Servant of God Enrique Shaw. / Credit: Acdeano, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Buenos Aires, Argentina, Jan 11, 2025 / 13:00 pm (CNA).
The cause for canonization of Argentine businessman Enrique Shaw took another step forward this week as the alleged miracle attributed to his intercession passed the medical stage and will now be evaluated by a commission of theologians of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints.
The vice postulator of the cause and the military bishop of Argentina, Santiago Olivera, informed the Argentine news agency AICA of the development.
The prelate explained from Rome that the miracle “has passed the medical consultation, but we must be very cautious because the process continues with the commission of theologians and then with the bishops and cardinals.”
“Once this happens, if everything goes well, Cardinal [Marcello Semeraro, prefect of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints] will present to the Holy Father the permission to announce the decree of his beatification,” Olivera added.
Although there are still several steps to take, the vice postulator indicated Thursday that “today was a very important day. It passed the medical phase regarding what was presented about the healing.”
“We continue to pray,” he said and encouraged the faithful “to wait and be very respectful of the following stages.”
Who is the venerable Servant of God Enrique Shaw?
Enrique Shaw Tornquist was a layman, businessman, husband, and father. He was born on Feb. 26, 1921, in Paris. Shortly after, his family moved to Argentina.
He belonged to the Naval Military School, where he carried out an apostolate with great dedication.
In 1943 he married Cecilia Bunge, with whom he had nine children. In 1945 he asked to be discharged from the Argentine Navy for the purpose of becoming a worker and carrying out an apostolate among the working class.
He promoted the creation of the Christian Association of Business Leaders and died on Aug. 27, 1962, at the age of 41 from cancer.
In 1997, the preliminary stage for the opening of the canonization process began, and 10 years later the formal opening of the cause was presented.
The diocesan phase was concluded in 2013, and in 2014 the documentation was sent to Rome.
In 2020, documents were submitted in Rome for the diocesan investigation into the alleged miracle attributed to the intercession of Shaw.
On April 24, 2021, Pope Francis approved the decree that recognizes Shaw’s heroic virtues, declaring him “venerable.”
This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.
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CNA Newsroom, Feb 6, 2023 / 11:30 am (CNA).
Three pilgrims died and another 20 — including at least two minors — were injured Sunday in a traffic accident on the Mexico-Puebla highway as they were traveling… […]
Roger Foley enjoys taste-testing three different kinds of hummus, his favourite food, on the day of a video shoot with Amanda Achtman of the Dying to Meet You project in Canada. The two spoke about Foley’s difficulty accessing quality care for his needs and being offered Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) “several times.” / Courtesy of Amanda Achtman
CNA Staff, Jun 23, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).
Amid ongoing efforts to expand euthanasia in Canada under the name of “medical aid in dying” (MAID), one Ottawa man says he has been offered euthanasia “multiple times” as he struggles with lifelong disabilities and chronic pain from a disease called cerebellar ataxia.
Roger Foley, 49, shared some of his story in a recent video interview with Amanda Achtman of the Dying to Meet You project, which was created to “humanize our conversation on suffering, death, meaning, and hope.” The project seeks to “[restore] our cultural health when it comes to our experiences of death and dying” through speaking engagements and video campaigns.
Roger Foley, a Canadian man with disabilities, says he’s been offered euthanasia “multiple times.”
Listen to him speak out against being devalued as he fights for the support he needs to live. pic.twitter.com/yY8N4NILkS
In the video, the fourth of a series, Foley said he has struggled with subpar medical help in his own home, where he is supposed to be getting quality care. Canada has a nationalized health care system but Foley said that individuals with illnesses are “worked at … not worked with.” He spoke out against being devalued as he fights for the support he needs to live.
In one case, he said, a home worker helped him into his bathtub and then fell asleep in the other room; Foley was left to crawl out of the bathroom on his own. “I reported to the agency, and then he confessed, and the agency, they really didn’t care,” he said.
Asked by Achtman if he has ever been offered euthanasia, Foley said: “Yeah, multiple times.”
“One time, [a doctor] asked me, ‘Do you have any thoughts of self-harm?’ I’m honest with them and tell them I do think about ending my life because of what I’m going through, being prevented from the resources that I need to live safely back at home.”
“From out of nowhere, he just pulls out, ‘Well, if you don’t get self-directing funding, you can always apply for an assisted.’”
Foley said the offers from doctors to help end his life have “completely traumatized me.”
“Now it’s this overlying option where in my situation, when I say I’m suicidal, I’m met with, ‘Well, the hospital has a program to help you with that if you want to end your life.’”
“That didn’t exist before [MAID] was legalized, but now it’s there,” he said. “There is not going to be a second within the rest of my life that I’m not going to have flashbacks to [being offered suicide]. The devaluing of me and all that I am.”
Noting that he’s “not religious,” Foley said: “Saying that it’s just religious persons who oppose euthanasia in society is completely wrong.”
“These people who usually say it, they have an ableist mindset,” he said. “And they look at persons with disabilities and see us as just better off dead and a waste of resources.”
Achtman told CNA there is a need for euthanasia-free health care spaces, not only for protecting the integrity of Catholic institutions but also because many patients — including nonreligious patients like Foley — want to be treated in facilities that do not raise euthanasia with patients.
“Having euthanasia suggested, in a sense, already kills the person. It deflates a person’s sense of confidence that doctors and nurses are going to truly fight for them,” Achtman told CNA. “When euthanasia is suggested ostensibly as one ‘treatment’ option among others, there are all-too-frequently no other real options provided.
She continued: “This is why I always say that a request for euthanasia is not so much an expression of a desire to die as it is an expression of disappointment. Responding to such disappointment with real interventions that are adequate to the person is demanding, but that’s what people deserve. It is wrong to concede or capitulate to a person’s suicidal ideation — instead, every person deserves suicide prevention rather than suicide assistance.”
Roger Foley enjoys taste-testing three different kinds of hummus, his favorite food, on the day of a video shoot with Amanda Achtman of the Dying to Meet You project. The two spoke about Foley’s difficulty accessing quality care for his needs and being offered Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) “several times.”. Courtesy of Amanda Achtman
Canada has become one of the most permissive countries in the world when it comes to euthanasia. The country first began allowing doctors to help kill terminally ill patients nearing death in 2016; the law was then expanded in 2021 to include patients whose death is not imminent.
In February the country paused a proposal to allow mentally ill individuals access to MAID, with the proposal set to be reconsidered in 2027. Earlier this year, Canadian health researchers alleged that MAID will “save” the Canadian health care system between $34.7 and $136.8 million per year.
A couple in British Columbia is currently suing the provincial government, as well as a Catholic health care provider, after their daughter was denied euthanasia while suffering from a terminal illness. The suit demands that the government remove the religious exemption from the Catholic hospital that protects them from having to offer MAID.
A judge in March, meanwhile, ruled that a woman with autism could be granted her request to die by MAID, overruling efforts by the woman’s father to halt the deadly procedure.
Asked what gives him hope, Foley told Achtman that he aspires one day to “be able to break through [the health care system] and get access to the resources that I need and to live at home with workers who want to work with me and I want to work with them and that we can work as a team.”
“I have a passion to live,” he said. “I don’t want to give up my life.”
Merida, Venezuela, May 30, 2018 / 03:14 pm (ACI Prensa).- A group of people appropriated the facilities of a parish in Venezuela’s Mérida state on Monday afternoon, saying they were acting on behalf of the local government.
The group seized Our Lady of Mount Carmel parish in Ejido, fewer than 10 miles southwest of Mérida, May 28.
Bishop Luis Enrique Rojas Ruiz, Auxiliary Bishop of Mérida, said the group stormed in and tore off the padlocks to the doors that give access to the soccer field and parish halls.
The pastor, Fr. José Juan Flores, prevented them from entering the church and asked their identity. They replied that they were from the city council and they came on behalf of the mayor of Ejido, Simón Pablo Figueroa.
The occupiers immediately asked Fr. Flores to remove his belongings and proceeded to weld shut from the outside the metal doors leading to the soccer field.
Speaking to ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish language sister agency, Bishop Rojas explained that once he learned about the incident he decided to send a Whatsapp message about the “frightening and arbitrary” behavior of the group.
“We call on the authorities in charge of this case to answer for physical integrity and safety of the parish priests as well as that all of the people who are there,” Bishop Rojas’ message reads.
Hours later, Bishop Rojas had a phone conversation with the mayor and invited him to a meeting. However, the meeting has not yet materialized, as the mayor is in Caracas.
Fr. Flores said that an incident of this kind was imminent since the church had been threatened with the seizure of its parish buildings and the priests and faithful had also been threatened.
“They have insulted the faith on many occasions, scratching highly offensive graffiti on the parish buildings. They want to damage the image of the priests and the diocese and so they damage beautiful works of art with expletives and major insults,” Bishop Rojas said.
Lawyers from the archdiocese and the town were to meet May 29 to agree on solutions to end the seizure.
This article was originally published by our sister agency, ACI Prensa. It has been translated and adapted by CNA .
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