The Archdiocese of St. Louis announced Monday that face masks will be optional at its Catholic schools this fall.
The announcement comes after the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) updated its COVID-19 mitigation recommendations for schools this month, amid a surge in virus cases in Missouri.
In a statement on Monday, the Archdiocese of St. Louis said that the wearing of masks in its Catholic schools would be “optional and at the discretion of each individual family,” beginning in the upcoming academic year. The archdiocese qualified that it could update its standards if new information emerged.
“The archdiocese urges all school families, students, leadership, faculties and staffs to be thoughtful of their own health—and that of their community—in all of their decisions, especially regarding the wearing of masks and monitoring for COVID-19 symptoms,” the statement said.
The archdiocese added that it “strongly encourages” all those eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine to receive one, “in order to protect themselves and those around them from the virus.” The archdiocese said the decision was made after “a successful year of in-person learning.”
Earlier this month, the CDC amended its recommendations for in-person instruction in schools to indicate that masks are not necessary for fully vaccinated students and staff, but should be worn by those who are not fully vaccinated. Children under the age of 12 are not yet eligible for the COVID-19 vaccines currently available in the United States.
The St. Louis County Department of Public Health issued a public health advisory on July 1 after an increase in COVID-19 cases, and on July 12 said Missouri became “a hotspot for COVID-19” in the previous two weeks. The St. Louis Post Dispatch reported that the city’s public schools will require masks for all students and teachers this fall, regardless of vaccination status.
“DPH is increasingly concerned about the risks to the residents of St. Louis County as the Delta variant becomes more widespread,” the county advisory stated. It noted that children are now “transmitting COVID-19 to each other much more easily now than they were last year.”
The archdiocese noted that each school will follow its own protocols, which could include temporary closures or mask requirements “depending on local health guidelines related to situations that arise in individual schools or communities.”
“The overall health and well-being of all in the Archdiocese of St. Louis continues to be of highest priority to Archbishop Rozanski and the archdiocese,” the statement said. “We will continue to closely monitor developments regarding COVID-19 guidance from the CDC as well as local health and government officials.”
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St. Louis, Mo., Oct 28, 2019 / 02:40 pm (CNA).- A hearing began on Monday in Missouri to determine the fate of the state’s last remaining abortion clinic.
“Planned Parenthood’s stubborn refusal to correct its gross deficiencies is the reason Missouri may soon be the first state since Roe v. Wade in 1973 to be free from abortion clinics,” Jeanne Mancini, president of the group March for Life, stated on Monday before the hearing.
Mancini said the St. Louis Planned Parenthood clinic “has left the state no choice but to deny renewal of its clinic license” because of its health violations and failure to comply with health requirements.
“Planned Parenthood should put the safety of women before its profits – the women of Missouri deserve as much,” Mancini stated.
The Missouri Administrative Hearing Commission held the hearing on Monday, months after the state’s Department of Health and Senior Services in June refused to renew the license of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region to perform abortions.
Jacinta Florence, the Missouri & Arkansas Regional Coordinator for Students for Life of America attended the hearing.
“What’s tragic is that Planned Parenthood is fighting to stay open but doesn’t want to comply with Missouri’s laws designed to protect women’s lives at this dangerous location,” Florence said.
Before it refused to reissue a license for the St. Louis Planned Parenthood clinic, Missouri’s health department had submitted a “Statement of Deficiencies” of the clinic to a court.
In that statement, the department cited an “unprecedented lack of cooperation” on the part of the clinic, as well as its “failure to meet basic standards of patient care, and refusal to comply with state law and regulations protecting women’s health and safety that resulted in numerous serious and extensive unresolved deficiencies including multiple that involved life-threatening conditions for patients.”
Planned Parenthood reneged on its agreement to perform pelvic examinations as a “preoperative health requirement,” the state said, several doctors at the clinic refused requests to provide interviews with the health department, and the clinic would not have been prepared for a case of “severe hemorrhaging” of a woman that occurred at a hospital.
The clinic had submitted a “Plan of Correction” as requested by the Missouri Department of Health and Human Services, but it had not properly addressed all the stated deficiencies, the health department said.
Planned Parenthood responded by saying that the health department “weaponized a regulatory process” and required pelvic exams that it admitted were “medically unnecessary” amidst “public outcry and the medical community coming out strongly against” the required exams.
After the state’s refusal to grant a license, a judge and the Administration Hearing Commission both granted a temporary stay of the health department’s decision, allowing the clinic to remain open while the case was reviewed.
Missouri had also enacted a comprehensive abortion ban in 2019, with Governor Mike Parson (R) signing it into law in May. The legislation was supported by St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson.
Missouri’s law set up a multi-tier ban on abortions after eight weeks, 14 weeks, 18 weeks and 20 weeks, as well as bans on abortions conducted solely because of the baby’s race, sex, or Down Syndrome diagnosis.
The law was crafted to be able to survive in the courts, but a federal judge in August struck down all of the bans related the stage in pregnancy, leaving intact the disability, race and sex-selective abortion bans for the time being.
Meanwhile, as the fate of the St. Louis clinic is being determined, Planned Parenthood has opened a “mega” abortion clinic just 13 miles away across the Mississippi River in Fairview Heights, Illinois that will have the ability to see 11,000 patients annually.
The new clinic replaced a smaller Planned Parenthood clinic in Fairview Heights that offered medication abortions but not surgical abortions.
In a controversial move, the organization used a shell company under which the facility was purportedly being constructed, and tried to shield from public view the fact that the facility under construction was an abortion clinic.
White smoke rises from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel on March 13, 2013, signaling that the College of Cardinals has elected a new pope. / Credit: ALBERTO PIZZOLI/AFP via Getty Images
ACI Prensa Staff, Mar 5, 2024 / 19:30 pm (CNA).
In March … […]
Paula Scanlan, a women’s sports activist and former teammate of trans-identifying athlete Lia Thomas on the University of Pennsylvania women’s swim team, speaks to a crowd about her story. Originally only speaking out anonymously, Scanlan has since gone public about the emotional impact of having to share a locker room with a biological male had on her as a sexual assault survivor. / Credit: Photo courtesy of Independent Women’s Forum
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Aug 19, 2024 / 12:00 pm (CNA).
The Biden administration’s expansion of Title IX regulations to offer protection of transgender individuals in women’s sports, educational programs, and school bathrooms has been blocked in half of the states in the country.
The new rule is currently blocked in 26 states as a coalition of states and conservative groups are fighting the rule in court.
Yet, for many of the country’s most populous states — such as California, New York, Illinois, and Pennsylvania — the rule took effect on Aug. 1. This means that the measure is impacting Americans in many of the country’s largest population centers.
Christiana Kiefer, senior counsel at one of these groups, the Alliance Defending Freedom, told CNA that “the Biden-Harris administration’s radical attempt to redefine sex in Title IX turns back the clock on women’s opportunities, erodes student privacy, and threatens women’s sports.”
“Policies that deny biological truth create real victims — particularly impacting the dignity and safety of women and girls,” Kiefer said. “We are hopeful that the courts will ultimately rule to protect privacy and safety, free speech, and fairness in sports.”
What is the new rule?
In April, the Biden Department of Education redefined the prohibition on sex discrimination in education, enshrined in the 1972 Title IX provisions, to include discrimination based on a person’s “gender identity.”
The new guidelines prohibit any policy and practice that “prevents a person from participating in an education program or activity consistent with their gender identity.” Schools that do not comply risk having their federal funding cut off.
According to May Mailman, director of the Independent Women’s Law Center (IWLC), the rule means that any male can now assert that he has been discriminated against based on gender identity and claim a right to use a women’s space.
As IWLC director, Mailman said she has seen the personal impact that forcing schools to allow biological men into women’s sports and private spaces has had on young women. Ultimately, she believes the new rule amounts to “the elimination of women’s spaces.”
“You have Paula Scanlan, who’s an IWF [Independent Women’s Forum] ambassador, she was forced to undress before a fully intact male 18 times a week. And she suffered through it, but how many women would do it? Certainly not all. So, women are going to remove themselves from circumstances that require them to be naked or to do really private activities like urinating in front of males,” Mailman explained.
Scanlan is a women’s sports activist and former teammate of trans-identifying athlete Lia Thomas on the University of Pennsylvania women’s swim team. Originally only speaking out anonymously, Scanlan has since gone public about the emotional impact of having to share a locker room with a biological male had on her as a sexual assault survivor.
“That is the opposite of what Title IX was created to do, which is to give women opportunities. So, what you’re going to see is Title IX actually being flipped on its head. Women are going to remove themselves from educational programs like sports because it requires such indecency.”
Where is the rule in effect?
A slate of Republican-led states has challenged the rule in court, many arguing that it violates their state laws. As a result, the Biden administration’s changes are currently blocked in 26 states.
The Independent Women’s Forum has published an interactive map showing which states have successfully blocked the rule and in which states it is currently active. The map also shows which states have pending litigation on the rule. Credit: Image courtesy of Independent Women’s Forum.
The Biden Title IX changes are currently blocked in most of the South and Midwest, including Texas, Florida, and Ohio. Because of a Kansas lawsuit that was joined by several other states and conservative organizations, the rule has been blocked in over 3,800 individual schools across the country.
However, the blocks in these states are only considered “preliminary injunctions,” meaning they are temporary, pending further review in the courts. Because of this, the rule could eventually take effect in any of the 26 states where it is currently blocked.
The Biden administration’s Title IX change has already taken effect in 24 states, primarily in Western and Northeastern coastal states, as well as the Great Lakes region.
“It seems like half the country, but it’s actually more than half the country because if you think about population, this is California, this is New York, so for a huge portion of the population, they are now under the Biden regime, where male and female spaces are no longer protected in education programs,” Mailman said.
“In those schools, the Biden administration can absolutely go after a school if it does not police pronouns, if it has male and female locker rooms, if it has male and female bathrooms, if it has male and female scholarships … it affects all education programs that accept federal money.”
What’s next?
On Friday the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously denied the Biden administration’s request to partially enforce the new rule in several states where it has been blocked. Mailman explained in a video posted to social media that while the decision does not change much right now it does signal the Supreme Court may agree that Biden’s changes to Title IX are unconstitutional.
Ultimately, Mailman believes the fate of this rule depends in large part on the presidential election. If elected to the White House, Mailman said that a Kamala Harris administration is “absolutely going to take it further.”
“Judges are something that the president has a huge say in because they nominate them. You can’t be a judge if you don’t have the president,” she said. “So, the types of judges that Kamala Harris is going to put on the courts are the types of judges who are going to say that absolutely, Title IX is some gender identity law, even though it’s not.”
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