by OSV News (OSV News) — Grace Stecker of the Diocese of Helena, Mont., pulled out her cell phone and called her dad, right in the middle of a talk during the National Catholic Youth Conference (NCYC). In fact, teens all around her were talking on their phones, even as the speaker stood on the stage. But they had his permission. “I want you right now, in one minute, to just make a call to somebody in your life whom you love, who’s pretty special, whom you appreciate,” Scripture scholar and astrophysicist Father John Kartje asked of the more than 12,000 NCYC participants. The request came as part of his talk on the oneness of God and the universe — faith and science — that served as the topic of the opening session of NCYC in Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis on Nov. 16. He began the talk echoing words spoken by Archbishop Charles C. Thompson just moments before. “The line that really struck me amongst everything he said is this,” Father Kartje noted: “You’re not a problem to be solved, but you are a mystery to be encountered.”

by Katie Yoder Joseph Julián and Monique González still remember the moment they decided to write a book shedding new light on Our Lady of Guadalupe: May 10, 2016, the month of Mary and the date of Mexico’s Mother’s Day. “After years of initial research, we were sitting in a coffee shop and looked at each other and made a formal commitment to see the book’s writing through to the end, no matter what that meant,” the husband-and-wife team told Our Sunday Visitor. Today, that book presents a new interpretation of Our Lady of Guadalupe by delving into the past ahead of her feast day on Dec. 12. “ Guadalupe and the Flower World Prophecy: How God Prepared the Americas for Conversion Before the Lady Appeared ,” published on Nov. 21, explores how Our Lady’s encounters with Juan Diego at Tepeyac Hill in Mexico in 1531 marked the culmination of thousands of years of evangelical preparation of the people of Mesoamerica.

“The Father Creator also engenders creativity in those who live as his children. So they learn to look at the world with new eyes, made more luminous by love and hope. They are eyes that enable one to look inside oneself with truth and to see far and wide in charity. Under this gaze, others do not seem like obstacles to overcome, but brothers and sisters to welcome.” — Pope Francis Reflection : How do you see other people, especially those most unlike you? What do you see when you look inside your own heart and mind? To what extent does the light of the Father’s love and hope influence what you see in the world? This content comes to you from Our Sunday Visitor courtesy of your parish or diocese.