Vatican City, Mar 20, 2020 / 09:30 am (CNA).- The Vatican department for liturgy published guidelines Friday for bishops and priests on the celebration of Holy Week, the Triduum, and Easter liturgies during the coronavirus […]
Washington D.C., Mar 20, 2020 / 12:00 pm (CNA).- Efforts to combat the spread of coronavirus should not be used to override ethical restrictions on the use of aborted fetal tissue in medical research, Catholic bioethicists warned on Thursday. The … […]
Rome, Italy, Mar 20, 2020 / 11:53 am (CNA).- Two convents, one in Rome and one in a town nearby the capital city, have been isolated as the majority of religious sisters in the communities tested positive for COVID-19.
According to Italian news agency ANSA, 59 sisters have tested positive for coronavirus between the two communities and are being isolated within their convents.
In Grottaferrata, a town on the outskirts of the metropolitan area of Rome, the religious community of the Daughters of San Camillo have had 40 sisters test positive for COVID-19, one of whom has been hospitalized. There are around 50 sisters living at the convent.
The religious community is typically occupied with caring for the sick.
The Angelic Sisters of Saint Paul, which has a convent in Rome, had 19 sisters out of 21 test positive for the coronavirus.
On their property, the sisters run a kindergarten, elementary, middle, and high school; however, classes had been canceled several weeks before the sisters’ positive coronavirus tests.
“We are also wondering what to do, we are also trying to understand the situation,” a sister of the Daughters of San Camillo told ANSA March 20.
“But we are fine, we hope to provide communications when the situation will be clearer.”
Mother Maria Ortensia Turati of the Little Missionary Sisters of Charity died March 16 at a hospital in Tortona. She was 89. And on March 15, Sister Maria Caterina Cafasso, 82, of the Mater Dei Province, died.
Bishop Derio Olivero of the Diocese of Pinerolo recently tested positive for COVID-19.
The bishop, age 59, was admitted to the hospital March 19. He is the second Italian bishop known to have had coronavirus.
Bishop Antonio Napolioni of Cremona was hospitalized in early March for COVID-19, but was released early this week to finish recovering under home quarantine.
As of March 19, the Italian dioceses around Milan had reported the deaths of 30 priests during the coronavirus outbreak, with at least 28 due to COVID-19.
Jerusalem, Mar 20, 2020 / 11:30 am (CNA).- As Easter is approaching, the Holy Land is enduring tough times: the sacred sites are shut down because of the coronavirus pandemic, and pilgrimages have come to an end.
These events “meaningfully impac… […]
For the past several years, my friend Representative Dan Lipinski (D-IL) and I have pondered the state of the Republic and Dan’s parlous political situation over omelets at Silver Diner or serious carbs at Pancake […]
Vatican City, Mar 20, 2020 / 11:05 am (CNA).- Cardinal Mauro Piacenza, head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, has said that the coronavirus pandemic may justify the use of general absolution, in extraordinary circumstances, for Catholics unable to go to i… […]
Buffalo, N.Y., Mar 20, 2020 / 10:30 am (CNA).- A Catholic hospital in western New York will become the state’s first hospital entirely dedicated to treating COVID-19 patients, it announced on Thursday.
Catholic Health, a hospital network serving… […]
Vatican City, Mar 20, 2020 / 06:41 am (CNA).- The Vatican’s Apostolic Penitentiary has granted a plenary indulgence for people with COVID-19 and for those who care for them, including medical staff and family members, and for those who pray for t… […]
Vatican City, Mar 20, 2020 / 05:01 am (CNA).- Pope Francis spoke Friday about the importance of returning to God, the loving Father, in the sacrament of reconciliation.
“But think of this: to return to God is to return to the embrace, the embrac… […]
Washington D.C., Mar 20, 2020 / 03:01 am (CNA).- The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic is, by most accounts, leading the United States toward a financial crisis.
According to Bloomberg, the global pandemic has caused the biggest decline in consumer confidence in the US economy since October 2008. The S&P 500 economic index sits at its lowest level since 2017, unemployment is rising, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is tumbling.
How might the market downturn affect how much US Catholics give to their parish and other Catholic causes?
While the economic outlook is changing day-by-day, two experts in fundraising for Catholic causes pointed to historical data that suggests that pastors and bishops ought not be reticent to continue fundraising efforts.
Steve Manno, managing director for CCS Fundraising, a firm that has fundraised for numerous U.S. Catholic dioceses, told CNA that while fundraising is difficult, pastors should not give up amid a market downturn.
Manno said that giving to Catholic causes could face some real obstacles in years to come.
Data from the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy suggests philanthropy tends to track with the stock market, with some of the more precipitous drops coming in the last economic downturn of 2008-2009, he told CNA.
The Lilly School data also suggests that while in terms of dollars, overall giving by Americans to charity has risen over the decades, the amount given per household actually is decreasing. Major gifts from high-net worth donors skews the data, Manno said.
In addition, the data show that in 2000, 66% of American households gave to charitable causes overall. By 2016, it was 53%.
Another study by Lilly Family School found that overall, 46% of American households gave to religious congregations in 2000, compared with 32% in 2016. The year 2019, Manno said, was unprecedented for faith-based giving in general.
“It dropped below 30% of all US philanthropy for the first time,” he said.
But Manno also pointed to data from the Center for Disaster Philanthropy that looks at the effects of natural disasters on charitable giving, which he said could provide relevant insights given the crisis at hand.
The data suggests that when an event such as a major natural disaster takes place, most households who donate to disaster relief will not donate less to other causes— in fact, a small percentage (12%) may increase their giving to other causes in addition to donating to disaster relief.
That data could suggest that the coronavirus pandemic itself might not lead to additional decreases in giving.
And there are bright spots on the fundraising landscape. Among them is online giving.
Overall, online giving to Catholic causes is up 2.6% from previous years, Brad Patterson, corporate vice president of CCS, told CNA.
He said development offices are better in general at driving toward online giving than they have been in the past.
In the face of the suspension of public Mass— which all Latin rite dioceses in the United States have now done amid the coronavirus pandemic— many parishes do not yet have an online giving portal set up are likely to feel the pinch of several weeks of no in-person donations. The current crisis will likely spur pastors to make online giving a priority, Patterson said.
Manno said in his experience, a time of financial uncertainty is the time for pastors and bishops to communicate with their flocks as much as possible. That communication is key, he said.
He said that if necessary, asking via videoconferencing for donations is a legitimate option.
“It may feel like now is a moment to pause, or delay activity, but it’s really important to take note that in previous economic downturns, those who continued to push forward in their [fundraising] efforts ultimately succeeded. And those who took a step back lost ground,” Manno told CNA.
He noted that some Catholics are giving less to the Church for reasons unrelated to the stock market, but such drops are highly regionalized. The Archdiocese of Washington, for example, took in millions of dollars less in its annual appeal this year, likely because of fallout from the sexual abuse crisis.
Still: “Catholics remain generous,” Manno said.
“When asked, Catholics give. When invited, they give. When shown what the specific need is, here’s what this money can do, then they tend to respond very favorably.”
© Catholic World Report