Holy Cross Catholic Church

Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski serves on the Committee on Migration of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. / Credit: "The World Over with Raymond Arroyo"/EWTN News Screenshot

CNA Staff, Jan 31, 2025 / 14:30 pm (CNA).

Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami, a member of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) committee that oversees migration and refugee services, spoke with EWTN’s Raymond Arroyo on “The World Over” Thursday about the multiple changes to U.S. immigration and refugee policy being made by the Trump-Vance administration.

In the wake of the new administration’s flurry of executive action on immigration, Catholic bishops across the country are publicly responding to the changes, with many calling for a more comprehensive and humane approach to immigration policy that respects the dignity of migrants and refugees. 

“They do have the prudential judgment to enforce, and it’s their obligation to enforce the laws of the land,” Wenski said of the new administration. “How they do it or the spirit in which they do it should be one that promotes the common good and does not create more harm than good in the process of implementing the laws,” he told Arroyo.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that “the more prosperous nations are obliged to the extent they are able to welcome the foreigner in search of the security and means of livelihood.” But it also notes that “political authorities, for the sake of the common good for which they are responsible, may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to various juridical conditions, especially with regards to the immigrants’ duties toward their country of adoption” (No. 2241).

Wenski noted that all human beings “have a right to conditions worthy of human life.”

“But if a person has not secured those conditions in the place where he is, in the country where he happens to be, where he was born, then he has the right to seek those conditions elsewhere,” Wenski affirmed.

Wenski also recalled that the U.S. “has been a welcoming country, with the spirit of what is written in the catechism, over the centuries.”

Deportation concerns

When asked about the bishops’ concerns over deportations, Wenski specified there is “no argument” about the need to remove criminal aliens who are public safety threats, “but after we get rid of those bad guys or [have] taken care of them, then let’s look at some way of honoring the people that have been here for years and have worked hard and not gotten into trouble, that have paid taxes, etc.,” he emphasized.

“President Trump has promised to get control of the border, and I think he’s going to be successful in doing that,” Wenski said. “I think policy-wise, that’s a good thing, to get control of the border.”

“But he also has promised us the greatest economy ever — that we’re going to have the most prosperous economy we ever had. That’s a great promise,” he continued. “But if he’s going to be able to keep that promise, he’s going to have to make an accommodation on migration because you’re not going to have the best economy ever without immigrants, because immigrants are part of this economy.”

The issue of government funding 

When asked about the federal government’s funding of various Catholic charitable organizations, Wenski noted that it’s ultimately up to the U.S. government to decide who to admit into the country, while Catholic groups will help whoever is there. 

“If the government has given this money to the various Catholic charities or organizations, they’re giving this money to carry out services on behalf of the government for people that the government has allowed into the country,” Wenski said. “These are people that have been paroled into the country with the understanding that they’re going to apply for asylum, etc.” 

“Now, that the prior administration’s policy perhaps encouraged people that would come across the country that did not have a bona fide case to make, that is another argument,” Wenski noted. “But if the government has these people and they say, ‘I need help,’ and they ask the Church, ‘Can you help?’ we help.”

Wenski said the country’s immigration system, including the asylum system in which cases currently take years to resolve, needs a major overhaul.

“A lot of these illegal aliens or illegal migrants or whatever you want to call them, it’s not so much that they’re breaking the law as the law is breaking them because there is no system or no procedure for them to regulate their status,” Wenski said. “We have a broken asylum system where it takes an inordinate amount of time to process an asylum.”  

Wenski further emphasized the need for “providing an orderly process” that would be beneficial to both migrants and American society. 

“It would open doors for people that have been here for a long time that are needed here because our economy needs them; but at the same time, it would require that they would show good moral character, so we would make sure we would not admit any bad actors in that case,” Wenski said. “That would be a way of providing an orderly process that would benefit not only the migrant but [also] the rest of the American society.”

Bishop James Conley of Lincoln, Nebraska. / Credit: Diocese of Lincoln

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jan 31, 2025 / 12:50 pm (CNA).

Having spent the past week paying visits to Catholic schools across the Diocese of Lincoln, Nebraska, for Catholic Schools Week, Bishop James Conley has issued a reflection on the value of faith-based education for students and their families.

“In the secular world of education, we often hear words like ‘excellence’ and ‘success,’” Conley wrote. “These are great words, but what do they really mean? The ultimate measure of excellence and success in Catholic education is how well we educate the whole person, body, mind, and soul, by instilling virtue, knowledge, and wisdom.” 

“In other words,” he continued, “excellence and success in Catholic education is measured by how well we cultivate faith, goodness, and sanctity in our students.”

Conley is a prominent advocate for Catholic education and has written extensively on the topic. In September 2024, the bishop published a pastoral letter, “The Joy and Wonder of Catholic Education: Developing Authentically Catholic Schools,” describing Catholic education as “the formation of human hearts, minds, and wills for the glory of their Creator,” which received widespread accolades. 

Referencing another of his recently published pastoral letters, Conley highlighted five elements needed for a school to be authentically Catholic: “1) inspired by a supernatural vision, 2) founded on a Christian anthropology, 3) animated by communion and community, 4) imbued with a Catholic worldview throughout its curriculum, and 5) sustained by Gospel witness.”

The bishop shared that he had visited five of the diocese’s six high schools, as well as several of its elementary schools, offering Mass, leading Eucharistic processions, and spending time with students, faculty, and staff. 

“It’s an exhausting week of travel but I love every minute of it, because it provides me with an opportunity to see our schools in action, in all their beauty and splendor,” he stated. 

Conley also pointed out the special meaning behind the timing of the annual calendar celebration, writing: “It’s all about the saints!” 

Situated at the end of January, Catholic Schools Week kicked off on the feast of St. Angela Merici, foundress of the Ursuline order that started the first Catholic school for girls. Tuesday marked the feast of the Angelic Doctor and patron of learning, St. Thomas Aquinas, while Friday is the feast of St. John Bosco, “father and teacher of the youth.”

Conley paid special tribute, however, to St. John Henry Newman, whom he quoted at the end of his letter as saying: “We attain to heaven by using this world well, though it is to pass away; we perfect our nature, not by undoing it, but by adding to it what is more than nature, and directing it towards aims higher than its own.” 

Archbishop Timothy Broglio, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, speaks at the USCCB fall plenary assembly Nov. 14, 2023. / Credit: USCCB video

Vatican City, Jan 31, 2025 / 11:10 am (CNA).

Archbishop Timothy Broglio defended the U.S. bishops’ support of migrants against “false” accusations in an interview this week with an Italian Catholic television station.

Broglio — the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) as well as the archbishop of the Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA — told TV2000 on Jan. 29 that criticisms the bishops have received are “false” and “have strongly affected us because they are not true.”

“We spend more than we receive to help the poor,” Broglio stated in the interview with longtime Italian journalist and TV director Antonio Di Bella on the weekly news program “Di Bella sul 28” on TV2000.

TV2000 is a Catholic television network owned by the Italian Bishops’ Conference.

Broglio said the USCCB has “always insisted on respect for the law but we have to respond to the concrete situation. If there is someone who has come here even illegally and needs assistance we must help them because it is Christ himself who is asking us.”

The archbishop said the U.S. bishops have decided not to go into “the substance of the speeches” against them but to simply tell the truth about what they have done and are doing for immigrants.

Bishops in the U.S. will continue to try to work with Congress to reform the migration law, Broglio continued, adding that they would like to speak not through the media but face-to-face with President Donald Trump or Vice President JD Vance about the issue.

“In this way, I think we can try to understand each other and move forward,” he said. 

“We almost all agree that [migration law] needs to be changed and we need to do some things suitable for the year 2025,” the archbishop said. “We are willing to have a dialogue.”

In a statement issued earlier this month, Broglio criticized Trump’s immigration plans, saying that “some provisions” of the immigration orders are “deeply troubling and will have negative consequences, many of which will harm the most vulnerable among us.”

Catholic bishops across the country have publicly responded to Trump’s recent executive orders on immigration, with many calling for a more comprehensive and humane approach to immigration policy that respects the dignity of migrants and refugees.

Pope Francis meets with the Roman Rota in the Vatican’s Clementine Hall on Friday, Jan. 31, 2025. / Credit: Vatican Media

Vatican City, Jan 31, 2025 / 09:15 am (CNA).

Pope Francis on Friday extolled the “gift of indissolubility” of marriage, which he said is not a limitation on freedom but something married couples live with God’s grace.

The pontiff addressed the topic of marriage’s indissolubility, or permanence, in a meeting with members of the Roman Rota, one of three courts of the Holy See, on Jan. 31. The audience in the Vatican’s Clementine Hall took place for the opening of the tribunal’s 95th judicial year.

The Roman Rota, the Church’s highest appellate court, handles marriage nullity cases. A declaration of nullity — often referred to as an “annulment” — is a ruling by a tribunal that a marriage did not meet the conditions required to make it valid according to Church law.

“Spouses united in marriage,” Francis said, “have received the gift of indissolubility, which is not a goal to be achieved by their own effort, nor even a limitation on their freedom, but a promise from God, whose fidelity makes that of human beings possible.”

Your work of discernment at the Roman Rota “as to whether or not a valid marriage exists,” he continued, “is a service to ‘salus animarum’ [the salvation of souls] in that it enables the faithful to know and accept the truth of their personal reality.”

In 2015, Pope Francis reformed Church law on the declaration of the nullity of marriage with the two motu proprios Mitis Iudex Dominus Iesus and Mitis et Misericors Iesus.

The reform, which simplified and shortened the process, was aimed at making the undertaking more pastoral, with “the concern for the salvation of souls” the primary guide, the pope said.

The pontiff explained that the diocesan bishop is an important part of the reformed process, and the bishop must guarantee that the priests and laypeople in the diocesan tribunal are well-trained, suitable, and carry out their work with justice and diligence.

He said “the rules establishing the procedures must guarantee certain fundamental rights and principles, primarily the right of defense and the presumption of validity of the marriage.”

Pope Francis also encouraged anyone involved in annulment cases to approach “the marital and family reality with reverence, because the family is a living reflection of the communion of love that is God the Trinity.”

In his greeting at the audience, dean of the Roman Rota Archbishop Alejandro Arellano Cedillo said the tribunal was encouraged by the pope’s words during the opening of the Holy Door and the start of the Jubilee of Hope on Dec. 24, 2024, to “set out ‘without delay’ so as to ‘rediscover lost hope, renew it within us, sow it in the desolations of our time and our world.’”

“Holy Father, we feel directly challenged by the challenges of the present and the future, aware that the Rota Romana, as the tribunal of the Christian family, is only a ‘hem of the cloak’ of the Church,” Arellano said. 

“Nevertheless, it seems to us that it is not foreign to our hope that, from the touch of that cloak, through the administration of justice, wounded people may find peace so as to foster ‘tranquillitas ordinis’ [tranquility of order] in the Church,” he added.

Jesuit Guy Consolmagno at the Vatican Observatory in Castel Gandolfo. / Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/ EWTN News

ACI Prensa Staff, Jan 31, 2025 / 07:00 am (CNA).

The Vatican Observatory’s summer school, known as “Specola,” has already selected students for its next edition.

During the month of June, 25 students who were selected from among 120 candidates from different countries around the world will have the opportunity to advance their education at this renowned institution of the Catholic Church located in Castel Gandolfo on the outskirts of Rome.

The director of the “Specola,” Jesuit Brother Guy Consolmagno, explained to ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner, that all of the students “are between 20 and 30 years old and plan to pursue doctorates in astronomy or astrophysics.”

He also noted that “the only limit is that no more than two students from the same country are chosen.” This year’s lucky winners are 25 students from 21 countries on several continents: two from Africa, two from Asia, 11 from Europe and North America, eight from Latin America, and two from Oceania.

Since 1986, the Vatican Observatory has organized this summer school at Castel Gandolfo every two years to offer young scientists from all over the world the opportunity to learn from the world’s leading experts in astronomy.

Alumni of this school are now leading many fields of astronomical research, such as notables Fernando Comeron, deputy director for science at the European Southern Observatory, and Heino Falcke, chair of the Scientific Council of the Event Horizon Telescope, which captured the first image of a black hole in 2001.

In addition, students in this year’s course will have access to the James Webb telescope, which has revolutionized astronomy through advanced research. The 2025 summer school will offer a global overview of the main achievements made possible by this telescope in its first three years of operation.

Professors at the summer school include Eiichi Egami of the University of Arizona; Consolmagno; Jesuit Father David Brown, the dean of the Vatican Observatory; Roberto Maiolino of the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom; former student Almudena Alonso-Herrero from the Center for Astrobiology; and Thomas Greene from NASA.

Consolmagno confirmed to ACI Prensa that “there are no religious requirements to participate in the school.”

Furthermore, the selection process is not related to the student’s financial situation, as no tuition is charged and additional financial support for travel and accommodation is provided by benefactors through the Vatican Observatory Foundation.

This is the 19th Specola Vaticana summer school. Since the first edition in 1986, more than 450 students have participated in these summer schools.

In addition to the Specola at Castel Gandolfo, the Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope, located on Mount Graham in southeast Arizona, is operated by the Vatican Observatory Research Group in collaboration with the University of Arizona. 

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

Father Hyacinth Ementa Ichoku. / Credit: ACI Africa

ACI Africa, Jan 31, 2025 / 06:00 am (CNA).

The vice chancellor of Nigeria’s Veritas University, a priest in the Awka Diocese, has encouraged journalists in the west African nation to expose Christian persecution, which is at its highest peak in the country.

In an interview with ACI Africa, CNA’s news partner in Africa, on the sidelines of an event that members of St. Josephine Bakhita Community of Salesians of St. John Bosco organized to mark the feast of Don Bosco, Father Hyacinth Ementa Ichoku described persecution as an enduring feature of Christian history.

“Persecution has always been part of the Christian story, right from its inception. There’s no moment when believers are not being persecuted,” Ichoku told ACI Africa on Jan. 29.

“Persecution doesn’t always mean people are being killed,” he said. “When you deny people their rights because of their beliefs, that’s persecution. For instance, being denied a promotion at work or access to land for building a church, these are subtle yet significant forms of oppression.”

“When the government makes it a policy to persecute people because of their faith and beliefs, it becomes dangerous. Using the power of the state to target a group is a grave injustice,” he said.

Ichoku noted that persecution that goes unnoticed eventually becomes more heinous. “But if those who have a voice can give publicity to these injustices, it transforms the issue into a public concern that demands action,” he said.

“Christian journalists and media practitioners must see their job as a vocation that they need to use to expose any form of Christian persecution and any form of discrimination against the body of Christ. Media advocacy is important to bring to the fore the plights of Christians in Nigeria; don’t be silent in the face of persecution and oppression,” Ichoku said.

He faulted favoritism and advantage perceived to be given to the Islamic religion in the Nigerian governance system and the institutionalization of Sharia law using public funds, noting that Christians lack an equivalent framework or legal system. 

“The constitution provides for Sharia law, funded by taxpayers, yet Christians have no comparable legal system. This disparity is unfair and gives undue advantage to the Islamic religion,” he said.

To counter the imbalance, Ichoku, who was ordained a priest in 1988, proposed that Christians should advocate for the recognition of canon law as an official legal system. 

“Canon law predates Sharia law,” he asserted. “If Muslims can operate under Sharia, Christians should also have the right to use canon law as their legal system in Nigeria.”

Ichoku also called for greater unity among Christians to resist systemic oppression. He cautioned against complacency amid the widespread Christian persecution in Nigeria, saying: “If you keep retreating, they will keep advancing. At some point, Christians must stand their ground and assert their rights.”

Ichoku underscored the importance of creating common platforms for advocacy and ensuring that Christians do not cede their rights in the face of systemic challenges. 

“We need a united voice to say, ‘This doesn’t have to be.’ If we continue to allow the imposition of Sharia law without resistance, it will encroach further into areas where it does not belong,” he told ACI Africa.

Ichoku underlined the importance of resilience and advocacy, saying: “Christians must stand against persecution, whether it’s subtle or overt. We have a responsibility to defend our faith and our rights.” 

On the misconception that Catholics do not engage with the Bible, Ichoku said: “We read the Bible every day, particularly if you’re going to Mass. There’s no way you wouldn’t read at least two passages daily.” 

However, he acknowledged the need for greater individual devotion to Scripture outside liturgical settings. 

“I always like to encourage people, especially Catholics, to read the Bible more. It is to our advantage because being the word of God, it is the source of our nourishment,” Ichoku said.

This story was first published by ACI Africa, CNA's news partner in Africa, and has been adapted by CNA.

Father Frederick Edlefsen is pastor of Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Arlington, Virginia. / Credit: "EWTN News Nightly"/Screenshot

CNA Staff, Jan 31, 2025 / 05:00 am (CNA).

After the tragic plane crash in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday night, a local priest made his way to the scene “to be present” with the grieving families. 

Father Frederick Edlefsen, pastor of Our Lady of Lourdes in Arlington, Virginia, shared about how he was able to be present to the families that night in an interview with Colm Flynn on “EWTN News Nightly.”

Edlefsen was heading to bed after a long day when he checked his phone and saw the news — a passenger plane had collided with a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan National Airport and sunk into the Potomac River.

With the airport a mile away from his parish, it was close to home for Edlefsen.

“I felt it was really my duty. I felt an impulse — call it the gifts of the Holy Spirit or guardian angel,” he recalled. “But the airport is within the boundaries of my parish; we have a lot of travelers from Reagan Airport, airline personnel come to our Masses, and so on. So I felt: I need to be there.”

Edlefsen coordinated with a parishioner and Knight of Columbus who had a background in law enforcement. The parishioner escorted the priest to the airport and the Admirals Lounge of American Airlines. 

“We were able to be present, not only to the grieving families but also to the personnel who, when they went to work this morning, they didn’t know this was going to hit them,” Edlefsen said. 

Edlefsen remained with the families, listening to them and praying with them as they awaited news about their loved ones in the crash. It wasn’t until past 1 in the morning that the families learned there were no survivors. 

“At around 1 or 1:30 more or less — that’s when some law enforcement from Washington, D.C., came in and told the families that no, there are no survivors,” Edlefsen recalled. “Going from search and rescue to recovery and it can take some time also to identify the bodies and the remains of the deceased. So that was a hard hit for those families.”

The crash was the first major U.S. commercial air crash in almost 16 years. 

Edlefsen emphasized how important it is to respect the privacy of families who are grieving and “who are still trying to grasp what happened.”   

“A tragedy like this not only provokes grief, but it’s a very intimate grief,” he reflected. “It was probably one of the most intense grief moments and situations I’ve ever seen in my own almost 24 years of priesthood.”

The tragedy is especially devastating because of its magnitude. The plane had been carrying 60 passengers and four crew, while the helicopter had three soldiers aboard. The effects reverberated across the nation as those aboard the passenger plane were from all across the U.S., including Wichita, Kansas; Boston; and Washington, D.C. 

“Because usually these happen within families, or one or two at a time,” Edlefson said. “But this was multiple families. Several people have lost several loved ones. Everybody is in total shock. They don’t know what to say or how to react. And they’re waiting for the best news.”  

When asked how he responded as a minister, Edlefsen said he focused on simply being present.

“The backstop here and the presumption is you don’t say anything,” he said. “You’re just present. You listen.”

Amid the grief, it’s essential to be present and listening, Edlefsen explained.  

“It’s hard to explain, but it’s more often than not OK to say ‘Can we pray together?’ And it has to be simple and short,” he said. “But right now the best thing is to say nothing. Presence is what’s important and reassurance of your presence. But also at the same time, maybe, a willingness to pray, maybe give someone a blessing if they ask for it. But to have the Church visibly present is absolutely key.” 

Edlefsen is set to offer a vigil Mass at 5:30 this Saturday for the victims of the crash and their families as well as others involved — American Airlines personnel, Reagan Airport personnel, first responders, and all the people working in the background.

St. John Bosco. / Credit: Public domain

ACI Prensa Staff, Jan 31, 2025 / 04:00 am (CNA).

History notes how much the Freemasons hated St. John Bosco, the founder of the Salesians — whose feast the Catholic Church celebrates on Jan. 31 — but less known are their attempts to kill him.

The two assassination attempts ordered by Freemasons against Bosco can be found in “The Biographical Memoirs of Don Bosco” and was recounted in the June 1, 1980, issue of the Salesian Bulletin, the official publication of the Salesian Family.

According to these accounts, a former student of Bosco named Alessandro Dasso showed up at the gatehouse in late June 1880 asking to speak to the priest.

“His eyes were full of anguish,” the account related. “Don Bosco received him with his usual kindness,” but faced with the “growing agitation” of the young man, the founder of the Salesian family asked him: “What do you want from me? Speak! You know that Don Bosco loves you.”

At these words, Dasso “fell to his knees, burst into tears and sobs,” and revealed the truth.

According to the story, the young man was a Freemason and the group had sentenced Don Bosco to death. Twelve men’s names had been drawn, and they were to carry out the order.

Dasso told Don Bosco that “it was up to me to be the first, just me! And this is why I came! I will never do it. I will draw down upon myself the revenge of the others; revealing the secret is my death, I know I’m done for. But killing Don Bosco, never!”

After confessing what his mission was, the young man threw the weapon he was hiding on the floor.

Despite Bosco’s attempts to console him, the young man quickly left the house. On June 23, Dasso tried to take his life by throwing himself into the Po River but he was rescued in time by policemen.

Some time later, Bosco helped him escape from Italy and he lived in hiding “until the end of his days,” according to the Salesian account.

Months later, in December 1880, another young man came to visit.

The “sinister” gleam in the young man’s eyes caused the holy priest to have “very little trust,” the story goes. The young man expressed himself as “a high and mighty man” and as he spoke, “a small six-shooter slipped out of his pocket onto the sofa.”

Without the man noticing, the priest placed his hand on the weapon and slowly put it in his pocket. The young man tried to find the gun in his own pocket but to no avail and looked astonished.

“What are you looking for, sir?” Bosco reportedly asked him calmly. The confused young man replied: “I had something here in my pocket... But where did it go?”

According to the story, “Don Bosco, moving quickly toward the door and putting his left hand on the handle in order to get ready to open it, pointed the gun at him and, without getting angry, said: ‘This is the tool you were looking for, isn’t it?  At the sight of this, the scoundrel was stunned.” And he “tried to grab his revolver. But Don Bosco told him forcefully: ‘Go on, get out of here right away! And may God have mercy on you!’”

“Then he opened the door and asked some of those who were in the anteroom to accompany the man to the gatehouse. The assassin hesitated, but Don Bosco told him: ‘Get out and don’t come back!’” And the young man who wanted to end the priest’s life had to leave along with other companions who were waiting for him outside in a carriage.

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

United Nations Building and the flags in Geneva Switzerland. / Credit: Nexus 7/Shutterstock

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jan 30, 2025 / 18:05 pm (CNA).

During its first week in office, the administration of President Donald Trump announced that the United States has rejoined the Geneva Consensus Declaration, a coalition of nations united in support of pro-life and pro-women policies.

The U.S. was a founding member of the Geneva Consensus Declaration (GCD), which was established in 2020 during Trump’s first term. Along with the U.S., Brazil, Egypt, Hungary, Indonesia, and Uganda were among the original signatories.

According to the Institute for Women’s Health (IWH), a key supporter of the GCD, the alliance was forged to “protect the health and thriving of women throughout every stage of life, assert that there is no international right to abortion, defend the family as foundational to every healthy society, and protect the sovereign right of nations to support these core values through national policy and legislation.” 

Today, 40 member nations are signatories of the declaration.

Valerie Huber, president of IWH and the architect of the GCD, said: “We knew that countries were standing for these values prior to the GCD, but when countries stand together, that multiplies the impact.” 

“Now 40 countries have declared that when we are talking about human rights, abortion is not one of them,” Huber continued. 

In 2021, nine days after his inauguration, former President Joe Biden withdrew the United States from the GCD. 

“The GCD, of course, poses a threat to progressive global hegemony because it’s both politically effective and entirely voluntary,” Huber said.

But in his second term as president, within the first 100 hours of his presidency, Trump recommitted the U.S. to the GCD, becoming the 40th nation to join the alliance. 

Huber, who served in the first Trump administration as the first special representative for global women’s health, initiated the GCD to make a pro-family and pro-women political declaration and nation-to-nation partnership.

In an IWH press release, Huber said: “By rejoining, President Trump sends a bold message that the United States stands with sovereign nations to defend the real health needs of women against coercive tactics by global power players.” 

“The Biden administration’s withdrawal from the GCD misrepresented and undermined the coalition’s commitment to advance health and thriving for women at every stage of life. Despite relentless efforts by critics to dismantle and discredit it, IWH celebrates that the GCD has not only survived but thrived over the past four years — expanding its membership and influence,” she said.

Huber said that after the news broke of America’s reentry, she received communications from multiple countries excited to be in the same coalition as the United States and eager to connect with the nation. 

“I hope that we have the opportunity to show more countries and more people that the good of America is back, and it never really left because so many Americans share the same altruistic, compassionate, and good heart,” Huber concluded.

The Metropolitan Cathedral Santiago Apóstol and the National Palace in Managua, Nicaragua. / Credit: Martin Thurnherr, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Lima Newsroom, Jan 30, 2025 / 17:35 pm (CNA).

The Nicaraguan dictatorship has forced the Poor Clare nuns to leave their monasteries in Managua and Chinandega in an action described by a well-known researcher as a “night of terror.” 

According to the newspaper Mosaico CSI, the dictatorship’s order was carried out on the night of Jan. 28, forcing some 30 cloistered nuns belonging to the Order of St. Clare to leave their monasteries.

An ecclesiastical source cited by the Nicaraguan newspaper states that the dictatorship’s envoys “first went to notify the sisters (in the Monastery of the Franciscan Poor Clare Sisters) in Managua and then went to Chinandega (to the Monastery of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary).”

“They were told they had to leave and they were allowed to take some of their belongings,” the source added.

Martha Patricia Molina, a lawyer, researcher, and author of the report “Nicaragua: A Persecuted Church?” — which in its latest edition documents almost 1,000 attacks by the dictatorship against the Catholic Church in the Central American country since 2018 — described what happened as a “night of terror for the nuns.”

Molina noted on X that the dictatorship’s agents “only allowed them to take a few belongings, just enough for their hands. Most of the nuns are Nicaraguan. Their whereabouts are unknown.”

The researcher stated that “the legal personhood of the congregation was granted to them by the National Assembly in February 2004, but on May 19, 2023, it was arbitrarily canceled.”

In a Jan. 29 statement to ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner, Molina said the nuns’ legal status was cancelled by “voluntary dissolution,” although “we already know that the ‘voluntary’ part doesn’t exist in the country but that the dictatorship forces them [to dissolve] under a state of siege.”

Bishop Álvarez’s residence in Matagalpa emptied out

On Jan. 28, the dictatorship also showed up at the chancery in Matagalpa, the residence of Bishop Rolando Álvarez, who has been living in exile in Rome since January 2024, and removed all the goods, furniture, and equipment, including religious objects, from the place.

“It’s the same dictatorship that is taking these things away, because at least in [St. Aloysius Gonzaga] Major Seminary of Philosophy they didn’t allow them to take anything, they only let the seminarians take their personal things,” a layman from Matagalpa told Mosaico CSI.

Molina told ACI Prensa that everything they took was loaded onto “several white trucks used to remove all the belongings, like a cross. They [the onlookers] tell me that seeing that was painful.”

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