Students bring Chesterton's example of faith from the U.S. to Rome

By Kielce Gussie and Fabrizio Peloni

Each week, pilgrims from across the globe gather in St. Peter’s Square—weather permitting—for the papal General Audience. This week, a group of students kicked off their capstone pilgrimage to Rome seeing Pope Leo in the Square.

The Chesterton Rome Pilgrimage takes place each year and brings high school years from various parts of the United States to the Eternal City.

Day two: A papal audience

For the next eight days, students will travel around Rome, Florence, and Assisi visiting churches and pilgrimage sites—being immersed in art and architecture and history.

Even though it’s only day two of the ten-day pilgrimage, Nora Kennedy—one of the students from the Chesterton Academy of the Holy Family in Illinois—described being in Rome as “the best experience” of her life.

She expressed her joy at being able to live the experience with her friends as unforgettable. Starting off the Wednesday at the General Audience was a special moment for Nora. “Seeing [the Pope] go by was so cool [and] hearing him address us in English—this I just can’t even put into words yet how impactful this has all been.”

This feeling is one that Konstantinos Karnezis, Chesterton Academy of the Holy Family near Chicago, shared. “Being here has honestly been such a blessing. It's something that I've honestly looked forward to ever since my freshman year.”

Fr. Joseph Johnson is the chaplain for the Network and his role, as he defined it, is to accompany the young people on their journey. This year, the pilgrimage was extra special as the 240 students were able to see Pope Leo—a fellow American.

The group was able “to both rejoice in the Holy Father coming from our own land, but also rejoice with all the Catholics of the world here” in St. Peter’s Square in “Bernini’s great colonnade, which welcomes pilgrims from all of the world that we’re all brothers and sisters together, one family in faith.”

The students came from all different parts of the U.S. for this capstone pilgrimage

Chesterton Schools Network works directly with ProRome Tours of Front Royal, Virginia, USA to make all these pilgrimages possible.

Joe Long, President and CEO of ProRome Tours, has been planning pilgrimages to Italy for Chesterton schools since 2019. He works with a team of faithful Catholics dedicated to helping pilgrimage groups experience their faith in a profound and memorable way.

As Long said, “Every Catholic should have the opportunity to walk where saints have walked, to pray where martyrs died, and to touch the stones that witnessed miracles.”

Inspired by the “apostle of common sense”

These students come from the Chesterton Schools Network, a Catholic non-profit apostolate dedicated to inspiring and supporting Catholic high schools around the United States and equipping parents to be the principal educators of their children.

G.K. Chesterton—the English author, philosopher, and apologist—became the inspiration for this network. Co-founders Tom Bengtson and Dale Ahlquist looked to the man known as the “apostle of common sense”, to create a classical, integrated high school education that is affordable to all.

For Nora, her experience at Chesterton has been life-changing. “My favorite thing about Chesterton is that faith is at the center of everything that we do—from daily Mass, confession, adoration, but then also in my friendships and the way that Christ is at the center of all of those.”

In a classroom setting where the school is centered on three types of formation—intellectual, character, and spiritual—students study great works by foundational authors, such as Homer, Plato, Dante, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Francis of Assisi, and, of course, G.K. Chesterton.

“I love the classical curriculum and how it teaches me how to think and how to articulate my thoughts”, Nora shared, noting that she understands how this will serve her in whatever settings throughout her life.

Faith plays a central role in the overall growth of the students at the Chesterton schools. “All my classmates are oriented towards Christ and bringing me closer to Him, and I do the same”, Nora explained. This shared focus on faith and prayer, she highlighted, deepened their friendships.

A sign of contradiction today

“Just like Chesterton in his own day was a sign of contradiction to those around him,” Fr. Johnson said, “so we today find ourselves standing in opposition to the secularism and those other voices in our world that don’t appreciate the truth of the Gospel.”

He argued that nowadays, we are all called to be witnesses of the Gospel message, avoiding anger. “There are too many angry voices in the world,” the chaplain stressed, “We want to follow Chesterton’s example of giving a witness with joy, hope, and love.”