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Krakow, Poland, Jul 19, 2016 / 11:32 am (CNA).- Poland has been known as the heart of the Divine Mercy devotion since the 1930s and also boasts the homeland of the late Pope St. John Paul II.

This year, an additional spotlight has been shed on the country as it hosts World Youth Day amidst the Jubilee Year of Mercy, which is why the Knights of Columbus are sponsoring a site called “Mercy Centre” in the heart of Krákow to offer youth a multitude of different mercy-themed events.

“Pope Francis has declared mercy a key theme both for this year and for World Youth Day,” Supreme Knight Carl Anderson said in a recent press release.

“This is especially appropriate given the selection of Krákow as host city, since this is where devotion to Divine Mercy was born, and where St. John Paul II during his time there grew in this devotion, which became a major theme of his pontificate as well,” Anderson continued.

Mercy Centre will be open from July 26-31 and will be located at the Tauron Arena Krákow, one of Poland’s largest event centers seating over 20,000 people. It is also listed as one of the places that Pope Francis will visit during the July 25-31 celebration of World Youth Day.

Although open to everyone, Mercy Centre has been primarily crafted to offer young, English-speaking pilgrims a site where they can learn about mercy through prayer and catechetical formation from renowned speakers such as George Weigel, Curtis Martin, and Jason Evert. Daily Mass, confession, and adoration will also be offered.

“Mercy Centre is thus perfectly situated to help pilgrims understand that Christian life must be an experience of receiving mercy from God, and giving it also to our neighbors in the form of love, charity and forgiveness,” said Anderson.

Among the many events, Mercy Centre will host a “Night of Mercy” on the evening of July 27, featuring concerts from Matt Maher and Audrey Assad, and a series of talks by Bishop Robert Barron of Word on Fire Ministries and LifeTeen’s Joel Stepanek.

In addition, Mercy Centre will offer a variety of historical exhibits throughout the week, including information on Divine Mercy, Christianity in Poland, and Auschwitz, as well as vocational exhibits on marriage, diocesan priesthood and the religious life. Pilgrims will also be able to venerate the relics of Polish saints such as St. Maximilian Kolbe, St. John Paul II and St. Faustina Kowalska.

The site will also be used by the United States, Canadian and Australian conferences of Catholic bishops for their national gatherings.

Mercy Centre is sponsored by the Knights of Columbus, who have been involved in World Youth Day for the past 25 years and are celebrating the 10-year anniversary of their presence in the country of Poland.

Other co-sponsors of Mercy Centre include the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy, the Saint John Paul II National Shrine in Washington, D.C., the Sisters of Life, Salt + Light Television, Holy Cross Family Ministries, the Dominican Liturgical Institute, the National Conference of Religious Vocations Directors and the National Council of Diocesan Vocations Directors.

More information about Mercy Centre can be found at www.wydenglishsite.org.

 

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Cleveland, Ohio, Jul 19, 2016 / 04:26 pm (CNA).- The detailed platform adopted by the Republican Party this week received mixed reactions among Catholics for its positions.
 
It was an “extremely conservative platform” in the words of Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.), co-chair of the platform committee, “one that, as I said in my comments on the floor here, upholds our moral tradition.”

Among many issues, the 54-page statement of the party's beliefs calls for building a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, asks for more restrictions on refugee resettlement in the U.S., defends marriage as between one man and one woman, calls for the passage of pro-life legislation, and even includes paragraphs calling pornography a “public health crisis.”
 
The pro-life group Susan B. Anthony List called the platform “the most pro-life platform ever,” noting how it pushed for bans on late-term abortions, sex-selective abortions, and disability abortions, and advocated for the Hyde Amendment, which forbids federal tax dollars from directly funding abortions.
 
Tom McClusky, the vice president of the March for Life who worked in the drafting of the pro-life plank of the platform, told CNA it was “the most detailed platform we’ve ever seen,” noting that “just about every single piece of pro-life legislation that is currently out there, it is mentioned in the platform.”
 
“There is some concern with the person at the top of the ticket,” he said, noting the importance of “having a platform that we could lean back on to hold him accountable.”
 
The platform also took a strong right-wing stand on immigration. After acknowledging the contributions of legal immigrants to American society, it called for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border to prevent the entry of undocumented immigrants into the United States.

“We oppose any form of amnesty for those who, by breaking the law, have disadvantaged those who have obeyed it,” the platform said.
 
It also advocated for a mandatory use of the E-Verify system nationwide, as well as a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in prison for attempted re-entry into the U.S. by someone who has been deported for illegal immigration. So-called “sanctuary cities” should be denied federal aid, it said.

The platform also called for changes to the guest worker program. “In light of the alarming levels of unemployment and underemployment in this country, it is indefensible to continue offering lawful permanent residence to more than one million foreign nationals every year,” it stated.
 
Jeanne Atkinson of the Catholic Legal Immigration Network expressed her concerns with the immigration plank to CNA.
 
“Immigration is about people and families and communities, not about walls, and punitive and damaging enforcement measures,” she said. “Immigrants actually create jobs and strengthen our economy.”
 
She noted the section’s first paragraph, which commended “immigrant labor building our country and making vital contributions in every aspect of national life.”
 
“That’s really what the focus should be,” she insisted, “that emphasis should be throughout the rest of the document”

At the end of the immigration section, the document asked for “major changes” to the refugee resettlement system.
 
Back in November, the party’s presumptive nominee Donald Trump floated the idea of a temporary ban on all Muslims trying to enter the U.S., as a purported security measure. The GOP platform didn’t endorse that specific position, but stated that “asylum should be limited to cases of political, ethnic or religious persecution.”
 
It added that “refugees who cannot be carefully vetted cannot be admitted to the country, especially those whose homelands have been the breeding grounds for terrorism.” It insisted that “our nation’s immigration and refugee policies are placing Americans at risk.”
 
One significant addition to the 2016 platform in the “ensuring safe neighborhoods” section is an anti-pornography plank, calling porn a “public health crisis.” This comes after the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a statement on porn back in November “Create In Me a Clean Heart.”
 
“Pornography is a scourge in every country, it is being fueled by globalization through the Internet and global travel,” Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles told CNA in an interview during last year’s synod on the family. “Everyone knows there are links between the porn industry and prostitution and human trafficking and child abuse.”
 
“We are in a crisis. Pornography is a public health crisis of the digital age,” Gail Dines, a professor of sociology at Wheelock College and founder of the group Culture Reframed, told CNA. Dines called it a “public health crisis” in a piece for the Washington Post in April.
 
She added that “it is in keeping with the 40 years of empirical research that we have that pornography has enormous social, psychological, cognitive, and sexual effects. We know that from the research, and that it is indeed a public health issue.”

Iraq’s embattled Christian minorities also have a place in the platform, which calls for attention to their plight and humanitarian aid.
 
“Defeating ISIS means more than pushing back its fighters while abandoning its victims. It must mean aiding those who have suffered the most — and doing so before they starve,” the platform stated.

Dr. Matthew Bunson, a contributor to EWTN, said the platform “expands the potential appeal for voters” by highlighting international Christian persecution and global repression of religious freedom, which he termed a “growing phenomenon of repression and curtailing of rights.”
 
For instance, it mentioned the dire need for aid among Iraq’s Christians and religious freedom concerns in China, part of the document’s “remarkably comprehensive” nature, he said.
 
Given concerns about Trump’s views on religious freedom – prompted by his ideas such as the Muslim immigration ban – Trump is “trying to protect his flank within the party by giving the cultural side what it wants the most,” Bunson suggested.

 

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IMAGE: CNS photo/Tannen Maury, EPA

By Dennis Sadowski

CLEVELAND (CNS) -- When Msgr. Kieran Harrington delivered the invocation on the opening night of the Republican National Convention, it wasn't just a coincidence that he ended up on the same stage where high-scale politics would dominate for four days.

The priest from the Diocese of Brooklyn, New York, told Catholic News Service that he worked for the Republican National Committee for five years in the 1990s and was known to some of the party's highest-ranking officials.

The process was not planned far in advance and his on-stage appearance was finalized only days before the convention began, he said. Things happened so quickly that Msgr. Harrington ended up driving from Brooklyn to Cleveland, arriving at 3 a.m. July 18, about 17 hours before offering the prayer.

"The way I look at it is I'm here to bring the Gospel. It's very important to hold up a mirror to let people know what their deliberations really are about," said Msgr. Harrington, chairman of the DeSales Media Group in the diocese and pastor of the Co-Cathedral of St. Joseph in Brooklyn.

The invitation came after he inquired about the status of press credentials for the staff of the diocese's New Evangelization Television cable TV network. Msgr. Harrington received a call from Sean Spicer, communications director and chief strategist for the Republican National Committee, who not only confirmed the credentials, but invited the priest to offer the prayer.

Msgr. Harrington cleared the request with Brooklyn Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio and began coordinating his short appearance at the convention.

Aside from Bishop DiMarzio, few knew about Msgr. Harrington's part at the convention until he told St. Joseph parishioners at Masses the weekend of July 16-17.

"I told them, 'I don't want you to be surprised. You may see me on TV. I want to tell you I believe you bring the Gospel everywhere and anywhere,'" he recalled.

Lasting about three minutes, the prayer referenced the example of the good Samaritan as told in the Gospel of Luke, which had been read at Masses the weekend of July 9-10.

"To me, the good Samaritan was important especially because, I think, of the great issues our country faces. The perennial issues on human life. To me, I don't think there is any way around saying this is the greatest evil our nation is engaged with at the moment. To take the life of child in the womb is barbaric," he said.

"At same time, as people who stand for human life, we understand life begins at conception, but it doesn't end when the child is born. There are people who are vulnerable and who are here in this country and are strangers. To my mind I wanted to hold that up because the rhetoric can be un-neighborly to say the least," Msgr. Harrington told CNS.

The prayer included a request for blessings and inspiration for the delegates and party leaders that their deliberations "might be earnest and fruitful."

Msgr. Harrington's career in politics lasted from 1994 to 1999. It began when he decided to take a year off from studying for the priesthood. He wanted to get a job and better understand the lives of people who go to work day in and day out so he could be a better priest. He joined the RNC doing research and working in campaign operations. One year stretched to five as he took on more responsibilities and became an aide to Jim Nicholson, then-party chairman, who later became U.S. ambassador to the Holy See and then secretary of Veterans Affairs.

Msgr. Harrington said today that he is a registered Democrat, but he did not offer any reason for his change in political allegiance.

When it comes to prayer though, he said, politics does not matter.

"Frankly in my time," he said, "I find most people who are involved in the political process are extraordinarily earnest and really do want to accomplish good. So I think it was appropriate (to offer the prayer)."

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Follow Sadowski on Twitter: @DennisSadowski

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