News Briefs
By Catholic News Service
U.S.
HHS delays, but does not change, rule on contraceptive coverage
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Although Catholic leaders vowed to fight on, the Obama administration has turned down repeated requests from Catholic bishops, hospitals, schools and charitable organizations to revise its religious exemption to the requirement that all health plans cover contraceptives and sterilization free of charge. Instead, Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, announced Jan. 20 that nonprofit groups that do not provide contraceptive coverage because of their religious beliefs will get an additional year "to adapt to this new rule. This decision was made after very careful consideration, including the important concerns some have raised about religious liberty," Sebelius said. "I believe this proposal strikes the appropriate balance between respecting religious freedom and increasing access to important preventive services." But Cardinal-designate Timothy M. Dolan of New York, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said the Obama administration had "drawn an unprecedented line in the sand" with the decision. "The Catholic bishops are committed to working with our fellow Americans to reform the law and change this unjust regulation," he added. "We will continue to study all the implications of this troubling decision." Sebelius announced the mandate and a narrow religious exemption to it Aug. 1, 2011. Under the plan, after Aug. 1 of this year, new or significantly altered health plans will be required to provide all FDA-approved contraceptives, including some that can cause abortions, without co-pays or deductibles as part of preventive health care for women. The only religious organizations exempt from the requirement would be those meeting four specific criteria -- "(1) has the inculcation of religious values as its purpose; (2) primarily employs persons who share its religious tenets; (3) primarily serves persons who share its religious tenets; and (4) is a nonprofit organization" under specific sections of the Internal Revenue Code.
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Abortion leading to less respect for lives of disabled, archbishop says
PHILADELPHIA (CNS) -- A Philadelphia hospital's alleged refusal to provide a kidney transplant to a mentally disabled 3-year-old is yet another example of the harm caused in the United States by the Roe v. Wade court decision legalizing abortion, according to Philadelphia Archbishop Charles J. Chaput. "The habit of treating genetically disabled children as somehow less worthy of life is growing across the country," the archbishop said in a column posted Jan. 19 on the website of his archdiocesan newspaper, The Catholic Standard & Times. He was commenting on the case of Amelia Rivera, whose parents say she was denied a kidney transplant at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia because she has Wolf-Hirschhorn syndrome, a chromosomal disorder that results in severe developmental retardation. The child's parents say a doctor at the hospital told them that a kidney transplant would not be performed on Amelia at the hospital using a donated kidney because she was "mentally retarded." The hospital has declined to comment on the specifics of the case, citing patient confidentiality, but said that transplant eligibility decisions were "based on widely accepted, medically valid methods, with many factors considered." Archbishop Chaput said it is "unwise to assume that news media get all the details of a story like this right, or that the motives of an entire hospital's leadership and staff are as unfeeling as an individual doctor might seem." But he added, "We need to understand that if some lives are regarded as unworthy, respect for all life is at risk. We should pray that Amelia Rivera gets the help she needs, and that God surrounds her parents with the support they need." Anticipating the 39th anniversary of the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade on Jan. 22, Archbishop Chaput said, "More than 45 million abortions later, the damage of that decision continues to grow -- undermining our reverence for the life not just of unborn children but of the mentally and physically disabled as well."
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Dual-language immersion seen as 'win-win-win' for Catholic education
SEATTLE (CNS) -- Teaching half the school day in English and half in Spanish could be a boon for Catholic education in the United States, according to a Hispanic educator. Luis Ricardo Fraga, a professor of political science at the University of Washington and director of its Diversity Research Institute, said such a program, called "two-way immersion," could provide a superior education, increase educational opportunities for Hispanic Catholics, increase enrollment and prevent school closures. Starting two-way immersion programs in Catholic schools would be a "win-win-win," Fraga said. "The hope is that Latino families will be attracted to this, that English-dominant families who want their children to learn two languages and cultures and Catholic values will be attracted to this, that this can lead to greater enrollments in schools with low enrollments, and that it provides a superior educational opportunity for these children, all at the same time." The first goal of implementing a two-way immersion program would be "to provide a proven, superior educational opportunity for families who are committed to give their children a Catholic education where two languages and two cultures are united by a common commitment to the Gospel and to our faith," said Fraga. "The model builds upon two-way immersion programs that have been used in the United States and in a few Catholic schools across the country for over 20 years." In a school with a two-way immersion program, children learn subjects in both English and Spanish from bilingual teachers, beginning in kindergarten. Half the students are drawn from households where Spanish is the primary language, and half from English-dominant homes. In such a program, Fraga said, students are fully bilingual and biliterate by fourth grade. And there's no trade-off in terms of academic achievement, he said.
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Catholic schools are looking at new ways to keep afloat, thrive
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The phrase "show me the money!" from the 1996 movie "Jerry Maguire" could certainly be a mantra for today's Catholic schools struggling to stay open or facing closure. Reports of school closures often point to escalating costs of operating schools coupled with the inability of parents to pay tuition especially in inner cities and the lack of available resources from parishes or dioceses to keep these schools afloat. Schools that are thriving have had to seek other forms of revenue from foundations, local businesses and alumni. Mary McDonald, superintendent of schools in the Diocese of Memphis, Tenn., knows all about needing money -- and getting it -- to keep Catholic schools open. In fact, she sought out funds from non-Catholic sources to completely reopen eight diocesan elementary schools that had been closed. The resurrection theme of these Jubilee Schools, in the poorest areas of Memphis, came about through multimillion-dollar contributions, foundations, grants, corporate funding and private donations. When McDonald first started her job as school superintendent in 1998, Memphis Bishop J. Terry Steib told her he wanted Catholic schools back in the city. "He also told me there was no money to do this," she recounted to Catholic News Service Jan. 19. She knew local Catholics, who made up only 4 percent of the population, could not finance these schools alone so she turned to the broader community and convinced them that restoring Catholic education in the city was a worthwhile investment. Since these schools began re-opening in 2000, she has continued her quest for funding and to prove to those who provide financial help -- whom she calls investors, not donors -- that their funds are making a difference. She frequently gives tours of schools and shows their test scores to reinforce the message that Catholic education is improving the lives of the young people it's serving, which in turn helps the community at large. When she asks for help, she said, it is never with the mentality of asking for money for a sinking ship. Instead her plea has always been: "Here's our plan, come along with us," which she follows up with proving schools are "worthy of people investing in us" by showing what they do now and their future plans.
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Does indecency rest in the eye -- or ear -- of the beholder?
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- After nearly a decade of threats, fines and court challenges, America may finally learn for sure whether the federal government has the authority punish the airing of indecent material on broadcast television. Or, America will get to see a continuing game of cat and mouse between the Federal Communications Commission and the broadcast networks to see where the line should be drawn and how thickly. The most clear answer is if the Supreme Court rules that the FCC does not have the authority to enforce a safe harbor free of indecent material -- 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., when children are most likely to be watching TV. The high court heard oral arguments Jan. 10 on the FCC's challenge to federal appellate court decisions that declared no such authority existed. The programs at issue? A few awards shows that were aired live while celebrities uttered profanities, an episode of a long-since-canceled cop show that bared an actress' behind, and the infamous "wardrobe malfunction" at the 2004 Super Bowl. Because Justice Sonia Sotomayor was serving on one of the appellate courts whose decision was argued Jan. 10, she recused herself. For the FCC, it needs five votes to overturn the lower courts' decisions. But the broadcasters can win with a stalemated 4-4 court since a tie is not good enough to change the law. If the government loses, "then one of what I think is the key functions of the FCC is gone," said Frank Morock, communications director for the Diocese of Raleigh, N.C., and head of the Catholic Academy of Communication Arts Professionals. Without the FCC, Morock asked, "then who will serve as the gatekeeper for these issues?"
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WORLD
Pope says virginity and martyrdom of St. Agnes example of faith
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI held up the life of a young virgin and martyr as an example to seminarians of the total commitment to Christ required by young men seeking to enter the priesthood. The pope also said that a solid cultural background and intellectual understanding of faith was essential in the formation of priests as spreaders of the word of God. The pope spoke in a Jan. 20 audience with students from one of Rome's oldest and most prominent seminaries, the Almo Collegio Capranica. He told them that while martyrdom marks a final and heroic act, the "informed, free and mature" choice of virginity is rather the "fruit of a long friendship with Jesus" developed through close knowledge of his words and constant prayer. Legend says St. Agnes died in 304 or 305 at the hands of the suitor she spurned so she could remain faithful only to Christ. Pope Benedict said the saint faced her fate with exemplary courage. Her martyrdom illustrates "the beauty of belonging to Christ without hesitation." The path to the priesthood requires a similar level of commitment, the pope said, as well as integrity, well-roundedness, ascetic exercise and "heroic faith." He reminded the seminary students that "faith has its own rational and intellectual dimension, which is essential to it," and that it is the student's responsibility to assimilate the "Christian synthesis of faith and reason."
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Cutting-edge science: the church and the study of human anatomy
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Many readers of the Vatican's official newspaper might have been taken by surprise in mid-January by an article effusively praising a well-known exhibition of "plastinated" human bodies, which was making an extended stop in Rome. "Body Worlds," which L'Osservatore Romano called a "wonderful ode to respect for the body," is an exhibition of preserved human corpses, displayed in often sporty stances. The show thus bears many similarities to another show, "Bodies: The Exhibition," which drew strong criticism a few years back from Catholic bishops in the United States, Canada and England, who expressed concerns over whether the preserved bodies were being exploited or degraded by being on public display. The different reaction to the show in Rome may stem, at least in part, from promoters' claims that all of the cadavers in "Body Worlds" are on display with the prior consent of the deceased. By contrast, news reports from 2008 revealed that the "Bodies" exhibition included unclaimed and unidentified cadavers from China -- strongly suggesting there was little if any free consent involved. The Catholic Church has consistently taught that the human body must be treated with respect, in accordance with the preservation of human dignity. Many critics, meanwhile, have said such concerns only put the brakes on science. In fact, the church and the Vatican have a long history of promoting knowledge of the human body. One 18th-century pope even sponsored a show that might be considered the "Body Worlds" of its day.
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Pope says neocatechumenal celebrations must lead members to parish Mass
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- As the Vatican approved the Neocatechumenal Way's unique rite, Pope Benedict XVI underlined that its celebrations were not "strictly liturgical" and that their aim must be to encourage members to partake fully in the liturgical life of the parish. The pope encouraged the movement's members to continue "to offer your original contribution to the cause of the Gospel," and he urged them to always make sure their "precious work" was in "profound communion with the Apostolic See and the pastors of the local church in which they're inserted. Unity and harmony of the ecclesial body are an important witness to Christ and his Gospel in the world we live in," he said during an audience Jan. 20 with some 7,000 members of the Neocatechumenal Way, a parish-based faith formation program. A number of top curial officials and the Neocatechumenal Way's Spanish founders, Kiko Arguello and Carmen Hernandez, were also in the Vatican's Paul VI hall. The Pontifical Council for the Laity approved a decree that said, with the approval of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments, the council "grants the approval of those celebrations contained in the Catechetical Directory of the Neocatechumenal Way, which, are not, by their nature, already regulated by the liturgical books of the church." The decree, dated Jan. 8 and released by the Vatican Jan. 20, was signed by the laity council's president, Cardinal Stanislaw Rylko, and is secretary, Bishop Josef Clemens. The decree also mentioned the Vatican's approval of the organization's statutes in 2008 and its catechetical directory in 2010.
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Cardinal Wuerl: Education a key to the new evangelization
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- A day after Pope Benedict XVI warned visiting U.S. bishops about the threat of "radical secularism" to American moral values, Washington Cardinal Donald W. Wuerl reflected on the implications of the pope's remarks, giving special emphasis to the role of Catholic education. "It's so important in our country right now that we not allow faith to be brushed aside," the cardinal told Catholic News Service. "And the only way that's not going to happen ... is a renewal of our own faith." Cardinal Wuerl was in Rome for his periodic "ad limina" visit, which included meetings with the pope and Vatican officials, covering a wide range of pastoral matters. On Jan. 19, he joined bishops from Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services, and the Virgin Islands to hear a speech from Pope Benedict in the Vatican's Apostolic Palace. In his speech, the pope emphasized the need for an "engaged, articulate and well-formed Catholic laity" with the courage and critical skills to articulate the "Christian vision of man and society." He said that the education of Catholic laypeople is essential to the new evangelization, an initiative that he has made a priority of his pontificate. Cardinal Wuerl, whose recent book, "Seek First the Kingdom," encourages Catholic laypeople to affirm their faith in various dimensions of secular life, said that Catholic schools are "one of the most tried and proven ways of passing on the faith." Efforts to renew Catholic religious education were proving an "enormous success" at the elementary and secondary levels, he said. "Where we need to concentrate now is on the level of higher education."
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Indian church leaders critical after Islamic court expels Christians
BANGALORE, India (CNS) -- Church leaders criticized an Islamic court's decision to expel five Christians, including a Catholic priest. A Shariah court in Jammu and Kashmir state ordered the expulsion of Mill Hill Father Jim Borst, who has worked in the region since 1963, after accusing him of "spreading communal disaffection." Shariah courts have no legal standing in India. "We are really concerned over this," Father Babu Joseph, spokesman for the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India, told Catholic News Service Jan. 20, the day after the ruling. He said personal laws of religious communities "should not be used against other faiths." Father Borst, a well-known retreat preacher, runs Good Shepherd School in Jammu and Kashmir's Pulwama district. The school was partially burned during the widespread protests against the desecration of the Quran in the United States in 2010. The school is often closed in Kashmir's harsh winters, and Father Borst was in the southern Indian state of Kerala when the grand mufti of Jammu and Kashmir, Nasir-ul-Islam, read the verdict.
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Sudanese churches commit to helping youths from war-torn Jonglei state
JUBA, South Sudan (CNS) -- The Sudan Council of Churches has committed to involving young people from war-torn Jonglei state in a grass-roots peace process. The council said the state's young people have no political leadership. A series of retaliatory attacks between ethnic groups in Jonglei has displaced tens of thousands of people since late December. Among the factors that led to the fighting between the state's Lou Nuer and Murle communities is that their political leaders "proved to be out of touch with their people, particularly the armed youth, and were unable significantly to influence events on the ground, nor even to provide accurate information about the situation," the council said. "Local church leaders also appeared unable to influence events," the council of churches, of which the Sudan Catholic Bishops' Conference is a member, said in a Jan. 18 statement from Juba. It said a church-run peace initiative, set up at the request of the government of South Sudan, was "dealing with the symptoms rather than the root causes. There is a clear disconnect between the youth and both the traditional and political leaders" in the region, it said. Council members expressed their "deep sorrow and regret that violence has broken out in South Sudan so soon" after its July independence from Sudan.
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PEOPLE
Dominican nuns resist war in prayer, action to disarm nuclear arsenals
BALTIMORE (CNS) -- They call themselves peacemakers, following in the footsteps of the nonviolent Jesus. Dominican Sisters Carol Gilbert and Ardeth Platte, members of the Jonah House community in Baltimore since 1995, have spent decades crisscrossing the United States opposing war and acting to bring to life the biblical call to "beat swords into plowshares" in symbolically disarming nuclear weapons and other tools of war. Their actions -- as feeble as they might seem -- have led to countless years in prison. They say there is no better calling. "I think being a good Catholic calls us to do these things," Sister Carol told Catholic News Service at Jonah House on the grounds of the Archdiocese of Baltimore's St. Peter's Cemetery, where the nuns and other community members are caretakers. "We talk about being faithful, living lives of faithfulness, being faithful to the Gospel. I think what the nonviolent Jesus was all about was faithfulness," she said. "What is so important for people to understand (is) that in being faithful, God speaks," Sister Ardeth continued. "We never know when we do an action where it's going to go, who it's going to touch, what it's going to speak to others." Sister Carol added: "It's not like we say, 'I think I'll go out today and do this. No, it's 'I think I'll go out and speak this truth.' I may be arrested, I may not be arrested. I may go to prison, I may not go to prison." The Michigan natives describe themselves as resisters of war and violence. They said their actions are meant to call attention to what they believe are the immoral war policies of the government. They contrasted their actions to disarm with civil disobedience, a tactic often used by protesters to change a law. Under such thinking, they explained, prison poses no fear. For them, their actions go hand in hand with their Catholic faith. Critics might consider the sisters misguided or even foolish. They have been dismissed as being fringe participants in a world that is far more dangerous than they realize. But they have the support of their order, the Dominican Sisters-Grand Rapids, whose charism proclaims they are seekers of truth and empowers others to join the same pursuit.
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Family credits strong Catholic education for daughters' career choice
TRENTON, N.J. (CNS) -- In the parable of the sower, Jesus taught his disciples that God's word must be nurtured to yield a fruitful harvest, words that four members of the Briant family -- sisters -- have taken to heart. Alison Briant Burley, Ellen Briant Reilly, and Susan and Katelyn Briant are Catholic educators. Their parents, Doris and Thomas Briant, made sure they all had 12 years of Catholic education, despite the prospect of all that tuition. "My motivation was to show (our) commitment to Catholic education," Doris said. "We didn't have family vacations, we went to Cape May for the day. You can give up all those trips to Disney World. The benefits you get (from Catholic education) are better than all those trips to wherever." Doris herself is the product of 12 years of Catholic school. She and Thomas, who became a Catholic when daughter Susan was born, will be married 35 years this September. The couple praised two people in particular for having a good influence on their daughters: the late Sister Juliana Naulty, a Dominican Sister of Hope who was principal of St. Joseph School in Toms River, and the late Father William P. Gardner, parochial vicar at their parish, St. Joseph, also in Toms River. "Sister Juliana demonstrated to all the girls that being a Catholic educator went beyond the classroom walls," Doris told The Monitor, newspaper of the Trenton Diocese. "She celebrated with them in their victories and supported them when they were down, (and) she knew the best way to help her students was to help their families. All four were honored to have known her."
Copyright (c) 2012 Catholic News Service/U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops