At Maryland conference, more than 800 Catholic men challenged to build ‘heroic friendships’

CLARKSVILLE – Patrick Kelly challenged more than 800 Catholic men gathered March 14 at St. Louis in Clarksville to become men of “heroic friendship” amid rising loneliness and spiritual drift.

During the Catholic Men’s Fellowship of Maryland annual conference March 14 at St. Louis Church in Clarksville, Patrick Kelly, Supreme Knight, CEO, and chairman of the board of the Knights of Columbus, the world’s largest Catholic fraternal service organization, addressed the theme of “Heroic Friendship.” (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

Speaking at the Catholic Men’s Fellowship of Maryland Conference, the Supreme Knight of the Knights of Columbus urged men to build faith-filled relationships that help one another live out God’s calling.

Every person, Kelly said, is created by God with a mission entrusted to no one else, and Catholic men have a special responsibility to help one another fulfill it.

“Each person has an important choice: to surrender to God or not – to serve or not,” Kelly said. “There is no middle ground. Our choices have consequences.”

The stakes, Kelly made clear, are high. Many young men are ensnared by addiction to pornography, video games and other destructive habits. Kelly cited studies showing

61 percent of men ages 18 to 25 feel lonely. He noted that over the past 35 years, the number of men who report having no close friendships has skyrocketed. Suicide rates among men are also up, he said.

“The reason we need friends,” Kelly said, “is to help us become friends with God himself.”

Archbishop William E. Lori humorously notes his official photo displayed on screen off camera is over a decade old, which gained a laugh from the audience, as he welcomed attendees from across the region to the 2026 Catholic Men’s Fellowship of Maryland annual conference, March 14, at St. Louis Church in Clarksville. (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

To illustrate what heroic friendship looks like – and what its absence can cost – Kelly contrasted the lives of two young men from similar backgrounds, with good families and strong educations.

Tyler Robinson, the 22-year-old Utah man accused of killing political activist Charlie Kirk in 2025, lacked a circle of friends who encouraged him toward holiness and away from a “false mission,” Kelly said.

By contrast, St. Pier Giorgio Frassati, an Italian layman who died at 24 in 1925 after contracting polio while ministering to the homeless in the slums of Turin, deliberately built a community of faith-filled companions he called his “precious guides.”

“He’s a saint because his friends led him to God,” Kelly said, noting that Frassati, canonized in 2025 by Pope Leo XIV, “refused to be deaf to injustice and suffering.” He kept a list of homeless people he needed to visit and made a habit of checking in on the elderly and forgotten.

“He gave them his friendship,” Kelly said.

Kelly encouraged men to become everyday evangelists – simply sharing how God has blessed them or helped them. He pointed to Cor, a Knights of Columbus initiative that invites men to walk together in faith, as a practical starting point. And he returned to prayer as the foundation of it all.

“Every minute you spend talking to God forms you,” he said.

Paul George, president of Art of Living, Inc., opened his keynote address at the 2026 Catholic Men’s Fellowship of Maryland annual conference March 14 at St. Louis Church in Clarksville, with a humorous story about his daughter’s promposal that went awry, which prompted laughter from the audience when he admitted he wasn’t exactly up-to-date on the latest high school trends. (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

Rising above the past

Paul George, a Louisiana native and president of Art of Living Inc., told attendees that the greatest tragedy for men is to believe they cannot change – that past sins and failings are the final word on who they are. That lie, he said, comes straight from Satan.

“He wants you to live in the past so you think of yourself as less than God made you to be,” George said.

George recalled a conversation with Cardinal Óscar Rodríguez Maradiaga of Honduras during a mission trip with Catholic Relief Services. Invited along with some others to ask a question of the cardinal, George asked how he could better serve the poor of the prelate’s country.

“It’s not the poor of my country who need the most help,” the cardinal said. “It’s the wealthy. The poor know they need God. The wealthy don’t know they do.”

George urged men to embrace that same poverty of spirit, recognizing that it is “in our poverty and need that we meet God.”

Tom Corcoran, pastoral associate at Church of the Nativity in Timonium and president of Rebuilt Parish, zeroed in on a simple but sobering truth about the battle for men’s souls.

Matt Aujuero, an attendee and vendor of the 2026 Catholic Men’s Fellowship of Maryland conference at St. Louis Church in Clarksville, March 14, embraces a friend during lunch. (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

“Whatever voice is loudest in your life will drive your behavior,” he said, echoing other speakers in urging men to find parish men’s groups to help them on their journey.

“You and I have a fundamental need to be understood,” Corcoran said. “You need a network of people to understand you.”

During the closing Mass, Archbishop William E. Lori warned that even a strong spiritual life can become distorted if it turns into self-righteousness.

Reflecting on Jesus’ parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, the archbishop compared two very different approaches to prayer. The Pharisee, he said, treated prayer like a résumé, listing his good works and comparing himself favorably to others. The tax collector, by contrast, stood at a distance and pleaded simply for God’s mercy.

“If we fail to pray, our relationship with God suffers,” the archbishop said. “If we boast when we pray, we crowd God out of our prayer; we end up talking to ourselves whilst rendering ourselves incapable of receiving his blessings.”

Rob Dauses, leader of the Fishers of Men, a group of devoted Catholic men at St. Margaret Church in Harford County, speaks during one of the breakout sessions. (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

Authentic prayer, he said, begins in humility.

“If we come before him to pray with a humble and contrite heart,” Archbishop Lori said, “the Lord will pour forth his blessings upon us, blessings without number.”
Scott Morris, a parishioner of St. Louis in Clarksville, a Knights of Columbus member and father of five, said the conference reinforced the importance of surrounding oneself with faithful companions.

“I heard a long time ago the expression, ‘you are who you’re with,’ and that made a deep impression on me when I had younger children,” said Morris, who has a son preparing for the priesthood for the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

“It’s made such a difference in their lives,” he said. “Who your kids are around and the values that they and their families hold makes a tremendous difference in their upbringing.”

Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church, Ellicott City, parishiopner James Dubyoski, raises his arms in praise as music opens the 2026 Catholic Men’s Fellowship of Maryland annual conference. (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

Dennis Narango, president of Catholic Men’s Fellowship of Maryland and a parishioner of St. Joseph in Fullerton, said he was struck at the conference by the emphasis on perseverance.

“If we stay consistent in our spiritual practices and stay aware of God’s presence, then we can make clear progress in our faith,” Narango said. “And when we share our spiritual experience with others, the progress can increase even more.”

Throughout the daylong conference, the theme of which was “Shine the Light,” men were invited not only to listen but to pray together and encounter Christ sacramentally. Many took advantage of opportunities for confession, communal recitation of the rosary and adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.

Email George Matysek at gmatysek@CatholicReview.org

To view more photos by Kevin J. Parks of the event, click through the slideshow below:.