The College Beat: Article II
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“USA, USA, USA!” rang out across the small campus coffee shop at Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas. Fifty or so patriotic college students had just watched the first American become the pontiff, and they were ecstatic.
I sat stunned that Robert Prevost, a South Side Chicago boy, was now Pope Leo XIV, the successor of Peter. The cynic in me quickly took over. I started jumping to conclusions about this new papacy.
Then I attended Mass to pray for our new Holy Father.
That cynicism turned to excitement and hope as I prayed and realized that the Pope Leo XIV pontificate is something completely new. He is not Pope Francis, nor is he Pope Benedict XVI, nor is he Saint John Paul II. He is Pope Leo XIV, and we cannot predict how he will govern. All we can do is hope.
Countless commentators have shared their thoughts and insights into how Leo XIV should govern and what he should prioritize. Each theological and liturgical camp has already claimed Leo XIV as their own, declaring that he will bring about the change they want to see.
But what about the youth of the Church, those who are the “future of the Church”?
They seek the meaning of life in this wasteland of egoism and self-centeredness, longing for something or somebody to correct and guide their path.
Over the course of the past several months, I have talked to many of my peers and friends about what they hope for in a pope, both privately and in my reporting for a variety of Catholic and secular news sites. Many tout the same desires perpetrated by their favorite media figures or express a desire that Leo XIV will be the John Paul II of our generation.
But that’s not what they need. What the youth of the Church need from His Holiness Pope Leo XIV, and what I hope the new pontiff will become, is a stable leader to whom the youth can attach themselves. I hope the new pontiff will fill a void in the lives of many young people and serve as a steady guide amid a crisis of stability. Leo doesn’t need to be a John Paul III. He just needs to be a shepherd.
I see this crisis of stability in myself, my peers, and my friends. We struggle to navigate the uncertain world of high school and college where everything around us constantly changes, including our homes, our friends, and our fields of study. As such, we find solace in the distraction and instant gratification of buzzing social media and humming technology. Countless reports have shown how Gen Z and younger generations spend a significant portion of their lives consuming social media and technology. These online platforms are seen as safe places where we can find stability and comfort, digital safety boxes where we can avoid the stresses of life, like forming human relationships.
However, social media isn’t simply an innocent escape that comforts us in unstable times. Rather, it insidiously proliferates an atheistic, relativistic culture that thrives on sensationalism and clickbait, making it the dominant worldview of many young people. Navigating through those tumultuous waters proves a challenge to many, if not all, college students. They seek the meaning of life in this wasteland of egoism and self-centeredness, longing for something or somebody to correct and guide their path.
Often, they find guidance in social media influencers, people who promote the image of “arrival.” “Follow me,” they beckon, “I have my life figured out.” Despite their best efforts, however, most influencers lack wisdom and truth. Behind the facade of materialism and makeup, they too are searching for that source of stability, that rock upon which they can place their trust. Even when young people alight upon reliable social media influencers like Fr. Mike Schmitz and Matt Fradd who can serve as good role models, the best earthly source of clarity is still the pope.
That is his mission, after all.
Young people should understand that the Church—in dispensing the sacraments, cultivating the saints, and upholding the truth—offers the ultimate antidote to this crisis of stability. Pope Leo XIV has the opportunity to give glory to God by becoming a greater source of stability and clarity to his young flock. When Christ instituted the papacy, he told Peter, “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church” (Matt. 16:18). As the successor of Peter, Leo XIV is that rock, that stable figure, the lighthouse that can and should guide us in uncertain waters.
In the early days of his pontificate, I found myself inspired by the new pope’s messages and moved by his witness. Take, for example, the Feast of Corpus Christi. Watching the successor of Peter process through the streets of Rome carrying our Lord moved my heart. The evident love and devotion our Holy Father has for Christ in the Eucharist brought me close to tears. He gazed upon Christ as his Beloved.
I want that. I am compelled by that. I am guided by that.
Like many, I have found a renewed interest in the papacy since Pope Leo XIV’s election and have been a voracious reader of his initial papal addresses. Often, I find myself clinging to every word the pope says, such as his address given at Rate Field in June.
I was utterly captivated. And I knew that many other young people felt the same.
For the past two hours I had been running around the baseball field, engrossed in my reporting duties. But when they announced that the pope’s address was about to begin, I stopped, found a seat, and leaned forward, captivated by our Holy Father’s words.
In particular, these words stood out:
I’d like to take this opportunity to invite each one of you to look into your own hearts, to recognise that God is present and that, perhaps in many different ways, God is reaching out to you, calling you, inviting you to know his Son Jesus Christ . . . and discover how important it is for each one of us to pay attention to the presence of God in our own hearts, to that longing for love in our lives, for . . . searching, a true searching, for finding the ways that we may be able to do something with our own lives to serve others.
At that moment, I felt like the pope was speaking directly to me. I was utterly captivated. And I knew that many other young people felt the same. That is the captivation that we need—captivation that leads to invitation into a deeper relationship with Jesus Christ.
Christ is the ultimate source of stability, the one constant in an ever-changing world. But we need somebody to guide and direct us there, to point us in the right direction. When Christ instituted the papacy, that was the mission: to be the head of the institution that would lead souls to him.
Now, Pope Leo XIV has that same task, a task seemingly more difficult in the age of influencers and social media.
Should Pope Leo XIV become the next TikTok influencer? Not at all. Should he strive to replicate the beloved John Paul II? No, he can pave his own path.
But I do hope that he finds new, creative ways to engage with and speak to the youth in the Church and invite them into this great adventure of the Christian life. In an often dark, uncertain, and unstable world, this is what young people need: clear light illuminating the path forward, the rock we can stand upon when we are overwhelmed by the stresses and noise of modern life, a father who nurtures his children, and a shepherd who can point us to heaven and away from the sinful distractions of the world.