A frozen-over lake in Texas, Feb. 17, 2021. Credit: jmanaugh3/Shutterstock.
Brownsville, Texas, Feb 18, 2021 / 01:07 pm (CNA).- Bishop Daniel Flores of Brownsville announced Thursday via Twitter that he is granting a dispensation from abstinence from meat for tomorrow, the Friday after Ash Wednesday.
“I am granting a general dispensation in the Diocese from the law of Lenten abstinence from meat tomorrow, February 19, 2021. Many families in the Diocese will have no other option except to eat what they have,” Bishop Flores tweeted Feb. 18.
He added, “The law does not intend to add hardship to what is already a situation of great hardship for many. Those who can observe the discipline may, of course, do so. I suggest for the intentions of those suffering at this time.”
The Diocese of Brownsville has been particularly affected by the winter storm currently hitting the southern region of the US.
Blackouts in Texas have created shortages of energy, food, and water, forcing the region to suspend classes, create “warming centers” for the elderly, and issue alerts to boil tap water because of blackouts at water treatment plants.
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Patients’ Rights Action Fund Executive Director Matt Vallière belongs to a broad spectrum of people — secular, religious, left, and right — who share the unifying principle that every person is of equal value and is deserving of equal suicide prevention care. / Credit: Ken Oliver-Méndez/CNA
Napa, California, Jul 29, 2024 / 09:20 am (CNA).
Despite the onslaught of legislative efforts to legalize physician-assisted suicide in many U.S. states, defenders of the disabled and others who oppose the devaluation of vulnerable lives are expressing optimism about the tide beginning to turn in their favor on the issue.
“If we hold back two more states that are still left in play, Massachusetts and Delaware, there will be three years in a row with no new legal states [permitting physician-assisted suicide],” Matt Vallière, executive director of the Patients’ Rights Action Fund, told CNA following a panel on the subject at the 2024 summer conference of the Napa Institute.
Vallière pointed to a number of reasons the tide is turning on the issue, including the growing number of “horror stories” coming out of Canada, where legal assisted suicide, dressed up by the euphemism “medical assistance in dying” (MAID), is rampant.
The proliferation of people being approved for assisted suicide and euthanasia in Canada due to temporary, solvable problems such as poverty and access to suitable housing, Vallière said, is causing people in general and policymakers in particular to reevaluate their stance on the issue.
“You get people who had a first blush understanding of what they thought they believed about the issue, and they’re thinking twice about whether or not this is good public policy. You’re getting outlets that have historically stonewalled our side’s voice now being concerned about it. They’re publishing pieces on our side of the issue,” Vallière said, referencing an editorial from this year cautioning against legalized assisted suicide by The Chicago Tribune, along with fresh reservations expressed by The Washington Post in view of the developments in Canada.
Such developments now lead Vallière and other opponents of assisted suicide, including his fellow Napa Institute panelists Life Legal Defense Fund CEO Alexandra Snyder and Americans United for Life (AUL) Chief Operating Officer and Corporate Counsel Evangeline Bartz, to express renewed confidence that the issue is a “winnable” one.
As Vallière pointed out during the panel, protecting the lives of the disabled and others who are vulnerable to committing suicide enjoys broad support across party lines. “It’s not a right/left issue where the whole thing has been pigeonholed,” Vallière observed.
Instead, defenders of those vulnerable to suicide share a “unifying principle that every person is of equal value, and they all deserve equal suicide prevention care and services when they’re in a dark moment.”
Bartz noted that this year assisted suicide bills went down to defeat in various states across the country, including in Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, Tennessee, and Wisconsin.
Americans United for Life Chief Operating Officer and Corporate Counsel Evangeline Bartz (center) speaks during the 2024 Napa Institute panel “Death and Dying: Assisted Suicide and the Most Vulnerable.” She is flanked by Life Legal Defense Fund CEO Alexandra Snyder (left) and Patients’ Rights Action Fund Executive Director Matt Valliére (right). Credit: Ken Oliver-Méndez/CNA
Instead of only playing defense, Bartz said proactive efforts are also underway in various states. Specifically, AUL advocates the enactment of state laws to establish there is no right to assisted suicide and protect against judicial activism that seeks to decriminalize assisted suicide.
Snyder observed that more often than not, support for assisted suicide is based on a “misunderstanding of what dignity is.” The panelists discussed how interdependence is part of the human condition and needing help with bathing or going to the bathroom, for example, is not by definition a loss of essential human dignity that should cause someone to give up on life.
Hopefully, Vallière concluded, laws permitting assisted suicide will eventually be eliminated because of their core devaluation of and discrimination against people who are living with disabilities.
The complete Napa Institute panel “Death and Dying: Assisted Suicide and the Most Vulnerable” is scheduled to post on the Institute’s YouTube page by mid-August.
Orange, Calif., Jan 10, 2018 / 03:28 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Raised by an alcoholic mother and without her birth father, Cordiella James found out she was pregnant while she was in jail in Orange County.
Her future at the time seemed bleak, but today, Co… […]
Pope Francis addresses the faithful at his Wednesday general audience on Feb. 28, 2024. / Credit: Vatican Media
Rome Newsroom, Mar 19, 2024 / 13:30 pm (CNA).
Pope Francis on Tuesday released his message for the 61st World Day of Prayer for Voca… […]
4 Comments
My poor cousin in TX has only enough water left to last till tomorrow and no way to get out to the store -even if the stores had anything on the shelves, which they don’t. The roads are still icy and dangerous. She’s under the blankets with her dog trying to keep warm. As many other people are doing.
Please pray for the folks in Texas. Thank you.
My poor cousin in TX has only enough water left to last till tomorrow and no way to get out to the store -even if the stores had anything on the shelves, which they don’t. The roads are still icy and dangerous. She’s under the blankets with her dog trying to keep warm. As many other people are doing.
Please pray for the folks in Texas. Thank you.
Mrs. Cracker, I will pray for your cousin and others in Texas.
Thank you so much for that Leslie! God bless you.
🙂
Prayers.