Posted on 08/4/2025 11:05 AM ()
Pope Leo tells young people gathered for the 36th International Youth Festival in Medjugorje to "walk together, support each other, and inspire one another".
Posted on 08/4/2025 10:00 AM (CNA Daily News)
Camp Mystic alumnae and family sing after a memorial service on July 7, 2025, honoring victims of the flash floods in Central Texas over the Fourth of July weekend. / Credit: Amira Abuzeid/CNA
Houston, Texas, Aug 4, 2025 / 06:00 am (CNA).
One month has passed since some of the deadliest and most destructive flooding in the state’s history took at least 136 lives in the Texas Hill Country over the Fourth of July holiday weekend.
Of the confirmed dead, 108 were in Kerr County, where the worst flooding occurred, and included 36 children, 27 of whom were attending Camp Mystic, a Christian all-girls summer camp on the banks of the Guadalupe River.
After extensive recovery efforts by local, state, federal, and international teams, as well as thousands of volunteers, most of the missing have been recovered or confirmed safe. Two people remained missing as of July 28, according to Kerr County commissioners. Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly said the county’s “primary goal is closure for the families” whose loved ones are still unaccounted for.
As cleanup and rebuilding continue one month later, Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of San Antonio Vice President of Programs Lizzy Perales told CNA the nonprofit will continue to help flood victims “as long as it’s needed.”
“It will take years for people to rebuild their lives,” Perales said.
At the request of San Antonio’s archbishop, Gustavo García-Siller, Catholic Charities was deployed immediately after the flood to assist the parish in Kerrville, Notre Dame Catholic Church.
Since then, the nonprofit has three staff on site who are providing case management services, coordinating help for victims’ material needs, including emergency and longer-term housing and financial assistance, as well as mental health counseling and legal support.
Catholic Charities also has a distribution site that has served over 450 people with hygiene items, food, water, cleaning supplies, baby items, and “anything families who have lost everything need,” Perales said.
In the immediate aftermath of the flood, the distribution site also provided aid to first responders in the form of food, electrolytes, tools, gloves, and small equipment.
Catholic Charities is assisting with emergency shelter and temporary lodging through a partnership with home rental company Airbnb. It has also assisted in the cost of several funerals in recent weeks.
Perales told CNA she is grateful for the many donations both Catholic Charities and Notre Dame Church have received in the last month. She said the recovery effort has been an ecumenical affair.
“We have worked with many other great organizations and collaborated with many other churches and faith leaders,” she said. “We all want to be good stewards and not duplicate our efforts.”
She asked for continued prayers for the victims as well as the many volunteers and relief workers.
The historic flooding began in the early hours of July 4 after record rainfall, with some areas receiving up to 15 inches. Hunt, a small town in Kerr County located near the headwaters of the Guadalupe River, received 6.5 inches in three hours, leading to the river rising 26 feet in 45 minutes and 33 feet in two hours.
Though most of the devastation occurred along the Guadalupe, the San Saba, Frio, and Colorado rivers also flooded as the same storm system moved across the area.
The immense volume of water caused the rivers to overflow their banks, tearing homes from their foundations and sweeping away RVs, cabins, cars, and trees. Many awoke to find quickly-rising water in their homes or cabins, and survivors had to act quickly to escape.
On July 3, ahead of an expected storm system, state officials held an emergency weather briefing in which they were warned there was a “minor” possibility of flash flooding in Kerr and surrounding counties. Due to the unexpectedly high volume of rainfall, at 1:14 a.m. on July 4, the National Weather Service issued a flash flood warning that included the towns of Kerrville, Ingram, and Hunt. The warning was escalated to an “emergency” at about 4:20 a.m., but by then, the river had already risen higher than 20 feet in some places.
The National Weather Service did not issue a flash flood emergency in Kerrville until 5:34 a.m.
Many have criticized delays in emergency alerts and the lack of a flood warning system in the area, known as “Flash Flood Alley,” blaming officials from Camp Mystic leadership, the county, the state, FEMA, all the way up to President Donald Trump.
In 2016, then-Kerr County commissioner Tom Moser said in a commissioners’ meeting: “I think that this area is one of the highest probability areas for flash floods that exists, OK — probably within, I don’t know, within the nation, but certainly within the state.”
However, after multiple attempts over several years, Kerr County failed to secure state or FEMA funding for flood warning systems.
Camp Mystic had just passed an inspection by the Texas Department of State Health Services on July 2, which certified that the camp had an emergency and evacuation plan in place for disasters, including flooding.
Camp Mystic is divided into two sections, and according to the inspection report, had 386 campers and 64 staff members at its Guadalupe River section and 171 campers and 44 staff at the newer, Cypress Lake section. All the victims, 26 girls and one counselor, came from the lower-lying Guadalupe River section.
A power outage around 4 a.m. that morning meant the camp’s public address system did not work, and no campers or counselors received text alerts because cellphones were prohibited while at camp.
Critics said the camp’s owners were irresponsible for continuing to operate the camp, even expanding it in recent years, knowing it was built on a flood plain. FEMA’s 2011 maps designated parts of Camp Mystic as a “Special Flood Hazard Area,” though some buildings were later removed from this designation after appeals by its owners, Tweety Eastland and her husband, Dick Eastland, who perished while rescuing campers during the flood.
Camp Mystic alumnae continue to fiercely defend the camp and the beloved Eastlands. Houston resident Mollie Osborne, who attended the camp as a girl and whose daughter had returned from a four-week session just before the July floods, said she will send her daughter back to the camp if it reopens next summer.
“The Eastlands are like family to us,” Osborne said. “And we trust them implicitly.”
Posted on 08/4/2025 09:29 AM ()
The Pope entrusts to the loving mercy of Almighty God the dozens of victims—mostly Ethiopian nationals—who perished in a shipwreck while attempting to reach Saudi Arabia and other wealthy oil-producing countries.
Posted on 08/4/2025 08:58 AM ()
A new UNICEF report documents high risk levels for the hundreds of thousands of children in Sudan suffering from malnutrition and the threat of cholera as a result of ongoing violence.
Posted on 08/4/2025 08:00 AM (CNA Daily News)
St. John Vianney. / Credit: Herwig Reidlinger via Wikimedia Commons CC 3.0
CNA Newsroom, Aug 4, 2025 / 04:00 am (CNA).
A century after the patron saint of priests, St. John Vianney, died on Aug. 4, 1859, Pope John XXIII reflected on the life of the saint and what it means to be a holy priest.
In contemplating his life, one immediately thinks of a priest who lived out great penance and whose “only motives were the love of God and the desire for the salvation of the souls of his neighbors,” John XXIII said.
The saintly pope reflected on the life of Vianney in an encyclical titled Sacerdotii Nostri Primordia. The encyclical was written in 1959 for the 100th anniversary of Vianney’s death.
After struggling with his studies, John Vianney was ordained a priest in 1815. Shortly afterward, he was assigned to Ars, France, near his hometown of Dardilly. There, he spent the majority of his priesthood.
The devoted pastor was known for his dedication to the poor, his counseling to those in need, and for founding La Providence, an orphanage for girls.
He was also well known for his dedication to the sacrament of penance. He would make himself available for confession for up to 16 hours daily.
In his encyclical, Pope John XXIII called St. John Vianney a model of priestly holiness.
“[The priest] is no longer supposed to live for himself … He must be aflame with charity toward everyone. Not even his thoughts, his will, his feelings belong to him, for they are rather those of Jesus Christ who is his life,” he wrote, quoting a sermon from Pope Pius XII.
“St. John Mary Vianney is a person who attracts and practically pushes all of us to these heights of the priestly life,” John XXIII further added.
The pope highlighted the three evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience, which he said Vianney exemplified.
“His example in the various works of priestly asceticism still points out the safest path to follow, and in the midst of this example, his poverty, chastity, and obedience stand forth in a brilliant light,” the pope said of Vianney.
“What great benefits are conferred on human society by men like this who are free of the cares of the world and totally dedicated to the divine ministry so that they can employ their lives, thoughts, powers in the interest of their brethren!”
Pope John XXIII said Vianney, who was a member of the Third Order of St. Francis, clearly lived a life of poverty. He noted the saint’s heavy mortifications — restraining himself from food, sleep, and other personal belongings.
“This detachment from external goods enabled him to offer the most devoted and touching care to the poor,” the pope said.
“He passed a life that was almost completely detached from the changeable, perishable goods of this world, and his spirit was free and unencumbered by impediments of this kind, so that it could always lie open to those who suffered from any kind of misery.”
Similarly, Pope John XXIII wrote, the preservation of chastity breaks the restraints of self-interest and grants a person greater dedication to those in need.
“St. John Mary Vianney has this pertinent comment to make in this regard: ‘A soul adorned with the virtue of chastity cannot help loving others; for it has discovered the source and font of love — God.’”
The pope also pointed to Vianney’s dedication to the virtue of obedience. The saint, he said, had desired a contemplative life rather than the heavy burden of pastoral duties, but he still remained obedient to his bishops.
“All his life he longed to lead a quiet and retired life in the background, and he regarded pastoral duties as a very heavy burden laid on his shoulders, and more than once he tried to free himself of it,” the pope said.
While God never allowed him to achieve this goal, it was certainly God’s way of forming the saint in the virtue of obedience, he said.
He also highlighted Vianney’s prayer life and devotion to the Eucharist, as well as his commitment to the sacrament of confession.
Pope John XXIII said Vianney “habitually restrained his own will” to further dedicate himself to the Church. He expressed hope that this fire for the Church that consumed Vianney may also consume all priests.
“It is said that St. John M. Vianney lived in the Church in such a way that he worked for it alone, and burned himself up like a piece of straw being consumed on fiery coals. May that flame which comes from the Holy Spirit reach those of us who have been raised to the priesthood of Jesus Christ and consume us too.”
This story was first published on Aug. 3, 2018, and has been updated.
Posted on 08/4/2025 07:35 AM ()
Andrea Monda, the Director of L'Osservatore Romano, reflects on the message of Pope Leo XIV at the Prayer Vigil for the Jubilee of Youth.
Posted on 08/4/2025 07:14 AM ()
Thousands of Palestinians rally across several West Bank cities, protesting Israel’s ongoing military campaign in Gaza and restrictions on aid deliveries that have fuelled widespread hunger in the enclave.
Posted on 08/4/2025 05:05 AM ()
A vigil was held on Sunday 3rd August in Beirut in an area adjacent to the site of the port explosion tragedy five years ago on 4 August 2020. A message from Pope Leo XIV read during the vigil expressed his closeness with the people. Apostolic Nunzio, Archbishop Borgia says, “the families of the victims need justice and truth about what happened. These are deaths that still have no explanation, and this weighs heavily on the whole country.”
Posted on 08/4/2025 02:48 AM ()
Following Pope Leo's annoucement of the dates for World Youth Day in 2027, the Prefect of the Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life extends an invitation to bishops and youth ministry offices worldwide to start their journeys towards the global event.
Posted on 08/4/2025 02:26 AM ()
The 20th SECAM Plenary Assembly, held in Kigali, Rwanda, concluded on Sunday at the Marian Shrine of Our Lady of Kibeho. The newly re-elected President of SECAM, Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo, Archbishop of Kinshasa, assured pilgrims that Africa has every reason to be optimistic about its future. He emphasised that this future lies in the hands of young people, who continue to embrace the faith.
