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 WASHINGTON-Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York called on everyone "concerned about the tragedy of abortion" to recommit to a "vision of life and love, a vision that excludes no one" on January 14. His statement marks the 43rd anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion. Cardinal Dolan chairs the Committee on Pro-Life Activities of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

"Most Americans oppose a policy allowing legal abortion for virtually any reason - though many still do not realize that this is what the Supreme Court gave us," wrote Cardinal Dolan. "Most want to protect unborn children at later stages of pregnancy, to regulate or limit the practice of abortion, and to stop the use of taxpayer dollars for the destruction of unborn children. Yet many who support important goals of the pro-life movement do not identify as 'pro-life,' a fact which should lead us to examine how we present our pro-life vision to others."

"Even as Americans remain troubled by abortion," wrote Cardinal Dolan, a powerful and well-funded lobby holds "that abortion must be celebrated as a positive good for women and society, and those who cannot in conscience provide it are to be condemned for practicing substandard medicine and waging a 'war on women'." He said this trend was seen recently when President Obama and other Democratic leaders prevented passage of the Abortion Non-Discrimination Act, "a modest measure to provide for effective enforcement" of conscience laws.

"While this is disturbing," said Cardinal Dolan, "it is also an opportunity." Pro-life Americans should reach out to "the great majority of Americans" who are "open to hearing a message of reverence for life." He added that "we who present the pro-life message must always strive to be better messengers. A cause that teaches the inexpressibly great value of each and every human being cannot show disdain or disrespect for any fellow human being." He encouraged Catholics to take part, through prayer and action, in the upcoming "9 Days for Life" campaign, January 16-24. More information on the campaign is available online: www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxJwfcefUiU

He also cited the Year of Mercy called by Pope Francis as a time for women and men to find healing through the Church's Project Rachel post-abortion ministry.

The full text of Cardinal Dolan's message is available online.
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Keywords: Roe v. Wade, anniversary, Pro-Life, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, 9 Days for Life, USCCB, U.S. bishops, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Year of Mercy, Project Rachel, Pope Francis
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London, England, Feb 3, 2016 / 03:47 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Peter Tatchell is a passionate human rights campaigner who outwardly voices his support of same-sex marriage and LGBT issues.

In 2014, he proclaimed his condemnation against Ashers Bakery in Belfast, Ireland, which was found guilty of “discrimination” because a pair of Christian bakers refused to ice a cake that would read “Support Gay Marriage.”

But now, two years later, Tatchell has halted his previous claims against Ashers Bakery, saying his change of heart has been motivated by the defense of freedom.

“Much as I wish to defend the gay community, I also want to defend freedom of conscience, expression and religion,” Tatchell wrote in The Guardian Feb. 1, saying “the court was wrong to penalize Ashers and I was wrong to endorse its decision.”

The court found Ashers Bakery guilty of discrimination in 2014 when the bakers denied Gareth Lee's order for a pro-gay marriage cake. This verdict was backed in light of the Equality Commission of Northern Ireland, which sets laws against discrimination.  

Although Tatchell continues to endorse same-sex marriage and believes the lawsuit against Ashers to be a well-intentioned blow against homophobia, he ultimately found that the legal action against the bakery went “a step too far.”

After further consideration, Tatchell believes Ashers was simply acting in light of its right to religious freedom – not out of political bigotry, as the court's ruling suggested.

The “cake request was refused not because he was gay, but because of the message he asked for. There is no evidence that his sexuality was the reason Ashers declined his order,” Tatchell said.

“This finding of political discrimination against Lee sets a worrying precedent,” he said.

According to Tatchell, the anti-discrimination laws cited in the court’s verdict – such as Northern Ireland’s Equality Act and Fair Employment and Treatment Order – were never intended to “compel people to promote political ideas with which they disagreed.”

Tatchell also explained that this ruling could have dangerous implications for the future of other service providers. If Ashers Bakery was fined £500 for defending their Christian beliefs, other businesses are also at risk if they refuse their services to customers with bigoted messages.

“If the Ashers verdict stands it could, for example, encourage far-right extremists to demand that bakeries and other service providers facilitate the promotion of anti-migrant and anti-Muslim opinions,” Tatchell suggested.

Ashers Bakery filed for an appeal, seeking to overturn the verdict with senior judges in Belfast. The two-day hearing is scheduled to begin on Feb. 3.

“In my view, it is an infringement of freedom to require businesses to aid the promotion of ideas to which they conscientiously object,” Tatchell stated.

“Discrimination against people should be unlawful, but not against ideas.”

Photo credit: www.shutterstock.com.

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Vatican City, Feb 3, 2016 / 03:55 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis will leave for Mexico in just over a week. In a new interview with a Mexican news agency, he told citizens of the crime-ridden country that while there, he hopes to be a messenger of peace, which must be fought for daily.

“Violence, corruption, war, children who cannot go to school because of their countries at war, trafficking, arms manufacturers who sell weapons so that the wars in the world can continue.”

“More or less this is the climate in which we are living in the world today,” the Pope said in an interview with Mexican news agency Notimex State, published Feb. 3.

The interview marks the first time Pope Francis has participated in a collective interview, in which he responded to four questions posed by 33 people from various states across Mexico.

Francis recorded his answers to the questions, which were raised by some 16 women and 17 men, on Jan. 22, in his residence at the Vatican’s Saint Martha guesthouse.

Echoing the well-known prayer named after his patron, “The Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi,” the Pope said that “I would like to be an instrument of peace in Mexico,” but said that he won’t be able to do it alone.

“It is obvious that I cannot do it alone, it would be crazy if I said that, but with all of you, an instrument of peace,” he said, adding that peace is something that is “kneaded with your hands” every day through small gestures of charity.

“Peace is born from tenderness, peace is born from understanding, peace is born or made with dialogue, not in rupture,” he said, and emphasized the importance of dialogue in the various areas and environments of one’s life.

He also encouraged Mexico's citizens to pray to Our Lady of Guadalupe, “Mexico's mother,” for assistance in achieving peace in the country, which has been plagued by increasing violence and drug trafficking for years.

“I would ask each of you the question: do I ask the Virgin of Guadalupe, Mexico's mother, Empress of America, do I ask her for peace? Do I ask her to make peace, in that place, in that person?” he asked.

The Pope said he's going to pray to Our Lady of Guadalupe on behalf of Mexico's citizens, “that she gives you peace of heart, of family, of city and of country.”

Pope Francis is scheduled to visit Mexico from Feb. 12-17, just over a week from now. In addition to visiting the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, which he has said is the primary reason for the visit, Francis will also travel to the border U.S. border city Ciudad Juárez, as well as Chiapas, one of the poorest regions in the country.

In the interview, Francis said that he’s not coming to Mexico as a “Wise Man” with a list of messages, ideas or solutions to problems, but rather as “a pilgrim” who wants to receive from the people and culture he encounters.

“I’m going to look for the wealth of faith that you have, I'll try to be contaminated by that wealth of faith,” he said, adding that Mexico has an “idiosyncrasy, a way of being that is the result of a very long journey, of a history that was slowly forged” with both joy and sorrow, success and failure.

Above all, Mexico has the wealth of refusing to be “orphans” because of their Mother, he said, referring to the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe. This, Francis said, is perhaps “the greatest wealth that I will seek.”

Veneration of Our Lady of Guadalupe dates back to the 16th century, and surrounds a miraculous image of Mary left on a tilma, made from a piece of poor-quality cactus cloth.

It all started when a “Lady from Heaven” appeared to Saint Juan Diego, a poor Indian from Tepeyac, on a hill northwest of Mexico City. Over the course of a series of apparitions in 1531, the woman, who identified herself as the Mother of the True God, instructed Juan Diego to have the bishop build a church on the site.

As a sign, the now-famous image of Our Lady of Guadalupe, was imprinted miraculously on his tilma. Both the image and the tilma remain intact after more than 470 years.

The Pope said that when he thinks of Our Lady of Guadalupe, he things of “safety and tenderness.”

He said that he frequently prays to her whenever he has a problem or when he doesn’t know how to react to a bad situation. When these things happen, the Pope said he likes to repeat Mary’s words to St. Juan Diego during one of her apparitions: “Do not be afraid. Am I not here who am your Mother?”

“This is what I feel: that she is a Mother, that she cares, protects, carries a people forward, conducts a family, that she gives warmth to the home, tenderly caresses and takes away the fear. That's what I feel in front of the image.”

Pope Francis explained that during one of his two previous visits to the shrine before his election, someone attempted to explain the symbolic image to him, but he declined and preferred to sit in silence before the “talkative” image.

This time, which marks his third visit to the shrine, the Pope asked for a similar favor: “What I would ask is that this time…you leave me alone for a little while before the image. It is the favor I ask.”

In his final response, Francis offered a few of his own expectations for Mexicans, primarily that they wouldn’t keep their faith inside to themselves, but would instead go out “to the streets,” and become visible in public life.

“Faith must grow and go out and put itself into daily life, a public faith. And faith becomes stronger when is public, especially in times of crisis,” he said.

“There is a great blessing and a desire – expressed by you – of faith jumps out, that faith is a missionary faith, that faith is not bottled, like a tin can,” he said, explaining that faith is born from an encounter with Jesus, our savior.

From this encounter, faith then “has to go out on the street,” including our schools, places of work, and even our conversations with others, he said.

The Pope alluded to the Cristero War of the 1920s, saying that Mexico has “martyrs in your history who have given their lives to follow this path,” and encouraged them not to stay locked up inside with Jesus, but to let him out, because “if we don’t go out, he doesn’t go out.”

He said that to renew one’s faith in this way means not being afraid of conflicts, but instead means searching for solutions.

While this might have its risks, the Pope reminded Mexicans of Mary’s words to Juan Diego: “do not be afraid to go out, do not be afraid my little son, my little daughter. Am I not here who am your Mother?"

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IMAGE: Catholic News Service

By David Agren

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (CNS) -- When Father Alberto Melendez began ministering at the prison in this once-violent border city nine years ago, rival gangs ran criminal operations from behind bars. Riots broke out regularly; a 2009 tragedy claimed 20 lives.

"There was no system of control inside," Father Melendez recalled. Inmates "were the ones giving the orders."

Pope Francis will visit the prison, known as Cereso No. 3, during a day trip Feb. 17 to Ciudad Juarez, which borders El Paso, Texas, and once held the dubious distinction of murder capital of the world. That is an image local leaders are eager to shed and a reality no longer reflected in crime statistics. The prison, meanwhile, has undergone renovations, and security officials say the situation inside has calmed considerably.

The pope also plans to celebrate Mass at the U.S.-Mexico border while in Ciudad Juarez to draw attention to migration issues and will meet with some of the employers and workers from the maquiladoras, factories for exports that underpin the economy but cause complaints over low wages and questionable labor conditions.

The prison visit is expected to draw attention to the shortcomings of Mexico's prison system -- the credibility of which was challenged by cartel kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, who tunneled out of a maximum security facility in July and was recently recaptured. Issues such as overcrowding, inmate control and corruption are rife, along with violence, according to an annual report on prisons from the National Human Rights Commission.

Officials say times have changed in Ciudad Juarez, however, with the prisons there undergoing renovations, the most dangerous inmates being sent to federal facilities and U.S. certification being given last year.

"It hasn't improved 100 percent," Father Melendez said, "but it's improved greatly."

The improvements are hard to verify. The human rights commission's report from 2014 ranks prisons in Chihuahua state, which includes Ciudad Juarez, eighth among Mexico's 32 states. The Ciudad Juarez prison received a lower score in the report than it did in 2011. The report also found evidence of overcrowding there.

Inmates interviewed by Catholic News Service spoke in the presence of prison staff and were unwilling to talk about any hardships suffered in Ciudad Juarez or other correctional facilities, though they said the work of the prison ministry had helped with spiritual matters.

The Ciudad Juarez prison once symbolized the city's problems. It suffered 12 riots and 216 murders in 2010. Last year, there were no riots registered in the prison and only one homicide, according to Chihuahua state statistics.

One prison official said the pope's visit isn't entirely about validating their improvements, however.

"It's not an endorsement. It's a recognition of the work we have done and the inmate's good behavior, too," said Alejandrina Saucedo Hernandez, spokeswoman for the prison. "It's a way for forgiving all that happened in Ciudad Juarez and those involved," which includes the acts of "some of those on the inside."

Father Roberto Luna, pastor of Corpus Christi Parish and former director of the diocesan outreach to the young offenders, echoed those comments on reconciliation, though he expressed skepticism on the claims of prison improvements. He stopped working in the juvenile facility due to disagreements after its control was transferred form the city's social work department to the state government.

The papal visit is "a message for everyone to tell them, we can reconcile with those who did wrong," Father Luna said. "It's the year of mercy. ... We can reconcile with everyone, even those who did wrong."

Father Luna, speaking of his time inside prisons, says inmates paid inflated prices for personal items on the inside -- $5 for a roll of toilet paper, for example -- while families often feed their imprisoned relatives because the food served on the inside can be inedible.

"If you truly reform a prison, you do away with the businesses inside," Father Luna said. Currently, "all of the privileges you have inside, you pay for."

Father Robert Coogan, an American priest and prison ministry director for the Diocese of Saltillo, said Mexican prisons have positive points, more evident prior to the crackdown on drug cartels and organized crime that began in 2006. He said compared to prisons in the United States, Mexican prisons have more family visiting days and conjugal visit privileges, and Mexican inmates spend more time outdoors and are able to leave their cells more often. Mexican prisons also aspire to rehabilitation -- a goal often not achieved -- which affords more access to work in prison workshops, artistic pursuits and educational opportunities.

There are shortcomings, though.

"What was terrible and what is still terrible is the judicial system," said Father Coogan, whose prison was controlled for a time by the Los Zetas cartel, to the point they painted his chapel over his objections.

Pope Francis' message remains uncertain, though Father Coogan expressed hope that the plight of innocent people being put behind bars would be addressed, along with the stigmas facing recently released prisoners, several of whom live with him in an informal halfway house and face persistent police persecution.

Attracting parishioners to prison ministry work also presents problems as many express fears of working with inmates, and those making donations offer low-quality items.

"Don't give me anything you wouldn't give your mother," he told one person in rejecting a donation of beat-up Bibles with torn pages.

Father Luna said he promoted sacraments in prison. He cited now-retired Pope Benedict XVI in calling sacraments "the seeds of faith." He said many young offenders have become part of his parish community.

"I believe in rehabilitation," he said. "I saw many young people inside hurting. Now I'm welcoming them into the church. I'm baptizing their children. I'm marrying them." 

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Follow Agren on Twitter: @el_reportero.

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