By Lorene Hanley Duquin
(OSV News) – From baking sweet breads to blessing baskets, Holy Week is full of long-standing traditions that transcend cultures and continents. The following list includes a quick overview of family favorites.
– Palm crosses: From medieval times, people have believed that blessed palms formed into the shape of a cross would protect them from danger. The easiest way to make a cross from blessed palms is to cut two pieces of the palm, arrange in the shape of a cross, put a thumbtack in the middle, and attach the cross to a doorway or a bulletin board. Check the Internet for directions on how to braid or weave palms into more decorative crosses.

– Housecleaning: In many cultures the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of Holy Week are designated as days for vigorous housecleaning in preparation for Easter. This custom probably evolved from the Jewish custom of ritual cleaning before Passover.

– Coloring eggs: Decorating eggs was a pagan symbol of rebirth at springtime for the Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, Persians and even the Chinese. Christians adopted the colored egg as a symbol of new life which comes with the Resurrection.

– Easter lilies: The tradition of buying Easter lilies during Holy Week for use as decorations in homes and churches came into practice in the 1800s. The white flower is a symbol of purity and new life that heralds the resurrection of Jesus.

– Visiting churches: The custom of visiting several churches to say a prayer on Holy Thursday was a tradition that evolved from the practice of making pilgrimages to holy places.

– Sweet breads: In many cultures, Holy Week was traditionally a time for baking sweet breads, cakes and pastries that would be served on Easter Sunday.

– Blessing of Easter baskets: In many cultures, families bring food that will be eaten on Easter Sunday to church in a basket for a special blessing on Holy Saturday.

– New clothes: From the time of the early Christians, the newly baptized wore white garments made from new linen. In medieval times, it became a tradition for people to wear new clothes on Easter Sunday, symbolizing the “new life” that comes with the Resurrection. In some places it was believed that bad luck would come to those who could afford new Easter clothes but refused to buy them.

– Holy Water blessings: Some families bring holy water containers to Mass on Easter so they can bring home some Easter water, which is blessed during the Easter Vigil, to bless their homes.

Many people and families also participate in the full cycle of Triduum liturgies, from Holy Thursday to Easter Sunday, walking with the Lord through his passion, death and resurrection. However you mark Holy Week, intentionally set it apart from the other 51 weeks of the year, because this one is truly special.

(Lorene Hanley Duquin is a Catholic author and lecturer who has worked in parishes and on a diocesan level.)

By Kate Scanlon

WASHINGTON (OSV News) – A joint report between organizations affiliated with different Christian churches found that a significant share of people impacted by the Trump administration’s pursuit of what it has called “the largest deportation in U.S. history,” are Christian.

The report, a joint project of the National Association of Evangelicals, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Migration and Refugee Services, the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, and World Relief, found many of those vulnerable to deportation themselves — or those who have a family member vulnerable to deportation — are Christians.

“One cannot help but ponder what our country and our lives would be like, if the same sort of restrictions and enforcement actions being contemplated today were imposed on those coming from places like Ireland, Germany, Poland, Italy and elsewhere by the boat full,” Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso, Texas, told reporters in a press call about the report.

“You know, it’s amazing how U.S. history repeats itself, and I don’t think many of us would suggest that the way that our immigrant ancestors were treated in many cases would be a model to be followed today,” he said.

Catholic social teaching on immigration balances three interrelated principles — the right of persons to migrate in order to sustain their lives and those of their families, the right of a country to regulate its borders and control immigration, and a nation’s duty to regulate its borders with justice and mercy.

While the individual Christian organizations behind the report may support or oppose particular policies according to their beliefs, participants explained, they share a common goal of seeking to understand not only how mass deportations would impact the U.S., but also their faith communities and Christians as a whole.

According to demographic data as of the end of 2024, the report found, more than 10 million Christians living in the U.S. would be vulnerable to deportation under Trump administration policies implemented in 2025.

Christians account for approximately 80% of all of those at risk of deportation. The Christians most at risk of deportation are Catholics, 61% of the total.

At the same time, about 7 million Christians who are U.S. citizens live in the same household as someone at risk of deportation.

Overall, the report found, about one out of every 12 Christians in the U.S. — including one out of 18 evangelicals and about one out of five Catholics — are either vulnerable to deportation themselves or could see a family member deported, barring law or policy changes.

Walter Kim, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, pointed to a recent Lifeway Research study showing that while evangelicals have been a consistent voting bloc supporting Trump during his three presidential campaigns, most support deporting individuals who have been convicted of violent crimes, but support programs to help refugees and policies aimed at keeping families together.

“Now, sometimes it’s thought that many evangelicals are supportive of this, but in fact, most evangelical Christians do not want to see deportation on this scale, of immigrants who have not been convicted of violent crimes, who are members of our churches whose deportations would result in families being separated,” Kim said.

Stephanie Gonzalez, a teacher at a Christian school in Southern California whose parents, 55-year-old Gladys and 59-year-old Nelson Gonzalez, who have no criminal record, were recently deported to Colombia after more than 35 years in the U.S. Gonzalez said when they arrived in the U.S., they sought to follow the law, but “my parents became victims of immigration fraud and dealt with several fraudulent lawyers who took advantage of them.”

“This was just the beginning of the nightmare that my parents faced when it came to attorneys and a flawed immigration system,” Gonzalez said.

Bishop Seitz and Gonzalez both raised the point that separating families contradicts Christians’ interest in protecting strong family units.

“The separation of families is heartbreaking, and I believe the separation breaks the Lord’s heart,” Gonzalez said.

The report, titled “One Part of the Body,” is a reference to the biblical teaching that Christians form one body, composed of distinct but interdependent parts, Matthew Soerens, vice president of advocacy and policy at World Relief, one of the largest evangelical ministries serving refugees and other immigrants, said on the call.

“When one part of the body suffers, we are all to suffer together, just as a hand cannot go about its business unaffected if a foot is in debilitating, debilitating pain,” he said. “With that biblical principle in mind, we set out to understand and quantify with this report how the Trump administration’s proposals for the largest deportation in U.S. history could impact the church in the United States. Immigrants from various countries form integral parts of the body of Christ in the U.S.”

(Kate Scanlon is a national reporter for OSV News covering Washington. Follow her on X @kgscanlon.)

By Simone Orendain

(OSV News) — An Arizona couple whose toddler survived a drowning incident March 2 is attributing his miraculous recovery to intercessions from Blessed Michael McGivney, founder of the Knights of Columbus, along with a multitude of saints and what they count as thousands of prayers from across the country and the world.

Caitlin and Wesley Robinson of suburban Phoenix told OSV News that at the hospital, doctors tried CPR for 52 minutes to revive their 15-month-old son, Vincent, who had a barely detectable, intermittent pulse since before he arrived. His father said he found their baby face down at the bottom of the family hot tub, which was not turned on.

The Robinsons said once the toddler was stable, Vincent was placed on oxygen, IV pain killers, paralytics and other sedatives. But he was not out of danger.

“Sunday (March 2), Monday, Tuesday we were preparing ourselves for a funeral, really. And so it was three days on our knees and just praying incessantly,” explained Caitlin Robinson.

The Catholic couple has eight children between ages 12 years and 15 months — all of them are named after saints who, Caitlin said, have special significance to the family. Caitlin, now expecting a ninth child, said they started praying for all of these saints’ and others’ intercession before God.

Caitlin shared they also prayed for the intercession of the departed who are not saints, but whose faith lives have had prominence in the church. Among them was the late Cardinal George Pell of Sydney, whom the Robinsons had met through a family friend, Father Joseph Hamilton, who was a secretary to the cardinal.

The cardinal spent 404 days in prison — most of it in solitary confinement — on a charge of child sexual abuse alleged to have occurred in the 1990s, but his conviction was thrown out by Australia’s High Court. Its seven justices unanimously concluded “a significant possibility that an innocent person has been convicted” based on weak evidence. Cardinal Pell credited his faith — and decision to forgive his accusers — for helping him survive the ordeal, which he chronicled in a diary, while affirming the abuse crisis was a “spiritual and moral cancer” resulting from the church too often not following the teachings of Jesus Christ. At 81, he suffered a heart attack and died Jan. 10, 2023, in Rome after a hip replacement surgery.

The Robinsons prayed for Cardinal Pell’s intercession and requested prayers from Father Hamilton, who said he would ask Sydney Archbishop Anthony Fisher to also pray for Vincent.

When Vincent was rushed to the hospital, Wesley Robinson immediately contacted his wife’s brother, Father Dan Connealy, based at a parish in Flagstaff, Arizona, two hours north of Phoenix.

Father Connealy told OSV News he was in shock and had an anxious drive to the Phoenix hospital, trying to steel himself for the funeral Mass that he was certain he would be offering for his baby nephew. But instead, he spent the rest of that first day at Vincent’s beside with the family and friends praying. Father Connealy asked his sister if he could contact as wide a network as possible of friends and clergy to pray for Vincent, to which Caitlin Robinson replied yes.

“It was really beautiful … a vulnerable moment where it’s like you can’t really process things. Her instinct was like, ‘Just get as many people praying as you can,'” said Father Connealy.

Among the people he contacted was a Connecticut-based priest friend, whose sister is Vincent’s godmother. The friend sent a first-class relic of Blessed Michael McGivney, founder of the Knights of Columbus, whose parish was St. Mary’s Church in New Haven, where his body is entombed.

Still, Caitlin Robinson was preparing herself for the worst. She said, “I was just so certain that I knew it was God’s will that we were going to lose our child and I’m ashamed that I didn’t trust more.”

But she held fast to a Catholic classic that she read in the hospital about trusting in God’s providence.

“We don’t actually ask God enough and so when we received the relic of Blessed McGivney I said, ‘OK, I’m just going to ask for total and complete healing, and I don’t think it’s going to work, but I’m going to ask for it and I trust,” said Caitlin.

The family said the relic, along with a novena prayer, which they and a sizable network of family, friends and parishioners prayed immediately, arrived on the third day of Vincent’s hospitalization. It was Ash Wednesday. They placed the relic on the comatose boy’s chest.

By that evening, doctors said the toddler was no longer in the “end of life” stage. The couple said doctors called his turnaround “remarkable.”

Caitlin said they placed the relic on a different part of Vincent’s body each day of the novena. And each day something remarkable happened. She read from a list that she documented, recounting: an MRI that showed clear images of undamaged organs; the removal of daytime oxygen and the feeding tube without needing to reinstate either; no more fluid in the lungs; Vincent being moved from the pediatric intensive care unit to the regular floor; early on getting up, walking and lifting things; being able to eat regular food and swallowing on his own; and finally, being discharged on the ninth day.

All along the family also sought the intercession of whoever was the saint of the day, and prayed with other relics of saints that started flooding in as the call for prayers spread.

Caitlin Robinson said that on the Tuesday after the drowning, the first responders left a manila envelope at the nurses’ station that the couple did not open until they took Vincent home. Inside was a packet for making funeral arrangements.

Wesley Robinson, a 39-year-old mergers and acquisitions attorney, said he had never prayed “so intensely in my life” and that his prayer life changed after this experience.

“I feel like this is a gift and it would be a shame if we waste this opportunity for us and our kids and our community,” he said. Robinson said he wouldn’t necessarily call it “a wake up call,” but reflected miracles serve to “kind of re-energize a community or a person; to kind of re-energize their faith.”

“The reality of the church triumphant has never been so clear to us that God actually listens to our prayers like in real time,” said Caitlin, 39, referring to the Catholic concept of the church in heaven where the saints who have triumphed with Christ over evil intercede for the church on Earth, so they too can be close to Christ like they are forever.

“We should all be calling on Christ and the saints and the angels,” Caitlin said. She added, “Like I said, intellectually we know this, but to feel it in this way, it’s just amazing.”

(Simone Orendain writes for OSV News from Chicago.)

By Gina Christian
(OSV News) – While the season of Lent is marked by fasting and abstinence, cooking for a hungry family in this season of prayer and penance “doesn’t mean boring or ‘fish all the time,’” a Catholic chef told OSV News.

Catholics fast and abstain from meat on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, and forego meat on all the Fridays of Lent as well. In the Latin Catholic Church, those norms are obligatory for the faithful ages 18 through 59.

Members of the 23 Eastern Catholic churches observe their own particular restrictions during Lent, more commonly known among those churches as the Great Fast.

But discipline and deliciousness aren’t necessarily mutually exclusive, said certified executive chef Jim Churches, president of the American Culinary Federation’s Michigan Chefs de Cuisine Association and a member of St. Patrick Parish in Brighton, Michigan.

Churches – who also offers culinary instruction through Homeschool Connections, a national Catholic homeschooling course provider – said the key to Lenten cooking is to “plan ahead.”

“When you don’t think about it until it’s Friday, it’s a knee-jerk reaction of, ‘What do we have around the house?’” he said.

Instead, he advised, “take the time throughout the year to write a note” about family favorites – such as “mac and cheese, or pizza” – that can be enjoyed “without the meat component,” and cook the meatless versions on a regular basis.

“You can nail it down, and have the kids excited about it,” he said. “Get their input. And then they start to say, ‘This is really good.’”

Ditching meat – and dairy, and fish – all year long is something the nonprofit PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) is hoping Christians and others will embrace.

PETA’s Christian outreach division, LAMBS (an acronym for “least among my brothers and sisters”), has issued a “40 Days of Lentils” challenge, inviting faithful to adopt a vegan lifestyle for both spiritual and ecological benefits.

The campaign includes vegan starter and creation care kits and cites numerous scriptural references to animals – with the organization noting that while Jesus is recorded in the Gospels as eating fish (and likely lamb, at least during Passover), he “would be horrified by today’s factory-farming practices.”

Although he doesn’t eschew meat, Churches admitted, “My body tells me sometimes, ‘You’ve had too much meat,’ and you just don’t crave it; you want something light.”

For millions worldwide, going meatless and eating light aren’t choices, but necessities – something Catholic Relief Services, the official humanitarian agency of the U.S. Catholic bishops, highlights in its annual Lenten Rice Bowl initiative.

Now in its 50th year, the campaign invites participants to prayerfully eat simple, meatless meals and donate savings toward CRS’s humanitarian and development projects, with 25% of the funds benefiting local hunger relief efforts and 75% assisting those in a number of low-income nations.

As part of Rice Bowl, CRS provides meatless recipes from the areas it serves, among them egg sauce with boiled yams from Nigeria, black bean soup from Guatemala, dahl (a lentil-based dish) from Bangladesh and crispy pancakes from Vietnam.

Churches told OSV News that some of his Lenten favorites are Polish pierogi – boiled or fried unleavened dough dumplings filled with vegetables (and, outside of Lent, meat) – as well as “really creative salads” with “strawberries, goat cheese and candied nuts.”

He describes his cooking style as “very cheese-forward and butter-forward,” heavily incorporating dairy in the style of classic French cuisine.

But even on a tight budget with limited room for dairy, Lenten meals can be flavorful and interesting, Churches said.

“You can buy dried gnocchi (Italian dumplings made of flour or potato starch), which is very inexpensive but very filling,” he explained. “You can make that with a white or red sauce … keep some of the pasta water to help thicken up your sauce a little bit, and throw your vegetables in there.”

Of course, fish and seafood are still staples of Lent, said Churches, noting the fish fry he started at his parish five years ago.

“One of our top sellers is the bang-bang shrimp,” he said, describing a popular recipe for fried shrimp in a spicy, sweet chili sauce with a mayonnaise base.

That recipe and Churches’ other signature Lenten dishes are a far cry from those listed in a late-19th century “Cookery Book for Fasting and Abstinence Days” by an author simply known as “P.O.P.”

The volume – released in London by Burns and Oates, and in the U.S. by the New York Catholic Publication Society – features instructions for eel soups and pie, as well as anchovy toast and imitation mutton broth, dishes the author hoped would offset the “monotony” of faithful’s Lenten fare.

Yet the main ingredient for Lenten cooking isn’t something found in a grocery store, said Churches.
“When you gather around the table, it’s a nourishing experience; a family-driven thing,” he said. “It’s all about family connection.”

(Gina Christian is a multimedia reporter for OSV News. Follow her on X @GinaJesseReina.)

WASHINGTON (OSV News) – The U.S. Postal Service is issuing a stamp honoring the late William F. Buckley Jr. (1925-2008), a lifelong devout Catholic who was an intellectual, provocative commentator well-known for his sharp wit. Buckley is considered a founder of modern conservatism.
The Postal Service said March 6 that the Buckley stamp is being issued along with other new stamps celebrating the 250th anniversaries of the U.S. Army, U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine Corps and one previewing the 2026 World Stamp Show in Boston. Additional stamps in the Postal Service’s 2025 program will be announced later.

One of the most influential public intellectuals in modern U.S. history, Buckley defined the conservative movement of the mid-20th century and was one of its most recognizable spokesmen. He was the founder of National Review magazine, hosted the weekly “Firing Line” television program for 33 years and wrote more than 50 books.

Greg Breeding, an art director for the Postal Service, designed the stamp, which bears a portrait of Buckley. Dale Stephanos created the original art by hand with graphite and charcoal on hot-press watercolor paper, then refined it digitally.

Born in New York City, Buckley served in the U.S. Army during World War II. Afterward he attended Yale University, where he engaged in debate and conservative political commentary. Upon graduating from Yale with honors in 1950, he worked at the CIA for two years, then went on to found National Review.

He died at his desk in Stamford, Connecticut, Feb. 27, 2008, at age 82. That April more than 2,000 people attended a memorial Mass for him. It was concelebrated by 18 priests at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York.
He was remembered as a man of deep faith and unfailing confidence in the Catholic Church who brought people to believe in God and inspired vocations to the priesthood.

“His tongue was the pen of a ready writer” and his “words were strong enough to help crack the walls of an evil empire,” according to Father George W. Rutler, principal celebrant and homilist. “His categories were not right and left, but right and wrong. What graces he had to change a century came by his belief in Christ, who has changed all centuries.”

Buckley’s “life testified that there can be no concord with evil, for evil always seeks to devour the good, and peace at any price is very expensive,” the priest added.

By Jack Figge
(OSV News) – Catholics across the world are embarking on pilgrimages to commemorate the Jubilee Year of Hope.

Many will travel to Rome to visit the four major basilicas and pass through their Holy Doors so as to gain a plenary indulgence.

For those that are unable to travel to Rome, however, they are still able to participate by traveling to one of the numerous Jubilee Year pilgrimage sites across the country.

These sites each have a unique history and hold significance in their local region, helping Catholics to encounter God in new ways.

In the densely populated East Coast, bishops have designated a multitude of jubilee sites located in dense cities and rural countryside.

Surrounded by dense forest, yet only a mere 50 miles away from New York City, sits Graymoor – the Holy Mountain.

Run by the Franciscan Friars of Atonement, Graymoor serves as a home for the friars and a retreat center. It also houses many ministries, such as St. Christopher’s Inn, a residential program for men battling drug addiction.

Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York designated Graymoor as one of the eight jubilee pilgrimage sites in his archdiocese.
When Atonement Father Jim Gardiner, director of special projects, and the other friars learned about the designation, they were ecstatic.

“We’re grateful to be named a pilgrimage site because Cardinal Dolan could’ve named all kinds of other places,” Father Gardiner told OSV News. “We see it as a sign of support and encouragement, which is especially needed as these are tough times, since we, like many other places, have been struggling with vocations.”
In Father Gardiner’s own vocation story, a pilgrimage to Graymoor played a significant role. He said it launched his discernment journey.

“In 1948, I was in the first grade when I visited Graymoor,” Father Gardiner recalled. “It was so exciting. We had Mass outdoors and walked around the property. When we were preparing to leave, one of the friars stopped and asked me if I had a good day. I said yes, and he said, ‘I’m going to pray every day that you come back here.’”

“I have no idea who that friar was, but as a result of that pilgrimage, I’ve been here 60-plus years now,” he said.

To commemorate the Jubilee Year, Father Gardiner and other staff members have developed a variety of programs and events.

“We have great staff here that has been meeting regularly, coming up with all kinds of great ideas,” Father Gardiner said. “We have special Masses planned, special retreats; but really, we just have a great space that we want visitors to take part in.”

In the South, Sacred Heart Parish in downtown Tampa, Florida, is preparing to welcome a plethora of pilgrims.

Founded in the early 1850s, the parish became a cornerstone in the Tampa Bay area as the city grew around it.

“Sacred Heart was founded in the infancy of Tampa Bay as a city,” Rob Boelke, director of communications at Sacred Heart, told OSV News. “John Jackson, an Irish immigrant, and his wife, Ellen, arrived in the area as a surveyor. He surveyed the majority of our downtown and the older areas of the city itself, and those streets largely stand in the same grid that he had put together. Soon after arriving, he and his wife sent a petition to the Diocese of Savannah asking for a parish to be founded.”

In the 1850s, the area that now comprises the St. Petersburg Diocese was part of the Diocese of Savannah, Georgia.

Soon after the Jacksons’ request, a small wooden church was built, served by Jesuit missionaries. By the late 1800s, the parish had outgrown it and began constructing a new Romanesque-style church. Completed in 1905, the church remains today as a unique architectural fixture in Catholic Florida.
“Most of the churches in Florida were built in the ‘60s and ‘70s, and they are not architecturally significant,” Boelke said. “Sacred Heart has very unique architecture that is much more in line with churches that you would see across the Northeast or in the Midwest. It’s largely Romanesque with beautiful stained-glass windows so people are drawn to the parish for its beauty.”

Sacred Heart is one of six Jubilee pilgrimage sites in the Diocese of St. Petersburg. Already, pilgrims are flocking to the church to commemorate both the Jubilee Year and the parish’s 120th anniversary.

“We are hosting lots of tours for both Catholic and secular schools; other parishes are calling us to set up times for large group visits,” Boelke said.

Located in the Midwestern small town of Perryville, Missouri, the National Shrine of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal is preparing to welcome pilgrims to its vast property for the Jubilee Year.

One of nine Jubilee sites in the Archdiocese of St. Louis, the national shrine has a robust history dating back to 1818, when a small log cabin church was founded on the property. The shrine encompasses 55 acres and includes a large church, a rosary walk and a grotto.

Run by Vincentian priests, Father Jim Osendorf, superior of the community, told OSV News that he hopes pilgrims will develop a deeper relationship with the Blessed Virgin Mary after visiting the site.

“Our facility is dedicated to the Blessed Mother and to commemorate the appearances of Mary to Catherine Labouré,” Father Osendorf said. “This just seems to be one of the perfect places to come just to kind of get away to pray, to meditate and to deepen our relationship with Mary, who leads us to Jesus.”
To commemorate the Holy Year, the community has planned various events throughout the year that include speakers, music and special liturgies.

“We have a number of guest speakers who will be coming and will have musicians regularly,” Father Osendorf said. “But really, we just want people to come and encounter God on our property. From my office, I can see people coming to pray, pray the rosary on our walk or sometimes just getting away to think, to ponder, to meditate. And it brings me so much joy to see this happening.”

Out in the West, historical shrines and churches are abundant, as they have been ministering to locals since Franciscan missionaries established them centuries ago.

One such church is Mission Basilica of San Buenaventura in California, which was founded in 1782. Since its founding, the basilica has played a critical role in the local community, Father Tom Elewaut, pastor of the mission, told OSV News.

“There are 21 original missions established by the Franciscan padres in what is now the state of California,” Father Elewaut explained. “The significance of our particular parish is that we were the last of the nine missions founded by St. Junipero Serra.”

The town of San Buenaventura, located 70 miles from Los Angeles, grew around the parish. The original church built in 1809 and refurbished in 1812 after an earthquake remains as the primary worship space.
“The church building that we have today was originally finished in 1809,” Father Elewaut said. “The artwork, the statues, the back altar – that is all original from 1809. Everything that was used to decorate the church had been shipped up from New Spain (today’s Mexico) … so there is a lot of history in the church.”

Father Elewaut is excited to welcome pilgrims from the surrounding area to the basilica. Everyday, pilgrims visit the historic church, and the priest uses these interactions and Sunday Mass as an opportunity to remind them to be pilgrims of hope.

“We are pilgrims of hope, and we certainly are including that message in our homilies weekly, and encouraging people to be hopeful in a world that sometimes wants to cast darkness; that we are to be people of hope in the light of Christ,” he said. “And not only for eternal life, but to be hope-filled in this life as well.”

(Jack Figge writes for OSV News from Kansas.)

By Kimberley Heatherington
WASHINGTON (OSV News) – Catholic agencies including Catholic Charities USA, Catholic Relief Services and Jesuit Relief Service/USA are facing major setbacks in the wake of the Trump administration’s 90-day pause and review of federal funding to numerous nonprofit organizations providing domestic and overseas aid to migrants, refugees and people in need.

Reversals, litigation and appeals have followed – but funds remain in limbo, and contracts have been terminated.

On Feb. 26 – after the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops filed suit challenging the funding suspension of its refugee admissions program – the U.S. State Department informed the USCCB its financial agreement would be terminated the next day, because the arrangement “no longer effectuates agency priorities.”

CRS is bracing for massive program cuts as high as 50%. Numerous Catholic Charities offices – including those in California, Kansas, New York and Texas – have scaled back operations and laid off staff. JRS/USA is trying to cover its funding gap, but laid off some 400 employees around the world.

While the cessation of funds has been devastating for these service-providing Catholic agencies, others that do not accept federal funds remain as active as before.

“Has the landscape changed? Absolutely. Has it changed irrevocably? Probably. Are we being asked to pick up where others can no longer function? Of course we will,” said Michael La Civita, communications director for the Catholic Near East Welfare Association, or CNEWA.

“This places a huge burden on the local church,” he said. “We work entirely through the local church – the local Eastern churches – and their landscape has been changed irrevocably, because the church doesn’t shut down. The church doesn’t change from one administration to the next. The church is present where her members are.”

Founded by Pope Pius XI in 1926, the New York-based CNEWA – an initiative of the Holy See – works through and with the Eastern churches to provide humanitarian and spiritual support in the Middle East, Northeast Africa, India and Eastern Europe.

As a Vatican agency, it operates independently of U.S. government funding – and instead raises its funds from individuals, family foundations, private grant organizations and partner agencies of the worldwide Catholic community. Material and spiritual aid is provided regardless of faith or religious creed.

While the funding freeze’s impact on other Catholic agencies will ultimately impact CNEWA as it attempts to help where others no longer can, La Civita remains optimistic.

“Things have changed so much and for the good in so many places, sometimes we lose sight of that,” he said. “And much of that has to do with, frankly, American Catholic generosity.”

American Catholics are “members of a global worldwide Catholic communion of churches – we’re not concerned about just what happens in our local parish; we’re concerned about the entire church,” he said.
With that perspective, La Civita is certain the U.S. faithful “will continue to respond to the question that was put to Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’ I have great faith and hopes in our Catholic family, that it will continue to rise to the occasion.”

The Pontifical Mission Societies USA likewise does not receive government aid for its charitable work overseas. Its fundamental purpose is to share the faith, not specifically humanitarian works, but it does operate Missio, a crowdfunding platform that digitally connects donors with current and emerging projects in the pope’s missions.

“Even though we do fund some of the church’s charitable outreaches in missionary territories, most of the time we do so through church structures – dioceses, parishes, seminarians, religious orders, etc. – in missionary lands, building churches, seminaries, converts, charitable centers and other ecclesiastical infrastructure, so that they can better minister to their people,” said Msgr. Roger J. Landry, national director of the Pontifical Mission Societies USA.

Current Missio projects include helping flood victims in Nigeria, providing food and clothes to Holy Land residents, and aiding earthquake victims in Turkey and Syria.

“We are grateful for the missionary zeal and charitable generosity of American Catholics that make this work possible,” Msgr. Landry said in an email to OSV News. “We’re not asking them to do so through their taxes.”

Edward Clancy, outreach director for Aid to the Church in Need-USA – an international papal charity supporting persecuted and suffering Christians around the world – said a certain amount of autonomy accompanies a decision not to receive government funding.

“It’s a long-standing policy of the organization – both in the United States and internationally – not to create alliances with governments,” Clancy said. “Obviously, they have their pluses and minuses. Governments are going to have great power and great money. But oftentimes that comes at the cost of the freedom of what we’re supposed to be doing with the money as a Catholic organization.”

Under the guidance of the pope, Aid to the Church in Need has provided pastoral and humanitarian assistance for nearly 75 years to the persecuted church around the world. It proudly notes its donors have helped “the suffering, the distressed and the poorest of the poor” in over 145 countries.

“We prioritize certain objectives that might be accepted, or not, by governments,” Clancy said. “And again, we don’t want to be beholden to them for long-term aid.”

Clancy shared an example involving the U.S. Agency for International Development, America’s now-dismantled overseas aid bureau.

“We were funding a project in Nigeria; the church was supporting victims of Boko Haram after their recovery and renewal from many years of torture,” he said. “And when the USAID initially said they were interested in supporting a project, the local project partner was happy to accept the funding — but they didn’t want to allow themselves to be subject to some of the strings attached. And then when it was decided not to be sent, Aid to the Church in Need, thankfully, was able to find donors to help them and to make up the difference.”

Echoing La Civita, Clancy confirmed that Aid to the Church in Need remains untouched by the uncertainty that can accompany political shifts.

“Aid to the Church in Need continues to work regardless of any administration or decisions at government levels – because we do the work of the church,” Clancy said. “That’s our mission.”

Mary’s Meals – an international charity founded in 2002 that establishes school meal programs in some of the world’s poorest communities and is currently feeding almost 2.5 million children every school day – also said its operations would not suffer disruption.

“Mary’s Meals is not currently receiving any U.S. government aid, and so our programs are not directly impacted by this news,” Magnus MacFarlane-Barrow, the Catholic CEO and founder of Mary’s Meals, told OSV News in an email. “We have diverse income streams through affiliate organizations and fundraising groups in more than 20 countries, who help to guide our grassroots movement and philanthropic activity.”

That does not mean, however, that Mary’s Meals will not feel the funding freeze’s effects.

“The communities we serve will still be impacted, though, and at a time of acute need, any reductions in aid budgets are devastating and likely to cost many lives – including the lives of children,” MacFarlane-Barrow said. “Right now, the world’s poorest communities are urgently in need of more life-saving assistance, not less.”

A lack of reliance on government funding instead means dependence upon everyday charity.

“Being largely reliant on the generosity of individuals, through our thriving grassroots support, allows us to make free choices on where to deliver our programs based on where need is greatest and allows us to stay free from politics,” MacFarlane-Barrow said. “We will continue to build our movement based on our confidence in the innate goodness of people and their little acts of love. Mary’s Meals is – and has always been – a movement of people who are not going to sit and do nothing in the face of child hunger, even if governments fail, or are not able, to act.”

(Kimberley Heatherington writes for OSV News from Virginia.)