Ss. Cyril and Methodius Ukrainian Catholic Church

null / Credit: Srdjan Randjelovic/Shutterstock

Philadelphia, Pa., Aug 24, 2025 / 09:00 am (CNA).

Nina Marie Corona thought she was just checking the box like any good cradle Catholic when she sat down in a pew over a decade ago. From her perspective at the time, she wasn’t there for anything dramatic — just the usual holy day of obligation Christmas Mass. Her heart wasn’t in it though. Addiction had crept into her family’s life, and her entire world felt like it was falling apart. So, while others sang and smiled and shook hands at the sign of peace, she wept quietly.

Alone. A stranger. In a church filled with people.

“I remember looking and thinking, you know, why does nobody know that I’m going through this?” she said. “Like, I need you people, you know? Where else do I turn?”

Already immersed in theology classes triggered by a retreat she had attended, Corona — who once ran a successful food manufacturing business — turned to an educational pursuit that sought to weave her spirituality with her social conscience.

In the years that followed, that moment of personal desperation developed into a multipronged outreach titled Afire and launched an international multimedia ministry called “We Thirst: Christian Reflections on Addiction,” which is now in university and seminary libraries, including Trinity College Dublin, and has been shown in churches across the United States and beyond.

The five-part parish-based series is part catechesis, part communal healing, blending Catholic spirituality with the biological, psychological, and social realities of addiction. People have watched it in living rooms, church halls, and classrooms. It’s been used by priests, parents, social workers, and people recovering from addiction. It has freed people to talk about addiction, to open up, to stop hiding.

“They drop the armor,” she said. “They receive the gift of courage to face reality. That’s when healing can begin.”

The way it works is simple. You watch the series as a group — maybe over five weeks, maybe as a weekend retreat, and then you talk — not about solutions or strategies at first, but about what’s real: fear, guilt, grief, love, hope. Each session incorporates comprehensive educational presentations with prayer, music for reflection, and imagery to enlighten and inspire.” On the final night of each series, attendees are encouraged to discern next steps in their own communities.

“I initially didn’t know what they should do, but over time I realized those things that were helpful to me and my family,” she explained. “So, we eventually created kits with leader and member manuals to help guide groups through a discernment process. The leader’s manual has been granted an imprimatur.”

Each parish group is given space to listen to one another, assess the specific needs in their community, and create a plan — whether that’s hosting prayer gatherings, offering support to families affected by addiction, starting recovery ministries, or assembling care packages for local recovery homes. The work is deeply local and highly personal, but its spiritual and emotional resonance is what fuels a broader growth.

Among the programs now offered by Afire Ministries are weekly Vespers via Zoom, an online Advent Prayer Calendar, and Set Hearts AFIRE — an evangelization resource designed to equip both experienced ministers and everyday Catholics to share the Gospel. The program provides everything needed to present the material, including fully developed scripts, music, media, and opportunities for personal witness.

Also forthcoming is Graced Collaboration, an innovative faith-based recovery program developed by Corona during her doctoral studies. It integrates evidence-based scientific approaches with the spiritual wisdom of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola.

“I can’t do this alone,” Corona said. “We need more people stepping up.”

One of the newest groups has formed at St. Isidore in Quakertown, where Sharon Butler is a parishioner. “My daughter has been battling addiction for a very long time,” she said. “My husband and I… we’ve always had each other, but I never went to anything. People would suggest Al-Anon or different groups, but I just didn’t go.”

This was different, she said. Right from the start. “It was very inspiring,” Butler said. “I couldn’t wait for the next week. Each session gave me something to think about. It all just spoke to me.”

The formula is repeated throughout Afire’s various programs, Corona said. And, she believes, God’s fingerprints are all over it.

“I didn’t know how to listen for God’s voice at first, but once I did, he didn’t stop,” she said. “I know the resistance. The shame. You think you’ve heard it all — another addiction talk, more statistics, more blame. But this is different. This is about healing hearts, not just solving problems. It’s about rediscovering our humanity and God’s love for us in the middle of pain.”

She continued: “I believe strongly that God wants to work this way through every person. So many of us are asleep. We’re distracted, numb. But if we just pause — listen — we’ll hear him. And he’ll move. That’s what happened to me. I just finally stopped long enough to listen.”

This story was first published by Catholic Philly and has been reprinted with permission. It is part of the Face of Hope, a series of stories and videos “highlighting the work of those who make the Catholic Church in Philadelphia the greatest force for good in the region.” 

St. Joseph Cathedral in Columbus, Ohio. / Credit: LO Kin-hei/Shutterstock

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Aug 24, 2025 / 06:00 am (CNA).

As federal budget cuts halt programs for people in need, Catholic Social Services (CSS) in Columbus, Ohio, is encouraging volunteers to step up and become community heroes. Modeling the good Samaritan, people are being invited to join the new “Super Neighbor” initiative to lend a hand to others in need, beginning with seniors who need help.

“You don’t have to wear a cape to show up and be a super neighbor,” president and CEO of CSS, Kelley Henderson, told CNA. As the program kicks off, the organization is calling on people who want to “make an impact by being present, showing up, and serving with the love of Christ.”

CSS is a Catholic Charities member agency for the Diocese of Columbus. It works with 168 other agencies across the country to support the needs of the local ordinary but also works on national policy issues, national funding, and advocacy work.

In the Columbus Diocese, CSS serves communities within 23 counties in Central and Southern Ohio through “a myriad of programs that operate to address acute and crisis needs, whether they’re of an older adult, a family with children, or a person living with a disability,” Henderson explained.

The organization’s work is “grounded in the good Samaritan parable in Luke 10” that reminds us that everyone is our neighbor. “It’s a core part of our Catholic social teaching, is this solidarity.”

‘Neighbors serving neighbors’

CSS programs stem from its motto: “Neighbors Serving Neighbors.” The Super Neighbor initiative was formed out of a belief that volunteerism is “an easy, structured way for people in a local parish to get involved and serve,” Henderson said. 

Super Neighbor was designed “to pair a volunteer from the parish with an older adult who might be living alone. They’ll go by and visit with them, play cards, go get a haircut, or meal plan … It’s really designed to go deep and build relationships with people.”

“Social isolation is a real challenge in our community, and as Catholics, we’re called to respond to the signs of our time, and isolation is a major sign,” Henderson said. “We really see that it not only has negative health impacts on people who are isolated, but it really is not being a good neighbor. We reach out and spend time with people.”

The initiative follows other senior-oriented programs that CSS has offered including the Senior Companion and Foster Grandparent programs, which were both catered to community relationships with seniors.

Both programs were mostly federally funded for the last 30 years, primarily through the AmeriCorps agency. The funds helped “lower-income seniors receive a little support money and travel reimbursement to be able to go out and spend time with others in the community.” But as federal funding cuts have been made across the nation, the programs are unable to operate as usual.

“Regardless, we’re committed to serving,” Henderson said. “We’ll find new innovative ways to serve, and Super Neighborhood is one of them.” 

“I really see beauty and value in volunteerism. I think volunteers can not only see the face of Christ in those we serve but be the face of Christ. And be the hands and feet of who we’re called to be in the community.”

What is unique about Super Neighbor is it doesn’t just have one type of volunteer. The program opens the doors for all kinds of people to serve and be served.

Historically, volunteers are people who have extra time. Henderson explained that it tends to be people who have retired, those winding down their careers, or parents with children in school, but CSS and Super Neighbor bring in an even larger demographic.

“We’re beginning to not only see the folks that have that discretionary time, but we’re seeing people make time available,” Henderson said. “One of our local Catholic high schools started a Catholic Social Services Club, and the kids are making time to volunteer.”

Employers around the diocese are even beginning to offer volunteer time off, including CSS, which gives its staff allotted time to serve the community. “They can take two hours a quarter to volunteer at a place of their choosing,” Henderson said. 

“The culture of giving back is really inspiring to see right now. And we’re using that as an opportunity to be that resource for people.”

The future of ‘Super Neighbor’ 

Although it is a new initiative, three parishes have committed to be a part of the effort. There are already 60 volunteers that have signed up who will begin the program with home visits with seniors in late September.

While prioritizing seniors, CSS is working to expand Super Neighbor to reach even more groups of people. It is working to place volunteers in local schools to be “homework helpers or tutors,” to connect with younger generations.

“My hope is by the Advent season, we have a couple hundred super neighbors signed up, which is really important because the impetus of the launch of this program was to have a hope-filled response to some of the cuts that we’re facing federally.”

Despite “a tightening fiscal environment … it’s an opportunity for the Church to show up,” Henderson said. “The Church is generally the one that shows up first.”

Bishop James Conley of Lincoln, Nebraska in St. Peter's Square, a day before the canonization Mass of St. John Henry Newman, Oct. 12, 2019. / Credit: Daniel Ibanez/CNA

CNA Staff, Aug 23, 2025 / 11:15 am (CNA).

Lincoln, Nebraska, Bishop James Conley this week said a proposed federal immigrant detention facility in the state must allow Catholic ministers to provide sacramental and pastoral care.

The bishop made the announcement after Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen announced the repurposing of the state Work Ethic Camp in McCook to house immigrants in the country illegally.

The state website says the camp presently offers “an integrated program that combines evidence-based practices with treatment and educational opportunities” for prisoners. Pillen told local media this week that the facility “would be converted and provide capacity for 300 migrants,” according to the Nebraska Examiner.

In his own statement this week, Conley said the Diocese of Lincoln has been allowed to administer the sacraments and pastoral care to detainees at the camp “for decades.” The diocese has been allowed to say Mass there “on a weekly basis,” he said.

“It will be of utmost importance that any person detained in the federal immigration detention center in McCook can also access regular and ongoing pastoral care,” the bishop said. “This is fundamental to the dignity of every human person, as each of us is called to union with God.”

Conley further urged that the facility should not be used to detain immigrants who are only in the country illegally but rather “those who have committed crimes that endanger public safety.”

“To do otherwise would undermine the facility’s moral legitimacy and erode public trust,” he argued.

Conley said he remains “committed to safeguarding human dignity, which maintains public safety and respects our migrant brothers and sisters.”

The bishop’s letter comes a few weeks after Catholic leaders in Florida were allowed pastoral access to the state’s so-called “Alligator Alcatraz” immigrant detainment facility in the Everglades.

Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski had previously expressed concern that Catholic ministers were not being allowed access to the facility, though the state ultimately allowed Mass to be celebrated there earlier this month.

A view from the entrance of Christ the King Chapel during the solemn blessing Mass on Aug. 17, 2025. / Credit: Photo courtesy of Franciscan University of Steubenville

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Aug 23, 2025 / 10:30 am (CNA).

Here’s a roundup of the latest Catholic education news in the U.S.:

Franciscan University blesses newly renovated Christ the King Chapel

Franciscan University of Steubenville has officially reopened its Christ the King Chapel after 15 months of renovation and expansion as part of the school’s Rebuild My Church Capital Campaign. 

“Franciscan’s chapel has nearly doubled its seating capacity — from 325 to 590 — to better accommodate the growing student population and has added a new altar and tabernacle, new sacred art, and stained-glass windows to beautify the space,” the school said in a press release on Monday. 

A Mass of solemn blessing was celebrated on Aug. 17 by Diocese of Steubenville Apostolic Administrator Bishop Edward Lohse to mark the occasion.

Former Black parish in Kentucky to be converted into science building at local college

Christ the King Catholic Church, a historically Black parish in Louisville, Kentucky, will be converted into a science and technology campus for Simmons College of Kentucky after the Archdiocese of Louisville donated it to the school following the church’s closure on March 7, according to local reports.

“Converting the church property into classrooms and labs is expected to cost around $32 million in total,” a university news article stated, noting the project has been in the works for years.

“At Simmons it’s so important for us to meet workforce needs,” said Simmons Chief of Staff Myra Rock. “There’s a need in our community, not just in the West End, not just in the city, but across the commonwealth, for talent in the STEM fields and specifically underrepresented talent.” 

Archbishop Shelton Fabre said the parish closure was due to declining membership and the financial burden of maintaining the historic property.

Oklahoma archdiocese celebrates grand opening of migrant education center

The Archdiocese of Oklahoma City on Wednesday celebrated the grand opening of its Holy Angels Education Center for immigrants in an event attended by Archbishop Paul Coakley and other Catholic leaders, according to the Oklahoman. 

The center will operate on the property of the former Holy Angels Parish, which has been closed since February 2023. 

“The Holy Angels Education Center was born out of a deep desire to serve, uplift, and walk alongside our immigrant brothers and sisters as they build new lives in our community through education, language learning, skills development, and cultural integration,” said Larann Wilson, the associate director for the archdiocese’s secretariat for evangelization. “This center will become a beacon of support and opportunity.”

ExxonMobil donates $5,000 to STEM program at Catholic school in Maryland

ExxonMobil Baytown has donated $5,000 to St. Joseph’s Regional Catholic School to promote “enhancing science education and empowering the next generation of innovators and problem solvers,” according to a local report.

Located in Beltsville, Maryland, St. Joseph’s Regional Catholic School’s mission “is to cooperate with families, who are the primary educators, in developing the whole child in the Catholic Christian faith,” according to its website.

Louisiana Catholic school brings nuns, therapy dogs to help students as classes begin

Sacred Heart of Jesus Catholic School in Baton Rouge kicked off the school year by inviting nuns and service dogs for the first weeks of classes to help ease anxiety among students, according to a local news report.

“Their presence here has been so transformative,” the school’s pastor and prominent Catholic speaker, Father Joshua Johnson, said in the report.

“And with the sisters came the dogs. When I saw the effect that the dogs were having on our kids, especially our kids who experience anxiety and the peace it brought to those kids, I knew we needed more dogs and more nuns.”

St. Pius X. / Credit: Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Aug 23, 2025 / 08:00 am (CNA).

The Catholic Church celebrated the feast of St. Pius X on Aug. 21 — an influential pope at the turn of the 20th century whose warnings about the heresy of “modernism” help shine light on the deterioration of faith in the West today and the disregard of Church teaching, according to one Catholic scholar.

Pius, who reigned as pope from 1903 to 1914 after the death of Pope Leo XIII, took charge of the Church in the aftermath of the Enlightenment era, which had spurred rationalist and liberal movements throughout Europe and the Americas.

Several of Pius’ predecessors combatted certain Enlightenment-era philosophies, which appeared to be a predominantly outside threat to the Church. This included Pope Gregory XVI’s rebuke of liberalism in the 1830s — which he saw as promoting religious indifferentism and secularism — and Blessed Pius IX, who condemned trends toward naturalism and absolute rationalism, which sought answers to philosophical questions absent divine revelation.

Pius X followed in their footsteps, combatting the heresy of “modernism” in his 1907 encyclical Pascendi Dominici Gregis. This heresy, he taught, was the pervasion of “false philosophy” within the Catholic laity and clergy, even within the Catholic university system and the seminaries that threatens the foundations of the faith itself.

“The danger is present almost in the very veins and heart of the Church, whose injury is the more certain, the more intimate is their knowledge of her,” Pius wrote. “Moreover they lay the axe not to the branches and shoots but to the very root; that is, to the faith and its deepest fires.”

Modernism, Pius explained, is essentially a form of agnosticism within the Church, which views human reasoning as confined to “things that are perceptible to the senses.” With agnosticism as their foundation, modernists see human reason as “incapable of lifting itself up to God, and of recognizing his existence, even by means of visible things.”

“It is inferred that God can never be the direct object of science and that, as regards history, he must not be considered as an historical subject,” the Holy Father wrote.

Because modernists hold that God cannot be understood through reason, Pius explained, the heresy reduces one’s relationship with God to an “experience of the individual.” A belief in God, the modernists believe, is rooted in “a kind of intuition of the heart, which puts man in immediate contact with the very reality of God.”

Pius continued to say this position can be used to justify any religion. He wrote: “Modernists do not deny but actually admit, some confusedly, others in the most open manner, that all religions are true.”

Pius called modernism “the synthesis of all heresies” because when one applies this foundation to all facets of the faith — such as the divinity of Christ, miracles, tradition, and Scripture itself — the modernists promote an ever-evolving understanding of dogma “that ruins and destroys all religion.”

“[Modernists believe] dogma is not only able, but ought to evolve and to be changed,” the Holy Father explained. “This is strongly affirmed by the Modernists, and as clearly flows from their principles.”

Ron Bolster, the dean of philosophy and theology at Franciscan University, told CNA that the concern about modernism is primarily rooted in its belief that “you cannot know the things of God” and that “all we can do is look toward our internal religious experience.”

“If you have a religious person convinced by a modernist that you can’t really know these things, it leads to a kind of despair,” he said.

“When people are convinced by that or too lazy to sort it out, they abandon the practice of the faith and they no longer have access to the means of salvation that God made available to them,” Bolster warned.

Modernism’s impact on modern society

Bolster said he believes there is “a very clear connection” between Pius X’s warnings against modernism in the Church and the subsequent decline in religiosity in the Western world, along with the large number of Catholics openly dissenting from Church teaching.

A Pew Research Center survey in January 2024 found that the largest religious category in the United States is the “nones,” which is no religion in particular. These individuals make up about 28% of the American population, but only 17% of people in that category identify as atheist. The majority of the category, 63%, identify as “nothing in particular” and the other 20% are agnostic.

The modernist impact on Catholicism itself is also clear. A 2025 Pew survey found that only about two-thirds of Catholics are certain that God exists. About 86% believe heaven exists, but just 69% believe in hell. A majority of Catholics support legal abortion and homosexual civil marriages.

A 2024 EWTN/RealClear poll found that about 52% of Catholics believe in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, while 32% do not and 16% are unsure. Among Catholics, the strongest dissent from teaching appears to consistently be the issue of contraception, with a 2024 survey showing that 90% have used condoms and 60% have used hormonal birth control.

Bolster said the Catholic dissent on contraception, which occurred about 60 years after Pius X published the encyclical, “was the first time that there was kind of a precedent-setting public dissent against Church teaching.”

“That was really your turning point where you see for the first time [a large number of Catholics] publicly dissenting from … Church teaching,” he said.

Bolster noted that “calling into question the teaching of the Church because [of the belief that] we cannot know [the truth]” is a major symptom of modernist trends.

When speaking about Pius X’s warnings about modernism, Bolster said “the language of that document is astoundingly strong” and the pope is “not pulling any punches and the threat is real and the solutions are heavy-handed.”

At the time of the encyclical, Pius X called for ousting clergymen who promote modernism and censoring the promotion of those beliefs, along with establishing diocesan watch committees to find promoters of the heresy.

Pius X also called for a resurgence of the teaching of Scholastic philosophy, for which he said modernists only have “ridicule and contempt.” Many scholastics, such as St. Thomas Aquinas, taught that people can learn about and understand God through the use of reason.

The encyclical also notes that the First Vatican Council anathematizes any person who states that God “cannot be known with certainty by the natural light of human reason by means of the things that are made.”

Bolster noted that Aquinas and other Scholastics point out that Greek pagans like Aristotle and Plato “reasoned to the existence of God” and understood certain limited truths about God that they could gather without specific revelation.

“We can know by natural reason that God exists, that he contains all perfections, that he’s all powerful, and that he’s limitless,” Bolster said.

In spite of the impact that modernism has had on society, Bolster said Catholics should “remain positive.” He said the easy availability of the Catechism of the Catholic Church and “materials that are available for teaching the faith today … [are] reason to hope and reason to give credit to the bishops.”

“We have to get back — double down on the teachings of the Church,” he said.

Tyler Duffy, director of evangelization at St. Thomas More Catholic Parish in Centennial, Colorado, outside More Coffee. / Credit: Francesca Fenton/CNA

Denver, Colo., Aug 23, 2025 / 06:00 am (CNA).

Step into More Coffee and you’re immediately greeted by the smell of fresh ground coffee, vintage images of the London skyline on the walls, quotes from Catholic saints on the chalkboard, and a crucifix hanging by the pickup counter.

The new coffee shop, owned and run by St. Thomas More Catholic Parish (STM) in Centennial, Colorado, hopes to become a gathering place of evangelization for those within the parish boundaries.

Tyler Duffy, director of evangelization at the parish, told CNA that the pastor of STM, Father Randy Dollins, “had this vision for an outpost of evangelization for our parish.”

According to canon law, a pastor is responsible for the spiritual care of all those within the boundaries of his parish — Catholic and non-Catholic alike. This, Duffy explained, is a responsibility Dollins takes “very seriously.”

“So he was thinking, ‘OK, what are we doing to evangelize within our territory? What are we doing to spread the faith?’ And one of the big things was people may not feel comfortable or may not want to step into a Catholic church, but maybe there’s a place that we could find within our territory that people would be comfortable stepping into,” Duffy explained.

From there they decided to find “an outpost … a place where we can naturally encounter people where their guard isn’t up, where they’d be happy to have a conversation, a natural place to build community.”

After hearing that the Augustine Institute — a private Catholic graduate school in theology — was moving to Missouri and had no plans for the space, STM decided to jump on the opportunity. Since the space had previously been a coffee shop, they were able to keep some of the furniture and equipment. However, they did redecorate, rebrand, and rename the shop. Additionally, STM also became the owners of the chapel in the building and a conference room that is attached to the coffee shop that they plan to allow anyone in the community to use for free. 

Duffy explained that through the coffee shop they are aiming to focus on “the transcendentals — truth, beauty, goodness.”

“We want to make the space beautiful and inviting. We want to speak the truth through our books and the conversations here and goodness — we just want to show what it is to live an upright moral life as a business, but also as individuals working the coffee shop,” he said.

However, Duffy added that he believes “one of the best uses of the coffee shop is if we could get our parishioners to utilize the space for their own evangelization.” 

He explained that while an individual might not feel comfortable asking someone to go to Mass with them, it is most likely very easy to ask someone to go grab a coffee together.

“So then you come into the space and you’re like, ‘Oh, let me tell you about this coffee shop. It’s actually owned by my church. And this is why I love my church so much.’ And that itself is like an easy way to be able to equip you to go out and evangelize.”

Duffy hopes that in time More Coffee “really becomes like a Catholic hub … [that] this place becomes known in the archdiocese as, ‘Oh, this is the Catholic coffee shop.’ And … that it becomes this meeting space and this gathering space just for Catholic conversation and ideation.”

Not only does Duffy want to establish a “robust Catholic atmosphere” but he also hopes that it will become the hub for good coffee in the area for everybody. The coffee shop is currently located in what is known as “The Denver Tech Center,” or DTC, a business and economic trading center located in Colorado in the southeastern portion of the Denver metropolitan area. 

“So, I would love to attract businesspeople to the area, work-from-home people to the area, people who are just looking for good coffee,” he shared. “And then if you combine the two — a robust Catholic community and atmosphere with this really beloved coffee shop in the community — then I think that naturally what you’ll find is these people who are coming just for the coffee, or just for the space, are just going to run into the beauty and the joy of the faith because they’re going to encounter a Catholic community here.”

Michael Iskander as David in Prime Video's "House of David." / Credit: Jonathan Prime/Prime

CNA Staff, Aug 22, 2025 / 16:40 pm (CNA).

Michael Iskander, the actor known for playing the lead role of King David in the new hit Prime Video series “House of David,” announced Aug. 21 that he has become Catholic.

“Today is a very special day, that looking back has been a long time in the making. Today I joined the Catholic faith,” he wrote in an Instagram post. “I’ve felt a calling to this Church for a long time, and as time went on, this calling became louder and louder.”

He added: “Eventually I ran into some really amazing people that helped me along the way. And rather than being the end of the road, this is the beginning of the journey. Please pray for me as I continue my walk with God, and thanks for celebrating this day with me.”

Iskander, 23, has shared in several interviews that he always dreamed of portraying King David but never thought it would happen. He was taking part in a Broadway production when he heard about the upcoming series focusing on Israel’s famous king. After his initial audition, Iskander was given a “no.” A couple weeks later, he was called to reaudition. Iskander was advised by his mother to pray and fast ahead of the second audition. Two months later, he was offered the role.

“For me, oftentimes God speaks with the softest voice and, for me, the softest voice was telling me ‘just hold out’ ... I don’t want to say that I knew this was mine — I really believe that God can choose anyone to accomplish his will,” Iskander said in an interview with Naomi Raine. “It’s not about me, it’s about him doing his will and it’s about someone who was willing to do his will.”

“So, I think in a way having that audition kind of not go through … I think it was God’s way of telling me: ‘Listen, there’s going to be rejection and there’s going to be a tough time and there’s going to be challenges, but the only way you get through is with me,’” he added.

Speaking at the Liberty University convocation, he shared that it’s easy for actors who have a role such as this to “make it about the human being rather than about God.”

“The show, for me, shouldn’t be called ‘House of David.’ It should be called ‘House of the Lord,’ ‘House of God,’ because it’s about him,” he said. “David’s heart was for the Lord and so that’s what I try to find in every scene, in every moment is where the Lord is and where the Holy Spirit can be found.”

Iskander has also spoken about the importance Scripture played while filming the series and portraying this famous figure.

“Keeping in mind the reverence for Scripture and what he means biblically, I found myself reading the Psalms and the Book of Samuel constantly just to be reminded of the true character of David and his heart and truly trying to find his heart in every single moment,” he told CNA in an interview.

He emphasized the importance of “focusing on the reverence for Scripture” in approaching his portrayal of David.

“House of David” is produced by the independent studio Wonder Project, which caters to faith-based and values-oriented audiences. The first season of the series — which aired exclusively on Prime Video — garnered over 40 million views worldwide and reached No. 1 on Prime Video in the United States.

In June, Wonder Project announced the launch of an exclusive subscription that will be offered on Prime Video that will allow subscribers to get early access to new original films and series produced by the production studio.

Season 2 of “House of David” will first be released on the Wonder Project subscription service this fall. It will then be available to all Prime Video users at a later date.

Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate former Rep. Abigail Spanberger speaks during an Everytown for Gun Safety rally on April 10, 2025, in Alexandria, Virginia. / Credit: Win McNamee/Getty Images

CNA Staff, Aug 22, 2025 / 14:08 pm (CNA).

Years-old video that surfaced this week showed Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger endorsing assisted suicide and appearing to suggest that even religious hospitals should be required to perform the procedure.

The footage, which shows then-U.S. House candidate Spanberger at a 2018 campaign event, depicts the Democrat being asked about her position on “legislation that would legalize medical aid in dying,” a common euphemism for assisted suicide.

“I support and I would support legislation that legalizes the right to die with dignity of a person’s choosing,” Spanberger responded. “That would include allowing for medical providers to provide prescriptions for life-ending prescriptions.”

Spanberger at the same time was asked to speak on “permitting religious health care institutions to dictate what their physicians are allowed to discuss with their patients.”

“I oppose the ability of religious institutions to put their religious-based ideas on individuals and their health care choices and options,” she responded in the video.

“I believe that we should trust people to have relationships with their health care providers that lead them to make strong decisions based on their medical practices, and I do not believe that people should have the option to allow their own personal beliefs to dictate the type of medical care that they are providing their patients,” she said.

The Democrat is running against current state Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears.

Spanberger’s campaign did not respond to multiple requests for comment on Friday morning asking if she still supports assisted suicide or forcing individuals and hospitals to perform it.

The resurfaced video generated backlash online this week. Republican State Del. Geary Higgins wrote that Spanberger’s remarks were “absolutely unbelievable.”

“Not only will religious organizations that do not believe in assisted suicide have to talk about it, they will have to make it available,” he said.

The National Right to Life Committee, meanwhile, described the Democrat’s position as “a window into how far some are willing to go to prioritize ideological consistency over constitutional rights.”

“Voters and lawmakers should take her at her word and reject the premise that the state may dictate the moral framework of faith-based institutions,” group outreach director Raimundo Rojas said.

State lawmakers in Virginia last year voted down an effort to legalize assisted suicide there. Nearly a dozen states and the District of Columbia presently allow the practice. 

Ahead of the Virginia bill’s defeat in the state Legislature last year, Virginia’s Catholic bishops warned that the proposal would “[make] the most vulnerable even more vulnerable” and put them at risk of “deadly harm.”

Bishop Michael Burbidge of Arlington and Bishop Barry Knestout of Richmond called the bill a “lethal measure” and reminded voters that human life “is sacred and must never be abandoned or discarded.”

Sebastien Lai, son of imprisoned free speech advocate Jimmy Lai, speaks on EWTN’s “The World Over with Raymond Arroyo” on Aug. 21, 2025. / Credit: “The World Over with Raymond Arroyo” screenshot

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Aug 22, 2025 / 13:38 pm (CNA).

Sebastien Lai, son of imprisoned Hong Kong democracy advocate Jimmy Lai, said this week his father is “still fighting” and “holding on” as closing arguments continue in his lengthy national security trial.

Jimmy Lai, the Catholic billionaire, human rights activist, and founder of pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, has been on trial since 2023 in Hong Kong for allegations of colluding with foreign forces under a national security law put in effect by the communist-controlled Chinese government. He faces a life sentence if found guilty. 

“It’s a textbook example of a show trial, of the weaponization of the legal system,” Sebastien told EWTN’s “The World Over with Raymond Arroyo” on Thursday.

“He’s not going to see a fair trial … It’s an absolute kangoo trial.”

Sebastien said the evidence brought against his father “all turned out to be completely untrue,” adding: “My father is in prison because of his journalism and because of his courage. Because he stayed to defend his people, because he dared to campaign for democracy and for human rights in Hong Kong. And that didn’t sit well with the Hong Kong government.”

While closing arguments began on Aug. 18, they continue to be postponed. Sebastien said the issue is that “the national security law is so broad,” explaining that the “rule of law” in Hong Kong, which was once fairly enforced, “no longer holds.”

“Instead of the rule of law, it’s the rule of men,” he said. “My father got more than a year in maximum security prison in solitary confinement on one of the sentences, which was for lighting a candle and saying a prayer at a Tiananmen Square massacre vigil.”

People can see it is “not just ridiculous, but how horrible it is to give someone a jail sentence over commemorating people who died, [but] who died for freedom and democracy in China.”

While “it’s an open trial” and people in Hong Kong can follow what is happening, “there’s no free press,” Sebastien said. “People are going to jail for liking social media posts or even writing on bathroom toilets … But foreign journalists can still go and local journalists can still cover parts of it. There’s at least that element of it.”

“My father said it best … when he was giving testimony: ‘My job as a journalist, as a publisher, is to hold a torch to the truth.’” 

Call for international support 

As leaders around the world rally to support Jimmy, Sebastien said his family is “incredibly grateful” for the help but that he thinks “it’s time to put action” behind words. 

President Donald Trump recently vowed to do everything he can to bring about Jimmy’s release.

“The fact that [Trump] is still keeping my father’s case close to heart is something that I’m incredibly grateful for,” he said.

“The U.S. government is much more effective and much stronger in terms of liberating people around the world. Now that both [the U.K. and U.S.] governments are so supportive, it gives us a lot of hope as a family, but … I think the U.K. government can do more to free my father,” he said.

“But I think we are in a situation now where my father dying in jail is not beneficial for any party. It’s not beneficial for Hong Kong. It’s not beneficial for China. It’s obviously not beneficial for anybody who enjoys freedom.” Jimmy would “essentially act as a martyr if he died in prison,” Sebastien said. 

Jimmy’s health concerns

“His health is not good,” Sebastien continued. “From my understanding, my father is much skinnier and much weaker, but still strong in spirit and still strong in mind.”

The Chinese government is “always trying to essentially break his spirit with all these multiple show trials. The government tells him that nobody cares about him and that he’s going to die for nothing.”

In solitary confinement, where Jimmy is most of the time, he is “in a little concrete cell, and there’s no air conditioning, so he bakes under the sun … never mind his diabetes,” the younger Lai said. Recently, Jimmy’s lawyers also shared that he is suffering from heart palpitations in prison.

As the trial continues, Sebastien said a statement his father made is what gives him hope: “‘The truth will come out in the kingdom of God, and that is good enough for me.’”

Washington Surgi-Clinic on F St. NW in Washington, D.C., on April 7, 2022. / Credit: Katie Yoder/CNA

CNA Staff, Aug 22, 2025 / 08:00 am (CNA).

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

Late-term abortionist in DC faces complaint for ‘medical malpractice’

A pro-life group filed a formal complaint against late-term abortionist Cesar Santangelo this week, citing “a documented history” of medical malpractice and serious injury of patients.

Leaders of the Survivors of the Abortion Holocaust group allege that Santangelo has “a pattern of injuring patients, endangering people’s lives, and prematurely ending at least one” in the complaint, which was addressed to members of the Washington, D.C., Board of Medicine.

The 12-page complaint details alleged medical malpractice by Santangelo that has led to the death or serious injury of patients. The letter is signed by The Survivors’ Director Timothy Clement and The Survivors’ D.C. Organizer Kristin Turner.

Pro-life activists associated Santangelo’s clinic with the discovery of the remains of five late-term unborn children. Pro-life activists said they found the children’s remains at the Washington Surgi-Clinic, an abortion center in northwest D.C. that is operated by Santangelo.

According to the letter, Santangelo performs abortions up to 28 weeks, just at the end of the second trimester of pregnancy.

Texas attorney general demands halt to illegal abortion pill shipments

Following two cases of abortion drug poisoning, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has issued a cease-and-desist letter calling on abortion organizations to stop illegally shipping abortion drugs into the state.

According to the Aug. 20 press release, Paxton demanded an end to “unlawful advertising, sale, and shipment of abortion-inducing drugs into the state of Texas.”

The letter ties in with recent cases in which abortion groups “facilitated men illegally purchasing abortion-inducing drugs,” according to the press release. The men then allegedly poisoned the mothers of their children with the drug, killing their unborn children.

“Texas will not tolerate the murdering of innocent life through illegal drug trafficking,” Paxton said. “These abortion drug organizations and radical activists are not above the law, and I have ordered the immediate end of this unlawful conduct.”

“This is a flagrant violation of both state and federal laws, and we are going to do everything in our power to protect mothers and unborn babies,” he said.

Catholic pro-life activists face charges after presidential pardon 

Pro-life activists, including two who were recently pardoned by President Donald Trump, are facing trespassing charges for their pro-life activism in Pennsylvania.

The six activists were participating in a Red Rose Rescue on July 31 in Upland, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia at the Delaware County Women’s Center in Crozer Chester Medical Center. Red Rose Rescue is a pro-life group that witnesses to life at abortion clinics and tries to stop abortions by offering roses to women.

The group, which included five Catholics and one evangelical, were charged with biosecurity trespassing (entering a medical treatment without following biosecurity protocols) and disorderly trespassing — misdemeanors that could lead to up to one year in jail and fines.

Two of the activists  — Joan Andrews Bell, 77, from New Jersey, and William Goodman, 55, originally from Wisconsin — had previously been pardoned by Trump after they were convicted under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act for blocking an abortion clinic entrance.

Several other activists were charged, including: ChristyAnne Collins, 70, from Texas; William Holmberg, 71, from Steubenville, Ohio; head of Citizens for a Pro-Life Society Monica Miller, 72, from Michigan; and Patrice Woodworth-Crandall, 61, from Minnesota.