The Church of St. Luke

Human-rights lawyer Jared Genser is advocating on behalf of all Armenian prisoners of war and refugees of Nagorno-Karabakh and for true peace and stability between Armenia and Azerbaijan. / Credit: Free Armenian Prisoners campaign

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Apr 3, 2025 / 15:00 pm (CNA).

A renowned international human rights lawyer is urging the Trump administration to fulfill its campaign promise and intervene on behalf of Armenian Christians as a recently negotiated peace agreement with Azerbaijan threatens to leave prisoners stranded.

“Our request up front to the administration has been quite clear: [A] deal for the release of Armenian Christian POWs must be a precondition to [a peace deal] moving forward, which has been the position of the administration,” Washington, D.C.-based international human rights lawyer Jared Genser told CNA.

Earlier this month, Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed to the text of a peace agreement that would end nearly four decades of conflict between the embattled countries. Neither country has signed the compact, though Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on social media has expressed eagerness to do so, despite widespread disagreement over several of its reported stipulations.

Once dubbed “the Extractor” by the New York Times, Genser is known for his successful work in freeing wrongfully imprisoned people around the world. He is currently working to free Ruben Vardanyan, the former state minister of the Nagorno-Karabakh region’s ethnic Armenian separatist government.

At the end of Azerbaijan’s nine-month blockade of the territory, Vardanyan was arrested while attempting to flee with his wife and has been detained in Baku ever since. 

Genser said that Vardanyan, a Christian belonging to the Armenian Apostolic Church, has been denied access to a Bible, which he said “has only reinforced that the persecution of him and other leaders from Nagorno-Karabakh is not exclusively because they were an alleged ‘breakaway republic’ but relates to the fact that he’s a Christian.”

“We’ve also seen since the ethnic cleansing as well the burning to the ground of Armenian churches and other Armenian heritage sites,” Genser added.

Vardanyan faces 42 separate charges and awaits trial before a military tribune, despite never having served in the military. Since being imprisoned, he has undergone 200 hunger strikes, according to Genser, with the latest strike lasting 23 days, during which he lost about 14 pounds.

Freedom for Armenian Christian POWs must come before any peace deal

Part of his work in freeing Vardanyan, Genser said, is advocating on behalf of all Armenian prisoners of war and refugees of Nagorno-Karabakh and for true peace and stability between the two countries. 

“When you represent a high-profile political prisoner,” Genser said, “your instructions are not to exclusively lobby for them because that really doesn’t even work, even if you wanted to do that. Really, it’s to look at the broader set of issues that are implicated and to work hard at addressing them.”

Genser pointed out that President Donald Trump had campaigned on standing up for persecuted Armenian Christians, condemning what took place in Nagorno-Karabakh as “ethnic cleansing” while on the campaign trail in October 2024.

Now, Genser said release of the prisoners is “a top priority for the new administration.”

“We have been told that their freedom needs to be a precondition for President Trump to ultimately bless a peace deal,” Genser revealed.

“I think that’s a really important development because our biggest fear all along has been that if a peace deal were to proceed, and there was no resolution of Nagorno-Karabakh or of the Armenian Christian POWs, then unfortunately, it could lead to a sacrificing of those prisoners as a part of the peace deal.”

Neither of these critical issues are contained in the current peace deal, nor are they on the bilateral agenda, according to Genser. However, he said there are many things the Trump administration can do to push for these ends.

Genser declined to say what specific methods should be employed to apply pressure on Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev for the POWs, though he encouraged the Trump administration to “shock” Azerbaijan’s president, whom he described as a dictator. 

“At the end of the day,” Genser said, “dictators only release political prisoners when they have to. They never do it because they want to or because they’re magnanimous or humanitarian by orientation.” 

“The only way that happens is when the dictator sees the cost of detaining the political prisoner or political prisoners as being dramatically higher than the benefits of detaining them.” 

Beyond the situation faced by Armenian POWs in Azerbaijan, Genser said there are “many issues outstanding in terms of the conditions of the peace deal as well that are worrying.”

Chief among them are Aliyev’s demands that Armenia cede the Lachin Corridor, giving him a pathway to lay a pipeline from Azerbaijan to Turkey via Armenia, and that Armenia remove a preamble in its constitution that lays a territorial claim on Nagorno-Karabakh. 

“The problem with that is that one has never seen any peace deal in the world where a country gives up their sovereign land and cuts off part of their own population from the main part of the country, which is what this would do,” Genser said.

As the Jamestown Foundation pointed out in its analysis of the peace deal, the Armenian government’s messaging on this front has been mixed, with Pashinyan having in the past stated Azerbaijan’s constitution contains territorial claims rather than the other way around, while also advocating as recently as March 13 for constitutional amendments that would have “inherently regional significance.”

“Unless Azerbaijan withdraws its long-standing demand that the Armenian Constitution be changed, it is unlikely to be signed before mid-2026 or even 2027,” the article noted.

Amid the dispute, Azerbaijan has accused Armenia of violating its ceasefire agreement — which Armenia denies — augmenting further tension between the countries as the fate of political prisoners hangs in the balance.

When asked about the plight of Armenian Christian POWs, the State Department told CNA: “We continue to monitor the situation closely through our embassies in the region. All those detained should have their human rights respected and, if criminally charged, have all fair trial guarantees afforded to them.”

Genser said peace will not be possible until “all relevant issues and all relevant potential provocations have been identified, negotiated, and fully addressed as part of a peace deal itself.”

“A peace deal that leaves unresolved what the future is going to look like for the people of Nagorno-Karabakh and the release of the Armenian Christian POWs is a recipe for future flare-ups, disagreements, and even potential war,” he said.

Cardinal Jean-Marc Aveline has been elected president of the French bishops’ conference, succeeding Archbishop Éric de Moulins-Beaufort as the Catholic Church in France continues responding to revelations of sexual abuse. / Credit: Laurent Coust/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

CNA Newsroom, Apr 3, 2025 / 12:00 pm (CNA).

The 66-year-old cardinal from Marseille will take over leadership of the French episcopate in July as the Church continues implementing sexual abuse reforms.

Idaho Capitol in Boise. / Credit: Through the Lens of Life/Shutterstock

CNA Staff, Apr 3, 2025 / 11:30 am (CNA).

Here is a roundup of recent pro-life and abortion-related news:

Idaho governor signs in utero human development education law

Idaho Republican Gov. Brad Little recently signed a law requiring public schools to teach students about human development in the womb. 

Last week Little signed the bill, which passed in the Idaho Senate in a 27-8 vote at the end of February and in the Idaho House 63-6 in March.

The law requires schools to teach about fetal development in grades 5 through 12 beginning in the 2025-2026 school year. 

Lessons must include a high-definition ultrasound video at least three minutes long that shows the development of vital organs as well as a rendered or animated video showing the process of fertilization and the stages of human development within the uterus. 

Live Action founding president Lila Rose noted in a post on X that this would include Live Action digital resources such as the “Baby Olivia” video, which follows the growth and development of an unborn child in the womb from conception to just before birth. 

Rose called the move a “big win for truth, science, and life!” In a statement she said she hopes students in Idaho “will gain a deeper understanding of the incredible process of how human life begins.”

Other states that require education on fetal development include North Dakota and Tennessee. 

Alabama attorney general can’t prosecute out-of-state abortion funding

A federal judge ruled on Monday that Alabama can’t prosecute people for obtaining or funding an abortion in another state where it is legal. 

The decision followed a 2023 lawsuit against state Attorney General Steve Marshall, who once threatened that he would prosecute funding for abortion in other states. In 2022 Marshall said funding abortions out of state is “potentially criminally actionable for us.”

Two pro-abortion organizations that fund abortions — the Yellowhammer Fund and West Alabama Women’s Center — requested a declaratory judgment that Marshall’s comments were unconstitutional.

Judge Myron Thompson of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Alabama said in this week’s ruling that the attorney general’s “threatened prosecutions are unlawful,” citing the right to travel as well as the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. 

Thompson ruled that Alabama may outlaw “what happens in its own backyard” but “it is another thing for the state to enforce its values and laws” against people who travel to another state where the conduct is legal.

Other states like Idaho and Tennessee ban “abortion trafficking,” including moving minors across state lines to obtain abortions. 

Nevada can enforce dormant parental notification abortion law, judge rules

A judge ruled Monday that Nevada can enforce a 40-year-old parental notification law for minors obtaining abortions.

U.S. District Court Judge Anne Traum in Nevada ruled that the 1985 law may take effect April 30. Traum cited the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson decision that repealed Roe v. Wade.

The Nevada law requires that parents or guardians are notified when minors receive abortions, but it allows an exception for minors who get a court order to authorize the abortion.

Traum left the possibility open for opponents to seek a court order to block the law while they challenge it, noting that “the injunction should be lifted unless the 1985 law should be enjoined on an alternative constitutional ground.”

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals initially found the law to be unconstitutional under Roe v. Wade. But after Roe was reversed, Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford and others took legal steps to restore the law.

Abortion in Nevada is legal until 24 weeks with exceptions for the mother’s life or health. A possible ballot measure is in progress that, if passed, could enshrine a right to abortion in the state constitution.

A philosopher of science and technology, Father Ricardo Mejía Fernández is an expert in transhumanism. / Credit: Photo courtesy of Father Ricardo Mejía Fernández

Madrid, Spain, Apr 3, 2025 / 10:30 am (CNA).

In a new book titled “Integral Transhumanism,” Spanish priest Ricardo Mejía Fernández examines the transhumanist movement.

A Planned Parenthood facility in Indianapolis. / Credit: Jonathan Weiss/Shutterstock

Ann Arbor, Michigan, Apr 3, 2025 / 08:30 am (CNA).

A coalition of pro-life organizations on Wednesday held rallies outside abortuaries to demand that Congress and the White House completely end the taxpayer subsidy of killing unborn human beings, nationally and at the state level.

The Pro-Life Action League and Citizens for a Pro-Life Society promoted the April 2 Nationwide Day of Protest to Defund Planned Parenthood to redirect public funds away from abortion to instead go to health centers that affirm life. 

In an interview with CNA, Matt Yonke of the Pro-Life Action League pointed out that “Planned Parenthood provides less than 1% of annual pap tests and clinical breast exams but performs 42% of annual abortions in the U.S. They’ve been caught shielding child predators, defrauding Medicaid, and harvesting fetal tissue for profit.” 

“Now with the Trump administration, it’s time to put defunding Planned Parenthood back on the table. Americans, even people who don’t have moral qualms about abortion, don’t want their tax dollars going to abortion,” he said. Yonke told CNA some 80 rallies took place in 20 states across the country.

The Trump administration is moving to freeze $27.5 million in federal funds for Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers of the more than $286 million allocated to the Title X program for the current fiscal year, according to the Wall Street Journal. 

Yonke cited as an example of pro-life action the rally that took place Wednesday at the Planned Parenthood-Aurora Health Center in Aurora, Illinois. The facility provides surgical and chemical abortion, contraception, and sex education. According to Yonke, the location also serves as a call center. Speaking to broad support among pro-lifers, Yonke said: “This is definitely an ecumenical effort among Christians.”

Monica Miller of Citizens for a Pro-Life Society told CNA that rallies were planned at four abortion facilities in Michigan, where she is based. “We want to draw attention to this issue and let Planned Parenthood know we are not going away,” Miller said.

The Government Accounting Office (GAO) found that federal funds going to domestic and international organizations providing “preventative health care services, including sexual and reproductive health services [and] family planning” as well as “treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS,” amounted to approximately $8 billion during the 2019–2021 period. During that time, Planned Parenthood Federation of America received about $148 million in HHS grants as well as $1.54 billion in Medicare, Medicaid, and CHIP (Children’s Health Insurance Program) payments. Its affiliates also received $89 million in loans and accrued interest that were forgiven.

In addition, the International Planned Parenthood Federation received about $2.03 million from the now-defunct U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Separately, MSI Reproductive Choices received about $1.35 million from USAID.  

Yonke said pro-lifers do not want to reduce spending on legitimate health care and that defunding Planned Parenthood “would not reduce the overall pool for spending on health care or women’s health care in particular.” 

Planned Parenthood not only receives millions in federal subsidies, it is also a political powerhouse. According to OpenSecrets, the organization gave over $500,000 to Democratic congressional candidates during the 2023-2024 season. 

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri, has introduced the End Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Providers Act, which would defund Planned Parenthood and abortion providers nationally.

“Americans have long made it clear that they oppose taxpayer-funded abortions,” Hawley said. “My legislation defends the unborn and upholds the will of the American people.” Similar legislation has been introduced in the House.

“We want to extract this bad actor, Planned Parenthood, from every level of public life altogether,” Yonke emphasized. Citing a recent New York Times article that references botched abortions, misplaced IUDs, declining revenue, and staff fatigue at Planned Parenthood affiliates, Yonke said the time is ripe to take action. 

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Christians should not see the Nicene Creed simply as a list of things they believe, but they should look at it with awe because it recounts the greatness of God's love and gift of salvation, said members of the International Theological Commission.

"Nicaea presents the reality of the work of redemption: In Christ, God saves us by entering into history. He does not send an angel or a human hero, but comes himself into human history, being born of a woman, Mary, into the people of Israel and dying in a specific historical period, 'under Pontius Pilate,'" the scholars said.

Members of the commission, who are appointed by the pope and advise the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, released the document, "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior: 1700th Anniversary of the Ecumenical Council of Nicaea (325-2025)."

The document was approved by Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, prefect of the dicastery and president of the commission, and its publication was authorized by Pope Francis.

The document was released April 3 in French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish. An English translation is being prepared.

The Council of Nicaea met in 325 in what is now Iznik, Turkey. It was the first of the "ecumenical" councils that gathered bishops from all Christian communities. 

"Its profession of faith and canonical decisions were promulgated as normative for the whole church," the theological commission members said. "The unprecedented communion and unity aroused in the church by the Jesus Christ event are made visible and effective in a new way by a structure of universal scope, and the proclamation of the good news of Christ in all its immensity also receives an instrument of unprecedented authority and scope."

While the wording of the Creed was refined at the Council of Constantinople in 381, the commission said, its basic affirmations were defined at Nicaea and continue to form the essential profession of faith for all Christians.

In reciting what technically is the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, "we confess that the transcendent Truth is written in history and acts in history," the document said. "That is why Jesus' message cannot be disassociated from his person: he is 'the way, the truth and the life' for everyone and not just one teacher of wisdom among others."

Celebrating the 1,700th anniversary of the council should give new energy to evangelization efforts, the document said. 

To use the Creed as the starting point for proclaiming Jesus as savior, it said, means first "to be amazed" by the immensity of Christ's love and obedience "so that all may be amazed" and "to revive the fire of our love for the Lord Jesus, so that all may burn with love for him."

"Proclaiming Jesus as our salvation from the faith expressed at Nicaea does not lead to ignoring the reality of humanity," it said. "It does not distract from the sufferings and shocks that torment the world and today seem to undermine all hope."

"Rather," it said, "it confronts these difficulties by confessing the only redemption possible, purchased by the one who has known in the very depths of his being the violence of sin and rejection, the loneliness of abandonment and death and who, from the abyss of evil, has risen to carry us, in his victory, to the glory of the resurrection."

What is more, the theologians said, "the faith of Nicaea, in its beauty and grandeur, is the common faith of all Christians. All are united in the profession of the Symbol of Nicaea-Constantinople, even if not all give an identical status to this council and its decisions."

Still, they said, celebrating the anniversary together is "an invaluable opportunity to emphasize that what we have in common is much stronger, quantitatively and qualitatively, than what divides us: all together, we believe in the triune God; in Christ true man and true God; in salvation in Jesus Christ, according to the Scriptures read in the Church and under the guidance of the Holy Spirit; together, we believe in the Church, baptism, the resurrection of the dead and eternal life." 

The Creed also should inspire hope among individuals as they recognize in various lines how God created them, loves them, saves them and will bring them to him at the end of time, the document said.

"Moreover," it said, "hope in 'the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come' attests to the immense value of the individual person, who is not destined to disappear into nothingness or into the whole but is called to an eternal relationship with that God who chose each person before the foundation of the world."

The International Theological Commission also asked people to consider their affirmation that the church is "one, holy, catholic and apostolic."

Christians profess and believe, the commission said, that "the Church is one beyond its visible divisions, holy beyond the sins of its members and the errors committed by its institutional structures," as well as universal and apostolic in a way that goes beyond cultural and national tensions that have plagued it at different times in its history.

One goal of the council was to establish a common date for Easter to express the unity of the church, the document said. Unfortunately, since the reform of the calendar in the late 1500s, Easter on the Julian calendar used by some Orthodox churches coincides only occasionally with Easter on the Gregorian calendar used throughout the West and by many Eastern Christians.

The different dates for celebrating "the most important feast" on the Christian calendar "creates pastoral discomfort within communities, to the point of dividing families, and causing scandal among non-Christians, thus damaging the witness given to the Gospel," the document said.

In 2025, however, the calendars coincide, which the theologians said should give more energy to the dialogue aimed at finding agreement.

In late January, Pope Francis affirmed again the Catholic position, officially taken by St. Paul VI in the 1960s: if Eastern Christians agree on a way to determine a common date for Easter, the Catholic Church will accept it.

U.S. Supreme Court. / Credit: PT Hamilton/Shutterstock

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Apr 2, 2025 / 18:16 pm (CNA).

The United States Supreme Court on Wednesday heard oral arguments for a lawsuit that will determine whether South Carolina and other states can deny Medicaid reimbursements to Planned Parenthood for non-abortive medical services.

All three justices appointed by Democrats appeared to empathize with Planned Parenthood in the case, but the six Republican-appointed justices were more nuanced with their questions for the lawyers representing both parties.

Federal Medicaid funds cannot be used to cover elective abortions, but federal law does not restrict abortion clinics, such as Planned Parenthood facilities, from receiving Medicaid funds for other services they offer.

However, in 2016, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster signed an executive order to block abortion clinics from receiving Medicaid reimbursements for any services, arguing that tax money should not support institutions that perform abortions. This spurred a lawsuit from Planned Parenthood and a patient named Julie Edwards who was receiving non-abortive services at a Planned Parenthood facility through Medicaid.

The bulk of the legal arguments focus on one line in federal law that regulates the way in which state governments must structure their Medicaid reimbursement policies.

Under the federal law, “any individual eligible for medical assistance … may obtain such assistance from any [doctor or health care provider] qualified to perform the service or services required.”

Interpretation of federal law

John Bursch, a lawyer with Alliance Defending Freedom representing South Carolina, and Nicole Saharsky, a lawyer representing Planned Parenthood, disputed the meaning of the federal law and whether patients can file lawsuits about the matter.

Bursch told the justices that states have the authority to set their own eligibility requirements and argued that the federal law does not establish an absolute “right” to receive services from any medical provider and patients should not be able to seek recourse through the courts. 

“[There’s] a difference between a benefit and a right,” he said and alleged that to assert an absolute right, there would need to be “rights-creating language with … an unmistakable focus on the benefited class.”

Bursch argued that South Carolina has many other alternative health care providers that can provide the services covered by Medicaid and acknowledged that one of the primary reasons the state denied funding to Planned Parenthood was because “they’re the nation’s largest abortion provider.”

Saharsky disputed those claims, arguing that the federal law uses “individual-centric rights-creating language that imposes a mandatory obligation” on South Carolina and all other states.

She said the federal law ensures that a patient “may obtain [these services] from any qualified and willing provider,” which she said prevents health care providers from “being excluded from Medicaid arbitrarily.” She argued that this language has the same effect as it would if Congress had used the word “right” or the language that no person “shall be denied.”

Saharsky referred to South Carolina’s rules as imposing a “magic word test” by asserting that there is no established “right” based on the word choice used. 

Justices weigh the arguments

Justices appointed by Democrats landed heavily on the side of Planned Parenthood during the oral arguments.

“What this language does is the same as the rights language does,” Justice Elena Kagan said. 

While questioning Bursch, Kagan asserted: “It’s impossible to even say the thing without using the word ‘right,’” adding: “The right is the right to choose your doctor.”

Justice Sonia Sotomayor said Congress was motivated to pass the law because “states were limiting the choices people had.” She added: “It seems hard to understand that states didn’t understand that they had to give individuals the right to choose a provider.”

“You’re not quite calling it a ‘magic word,’ but you’re coming pretty close,” she added.

Alternatively, Republican-appointed justices assumed a more nuanced approach when addressing the lawyers. 

Justice Brett Kavanaugh, for example, said he’s “not opposed to magic words” if it could provide clarity on “the words that are rights-creating.”

“One of my goals coming out of this will be to provide that clarity,” Kavanaugh said.

Polonia Castellanos, founder of the Spanish Association of Christian Lawyers. / Credit: Women World Platform, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Puebla, Mexico, Apr 2, 2025 / 17:46 pm (CNA).

Attacks against Christians, especially Catholics, are on the rise in both Europe and Latin America, according to various reports from specialized organizations.

Vice President JD Vance speaks at a film-screening event April 1, 2025, at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. / Credit: Erin Granzow/Courtesy of the Heritage Foundation

National Catholic Register, Apr 2, 2025 / 17:03 pm (CNA).

Vice President JD Vance hailed the accomplishments of the Trump administration in ushering in a return to democratic and faith-based values Tuesday evening at the screening of a documentary film series that warns a regime of “soft totalitarianism” threatens the United States and the West.

In his remarks, Vance returned to the theme he raised in his February speech at the Munich Security Conference in which he criticized European Union leaders for undermining free speech and democracy.

“The ruling elite of the societies have become actively hostile to some of the very ideas that those countries were founded on in the first place,” Vance said before an audience of about 100 people at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. In addition to Vance’s speech, the by-invitation-only event featured a screening and discussion of the first episode of the film series “Live Not by Lies” released April 1 by Angel Studios.

The vice president praised the 2020 book the film is based upon, “Live Not by Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents,” written by Rod Dreher, who he said is a “dear friend.”

The book’s title comes from a 1974 essay Soviet dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote in which he urged his countrymen to stand up for truth and resist the communist regime’s pervasive ideology. It features the accounts of survivors of Soviet persecution and argues that life in the West today is a sort of “soft totalitarianism” that bears a resemblance to life behind the Iron Curtain.

Vance called the work the author’s “most prophetic” book, pointing to its diagnosis that the problem afflicting the West is a spiritual one, created by the abandonment of the West’s Christian heritage. Dreher is the author of the bestselling 2017 book “The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation.”

“It’s the most prophetic about where Western civilization has gone; and, in particular, some of the very founding ideas of the West, the Christian faith on which all Western nations were in some important respect really based on in their original charter,” Vance said.

“Those very ideas have not just fallen out of favor, and they’re not just less popular than they were 200 years ago or 300 years ago; of course, in the case of our friends in Europe, a thousand years ago. What we’ve seen is that those ideas have become disfavored,” Vance said.

“You see, in Europe, people arrested for praying, and you have the police asking them, ‘Well, what are you praying about?’ — as if it was any of the police’s business. Yes, you see people who are thrown in prison or have their jobs destroyed because they don’t believe the right things or they don’t say the right things, according to the liberal intelligentsia that rules some of these societies,” Vance said.

The vice president credited President Donald Trump for “making progress” toward a return to these faith-based values, as evidenced by the administration’s protection of free speech.

“I think if you just look in the past two months in this administration, we’ve gone from a country where we would harass and threaten and investigate and even arrest pro-life protesters to one where we’re encouraging pro-life activists to do what they can to persuade their fellow Americans,” he said.

“A couple of months ago, we had social-media censorship run amok. We were threatening people’s right of free expression for not saying the things that Silicon Valley technology companies told them to say. Now, I believe that we have more free speech on the internet today than we’ve probably had in 10 or 15 years. So we’re making progress,” Vance continued.  

Following the vice president’s remarks, Dreher concurred with Vance’s assessment of the Trump administration’s efforts to reverse the trends he documented in his book but warned against complacency.

“We are living in a time of hope,” he said. “But we can’t lose our vigilance because the conditions that allow for totalitarianism to rise are still with us.”

“These evil lies do not conquer our institutions overnight, and they won’t be gotten rid of overnight,” he said.

Dreher referred to the work of philosopher Hannah Arendt whose 1951 work “The Origins of Totalitarianism” pointed to certain conditions that made Germans and Russians incapable of resisting the state’s “lies,” even to the point of turning against their fellow citizens and reporting their transgressions to authorities.  

Arendt, he said, saw that “mass atomization and loneliness, a complete lack of confidence in institutions, a desire for transgression for the sake of transgression” paved the way for totalitarianism then, adding that those conditions remain with us today.

“I’m very grateful that we have a president and a vice president who are pushing back hard against this stuff,” he said.

He said he hopes the book and the film “Live Not by Lies” are shared with young people, many of whom know little about the consequences of communism and even profess themselves enamored of it.

“Let’s remember that if we forget the past, we are condemned to repeat it. This film and the book, they’re acts of memory. And do not forget what you see here. And be sure to tell, especially young people, that it’s important to know what communism was,” he said, noting that there are dozens of films on Nazism on Netflix but little focus on communism from the streaming service.

Dreher emphasized: “This is why I believe we have a whole generation, a post-Cold War generation, of young people who are all into socialism and communism. That’s all on us. We can now turn it around. But you’ve got to share these stories with young people and let them know what happened and why it matters to them.”

Watch

“Live Not by Lies” is produced and distributed by Angel Studios, which previously produced the popular series “The Chosen” about the life of Jesus as well as the film “Sound of Freedom.” The first episode of the four-part documentary film is now available to stream on the Angel Studios app for members of the Angel Guild, a paid subscription service that allows the studio’s faith-based content to be crowdfunded. To join the Angel Guild, visit Angel Studios’ website. Subsequent episodes will be available to watch each week. Watch the trailer here.

This story was first published by the National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news partner, and has been adapted by CNA.

Asylum seekers wait for their CBP One appointments with U.S. authorities before crossing through El Chaparral port in Tijuana, Baja California state, Mexico, on Jan. 20, 2025. / Credit: GUILLERMO ARIAS/AFP via Getty Images

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Apr 2, 2025 / 16:31 pm (CNA).

Catholic and evangelical leaders are urging Christians to consider the “sobering” effects of mass deportation efforts by the government, arguing that ongoing aggressive immigration enforcement will be felt beyond those who are being deported. 

Church leaders with the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the National Association of Evangelicals, World Relief, and the Center for the Study of Global Christianity in their report “One Part of the Body” highlight the potential impacts of mass deportations on Christian families in the U.S.

“In the United States,” the leaders write in the report, “immigrants from various countries form integral parts of the body of Christ. Most, of course, are lawfully present, whether as naturalized citizens, lawful permanent residents, resettled refugees, or others with permanent legal status.”

“But,” the report argues, “a significant share of the immigrants who are a part of our body are vulnerable to deportation, whether because they have no legal status or their legal protections could be withdrawn.”

“That has long been true, but it is of increased urgency given President Trump’s repeated pledge to carry out ‘the largest deportation in U.S. history,’” they write.

The report includes what the leaders call “sobering” statistics that reveal how broadly this situation may affect Christians. 

Currently, 80% of all individuals at risk of deportation are Christians, according to the report. The majority of this group is Catholic at 61%, greatly surpassing the 13% of evangelicals and 7% of other Christian denominations.

About 1 in 12 Christians are vulnerable to deportation or live with someone who is, specifically immigrants in the U.S. who entered “unlawfully” or “on a temporary nonimmigrant visa,” the report says. 

The report specifies that of these Christians, 1 in 5 are Catholic.

The leaders state that people in the U.S. who have been granted temporary protected status could have their status “withdrawn by the executive branch, without the need for congressional approval.” More than half of those individuals are Catholics.

Those who hold temporary status “are physically present in the U.S. as of a particular date when the conditions in their country of origin make it unsafe for them to return for reasons such as war, conflict, a natural disaster, or a public health epidemic,” according to the report.

Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients are also primarily Catholic, making up 73% of the group. The DACA program was originally created to allow deferred deportation for young adults who were brought to the U.S. as children, but the report argues that this program is at risk along with its Christian recipients.

Individuals who have been granted DACA status will be at risk “if the Trump administration (or any subsequent presidential administration) would follow the appropriate processes to terminate DACA or if the U.S. Supreme Court would agree with the lower courts that the program was created illegally and, as a result, invalidate the policy.”

Lastly, the statistics reveal that 58% of immigrants who came to the U.S. as asylum seekers are Catholic. These individuals “could be at risk of deportation after the final disposition of their immigration court proceedings, if they are not granted asylum or other relief by an immigration judge.”

The report states that “nearly 7 million Christians who are U.S. citizens live in households with someone at risk of deportation,” arguing that this issue does not affect only immigrants but also their families and other Christians.

“Our prayer is that the president and his administration as well as the Congress will take these stark realities into consideration as they pursue immigration policies,” the religious leaders say.

“Just as importantly,” they continue, “we pray that the whole of the American church, including the 11 out of 12 Christian households not at risk of losing a family member to deportation, will recognize that this suffering that is likely to affect many parts of the body of Christ actually impacts them as well.”