CNA Staff, Jan 11, 2021 / 05:06 pm (CNA).- The Diocese of Buffalo released thousands of clergy abuse documents and related records to abuse victims and their lawyers this week as part of an agreement in ongoing clergy abuse negotiations during its bank… […]
Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, Jan 11, 2021 / 04:47 pm (CNA).- The Dominican bishops’ conference issued a statement Sunday rejecting a proposal to decriminalize abortion under certain conditions in a newly revised penal code being debated in the Dominican Congress.
“Life is the first civil right that is mentioned in our Constitution in its art. 37, which reads: ‘The right to life is inviolable from conception to death.’ Life is a right prior to all legislation. Without life there are no possibilities to enjoy any other right,” the bishops said in the Jan. 10 statement.
Despite the fact that the nation’s constitution rejects the possibility of legalizing abortion, radical feminist activists have been trying to de facto legalize it via a “decriminalization” using the penal code.
“According to our own Constitution, the State cannot apply the death penalty even to the worst offenders, since it says: ‘The death penalty may not be established, pronounced or applied, in any case.’ So, how to accept that in our country abortion is consecrated, in the so-called three causes, in which innocent creatures are killed, the nasciturus (the unborn child)?” the bishops’ document says.
In December 2020, the president of the Dominican Republic, Luis Abinader, told the left-leaning Spanish newspaper El País that “I disagree, as does the majority of the population, not only in the Dominican Republic but also in the world, with free abortion, but I do think that there must be grounds that allow the interruption of the pregnancy. That has been the official position of our party.”
The Dominican congress, with the president’s support, is debating legalizing abortion in the cases pertaining to “the health of the mother,” rape, and “severe fetal malformation.”
According to the bishops’ conference, “Incorporating abortion into our legislation, in any circumstance, is a flagrant constitutional violation, and a blow to the social and democratic state of law. Approving the so-called three grounds would be a serious violation of the right to life that could only be based on a wrong interpretation of the Constitution.”
“We are shocked to know that in our society there are those who think that sacrificing innocent children under euphemistic names such as ‘a decision about one’s own body,’ ‘women’s empowerment’ or ‘sexual and reproductive rights’ can be seen as part of authentic progress.”
Regarding “therapeutic abortion,” the bishops explain that “Medical ethics indicates that in the case of complications in a pregnancy, efforts should be made to save mother and child and never see the premeditated death of one of them as an easy way out, as established in the official protocols of the Ministry of Public Health, which have been used in public hospitals in our country for many years.”
“Let us promote the approval of a Penal Code in accordance with our Constitution, one that shows to the world that Dominicans love life, and that motherhood is one of the great treasures that the Dominican woman and our Nation have.”
Washington D.C., Jan 11, 2021 / 03:34 pm (CNA).- In a joint statement Jan. 11, the U.S. bishops’ domestic justice chair Archbishop Paul Coakley of Oklahoma City, joined by pro-life chair Archbishop Joseph Naumann, called for a stop to planned fed… […]
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jan 11, 2021 / 01:49 pm (CNA).- Catholic leaders spoke out against human trafficking on Monday, National Human Trafficking Awareness Day.
“It is shocking to consider the size and scope of the tragedy of human trafficking that exists in our world in 2021,” stated Bishop Robert Deeley of Portland, Maine.
He called human trafficking “a horrific crime against the basic dignity and rights of the human person.”
Jan. 11, 2021 is National Human Trafficking Awareness Day, held during January which is National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month.
There are more than 40 million estimated victims of trafficking worldwide—25 million of them trapped in labor or sex trafficking, and 15 million people in forced marriages. Human trafficking has been calculated at a $150 billion industry.
Trafficking victims are everywhere—but hiding in plain sight, said a Catholic Relief Services (CRS) advisor on the group’s fact-sheet for January.
“They are hidden from view. You don’t recognize them in the back kitchens, shops, gas stations and in hospitality. They are also tucked away in fields,” said Dr. Lucy Steinitz, Catholic Relief Services senior technical advisor for protection.
These forms of “modern-day slavery” look quite different from those of centuries past, she added.
“They [victims] are not in shackles or on farms,” Steinitz said. “People are coerced into harsh employment under horrible conditions, and then have no freedom to leave.”
Other Catholic groups also recongized National Human Trafficking Awareness Day, including Catholic Charities USA and the Texas Catholic Conference, which has organized a week of prayer to end trafficking, held from Jan. 11-17.
The problem of trafficking, Bishop Deeley said, runs so deep that it requires action at all levels of government.
He called on Congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform to encourage legal immigration and reduce the risk of refugees and child migrants being trafficked.
“Survivors of human trafficking are commonly linked by poverty and a lack of opportunity, particularly immigrants and undocumented workers in the U.S.,” he said. “The selling of people, treated as instruments of gain, takes away all fundamental values rooted in the nature of a human being.”
As part of the efforts to fight trafficking, parishes can play a role in hosting discussions, he said, also praising diocesan programs such as housing assistance for women trafficking survivors.
Pope Francis’s latest motu proprio, Spiritus Domini, opens up the minor ministries of lector and acolyte to women. On the surface, this can look like much-ado-about nothing since females have been functioning as lectors and […]
Vatican City, Jan 11, 2021 / 11:45 am (CNA).- On Jan. 11, Pope Francis published an apostolic letter issued motu proprio (which means “on his own impulse” in Latin), modifying canon law regarding women’s access to the ministries of le… […]
Dublin, Ireland, Jan 11, 2021 / 10:54 am (CNA).- After receiving thousands of complaints from citizens and vocal criticism from religious leaders, Ireland’s state broadcaster has apologized after a sketch on its New Year’s Eve programming j… […]
CNA Staff, Jan 11, 2021 / 07:30 am (CNA).- On Sunday, Jan. 10, the internet was abuzz with false reports of an overnight blackout at the Vatican, accompanied by a series of claims concerning Pope […]
Vatican City, Jan 11, 2021 / 04:05 am (CNA).- Pope Francis issued a motu proprio Monday changing canon law to allow women to serve as lectors and acolytes.
In the motu proprio “Spiritus Domini,” issued on Jan. 11, the pope c… […]
VILNIUS—The Church has opened the beatification cause of Sr. Wanda Boniszewska, a Polish nun who was a reputed stigmatist and was tortured by Stalin’s secret police. Being a stigmatist means someone either literally or mystically […]
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