On Candace Owens and Catholic Speakers Organization (CSO).

Amanda Achtman is a Canadian Catholic pro-life advocate. Ethics Director for Canadian Physicians for Life and founder of the Dying to Meet You project, Achtman has built a reputation for herself as an articulate and passionate voice for the value of life in the face of suffering. In Canada, where one in every 20 deaths are due to medical assistance in dying, otherwise known as euthanasia, her voice is necessary.

Candace Owens almost needs no introduction. With a YouTube channel boasting nearly six million subscribers and an aggressive method of media engagement, it is hard to be online these days without bumping up against her content.

One of these two young women has been platformed by a U.S.-based Catholic speakers’ agency that lists such high-profile Catholics as Bishop Robert Barron and Dr. Scott Hahn. The other has had her initially successful application to that same agency quietly dropped.

In an effort to raise her profile outside of Canada, Achtman was recently encouraged by some trusted Catholic colleagues to consider joining the Catholic Speakers Organization (CSO).

The agency advertises itself as a one-stop speaker shop for parishes and Catholic groups. Over 400 speakers are profiled on the site, and the list includes not just famous bishops, but also sports stars like NFL quarterback Phil Rivers, former politicians like Rick Santorum, and many leaders of the pro-life movement.

Achtman initiated the application process last June and it was a smooth one at the outset. After a few back-and-forth emails with CSO Director of Operations Wendy Jasinki in June 2025, Jasinki cheerily signed off, “I would love to welcome you as a speaker!”

But then Achtman discovered that one of CSO’s “featured” speakers was Candace Owens. That posed a problem – at least for Achtman.

For those who haven’t been following the bouncing ball crazily careening around in this too spacious corner of the U.S. conservative movement, it is difficult to convey who Owens is and all that she represents.

In the last nine years, the 36-year-old black woman from Stamford, CT has worked with some of the biggest organizations in the conservative ecosystem – Turning Point USA (TPUSA), PragerU, and The Daily Wire. She is both young and attractive, and even her most vocal critics admit that she is a master communicator. She has been hailed as a fearless culture warrior, uncowed in the face of woke and Zionist opposition.

Despite a history of being hired or mentored by several very high-profile Jewish conservatives, including Dennis Prager and Ben Shapiro, Owens has gained notoriety for her antisemitic content.

Owens left her position as communications director at Turning Point USA in 2019 after her comments about Adolf Hitler. “If Hitler just wanted to make Germany great and have things run well, OK, fine. The problem is that… he had dreams outside of Germany.”

She parted ways with the Daily Wire two weeks following a Mar 2024 show in which Owens queried whether there might be a “very small ring of specific people” doing “horrific” things in Hollywood “who are using the fact they are Jewish to shield themselves from any criticism.”

Owens has carried on in that vein, shielding herself from criticism by declaring her comments are taken out of context or that she is being attacked for being anti-Zionist rather than being antisemitic.

Dennis Prager, founder of PragerU, wrote Owens a 15-page letter in September 2024, “one of the most difficult letters I have ever written,” outlining the historical and categorical errors in her content.

“You may not consciously intend to engender hatred of Jews and Israel. But that doesn’t really matter. The fact is that you are doing so. Whatever your motives, I cannot think of anyone in public life engendering as much suspicion of Jews, Zionism, and Israel as are you,” wrote Prager.

It was these concerns about Owens that Achtman sent a follow-up email to Jasinski.

As a Jewish-Catholic, Achtman felt she could not in good conscience share a platform, if only a virtual one, with a woman who had built her business on Jew-hate and whose rhetoric has only ramped up since her 2024 conversion to Catholicism.

The month following her departure from the Daily Wire, Owens announced on Instagram she had been received into the Catholic Church. The next month, on the feast of St. Joan of Arc, an organization called Catholics for Catholics hosted a “Welcome Home Mass for Candace Owens.”

In August 2024, on her relaunched YouTube channel Candace, Owens told guest Tristan Tate that Judaism is a “pedophile-centric religion that believes in demons…[and] child sacrifice.” Two weeks later, she was a guest speaker at an anniversary celebration of the Station of the Cross Catholic Media Network.

Despite having committed herself to a hierarchical church that has both creed and catechism, Owens began to speak as one who need answer to neither.

The 1965 declaration Nostra Aetate made clear that the Church, “mindful of the patrimony she shares with the Jews and moved not by political reasons but by the Gospel’s spiritual love, decries hatred, persecutions, displays of anti-Semitism, directed against Jews at any time and by anyone.”

In his 2010 visit to the synagogue of Rome, Pope Benedict XVI said, “the Church has not failed to deplore the failings of her sons and daughters, begging forgiveness for all that could in any way have contributed to the scourge of anti-Semitism and anti-Judaism.”

But in every way that is open to her, Owens has done the very opposite and has built her brand on antisemitism, conspiracy theories, and calumny. With a large crucifix and reliquary as her studio backdrop, Owens spins tales that capture the imagination of millions.

There is her story of how “psychopathic” Brigitte Macron, wife of French president Emmanuel Macron, is a biological man. And after TPUSA founder Charlie Kirk was shot and killed last September, Owens engaged in a campaign to suggest his widow Erika Kirk and TPUSA leadership are responsible for his murder.

On Feb. 10, Owens posted on X, “If we had any semblance of a justice system, Erika would at this point be taken in for questioning by the police.”

In the secular arena, there are legal remedies for victims of defamation and slander. The Macrons filed a defamation suit against Owens in a Delaware court last July. TPUSA sent Owens a cease-and-desist letter last month. But by what mechanism do Catholic organizations adjudicate whether a particular Catholic speak with the imprimatur of the Church?

The Catholic Speakers Organization promises that all their speakers have been “rigorously screened and vetted” and are “diocesan approved.”

But CSO is not as diligent in establishing or documenting the bona fides of their speakers as they claim. Some speakers have reference letters from parish priests attached to their profiles and a few have a diocesan letter of good standing. Candace Owens has neither.

As Owens is listed as living in Nashville, I contacted the communications representative of the Diocese of Nashville, Rick Musacchio. He told me that the diocese has no record of having been approached by either Owens or CSO for a letter of recommendation and, in any case, no such letter has ever been written.

In July, Jasinski booted Achtman’s concerns up the chain of command to her boss Joe Condit, founder of CSO and serial entrepreneur.

A protracted email exchange ensued in which Achtman would politely prod and Condit would deflect.

In October, Condit wrote, “we are looking into everything and if this is the subject matter of why you want to speak, this call would be premature, and I am not able at this time to comment.” At the beginning of January, he signed off on the file, “unfortunately, at this time, I have to decline your request. Thank you for your understanding.” And that, as they say, is that.

Except it isn’t. It isn’t enough to dismiss Owens as a bit player who is either crazy, a grifter or both.

In CSO promotional material, Condit describes the organization as “spreading the Word of God by promoting and representing professional speakers of Faith that do it best.”

When I asked Achtman why Catholics should care about Owens being platformed by the Catholic Speakers Organization, she responded:

“When Jews think of Catholicism, they now think of Candace Owens. It is important for all Catholics of good will, but especially incumbent upon Catholic leaders, to consider what that does to the witness of the Catholic Church and then to constructively counter it.”