Catholic News 2

Full Article

Full Article

Full Article

Full Article

Full Article

Full Article

Dublin, Ireland, Jun 13, 2016 / 03:18 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pro-life groups in Ireland are charging that a United Nations human rights committee contradicted its mission when it ruled that the Republic of Ireland’s laws against abortion violated a woman’s rights.

The ruling’s critics included Niamh Ui Bhriain of Ireland’s Life Institute.

“Instead of protecting the most vulnerable, the U.N. has chosen, yet again, to champion abortion, and has trampled on the right of people with disabilities,” she said. She charged that the committee “seriously undermined its credibility by rushing to support abortion.”

Ui Bhriain told CNA the committee used “the ugly language of discrimination” in using terms like “fetal abnormality.”

“Their reasoning is so distorted that it has lost all meaning,” she said. “Abortion is inhumane, and the U.N. should seek to find progressive answers to assist women who are told their babies may not live for long after birth.”

The Republic of Ireland’s constitution equally recognizes the right to life of both the mother and her unborn child in its Eighth Amendment, against abortion. Pro-abortion rights lobbyists have targeted the amendment for repeal.

Members on the human rights committee of the Geneva-based U.N. High Commissioner on Human Rights called for legal changes, including constitutional changes, to ensure “effective, timely and accessible procedures for pregnancy termination in Ireland.”

The committee, in their ruling distributed June 9, stated that the Irish government must compensate a woman who wanted a legal abortion, saying that the country’s laws against abortion violated her rights to freedom from cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment.

According to the committee, Ireland’s restrictive abortion laws caused severe emotional and mental pain to the woman, who was told in 2011 she could not have an abortion in Ireland. Doctors had discovered her unborn baby had congenital defects and said the baby would die in the womb or shortly after birth.

The committee said Ireland violated the woman’s rights by forcing her to choose between “continuing her non-viable pregnancy or travelling to another country while carrying a dying fetus, at personal expense, and separated from the support of her family, and to return while not fully recovered.”

The ruling also criticized Irish law limiting advocacy or promotion of abortion. It drew from the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Ireland is a signatory.

Ui Bhriain objected that the committee did not hear evidence from families who had carried sick babies to term. She said this evidence “would have shown that continuing with the pregnancy, rather than aborting the baby, brings great joy and love.”

Other critics of the committee include Michael Kelly, editor of the Irish Catholic newspaper.

“I’m afraid that the Human Rights Committee has exposed itself as effectively a pro-abortion lobby group, which, at the very least, calls in to question the body’s right to comment on matters in relation to human rights,” Kelly told CNA.

He objected that the action called into question the right to life of children with life-limiting conditions. Kelly said the ruling was “a deep betrayal” of the U.N.’s founding principles and its commitment to defend human rights.

The pro-abortion Center for Reproductive Rights, headquartered in New York City, had filed the complaint to the U.N. human rights committee on the woman’s behalf.

Leah Hoctor, the center’s European regional director, said the decision would encourage those seeking legal change in countries where abortion is criminalized, the U.K. newspaper The Guardian reports.

Ui Bhriain charged that the Center for Reproductive Rights “used the most vulnerable children of all, unborn babies with severe disabilities, to try to drive a wedge in Ireland’s abortion laws.”

Kelly told CNA that Ireland’s current government has pledged to hold a citizens convention on the issue of repealing the Eighth Amendment to the Republic of Ireland’s constitution. The exact details are not confirmed, but politicians and members of the general public will be among the convention’s members.

Kelly said there is concern that pro-abortion lobbyists will infiltrate the gathering. He also voiced concern that parliament is abdicating its responsibility by referring the issue to the convention.

Smaller political parties in Ireland have called for making abortion available, but the 2016 general election saw many pro-life deputies elected to parliament.

In Kelly’s view, the ruling will have an impact on the campaign to legalize abortion in Ireland.

“Unlike other countries, Ireland has tended to fetishize U.N. rulings in recent years and seems to pay more attention to opinions from international organizations than it does to public opinion in Ireland,” he said.

Kelley said the Irish pro-life movement is mobilized, but needs to intensify its efforts.

“The pro-abortion lobby is extremely well-funded and supported from overseas,” he said. “Pro-life campaigners must redouble their campaign to make politicians aware of the depth of feeling that there is in Ireland to defend the pro-life position of our constitution.”

Archbishop Eamon Martin of Armagh has called for “strong character” to defend the right to life of mothers and babies, the Irish Catholic reports.

“May we never forget that the defenseless unborn child is a real, human person, worthy of love and protection,” he said at the 30th anniversary celebration of the All Ireland Rosary Rally at Knock shrine.

Full Article

Ontario, Canada, Jun 13, 2016 / 04:02 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A risky adult stem cell clinical trial in Canada has proven effective in stopping and even reversing the symptoms in patients with severe cases of multiple sclerosis, a progressive disease of the immune system that is often untreatable.

The stem cell therapy was performed on 24 adult patients who were expected to be confined to a wheelchair within 10 years. After the treatment, most patients saw no further progress in their symptoms, and were even able to regain functions that had been taken away by the disease, such as their vision, balance, or ability to walk, the Guardian reports.  

The treatment performed by doctors in Canada is still considered highly risky, as it required the destruction and rebooting of each person’s immune system, causing the death of one of the 24 trial patients.

However, the other patients, who were followed for up to 13 years after the treatment, all experienced no further progression of the disease, which typically worsens over time. Many of these patients were able to go back to work and resume their other normal activities such as driving or playing sports.

Multiple sclerosis is a potentially disabling disease of the immune system, which attacks the protective sheath (myelin) that covers nerve fibers and causes communication problems between the brain and the rest of the body. Eventually, the disease can cause the nerves themselves to deteriorate or become permanently damaged.

Symptoms include a progressive loss of motor function, fatigue, vertigo, memory loss and depression. The disease affects approximately 2.3 million people throughout the world.

During the trial therapy, doctors first administered a drug to each patient that caused the stem cells in their bone marrow to move out into their bloodstream.

Doctors then extracted these stem cells, and processed them in a lab to purify them of the cells that cause MS. The patient was then given a drug that completely destroyed their immune system.

Finally, the newly purified stem cells were re-injected into the patient’s bloodstream, where they were able to make their way back into the bone marrow and slowly rebuild the immune system, free of the MS-causing cells.

While the Catholic Church does not support embryonic stem cell research that creates and destroys embryos for the sake of harvesting their cells, the Church does support ethical stem cell research and treatments such as those using umbilical cord stem cells or adult stem cells, like the ones used in the MS trial.

“Clearly, the Church favors ethically acceptable stem cell research. It opposes destroying some human lives now, on the pretext that this may possibly help other lives in the future. We must respect life at all times, especially when our goal is to save lives,” the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops explains on their website.

“The Catholic Church has long supported research using stem cells from adult tissue and umbilical cord blood, which poses no moral problem. Catholic institutions at times have taken the lead in promoting such constructive research, which is already providing cures and treatments for suffering patients,” their website reads.

In April, the Pontifical Council for Culture helped host a conference at the Vatican on “The Progress of Regenerative Medicine and its Cultural Impact”, which brought together doctors, researchers and bioethicists throughout the world to discuss the potential for adult stem cells and other ethical cellular therapies to treat cancer, diabetes and other debilitating medical conditions and diseases.

While the results of the MS study were promising, the treatment is still limited in its availability due to its high risk and specialized nature.

Mark Freedman, a neurologist at the University of Ottawa who co-led the trial, told The Guardian that while all patients experienced a halt in new brain inflammations, he was hesitant to call the treatment a cure.

“A cure would be stopping all disease moving forward and repairing all damage that has occurred. As far as we can ascertain no new damage seems to occur beyond the treatment and patients don’t need to take any medication, so in that sense I think it has induced a long-standing remission. Some patients did recover substantial function and it allowed them to do things they couldn’t do for years, but others did not,” he said.

Freedman also said that because of the risky nature of the stem cell transplant, only about 5-10 percent of MS patients would be eligible for the treatment. It would be considered too risky for those with milder forms of MS whose symptoms can largely be controlled by other medications.

Still, the results are promising for MS sufferers who go to great lengths to find ways to treat the disease. A neurologist in the U.K. is planning a similar study with a less intense drug, and with 180 participants.

The clinical trial in Ontario was funded by the MS Society of Canada, and the findings were published in the Lancet medical journal.

Photo credit: www.shutterstock.com.

Full Article

Orlando, Fla., Jun 13, 2016 / 05:38 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- After a gunman pledging allegiance to ISIS carried out the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history, attorneys with the American Civil Liberties Union pointed their finger toward Christians in blame.

But leading Christians from organizations across the country rejected this characterization, stressing that while they disagree with gay marriage, they promote the dignity of every human life, no matter the sexual orientation.  

Early Sunday morning, 29-year-old Omar Mateen of Port St Lucie, Florida, opened fire in a gay night club in Orlando. He took hostages and engaged in an hours-long standoff with police before being killed. At least 49 people were killed and 53 injured, the highest death toll of any mass shooting in the nation’s history.

Mateen had pledged allegiance to ISIS in a 911 call he made from inside the nightclub, authorities said.

He had “strong indications of radicalization,” according to FBI director James Comey. President Barack Obama, in his remarks Monday morning, acknowledged that the shooting “is being treated as a terrorist investigation. It appears that the shooter was inspired by various extremist information that was disseminated over the Internet.”

In the hours after the shooting, ACLU attorney Chase Strangio skewered those who offered their “thoughts and prayers” for the victims and their families. “You know what is gross — your thoughts and prayers and Islamophobia after you created this anti-queer climate,” he tweeted.

He continued by lambasting “the Christian right” for pushing legislation to protect the conscience rights of individuals and business owners. “The Christian Right has introduced 200 anti-LGBT bills in the last six months and people blaming Islam for this. No.”

Another ACLU member, Eunice Rho, chastised GOP lawmakers expressing solidarity and offering prayers after the shooting. Rho accused them of sponsoring the “extreme, anti-LGBT First Amendment Defense Act.”

Yet conservative Christian leaders rejected the idea that policies protecting the right to decline participation in same-sex weddings were somehow tied to the Orlando massacre.

Matthew Franck, director of the William E. and Carol G. Simon Center on Religion and the Constitution at the Witherspoon Institute, told CNA that upholding Christian teaching on marriage is not equivalent to violence.

“Christians who have resisted the redefinition of marriage, and who now want to be free to live what their faith teaches them is the truth about marriage, do not hate anyone, and legislation to protect their freedom is not ‘anti-LGBT’ except in the minds of the intolerant enforcers of coerced conformity,” he told CNA.

“The worst response to an atrocity is to take it as validation of one’s own political passions and an excuse to demonize one’s political opponents,” he said. “Sadly, this is what some representatives of the American Civil Liberties Union have done.”

“In the wake of the horror in Orlando, the temptation to demonize any group making arguments for its rights in the public square – LGBT, Christian, or Muslim – should be steadfastly resisted by all people of decency.”

Ryan T. Anderson of the Heritage Foundation, co-author of the book ‘What is Marriage?’ agreed. “Anti-LGBT bigotry exists and is wrong. It should be condemned,” he told CNA. “But supporting man-woman marriage and male-female bathrooms aren’t examples of it.”

Dr. Robert George, a law professor at Princeton University and senior fellow at the Witherspoon Institute, said the accusations would normally be considered “outrageous and defamatory” but “can be forgiven” since they were issued shortly after a mass shooting that was a “truly traumatizing event,” and at a time “when people are angry and grieving.”

Americans must mourn together and not point fingers at each other, he insisted.

“Now is not a time for returning rhetorical fire or trying to make a person who has said something regrettable look foolish. It is certainly not a time for people on either, or any, side of a moral or political dispute to attempt to score points or advance an agenda,” said George, who also co-authored the book ‘What is Marriage?’

Rather, “it is a time for grieving” and “a time for prayer and a time for solidarity,” he said.

After the shooting, Christian leaders expressed their condolences for the victims and their families.

Catholic bishops have asked for prayers for all involved. Masses are being offered for victims, both in Orlando and around the country. “The merciful love of Christ calls us to solidarity with the suffering and to ever greater resolve in protecting the life and dignity of every person,” said Archbishop Joseph Kurtz of Louisville, head of the U.S. bishops’ conference, in a statement.

“We weep with those who mourn their loved ones as we also weep with those who mourn the presence of such violent evil in the world. Rom 12:15,” Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, tweeted on Monday.

“Like all Americans, I am deeply saddened and outraged by the murder of 49 Americans in ?#‎Orlando??,” Lt. Gen. (Ret.) Jerry Boykin, executive vice president of the Family Research Council, stated on Monday in a Facebook post.

“Our prayers go out to all those affected by the Florida shooting,” the National Organization for Marriage tweeted on Monday.

 

Full Article

Full Article