‘It felt like history’: Teens, organizers on cloud nine after live dialogue with Pope Leo

Indianapolis, Indiana, Nov 21, 2025 / 18:10 pm (CNA).

At a press conference Friday following Pope Leo XIV’s historic “digital visit” with 16,000 young people at the National Catholic Youth Conference in Indianapolis, leaders and young participants praised Pope Leo’s warmth, humility, authenticity, and pastoral clarity, highlighting his central message: a personal relationship with Jesus is essential.

“Walking up on that stage felt like history. It really did,” said Elise Wing, a high school senior from Waterloo, Iowa, and one of the teens selected to ask Pope Leo a question during the live dialogue, which was facilitated digitally by EWTN on Nov. 21. 

“It’s beautiful to see somebody so holy really coming to us like that, like Jesus would — like Jesus does,” Wing said. 

“Because in the end … we’re not excited because we got to talk to the pope. We’re excited because this is Jesus working through the Church, working through the pope in this conversation. I just think that knowing that, and feeling that it wasn’t just about us in that moment, makes this experience all the more incredible.”

Joining the young people on the press conference stage were Archbishop Nelson J. Pérez of Philadelphia, episcopal adviser to the National Federation for Catholic Youth Ministry (NFCYM); Archbishop Charles C. Thompson of Indianapolis; Montse Alvarado, president and chief operating officer of EWTN News; Christina Lamas, executive director of NFCYM; and Katie Prejean McGrady, an author, radio host, and moderator for the dialogue with the pope.

Ezequiel Ponce, a senior from Downey, California, said his heart was thumping as he approached the microphone, but the extensive preparation that the teens had received before the dialogue gave him confidence.  

“I was really able to live in a moment. I felt at ease. When I was talking to the pope, I felt like I was talking to my dad or someone close to me. It felt personal because he addressed us. He said my name. He said it right,” Ponce said. 

During the dialogue, five teens from around the country asked Pope Leo probing questions about mental health, artificial intelligence (AI), and the future of the Catholic Church, while tens of thousands of their peers in the stadium and at least 50,000 people online watched live. The dialogue was also picked up by several major secular news outlets globally.

If you want to help the Church prepare for the future, the pope told the young attendees, start by “being involved today” — stay connected to your parish, attend Sunday Mass, join youth activities, and say yes to faith-nurturing opportunities, the pontiff advised. 

“I will accept Pope Leo’s challenge of really being involved in the Church,” Ponce commented. “He talked about finding people that you can really trust … that not only will listen to you, but help guide you with your faith in the Lord, push you to ask questions and push you to better your understanding and be there for you truly.”

Wing expressed amazement that the pope addressed the teens by name and engaged directly with their questions during the face-to-face call.

“The pope just kept bringing it back to the Lord. That’s why we’re here. That’s why all of us are doing what we’re doing,” she said. 

“Jesus is what we’re longing for. And I think that that is the message that was really conveyed.”

Ponce, who is involved in a Catholic summer camp back home in California, said it was “super refreshing” to hear Pope Leo vocalize a sentiment that Ponce’s youth leader has also told him: that young people aren’t merely the future of the Church, they are also “the present.”

“To hear that basically being put into Pope Leo’s words and being shown by him directly nodding and agreeing with us … It felt super, super refreshing to hear that. [And] not only is that message going to be sent across to us, and back home, but all over the world,” Ponce said. 

Wing agreed, saying that the pope modeled for young Catholics respectful, non-polemical dialogue that she hopes will shape wider Church and cultural engagement.

“I think that the pope set an amazing example for how we should really communicate with each other. All the bishops and people that are here at NCYC are people who want to talk to teenagers, and who are willing to listen, but not everybody in the world is like that,” Wing said. 

“To hear the pope do what he did and talk to us, and be able to not debate but understand each other is, like Ezequiel said, just refreshing.”

Cardinal Christophe Pierre, the apostolic nuncio to the United States, praised the poise and maturity of the teen participants and spoke about how he feels the pope’s words, and the dialogue in general, was valuable for all Catholics. 

“I had the impression that it was a ‘Church event.’ It was not just a ‘show’ of the Holy Father. It was a Church event,” the cardinal said. 

“Because the Church is made of people. The Church is not something above us. We are quite often tempted to put ourselves as the judges of the Church, as if the Church was something else … [but] we are the Church.”

Lamas spoke about the fulfillment of her “dream” that the pope would directly address the thousands of young people at the annual conference. 

“I recall myself sitting there and just looking around the stadium, thinking to myself, ‘This generation that we’re seeing here will now enter into a new phase.’ They have now experienced Pope Leo in a way that none of us as Church [have]. And so what’s to come into the future? I don’t know. But I know hearts have been changed,” Lamas said. 

Lamas also said the pope’s “yes” to taking the time and considerable effort to have a genuine dialogue with the young people of the United States shows an authenticity that resonates with the youth she works with.

“I saw Pope Leo [being] very authentic, and that’s what our young people are craving — authenticity. He said it numerous times in his words and how he answered some of the questions. He wants people to show up … he did that for them,” Lamas said. 

For her part, Alvarado noted that the digital encounter included two breakthroughs: a demonstration of cutting-edge Vatican production, and the pope’s fluency with tech culture — discussing such topics as “screen time” and AI. 

“That shows you that not just the Vatican, but the Church itself, is encountering the world in a new and different way through the person of Pope Leo XIV,” Alvarado said.

Source: https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/268035/it-felt-like-history-teens-organizers-on-cloud-nine-after-live-dialogue-with-pope-leo