallen in love with the Catholic Church,” she continued,  “There is such richness in the faith. The Holy Trinity, the Father, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, Mary the Mother of God, all the inspiring, heroic, and beautiful saints, the sacraments, the history, the tradition, everything! But what has touched me the most is the Eucharist … something so surprising for me with Jesus physically present.”

Entry into Catholic Church, first Communion

On April 3, Solstad shared on her social media some photos of her first Communion at the Easter Vigil on March 30.

“These five seconds will forever be emblazoned in my heart, mind, and soul. This is the best moment of my life,” the young woman wrote. 

“My life has changed for the better so much during these past several months, but it pales in comparison to how much this moment of receiving my first Eucharist permanently transformed me,” she recounted.

“I will never be the same again and I thank God for this undeniable fact. I am so in love with you, Jesus. Never allow me to move even one inch from your most Sacred Heart,” she wrote.

Solstad concluded her post with the first part of the Magnificat, the prayer the Virgin Mary exclaimed when she was pregnant with Jesus and met her cousin Elizabeth, who was pregnant with John the Baptist.

“My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has regarded the low estate of his handmaiden. For he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name. And his mercy is on those who fear him from generation to generation,” she wrote, quoting Mary’s response to Elizabeth as recorded in Luke’s Gospel. 

Solstad’s sole source of income now is from her religious goods store, which can be found here.

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA. Excerpts were also drawn from ChurchPop.

German police cars (file image) / Mike Baumeister via Unsplah (CC0)

CNA Newsroom, Apr 12, 2024 / 14:00 pm (CNA).

The Düsseldorf public prosecutor’s office revealed that the suspects, between 15 and 16 years old, were apprehended over the Easter weekend.

Pope Francis meets with a group of 200 children studying catechism and in a relaxed manner answered some of their questions on April 11, 2024, at St. John Mary Vianney Parish in Borghesiana, Italy. / Credit: Vatican Media

ACI Prensa Staff, Apr 12, 2024 / 13:30 pm (CNA).

Pope Francis made a special “getaway” from the Vatican on Thursday to meet with a group of 200 children at a parish in metro Rome.

Archbishop Georg Gänswein and Pope Francis on St. Peter’s Square, May 21, 2014. / Credit: Daniel Ibañez/CNA

CNA Newsroom, Apr 12, 2024 / 10:25 am (CNA).

While speculation is again running rife on social media about Archbishop Georg Gänswein’s next role, neither he nor the Vatican have confirmed a nuncio posting.

Bishop Mark Seitz of the Diocese of El Paso speaks at the “Responding to Changing Realities at the U.S. Border and Beyond" conference, hosted by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Catholic University of America on April 11, 2024. / Credit: Photo courtesy of The Catholic University of America

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Apr 12, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).

Bishop Mark Seitz of the Diocese of El Paso criticized a Texas law that increases the state’s role in deterring illegal immigration to the United States and denounced “anti-immigrant” rhetoric that he said is rising in the country’s two major political parties.

Seitz, who chairs the Committee on Migration of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), commented on the Lone Star State’s new law during an immigration conference jointly hosted by the Catholic University of America and the USCCB. The April 11 event was titled “Responding to Changing Realities at the U.S. Border and Beyond.”

SB 4, which Gov. Greg Abbott signed in December 2023, makes illegal border crossing a state crime and allows state police to arrest people who enter the United States illegally through Texas. U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration has sued the state over the law based on allegations that it usurps the federal government’s authority to enforce laws related to immigration. 

“We’re concerned that this leads to profiling — racial profiling as well,” Seitz said. “It puts fear into every immigrant no matter what their immigration status may be.”

The bishop questioned the constitutionality of the law and how it could be effective without the cooperation of Mexican authorities. He further argued that the law threatens the right to seek asylum by denying the “opportunity to be processed … to see if their claims to asylum are legitimate or not.” 

“[We] hope and pray the courts will not cave to the political pressure,” Seitz said.

During his discussion at the conference, the bishop was critical of “anti-immigrant” rhetoric and approaches to policy, which he said now exists in “both parties.” He claimed the media has “misrepresented” the situation at the border, which he said has also stoked anti-immigrant sentiment.

“You’re not going to see chaos [at the border],” Seitz said. “You’re going to see lots of fences and wires and things like that.”

The bishop, who works with migrants and hosts a shelter on his property in the diocese, spoke positively of the individuals with whom he has interacted. 

“I meet these people every day,” Seitz said. “They’re some of the most peaceful, patient family-oriented people I’ve ever met.”

Speaking to CNA following his remarks at the conference, Seitz said the Catholic Church provides a “beautiful balance” for ensuring the dignity of migrants is respected and that countries can maintain their borders. 

“The Church says nations have a right to a border and they have a right and a responsibility to control their border,” the bishop explained. “So we don’t have a problem with that.” 

Seitz said, however, that the answer cannot be “to close off the possibility of a legitimate flow across the border.” 

“People have a right to migrate when there is a need,” the bishop added. 

Other speakers at the conference echoed similar concerns about policy and rhetoric. 

Father David Hollenbach, a Jesuit priest and research professor at Georgetown University, cited messages in Scripture about welcoming strangers and argued that the United States has a moral obligation to assist migrants and refugees because the country has the capacity to help in a way that poorer countries do not. 

“These people are created in the image and likeness of God,” Hollenbach said during a panel discussion. 

Another speaker, Sister Sharlet Ann Wagner, executive director of the Newcomer Network at the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C., branch of Catholic Charities USA, said during a panel discussion that politicians are “using immigrants as political footballs.” 

Although Wagner acknowledged that some local communities have “unanticipated costs” when dealing with the influx of migrants, she said most are of prime working age and desire to work. 

“This is an investment that will pay off,” Wagner said.

Although the conference focused mostly on an obligation to assist migrants in coming to the country, some Catholics have expressed a more cautious approach to the influx of people who have entered the country between official ports of entry.

Chad Pecknold, a professor of systematic theology at the Catholic University of America, who was not a part of the conference, told CNA that the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas on immigration provide “a sound and reasonable guide for these discussions.” 

Referencing Aquinas in the “Summa Theologiae,” Pecknold recalled that the doctor of the Church “teaches that while hospitality should be offered to the wayfarer passing through, political communities must ensure that those ‘entering to remain’ demonstrate a commitment to the customs, language, religion, and mores of their commonweal.” 

“Every human being having dignity does not immediately and obviously supersede the sovereignty of nations,” Pecknold added. “Statesmen have a sacred duty to safeguard the political common good of their country, and this will sometimes mean restricting who can legally enter and remain in their countries,” he noted.

Maya Hawke as American writer Flannery O'Connor in the 2024 film "Wildcat." / Credit: Oscilloscope Laboratories

CNA Staff, Apr 12, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

A new film depicting the life of American writer Flannery O’Connor, whose work reflected her Catholic faith and frequently examined questions of faith, morality, and suffering, will be released in theaters on May 3. 

"Wildcat" follows O’Connor as she struggles with a lupus diagnosis at age 24, the same disease that took her father’s life, and dives into an exploration of beliefs. Actress Maya Hawke portrays O’Connor, and her father, Ethan Hawke, directed, co-wrote, and produced the film.

The inspiration for the movie came from Maya Hawke, who created a monologue from entries in O’Connor’s “Prayer Journal” for an audition for Juilliard, to which she was accepted. After performing her monologue for her family, they were blown away. She said that ever since, she’s had a personal connection with O’Connor and eventually asked her father to help her make the movie.

Executive producer Eric Groth, a Catholic and the CEO of Renovo Media Group and president of ODB Films, told CNA in an interview that he was drawn to the movie because “we [his company] really love to bring beautiful, good, and true stories front and center and that certainly focus on things of a Catholic nature.”

“I hadn’t read a lot of Flannery, I had read a little bit, but I was very intrigued by her and who she was and how important she was in the 20th century as an author,” he added. “And I was very fascinated by the fact that there hadn’t been a lot of things produced about her or her stories.”

However, what attracted him the most to the film was the “family element.” 

“I love that Ethan and Maya were doing something as a father and daughter and even Ethan’s wife, Ryan, was one of our lead producers and all of Ethan’s other kids found their way into the film as well,” Groth said.

Groth pointed out that he believes this story is important to tell today because “the culture can really learn from her.”

“I think she had a really great ability to converge all her faith with what she was living out in her day,” he explained.

The producer shared that in his eyes, O’Connor “kind of flips grace on its head. We kind of put God in a box and think if God is going to deliver grace it’s going to come through this really nice channel … I think Flannery says, ‘Look, God can deliver his grace in any way, any time, any fashion.’”

He continued: “People need to know that God is there, God is present, and we can look and see that God’s grace comes from all different things.”

Groth hopes that viewers will “walk away with a tremendous appreciation” for the 20th-century Gothic-style writer.

“She saw the messiness of the world, and that messiness — God is in the midst of it, that God enters into it and that our lives are messy,” he said. “I want people to walk away seeing somebody who saw that and understood it. I want them to walk away seeing a young woman who suffered terribly from a disease that ultimately took her life, but that she pressed on.”

He added that he hopes the audience will see that “we’re called to seek that relationship with God and it’s going to be difficult at times, but also that we can be victorious and that we can look to see how God’s going to deliver grace to us in all kinds of ways.”

Watch the trailer for “Wildcat” below.