Catholic News 2
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Aung San Suu Kyi's latest visit to Washington signals her transformation from long-imprisoned heroine of Myanmar's democracy struggle to a national leader focused on economic growth....
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Democrats are sounding increasingly concerned about their chances of retaking control of the Senate, as Republicans demonstrate a commanding fundraising advantage and Hillary Clinton's lead narrows in key battleground races....
HANNIBAL, Ohio (AP) -- Crushed by Chinese competition and feeling betrayed by mainstream politicians, workers in the hills of eastern Ohio are embracing Donald Trump and his tough talk on trade....
Washington D.C., Sep 13, 2016 / 08:02 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- If it hopes to bring peace to racial tensions in the U.S., the Catholic Church must be more present in troubled communities and unite with other faiths in doing so, bishops insisted.“Not every neighborhood and every urban environment is filled with violence,” Archbishop Wilton Gregory of Atlanta said.“But when there is violence, there ought to be Catholic presence and prayer and action to raise up the frustration that drives the violence, whether it be lack of economic opportunity, jobs, education, all of those things that are really systemic examples of racism that need to be identified and confronted.”Archbishop Gregory chairs the U.S. bishops’ Task Force to Promote Peace in Our Communities, speaking in a phone call with reporters on Thursday before the National Day of Prayer for Peace in Our Communities.The day of prayer was held on Fri., Sept. 9, the feast of St. Peter Claver, a Jesuit missi...
Washington D.C., Sep 13, 2016 / 08:02 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- If it hopes to bring peace to racial tensions in the U.S., the Catholic Church must be more present in troubled communities and unite with other faiths in doing so, bishops insisted.
“Not every neighborhood and every urban environment is filled with violence,” Archbishop Wilton Gregory of Atlanta said.
“But when there is violence, there ought to be Catholic presence and prayer and action to raise up the frustration that drives the violence, whether it be lack of economic opportunity, jobs, education, all of those things that are really systemic examples of racism that need to be identified and confronted.”
Archbishop Gregory chairs the U.S. bishops’ Task Force to Promote Peace in Our Communities, speaking in a phone call with reporters on Thursday before the National Day of Prayer for Peace in Our Communities.
The day of prayer was held on Fri., Sept. 9, the feast of St. Peter Claver, a Jesuit missionary who baptized and ministered to over 300,000 African slaves taken by boat to South America in the 1600s.
After several high-profile incidents of racial tension over the summer – fatal shootings of black men by police officers in Minneapolis and Baton Rouge, and shootings of five police officers in Dallas – Archbishop Joseph Kurtz of Louisville, president of the USCCB, called for the Task Force to Promote Peace in Our Communities.
The purpose of the task force was to help bishops prepare for the day of prayer for peace, and to see how the Church could better address societal problems like racial tension, gun violence, and lack of economic opportunity, Archbishop Kurtz said.
“By stepping forward to embrace the suffering, through unified, concrete action animated by the love of Christ, we hope to nurture peace and build bridges of communication and mutual aid in our own communities,” he announced at the creation of the task force, which will issue a report on its findings at the bishops’ November General Assembly in Baltimore.
Two members of the task force – Archbishop Gregory, the chair, and Bishop Shelton Fabre of Houma-Thibodaux, Louisiana, a member – encouraged dioceses across the country to pray for healing and peace on Friday.
However, prayer is only the beginning of the solution, they insisted.
“Prayer is supposed to then inspire and empower and strengthen us to do something,” Bishop Fabre, who also chairs the bishops’ Subcommittee for African-American affairs, stated.
“It is my hope that the Day of Prayer tomorrow will be precisely that,” he added, where dioceses “will take some action steps toward achieving what we desire.”
In taking action to fight racism, Church leaders must do so in person in the communities where such racism exists, the bishops added.
Some dioceses have begun initiatives to do this, Archbishop Gregory said, like the Archdiocese of Detroit which organized a prayer demonstration in one of its most violent neighborhoods during a week in August.
Archbishop William Lori of Baltimore led a prayer walk for peace through the Sandtown-Winchester neighborhood, where over one year ago riots erupted after the death of Freddie Gray while in police custody, the Catholic Review reported.
However, “more must be done,” Archbishop Gregory said.
And the Church will also have to work with other Christian denominations and religions. “The issues that we face are not Catholic issues. They are American issues,” he maintained.
“We have to work with our interfaith and ecumenical partners so that we present a united front, so it’s not simply the Catholic Church speaking in response to violence and racism, it’s a community of believers and men and women of good will who may not have any particular religious faith that they follow,” the archbishop said.
A new pastoral letter on racism is in the works, the bishops confirmed. Archbishop Kurtz issued a statement on race relations in June of 2015, but a pastoral letter would be the first new such letter by the bishops since “Brothers and Sisters In Us” from 1979.
Bishop Fabre noted that the letter is “really in the very beginning stage,” but will cover “how is it that racism manifests itself in society, and maybe even in the Church today.” He hoped it will offer practical “action steps” for Catholics to “actively work on the healing and reconciliation that is hoped for in this pastoral letter.”
“We’ve made a lot of progress but there remains a lot of progress that needs to be made,” the bishop continued. “We thank God for what we have done, and we ask God’s encouragement and God’s strength to face what we need to do.”
The bishops were also asked if they would eventually have to take a stance on the Black Lives Matter movement, and if the issues raised by the movement would be addressed in the pastoral letter.
“The Church has always held that all of human life is sacred, and particularly in those areas where human life might be under attack or threatened, we would certainly want to work with others to see that those issues are addressed,” Bishop Fabre said.
“I do know that the Black Lives Matter, it’s still unfolding, and certainly depending on what is it that they embrace and what is it that they want to devote their time and their attention to, I think that the Church would be very interested in discussing working with them to see how together we can assist one another in addressing these needs in the community.”
“While the emphasis on the Black Lives Matter sheds light on the very serious issues that confront African American and people of color in too many situations of violence, it is not in any way contrary to the Church’s position that human life in and of itself has a dignity that must be respected in all circumstances,” Archbishop Gregory stated.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The deal crafted by the U.S. and Russia to halt the Syrian civil war and focus efforts on rooting out extremists in the country is rife with legal and liability questions that are fueling Pentagon skepticism about military cooperation between the two powers, senior U.S. officials said....
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- Samsung plans to issue a software update for its recalled Galaxy Note 7 smartphones that will prevent them from overheating by limiting battery recharges to 60 percent....
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. (AP) -- The White House was submerged in scandal. Democrats faced tough midterm elections. And Hillary Clinton, far more popular than her embattled husband, had become a one-woman campaign machine....
Vatican City, Sep 13, 2016 / 02:33 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Don’t let indifference stop you from an authentic encounter with another person, Pope Francis said Tuesday.“In our families, at the dinner table, how many times while eating, do people watch the TV or write messages on their cell phones. Each one is indifferent to that encounter. Even within the heart of society, which is the family, there is no encounter,” he lamented in his Sept. 13 homily at the chapel of the Santa Marta residence in the Vatican.He said that this situation of indifference should move us “to strive for this culture of encounter, just as simply as Jesus did so.”“Not just see, but look. Not just hear, but listen. Not just meet and pass by, but stop,” Pope Francis said. In the face of tragedy, one should not just say, “What a shame, poor people.” Rather, we should “allow ourselves to be moved by pity.”“And then draw near, touch and say in th...
Vatican City, Sep 13, 2016 / 02:33 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Don’t let indifference stop you from an authentic encounter with another person, Pope Francis said Tuesday.
“In our families, at the dinner table, how many times while eating, do people watch the TV or write messages on their cell phones. Each one is indifferent to that encounter. Even within the heart of society, which is the family, there is no encounter,” he lamented in his Sept. 13 homily at the chapel of the Santa Marta residence in the Vatican.
He said that this situation of indifference should move us “to strive for this culture of encounter, just as simply as Jesus did so.”
“Not just see, but look. Not just hear, but listen. Not just meet and pass by, but stop,” Pope Francis said. In the face of tragedy, one should not just say, “What a shame, poor people.” Rather, we should “allow ourselves to be moved by pity.”
“And then draw near, touch and say in the language that comes to each one of us in that moment, the language of the heart: ‘Do not weep,’ and donate at the very least a drop of life,” the Roman Pontiff advised.
He reflected on the gospel story of Christ's bringing back to life the only son of a widow, and discussed meetings between two people where each of them is thinking of themselves without perceiving or listening to the other.
“An encounter is something different,” he said, describing the gospel story as “an encounter that makes us reflect on our way of interacting with each other.”
The “joyful crowd” following Christ met the group of people weeping and accompanying the widow.
Christ was “moved with pity” when he encountered the widow. This is a pity different from those who simply pass by something sad on the streets. Instead, he approached her son and performed the miracle.
The Pope reflected on how people can grow accustomed to indifference when we see disasters or small things. We say, “What a shame, poor people, look how they are suffering,” and then we carry on.
“We are accustomed to a culture of indifference and we must strive and ask for the grace to create a culture of encounter, of a fruitful encounter, of an encounter that restores to each person his or her own dignity as a child of God, the dignity of a living person,” he said.
Pope Francis stressed the need to perceive an encounter by stopping, looking, touching, and speaking. Otherwise “I cannot help to build a culture of encounter.”
Vatican City, Sep 13, 2016 / 03:46 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis has written a private message approving the Buenos Aires bishops’ response to the divorced-and-remarried inspired by his apostolic exhortation on the family.The pastoral response said ministry to the divorced-and-remarried must never create confusion about Church teaching and the indissolubility of marriage, but may also allow access to the sacraments under specific limits. These may include specific situations when a penitent in an irregular union is under attenuated culpability, as when leaving such a union could cause harm to his children.The bishops of the Buenos Aires region had written basic criteria for their priests about the Pope’s post-synodal exhortation Amoris laetitia, which was released April 8 following two synods on the family.The Pope discussed these criteria in a Sept. 5 letter addressed to Bishop Sergio Alfredo Fenoy of San Miguel, a delegate of the Argentina bishops’ Buenos Air...
Vatican City, Sep 13, 2016 / 03:46 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis has written a private message approving the Buenos Aires bishops’ response to the divorced-and-remarried inspired by his apostolic exhortation on the family.
The pastoral response said ministry to the divorced-and-remarried must never create confusion about Church teaching and the indissolubility of marriage, but may also allow access to the sacraments under specific limits. These may include specific situations when a penitent in an irregular union is under attenuated culpability, as when leaving such a union could cause harm to his children.
The bishops of the Buenos Aires region had written basic criteria for their priests about the Pope’s post-synodal exhortation Amoris laetitia, which was released April 8 following two synods on the family.
The Pope discussed these criteria in a Sept. 5 letter addressed to Bishop Sergio Alfredo Fenoy of San Miguel, a delegate of the Argentina bishops’ Buenos Aires Region.
“The text is very good and makes fully explicit the meaning of the eighth chapter of ‘Amoris Laetitia’,” Pope Francis said. “There are no other interpretations. And I am sure it will do a lot of good. May the Lord reward you for this effort of pastoral charity.”
He said pastoral charity “moves us to reach out to those who have drifted away, and once we have met them, to begin a path of welcoming, accompaniment, discernment and integration into the ecclesial community.”
The Buenos Aires document, also dated Sept. 5, aimed to offer “minimal criteria” on the discernment of the possible access to the sacraments by penitents who are divorced and in a new union. Every bishop may clarify, complete, or establish limits on these criteria in his own diocese, the document said.
This advice must not be understood as “unrestricted access” to the sacraments or as if “just any situation would justify it,” the document said.
“What is proposed is a discernment which adequately distinguishes each case,” it said.
It emphasized a process of discernment for a penitent accompanied by a pastor. The pastor must emphasize the fundamental proclamation of Christ. This path calls for the priest to show pastoral charity in welcoming the penitent, listening carefully to him, and accepting the penitent’s “upright intention and good purpose to place his entire life in the light of the Gospel and to practice charity.”
“This path does not necessarily end in the sacraments, but rather it can guide one to other ways of joining more in the life of the Church,” it said. This include a greater presence in the community, participation in prayer groups, and commitment to various ecclesial services for those who have divorced-and-remarried.
“When the concrete circumstances of a couple make it feasible, especially when both are Christians with a faith commitment, it is possible to propose that they try to live in continence,” the document said.
“In other more complex circumstances, and when a decree of nullity cannot be obtained, the mentioned option may not in fact be feasible. Nevertheless, a path of discernment is equally possible.”
The Buenos Aires document did suggest that penitents in a limited number of circumstances, after careful discernment, could access the sacraments.
“If one comes to recognize that in a specific case, there are limitations that attenuate responsibility and culpability, particularly when a person believes that he would fall into a subsequent fault of harming the children of the new union, Amoris laetitia opens up the possibility of access to the sacraments of Reconciliation and Eucharist. These sacraments in turn dispose the person to continue to mature and grow with the power of grace.”
Adequate discernment of each case deserves “special care” in examples such as a new union that arose from a recent divorce or the situation of someone who has consistently failed in his family obligations.
The document also warned of situations where a person justifies or flaunts one’s situation “as if it were part of the Christian ideal.”
“In these more difficult cases, we pastors must accompany with patience, trying to find some way of reinstatement,” the Buenos Aires document said.
The document stressed the importance of the examination of conscience as well as the need to avoid confusion about Church teaching.
In some cases it may be appropriate that access to the sacraments takes place in “a discreet manner” when conflicting situations can be foreseen.
“But at the same time the person should not stop accompanying the community so that he or she grows in a spirit of understanding and of welcome, without this involvement creating confusion regarding the teaching of the Church about the indissolubility of marriage.”
Pope Francis’ Sept. 5 letter to the Buenos Aires bishops reflected on the difficulties of discernment.
“We know this is tiring, it is a matter of a ‘person to person’ pastoral ministry, not satisfied with programmatic, organizational or legal mediations, however necessary. Simply: to welcome, accompany, discern, integrate. Of these four pastoral attitudes the least cultivated and practiced is discernment; and I consider formation in discernment, personal and communitarian, in our seminaries and rectories to be urgent,” he said.
He added that the apostolic exhortation was “the fruit of the work and prayer of the entire Church, with the mediation of the two synods and the Pope.”
The eighth chapter of Amoris laetitia had prompted much discussion and apparently conflicting views.
In a May 4 speech, Cardinal Gerhard Müller, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, countered arguments that the apostolic exhortation eliminated Church discipline on marriage and allowed in some cases the divorced-and-remarried to receive the Eucharist “without the need to change their way of life.”
He placed the exhortation in the context of the writings of previous Popes.
“This is a matter of a consolidated magisterial teaching, supported by scripture and founded on a doctrinal reason: the salvific harmony of the sacrament, the heart of the ‘culture of the bond’ that the Church lives.”
If Pope Francis' exhortation “had wanted to eliminate such a deeply rooted and significant discipline, it would have said so clearly and presented supporting reasons,” Cardinal Müller said.
He countered claims that the exhortation’s footnote 351 offered the sacraments to those living in an objective situation of sin.
“The basic principle is that no one can truly desire a sacrament, that of the Eucharist, without also desiring to live in accord with the other sacraments, including that of marriage,” the cardinal added. “One who lives in contrast with the marriage bond is opposed to the visible sign of the sacrament of marriage; in that which touches his bodily existence, even if he should be subjectively not culpable, he makes himself an ‘anti-sign’ of indissolubility.”
Pope Francis had previously discussed this section of Amoris laetitia in an April 16 in-flight interview with reporters on his plane returning from the Greek island of Lesbos.
The Pope responded to a reporter’s question about whether there are new, concrete possibilities for divorced-and-remarried persons to access the sacraments. The Pope said that there are “many” such possibilities.
The Pope said he had been bothered and saddened by media coverage’s great focus on Communion for the divorced-and-remarried. He pointed to other problems like the “family crisis” and the falling birth rate in Europe. He cited Benedict XVI’s February 2013 statements about a “council of the media” whose coverage distorted the Second Vatican Council.
“Do you not realize that the youth don’t want to marry?” Pope Francis asked. “Don’t you realize that the lack of work or the little work (available) means that a mother has to get two jobs and the children grow up alone? These are the big problems.”
Richmond, Va., Sep 13, 2016 / 04:56 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Soon after Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tim Kaine suggested the Catholic Church would change on same-sex marriage, the Bishop of Richmond has said Catholic teaching on marriage is constant.“More than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on marriage, and despite recent statements from the campaign trail, the Catholic Church’s 2000-year-old teaching to the truth about what constitutes marriage remains unchanged and resolute,” Bishop Francis X. DiLorenzo of Richmond said Sept. 13.“As Catholics, we believe all humans warrant dignity and deserve love and respect, and unjust discrimination is always wrong,” he said. “Our understanding of marriage, however, is a matter of justice and fidelity to our Creator’s original design.”Bishop DiLorenzo’s statement does not mention Kaine. The former U.S. Senator is a parishioner at St. Elizabeth Catholic Church in the...
Richmond, Va., Sep 13, 2016 / 04:56 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Soon after Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tim Kaine suggested the Catholic Church would change on same-sex marriage, the Bishop of Richmond has said Catholic teaching on marriage is constant.
“More than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on marriage, and despite recent statements from the campaign trail, the Catholic Church’s 2000-year-old teaching to the truth about what constitutes marriage remains unchanged and resolute,” Bishop Francis X. DiLorenzo of Richmond said Sept. 13.
“As Catholics, we believe all humans warrant dignity and deserve love and respect, and unjust discrimination is always wrong,” he said. “Our understanding of marriage, however, is a matter of justice and fidelity to our Creator’s original design.”
Bishop DiLorenzo’s statement does not mention Kaine. The former U.S. Senator is a parishioner at St. Elizabeth Catholic Church in the Diocese of Richmond.
“Marriage is the only institution uniting one man and one woman with each other and with any child who comes from their union,” said the bishop.
Kaine made his comments in a Sept. 10 keynote address at the national dinner for the influential LGBT advocacy group the Human Rights Campaign. He said his “full, complete, unconditional support for marriage equality” is at odds with “the current doctrine of the church that I still attend.”
“But I think that's going to change, too,” he said.
He cited God’s declaration in the Book of Genesis that creation, including mankind, is “very good.”
He also cited Pope Francis' “who am I to judge” comment, and then said: “I want to add: Who am I to challenge God for the beautiful diversity of the human family? I think we're supposed to celebrate it, not challenge it.”
Bishop DiLorenzo’s statement suggested that same-sex marriage purposely deprives children of the right to be “nurtured and loved by a mother and a father.”
“We call on Catholics and all those concerned for preserving this sacred union to unite in prayer, to live and speak out with compassion and charity about the true nature of marriage – the heart of family life,” the bishop said.
Kaine has also been a staunch supporter of pro-abortion political causes. Though he says he is “personally opposed” to abortion, he received a 100 percent rating in 2016 from the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, the political arm of the United States’ largest abortion provider.
