It was a still, humid afternoon, much like the weather we’ve had recently, when the mugginess of any given day can erupt into a thunderstorm. It was the perfect Southern afternoon to listen to R.E.M.’s record, which brims with references to Southern folklore, religion and mythology. It’s one of the most mystical albums this very special Georgia band ever made. 

Much of the record’s allure owes to its sense of storytelling and character development. Many of the songs are about real people in and around Athens, Georgia, including characters such as Old Man Kensey and Wendell Gee. One of the most fascinating characters on Fables, as fans refer to the album, isn’t named, but the song about him is one of the band’s best. 

Brivs Mekis was an eccentric Athens man, rumored to be schizophrenic, who lived a solitary life on Meigs Street in a house that he divided completely in two. Each side was furnished differently, decorated differently, and arranged as though two different people lived on either side. Each side was rumored to have its own pets. Mekis lived in whatever side of the house that suited him at any given time. When he died, and his house was being emptied on both sides, cleaners found a trove of books Mekis had published through the vanity press. The title of the book was “Life: How to Live.”  In the song about Mekis, “Life and How to Live It,” R.E.M. doesn’t gape or poke fun. Instead, in that uniquely Southern way, the band seems to respect Mekis’ eccentricity. 

The core of The Rule 

When the Trappist Monks of Our Lady of the Holy Spirit Monastery first arrived in Georgia after leaving their mother house in Kentucky, many people did gape. Catholics in Georgia were a rarity, let alone monks. Though locals eventually welcomed the monks, and even assisted in building their beautiful church, there was an initial skepticism, even suspicion. 

Fittingly, the monks arrived in Georgia on March 21, 1944, St. Benedict’s Day. Benedict had also written a book about how life might be lived, though his text became a cornerstone of Western Monasticism and—one might argue—Western civilization. 

St. Benedict of Nursia’s Rule dates to the early sixth century, a time when the composition of similar guidebooks about living in community was common. Both St. Basil and St. Augustine had written Rules. Yet no guide for monastic life has endured quite like Benedict’s.  

At its core, the Rule is a key to living life in communion with God and with others while also nurturing a sense of personal vocation. The Rule depends upon some simple principles: live a life of peace, live a life with empathy and understanding for others, and live a life in which prayer and work—Ora et Labora—are constantly in union. 

A statue of St. Benedict is seen outside the Haverty Center at Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas. The saint’s Rule dates to the early sixth century, a time when the composition of similar guidebooks about living in community was common.

The Rule contains 73 short chapters, some only a paragraph or two, devoted to both practical matters and ideals. That the book is grounded in human reality is one reason that the Rule flourished in the Middle Ages. The Medieval mind was fascinated with the concept of community and social order, and it’s in the Middle Ages that we really begin to see the roots of human fellowship and relationships as we understand them today. The two great Western traditions of Medieval Europe—the University and the Monastery—are still thriving today. 

Like most human endeavors, however, Monasticism needed reform in the Middle Ages. While many different monastic communities use the Benedictine Rule as a guide, the founding of the Cistercian order in 1098 intended to return to a strict observance of the Rule. In doing so, the Cistercians also broadened the Rule’s valuation of silence, so that community life was balanced by a greater commitment to solitary life. This approach underscored the fundamental role God plays in the life of both the individual and the self among others. It encouraged a greater understanding of one’s most authentic self in communion with God, both in solitude and in action with the community. 

By 1664, the Cistercian Order itself was reformed at the Abbey of La Trappe in France. The monks began calling themselves “Trappists,” and by 1902 they adopted the formal name Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance. The first American Trappist Monastery was founded in Kentucky in 1849. From this monastery came the monks who founded the monastery outside of Conyers, which remains a historical, cultural and religious treasure for the Archdiocese of Atlanta and all who come to visit. 

Hospitality and self-reliance are additional values Benedict affirms in the Rule. Monasteries support themselves through their work. Trappist monasteries all over the world bake bread, make cheese, craft fruitcakes and chocolate and brew beer—all with the dual aim of supporting their communities and nurturing others through simple yet special goods. Their emphasis upon quality and value remains unchanged. 

As a child in Atlanta in the 1970s, I will never forget the Monastery bread that was a staple at my grandparents’ house, as much a fixture of their kitchen as Coca-Cola, Stuckey’s Coconut Butter and cookies from the Nabisco plant where my grandfather worked. Though my grandparents were not Catholic, they loved to visit the Monastery on day trips, and on at least a few occasions they took me along. Neither they nor I could know how important the Monastery would one day become to me. 

As a graduate student at Georgia State University in 1990, I met my dear friend and mentor, the late professor Dr. Victor A. Kramer. Dr. Kramer was a specialist in Monasticism and the work of Thomas Merton, and he hired me as his graduate research assistant. I worked with Kramer on “The Merton Annual” and his oral histories of the monasteries in Kentucky and Conyers, and through this work I experienced a profound conversion experience that led me into the Catholic Church in 1992. He and his wife Dr. Dewey Weiss Kramer were great advocates for the Monastery, and Dewey’s book Open to the Spirit has grown through multiple editions as the essential history of the Monastery. 

I visited the Monastery many times during the early 90s as I was becoming Catholic, and it remains very special to me. Not long ago we celebrated Victor’s funeral Mass there and buried his ashes in the Honey Creek Woodlands natural cemetery that the monks maintain. For me it was a perfect circle illustrating how Benedict’s vision continues to impact life upon life through the fundamental value of Tradere—“handing one another along.” 

The Benedictine Rule encourages us to do just that, to let our lives be an instrument through which other lives are bettered. The Rule instructs us to “listen with the ear of our heart,” as God calls us to understand what others want and need. 

An understanding of Ora et Labora 

When I mention the Rule of St. Benedict to people in my OCIA class, they are often wary. How could a 1500-year-old text for monks have any relevance to their lives now? How could the ideal of Ora et Labora be applied to their own work?  

I will never forget an OCIA participant I once taught who worked as a project manager for a construction company that specialized in building hospitals and other medical facilities. He traveled a great deal for his job, and when we met on Sunday evenings, he was often headed for the airport right after class. He had an innate understanding of what the Benedictine Rule implies. Though he knew he was not a doctor, that he would never use the spaces he built to diagnose or operate, his work in building those spaces had a direct impact upon the patients who would one day experience profound transformation in them. They might be born in them; they might die. They might face mortality, or a miracle. One way or another, they would be changed. 

What a beautiful understanding that student had. He saw himself as not a bit different from those who built the great cathedrals who never saw their completion, or as a monk in Conyers in a barn monastery who could barely imagine what the place would become. 

The Rule of St. Benedict is a simple yet beautiful “vade mecum,” a companion that offers brilliant insights into life and how to live it. 

I often wonder if Michael Stipe has read Benedict’s Rule. Besides the song lyric that captures so well the essence of community—“Two doors, two names to call, your other and your own”—it’s interesting to remember that in 1985, during the Fables of the Reconstruction tour, Stipe shaved his head into a monk’s tonsure. 

Antonio and Liliana Borges put on the team shirts of their rivals Brazil at a World Cup watch party at St. Theresa of the Child Jesus Church, Douglasville. The gathering drew parishioners supporting Haiti, Bolivia, the Netherlands and others, while the party focused on Morocco’s World Cup match against Brazil, favored by their Brazilian-born pastor. The Borges’ hearts are with Argentina, Liliana’s native country. Photo by Andrew Nelson

DOUGLASVILLE—Antonio Borges and his wife Liliana wore the colors of their South American soccer rival Brazil for the day, but their hearts remained with Argentina, Liliana’s native country 

A Haitian parishioner waved a Brazilian flag while holding on to her loyalty to Team Haiti. 

That’s the spirit that filled the gym at St. Theresa of the Child Jesus Church, Douglasville, where some 300 men, women and kids brought their chairs from home to watch an opening game of the World Cup June 13. 

The gathering drew parishioners supporting Haiti, Bolivia, the Netherlands and others, while the party focused on Morocco’s World Cup match against Brazil, favored by their Brazilian-born pastor.  

The game connects parishioners from 29 countries and cultural backgrounds who worship at English and Spanish Masses who might not otherwise interact, helping them realize they are “one big family,” said Borges, who holds season tickets to the Atlanta United soccer team and is a parish catechist leading a men’s Bible study.  

“Sports allow us to bring different cultures, different thoughts, ways of thinking, different behaviors, and allow it to bring them all together,” he said.  

For parish pastor Father Leandro Nunes Teixeira, the hours spent in the gym go beyond winning and losing. He said while some homes have more TVs than residents, parishioners chose the church for the “magic” of time together. 

“It’s an amazing feel. It’s a magic because we have an opportunity to get together, to share, you know, talents, to share time,” said Father Leandro, wearing a fedora and blowing noise makers every time his beloved team threatened a goal against Morocco.  

Brazil and Morocco faced off in the first round of the 48-nation World Cup tournament. The parish gym erupted in joy when the Brazil evened the score to a 1-1 tie. 

The watch party organizers had to shut down the registration form due to its popularity. The parish capped the attendance at 280 people.  

Veronic Vasquez and Marco Antonio Eguez, natives of Bolivia, support the Brazil national team at the parish World Cup party on June 13. Photo by Andrew Nelson

The parish plan was a simple one. Gather the community in the gym. Cheer for the teams. Enjoy a BBQ meal, provided by the Catholic Metro Sports League, a regional sports league. 

Rob Aldrich, who supports the team from the Netherlands, said the league was excited to be there, interacting with the fans. There is an enthusiasm for sports among adults, and the goal is to recruit some to become coaches to lead youth programs, said Aldrich, the managing director.  

Organizers Evelyn Ortega, the parish communications director, and Dianna Paz, the director of religious education, inflated noise makers and handed out flags of Brazil and Morocco to incoming fans as they streamed into the gym following Saturday Mass.  

“We want them to remember the feeling of being together in fellowship. We are all one family even though we may be cheering for different teams,” said Ortega. “We are in the same church family.”  

The pastor’s national team country has won the World Cup trophy in victory five times. And he is full of memories of the global competition. During his seminarian days, he shadowed a pastor during the 2002 tournament in Japan. One of Brazil’s matches with the time change coincided with Sunday Mass. Laughing at the memory, Father Leandro said the priest decided to reschedule the liturgies for later in the afternoon so people could gather to watch the match. The priest humorously told the parishioners, “Jesus is also watching the game.” 

Speaking like a true believer, Father Leandro compared faith to the game of soccer.  

“Soccer evangelizes because soccer reminds us of something. That life, I would say, is not about a competition to shine alone,” he said.  

Even the most faithful person or player will fail if they do not care for others or allow others to play their own part, he said. Without concern for others, “even if they have talent, they still have not understood, I would say the game of life.” 

“Life and faith is like, we have to pass the ball. For everybody matters. We are a team,” said the priest. 

(OSV News)–Before the great wave of Hispanic immigration that swept the U.S. in the last several decades, historians spoke of four main periods of Catholic immigration linked to four ethnic groups: the Irish (peaking in the 1850s), the Germans (1880s), the Italians (early 1900s) and the Poles and other Slavs (1920s). The immigrant experience, including entry into the Catholic Church as they found it in the new country, was in some ways different for each.

And for none more difficult than for the Italians.

Between 1880 and 1920, as many as 4 million of them came to America, mostly from poverty-ridden southern Italy. Many were temporary workers–“builders of bridges, tunnels and subways, longshoremen and factory workers,” as one writer said–who came to earn money and, that done, hastened home. But many stayed and made new homes in America. Or tried.

Early in those years, Frances Cabrini had met with Pope Leo XIII and told him of her dream to go to China as a missionary. “No,” Pope Leo answered, “not to the East but to the West.” He wanted her and her new Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart to go to America and do pastoral work among the Italian immigrants.

What happened after that is a bright page in the sometimes tumultuous story of Italian-American Catholicism. The heroic love of God and neighbor that motivated her was formally recognized in 1946 when Frances Cabrini was declared a saint. That made her the first U.S. citizen to be canonized–even though she remained, in the words of a historian, “Italian … to the very marrow of her bones.”

Francesca Cabrini was born July 15, 1850, in Sant’Angelo Lodigiano, a town in Lombardy, youngest of 13 children in a well-off farming family. A pious child–the “little saint,” neighbors called her–she longed to be a missionary and played at sailing paper boats filled with violets representing the sisters she meant to send all over the world.

But her father had other ideas, and after studying to be a teacher, Francesca taught school. On two occasions, she sought admission to religious orders but was turned down–ostensibly for poor health, but in fact because a local monsignor had other ideas: He wanted her to take over direction of a troubled orphanage.

After she had run the orphanage for six years, the bishop of the diocese asked her and her companions to form a religious community. The Missionary Sisters were born, with the foundress taking Frances Xavier as her religious name–“Xavier” for the 16th-century Jesuit missionary to the Far East, Francis Xavier.

Although the new order was at first only a diocesan institution, Mother Cabrini had larger plans from the start. After establishing new convents in Cremona and Milan, she went to Rome to seek papal approval and, she hoped, open a convent there. At first the cardinal in charge of such matters said “no”–Rome had enough convents already–but this determined woman of great charm persisted, and the cardinal ended by allowing her to open not just one convent but two.

It was around then that she had the interview with Leo XIII that sent her on her way to the United States. Already in 1884, the American bishops at the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore had discussed the desperate pastoral situation of the Italian immigrants. Little came of it, except that “the Italian problem” was by now recognized as a problem for the church at large.

New York already had some 50,000 Italians, but only a handful ever went to church. The newcomers’ situation included poverty, a critical shortage of Italian-speaking priests, habits of anticlericalism and spotty religious practice that accompanied them from the old country. There was also pervasive anti-Italian feelings, not only outside, but within the American Catholic community.

Over time, a pastoral strategy began to take shape, bolstered by the arrival of new Italian religious communities like the Scalabrinian Fathers and the Pallottines as well as by training American priests to work with the Italians. The first parish in the U.S. specifically for them had been founded in Philadelphia in 1852, and now these spiritual enclaves retaining the language and devotional traditions of Italy multiplied. Mother Cabrini and her sisters were part of the increasingly effective response to a situation of obvious need.

Mother Cabrini arrived in New York March 31, 1889, and, after a short-lived period of tension with the local archbishop over where to set up shop, she and her companions got to work. Within a month, they were running an orphanage. In less than three years, they had a hospital as well. (Mother Cabrini called all her hospitals–two in New York, two in Chicago–Columbus Hospital.)

The spread of the order’s work

There’s not enough room here to list here all the orphanages, schools, hospitals and clinics these women were responsible for establishing and operating. But numbers at least suggest the magnitude of what they achieved. By the time Mother Cabrini died 34 years after her arrival, the 2,300 Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart working in the United States and throughout the Western Hemisphere had launched 67 institutions devoted to the physical, moral and spiritual welfare of people in need. Italians were not the only ones they served, but Italians remained the special focus of the sisters’ efforts.

As early as September 1891, Mother Cabrini took 14 sisters to Nicaragua to start an academy. Returning to the United States by way of New Orleans, she discovered that a year earlier a mob there had lynched a number of Italians accused of crimes. Her response was to summon several sisters from New York to begin work among the Italians of the Crescent City.

Like the little girl who years before had dreamed of dispatching missionaries all over the world, Mother Cabrini carried on a ministry of expansive horizons. Argentina and Chile, France, Spain, England–Missionary Sisters went to all these places to work. In the U.S., the order spread west across the United States–to Chicago, to the mining camps of Colorado and Sing Sing prison in New York, Mississippi, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Washington state.

In 1909, Mother Cabrini became a naturalized citizen. The following year, knowing her strength was failing, she announced her intention to resign as superior general of her order and devote herself exclusively to prayer. But the houses of the Missionary Sisters voted unanimously in favor of her staying on. Observing those results, the cardinal-prefect of the Vatican’s congregation for religious told her, jokingly, “Mother Cabrini, though up to now you have governed your institute badly, I have decided to give you another chance. You are to remain superior general.” The foundress wasn’t fazed. “Well, I warn you that I shall be just as severe as in the past,” she replied.

She died Dec. 22, 1917, at Columbus Hospital in Chicago. After the unusually brief interval of 21 years, Pope Pius XI declared her blessed. Pius XII canonized her in 1946 and in 1950 designated her “Patroness of the Immigrants.”

The June 10-12 assembly was animated in particular by its culminating event, the national consecration of the United States during a June 11 Mass at Orlando’s Basilica of the National Shrine of Mary, Queen of the Universe.

“To consecrate ourselves to the Sacred Heart is ultimately to accept Christ’s invitation to remain in his love and to allow that love to shape every aspect of our lives, public and private,” Archbishop William E. Lori of Baltimore, the homilist for the Mass, said. “It is a declaration that the future does not belong merely to political movements, economic forces, or human plans. The future belongs to God.”

The opening session of the U.S. bishops’ meeting June 10 had two addresses that reflected on the Church’s evangelizing mission and the Sacred Heart.

Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City, in his first address to the bishops as USCCB president, spoke of how “the truth of Christ must be proclaimed all the more confidently” to restore hope that is under threat from wide-ranging attacks on human dignity and polarization “within our country, and even within our Church.”

In response, he called for preaching that “life is a gift from God,” the “cultivation of interpersonal relationships and conversations between those who may disagree,” and acting on the bishops’ mission directive “to reach out to the disaffiliated and the unaffiliated.” But above all, Archbishop Coakley reminded his brother bishops, “It is the love flowing from the Sacred Heart of Jesus that feeds our hope.”

Archbishop Gabriele G. Caccia gave his inaugural address to the bishops as nuncio to the U.S. and also highlighted the consecration of the U.S. Church to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. He urged the bishops to fulfill their mission as missionary disciples by welcoming immigrants in their midst, and reminded the bishops his ministry is there to support them.

The start of the public session also included a message from the U.S. bishops to Pope Leo XIV thanking him for shining “the light of the Gospel and the tradition of the Church on the new opportunities and challenges posed by the rise” of artificial intelligence and “emerging technologies” through his new encyclical “Magnifica Humanitas.”

Other presentations that day also lifted up exemplars of the Church’s witness and opportunities to strengthen that witness.

Mathematical biologist Santiago Schnell, provost of Dartmouth University, addressed the bishops on “Ex Corde Ecclesiae,” St. John Paul II’s 1990 apostolic constitution on Catholic universities, and invited them to explore how they can reawaken the Catholic imagination in academic life and nurture leaders who can become “voices for the Catholic Church.”

The bishops heard a report on World Youth Day 2027, which is to take place Aug. 3-8 in Seoul, with 10,000-15,000 pilgrims expected to travel to South Korea from the U.S. Seoul Auxiliary Bishop Paul Kyung Sang Lee, general coordinator for WYD 2027, shared with the bishops that the Catholic Church in Korea began with the laypeople, became strengthened by the blood of 10,000-plus martyrs, and served as a sanctuary for democracy and human rights.

The bishops also gave a unanimous consent June 10 to support the advancement of two American canonization causes: Duluth, Minnesota’s pioneer missionary priest Msgr. Joseph Buh, and upstate New York’s entrepreneur-turned-evangelist John Rick Miller.

Duluth Bishop Daniel J. Felton spoke of how Msgr. Buh is a model for how “missionary discipleship demands courage, sacrifice, perseverance and complete availability to God’s will.” Miami Archbishop Thomas G. Wenski spoke of Miller — who worked to re-evangelize Latin American countries and have them consecrated to the Sacred Heart — as having “lived the baptismal call to holiness in an exemplary way.”

Atlanta Archbishop Gregory J. Hartmayer attends a June 10 session of the annual spring meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Orlando, Fla. OSV News photo/Bob Roller

On the second day of public sessions, the U.S. Catholic bishops approved portions of two texts with near unanimity: a new edition of the Lectionary for Mass, which provides the Scripture readings and psalm for each day’s liturgy; and the 2025 Roman Missal-Liturgy of the Hours Supplement.

The bishops also ultimately agreed to move ahead and approve updates to their landmark document on protection policies for minors. The revision commits the Church to “act on the presumption of the sincerity of those who bring forth a complaint of sexual abuse” while also maintaining “a corresponding presumption of innocence on the part of the accused until guilt is proven.”

The bishops voted on the floor to add a further revision that would commit themselves to form future clergy in “trauma-informed” pastoral care.

Sara Larson, executive director of Awake, a community of abuse survivors, Catholic advocates and other allies, issued a statement following the vote commending the “important progress” the Catholic Church in the U.S. has made in two decades in protecting children, but emphasized it was important for the bishops to extend that protection to adults who “continue to experience devastating abuse in situations of vulnerability like confession, spiritual direction, pastoral support, religious life, and employment.”

“Awake encourages Church leaders throughout the United States to continue building upon the progress already made by extending safeguarding efforts to adults, implementing trauma-informed practices, and engaging survivors as valued partners in the Church’s ongoing work of reform and healing,” she said.

While the scope of the charter’s revision did not address adults, and stayed within its mandate to focus exclusively on protecting minors, Deacon Bernie Nojadera, executive director of the USCCB’s Secretariat of Child and Youth Protection, told OSV News in an interview that they anticipate possible related developments in this area coming from the Vatican’s Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors.

“The U.S. Catholic Church stands ready once those documents do come forward,” he said.

But the revised charter saw animated debate — not so much around the proposed changes, but rather over the process of consultation. Following the June 10 presentation, Archbishop W. Shawn McKnight of Kansas City, Kansas, asked if it would be possible to suspend the vote on the revisions pending further consultation among presbyteral councils and diocesan review boards. He cited several factors and also argued further consultation was more in line with the synodal style of consultation envisioned for the Church.

Bishop Barry C. Knestout of Richmond, Virginia, chair of the USCCB’s Committee on the Protection of Children and Young People, acknowledged that the charter is “not a perfect document,” but he noted that consultation on the revision has been “occurring for about five years,” with “input received on multiple occasions from bishops.”

On June 11, ahead of the vote, Archbishop McKnight reiterated his call to postpone the vote, with Bishop Earl K. Fernandes of Columbus, Ohio, seconding the motion. But after balloting, the motion failed, and a two-thirds majority voted to approve the revised text.

Auxiliary Bishop Juan Miguel Betancourt of Hartford, Connecticut, then spoke on behalf of a USCCB task force on the ongoing implementation of synodality in the life of the Church. He provided the bishops June 11 with an update on recent consultations among the bishops, but also invited them to hear directly from Pope Leo himself.

The bishop played a video of the pope addressing some of the U.S. concerns about synodality at a Jubilee 2025 gathering, where Pope Leo emphasized the importance of a patient and proper formation “on every level” about what it means to be a “Church which is synodal.” But Pope Leo also affirmed the Church in the U.S. already has many existing structures that “have great potential for being synodal” and encouraged them “to find ways of continuing to transform them into more inclusive kinds of experiences” for the laity, the clergy, and women and men religious, in order that all might feel “a co-responsible sense of belonging, and of leadership and accountability in the life of the Church.”

The bishops also heard a presentation on the Catholic Prison Ministry Coalition, where Bishop William A. Wack of the Diocese of Pensacola-Tallahassee, Florida, gave his own personal testimony of serving in prison ministry, and how a prisoner’s letter convinced him to “go regularly.”

“I invite you to visit, too. You know how important it is for the prisoners to have a visit from a priest, deacon, religious, but especially a bishop?” he said. “Like that prisoner wrote to me, the bishop is their shepherd. They are part of your flock.”

Bishop Oscar Cantú of San Jose, California, chairman of the bishops’ Subcommittee on Hispanic/Latino Affairs, addressed his fellow bishops June 11 about preparations for the 500th anniversary of Our Lady of Guadalupe’s appearance to St. Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin in five years, and dioceses’ participation in the Intercontinental Guadalupan Novena.

Before the bishops headed out to consecrate the U.S. to the Sacred Heart, they heard reflections on the Sacred Heart of Jesus from three of their brother bishops.

The final day of the conference, June 12, was spent in executive session. The remaining bishops then returned home to their own dioceses to carry out the consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus from their own cathedrals

ROME—Between railroad tracks and a shopping center, several people streamed in from all directions to find three Catholic sisters praying and distributing food from the trunk of their van. Some people rode their bikes into the parking lot, and others walked on foot to retrieve bags of sandwiches, a hot meal and snacks—the food that would sustain them for a few days. 

Sisters Poor of Jesus Christ, a community of three sisters living in the nearby small town of Cedartown, deliver food every Monday to the parking lot as part of their charism to serve the poor. Homeless and low-income residents of Rome have found the sisters’ street ministry mostly through word of mouth. 

“Our mission is based on Matthew 25—I was hungry and you gave me food; I was naked and you clothed me,” said Sister Myrian of the Crucified. “If we do this for those in need, then we do it for him (Christ).”  

On a recent evening as the sun was setting, the sisters greeted some familiar faces with hugs. They invited the individuals who were receiving food into conversation if they wanted to talk. Some stayed to share their lives with the sisters, and others retreated into nearby woods with food bags hanging on their bicycle handlebars. 

“Being here and serving the people that God entrusted to us is meaningful because Jesus calls us to bring hope to the people who maybe don’t have hope and light right now,” said Sister Dalva of the Risen Jesus. “Our founder says it’s about being family to the poor. It’s more than just food.” 

Sisters Poor of Jesus Christ was formed in Brazil in 2001 by Father Gilson Sobreiro who felt a calling to serve youth who were suffering from poverty, addiction, violence, unemployment and broken families. A decade later, the first North American mission was established in Kansas. 

Now, the congregation has 80 missions in 16 countries. In the United States, there are four mission houses—Kansas, Baltimore, Los Angeles and Cedartown. 

The Cedartown mission, called Fraternitas St. Katharine Drexel, began in early 2022 at the invitation of Father Tim Gallagher, then pastor of St. Bernadette Catholic Church. The old parish building was converted into a simple convent where three sisters live and pray. 

The sisters keep a daily schedule of personal prayer, communal prayer and worshiping at Mass. They eat together, do chores and have free time for reading or planning retreats. 

In addition to their food ministry, the sisters also serve the St. Bernadette’s parish community that is largely Hispanic and Spanish speaking. They have accompanied grieving families and helped married couples who are struggling. Additionally, they lead formation activities such as eucharistic minister training, confirmation retreats and retreats for catechists. 

The sisters are searching and praying for another outreach to expand their service in the area, Sister Myrian said. 

Sister Dalva of the Risen Jesus,PJC, sorts through piles of donated clothes. She separates them into men’s and women’s to give to the poor and homeless community of Rome. Photo by Julianna Leopold

Spiritual fruits 

Sister Mary of the Obedient Jesus has found that living in Cedartown pushes her to recognize that poverty can take many forms in addition to material poverty. People may be lonely, depressed, or anxious and need the community that the sisters bring to Cedartown and Rome, she said. 

“We come here to create a community with them, to pray with them, and to feed them,” said Sister Mary. “We know the importance of the physical fruit but also the spiritual fruit and recognizing that Christ is with us. Here in Cedartown and Rome, I’ve learned to see the poor in all of us.” 

Sister Mary was living at a mission house in Ontario, Canada, prior to professing vows in January and moving to Cedartown. The poor and homeless were more numerous and visible in Ontario than Cedartown, she said. 

Likewise, Sister Dalva said they don’t see as many homeless as she did at her prior mission in Baltimore, but the poor have similar needs wherever she goes. 

“We see him (Christ) in every culture, every language,” she said. “God is present and we have to be open to that calling as a missionary.” 

On a typical Monday evening, the sisters and volunteers serve food to about 25 to 30 people in Rome. Some weeks, they also have clothing available.  

Sisters Poor of Jesus Christ profess vows of chastity, poverty and obedience. They also profess a fourth vow called availability, which means being open to God’s call like Mary was when she quickly went to visit her cousin, Elizabeth. 

Sister Dalva said she started to feel God’s calling to her vocation when she was 13 years old and preparing for her first communion. She’s inspired by St. Teresa of Kolkata who said Christians are “called to be poor with the poor.” Living a life of simplicity and poverty is her way to holiness, she said.  

Marlen Baldizon is a volunteer from Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Carrollton who cooks a hot meal once a month to distribute alongside the sisters. The sisters have helped her be courageous in her service to the poor, she said. 

“They are my little angels. They are the bridge to reach people I never thought I would,” said Baldizon, who met the sisters during a retreat. “I love to serve. To serve is to be alive.” 

Bishop Joel M. Konzen, SM, left, and Bishop John N. Tran walk together during eucharistic procession starting from the Church of the Purification to celebrate the Feast of Corpus Christi. Photo by Julianna Leopold

CRAWFORDVILLE—Catholics gathered on June 6 to celebrate the Feast of Corpus Christi in the place where the faith began in Georgia. 

Archbishop Gregory J. Hartmayer, OFM Conv., and Atlanta’s auxiliary bishops celebrated an outdoor Mass in a meadow on the property of the Retreat at Heritage. A eucharistic procession—two and a half miles in length—preceded the Mass. The procession began at the Church of the Purification, the first Catholic Church in Georgia.

The weekend celebration also included a display of eucharistic miracles at the Retreat at Heritage. The archdiocese offered transportation for those wanting to travel to the event from the Atlanta area.

Corpus Christi—the Feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ—celebrates the Catholic belief in the real presence of Jesus Christ’s body, blood, soul and divinity in the Eucharist. More than 100 pilgrims participated in the procession including laypeople, priests and the Missionaries of Charity.

Then the longtime priest adjusted the chasuble, the outermost cloak, on his former parishioner’s shoulders. Embroidered on the front is the seal of the Archdiocese of Atlanta.   

And concluding with a hug, the quick change of church vestments visually represented the new role of Father Butz in the church, from deacon to priest.  

While Archbishop Hartmayer ordained Eric Baylot, Jacob Butz, Juno Lee and Sean Lee priests, the then-transitional deacons stand at the altar supported by their families and seminaries, their parishes and priests.  

In the ordination ritual, each of the deacons chose the priest who would help him put on the vestments of a priest for the first time. Asking a priest to serve in this role is a sign of appreciation and gratefulness for their support as a role model. 

Father Sean Lee chose Father Sunny Punnakuziyil, his pastor since he was a teen; Father Juno Lee chose Father Cyril Chae, with their shared Korean heritage; Father Jacob Butz selected Father Larry Niese, his longtime pastor and Father Eric Baylot’s vesting priest was Father Bradley Starr, his cousin.  

The men were ordained to the priesthood May 30 at Holy Vietnamese Martyrs Church, Norcross.  

A priest of presence 

Father Sean Lee, 27, grew up in St. John Neumann Church, Lilburn. He was a middle school student when a new pastor, Father Punnakuziyil, arrived. As a teenager, Father Lee assisted at Mass as an altar server, explored his faith through the Life Teen youth program and asked questions.  

“As I began to embrace the faith as my own and fall deeper in love with Our Lord, Father Sunny always made himself available. He was always there to answer any random question I would throw at him,” said Father Lee in an email.  

Like many seminarians, the young man shared his concerns about the future. Father Punnakuziyil in return recalled his own memory of hesitation before he was ordained more than 30 years ago.  

Through the years, Father Sunny said he saw the new priest move from uncertainty to a mature spirituality.  

“I could see him progressing in his formation, and he developed and grew into a fine young gentleman as I know him now,” he said. 

Father Lee said it only made sense for his pastor to serve as his vesting priest, as he “helped ‘clothe’ my own understanding of the priesthood.” 

The young priest said he has a mentor whose ministry is focused on being “genuinely present to his people” and with a “joyful presence.” 

Father Punnakuziyil said in his 32 years of ministry as a member of the Missionaries of St. Francis de Sales religious community, this is the first time he has been asked to vest a new priest. He felt it a deep honor knowing the many priest friends Father Lee could have asked.  

The longtime priest saw Father Lee become very prayerful, dedicated to the Liturgy of the Hours, serious about Mass and confession during his visits home from St. Vincent de Paul Regional Seminary in Boynton Beach, Florida. 

Newly ordained Father Juno Lee distributes holy Communion for the first time as a priest at Holy Vietnamese Martyrs Church. Father Lee fulfilled his military obligation in South Korea before taking on his childhood desire for the priesthood. Photo by Julianna Leopold

The St. John Neumann community holds the new priest close as it prays for him.  

“The parish community has just embraced him. He’s already a star here,” said Father Sunny. “They were lucky to hear his homilies as a deacon during the past year. “He’s able to connect with the people, with the congregation, so people love him,” said the pastor.  

A shared heritage 

Father Juno Lee also chose a priest who has known him for years, but through a unique route: friendship in Korea. 

Father Lee, 33, was born in Maryland, lived in Chicago, and spent many years in South Korea. His mother and Father Cyril Chae’s elderly mother lived in a shared apartment complex in Korea. The two women worshipped at the same parish. That connection in 2010 led Father Chae to meet the young man, who was then thinking about priestly life. It was Father Chae who suggested he consider serving as a priest in Atlanta.  

“In that sense, he was one of the priests who helped guide me toward the path that eventually led to my ordination,” said the newly ordained.  

Father Lee had spoken about being a priest since grade school, stopping at a chapel for eucharistic adoration and telling Jesus about his day and later discerned his vocation seriously. After finishing his mandatory military service, Father Lee moved to the United States to enter seminary.  

Throughout his time in the Boynton Beach, Florida, seminary, Father Chae offered Father Lee a place to stay at his rectory, in addition to welcomed home-cooked meals. Father Chae, who was ordained in 2004, serves at St. Patrick Church, Norcross.  

“Through all these moments, our relationship became more than just a simple acquaintance,” said Father Lee about his mentor. “He became someone who walked with me in my vocation.”  

Father Chae believes the new priest’s prayer-filled experiences as a young person were signs of “abiding in Christ” as he weighed his options.  

The role of vesting is more than a simple gesture and tradition for Father Chae. He compared it to a father entrusting a loved one with complete support to another life, here as a priest to the church.  

It signifies Father Lee “is entering into full participation in the ministry of Jesus,” he said. “Acting through me, the Holy Spirit is affirming and conforming him as a true disciple.”  

Experience as a true teacher 

Deacon Jacob Butz, 31, asked Father Larry Niese, his longtime pastor at St. Michael the Archangel, Woodstock, to assist him. It is the second time Father Niese has served in this role, doing the same for Father Joe Wagner in 2022.  

“He has shown me what a good friend in the priesthood looks like,” said Father Butz. 

Deacon Eric Baylot, 30, was assisted at the ordination by his cousin Father Bradley Starr, the parochial vicar at St. Clare of Assisi Church, in Acworth.  

Father Bradley Starr, right, removes the stole of deacons from the shoulder of the newly ordained Father Eric Baylot, left. He replaces the garment, which rests diagonally across the chest, with the stole of priests. The two priests are cousins. Photo by Julianna Leopold

Experience is the only true teacher of priestly ministry, say the seasoned clergy.  

Father Larry Niese said the newly ordained priests will learn to serve by doing ministry, not from seminary classes.  

A lesson he learned the hard way is the importance of earning trust. Early in his ministry, his counsel was ignored as he rushed to tackle difficult issues when advising people, as if that was the most important concern before befriending them.  

“I think they have got to see that you care about them, that you love God’s people, and they see you love them,” said Father Niese. If a priest does not learn that, the ministry will suffer, he said.  

Ministry is more than theology or rules, but walking with people, understanding their spiritual needs, and helping them move closer to Christ, said Father Niese.  

“It’s understanding and being patient with where people are and trying to raise them up to at least a notch up,” he added. 

Father Punnakuziyil said the new priests will learn the priesthood is “24/7 service” that must be balanced with personal time. This availability may require significant sacrifice, such as responding to sick calls in the middle of the night or listening to a parishioner’s personal problems immediatelyafter a Sunday Mass, rather than making an excuse to leave. 

In his 32 years, he has learned that “bookish knowledge” is secondary to understanding how to serve parishioners in real life.  

“It’s not taught in the seminary how you handle such a situation. It only comes with experience,” he said. “That requires a heart-to-heart relationship with the people.” 

A setting fit for a June 11 Mass that united U.S. bishops gathered for their spring plenary June 10-12. After concluding the second of two days of public sessions, they left the Omni Resort in ChampionsGate for a half-hour drive up Interstate 4 for the spiritual refuge that is the Basilica of the National Shrine of Mary, Queen of the Universe in Orlando.

And the Mass was a momentous one as it served to formally consecrate the United States to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, as part of the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City censed the altar after processing in from the thick humidity and cloudy skies of a typical Orlando afternoon outside the shrine. The president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops was joined on the altar by bishops and deacons of the Orlando Diocese.

“Clothe us, Lord God, with the virtues of the heart of your son, and set us aflame with his love,” the archbishop prayed in opening the Mass.

More than 200 bishops present, along with about 150 observers, mostly benefactors and staff of the Diocese of Orlando. The monstrance used ahead of Mass for Eucharistic adoration was from the Servants of the Pierced Hearts, a Miami-based religious institute.

The relics of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque–the French Visitation sister who experienced visions of Jesus revealing his Sacred Heart–were also present at the Mass, on loan for the consecration from the Knights of Columbus.

In his homily, Archbishop William E. Lori of Baltimore described the Sacred Heart of Jesus not as an “abstract devotion,” but as a “visible sign of love.”

He explained why the Church consecrates. He described it as an act of faith and acknowledgment of the need for God’s mercy, wisdom and guidance. It is also an act of hope. It is “a heart that has known joy and sorrow, friendship and betrayal, suffering and sacrifice,” he said.

The act of consecration is an act of faith and hope, the archbishop said, but it is also an acknowledgment of God’s faithful work and love in the world and how we as people and as a Church have not always “clearly reflected that love.”

“Indeed, it is sometimes obscured almost beyond recognition,” the archbishop added. “To be sure, there have been moments of extraordinary witness and holiness. But there have also been moments of failure, division and sin. Consecration requires the humility to acknowledge both.”

A prelate venerates a reliquary containing the relics of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque before the U.S. Catholic bishops consecrate the country to the Sacred Heart of Jesus at the Basilica of Mary Queen of the Universe in Orlando, Fla., June 11, during their spring plenary assembly. OSV News photo/Bob Roller

And why the Sacred Heart? Because it reveals a savior who “desires not merely our obedience, but our friendship; not simply our service, but our communion with Him,” he said.

“To consecrate ourselves to the Sacred Heart is ultimately to accept Christ’s invitation to remain in His love and to allow that love to shape every aspect of our lives, public and private,” Archbishop Lori said. “It is a declaration that the future does not belong merely to political movements, economic forces, or human plans. The future belongs to God.”

The act of consecration does not just happen among the shepherds, but also the sheep. In speaking to the laity both in the pews at the shrine and watching on the livestream, Archbishop Lori said the act of consecration is one the faithful and leaders do together.

“This consecration is not something the bishops do for you. It is something we do together,” he said. “The renewal of the Church and our nation will not come through declarations alone. It will come through disciples who remain in Christ’s love and bear the good fruit of holiness in families, parishes, communities and in their daily lives.”

The Sacred Heart reconciles divisions and transforms hardened hearts, the archbishop said.

“It means building communities–ecclesial and civil–where truth is proclaimed clearly and charity is practiced generously. It means resisting the temptation to define ourselves by division, ideology or resentment,” Archbishop Lori said. “We consecrate our nation, not because it is perfect, but because it is beloved by God. We entrust to the Heart of Christ our achievements and failures, our hopes and anxiety, our present challenges and our future aspirations.”

The tournament—set to be played across the United States, Canada and Mexico—will be the largest in FIFA history, featuring 48 teams and 104 matches.

In the United States, 11 host cities will stage games from June 11 to July 19, with the championship scheduled for July 19 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, which sits just across the Hudson River from New York City.

The 11 U.S. host cities: Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Houston, Kansas City in Missouri and Kansas, Los Angeles, Miami, Philadelphia, the San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle and the New York/New Jersey metro area.

Across these cities, Catholic leaders are already preparing for the convergence of international visitors, local parish life and public witness.

In Kansas City, a coordinated effort known as OneKC Catholic—a joint initiative of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph—has been created to prepare for the influx.

According to its overview, OneKC Catholic is “an effort of evangelization, hospitality, and charity aimed at welcoming visiting Catholics to the KC metro area.”

It adds: “Whether you are visiting, passing through or considering making the Kansas City area your home, our Catholic parishes are ready to welcome you.”

The initiative includes coordinated parish listings, multilingual resources, and collaboration with Catholic Charities on hospitality and planning during the tournament. A kickoff Mass is planned with Bishop James V. Johnston of Kansas City-St. Joseph and Archbishop W. Shawn McKnight of Kansas City in Kansas.

Atlanta’s hospitality

In Atlanta, the archdiocese has also begun preparations that combine outreach, hospitality and public safety awareness.

Maureen Smith, chief communications officer for the Archdiocese of Atlanta, told OSV News that the city initiated early coordination with the Church.

“The City of Atlanta approached one of our pastors early in the planning process to let him know about training for faith leaders in how to recognize and respond to human trafficking,” Smith said. “Experts in human trafficking tell us there is always an increase in activity during large sporting events, so we felt like this was an appropriate and important place to start with our own planning.”

Smith also described a broader effort to welcome international visitors through parish engagement.

“We also wanted to offer a welcome to fans and teams who are coming to Atlanta for the World Cup matches,” she said. “We sponsored a contest for a Catholic artist to design a two-inch sticker welcoming guests. We will provide stickers to the parishes and encourage them to get photos of fans with their stickers at church.”

Byron Felton designed the winning sticker for the Archdiocese of Atlanta-sponsored contest. The archdiocese provided stickers to parishes and encouraged them to get photos of World Cup fans visiting Atlanta and its churches.

Parishes will also promote Masses in multiple languages, including Portuguese, Haitian Creole and Spanish, with social media outreach to help visitors locate worship opportunities.

Other host cities are developing their own pastoral and hospitality responses.

In Houston, an official World Cup 2026 resource page created by the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston offers access to Mass, confession and Eucharistic adoration in the city, along with a parish locator tool to assist international visitors. Local ministries are also preparing hospitality and fellowship outreach during the tournament.

In Seattle, Catholic leaders have coordinated pastoral care initiatives focused on travelers and migrants, alongside public prayer efforts for peace during a period of global tension involving some participating nations.

In San Francisco’s host region, Mission Santa Clara on the campus of Santa Clara University has been highlighted as a Catholic focal point tied to the tournament’s presence in the Bay Area.

In Miami, Catholic communities are preparing for a large influx of international visitors, with emphasis on multilingual access to the sacraments and parish hospitality. The archdiocese has also noted the Catholic heritage connected to the World Cup’s origins, including FIFA founder Jules Rimet, a devout Catholic who envisioned the tournament as a means of fostering international fraternity.

In Dallas, Catholic institutions such as the University of Dallas and parish networks are preparing volunteer participation in tournament-related roles, including FIFA-linked programs such as player escort opportunities.

In Philadelphia, preparations include awareness that World Cup matches will coincide with the 250th anniversary of the United States on July 4, adding a unique national and civic dimension to the city’s hosting role.

In Boston, Catholic communities are preparing for international visitors through parish outreach and hospitality coordination tied to the expected influx of fans.

In Los Angeles, SoFi Stadium will host multiple matches, including games featuring the United States team. Local Catholic communities are preparing for large-scale visitor engagement and multilingual pastoral outreach.

Underlying many of these efforts is a shared theological reflection on universality.

The Catholic tradition itself is rooted in the word katholikos, meaning “universal” or “according to the whole.”

That meaning resonates strongly in the episcopal motto of Pope Leo XIV: “In Illo uno unum” (“In the One, we are one”), drawn from St. Augustine’s exposition on Psalm 127.

Augustine’s reflection—”although we Christians are many, in the one Christ we are one”—has often been cited in discussions of global gatherings marked by cultural and national diversity.

In that sense, Catholic leaders note, the World Cup becomes more than a sporting event. It becomes a lived image of encounter: nations gathered, languages interwoven, cultures present in one shared space.

For Catholic communities across those 11 cities, the weeks ahead represent both preparation and invitation—preparation for the practical demands of hosting the world, and invitation to live out a vision of hospitality rooted in faith.

As OneKC Catholic’s mission states, the goal is simple: that visitors “feel known, welcomed, and connected.”

In that spirit, dioceses across the United States are approaching the World Cup not only as an international event, but as a moment of encounter—between Church and world, between local parish and global visitor, and, for many, between hospitality and grace.

What is artificial intelligence? The term is used so loosely in public conversation that it helps to be clear. Artificial intelligence refers to computer systems designed to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence: recognizing language, generating text and images, making predictions, diagnosing disease, driving vehicles, or conducting financial transactions. These systems learn from vast amounts of data and, in their most advanced forms, can produce outputs that are remarkably difficult to distinguish from those of a human being. They are already embedded in the phones in your pocket, the searches you conduct online, the recommendations streaming services send you, and increasingly in the decisions made about your credit, your healthcare and your employment. AI is already here. 

At first glance, an encyclical on artificial intelligence may seem unusual. Yet Pope Leo XIV places the issue squarely within the Church’s long tradition of Catholic social teaching. He deliberately signed the document on the 135th anniversary of Pope Leo XIII’s landmark encyclical “Rerum Novarum,” which addressed the social upheavals of the Industrial Revolution. Just as Leo XIII responded to the challenges posed by industrialization, Pope Leo XIV seeks to guide the Church and the world through the transformations brought about by digital technology and artificial intelligence.  

The Holy Father begins with a stark observation: humanity stands at a crossroads. Drawing upon the biblical image of the Tower of Babel, he warns that technological progress divorced from moral wisdom can lead to new forms of domination, inequality and dehumanization. At the same time, he insists that technological advances can serve authentic human flourishing when guided by ethical principles rooted in the dignity of the human person.  

A central theme throughout the encyclical is that human beings are more than the sum of their abilities, productivity, or data. Artificial intelligence may perform tasks with astonishing speed and efficiency, but it cannot replicate the spiritual, relational and moral dimensions that belong uniquely to the human person. Human dignity derives not from what we can produce, but from who we are: persons created in the image and likeness of God.  

The pope expresses particular concern about the growing concentration of technological power in the hands of a few corporations and institutions. He warns that unchecked technological development could exacerbate economic inequality, undermine democratic participation and weaken social solidarity. The encyclical therefore calls for prudent regulation, public accountability, and international cooperation to ensure that technological innovation serves the common good rather than private interests alone. 

Education receives special attention in the document. Pope Leo XIV cautions that reliance on AI-generated information can weaken critical thinking, creativity, and genuine human interaction if used uncritically. For Catholic schools, colleges and universities, the challenge is not simply whether to use AI but how to use it responsibly. Educational institutions must form students who can engage in technology wisely while preserving the habits of reflection, discernment and interpersonal encounters that are essential to human growth.  

The Holy Father also addresses the future of work. Echoing themes found throughout Catholic social teaching, he argues that labor is not merely an economic activity but a participation in God’s creative work. As automation transforms industries and professions, societies must ensure that workers are not treated as expendable. Economic systems must remain ordered toward the flourishing of persons and communities, not solely toward efficiency or profit.  

Among the most striking sections of the encyclical are those dealing with warfare and the military use of artificial intelligence. Pope Leo XIV strongly warns against delegating life-and-death decisions to autonomous systems. Human beings must remain morally responsible for decisions affecting human life. Technologies that distance decision-makers from the consequences of violence risk eroding the moral foundations necessary for peace.  

 Yet “Magnifica Humanitas” is not fundamentally a document about machines. It is a document about humanity. Again and again, the Pope returns to the Christian conviction that every person possesses an inviolable dignity that no technology can replace or surpass. The encyclical calls believers to resist the temptation to measure human worth by efficiency, utility, or technological capability. Instead, it urges a renewed commitment to solidarity, fraternity, truth, and love.  

 For Catholics, the encyclical offers both a challenge and an opportunity. The challenge is to engage in emerging technologies thoughtfully and ethically. The opportunity is to witness to a vision of the human person grounded in the Gospel. In an age increasingly shaped by algorithms and automation, Pope Leo XIV reminds the Church and the world of a timeless truth: technology exists for the human person, not the human person for technology.  

Next steps for Atlanta Catholics 

What does this mean for us here in Atlanta? Our archdiocese is home to a remarkable and growing community of Catholics—people from every nation, every background, every walk of life. We have hospitals and universities and schools. We have professionals in the technology sector itself, many of them people of deep faith who are grappling every day with exactly these questions. We have families trying to raise children with integrity and inner freedom in a world saturated with digital noise. We have workers worried about what the next five years will bring. And we have parishes—communities of prayer and support where these questions can be brought before God and discerned together. 

“Magnifica Humanitas” is addressed to all of them. It is addressed, too, to those who make decisions—in business, in government, in education, in healthcare—about how AI is developed and used. The Church is not asking those leaders to be less innovative. It is asking them to be more human. It is asking them to bring to the table what the Pope calls “a wisdom concerning the human that our present time desperately needs.” 

I encourage you to read this encyclical, or at least to spend time with it. It is available in full on the Vatican website. In the months ahead, there will be opportunities for reflection and conversation about its themes—in our schools, our parishes and our community organizations. I hope our pastors, educators and lay leaders will take it up as a resource for adult faith formation and community discernment. The questions it raises are not peripheral. They are among the most important questions of our time. 

The pope concludes with a line that has stayed with me since I first read it: “In the era of artificial intelligence, when human dignity is threatened by new forms of dehumanization, ours is the pressing duty to remain profoundly human.” That is a duty the Church has always understood. It is, in the end, the duty of love. 

“We are gathered around the Eucharist, the gift of Christ’s living presence among us. He who wished to offer us his life so that we might enter into communion with the Father and become his children, is here as the living Bread come down from heaven, to nourish us with the very life of God, with a love stronger than death,” Pope Leo said in his homily.

“Just as Christ gives himself as food in the eucharistic celebration, the procession shows that he is not confined to the church, but comes out to meet us,” he added. “Jesus travels the streets, crosses the squares and visits our neighborhoods, dwelling in the settings of our daily lives.”

Eucharistic grace to transform lives

The pope offered Mass in the Plaza de Cibeles, the city’s iconic neoclassical fountain square where several of Madrid’s grand avenues converge, before leading the Corpus Christi procession that wound nearly a mile and a half through streets adorned with elaborate floral carpets crafted by local artisans from more than 30,000 carnations.

Children who recently received the sacrament of First Communion scattered flower petals and religious sisters carried candles near the front of the long procession of priests and bishops, culminating with a golden canopy under which Pope Leo carried the large monstrance containing the Blessed Sacrament. People in the crowd knelt down and tossed flowers as the Eucharist passed by.

In his homily, Pope Leo reflected on the power of eucharistic grace to transform people’s lives.

“It is not merely a matter of bringing out the monstrance, but of allowing ourselves to be brought out of our selfishness and indifference, of a comfortable, private faith, so as to respond to his invitation to conversion, to change our perspective, and to welcome his presence which transforms us,” the pope said, telling Spaniards to live their faith courageously in the public square.

The task of Spain today and in the future, the pope said, is to “ensure that the religiosity which has shaped and defined this country for centuries is not a museum of the past to be visited, but a school of faith from which to draw even today.”

In a country struggling with extreme political polarization and unhealed wounds of the Civil War, the pope said the living faith can transform society as “no one can kneel before the Lord” and at the same time “despise their brother.”

Catholic roots of Spain can be “a school” that “teaches us of the gratuitousness of love that becomes a gift, so that it may flow among us and break the chains of all selfishness,” and one “from which we learn that God is a real presence and that we too are called to be present in the realities and challenges of society, not shying away, but personally committing ourselves to the building of the common good.”

Silent fidelity to the Eucharist

As Pope Leo passed by in the procession, he may have recognized one of the faces in the crowd.

Twenty-eight-year-old Erci Torres from Peru, was confirmed by Pope Leo when he served as her bishop at the Santa Rosa de Lima parish in Chiclayo. Today she lives in Madrid and was thrilled to see the pope again.

“It was a very unforgettable experience,” Torres told OSV News. “And to imagine that he is now the pope is incredible.”

During the Mass, Pope Leo invoked St. Manuel González García, an early 20th-century Spanish bishop who passionately urged people to recognize the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist.

Today the saint is known as “the bishop of the abandoned tabernacle” because on his tomb in the Blessed Sacrament Chapel of Palencia Cathedral, it is written, “I ask to be buried next to a tabernacle, so that my bones after my death, like my tongue and my pen in life, may always be repeating to those who pass by: ‘Jesus is here! Jesus is here! Do not leave him abandoned!'”

A man wears a T-shirt with an image of Pope Leo XIV as the pontiff celebrates Mass at Plaza de Cibeles in Madrid June 7, during his apostolic journey to Spain. OSV News photo/Violeta Santos Moura, Reuters

Pope Leo said, “His life reminds us that the Eucharist should be honored not only during great celebrations or on special occasions, but also through the silent fidelity of those who accompany the Lord with a humble and quiet friendship that is nourished day by day.”

The pope also drew on the poetry of St. John of the Cross, who, while imprisoned in Toledo around the time of Corpus Christi in 1578, found the Lord in the darkness of his cell, which the pope described as “a presence from which emanates a light that never fades.”

Special moment for Madrileños

Crowds lined the major avenues leading to the plaza for hours before the Mass began, with 2,300 eucharistic ministers needed to distribute communion to the assembled faithful. About 400 musicians provided music for the liturgy, including an orchestral ensemble.

Among the crowd was the Adam family, eight siblings who waited together for hours to take part in the papal Mass. Seventeen-year-old Patricia Adam is the second oldest of the 8 siblings. Her older sister played violin in the orchestra for the papal Mass.

“For me, my Catholic faith is living a relationship with God and with Jesus in intimacy,” Adam said. “Being here with my family means a lot because it is not just a relationship one to one, but all together with God.”

Nearby 23-year-old Lucia waited with her four siblings and 17 cousins as they attended the Mass together.

“Faith has always been so important to me,” she said. “I have an aunt who is a nun. She is from the Missionaries of Charity. She’s my best example of faith.”

The elaborate floral carpets lining the Calle de Alcalá were created by artisans from the Galician town of Ponteareas, working alongside more than 160 volunteers. The 16 large carpets depicting Eucharistic and Christian symbols lined the streets.

“The solemn processions held on this day have for centuries shaped the piety, art, music, architecture and life of the Spanish people,” Pope Leo said. “Even today, they still express and manifest the spiritual sentiments of this country through the beauty and elegance of the floral carpets, the altars erected in the streets, the carefully crafted monstrances and stands, the hymns and the liturgical vestments.”

For Spaniards, Corpus Christi remains one of the country’s most beloved public expressions of faith and an example of how deeply rooted popular piety remains in Spanish culture.

“This is not an exhibition,” the pope said. “It is a profession of faith in the presence of the risen Lord, who is alive and continues to walk among us, who becomes bread to satiate our hunger for life, and visits the recesses of our hearts and history, even those shrouded in darkness.”

“May the Lord Jesus, present in the Eucharist, transform you into bread that is broken, given, and offered, so that a life of fullness may spring forth for you, for your families, and for your country.”

Pastors and administrators

• Father Israel J. Rodriguez, a priest of the Archdiocese of Boston, is appointed pastor of St. Paul of the Cross Church, Atlanta.
• Father Dominic Tran is appointed administrator of Our Lady of La Vang Mission, Marietta.
• Father Cong Nguyen, administrator of St. Francis of Assisi Church, Blairsville, is appointed pastor.

Parochial vicars

• Father Abel Guerrero Orta is appointed parochial vicar at St. Andrew Church, Roswell.
• Father José Enrique Quintero, a priest in residence at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Atlanta, is appointed parochial vicar of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Special assignments

• Father Ben Thomsen is appointed to the faculty of Notre Dame Seminary, New Orleans.

Varia

• Father Bradley Starr is appointed priest in residence at Emory University Catholic Campus Ministry Rectory.
• Father Carl Jean, chaplain to the Haitian Catholics of the Archdiocese of Atlanta, is appointed priest in residence at Our Lady of Lourdes Rectory, Atlanta.

The archbishop expresses his gratitude to the Congregation of the Passion of Jesus Christ (CP) in founding the parish of St. Paul of the Cross in 1954 and for faithfully providing pastoral care for more than 70 years. The archbishop thanks Father Patrick Daugherty, CP, and Father Luis Lopez Galarza, CP, for their lasting commitment to the parish.

This is an update from the first round of assignments published May 15 by The Georgia Bulletin. Read the full story here.

Blessed Trinity High School in Roswell honors Joshua Paul Gaus as the valedictorian. He is the son of Mary and the late James Gaus. He worships at St. Peter Chanel Church, Roswell. Gaus will be attending the Georgia Institute of Technology. Blessed Trinity’s salutatorian is Kiersten Marie Preissler. She is the daughter of Susan and David Preissler. She is a parishioner of St. Ann Church, Marietta. Preissler will be enrolled at the University of Notre Dame. 

Cristo Rey Atlanta Jesuit High School names Allyson Rojas as the valedictorian. Rojas attends San Felipe de Jesus Mission in Forest Park. She is the daughter of Victor Rojas and Juana Badillo. Rojas will study chemistry at Brown University. Cristo Rey’s salutatorian is Christina Reh, who worships at Corpus Christi Church in Stone Mountain. Reh is the daughter of Nga Reh and Tee Moh. She will pursue a finance degree at the Georgia Institute of Technology. 

Holy Spirit Preparatory School in Atlanta recognizes Edward “Gage” Durham as its valedictorian. Durham is the son of Chris and Megan Durham. He will attend the University of Gloucestershire and plans to study business. Holy Spirit Prep’s salutatorian is Lauren Wilhelm. She is the daughter of Ryan and Kristina Wilhelm. Wilhelm is undecided on her college plans. 

Marist School in Atlanta celebrates Ava Marsh as the valedictorian. She is the daughter of Amanda Marsh and Howard Marsh. She attends Peachtree Presbyterian Church. Marsh will study finance and data science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The Marist School salutatorian is Hunter Nguyen, a parishioner at St. Andrew Church. Nguyen’s parents are Kim Dao and Dr. Hai Nguyen. He plans to study electrical engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. 

Donovan Catholic High School, Athens, honors Brisa Maria Jose Castro Aguirre as the valedictorian. She will attend the University of Georgia to study political science. Her parents are Manuel and Rocio Ponce, and they are parishioners at St. Joseph Church in Athens. Monsignor Donovan’s salutatorian is Morgan Walker, who will attend Auburn University with a double major in political science and history. Her mother is Dr. Ashli Walker. She is a parishioner at St. Joseph Church. The honorarian graduate is Alice Frances McNiff, who will be enrolled at Georgia College & State University to study biology. McNiff’s parents are Rob and Walker McNiff. They worship at St. Joseph Church. 

Notre Dame Academy in Duluth recognizes Wonji Lee as the valedictorian. She is the daughter of Jungwon bang and Dongkeun Lee. In the fall, Lee will be studying at Yale University. Notre Dame’s salutatorian is Casey Silcott, daughter of Vance Silcott and Vivia Hill-Silcott. They are parishioners at St. Benedict Church, Duluth. Silcott will attend the Purdue University Honors College. 

Pinecrest Academy in Cumming names Nick DiMarco as valedictorian. DiMarco worships at St. Brigid Church, Johns Creek. He is the son of John and Anne DiMarco. He will study computer science at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Pinecrest’s salutatorian is Evelyn Fuentes of St. Brendan the Navigator Church, Cumming. Her parents are José and Lana Fuentes. She will pursue a bachelor’s degree in saxophone performance at the Bienen School of Music at Northwestern University. 

St. John Bosco Academy in Cumming honors Alexandra Faye Le-Jing Danilovich as valedictorian. Her parents are Bryan and Lilian Danilovich. She is a parishioner at St. Thomas More Church, Decatur. Danilovich will major in international business and Chinese at the University of Georgia. Mary Therese Miles is the salutatorian. She is the daughter of James and Patricia Miles. Holy Cross Church, Atlanta, is her home parish. Miles will be enrolled at Franciscan University of Steubenville to study biology. 

St. Mary’s Academy in Fayetteville celebrates its valedictorian, Adrian Sanchez. He is the son of Patricia Sanchez and Rodrigo Sanchez. They attend St. Joseph Catholic Church in Macon. He will study pre-med courses and philosophy at Yale University. St. Mary’s salutatorian is Ai Ha. She is the daughter of Kim-Uyen Tran. Ha’s home parish is Our Lady of Vietnam Church in Riverdale. She plans on attending either the University of Georgia or Emory University to study psychology on a pre-med track. 

St. Pius X High School in Atlanta recognizes Julianna Esper as this year’s valedictorian. Her parents are Christine and Gregory Esper. They worship at the Greek Orthodox Cathedral of the Annunciation. Esper will be enrolled at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Cate Chandler is St. Pius X’s salutatorian. She is the daughter of Bonnie and Greg Chandler. They are parishioners at the Cathedral of Christ the King in Atlanta. Chandler will attend the University of Georgia Honors College. 

On May 30, Archbishop Gregory J. Hartmayer, OFM Conv., received the promises of obedience from Eric Baylot, Jacob Butz, Juno Lee and Sean Lee. He blessed their hands with sacred oils and ordained them priests of the Archdiocese of Atlanta.  

Holy Vietnamese Martyrs Church in Norcross overflowed with family, friends and well-wishers including visitors from out of state for the ordination. The Cathedral Choir of Christ the King, accompanied by the Atlanta Symphony Brass Quintet and Timpanist, filled the church with soaring organ music as scores of priests and deacons joined Bishops John N. Tran, Bernard E. Shlesinger III and Joel M. Konzen, SM, for the celebration.  

Called to serve 

In his homily, the archbishop said the men had been called to serve following an initiative first started by God. He said the priesthood is a ministry of humility, as the priests are entrusted with gifts none have earned.  

“You are not the origin of what happens at this altar,” said the archbishop. “You are the instrument.” 

Prayer is the foundation of their service as priests. It is vital to their ministry and without it, the efforts risk becoming fruitless. It is part of the “one integrated life” tying together prayer, obedience and celibacy, he said. 

Bishop John N. Tran, right, kisses newly ordained Father Eric Baylot’s consecrated hands during the priest ordination Mass at Holy Vietnamese Martyrs on May 30. Photo by Julianna Leopold

“A priest who does not pray cannot lead others to prayer,” said the archbishop. “A priest who neglects his own interior life has nothing to give.” 

The four are now part of a larger community linked to brother priests in the Archdiocese of Atlanta. He encouraged them to stay in touch, share life’s tragedies and joys and be concerned for each other.  

“The world does not need heroic Lone Rangers in clerical collars. It needs a fraternity of humble, prayerful and joyful men,” he said.  

Paths to the altar 

For the four, the ritual marked the end of years of discernment, studies, a year spent in parish and in the diaconate.  

Eric Baylot, 30, pursued his vocation after studying theater at the University of Georgia. He grew up in Norcross, worshipping at Mary Our Queen Church. Father Baylot is the son of Michael Baylot and Jeannine Baylot. He has three siblings. He said stepping out to follow his vocation began with “a lot of running amid fear” until he had “powerful prayer experiences” in eucharistic adoration.  

Jacob Butz, 31, left a position as an accountant. Raised in a family of five, Father Butz is the son of Kevin and Karen Butz. He grew up with his siblings in Woodstock. The family worshiped at St. Michael the Archangel Church. While attending Kennesaw State University, he worked as a summer missionary for Life Teen. He said while serving at this camp he first felt the desire from God to serve as a priest. 

Juno Lee, 33, fulfilled his military obligation in South Korea before taking on his childhood desire for the priesthood. He said it was “step by step” guidance by God, shaped by joyful witnesses of priests in Korea, where about 11 percent of the country is Catholic. Father Lee is the son of father Yoon-Su Lee and mother Yu-Kyung Hwang, who live in South Korea. He has two siblings. An encounter years ago confirmed his vocation. As he wrestled with whether to pursue attending seminary, a woman approached him after Mass, and not knowing his inner conflict, encouraged him to “keep your eyes forward and go.”  

Sean Lee, 27, entered seminary after high school. A native of Lilburn, he attended St. John Neumann Church. He grew up in a household led by his parents, Bill Lee and Christine Lee. He is one of three children, with two brothers. During the summer before his freshman year of high school, he attended the Steubenville Youth Conference, where he felt “a gentle nudge in my heart” to consider the priesthood. That feeling never left. After guidance from a close, respected priest, he applied to seminary after high school graduation. Shaped by that experience, Father Lee said he is “particularly passionate about accompanying teens and young people, helping them discover the Lord’s presence in the life of the Church and grow into a living, personal faith.” 

New priest Father Juno Lee gives communion for the first time after being ordained at Holy Vietnamese Martyrs Church on May 30. Photo by Julianna Leopold

First blessings 

Following the ordination, the crowd of well-wishers filled the parish hall to receive first blessings from the new priests. 

Marissa and Steven Couch stood in line to greet their longtime friend Father Juno Lee. Marissa knew him from her work with high school students at St. Brigid Church in Johns Creek. Steven was with him at St. Joseph Seminary College.  

Steven said his former classmate may seem shy, but he is an amazing person who puts others’ concerns at the forefront of his mind.  

“You feel like you’re the only person in the room,” he said.  

At the parish, Marissa saw Father Lee talk to high schoolers, first as an observer and then win their respect when he crushed them playing video games. He carries a lot of joy, and he will deeply “share in the joy of a lot of his parishioners,” she said.  

A group from St. John Neumann Church were on hand to watch their former parishioner, Father Sean Lee, become ordained. The Lilburn parish was hosting his first Mass, which they predicted would be filled beyond capacity.  

Jeffrey Newman, who is attending classes to become a permanent deacon, said one of Father Lee’s gifts is an ability to relate to everyone.  

“He knows how to talk to all of the different ages and bring Jesus to everyone in their appropriate place in life,” said Newman. 

Emily Snipes is the assistant principal at St. John Neumann Regional School in Lilburn. She has known Father Lee since he began altar serving before he was 10. Seeing him ordained felt like witnessing your own child being married, she said.  

The new priest has a vibrant faith that will inspire others, she said. 

“I would not be surprised if he has an impact on bringing more people to the priesthood or the religious life,” said Snipes.

“I’m worried about him driving alone,” my aunt said. 

“Oh, he’ll be fine,” I replied. 

But this did not stop her from positing a list of potential disasters that could unfold on the interstate. The son in question was in his sixties with two grown children of his own, but in my aunt’s eyes, he was still a little fellow running around the house in pajamas with footies. 

My aunt also fretted over her daughter, her grandchildren and great grandchildren—and yours truly. For example, when I was visiting her in Florida, she asked me to fetch a blanket from her bedroom closet. 

As I left the room to do so, she called out, “Be careful! Don’t pinch your fingers in the door.” At that moment, I was 3 years old again, hauling around my favorite stuffed dog.  

Truth be told, I inherited the worry gene myself. When I took my niece, the capable mom of three children, to the airport, I advised her: “Now don’t get lost!”  

For years, I had a worry tucked away in the back of my mind about the devastating loneliness I would endure, should my husband die before me, and in fact, he did. From that tragedy, I learned that sometimes our worst nightmares do come true, but God’s grace will guide us through them. 

I do not have offspring but commiserate with friends whose kids are struggling at school or acting up at home. Like my friends, I sometimes identify with Martha, the quintessential worrywart in the Gospels, who rushes around readying the house for her guest, who is none other than Jesus. 

She goes to Jesus and complains her sister isn’t helping, and he chides her gently, “Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.” 

She might have been surprised when he said her sister, Mary, had “chosen the better part.” After all, Mary was not engrossed in practical matters, but was sitting quietly with Jesus, listening to him.  

It is so easy to become “anxious and worried” when our daily lives are filled with overlapping trials, tribulations and temptations. I find solace in the words of Caryll Houselander, a 20th-century English Catholic mystic and author, who lived through the bombings in London during World War II.  

She wrote: “I was terrified, but I was also perfectly conscious of being held in God’s hands … and there was nothing more to worry about.”  

In a letter, a friend asked Houselander how to stop worrying, and she replied, “The more you say, ‘I must not worry,’ the more you will: I think it is better simply to offer the worrying to God.” 

We can ask God to transform our fretting into a prayer. Just as Jesus offered his suffering on the cross for the redemption of the world, we can give God our mental anguish to help others. 

On the cross, Jesus said, “Lord, into thy hands I commend my spirit.” Like him, we can pray, “God, into thy hands I place my friend, my child, my spouse, my neighbor.” 

These are big, loving hands, which shaped the skies, the seas and the stars. Hands that healed the lepers and the blind. Hands that are steering the ship of our lives.  

We can place in these capable hands our worries about our loved ones driving on the highway, getting frazzled when guests arrive and getting their fingers caught in the closet door. 

Juan Pablo Mora Duran, Chrystian Bis, Bryan Lee Roberts and William Charles Whitlow were ordained before family members, clergy, seminarians and parishioners from across the Archdiocese of Atlanta.  

In his homily, Archbishop Hartmayer spoke to the ordained men about the humility required in ministry.  

“I say this as someone who has stood where you are standing,” he said. “There is something sobering about this moment. Something that brings a man face to face with the distance between what he is and what he is being asked to do.”  

The archbishop reminded the men that their future ministry would depend not simply on talent, but on grace.  

“Each of you brings real gifts to this work,” he said. “But the work does not depend on your gifts alone. It depends on God’s grace.” 

Seminarian Juan Pablo Mora Duran walks out of the church as a deacon amid cheers from the congregation after years of study and discernment. Growing up in the Venezuelan countryside, Mora Duran said he first felt his call to the vocation when he was 6 years old. Photo by Julianna Leopold

Many wiped tears as the men lay prostrate before the altar during the Litany of the Saints, and applause filled the church as the men exited as deacons, taking the final step before being ordained as priests next year. 

The liturgy reflected the backgrounds and families of the new deacons. The first reading was proclaimed in Polish to honor Bis’ Polish heritage, while the second reading was proclaimed in Spanish as a nod to Mora Duran’s Venezuelan roots.  

Following the Mass, long lines formed as relatives and friends approached the newly ordained deacons for blessings.  

A childhood call 

Mora Duran, 34, was born in La Grita, Tachira State, Venezuela. He grew up first in the Venezuelan countryside in Rio del Paramo before moving into the city. He later became a cantor and member of apostolic groups at the Basilica del Espíritu Santo Shrine of Santo Cristo de La Grita, a major pilgrimage site in Venezuela. 

Mora Duran said he felt drawn to the vocation when he was only 6 years old and credited his personal experiences as moments that strengthened the call. After his father’s death in 2004, he served as an altar server at his local parish, Nuestra Señora de Los Angeles Church.  

After spending seven years in formation at the St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary in Palmira, Venezuela, Mora Duran stepped away from the seminary amid rising political tensions in the country.  

“In those moments, I have learned to be honest with the Lord, to listen and to trust him more deeply,” he said.  

He later moved to Colombia where he worked evangelizing youth through a Catholic foundation before eventually discerning a return to formation through the Archdiocese of Atlanta. As a seminarian at Notre Dame Seminary in New Orleans, he shared that prayer before the Blessed Sacrament became central to his spiritual preparation for ordination.  

“Life at the seminary is excellent for me,” he said. “We live to learn more about Jesus Christ and his church while simultaneously experiencing and enjoying God’s love for us.” 

Mora Duran said he looked forward to accompanying people in their daily lives through preaching and sacramental ministry. This summer he will serve at Christ the Redeemer Church in Dawsonville.  

“While I know I can serve as a committed layperson, I feel called to bring God’s grace to others in a sacramental way,” he said. “I desire to be a disciple of Christ who radiates his love not only through my life, but especially through the celebration of the sacraments.” 

Ready to serve a growing community 

Bis, 27, was born in Fort Stewart to Polish parents and was later raised in Gainesville. He shared he discerned his vocation quietly over several years through prayer and Eucharistic adoration.  

“I stewed on it for years in private adoration and reading,” he said. “I decided by the end of college to try turning my life completely in the pursuit of this discernment through joining the seminarian program in Atlanta.” 

Deacon Chrystian Bis joyfully hugs one of the priests during the Kiss of Peace at the transitional diaconate ordination at St. Peter Chanel on May 23.

Bis attended the University of North Georgia and earned a degree in finance before entering the St. Vincent de Paul Seminary in Florida. 

His brother, Albert Bis, described the ordination as an emotional and joyful moment for the family, who are parishioners of Prince of Peace Church in Flowery Branch.  

“I feel really overjoyed,” he said. “I’m very blessed that he’s gotten to this. We’ve done everything we can as a family to support him, so I feel very fortunate seeing him do this.” 

Bis described his vocational journey simply as “giving the Lord my trust and going for it.”  

Formation, he said, has taught him the importance of sacrifice and openness in ministry. 

“I learned that service requires a willingness to realize my shortcomings, and to be open to put aside my own desires and comfort to be the minister that the Lord wants me to be,” he said.  

Bis said he is excited to serve the growing Catholic population in Georgia, especially through the sacraments. He will serve at All Saints Church in Dunwoody this summer.  

“The faith is growing rapidly in Georgia,” he said. “Being able to be part of supporting that growth is exciting.” 

Surrounded by zeal for Christ 

Roberts, 30, originally from Boca Raton, Florida, described his vocation as “one of God’s mercy and zeal.”  

After living in Florida for much of his childhood, Roberts moved with his family to Georgia in 2009 and became active at St. Brigid Church in Johns Creek where he was confirmed and remained involved throughout high school. 

Roberts said his relationship with Christ deepened in college through confession and friendships with faithful Catholics.  

“The Lord drew me to himself in college through the sacrament of confession and through zealous followers of Christ,” he said. “As I learned how to pray and serve others in my college community, the Lord kept tugging my heart to serve him.” 

Francisco and Silvia Garduno, parishioners of St. Lawrence Church, kneel before Deacon Bryan Lee Roberts to receive one of his first blessings as an official deacon after the transitional diaconate ordination at St. Peter Chanel Church on May 23. Photo by Julianna Leopold

After graduating college, Roberts served for two years as a FOCUS missionary, accompanying and evangelizing college students. During that time, he said, the Lord confirmed his desire to become a priest.  

Roberts now studies at St. Vincent de Paul Regional Seminary. He said one of the most important lessons of formation has been understanding that ministry must flow from a relationship with Christ. 

“During time of formation, I have learned that service and ministry flow from our relationship with our Lord and always brings us back to our relationship with him.” 

Roberts will serve at St. Catherine Labouré Church in Jefferson this summer.  

A strong support system 

Whitlow, 29, a native of LaGrange and parishioner of St. Peter Church, said his vocation has been rooted in learning to listen to God.  

“The beauty of this is the realization that our path to holiness derives from listening to the Lord calling us,” he said.  

Archbishop Gregory J. Hartmayer, OFM Conv., smiles at Deacon William Charles Whitlow, left, in the sanctuary at the transitional diaconate ordination at St. Peter Chanel. Archbishop Hartmayer addressed the deacons in his homily, “There is something sobering about this moment. Something that brings a man face to face with the distance between what he is and what he is being asked to do.”

Every stage of life, including challenges and unexpected turns, he shared, became “conduits for grace,” that led him to the priesthood.  

Now studying at Notre Dame Seminary in New Orleans, Whitlow said an eight-day silent retreat before his pastoral year became one of the most important moments of spiritual preparation in his formation.  

“Those days and time spent pouring over sacred Scripture were tremendous as it allowed me to unlock the word of God in ways I hadn’t previously,” he said.  

Whitlow said he’s especially grateful to the people across the Archdiocese of Atlanta who supported him during formation. 

“The opportunities to serve on summer assignments, being present for events and receiving so much support over the years has been incredible,” he said. “In the moments of difficulties, it has been recalling the community in Atlanta and the vocation to serve them that has been the greatest support.”  

This summer, Whitlow will serve at Holy Spirit Church in Atlanta.  

The newly ordained transitional deacons left with encouragement as they prepare to serve the archdiocese and its parishioners as future priests. 

“When you open the breviary, you are joining your voice to every priest, deacon, religious and faith person praying at the same time across the world,” Archbishop Hartmayer said in his homily. “You are holding the Church before God in the hours when no one is watching.”

Once a newcomer to the independent Catholic school, with parents whose first language was not English, Seo relates to students who may not be able to lean on parents to help them with classwork. 

The rising senior, whose family heritage is Polish and Korean, brainstormed to create a tutoring program for those lower school students. She wanted to encourage students to turn to her and her friends, especially to guide those whose parents may struggle with speaking or reading English.  

“Notre Dame also has a lot of international students within their lower school, where parents don’t necessarily know the English language,” she said. “The upper school students are able to help with that.” 

Hanna Seo of Notre Dame Academy spends time with younger students after school to help them academically and socially. Seo saw a need to guide the students in the lower grades, particularly those whose parents might struggle with the English language. Photo Courtesy of Notre Dame Academy

She started Bridge by Knowledge as a small project with a handful of lower school students in the spring. In the weekly hour meetings, the young students work with tutors on the classwork where they struggle. Seo said she’s seen academic confidence develop as the students work through the problems.  

“It’s genuinely amazing to see how much they started liking math and English and how much fun they are having all working together,” she said.  

Teachers have seen self assurance grow in young people attending tutoring sessions.  

“Building confidence and enthusiasm around math is such an important first step, and I’m hopeful we’ll continue to see growth as they attend more consistently,” wrote third-grade teacher Kristen Harris in an email.  

With time during the summer to plan the next round of the program, around 18 students have enrolled for the fall already.  

Seo’s work and the service requirements at area Catholic schools seem to put the teenagers in a good position for future success. A recent national survey by Gallup found that community service is associated with confidence and community ties. The data show that young people who engage in service report greater career readiness. 

Building service into life 

Julie Pack, Notre Dame Academy’s service learning coordinator, believes it is key to foster joy in students around community service early and to repeat the experience, so students feel it’spart of their identity, not a box to check. Service starts as early as kindergarten for the 325 students here. Once they reach the upper school, Notre Dame’s requirement is four service projects per year. Each grade works with a nonprofit, taking students from the Atlanta Humane Society and an assisted living center to Rainbow Village, a temporary housing program for families in crisis.  

“We want it to be a part of who they are,” she said. “It’s what God’s called us to do, to love and to serve one another and to truly live the Gospel.” 

Area Catholic schools build service into student life. At St. Pius X High School, the Works of Mercy program asks students to give an hour a month from August to March.  

“When we go out into the world and participate in God’s love through serving others, we come to know the goodness found in each human just as Jesus showed us,” the school’s program states. At Blessed Trinity High School, students are encouraged to give 15 hours to projects serving those most vulnerable and in need, with campus ministry pointing students to the corporal works of mercy, including feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless and burying the dead. 

Asking some 3,000 young people, between 12-25, the Gallup survey found 52 percent said service had a positive impact on feeling prepared for a future career. The survey reported young people felt time aiding others builds confidence in practical skills. They were more likely to rate themselves highly in leadership, communication and teamwork. 

Avery Weaver took on a service project to help Donovan Catholic’s baseball team. He asked Athens businesses to support his project and raised more than $2,000. The project he organized improved the field’s dugouts, batting cage and installed a flagpole. Weaver led a group of five adults and three peers to complete the project. Photo Courtesy of Donovan Catholic

Nearly half of young people with service experience reported feeling confident they can achieve the kind of career they want, compared with one-third of those without service experience, according to the survey. Confidence is even higher among those with greater involvement in service. 

Greater involvement in aiding others is a goal at Athens’ Donovan Catholic High School.  

Theology teacher Lanchus Sexius works with the students so their faith commitment to service also translates into adulthood.  

“If they see a need, whether it’s in their family, in society, then they can fulfill that need. And that’s what service is about,” he said, about his hope for growing a service mindset after the students receive their diploma.  

He has built the program around projects for a semester, rooting them in the corporal works of mercy. The school first models service projects for students as teachers create the project and take students into the community. Starting in 10th grade, students create their own projects, generally one per semester. Students must choose the work, design a project around it, present it for approval, complete it and get verification. 

Sexius said he wants the projects to become meaningful and rooted in Catholic teaching for young people. 

For Seo, service can give young people a feeling of accomplishment because they know they helped someone who needed support, no matter how small the task. 

 “It’s like it feels like a big hug to a person,” she said. “That’s something that they need sometimes.” 

Archbishop Gregory J. Hartmayer, OFM Conv., celebrated the anniversary Mass. The celebration marked a milestone generations in the making, one rooted in the vision of Catholics who, in 1951, established a new parish on a hilltop in North Atlanta.

Seventy-five years later, the parish has grown from a fledgling community celebrating Mass in temporary spaces to one of the largest and most established Catholic communities in the Archdiocese of Atlanta.

Through decades of change, including the transition from Marist leadership to archdiocesan priests last year, parishioners say the heart of OLA has remained the same.

“What makes this parish community unique is, without question, our people,” said Anne Stephens, parish communications director. “We take care of one another here.”

Founded on May 1, 1951, Our Lady of the Assumption was named mere months after Pope Pius XII formally declared the dogma of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Father Paul Burkort, SM, pastor of OLA, is photographed with some of the youngsters receiving first holy communion in November 1969. Photo Courtesy of OLA

Archbishop Gerald P. O’Hara of the Diocese of Savannah-Atlanta purchased the original 10-acre tract of land for $50,000, envisioning a parish that would include a church and school for Atlanta’s growing Catholic population.

Before parish buildings were completed, parishioners gathered for Mass at the old Lawson General Hospital near Naval Air Station Atlanta and later in the auditorium of Jim Cherry Elementary School. By 1952, Masses were celebrated in the chapel of the newly opened school, staffed by the Sisters of Mercy.

The original church building opened in 1957 under the leadership of Msgr. Joseph Moylan, OLA’s founding pastor. The parish would later undergo renovations following the reforms by Vatican II liturgical directives before eventually constructing the current church building, dedicated in 2005 by then-Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory.

Stephens’ connection to OLA is deeply personal.

“I grew up here,” she said. “OLA has been woven into every part of my life.”

Stephens began serving as director of OLA’s youth ministry in 1998 before later taking on the role as the parish’s communications director.

Over nearly three decades working at the parish, she witnessed many of the milestones that shaped the community, including the construction of the current church, the opening of the preschool and the growth of Indonesian and Hispanic communities.

Gloria Bartolon and her husband Manuel Roblero of the Latino Community at Our Lady of the Assumption prepare to celebrate the Feast of the Assumption in August 2025. To serve its diverse community members, the parish offers Mass in Spanish and an Indonesian Mass on Sundays. Photo Courtesy of OLA

In 2000, the parish began offering Mass for Indonesian Catholics in the area. The community has become a “vibrant and integral part of parish life,” Stephens said.

After the closing of Our Lady of the Americas Mission in Doraville, OLA added a Sunday Spanish-language Mass in 2007.

“Over the years, the Latino community has brought life and energy to the parish through their deep and reverent faith, active involvement and spirit of celebration,” Stephens said.

The parish’s long history also includes decades of retreats, ministries and service organizations that parishioners say helped define the spirit of OLA. One of the most influential has been Christ Renews His Parish, a retreat program first held in 1980.

“Attendees of that weekend experience renewal in their personal lives that heals brokenness, strengthens faith, creates lifelong friendships and brings people into ministry,” Stephens said.

Stephens credits the retreat in changing her own life.

“I had been that person who snuck out the back door of the church after Mass each week to avoid having to socialize with anyone,” she said. “The weekend changed my life. Within a few months I was teaching seventh grade Sunday school.”

Parishioners take part in the program, Christ Renews His Parish, in 1982 at OLA. The weekend experience helped many heal and strengthen faith. Photo Courtesy of OLA

The retreat eventually led Stephens into parish ministry, where she spent years accompanying young people through confirmation retreats, youth programs and service opportunities. Today, she watches many of those former teens return to OLA as adults raising families of their own.

“One of the greatest joys of serving at OLA for so many years has been watching the young people I once knew in youth ministry return to the parish as adults,” she said. “It’s incredible, and a great blessing, to see these former kids of mine grow into strong, kind, faith-filled adults.”

Bringing people together

Faith being passed down to generations is something that defines OLA, parishioners say.

Stephanie Maddox joined the parish in 2009 with her husband, Nick Maddox. They are now raising their three children in the parish.

“Our church does not have a cry room, and the fact that children are welcome into Mass has shaped our family,” Maddox said. “OLA encourages children to come to Mass, to be part of the family and for the family to worship together.”

Maddox serves in several ministries, including the parish docent ministry, which offers tours of the church and shares the history behind its architecture and sacred artwork.

“My favorite tours are those where long-time parishioners join us,” she said. “They bring their stories from years past to the tour, making OLA’s history accessible and real.”

Some of her most meaningful memories at the parish center around her children’s sacraments, but also moments of grief. Maddox recalled the funeral Mass of a close friend who died from pancreatic cancer in 2022.

“Remembering the entire church filled with the community that rallied behind the family was truly touching,” she said. “It showed the power that God has in bringing people together.”

OLA continues to grow among young families. Father Daniel Ketter, who became pastor in July 2025 after the parish returned to the care of the Archdiocese of Atlanta, described the parish as “growing young.”

Nia Santoyo and Enrique Lopez with their children Grecia and Jessia enjoy time with Father Jim Duffy, SM, the last Marist pastor of Our Lady of the Assumption Church. Diocesan priests returned to the Brookhaven parish in 2025 after years of service by the Marists. Photo Courtesy of OLA

“We have more and more young families and young adults joining our parish, which is a huge blessing and gives us confidence about our future and that of the Catholic Church in Atlanta.” Father Ketter said. “These young families and parishioners imbue the parish with a vitality that is palpable.”

He pointed specifically on the crowded 9:30 a.m. Sunday Mass, which is “crawling, literally, with little children.”

Father Ketter acknowledged that the transition from Marist leadership after nearly six decades brought uncertainty for some parishioners. The Society of Mary assumed pastoral care of OLA in 1965 and remained at the parish until June 2025.

“Some understandably have expressed the trepidation they have experienced over losing their beloved Marist fathers,” Father Ketter said. “It certainly helps that both Father Nick Le and I are Marist graduates and have ourselves been formed in the Marist spirit.”

For Father Ketter, “it’s a great honor to be the pastor of our parish as we mark this important milestone.”

As OLA looks toward its next chapter, parishioners say the parish’s greatest strength is its people, which is one that has sustained across the last 75 years.

Looking through decades of parish archives while prepping anniversary Mass materials, Stephens said she was moved by the photographs of parishioners who helped build the foundation of the community long before her time.

“They laid the foundation for the wonderful community that exists today,” she said.

Now, another generation continues the story.

“My hope is that we continue to grow in faith and love, serving God’s people and bringing his light and love into the world in all that we do,” Stephens said.

Bishop Bernard E. Shlesinger III

In listening to the other excellent speakers who presented that day, they reminded the graduates of the gift that they had received and how they had been given a firm faith and academic foundation to succeed in the future; they were challenged to give gratitude for the investment that their parents had made in their education and life lessons, and to the teachers who had accompanied them. All the speakers highlighted the importance of the students’ journey together and the friendships they had forged.   

In preparing my message for this event and after reflecting upon my own journey following high school, I was drawn toward a question: “What might Jesus say if he were there at the graduation?”  

It is not recorded in the Scriptures that he ever graduated from a program of learning. Of course, Jesus was very familiar with the Scriptures because he attended the synagogue. He was known as the carpenter’s son, so had learned a trade from St. Joseph. The Scriptures say that he was obedient to Mary and Joseph and that he grew in grew in wisdom and stature before God and men. Later, many would refer to him as Rabbi—teacher—as he spoke with authority unlike any other teacher.   

I consulted artificial intelligence with this question about what Jesus might say at a commencement ceremony. My search led me to see that he might say something like, “Do not be anxious about tomorrow” or “In the world you will have problems, but take courage, I have overcome the world.” Jesus might have said, “The greatest among you shall be your servant.”  Most of our journey in life is remembering such core truths. However, the last words of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew now ring out more loudly to me, and I hope for them, “Behold, I am with you always until the end of the age.” 

Jesus never journeyed alone while on his earth. He did nothing alone; he did only what he saw his Father was doing. His food was to do the will of his Father. He and the Father were one. His life and mission were rooted in this. He spent himself in service of others, especially accompanying those who will dream of a hope-filled future, but who will face failure and suffering while discovering that they are blessed in their poverty. 

The future for all of us always begins with the presence of the Risen Christ and our personal relationship with him. Either we live a life hidden in Christ or a life lived around him. We never graduate from this challenge for we are reminded at the Eucharist to live through him, with him and in him, lest we live apart from him, separated from the vine that brings life into the branches and produces fruit.  

I don’t know if my words at the commencement will be remembered, however I pray that the grads will never forget that Jesus will get them much farther in life than they can ever imagine.

In the 82-page document, released May 25, the day after Pentecost, the pope also asked forgiveness for the Church’s long tolerance of slavery, and he declared that its “just war theory” was now outdated.

“Today, more than ever, without prejudice to the right to self-defense in the strictest sense, it is important to reaffirm that the ‘just war’ theory, which has all too often been used to justify any kind of war, is now outdated,” he wrote.

“Humanity possesses far more effective and capable tools for promoting human life and resolving conflicts, such as dialogue, diplomacy and forgiveness. The use of force, violence and weapons reflects a relational poverty that always has disastrous consequences for civilian populations,” the pope’s new document said.

The document, signed May 15, marked the 135th anniversary of his namesake’s landmark social encyclical, “Rerum Novarum,” which reflected on society, the economy and politics, and ushered in what is now known as the “Social Doctrine of the Church.”

“When some objected that the Church should not waste energy on worldly matters, but instead focus on communicating the message of eternal life, Leo XIII responded with realism and wisdom, saying that the proclamation of the Gospel cannot overlook the concrete lives of people,” Pope Leo XIV wrote.

While his turn-of-the-last-century predecessor focused on the industrial revolution’s impact on the human being and society, Pope Leo looked at the consequences of the digital revolution in the 21st-century and how best to safeguard “the human person in the time of artificial intelligence.”

This is the cover of “Magnifica Humanitas: On the Care of the Human Person in the Age of Artificial Intelligence,” the first encyclical of Pope Leo XIV, published May 25. OSV News illustration/Our Sunday Visitor

Pope Leo used nearly the first half of the document to outline the role and development of the church’s social teaching, and why and how it continues to be needed in a world facing both old and new challenges.

“Today, the Social Doctrine of the Church is a legacy of wisdom, where we find principles for thought, criteria for discernment and judgment, and concrete guidelines for action” to “clearly interpret the challenges of the present and identify appropriate ways for living out a clear Christian witness, with joy and in service to the world,” he wrote.

“It is not an inert set of concepts, but a living corpus of truth that safeguards and interprets humanity’s vocation to a full and just life. I therefore wish to add my own voice to this living tradition,” he added.

Listening to and engaging with the wider world, especially those active in the fields of science, technology, academia and politics, he wrote, is crucial to a process of “shared discernment” to identify and heal the spiritual and cultural roots of present-day problems rather than issuing reactive pronouncements or “risk letting the succession of emergencies dictate the direction of our path.”

While the Church is concerned with theological, “anthropological” and social questions, it is also “necessary to establish adequate regulatory tools capable of upholding justice and curbing the distorting effects of technological power,” the pope wrote.

“Nevertheless, the issue is not limited to regulation. As Pope Francis warned, we must realistically ask ourselves who holds this power today and how they use it,” he added.

“Humanity, created by God in all its grandeur, is today facing a pivotal choice: either to construct a new Tower of Babel or to build the city in which God and humanity dwell together,” he wrote. Every generation has the same duty of “guiding history to become a place where the dignity of every person is safeguarded, justice is promoted and fraternity is made possible.”

While the document was embedded “in a time of artificial intelligence,” it also included a wide gamut of ongoing, lingering ills such as: the exploitation of people and nature; war; the arms race; disrespect for human life; threats to democracy and the common good; discrimination against the poor and women; and new forms of slavery.

“Human trafficking must be recognized as a contemporary form of slavery and a grave violation of human dignity. Failing to respond firmly, or tolerating these practices in any way, is in some way to become complicit in today’s sins, which are akin to those of the past when slavery was being concealed and justified,” Pope Leo wrote.

While the Catholic Church constantly affirmed the dignity of every human being, he wrote, “neither can we deny or diminish the delay with which both society and the Church came to denounce the scourge of slavery,” noting it wasn’t until the 19th century “that a formal, absolute and universal condemnation of slavery was clearly articulated, notably under Pope Leo XIII.”

“This development offers a clear example of the Church’s growth in understanding the perennial truths of Revelation that she safeguards,” he wrote, “even if it took eighteen centuries for its full incompatibility with slavery to be explicitly recognized.”

“This constitutes a wound in Christian memory, one from which we cannot consider ourselves detached,” he wrote, and “for this, in the name of the Church, I sincerely ask for pardon.”

It is “a shared responsibility,” he wrote, of all members of the human family to come together and discern “Where are we going? Toward what goal do we wish to orient ourselves? What direction should we choose as a people and as a human community?”

“The search for the truth in public life, education in the digital environment, the transformation of work, the fragility of families and new forms of slavery are not isolated phenomena,” he wrote. “Rather, they reflect a common underlying issue, namely that if technology becomes the ultimate criterion, the human person risks being reduced to data, a cog in a machine or a commodity.”

“If, however, technology is integrated with a wise perspective, it can become an instrument of growth, justice and fraternity,” he added.

Innovation can genuinely serve integral human development and integral ecology, Pope Leo wrote, “rather than becoming a source of exclusion and dominance.”

Referring often to St. Augustine’s teachings, Pope Leo clearly defined the two “cities” people today must choose to contribute to: either a worldly, selfish land dedicated to building a “Tower of Babel” or a Christian “civilization of love in the digital age.”

He decried today’s “culture of power” that was “normalizing” war, ballooning military arsenals, and fomenting fear and polarization; he reinforced the Vatican’s long-standing opposition to leaving the decision to use lethal force to AI or “to opaque or automated processes.”

The pope also condemned today’s “false realism,” calling it “truly irresponsible” to stoke resignation by pretending war is inevitable and peace and dialogue are “utopian or irrational positions that ignore the risks at stake.”

“In fact, peace is neither a naïve hope nor merely the absence of war; instead, it is always possible as the fruit of justice and charity,” he wrote.

Pope Leo underlined the need for everyone to take responsibility in building a better world by quoting the wizard Gandalf in J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings. The Return of the King.” “It is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till.”

Pope Leo then proposed five paths toward daily and public responsibility: “the need to disarm words; building peace through justice; adopting the perspective of victims; cultivating a healthy realism; and reviving dialogue and multilateralism.”

Fundamentally, he added, what is needed is the Christian view of humanity and understanding of God’s plan for his creation.

“As a believer among believers, I invite everyone to contemplate, in the face of the Son of God, the grandeur of humanity that shines a light also on the era of AI,” he wrote. “In Christ, we are called to cooperate in the work of creation, rather than be disinterested observers of technological processes that limit our freedom and responsibility.”

“The dignity inscribed in each of us by the Holy Spirit can also be seen in our capacity to reflect critically, choose and love freely, and form authentic relationships,” Pope Leo wrote.

“No computational system, however sophisticated, can create a heart that gives itself, or a conscience that discerns good from evil,” he wrote. “Even when machines excel in efficiency, a human face that asks to be gazed upon remains the center of our history.”