A Downey high school senior was one of young people who got to ask questions to Pope Leo XIV Friday during the National Catholic Youth Conference.
Ezequiel Ponce, a 17-year-old from the Los Angeles Archdiocese, got up on the stage of a packed stadium in Indianapolis to ask Pope Leo’s advice on how to maintain faith when life gets hard.
“There are moments in which a lot of us feel sad or overwhelmed,” Ponce asked the pope. “Friends and family often say just give my problems to the lord. But how can I really give my problems to God and feel that he is close to me, even if I feel like this?”
The head of the Catholic Church responded while maintaining a gentle smile, reminding Ponce and other 16,000 young Catholics inside the stadium, that their faith mattered.
“Scripture reminds us that he is near to the brokenhearted. Even when we do not feel his presence, our faith tells us that he is there,” Pope Leo said. “To entrust our struggles to Jesus, we have to spend time with him in prayer.”
After his one-on-one interaction with the pope, Ponce told NBC Los Angeles that he felt as though the pope was speaking to all youth in America.
“It spoke to me in specific because his answer felt like it was so personalizing,” the teen, who also serves as a youth leader in Bellflower, said.
The teen whose goal is to become a math teacher said his conversation with pope has strengthed his faith.
“He’s like the greatest dude ever. He’s amazing,” Ponce said. “it was super cool to see him interact with us, say our names, address our questions like, ‘Oh, that’s a great question, Ezequiel.'”
Among other piece of wisdom Pope Leo shared, the Catholic leader told the teens that while AI can be a useful tool for learning, it can never replace real, in-person relationship while telling them not to ask AI to do their homework.
This is the first time a pope joined the youth conference remotely, engaging with young Catholics directly real time. Pope Francis had sent video message to the same events.
