As much as a human being can love an institution, I love the Catholic Church and the United States. That is why I was at Ground Zero this week. Tonight, from a bench overlooking Lower Manhattan, I wrote about why it’s time for America to stop clinging to September 11.

Twenty-Five Years After 9/11, America Needs a 9/12 Generation

I am writing from a bench above lower Manhattan as dusk turns to night, and I have never heard New York this quiet. Here is why I filled your inbox all week, and why it is time to move on.

thelettersfromleo.com

She’s still there, shining in all her glory, as a beacon to all those seeking the blessings of liberty. I think of my ancestors and all of those who passed through this harbor, went by this lady, and looked up at her torch. It’s up to you and me to ensure that light shines for our posterity.

NEW: For 25 years, the memory of 9/11 has been sanitized to leave out the 200 who jumped, partly from a Christian fear that jumping was suicide. The Catholic Church does not teach that. Gwendolyn Briley, the Falling Man’s sister, said it best: “They were falling into the arms of God.”

“They Were Falling Into the Arms of God” — A Catholic Defense of the 9/11 Jumpers

At least 200 people jumped from the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, and America agreed to look away. A Church that hangs the crucifixion over every altar has no business sanitizing that morning.

thelettersfromleo.com

1/9 Father Mychal Judge — the first recorded death at Ground Zero on September 11 — could become the first known gay saint in Catholic history. www.thelettersfromleo.com/p/father-myc...

Father Mychal Judge, Gay Franciscan Killed in the North Tower, Could Be 9/11’s First Saint

The first recorded death at Ground Zero would become the first known gay person canonized a saint in the Catholic Church’s history.

thelettersfromleo.com

In the midst of rising hatred against Muslims in the United States and the West, the U.S.-born pontiff Pope Leo XIV is telling Christians to “be a little less fearful [of Islam].”

The last voice at Ground Zero today belonged to Catholic Michael Massaroli, whose father was killed in the North Tower 25 years ago. “I’ve had to grow up and spend the past 25 years seeing people use it to hate on our Muslim brothers and sisters. That’s wrong.”

The last voice at Ground Zero today belonged to Catholic Michael Massaroli, whose father was killed in the North Tower 25 years ago. “I’ve had to grow up and spend the past 25 years seeing people use it to hate on our Muslim brothers and sisters. That’s wrong.”

The 9/11 story behind America’s pieta.

Father Mychal Judge, Gay Franciscan Killed in the North Tower, Could Be 9/11’s First Saint

The first recorded death at Ground Zero would become the first known gay person canonized a saint in the Catholic Church’s history.

thelettersfromleo.com

NEW: Just ten days after the 9/11 attacks, the future Pope Leo XIV warned against seeking revenge. Fr. Robert Prevost said that “hatred and violence will continue to grow as long as so many people are forced to live in extreme poverty and are oppressed by so many forms of injustice.”

Ten Days After 9/11, Future American Pope Warned Against Seeking Revenge

Ten days after the towers fell, the new prior general preached at Santa Maria del Popolo that hatred grows where 24,000 people die of hunger every day. Twenty-five years later, he is the pope.

substack.com

On 9/11, firefighters carried the body of chaplain Fr. Mychal Judge to this altar. Moments later, doctors took the altar cloths and linens outside to bandage the dying on the church steps. Catholics believe that on those linens, God becomes flesh. That same cloth healed the flesh of New Yorkers;

NEW: Six days after 9/11, George W. Bush stood in a mosque and declared that “Islam is peace.” Twenty-five years later, New York’s Muslim Mayor is being harassed by right-wing groups. Pope Leo XIV is pushing back, telling Christians, “We should be a little less fearful [of] Muslims.”

George W. Bush Defended Islam After 9/11. Catholics Should Too.

Six days after the towers fell, a Republican president walked into a Washington mosque and said “Islam is peace.” Twenty-five years later, Pope Leo XIV is asking American Christians to be “a little le...

thelettersfromleo.com

Midnight strikes on September 11 in New York City.

President Biden told me he was going to his granddaughter’s birthday party after attending the 9/11 Memorial Mass. Here’s a photo of that gathering. Happy birthday, Finnegan!

NEW: President Biden, Mayor Mamdani, and Gov. Hochul attended Archbishop Ronald Hicks’s 9/11 Memorial Mass. Biden’s attendance was unannounced, and the congregation of victims’ families applauded when he walked in. Pope Leo XIV’s appointment invited Mamdani over objections from right-wing grounds.

Biden, Mamdani, and Hochul Join Archbishop Hicks’s 9/11 Mass After Trump and Vance Decline

The White House declined the invitation from Pope Leo XIV’s new archbishop of New York. I interviewed both Mamdani and Biden, who told me his health is doing well.

thelettersfromleo.com

A huge round of applause breaks out at St. Patrick’s Cathedral as President Joe Biden makes a surprise appearance at the 9/11 Memorial Mass to join Governor Hochul and Mayor Mamdani.

NEW: I asked New York Mayor Mamdani what he wanted to say to Catholic New York on the 25th anniversary of 9/11. “We can never say thank you enough to the Catholic community that … in this city's darkest ever day, showed so much of the light that kept New Yorkers moving forward.”

A short interview coming up with NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani outside St. Patrick’s Cathedral about the meaning of the sacrifice of Catholic first responders on 9/11.

Hello from St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Midtown Manhattan where we’re waiting to begin the 9/11 Memorial Mass with Archbishop Ronald Hicks and Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

This photograph of firemen taking the mortal remains of Fr. Mycal Judge to the altar of St. Peter’s Church, blocks away from the World Trade Center, on September 11, 2001, is a modern-day Pietà. It reminds me of Jesus’s friends carrying him to the tomb after his death.

Father Mychal Judge, Gay Franciscan Killed in the North Tower, Could Be 9/11’s First Saint

The first recorded death at Ground Zero would become the first known gay person canonized a saint in the Catholic Church’s history.

thelettersfromleo.com

NEW: Fr. Mychal Judge, a gay Franciscan priest killed while ministering to firefighters in the North Tower on September 11, 2001, could become the first canonized saint connected to 9/11. He would also be the first openly gay person canonized in the two millennia history of the Catholic Church.

Father Mychal Judge, Gay Franciscan Killed in the North Tower, Could Be 9/11’s First Saint

The first recorded death at Ground Zero would become the first known gay person canonized a saint in the Catholic Church’s history.

thelettersfromleo.com

The story of a Catholic priest ministering in Ground Zero on 9/11. Fr. Martin and others set up makeshift altars and celebrated Mass in the rubble. To direct first responders to Mass, firefighters spray-painted a sign that said “Body of Christ,” with an arrow pointing to the celebration.

The conclave is built to withstand empires, spies, and kings. Not iPhones. Yet during the very first vote to elect Pope Leo XIV, Vatican security detected an active SIM card inside the Sistine Chapel. Someone had brought a phone. Here’s what happened next.

Smuggled Phones, Double Votes, and a Battle for the Church: Inside the Conclave That Elected Pope Leo XIV

A new book reveals the minute-by-minute drama of the conclave — from a cardinal's contraband cell phone to a botched vote count — and how the reformers defeated the conservative bloc to make Leo pope.

thelettersfromleo.com

Before the papal conclave, a well-funded conservative outfit built dossiers on the candidates with one aim: sink the liberals and get a right-winger elected. On Robert Prevost, they found almost nothing — no books, few public statements, a canon law dissertation from the late 1980s.

“Just Say Nothing” — What I Learned in Rome About Pope Leo XIV

An Irish novelist’s essay has become a key reading of this pontificate. Two weeks of Roman conversations revealed a pope building for decades — and watching the American Church closely.

thelettersfromleo.com

Peter Thiel told the Aspen Ideas Festival this summer that Pope Leo XIV is “working for the Chinese Communists” because his encyclical calls for AI regulation.

Peter Thiel Accuses Pope Leo XIV of Working for the Chinese Communist Party

Thiel told a nonrecorded Aspen Ideas Festival panel with Francis Fukuyama that the pope’s AI encyclical serves Beijing. The billionaire behind JD Vance has spent a year casting Leo as an agent of the…

thelettersfromleo.com

NEW: At the invitation of Ronald Hicks, Pope Leo XIV’s new archbishop of New York, Zohran Mamdani will attend a 9/11 memorial Mass alongside victims’ families. This comes as Bill Donohue, president of the right-wing Catholic League, has tried to keep Mamdani away from Friday’s Ground Zero ceremony.

Invited by Pope Leo XIV’s New Archbishop, Mamdani Will Attend 9/11 Memorial Mass

Three sources say the mayor will join Archbishop Hicks at St. Patrick’s Thursday and stay for the reception. The Catholic League boss who wants him gone made $671,000 last year writing press releases.

thelettersfromleo.com

Just as God raised up a pope from behind the Iron Curtain to help defeat communism, God has raised up a pope from the Americas to defeat the global scourge of MAGA authoritarianism — and to call our nation back to a land of dreams and dignity for all who inhabit it.

I Love This Church. I Love This Country. And I Refuse to Give Up on Either.

Sixty-three days before the first nationwide election of Leo’s pontificate, here is what this movement exists to do. I’m asking you to join us for the stretch run.

thelettersfromleo.com

When a bishop takes office, he’s asked to make this promise before God and the entire Church: “Do you resolve, for the sake of the Lord’s name, to be welcoming and merciful to the poor, strangers, and to all who are in need?” It isn’t an adjunct of his ministry. It’s core to the entire sacrament.

Lay Catholics Should Be Partisans. Bishops and Priests Should Not.

In response to my Barron piece, two clerics I respect called me a partisan Democrat. Guilty. The Second Vatican Council makes it clear: lay people should do partisan politics. Prelates shouldn’t.

thelettersfromleo.com

NEW: Two clerics argued that a partisan Democrat has no standing to call a bishop too close to MAGA. The Church has settled who belongs in secular politics. That’s why John Paul II ordered Fr. Robert Drinan out of Congress. Faithful Catholics belong inside both parties. Bishops belong in neither.

Lay Catholics Should Be Partisans. Bishops and Priests Should Not.

In response to my Barron piece, two clerics I respect called me a partisan Democrat. Guilty. The Second Vatican Council makes it clear: lay people should do partisan politics. Prelates shouldn’t.

substack.com

Epstein and Bannon conspired to take down Pope Francis. DOJ-released messages reveal Epstein’s Vatican obsession — and a disturbing alliance with Bannon to “purify” the Church. Here’s the first part of the story behind their attempt to take down the leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics.

Epstein and Bannon Plotted to “Take Down” Pope Francis

New Epstein Files reveal a chilling alliance between Jeffrey Epstein and Steve Bannon — and a failed campaign to crush the Francis papacy.

thelettersfromleo.com

NEW: Welles Crowther, a 24-year-old educated by the Jesuits, is credited with saving as many as 18 people on 9/11 before the building fell on him. In an era when empathy is attacked as weakness, Crowther’s answer still stands: he felt the terror of strangers and gave his life to get them out.

Welles Crowther, the Man in the Red Bandana, Showed the World What Christian Empathy Looks Like

The Man in the Red Bandana saved as many as 18 people on 9/11 and was honored with the Medal of Freedom on Tuesday. Pope Leo XIV calls empathy a call from God, and Welles Crowther is what that call lo...

thelettersfromleo.com