Washington D.C., Dec 6, 2018 / 07:00 pm (CNA).- An immigrant rights group hopes the Maryland legislature will protect migrant workers in the state from labor trafficking and fraud by banning recruitment fees, licensing recruiters for jobs, and prohibit… […]
Denver, Colo., Dec 6, 2018 / 06:01 pm (CNA).- During Wednesday’s funeral for George H.W. Bush, US President Donald Trump made headlines when he did not recite the Apostles’ Creed. Supporters and critics of the president speculated on what his omission might have meant.
But the occasion raises another important question: What is the Apostles’ Creed, and what does it mean?
The Apostles’ Creed is a developed expression of the faith handed down by the apostles, which originated in Rome and is used by the Catholic Church and the ecclesial communities of the West.
The creed took shape in the second or third century in connection with baptism, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, later Benedict XVI, wrote in his 1968 work Introduction to Christianity.
Catechumens in those centuries were asked successively if they believed in each of the three persons of the Trinity, responding, “I believe”.
“Thus the oldest form of the confession of faith takes the shape of a tripartite dialogue, of question and answer, and is, moreover, embedded in the ceremony of baptism,” Ratzinger wrote.
The middle section of the creed, concerning God the Son, was expanded in the second, or, probably, third century, and it was in the fourth century that a continuous text, detached from the question and answer format, began to emerge.
The text of the Apostles’ Creed was finalized in Gaul during the ecclesiastical reforms of Charlemagne in the ninth century. That text was received in Rome, and the creed has been used in the same form ever since.
Ratzinger noted that the Apostles’ Creed is focused on salvation history and Christology, and is rooted in the ecclesiastical form of faith: that “faith demands unity and calls for the fellow believer; it is by nature related to a Church.”
The creed was treated by the early Church as a kind of symbolum, a tradition whereby a ring, staff, or tablet would be broken in half, and the corresponding halves used as identification for guests, messengers, or treater partners.
“Possession of the corresponding piece entitled the holder to receive a thing or simply to hospitality. A symbolum is something which points to its complementary other half and thus creates mutual recognition and unity. It is the expression and means of unity,” according to Ratzinger.
“In the description of the creed or profession of faith as the symbolum we have at the same time a profound interpretation of its true nature. For in fact this is just what the original meaning or aim of dogmatic formulations in the Church was: to facilitate a common profession of faith in God, common worship of him.”
The Apostles’ Creed’s connection to a dialogue between the Church and a catechumen during the ceremony of baptism is thus reflective of the communal nature of faith, which arises in the Church.
It also demonstrates that it is in worship that doctrine “assumes its proper place,” Ratzinger wrote, and that the Church “belongs necessarily to a faith whose significance lies in the interplay of common confession and worship.”
According to the Pope emeritus, the Church herself “holds the faith only as a symbolum … which signifies truth only in its endless reference to something beyond itself, to the quite other.”
This profession of faith was called the Apostles’ Creed at least as early as 390, when a council headed by St. Ambrose used the term in a letter to St. Siricius.
A legend holds that it is known as the Apostles’ Creed because it includes 12 articles, each of which was contributed by an apostle before their dispersal.
This legend “has the disadvantage of calling attention to a division … into twelve articles,” Henri de Lubac wrote in The Christian Faith, “whereas the structure of the Creed is tripartite because Christian faith is essentially faith in the indivisible Trinity.”
Moreover, this legend was discredited when at the Council of Florence in the 15th century, the Latins were surprised to find that the Greeks did not use the Apostles’ Creed.
The Apostles’ Creed has not been received by the Eastern Orthodox because it was not a subject of the first seven ecumenical councils; their sole profession of faith is the Nicene Creed. This has led at least a few journalists to wonder if perhaps Trump is seeking admission to an Eastern Church.
The Apostles’ Creed was used liturgically in the Latin rite of the Church until 1955. Prior to that year’s reform of the general calendar and the rubrics of the Roman Breviary, it was recited at the beginning of Matins and Prime, at the end of Compline, and during the preces of Prime and Compline during certain seasons.
Philadelphia, Pa., Dec 6, 2018 / 05:13 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A new statistical analysis seeks to contextualize data about child sexual abuse by Catholic clergy in Pennsylvania, four months after a grand jury report detailed hundreds of abuse allegations… […]
Bradenton, Fla., Dec 6, 2018 / 03:39 pm (CNA).- Millie Francis almost died once. She’s willing to do it again.
This time, she says, it would be for Our Lady of Guadalupe.
Property managers at the retirement community trailer park where Francis lives in west-central Florida have reportedly demanded that she remove a piece of plywood from her mobile home, on which she has painted an image of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
But from the sound of it, they will have a hard time getting her to comply.
“They’ll have to kill me first,” Francis, 85, told the property management authorities, according to the Bradenton Herald.
“You’re not going to tell this old lady what to do,” she told the newspaper. “This is America. As long as I have two arms and two legs, I’m going to do it.”
Francis said she feels blessed to even be alive, after a scrape with death during surgery 16 years ago, during which she says she was declared clinically dead for 15 minutes.
Her fierce devotion to her Catholic faith and to Our Lady of Guadalupe, patron saint of the Americas, have remained strong, and she said she’ll go to court if she has to. She does not plan to remove her painting.
The painting of the Virgin Mary was done on a piece of plywood that replaced a window Francis had removed from her mobile home. She said wanted to replace the window with plywood because of a nosy neighbor, and because light from security guards’ flashlights bothered her at night.
Francis said she obtained permission for the removal from Vanguard Property Management at Bradenton Tropical Palms, the 55+ trailer park where she lives.
The inspiration for the image came to her during Mass, she said, when she was praying about what to do with the piece of plywood that would cover the space where he window once was.
“I don’t want to say I had a vision or anything like that, but felt enlightened and received the inspiration from our Lady of Guadalupe to paint her image. So I promised that I would,” she told the Bradenton Herald.
Janet Nowakowski, a Vanguard property manager based in Tampa, demanded that Francis remove the painted plywood, allegedly because Francis did not have the window removal project completed by Oct. 31, per her agreement with property management.
Vanguard representatives also told reporters that Francis did not fill out an architectural request form, or seek permission from the trailer park’s architectural review committee, before painting the Blessed Virgin Mary on the plywood that replaced the window.
Francis said that the window removal was completed on time, and believes the order to remove the plywood image is an act of discrimination against her Catholic faith.
Other neighbors have decorated their lawns and trailers with all kinds of things, she said, and her painting “isn’t hurting anyone.”
“There’s all kinds of stuff out there, but this is because I’m Catholic and it’s wrong,” she said. “With all the things going on in the world, I would think there would be more important things to worry about than this.”
On November 9, lawyers representing Vanguard gave Francis 30 days to remove the image. The deadline is fast-approaching – and falls three days before the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe, which is on December 12.
But Francis refuses to budge.
According to reporting by Mark Young at the Bradenton Herald: “Documents indicate that Francis did have permission from the committee to replace the window, and she was inspired to have the painting done while at church at the last minute. Francis said she not only completed the project on time, but also there is nothing in the park rules regarding decorating after the fact.”
CNA has contacted Tropical Palms trailer park for a copy of their property guidelines, but did not receive a response by press time.
More than 22 million Americans live in manufactured housing, the Manufactured Housing Institute reports. Manufactured home residents have a median annual income of less than $30,000. Mobile home parks are often owned by large corporations or distant landlords, and managed by third-party property management corporations.
Francis believes she has followed the rules at the trailer park where she lives.
While the stress of going to court has been affecting the octogenarian’s health, she said she plans to decorate for Christmas and shine a laser on the image.
She does not plan on re-applying for permission for the project. She said she has appealed to her local Knights of Columbus chapter, through her parish at Sacred Heart Catholic Church, for help.
“I just don’t know anything about this legal stuff,” she told the Bradenton Herald.
“They say I’ll have to pay their attorney fees if they prevail in court. I can’t afford this. I need help and I don’t know what will happen to me, but I do know I’m not taking it down.”
Santiago, Chile, Dec 6, 2018 / 01:49 pm (ACI Prensa).- The Archdiocese of Santiago de Chile reported Tuesday it has sent to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith all information from the preliminary investigation into Fr. Diego Ossa Errá… […]
Nashville, Tenn., Dec 6, 2018 / 01:43 pm (CNA).- Hours before David Miller is scheduled to be executed in Tennessee’s electric chair, the state’s governor has rejected Miller’s request that his sentence be commuted to life in prison.
Gov. Bill Haslam released a one-sentence statement Dec. 6, saying that “after careful consideration of David Earl Miller’s clemency request, I am declining to intervene in this case.”
Miller, 61, was convicted of the 1981 murder of Lee Standifer, whom he bludgeoned to death and stabbed. He was sentenced to death, and chose to be executed by the electric chair rather than by the state’s controversial lethal injection protocol.
Attorneys for Miller filed a clemency petition with the governor last week. The petition said that Miller “accepts responsibility for the death of his friend.”
The petition also argued that Miller suffers from “severe mental illness” that renders him “far outside that group of offenders who are the worst and for whom the death penalty is reserved.”
Miller’s attorneys said that sentencing courts had not considered “years of horrific physical abuse, sexual assault and neglect,” or their ensuing effects, when the man was sentenced to death.
Court records say that as a child Miller was routinely beaten by an alcoholic stepfather, and Miller says he was serially sexually abused by family members, including his mother, beginning at age 5. His family disputes his claims.
According to The Tennessean, Miller attempted suicide at age 6, and spent most of his childhood in state institutions. After a brief stint in the Marine Corps, he became a drifter, doing manual labor and hitchhiking.
In the early 1980s, Miller lived briefly with a Baptist pastor and his family in Tennessee, and during that time he met Standifer. She was, like Miller, in her early twenties. She was mildly brain damaged, and lived at the YWCA in Knoxville. The two became friends.
On May 20, 1981, Miller killed her. He was using LSD at the time, and drinking. He claims not to know exactly what happened, though he acknowledges his responsibility for Standifer’s death. He fled, and was arrested a week later, passing counterfeit bills in Ohio.
Miller’s attorneys have argued that Standifer’s death was the result of a psychotic fury, the result of post-traumatic stress disorder and other psychological illnesses, manifested amid an argument between the two.
He was convicted in 1982 and sentenced to death.
Tennessee’s bishops say that while “there was absolutely no justification for the crime Mr. Miller committed 38 years ago,” the death penalty is not necessary.
In a Dec. 5 statement, Bishops Richard Stika of Knoxville, Mark Spalding of Nashville, and Joseph Kurtz, apostolic administrator of Memphis, wrote that “the Church teaches that the death penalty is simply not necessary when society has other means to protect itself and provide a just punishment for those who break civil laws. Rather than serving as a path to justice, the death penalty contributes to the growing disrespect for human life.”
“We believe that all those convicted of terrible crimes still retain their human dignity and deserve a chance to live,” they added.
“To recognize the dignity of the lives of those on death row is not to deny the dignity of the lives of their victims or their grieving loved ones left behind. The lives of victims and sinners alike should be respected; the taking of another life will serve no purpose but vengeance.”
Pope Francis is an outspoken opponent of the death penalty, revising in August the Catechism of the Catholic Church to classify its use as “inadmissible.”
The pope’s predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, called leaders in 2011 to “make every effort to eliminate the death penalty.”
Pope St. John Paul II prayed publicly for universal abolition of the death penalty.
In the 1995 apostolic exhortation Evengelium vitae, he wrote that governments “ought not go to the extreme of executing the offender except in cases of absolute necessity: in other words, when it would not be possible otherwise to defend society. Today however, as a result of steady improvements in the organization of the penal system, such cases are very rare, if not practically non-existent.”
Haslam has declined to stop two other executions in 2018.
Miller’s legal team has petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court for a stay of execution. He is scheduled to be executed at 7 p.m., Dec. 6.
Newcastle, Australia, Dec 6, 2018 / 12:39 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A district judge overturned Thursday the conviction of Archbishop Philip Wilson for failing to report allegations of child sexual abuse disclosed to him in the 1970s, saying there was reasonable doubt a crime had been committed.
Newcastle District Court Judge Roy Ellis said Dec. 6 that the Crown had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Archbishop Wilson did not report abuse committed by Fr. James Fletcher, when Fletcher was charged in 2004 with child abuse which occurred between 1989 and 1991.
Peter Creigh, and another altar boy who is unnamed for legal reasons, said they both had told Wilson in 1976 of their abusive experience with Fr. Fletcher.
Archbishop Wilson, 68, resigned as Archbishop of Adelaide July 30.
Ellis said that “there were very honest features” of Archbishop Wilson’s evidence which “provide a strong platform for him to be an honest witness,” and that “there is no proper basis on which I can rely to reject” the prelate’s evidence, according to the ABC.
The judge also noted that the archbishop “did not attempt to blacken the name of Peter Creigh and allege he was a liar,” calling it an indication of the prelate’s “overall honesty.”
Archbishop Wilson did not say he disbelieved Creigh, which Ellis said “is once again supportive of his honesty as a witness,” The Sydney Morning Herald reported.
Ellis questioned his memory of the conversation Creigh says he had with Wilson 42 years ago, and said there were inconsistencies in Creigh’s evidence, asking: “Was the duration of the abuse, six or nine months?”
While calling Creigh “an honest witness doing his best to recall events in 1976,” Ellis said that “acceptance of Mr Peter Creigh as an honest witness does not automatically mean I would be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that he complained to Philip Wilson in 1976 that James Fletcher had indecently assaulted him.”
“It is not inconceivable that in looking back Mr Creigh convinced himself that he had complained rather than asking himself why he didn’t complain, which might especially be so if he had wanted to complain but never actually did.”
Creigh made “no complaint to anyone until he told his family 33 years later in 2009,” Ellis said, adding that he “made no notes of the conversation with Philip Wilson either at the time or shortly after the alleged conversation, nor at any time during the ensuing 39 years.”
The judge also noted the possibility of undue media influence on the case.
“This is not a criticism of media, but intended or not, the mere presence of large amounts of media from all around Australia and the world carries with it a certain amount of pressure on the court,” Ellis stated.
The heavy media presence “may amount to perceived pressure for a court to reach a conclusion which seems to be consistent with the direction of public opinion, rather than being consistent with the rule of law that requires a court to hand down individual justice in its decision-making processes.”
“The potential for media pressure to impact judicial independence may be subtle or indeed subversive in the sense that it is the elephant in the room that no one sees or acknowledges or wants to see or acknowledge,” Ellis said.
He added that Archbishop Wilson could not be convited merely because the “Catholic Church has a lot to answer for in terms of its historical self-protective approach” to clerical sex abuse. “Philip Wilson when he appears before this court is simply an individual who has the same legal rights as every other person in our community.”
“It is not for me to punish the Catholic Church for its institutional moral deficits, or to punish Philip Wilson for the sins of the now deceased James Fletcher by finding Philip Wilson guilty, simply on the basis that he is a Catholic priest.”
Archbishop Wilson did not attend the court in person, but watched the decision via media link.
The Crown has said it will appeal Ellis’ decision.
The archbishop has maintained his innocence throughout the process, saying he had no recollection of the accusations, and insisting that if he had been notified of the scandal, he would have offered pastoral care to the victims and their families, and reported the event to his superiors.
Fr. Philip Marshall, administrator delegate of the Archdiocese of Adelaide, said we “welcome the conclusion of a process that has been long and painful for all concerned. We now need to consider the ramifications of this outcome.”
“The survivors of child sexual abuse and their families are in our thoughts and prayers, and the Archdiocese remains committed to providing the safest possible environments for children and vulnerable people in our care,” Fr. Marshall added.
Archbishop Wilson had been convicted May 22, and was sentenced to 12 months of home detention in July. He had been serving the sentence at the home of a relative in New South Wales, wearing a tracking device.
Archbishop Wilson resigned as Archbishop of Adelaide in July, after having said initially he would only do so if his appeal failed.
He said he changed his mind because “there is just too much pain and distress being caused by my maintaining the office of Archbishop of Adelaide, especially to the victims of Fr. Fletcher,” and he had become “increasingly worried at the growing level of hurt” his conviction had caused.
Wilson was ordained a priest in 1975, and consecrated a bishop in 1996.
Vatican City, Dec 6, 2018 / 11:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis Thursday published new laws governing the administration of Vatican City State, including the formation of a new oversight body for verifying departmental compliance with regulations a… […]
Chittagong, Bangladesh, Dec 6, 2018 / 10:50 am (CNA/EWTN News).- As new evidence emerges of atrocities committed in Burma’s Rakhine state, the president of Caritas International visited Monday a Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh.
In 2017 the Rohingya, a Muslim minority group, faced a sharp increase in state-sponsored violence in Burma, also known as Myanmar. The violence reached levels that led the United Nations to declare the crisis “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing.”
More than 700,000 Rohingya have fled across the border to Bangladesh, and are living in refugee camps, many of which are located in a swampy sort of “buffer zone” along the border between the two countries.
Researchers with the Public International Law and Policy Group, contracted by the U.S. State Department to investigate Burma’s treatment of the Rohingya, found “reasonable grounds to believe that genocide was committed against the Rohingya,” in a report published Dec. 3.
The researchers interviewed more than 1,000 refugees, who shared their experiences of “mass shootings, aerial bombardments, gang rapes and severe beatings, torture and burning” by Burma’s armed forces.
Seventy percent of the Rohingya interviewed had witnessed their homes or villages being destroyed and 80 percent witnessed the killing of a family member, friend, or personal acquaintance.
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Cardinal Luis Tagle of Manila visited Kutupalong refugee camp, more than 100 miles south of Chittagong, Dec. 3, describing it as “a cry to the whole world for a better politics based on compassion and solidarity.”
“When will we learn our lessons and be able to stop a crisis of this magnitude happening again? How as an international community and a human family can we get back to the basics of dignity, care and compassion?” continued Tagle.
The Filipino cardinal is the president of Caritas International, a group that has served the Rohingya refugee population since the crisis began.
Caritas has helped nearly 500,000 refugees by providing shelter, water, sanitation, hygiene, and living supplies.
“The situation of refugees from Myanmar was heartbreaking for me when I came first, but I’m seeing things improve,” Tagle said. “We wish for a permanent solution for these people who are stateless and helpless. It is our responsibility to be with them. We want them to have a happy life.”
Tagle found particular hope in seeing the efforts of the Caritas Bangladesh volunteers and staff to help the refugees during the Advent season.
“Here I am this first week of Advent with a people waiting for a future,” Tagle said. “For us Advent is waiting not for something but for someone. Jesus, who was born poor, who became a refugee but who never stops loving. I hope this message coming from this camp will encourage all of us never to get tired of loving.”
Bangladesh and Burma have agreed to a repatriation program which began last month, but few if any Rohingya have chosen to return to their homeland.
The Burmese government refused to use the term Rohingya, and considers them illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. They have been denied citizenship and numerous other rights since a controversial law was enacted in 1982.
Vatican City, Dec 6, 2018 / 05:16 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis will travel to Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates Feb. 3-5 to participate in an international interfaith meeting, the Vatican announced Thursday.
“This visit, like th… […]
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