Richmond, Va., Nov 6, 2019 / 12:00 pm (CNA).- Tuesday’s state election results suggest coming fights over abortion, religious freedom, and gun restrictions in Virginia and Kentucky.
In Virginia, Democrats won both chambers of the state legislatu… […]
Vatican City, Nov 6, 2019 / 08:15 am (CNA).- St. Paul announced Jesus Christ to “idol worshippers” in Athens without attacking them, but by building bridges, Pope Francis said Wednesday.
“We also ask the Holy Spirit today to teach us… […]
Melbourne, Australia, Nov 6, 2019 / 07:00 am (CNA).- Two former employees of the cathedral school in Melbourne, Australia are expressing strong doubts about the charges that landed Cardinal George Pell— the most senior member of the hierarchy ever convicted of sexual abuse— in prison.
The former employees, Lil Sinozic and Jean Corish, have also expressed disappointment that Pell’s defence team did not call them as witnesses in the trial.
Pell, 78, was convicted of exposing himself and forcing two choir boys to commit sex acts while fully vested in his Sunday Mass garb, almost immediately after Mass in the priests’ sacristy at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in 1996. Pell was at that time Archbishop of Melbourne.
He was also convicted of fondling one of the boys in a corridor in 1997.
Pell has maintained his innocence, with his defense making central the argument that the alleged crimes would have been, under the circumstances, “simply impossible.”
Both Cornish and Sinozic were on duty nearly every Sunday morning at the cathedral in late 1996.
Sinozic, a former teacher and executive assistant to then Father— now Monsignor— Charles Portelli, who was Pell’s master of ceremonies, echoed the defense, insisting that the circumstances of the alleged crimes as presented to the jury simply did not add up.
“I just know for a fact that what they’re describing could not have happened, given the situation in the sacristy after Mass…to say that there was this five minute interval where these acts were performed, and nobody saw or heard anything is ridiculous. I don’t know why the jury was led to believe otherwise,” she told CNA in an interview.
Pell was convicted Dec. 11, 2018 on five charges of sexual abuse. CNA reported last year that his initial trial, bound by a gag order, ended in a mistrial; this fact was confirmed by one of the judges in the Aug. 21 proceeding.
The prosecution rested on the testimony of one of the alleged victims— the one reported to have suffered two instances of abuse by Pell. The other victim died in 2014 and was unable to testify, but had in 2001 denied to his mother that any abuse occurred while he was a member of the choir.
Although Sinozic was not present on the date of the alleged incidents, she said she was very familiar with the Sunday Mass routine within the cathedral, and the behavior of the people involved.
“Normally the archbishop would go out the front of the cathedral, and he would spend at least half an hour, if not an hour, meeting and greeting people,” she said.
“Particularly at that time, when he was new, everyone was curious about him and wanted to get to know him. So he would have spent quite a good deal of time out front just chatting to people. And then he was always followed by his entourage; he would have had his master of ceremonies, other people hanging on, and the sacristy was always busy as a beehive after Mass, as you might imagine.”
She also pointed out that Cornish, her colleague, would have been patrolling the area where the alleged incident occurred “all the time” because there was a problem with tourists coming in near the sacristy, and walking into the cathedral during Mass.
Though Cornish told CNA that her recollections of the months of Oct. 1996 to Christmas 1996 are “sketchy to say the least,” she confirmed Sinozic’s view that it would be highly unlikely for the archbishop to be totally alone minutes after the end of Mass.
“It could be up to an hour after the end of Mass before the area was clear of people who were in all the areas mentioned by the accuser, including the priests sacristy which was the busiest of all the sacristies at that time,” Cornish said in an emailed response to CNA’s questions.
Cornish is the former principal of Good Shepherd Catholic school in Melbourne. She said her office at the time in 1996 was in the presbytery, which was connected to the cathedral.
The archbishop had asked her to be the lead staffer for the forthcoming centenary celebrations of St Patrick’s Cathedral in addition to her regular job as the school principal.
She said the archbishop would always spend a great deal of time shaking hands and greeting people after Mass, even as protestors sometimes made their presence known with placards, shouting slogans like as “Pell go to hell” and ”We will get you Pell no matter what.”
Cornish also said she was in the habit of observing the activities and movement of people in the cathedral’s sacristy area.
“This was something I had learned to do even in the short 2 months I had been there, as the main sacristy corridor door was open to allow the altar servers, the assistant sacristan, Ralph [now deceased] and Alan the florist as well as others who attended to the sanctuary and sacred vessels to access the area freely.”
Cornish said she believes that the area where the abuse allegedly occurred was the “busiest and most open” of the sacristy areas, and reiterated that Pell was never alone before, during, or after a Sunday Mass.
To get to the vesting room, which did not have its own door, one would have had to go through the main sacristy, Sinozic said. She said the altar boys, who allegedly were drinking communion wine in the room where the alleged abuse occurred, would have had to go through several doors to get to the vesting room.
If the boys made their way back there, she said she finds it hard to believe that no one saw them.
“George is too smart to do something so stupid. Why would he do something like that? Knowing that anyone could walk in any second,” she commented.
Someone would have asked what they were doing, Sinozic said, particularly an hour after Mass when all the other boys would have gone home, and their parents would be wondering where they were.
In addition, the cathedral had an evening Mass, so additional people would have already been in the cathedral preparing, she said. Cornish agreed, adding that it was “quite a major undertaking” to get the church ready again after a large concelebrated Mass.
“And they never mentioned anything for 22 years…why all of a sudden?” Sinozic wondered.
The incident is alleged to have occured when Pell was fully vested for Mass. Sinozic expressed doubt that one of the boys would not have run away while the abuse was taking place, or at least called out to the other people that would have surely been in the area.
Court documents report that “the two boys made some objections but did not quite yell. They were sobbing, in shock, and whimpering. During the offending, Cardinal Pell told them to be quiet, trying to stop them from crying.”
The Court of Appeals in Victoria upheld Pell’s conviction last summer. After an appellate panel announced its decision at a court proceeding Aug. 21, the cardinal was returned to prison. The Chief Justice ruled that Pell will be eligible to apply for parole after he has served three years and eight months of his six year sentence.
Pell has been held in solitary confinement, and is not permitted to celebrate Mass in prison. He has recently obtained a prison job weeding a courtyard.
Cornish said Paul Galbally, Pell’s solicitor, contacted her prior to his first trial, and they talked at length and then again later. She said she had to think through the dates at first, and then called him and told him she was not actually in an office in the sacristies at that time, but later had a full-time job and an office diagonally across the corridor from the archbishop’s sacristy.
“I think Paul did not think my testimony would be helpful,” she said.
Sinozic also spoke to Pell’s solicitor at the beginning of the trial, but says she was never contacted after that. She said she’d agreed to testify, but said she suspects that she was not called as a witness because she wasn’t there on those actual dates.
“I think maybe they thought it wasn’t necessary, but I thought it would have given the jury a different perspective of the man if two laypeople got up, particularly women, and particularly teachers,” she commented.
“We know how to spot children who are out of place, because we did yard duty for many years and we can tell if something’s amiss. And we would have given a different side of view for the jury to perhaps reflect on. Because they were saying it’s just priests sticking up for each other— a men’s club.”
Cornish echoed Sinozic, saying that both of them dealt with every aspect of cathedral life, with Lil having been a vice principal and Jean having been a principal of a school of 1,000 children, and having dealt with pedophile cases before.
“I just think that Lillian Sinozic and I would have perhaps been able to give an overall picture long term of the workings of the cathedral from a female perspective…However I accept that at the time the lawyers probably thought we could not add anything to the picture.”
Pell’s attorneys did not respond to a CNA request for comment.
Pell’s appeal was presented on three grounds, two of which were procedural and dismissed by all three appeal judges.
The judges were divided on Pell’s primary ground of appeal, that the decision of the jury was “unreasonable.”
At particular issue was the question of whether the jury which convicted Pell had properly weighed all of the evidence presented in his defense, or reached the determination of guilt despite the demonstration of clear “reasonable doubt” that he committed the crimes with which he was charged.
Chief Justice Anne Ferguson and Court President Chris Maxwell formed the majority in favor of rejecting Pell’s appeal that the jury verdict was unreasonable on the evidence presented, finding that it was open to the jury to find beyond “reasonable doubt about the truth of the complainant’s account.”
In an extensive dissent from the majority finding, Justice Mark Weinberg noted that the entirety of the evidence against Pell consisted of the testimony of a single accuser, whereas more than 20 witnesses were produced to testify against his narrative.
Pell will appeal his conviction to the Australian High Court, exercising his last legal avenue to overturn his conviction.
“Pell comes across on TV as a bit arrogant and cold, but that’s not what he’s really like,” Sinozic said.
“And people get the wrong idea of him and just dislike him for some reason. So they were happy to blame him and use him as a scapegoat for all the other people that did something.”
Cornish also defended Pell’s character.
“Nothing will convince me that the Cardinal was capable or had tendencies towards committing this crime. A finer, more upstanding man I have never met,” she said.
“He is a man of black and white. He says what he believes, always taught what is right and is no man’s fool…He is a family man, equally at home in the presence of women, men and children.”
Washington D.C., Nov 6, 2019 / 04:00 am (CNA).- U.S. senator and noted hip-hop enthusiast Marco Rubio shared his thoughts on rapper Kanye West’s new gospel album in a recent interview with CNA.
“I don’t know if I like it or dislike it,” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) told CNA of the track “Selah” on West’s highly-anticipated album “Jesus is King.” Rubio said the track was the only one he had listened to on the album as of Monday.
The Florida senator has often spoken publicly about his fondness for rap, previously professing a preference for the West Coast rappers of the 1990s in their musical feud with New York East Coast artists. In a 2012 interview, Rubio described Eminem as “the only guy that speaks at any sort of depth” in the genre.
“He’s a guy that does music that talks about the struggles of addiction and before that violence, with growing up in a broken family, not being a good enough father,” Rubio said of Eminem in 2012, while noting it was harder to find time to play rap music with a growing family of children around.
Returning to West’s new offering, Rubio told CNA that “he’s an interesting artist, and obviously someone who is going through a lot positively, and potentially, I don’t know, negatively as well,” Rubio said of West. “I don’t mean to be judgmental, he’s doing it in the public eye,” he said, “and it’s not the first time that he has religious themes in his music.”
West’s track “Jesus Walks” was featured on his 2004 album “College Dropout.”
“His faith is clearly something that calls to him, and obviously it’s a road he’s been on for a while and it’s interesting to see it cross over into his music,” Rubio said. “What’s most interesting, however, is to see the critical reaction to it.”
Rubio discussed the album with CNA, along with his vision for “common good economics” Nov. 4, ahead of a major speech on the same theme at the Catholic University of America on Tuesday morning.
The senator addressed students at Catholic University’s Busch School of Business on “common good capitalism” and the dignity of work, during a Vocation of Business Class taught by Professor Andreas Widmer.
Rubio said that profit making has been prioritized over the dignity of workers, with the result of many Americans being “left behind” in an economy that, overall, has grown in recent decades. He cited Pope Francis’ warning that “finance overwhelms the real economy” when profit is prioritized above all else.
The political right, he said, upholds the rights of companies and shareholders to profits, but ignores the rights of workers. The political left, meanwhile, promotes “free everything” but will “rarely focus on our obligation to work.”
“When an economy stops providing dignified work for millions of people,” he said, parents no longer have time for their children and resources to volunteer and contribute to their communities.
Furthermore, when men in particular do not have dignified work to provide for their families, he said, “the impact is corrosive and devastating.” He pointed to evidence in declines in rates of marriage, childbirth, and life expectancy, and corresponding increases in drug abuse, drug overdose and suicide.
Yet as a solution, “socialism would be far worse” than the current challenges of working families in the U.S., Rubio said.
Instead, he said, Catholics should look to “restore ‘common good capitalism’” where people have dignified work and businesses can make a profit, while reinvesting in the company.
Professor Andrew Abela, founding dean of the Busch School, agreed with the importance of Rubio drawing attention to those “left behind” in today’s economy. While the Busch School emphasizes “entrepreneurial capitalism” that exists “to serve others,” today’s “crony capitalism” promotes greed, selfishness, and a utilitarian view of workers, he said.
“The moment it’s cheaper to move to China, you’re gone,” he said of the view of workers by corporations under “crony capitalism.”
Rubio pitched specific policies as an antidote to today’s economy, including preferences in the tax code for job creation, families with children, and higher wages for workers rather than company stock buybacks.
Rubio also said the U.S. should look to invest in whole industries such as aerospace, telecommunications, transportation and housing, “to retrofit past engines of productivity” for the new economy, and also revamp the Small Business Administration.
The proposal to reenergize the Small Business Administration was “music to my ears,” Widmer told CNA, as his class seeks to form principled entrepreneurs who will create dignified jobs.
“We’re not the business school you go to, to become the next president of GE,” he said. “Here you come to run your family business.”
Immigrant Catholics have had a storied tradition of running small businesses in the U.S., he said. “The Catholics aren’t the Bill Gateses of the world. The Catholics are the dry cleaners and the lawn care companies and all of that kind of stuff,” he said.
“We have a finance department and all of that, but the majority of our students are people who will go back and run Main Street, not Wall Street and not Silicon Valley,” he said.
Washington D.C., Nov 6, 2019 / 02:50 am (CNA).- On October 24, CBS published a 20-minute documentary following the lives of several different groups of people in polyamorous relationships, also called consensual non-monogamous relationships. In such relationships, three or more people in a group are sexually and emotionally involved with the other members of the group.
On the same day, ABC’s Nightline aired a segment on actor Nico Tortorella, whose open marriage with Bethany Meyers is documented in Tortorella’s new book, Space Between: Explorations of Love, Sex, and Fluidity.
The week prior, Congresswoman Katie Hill was reported to have been in a “throuple,” or a threesome relationship, with her estranged husband and a female staffer. She has subsequently announced her resignation from Congress.
To read the news, it would seem that consensual non-monogamy (CNM) is prolific. An oft-cited statistic in stories about CNM claims that one in five Americans has participated in such a relationship at some point in their lives.
“There is nothing with which modern relationship journalism seems so peculiarly infatuated as non-monogamy. Call it ‘polyamory,’ ‘swinging,’ or ‘consensual non-monogamy’ —if reporting is to be believed, it’s everywhere,” Charles Fain Lehman, a staff writer for Washington Free Beacon, wrote in a recent analysis for the Institute of Family Studies.
But really, Lehman argues, polyamory is not everywhere. Or it is at least not as common as most media coverage, and the ubiquitous “one in five” statistic, would make it seem.
“Where does that number come from? Essentially all of the articles point to the same source, a 2016 study in the Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy by a group of researchers at the Kinsey Institute. The abstract of the study does indeed confirm that ‘more than one in five (21.9% in Study 1; 21.2% in Study 2) participants report engaging in CNM at some point in their lifetime,’” Lehman said.
However, a closer look at the study reveals that the two surveys on which it is based rely only on information from single people – in the first study aged 21 and older, in the second study aged 18 and older. The first study surveyed people who were legally unmarried at the time, while the second study surveyed people who were either single or just casually dating.
Lehman said this means the conclusions of the survey can only apply to the single population and not to married people, even though all married people were at one time single.
“But, as decades of research have shown, married people vary systematically from their single peers. Among other factors, they are whiter, wealthier, and more religious,” Lehman noted.
“It is entirely plausible that a sample of entirely single people overrepresents a preference for polyamory—indeed, that they have not selected out of singlehood and into stable monogamy is one such indicator.”
Moreover, Lehman said he is not sure that the “one in five” statistic can even be accurately claimed for the single population, because of the phrasing of one of the questions in the survey and what may be a difference of definition.
“According to the study, ‘(a)ll participants were asked if they had ever had an open sexual relationship.’ What’s an open sexual relationship? ‘An agreed-upon, sexually non-exclusive relationship,’” Lehman noted.
“This language could, of course, describe ‘swinging’ or ‘opening up.’ But it could also quite plausibly describe casual dating, in which singles knowingly date, and sleep with, multiple people at once,” Lehman said.
“Such relationships are perhaps, strictly speaking, a-traditional, but they do not meet most people’s intuitive definitions of ‘polyamory,’ or even ‘open relationships’ (which connotes a degree of romantic, but not sexual, commitment—a nuance uncaptured by the question),” he added.
Even some CNM relationships would not fit this definition, if they are sexually exclusive relationships between three or more people, but are not open to others outside of the set group, Lehman wrote.
“There’s at least one other reason to be suspicious of Haupert et al.’s finding,” Lehman added. “Their methodology notes that they deliberately oversampled ‘homosexual men and women.’ In fact, 15.3% of study 1 and 14.3% of study 2 respondents self-identified as LGB (lesbian, gay, or bisexual). That’s substantially higher than the population-wide prevalence of LGB people, which is generally pinned at 3 to 5%.”
“Previous research cited by the paper has shown, and Haupert et al. confirm, that identifying as lesbian, gay, or bisexual is associated with a significantly higher likelihood of reporting engaging in consensual non-monogamy,” he said.
“In other words, the study substantially oversampled the very subpopulation they then find is far more likely to engage in CNM.”
Lehman said it is not explained in the study whether the researchers adjusted for this bias in the results, though he said it seems unlikely. But the frequently-cited statistic that at least 20% of all Americans have dabbled in CNM seems to be a product of sample selection instead of reality, he noted.
“As always, the reality is probably more boring. Some single people engage in non-exclusive relationships; a smaller, unmeasured share probably engage in more formal ‘polyamorous’ or ‘consensually non-monogamous’ relationships, and that share has probably risen slightly,” he wrote.
In fact, he noted, the 2018 “i-Fidelity” survey by YouGov for The Wheatley Institution at BYU found that roughly 12% of Americans had ever engaged in an “open sexual relationship,” defined as “an agreed-upon, sexually non-exclusive relationship with more than one partner.”
Millennials were more likely to have engaged in such relationships, but still at a rate of less than 20%, he added.
“Polyamory may sound fun and exotic, but most of us don’t live such fun and exotic (and complicated) lives. By their 30s, most Americans (80%) are either married or single, with little evidence that ‘alternative’ structures are filling the gap for a significant share of adults. As Dr. Alan Hawkins recently put it, ‘the norm of marital monogamy is not crumbling’ after all.”
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Baltimore, Md., Nov 6, 2019 / 12:03 am (CNA).- Catholic Relief Services, the official charitable arm of the U.S. bishops, is expressing strong opposition to the Trump administration’s decision to withdraw from the 2015 Paris Climate Accord.
“With the planet warming at an alarming rate and the poorest of the poor left to withstand the consequences, there will undoubtedly be more global instability, forced migration and conflict,” said Bill O’Keefe, CRS’ executive vice president of Mission, Mobilization and Advocacy.
“It is not too late to take meaningful steps to care for creation and mitigate some of the worst impacts of climate change, which is why we hope our government reconsiders this misguided decision.”
On Monday, the United States gave its formal notification of its intent to exit the Paris Climate Accord.
The Dec. 2015 agreement, which 188 nations signed following the United Nations Climate Change Conference, came into force during Nov. 2016.
The coalition of nations agreed to attempt to limit the rise of global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels by the end of the century.
Pope Francis hailed the agreement as “historic” and said that it would require “a concerted and generous commitment” from members of the international community. Since then, officials of the Holy See have reiterated its view that climate change is a moral issue and has an effect on human dignity.
At a UN climate change summit in Poland in Dec. 2018, Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin urged the implementation of the Paris Climate Accord by “easing the impact of climate change through responsible mitigation and adaptation measures.”
“The scientific data at our disposal clearly show the urgent need for swift action, within a context of ethics, equity and social justice,” Parolin said.
Some 60 dioceses in the United States have so far pledged to continue to support action to mitigate climate change, along with close to 200 religious communities, more than 100 parishes, and other Catholic groups in an agreement affirming the goals of the Paris Climate Accord.
President Donald Trump had announced his intention to withdraw the United States from the agreement after he took office in 2017, citing economic downsides to the plan’s implementation.
The United States is the world’s second largest emitter of greenhouse gases, after China. Trump has previously said that the agreement put “no meaningful obligations on the world’s leading polluters” like China.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued a formal notification to the United Nations of its intention to withdraw on the first possible day to do so, the BBC reports. UN rules meant it was not possible for the U.S. to start the withdrawal process until Nov. 4, 2019.
The withdrawal will take effect on Nov. 4, 2020, one day after the 2020 presidential election.
According to the BBC, the Paris Climate Accord included efforts to limit the amount of greenhouse gases emitted by human activity to the same levels that trees, soil and oceans can absorb naturally, beginning at some point between 2050 and 2100, as well as a review of each country’s contribution to cutting emissions every five years.
Pompeo said the U.S. would instead follow “a realistic and pragmatic model,” using “all energy sources and technologies cleanly and efficiently.”
CRS said in a Nov. 4 statement that the Paris Climate Accord signifies international recognition that climate change is especially threatening “the most vulnerable who contributed the least to it,” and asserted that the agreement would “secure the cooperation, action and resources needed to address the problem.”
The agency also quoted Pope Francis’ 2015 encyclical Laudato Si on the environment: “Faced with a climate emergency, we must take action accordingly, in order to avoid perpetrating a brutal act of injustice towards the poor and future generations.”
CRS noted that in Bangladesh, rising sea levels are encroaching on water tables and coastal homes. In Central America, CRS said in 2017, coffee farmers are losing their crops due to more frequent drought and because warmer temperatures help pests thrive.
According to data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the years 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 are the four warmest years in recorded history, with 2019 projected to be in the top three.
The next UN climate summit will begin in Madrid in December.
The death of terrorist leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi raises some important questions about Islamic beliefs, as well as about the motivations of terrorists. Terrorist leaders claim that their actions are perfectly in accord with the […]
London, England, Nov 5, 2019 / 07:01 pm (CNA).- The British government launched Monday a public consultation on a proposed framework for the legal provision of abortion in Northern Ireland. It proposes that elective abortions be available up to 12 or 14 weeks gestation.
“With a legal duty now placed on the Government to change the abortion law in Northern Ireland, this consultation focuses on what new regulatory framework must be put in place for lawful access to abortion services in Northern Ireland,” Julian Smith, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, wrote in a foreword to the consultation begun Nov. 4.
“In doing so, the health and safety of women and girls, and clarity and certainty for the medical profession, are at the forefront of the Government’s consideration,” he stated.
The consultation will close Dec. 16. It includes 15 questions regarding particularities of how legal abortion provision should be made in Northern Ireland.
The government intends to published its response to the consultation and details of the action it will take within 12 weeks after Dec. 16.
Under the Northern Ireland (Executive Formation etc) Act 2019, passed in July by the British parliament, the government is obliged to create legal access to abortion in the region by March 31, 2020.
The act also provides that since Oct. 22, abortion has been decriminalized in Northern Ireland, and a moratorium has been placed on abortion-related criminal prosecutions. Since Oct. 22, the abortion of a child capable of being born alive, except when the purpose is to preserve the life of the mother, remains unlawful.
Previously, abortion was legally permitted in the region only if the mother’s life was at risk or if there was risk of long term or permanent, serious damage to her mental or physical health.
The NI EF Act was passed because the Northern Ireland Assembly, which has been suspended nearly three years due to a dispute between the two major governing parties, was not able to do business by Oct. 21.
Smith said that among the guiding factors of the provision for legal abortions “will be to ensure that there is a balancing of rights and obligations, as far as practicable, so that no one is compelled to provide services that they have an objection to on the grounds of conscience. This will be recognised and respected, in accordance with other existing medical procedures.”
“We will also continue working with the healthcare profession to ensurethat the legal provisions can also be accompanied by models of care, training, professional guidance and professional standards of practice to assist healthcare professionals in Northern Ireland to clearly understand their legal rights, obligations and duties.”
The government is proposing a legislative framework that will be informed by a UN report based on the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. The NI EF Act requires that the government implement the report’s recommendations.
The consultation includes proposals for the grounds for procuring abortion and gestational time limits; who can provide abortions and where; conscientious objection; and notification requirements.
The government proposes that abortion be available unconditionally up to 12 or 14 weeks gestation.
It proposes that “the gestational time limit in circumstances where the continuance of the pregnancy would cause risk of injury to the physical or mental health of the pregnant woman or girl, or any existing children or her family, greater than the risk of terminating the pregnancy” be either 22 or 24 weeks. It notes that abortion under these circumstances is lawful in England and Wales up to 24 weeks, though “with advances in medicine and healthcare, it could be possible that a fetus having reached a gestation of 22 weeks (21 weeks + 6 days) is viable and thus capable of being born alive.”
In cases of fetal abnormality, the government is proposing that abortion without time limit be available. It also proposes that abortion without time limit be allowed where there is risk to the life of the mother or it is necessary to provent grave permanent injury to her physical or mental health.
The government proposes that a medical pracitioner or any other registered healthcare professional be able to provide abortions, provided they are appropriately trained and competent to provide treatment in accordance with their professional body’s requirements and guidelines.
It is proposed that abortions could be procured in a variety of settings, with the government noting in particular that medical abortions are becoming more common and can be administered at home. It adds that abortions past 22/24 weeks should be provided in hospitals.
While in England, Wales, and Scotland two doctors must certify that there were lawful grounds for abortion, the government is considering whether only one doctor’s certification should be required in Northern Ireland, “as it is likely that there will be a more significant number of people raising conscientious objections than in other parts of the UK. This could create practical difficulties, in particular delays in women accessing termination services, if two medical professionals, both with an understanding of the woman or girl’s situation, are required to certify the grounds for an abortion.”
The government is also proposing that Northern Ireland have a notification process so there can be data to provide transparency around abortion access.
Regarding conscientious objection, the government proposes that it should be allowed for direct participation in the abortion, “but not associated ancillary, administrative or managerial tasks.” This is in line with the rest of the UK. It would also compel participation when the abortion is deemed necessary to save the mother’s life or to prevent grave permanent injury to her physical or mental health, and another healthcare professional is not immediately available.
The government is asking whether buffer zones should be set up around locations where abortions are procured, barring protest in the locations’ immediate vicinity.
The UK will hold a general election Dec. 12, shortly before the public consultation is due to end.
The amendment to the NI EF Act obliging the government to provide for legal abortion in Northern Ireland was introduced by Stella Creasy, a Labour MP who represents a London constituency.
Bills to legalize abortion in cases of fatal fetal abnormality, rape, or incest failed in the Northern Ireland Assembly in 2016.
In October, the High Court in Belfast had ruled that the region’s ban on the abortion of unborn children with fatal abnormalities violated the UK’s human rights commitments.
Northern Irish women have been able to procure free National Health Service abortions in England, Scotland, and Wales since November 2017.
Austin, Texas, Nov 5, 2019 / 06:00 pm (CNA).- The Texas Conference of Catholic Bishops have called on Gov. Greg Abbott to delay or cancel the execution of Rodney Reed, a convicted murderer who maintains his innocence.
“The Texas Catholic Conference of Bishops engages in advocacy efforts for every single Texas execution by urging the Board of Pardons and Paroles to grant reprieve as a matter of mercy based on our position that the death penalty is inadmissible in modern society,” said Jennifer Allmon, executive director of the Texas Conference for Catholic Bishops in a statement provided to CNA.
But, Allmon said, Reed’s case is different.
“In the case of Mr. Reed, we are engaging as a matter of justice rather than mercy because there is substantial evidence that he may not be guilty of this crime,” Allmon said.
“It would be a tremendous miscarriage of justice to allow the actual killer to go free while taking Mr. Reed’s life when there is untested DNA and an allegation of a confession by an alternate suspect that has not yet been investigated,” she said.
The Texas bishops will continue to pray for justice and for the family of Stacey Stites, who Reed was convicted of murdering.
Reed was sentenced to death in 1998 for the murder of 20-year-old Stites in Bastrop County, Texas. After not showing up to work on the morning of April 23, 1996, Stites’ body was discovered in a wooded area that afternoon. She had been strangled by her own belt, and had unknown male DNA in and around her body. Officers believe that she had been sexually assaulted.
At the time of her murder, Stites was engaged to be married to a police officer named Jimmy Fennell. Fennell was considered to be the main suspect in her murder, but the DNA on her body did not match his and he was never charged. Years after Stites’ murder, Fennell was sentenced to 10 years in prison for charges related to sexual assault.
Reed’s supporters allege that it was Fennell, not Reed, who killed Stites. DNA from the belt has not been tested and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals will not approve of new DNA testing.
A year after Stites’ murder, the DNA on her body was matched to that of Reed, who had a criminal history. Reed initially denied knowing Stites, but later changed his story and claimed they had a consensual sexual relationship and a secret affair.
Reed is due to be executed on Nov. 20.
Among those also calling for Gov. Abbott (R) to stop the execution are celebrities such as Kim Kardashian West, Rihanna, Meek Mill, and Gigi Hadid. A petition organized by The Action PAC on “FreeRodneyReed.com” requesting that Abbott stop the execution has been signed by over 1.1 million people.
Those who think Reed is innocent cite many concerns regarding his trial and the potential of a cover-up by the town’s police department. Reed, who is black, was convicted by an all-white jury. A man imprisoned with Fennell wrote in a sworn affidavit that Fennell had confessed to murdering Stites due to being angry that she had been in a relationship with a black man.
The Catholic Church is opposed to the use of capital punishment.
In a livestream conversation held on Oct. 10, the World Day Against the death penalty, Archbishops Paul Coakley of Oklahoma City and Wilton Gregory of Washington were joined by Bishop Frank DeWane of Venice (FL) discussed Church teaching on capital punishment and said that they believed the death penalty was outdated.
“What the Church wants us to understand is that taking a life, even the life of one who may have been guilty of a horrendous crime, is itself a continuation of violence,” said Gregory.
“It makes us violent to do violence against another human being” regardless of the circumstances, Gregory said.
Catholics, said DeWane, have a moral obligation to “say something” when life is not being respected, especially in instances that involve people who cannot speak for themselves.
© Catholic World Report