Loneliness is often described today as a social epidemic. We see it in rising anxiety, polarization, digital exhaustion, and the growing sense that many people—even those constantly connected online—do not feel truly known.
But during a recent ACST Catholic conversation on loneliness, division, and parish renewal, Terry Poplava, General Manager of ACST Catholic, Jason Simon, President of Evangelical Catholic, and Dan Cellucci, CEO of the Catholic Leadership Institute, returned repeatedly to a deeper point: the Church’s response to loneliness is not primarily programmatic. It is relational.
That distinction matters.
Parishes are often tempted to respond to cultural problems structurally first—with initiatives, events, systems, strategies, or communication plans. Those things can help. But loneliness is not ultimately solved by efficiency. It is answered through encounter.
As host Terry Poplava noted, parishes remain one of the few places uniquely capable of bringing people together in a culture increasingly marked by isolation.
As Jason Simon observed during the discussion, many people experience parish life anonymously. They arrive at Mass, sit alone, leave immediately afterward, and never move beyond surface-level connection. At the same time, many younger adults have grown up in a world shaped almost entirely by digital interaction, often without deep formation in friendship or community.
“The antidote to this loneliness,” Simon said, is discipleship itself.
Not discipleship as a program category, but discipleship as a way of living: people formed deeply enough in Christ that they begin noticing others, lingering after Mass, initiating conversation, and creating space for authentic friendship.
“Our mission starts immediately after Mass,” Simon reflected.
That vision reframes hospitality entirely.
A welcoming parish is not simply one with greeters at the door. It is a parish where people intentionally make room for one another—sometimes literally. During the conversation, Dan Cellucci joked about the surprisingly strong reactions he received after encouraging parishioners to “move toward the center of the pew.” Beneath the humor was an important spiritual insight: hospitality often begins in small acts of self-forgetfulness.
The deeper challenge, Cellucci suggested, is learning to resist the transactional habits that shape so much of modern life.
“What am I getting from this relationship?” is often the unspoken question people carry into parish life. But Christian friendship asks something different. It calls people beyond convenience, preference, or ideological alignment toward sacrifice, presence, and shared life in Christ.
That becomes especially important in a culture increasingly shaped by division and digital isolation.
Throughout the conversation, all three leaders returned to the importance of listening—not merely as a communication skill, but as a spiritual discipline. Simon noted that much evangelization today begins not with speaking, but with genuinely hearing another person.
“We’re not in a culture where we’re going to stand on corners and preach at people,” he said. “Unless people feel understood and appreciated in their perspectives, there’s no room to share any other perspective.”
In that sense, listening itself becomes an act of charity.
It is also one reason parishes cannot afford to become purely digital communities. Online tools can support ministry. Technology can create bridges. But it cannot replace human encounter.
“Spiritual formation doesn’t happen through texting,” Simon said plainly.
That insight shaped much of the discussion around AI and digital culture. Both Simon and Cellucci acknowledged that technology can serve the Church well when used appropriately. AI can reduce administrative burdens, help identify disconnected parishioners, or support communication workflows. But the moment technology begins replacing authentic human presence, something essential is lost.
Cellucci offered a distinction many parish leaders may find helpful: technology should help prepare people for interpersonal ministry, not replace interpersonal ministry itself.
A parish might use AI to identify families it has not connected with in a year. That may be a wise use of technology. But generating automated pastoral outreach in place of real human communication risks undermining the very relationships the Church is trying to foster.
Why? Because discipleship is not merely the transfer of information. It is encounter.
Late in the conversation, Simon shared a story from his own journey into the Catholic Church. As a young seeker wrestling with questions about the Eucharist, he sat in a priest’s office asking intellectual questions about doctrine. But what ultimately moved him was not an argument.
It was witness.
“I never would have seen his eyes tear up,” Simon said, reflecting on how easily those questions today might be directed to an AI platform instead of another person.
That moment captures the heart of the Church’s response to loneliness.
Responding to Simon’s reflection, Poplava noted how many Catholics can recall encounters with holy people whose witness communicated something deeper than information alone. Those moments of authentic encounter, he suggested, are often what draw people more deeply into relationship with Christ and the Church.
People are not only searching for answers. They are searching for communion—for relationships marked by authenticity, holiness, sacrifice, and presence. They are looking for someone who sees them, listens to them, and walks with them toward Christ.
And that is precisely where parish life still holds extraordinary hope.
Not because the Church has perfected a strategy for modern loneliness, but because Christianity has always been incarnational. The faith is passed person to person. Heart to heart. Witness to witness.
In a culture increasingly tempted to substitute convenience for community, the Church still insists on something beautifully demanding: people need one another.
