EWTN News President Montse Alvarado honored for religious freedom advocacy

CNA Staff, Sep 5, 2024 / 13:05 pm

EWTN News President and COO Montse Alvarado on Tuesday was announced as the recipient of an award from a major religious advocacy group recognizing her “consistent, effective, and innovative leadership in advancing religious freedom.”

The Religious Freedom Institute (RFI), a nonprofit and nonpartisan D.C.-based organization that advocates religious freedom for all people worldwide, announced Sept. 3 that Alvarado had earned its 2024 Religious Freedom Impact Award. 

Alvarado, a native of Mexico City, previously served as executive director and chief operating officer at the Becket Fund, a nonprofit public interest group that defends religious freedom at the U.S. Supreme Court and elsewhere.

She took the helm of EWTN News — which includes Catholic News Agency, the National Catholic Register, and other major Catholic news properties — in March 2023.

Before taking over as president and COO, Alvarado was the founding anchor of the weekly television program “EWTN News In Depth,” recently passing the role of anchor to Catherine Hadro.

Alvarado told CNA that she “never intended for religious freedom to be such a big part of my career” but that working to defend the rights of religious people of all backgrounds has deepened her own Catholic faith.

“That just shows you God always knows better and will qualify you into what he’s called you to do. Trust him,” she said.

In addition to her work with EWTN News, Alvarado presently serves on the boards of numerous Catholic nonprofits and apostolates including the Catholic Information Center, Acton Institute, the Knights of Columbus Charitable Giving Fund, Benedictine College, and Patients’ Rights Action Fund, a leading advocacy organization against the legalization of assisted suicide. 

She is also on the advisory council to the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious (CMSWR) and the GIVEN Institute, and advises the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops through their Religious Liberty Committee.

“Throughout her career, Montse Alvarado has been a strong, clarion voice for religious liberty in media, culture, and the courts,” RFI President David Trimble said this week.

“She has steadfastly dedicated her time and talent to protecting the rights of not only her fellow Catholics but of all people of faith in America.”

‘God always knows better’

Reflecting on her time working in the field of religious freedom, Alvarado said that although certain legal protections for religious freedom in the U.S. have improved in the past few decades, the “culture has changed” in such a way that many people today do not understand or appreciate the importance of religion. 

“The lack of religious literacy is the greatest danger to religious freedom, and we see it manifested in the attacks against churches and rampant antisemitism around the world. People don’t understand the religious impulse, and we fear and persecute what we don’t know,” she noted. 

Alvarado said her legal work with Becket in defense of religious freedom was an “exercise in humility, prudence, and a great check on self-reliance,” and a solid reminder of the importance of the power of prayer as a sustaining factor in difficult work.

“Defending religious freedom made me more religious, not less. Encountering the deep faith of other traditions — no matter what they are — changed my heart forever,” Alvarado said. 

EWTN News covers numerous topics related to religious freedom under Alvarado’s leadership. She encouraged Catholics to support religious freedom for all people, in part because “the search for God must be free from coercion.”

“The Christian man offers Jesus Christ as the answer, knowing only the Holy Spirit will move the other person’s heart in his perfect time,” she said.