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A Rock In the Storm: Athletics Chaplain a Blessing for St. John’s University Basketball Team

By Currents News

The St John’s University men’s basketball team has won more games this season than it has in some 25 seasons. Their Hall of Famer coach Rick Pitino has called the team’s hard work a blessing, one that’s possible thanks to their faith is moving them forward.

But even when the starting five of the St. John’s University men’s basketball team take the court, there’s still one key member of the Red Storm who ends up riding the bench.

At six-feet two inches tall, he is their rock – Father Richard Rock, that is. Players and students know him alike as the campus minister for athletics at the Queens Catholic university. 

“He’s the joy of the team,” player Simeon Wilcher tells Currents News. “All the time he’s always the one to make sure that when you’re coming out of the game or even before a game that your spirits are up, that you’re happy and excited and just grateful that God is giving us another day to go out there and hoop.”

Before each basketball game at Carnesecca Arena on the SJU Queens campus he heads to the locker room, offering the players a moment of peace before the storm of competition.

“One of the things I always tell the athletes is that we are at our best when we’re thankful and you have to be thankful to God,” he tells Currents News. “Thankful for your team, thankful for your talents, and hopefully that’s going to help you do well.”

But Father Rock doesn’t just offer an assist before and during the game. On any given day the athletes can find him in his office, ready to lend an ear.

“We try to appreciate it. What do you need to grab on today? What happens if you get hurt? What are you looking forward to for the rest of your life? You need the values of the Catholic, the Vincentians community to try to help them to learn,” Father Rock explains. “They might not always get it now but the fact is, somewhere along the line, they do.”

He lets athletes know that with god as their center their faith can help them rise above the fear of failure and appreciate the satisfaction of success.

“They’re not looking for a whole lot of knowledge, they’re looking for people who really care about them,” Father Rock says of the students he engages with. “Because as I say, in their lives as athletes and students, there’s highlights and there’s lowlights, and there’s successes and failures, there’s good days and there are bad days.”

Even on those bad days, their rock is always on the bench.

 

TONIGHT AT 7: Catholic Academy Brings Jubilee Doors to Diocese of Brooklyn

By Currents News

For some students in the Diocese of Brooklyn, a Jubilee site that millions around the world travel to the Vatican to see is now right at their doorstep. St. Stanislaus Kostka Catholic Academy in Queens has recreated Rome’s Holy Doors, and reporter Jessica Easthope has the story from Maspeth.

Queens Couple Credits Faith for 62 Years of Wedded Bliss

by Katie Vasquez

Maria and Ernest Pospischil have traveled the world together.

“We’ve been to England, we’ve been to Portugal,” Ernest tells Currents News.

But their journey in love started in Manhattan, when they met at a popular dining and dance spot on June 19, 1961.

“The ladies asked the men to dance, rather than reverse,” Ernest recalls.

“And I chose him and that was, you know, love at first sight,” his wife Maria says of that night.

The Queens couple would get married two years later at Immaculate Conception Church in Astoria, Queens. From the moment they said “I do,” they knew they would be on an adventure together, forever.

“We are one. We are not two anymore,” Maria tells Currents News. “We become one, and that is so important that you carry that through your life.”

The pair, who both grew up in traditional Catholic families from different parts of Europe, say it was God who has fueled their lives and their love.  

To this day, they attend Mass six days a week at St. Matthias Church in Ridgewood, Queens.

“When you’re married, you’re supposed to help each other to get to heaven,” Ernest explains.

“So, that’s what we try to do,” agrees Maria.

Although they have had their share of bad days, they always remember the good traits in each other. 

“He likes to listen to me,” says Maria.

“When they made Maria, they threw away the mold,” says Earnest.

62 years later with one child, three grandchildren and three great-grandchildren, they still keep the spark alive.

“We always, always trusted each other,” explains Maria, “and we trusted in God and that, I think, is so important.”

“I was just totally convinced that this was what was meant to be. And I couldn’t be happier,” adds Earnest.

They hope to keep exploring the world, together and happily in love.

Catholic News Headlines for Friday 2/14/2025

In honor of Valentine’s Day, we’ll introduce you to a Queens Catholic couple who is sharing the secret to staying in love for over 60 years.

Pope Francis is in the hospital for his ongoing bronchitis.

Presidents’ Day is coming up – Currents News takes a look back at all the historic meetings that have occurred between presidents and popes.

Faith Stitched Together: Queens Ministry Creates Prayer Shawls for Charity

By Currents News

Currents News first introduced you to this group as part of our series “Pulse of the Parish,” but now a group of women who put prayer in every stitch of the shawls they make at Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Queens Village, New York, have added to their rows. 

The ministry tells Currents News they gained new members after the news report aired in May of 2024. 

The group has been hand-making the beautiful items for over 25 years and giving them away at no cost to those in need of comfort and solace, or to those celebrating life’s joys like the birth of a new baby.

Members who make the shawls pray for recipients before starting each stitch, and they say it’s nice to think of where the shawls will end up. 

“People are very happy to get a visit and to get the prayer shawl because some of them are elderly and they’re sick, and they’re just happy to have the prayers,” Rita Watson, a member of the group, tells Currents News. 

“They send nice, beautiful letters thanking us for the prayer shawl,” explains ministry member Carol Washington. “And that thrills me, I guess. But it’s fulfilling work and it makes somebody happy, makes me happy.”

“The ones that are in nursing homes and places like that, to get a gift like that, it’s just wonderful,” adds member Clare Glennon. “All the work that goes into it, and the people are happy to do it, and they’re just so happy that they have one.”

The pastor of Our Lady of Lourdes, Father Patrick Longalong, blesses the shawls before they’re gifted. 

To keep the ministry going, around Christmas time they sell handmade items to help buy their yarn for the year.

 

Catholic News Headlines for Thursday 2/13/2025

In Bushwick, Brooklyn, one priest is sticking to his decades-long promise of helping migrants, no matter who they are.

The Acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Danielle Sassoon, stepped down on Thursday instead of obeying a Department of Justice order to drop corruption charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams. This, as Adams meets with President Trump’s border czar at the city’s ICE headquarters.

The Anne Frank House exhibition in Manhattan was scheduled run for a limited time, but now visitors will be able to get tickets well into 2025.

Brooklyn Priest on a Mission To Help the Newly Arrived

By Katie Vasquez

The sidewalk outside District Three Youth and Adults, Inc. is empty, a different scene from a few weeks ago. 

“We had lines, long lines that now they’re scared. They’re scared to come out. They don’t know what’s going to happen,” Monsignor James Kelly, an attorney at the Brooklyn organization, tells Currents News.

Responding to the panic from President Donald Trump’s recent executive orders and directives on migration, Monsignor James Kelly and the staff at his Wyckoff Avenue office are doing what they can to help the 50 to 100 people that still show up every day hoping to live and work in New York legally. Monsignor Kelly offers them a deep discount on legal assistance without any funding, because he understands their plight as a former new arrival from Ireland. 

“As an immigrant myself, I appreciate the difficulties,” he explains.

The 87-year-old retired priest doesn’t go to court anymore, but he’s well known in Bushwick, where he’s been working with immigrants since before he got his law degree. 

“I couldn’t do anything for them because I couldn’t go to court,” he says of that time in his life.

Once he got his degree from St. John’s University in 1980, he was inundated with requests from families looking to become U.S. citizens. 

“I started off with Italian immigrants. They were easy. We made hundreds of them citizens very, very easy,” he recalls.

Richard Reinoso’s family was helped by Monsignor Kelly 20 years ago. 

Now as a legal counselor at his office, Richard understands the power of having a priest in your corner. 

“It’s that trust through the Catholic church that most of the Latino community, most of the immigrant community, most of the Catholic community has that really helps us file,” he tells Currents News. “Not only my family, but those around us, because people trust Father.”

Monsignor Kelly has physically slowed down over the years as he’s struggled with health issues, but mentally he’s just as strong, still coming into the office six days a week. 

Richard is hoping to get his law degree so he can take over. 

“We hope and pray every day that he lives until 150,”  Richard says. “but he’s at least helping me in the ropes, coaching us from behind so that we may be the next generation to carry his torch for him.”

Despite all the challenges ahead, Monsignor Kelly says he will continue to fight the good fight.

“Keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best,” is what he’s doing.

For more information on their services, you can email: sheamusk@aol.com or visit their office at 265 Wyckoff Avenue in Bushwick Brooklyn, 11237.

You can also help Monsignor support migrants by mailing a check or money order to that address, making the check out to “District Three Youth and Adults, Inc.”

 

Catholics With Non-Speaking Autism Use New Technology To Communicate Their Faith Story

By Jessica Easthope

One in every 36 children has been diagnosed with autism, according to the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The neurological condition has been steadily on the rise since doctors and researchers first started tracking it. 

Today, while there are advances in communication technology and early intervention leading to more resources for the autism community, misconceptions, stigma and shame still exist – even within the Catholic Church. 

People with non-speaking autism describe the condition to Currents News reporter Jessica Easthope as a “mind-body disconnect.”

They take in information and process it, but oftentimes there’s a disruption in the organization and regulation of things like speech and movement. It’s something that can make an experience like going to Mass challenging. 

Susan Esposito, a parishioner at the Basilica of Regina Pacis on Staten Island, New York, and her two adult sons who both have non-speaking autism, spoke to Easthope about how faith plays a role in their lives and how the church has received them. 

Thirty-three-year-old Charles Esposito can at times been found motoring through puzzles that help bridge the gap of the mind-body disconnect he experiences as someone who has non-speaking autism.

He and his brother Anthony live on Staten Island at On Your Mark, a residence and day program for adults with developmental disabilities. Their mother, Susan, fought to get them there.

“What you’re told when they’re babies and younger, what’s not going to be and what’s not going to happen, happened,” she tells Currents News. “They’re independent. They do their own thing. They come to program. They enjoy their lives.”

Susan has been fighting for her sons all their lives. While faith has been a constant for her family, she says her children have not always been compassionately received at church. 

“We were parishioners at a church by my house, and we were thrown out with Charles a number of times. The usher threw us out,” she explains. “Then we went in, standing in the back. Then somebody else told us we had to leave. So it was difficult.”

Recently, thanks to something called a letterboard, both Charles and Anthony have been able to use their own voices to express their pain in moments like that. 

“Church always increased anxiety, unfortunately when my vocalizations would take control, I very often felt judged and embarrassed,” he tells Current News.

“Though I have struggled resonating with God, I always felt comfort in the statues. It’s hard to accept why we were created this way,” adds Anthony. 

Charles and Anthony take everything in: they learn and process information just like someone who’s neurotypical, but they can’t control their bodies in a way that allows them to consistently and reliably give that information back.

“It turns out that those individuals understand absolutely everything, and the technical term is apraxia for which is difficulty and motor planning,” explains Cheslea Cialino, a therapist at On Your Mark. “And the guys who communicate on the letterboard who have learned this method, it’s not in their control.”

She says that letterboard communication is only recently becoming widely recognized as a credible form of communication for people with non-speaking autism. 

“To never know if their voices were ever going to be heard or found, if they were ever going to be understood. I mean, they lived 30 years of their life trusting and hoping that it would come to this,” she explains. “And fortunately it has.”

In terms of their faith, these two men have a lot to say. For the first time in their lives, they can say what they want to get out of the church experience. 

When asked what the ideal Mass experience looks like for a Catholic with autism, Charles says it looks the “same as it would for a typical Mass, but I would like to see the parishes be informed on the truth behind non-speaking autism.”

Susan listens to – and is always learning about – her sons.

“We need to make it more welcoming. I know again, it’s overwhelming,” she says. “It’s loud at times with the music, but it’s part of our life. As Catholic families, if there were more religion classes, if there were more church functions, It would help them, I think, to realize, ‘I’m part of this family too: God’s family.’” 

Over 1 Million Catholics Have Taken Part in Jubilee Celebrations at the Vatican

By Currents News

From December 24, 2024, when it was first opened by the Holy Father, to February 7, 2025, over one million pilgrims have crossed the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica.

Considering that the first months of the year are a slow season in Rome, these new numbers caught officials by surprise. 

In fact, the numbers are likely to increase exponentially in the run-up to Easter, one the times of the year that the Eternal City receives the most tourists and pilgrims.

On Easter Sunday morning alone last year, for the Pope’s Urbi Et Orbi blessing, some 100,000 people gathered in St. Peter’s Square.

However, the two key moments for the Jubilee will undoubtedly be April 27, with the canonization of Carlo Acutis during the Jubilee of Adolescents, and the Jubilee of the Youth in late July, where about 2 million people are expected to attend.

Overall, more than 30 million pilgrims are expected to take part in the Holy Year. But Archbishop Rino Fisichella reminds pilgrims that the Jubilee is meant to be about faith and fellowship.

“It is not the numbers that make people say, ‘the Jubilee is successful,’” he tells Currents News. “Because if we were to count the numbers we will find that the hoteliers’ association says the Jubilee is going badly; if we ask the restaurateurs’ association it tells us it is going very well.

The data compiled is only from St. Peter’s Basilica and not from the other papal sites. The numbers are updated on a daily basis.