News Briefs

CNA Staff, Nov 4, 2020 / 07:29 pm (CNA).- Archbishop Alexander Sample of Portland discussed the meaning of suffering – and how Catholics should respond to it – in a recent video reflection.

“We’ve been suffering through this pandemic. We’re suffering through these terrible divisions in our country and the remnants of evils, such as racism [and] social unrest. Here in Oregon, we’ve had these terrible wildfires,” he said October 23 on his weekly video program, Chapel Chat.

“Even though we know suffering is always there, it’s a little bit in our face right now more so perhaps than in the usual course of things. It’s important for a Christian to understand the meaning of suffering.”

Suffering is a mystery, the archbishop said, but the Christian faith helps us understand that suffering does have purpose. He said the question of how an all-good and all-powerful God can allow suffering is particularly important to answer in today’s culture.

God did not create evil or suffering, the archbishop said. Rather, evil entered the world through the disobedience of Adam and Eve and brought with it suffering and damage to creation.

“This fallen world has resulted in alienation of the human person from nature even, and certainly that alienation between persons. So things like these natural disasters and diseases and those sorts of things that aren’t the result of human action are part of a fallen world,” he said.

“That may be hard to kind of grasp, but it wasn’t just human beings that were affected by that sin, but this perfect harmony and beauty and goodness that God put in his original creation, all of that has been wounded by that great sin of disobedience.”

But Christ’s sacrifice on the cross has reclaimed suffering and given it value, the archbishop continued. In Christ, suffering is given a new meaning and hope, and it is no longer void of purpose, as Christians can unite their suffering to that of Christ.

“This suffering has been redeemed by Christ … Suffering has value. I know that sounds crazy to people, but Christ has given meaning to human suffering. It’s no longer just an evil that has no purpose, no relation to anything else,” he said. “Now in Christ, it takes on a whole redemptive meaning because we now participate in the redemptive act of Christ.”

By participating in Christ’s passion, we are also able to join in his resurrection, Sample said. He noted that Christ’s sufferings were not merely physical, but that he embraced spiritual suffering as well, as he shouldered the “total reality of sin, of evil, taking it to the cross.”

“Then this means that the weaknesses of all human sufferings are capable of being infused with the same power of God manifested in Christ’s cross,” the archbishop said. “[T]o suffer means to become particularly susceptible, particularly open to the working of the salvific powers of God, offered to humanity in Christ. In him, God has confirmed his desire to act, especially through suffering.”

While this understanding does not remove suffering, Sample said, “it takes on a whole new meaning because we see it in the light of Christ’s redemptive act.”

[…]

Denver Newsroom, Nov 4, 2020 / 05:11 pm (CNA).- Planned Parenthood on Tuesday dropped a lawsuit challenging several abortion restrictions in Arizona, including a 24-hour waiting period for women seeking abortions, laws that bar non-physicians from carrying out abortions, and state laws against telemedicine abortions.

In a notice dated Nov. 3, Planned Parenthood Arizona voluntarily and without explanation dismissed its lawsuit against Arizona attorney general Mark Brnovich, which it had first filed in 2019.

PPAZ says the pro-life laws it was fighting have reduced the number of abortions it has performed in the state by 40% since 2011.

Cathi Herrod, president of the Center for Arizona Policy, told CNA that Planned Parenthood tried to argue that the combination of Arizona’s various pro-life laws created an “undue burden” on a woman’s right to choose abortion.

The Center for Arizona Policy has been advocating for various pro-life measure in Arizona for several years, working with the Arizona Catholic Conference and the Bioethics Defense Fund to craft policy, Herrod said.

“It’s a great day for Arizona women and for preborn children. Planned Parenthood challenged laws that basically provided for women’s health and safety,” Herrod told CNA in an interview.

In the lawsuit, Planned Parenthood had challenged several laws in Arizona pertaining to abortion including provisions that “effectively prohibit anyone other than a licensed physician from providing abortions and related services,” as well as a ban on the use of telemedicine to prescribe abortion pills.

“The laws that were challenged by Planned Parenthood were all common-sense regulations that would apply to most any other medical procedure, so it’s very good news that they dropped this lawsuit,” Herrod continued. 

Denise Harle, Senior Counsel for the Christian legal group Alliance Defending Freedom, also welcomed the dismissal as a boon for the women of Arizona.

ADF, along with a Phoenix-area pro-life pregnancy center, had in March intervened in the lawsuit to defend the 24-hour waiting period provision in Arizona law.

“Abortion is a life-altering decision, and no woman should be rushed or pressured into it. That’s why we are pleased that Planned Parenthood has notified the court that it wants to drop its flawed challenge to Arizona’s common-sense protections for women, which are similar to those the U.S. Supreme Court has already upheld,” Harle said in a Nov. 4 statement.

“As many medical experts agree, significant, non-emergency medical procedures should not be performed without in-person consultation, or on a drop-in basis—let alone be performed by someone who is not a licensed physician,” Harle noted.

Planned Parenthood Arizona claimed in its lawsuit that the pro-life laws at issue have led to the organization performing 40% fewer abortions in the state since 2011, and have also led to the closure of four abortion clinics located in Yuma, Goodyear, Prescott Valley, and Chandler.

Arizona first imposed its 24-hour abortion waiting period in 2009. Courts blocked parts of the bill that brought about the waiting period, including provisions for mandatory counseling, until 2011, when they were allowed to go into effect.

At least 26 states mandate waiting periods for women seeking abortions, most of them 24 hours. Five states— Utah, Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and South Dakota— have a 72-hour waiting period in place.

The Supreme Court held in 1992 that 24-hour waiting periods did not did not impose an undue burden on the right to abortion. Federal courts had not struck down a state’s waiting period until this year, when in October a federal judge ruled unconstitutional a mandatory 48-hour waiting period for women seeking abortion in Tennessee, which had been in effect since 2015.

Arizona has passed several pro-life measures since 2009, including a provision that minors must have notarized consent from one parent to obtain an abortion. The state also in 2011 passed a ban on abortions based on the race or sex of the unborn child or based on the race of a parent.

In 2015, the Arizona legislature passed a law barring abortion coverage from all health plans offered through the state’s health insurance exchange.

During April 2018, Governor Doug Ducey signed into law a bill which requires doctors to ask women seeking abortions for a specific reason why they want to end their pregnancy, such as rape or sex trafficking. The questions are intended to helo women who are being coerced into abortion; women can refuse to answer. 

Other states, such as Virginia, have in recent years moved to liberalize abortion access by allowing nurse practitioners and physician’s assistants to carry out the procedure.

During August 2019, an Arizona court awarded a former Planned Parenthood clinic director $3 million in damages in a wrongful termination case. The former employee, Mayra Rodriguez, claims that she witnessed physician malpractice, illegal conduct of a doctor, falsification of affidavits and patient records, and failure to report a minor who had an adult partner.

[…]

CNA Staff, Nov 4, 2020 / 04:17 pm (CNA).- Voters in four states approved the legalization of recreational marijuana on Tuesday, while one state voted to legalize medical marijuana and another elected to decriminalize harder drugs in an effort to promote addiction treatment programs over criminal sentences.

The Catholic bishops in many of the states had spoken out against the drug legalization measures, pointing to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which teaches that drug use “inflicts very grave damage on human health and life.”

 In June 2014, Pope Francis condemned the legalization of recreational drugs in an address to drug enforcement agencies.

“Let me state this in the clearest terms possible: the problem of drug use is not solved with drugs! Drug addiction is an evil, and with evil there can be no yielding or compromise,” the pope said. “To think that harm can be reduced by permitting drug addicts to use narcotics in no way resolves the problem. Attempts, however limited, to legalize so-called ‘recreational drugs’, are not only highly questionable from a legislative standpoint, but they fail to produce the desired effects.”

Oregon

Oregon passed Ballot Measure 110, making it the first state to decriminalize the possession and use of small amounts of controlled substances including heroin, cocaine and methamphetamines. It will reduce penalties for possession of large amounts of such controlled substances.

Fifty-nine percent of voters approved the measure, while 41% opposed it, with 82% of results reported.

Recreational marijuana was legalized in the state in 2014.

The text of Measure 110 cited poor access to drug addiction treatment compared to other states. Backers of the measure argue that reduced arrests and incarceration will provide savings that can be used to make addiction treatment more widely available and free of charge. They also say drug crimes are disproportionately enforced against racial minorities.

The Oregon Catholic Conference adamantly opposed the measure, arguing that treatment and rehabilitation should be the focus of addiction recovery, without programs that will promote the use of illegal drugs.

The conference cited local communities and treatment groups that have expressed reservations about how the program would be applied. Other critics have said decriminalization of the drugs would cause more addiction by making drugs easier to acquire and by removing law enforcement and the courts from drug regulation, the New York Times reports.

Oregon voters also approved Ballot Measure 109, which will legalize psilocybin, a psychoactive compound found in some mushrooms, for mental health treatment. The initiative drew the support of 55% of voters.

Though the FDA has deemed psilocybin a potential breakthrough therapy for major depression, studies are inconclusive. The American Psychiatric Association and the Oregon Psychiatric Physicians Association both oppose the measure, saying proponents overstate the drug’s usefulness in treating many phenomena including anxiety and addiction.

South Dakota

Voters in South Dakota approved Amendment A, which will legalize recreational use of marijuana for those 21 years and older. It will legalize possession or distribution of up to one ounce of the drug. It will also require the state legislature to pass laws providing for a medical marijuana program and the sale of hemp.

The measure, which passed 53%-47%, was opposed by the South Dakota bishops.

“Human beings are endowed by God with the gift of reason. Reason aids us in differentiating between right and wrong and is foundational for human freedom and personal responsibility,” they said. “Thus, we can understand that to directly intend to suppress our God-given rational faculties is gravely wrong.”

The bishops warned that in Seattle and Denver, where marijuana businesses are legal, they are disproportionately located in poorer neighborhoods. According to one analysis, they said, every dollar raised in marijuana sales costs $4.50 in unwanted effects, primarily in healthcare and reduced workforce readiness.

Montana

In Montana, voters approved two measures that will legalize recreational marijuana in the state.

Constitutional Initiative 118 will change the state’s constitution to allow adults age 21 and up to purchase recreational marijuana, and Initiative 190 creates a framework to legalize and regulate marijuana use, creating a 20% tax on non-medical marijuana and allowing counties to ban dispensaries.

Both measures passed by roughly 57%-43% of the vote.

The bishops of Montana opposed the measure as “a threat to the flourishing of individual persons – particularly, the young, the poor, and those who struggle with either substance abuse or mental health challenges.”

They stressed that since Colorado legalized marijuana in 2012, the state has seen a higher prevalence of marijuana use in suicides.

“Publications link marijuana use with cognitive impairment, lung damage and an increased risk of psychotic disorders (among other concerns),” the bishops said. “Legalization of recreational marijuana will only exacerbate the already serious mental health crisis gripping our state.”

Arizona

In Arizona, citizens approved Proposition 207, which will both allow persons 21 and older to possess one ounce of marijuana and provide for the legal sale of the drug.

Also known as the Smart and Safe Arizona Act, the measure passed 60%-40%, with 85% of results reported.

The Arizona Catholic Conference had criticized the proposal, saying it would send the message to children that “drug use is socially and morally acceptable.”

“It is anticipated that legalizing the recreational use of marijuana in Arizona will lead to more abuse by teens, increase child fatalities, and result in more societal costs,” the Arizona bishops warned in a Sept. 23 statement.

They noted that self-reported marijuana use of Arizona middle- and high-schoolers has already increased because fewer youth believe it is risky. They also pointed to a report out of Colorado showing significant increases in traffic deaths, crime, emergency room visits, and youth usage of marijuana after the drug was legalized for recreational use.

New Jersey

In New Jersey, citizens approved Public Question 1, which will legalize recreational marijuana, with a state-run program to oversee it. The measure drew 67% of voter approval, with 63% of votes recorded.

Legalized drug sales have been touted in the state as a way to boost revenue and employment, save money and redirect police resources.

Medical marijuana presently sells for about $400 to $500 per ounce in the state, the New York Times reports. The state legislature’s research arm estimated that a developed recreational marijuana industry would generate about $126 million in tax revenue a year.

Backers of the New Jersey measure also point to the disproportionate criminal charges against Black Americans for marijuana possession, even though they use the drug at similar rates to white Americans.

Mississippi

Voters in Mississippi overwhelmingly approved Initiative 65 to license and regulate marijuana dispensaries and allow a patient to possess up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana to treat any of 22 conditions.

The measure won 74% of voter approval. Over 228,000 Mississippi voters signed a petition to place the initiative on the ballot.

Critics have said the amendment fails to restrict the number of marijuana businesses. They also argue the amendment could trump local zoning laws. Pot dispensaries are barred within 500 feet of a school, church or child care center, but the language says zoning ordinances on dispensaries must be no more restrictive than they are on pharmacies and “shall not impair the availability of and reasonable access to medical marijuana.”

Some law enforcement leaders say the amount of legal purchase allowed is enough that patients would be able to re-sell marijuana on the streets.

Fees on dispensaries will fund only the medical marijuana oversight program. The language prohibits revenue from going into the state’s general fund.

[…]

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 4, 2020 / 02:40 pm (CNA).- The Tuesday night election result, or lack thereof, confounded the many confident predictions of a “Blue Wave” that was expected to sweep Joe Biden into the White House. It also sugg… […]

CNA Staff, Nov 4, 2020 / 02:01 pm (CNA).- Voters in Nebraska sided with efforts to limit payday loans, passing an initiative Tuesday that the Nebraska Catholic Conference had endorsed as a means to protect the poor from becoming trapped in debt.

Over 80% of Nebraskan voters backed Initiative 248, which caps payday loans at a 36% annual percentage rate, the Lincoln Journal-Star reports. Previously, the legal lending rate was set at 400%.

Sixteen other states have similar limits, or prohibit payday lending altogether.

The Nebraska Catholic Conference was among the supporters of the initiative.

“Payday lending too often exploits the poor and vulnerable by charging exorbitant interest rates and trapping them in endless debt cycles,” Archbishop George Lucas of Omaha said Oct. 7. “It’s time for Nebraska to implement reasonable payday lending interest rates. The Catholic bishops of Nebraska urge Nebraskans to vote for Initiative 428.”

Nebraskans for Responsible Lending was another backer of the ballot initiative, which was placed on the ballot after receiving over 120,000 signatures in support. Foes of high payday lending rates tried to pass similar limits through legislation, then turned to the ballot measure when that path proved unsuccessful.

Religious leaders, veterans groups, the American Association of Retired Persons, the American Civil Liberties Union of Nebraska, and other social welfare groups backed the initiative, the Journal-Star reported.

Critics of the measure said the caps will block credit from people who cannot get loans anywhere else and put the businesses that serve them out of business.

Tom Venzor, executive director of the Nebraska Catholic Conference, explained the need to cap payday loans in an Oct. 9 statement.

“In 2019 alone, payday lenders have extracted more than $30 million in fees from borrowers,” Venzor said. Those who seek payday loans tend to lack a college degree, rent rather than own a home, earn under $40,000 a year, or are separated or divorced. African Americans also disproportionately seek payday loans.

“They turn to payday loans to cover basic living expenses like utilities, rent or mortgage payments, food, or credit card bills,” said Venzor.

The Nebraska Department of Banking and Finance’s 2019 annual report on payday lending practices said the average borrower was charged 405% at an annual percentage rate on a $362 loan, and took 10 loans in a single year.

“When borrowers are unable to repay their loan after two weeks, they usually have no choice but to take out a second loan to repay their first,” Venzor added. “This inability to repay a loan can lead to a vicious ‘debt cycle’ which can continue for years.”

Venzor explained that Catholic teaching rejects exploitative loans.

“Catholic social teaching is very clear on this issue,” he said. “It recognizes that it is both morally acceptable to earn reasonable and equitable profits in economic and financial activities, and morally reprehensible to lend money at unreasonably high rates of interest (a practice also known as usury).”

Venzor noted that the Catechism of the Catholic Church rejects usury as a violation of the commandment ‘Thou shall not steal’. St. John Paul II, in a Feb. 4, 2004 general audience, denounced usury as “a scourge that is also a reality in our time and has a stranglehold on many people’s lives.”

In February the Montana Catholic Conference backed federal limits on payday and car title loans. It encouraged voters to ask their Member of Congress to back the Veterans and Consumers Fair Credit Act of 2019. The bill that would limit the interest rate on payday and car title loans. The bill would expand the 2006 Military Lending Act rate cap – which only covers active military members and their families – to all consumers. It would cap all payday and car-title loans at a maximum of a 36% APR interest rate.

The U.S. Catholic bishops have backed the bill.

In July the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a government agency overseeing consumer protections, revoked federal restrictions on payday loans, drawing objections from the U.S. Conference of Catholic bishops. The rules were announced in 2017, but the bureau said their legal and evidentiary bases were “insufficient.” The bureau said removing the rules would help “ensure the continued availability of small dollar lending products for consumers who demand them.”

The industry collects between $7.3 and $7.7 billion dollars annually from the practices that would have been barred, the bureau said.

Archbishop Paul Coakley of Oklahoma City, chair of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ domestic justice committee, objected in to the changes in a July 10 letter that characterized payday lending as “modern day usury.”

The Church has consistently taught that usury is evil, including in numerous ecumenical councils.

In Vix pervenit, his 1745 encyclical on usury and other dishonest profit, Benedict XIV taught that a loan contract demands “that one return to another only as much as he has received. The sin rests on the fact that sometimes the creditor desires more than he has given. Therefore he contends some gain is owed him beyond that which he loaned, but any gain which exceeds the amount he gave is illicit and usurious.”

In his General Audience address of Feb. 10, 2016, Pope Francis taught that “Scripture persistently exhorts a generous response to requests for loans, without making petty calculations and without demanding impossible interest rates,” citing Leviticus.

“This lesson is always timely,” he said. “How many families there are on the street, victims of profiteering … It is a grave sin, usury is a sin that cries out in the presence of God.”

[…]

CNA Staff, Nov 4, 2020 / 12:35 pm (CNA).- On Wednesday morning, the Supreme Court heard arguments on a Pennsylvania adoption case, as senior U.S. bishops warned of the case’s potential consequences for religious freedom and the role of Catholic welfare agencies in American public life. 

Fulton v. City of Philadelphia concerns the right of religious individuals to serve as foster carers while holding religious views about the definition of marriage. In 2018, the city of Philadelphia notified Catholic Social Services with the Archdiocese of Philadelphia that their policies of not working with same-sex couples on foster care placements were discriminatory; the city stopped contracting with both services. 

Sharonell Fulton and Toni Simms-Busch, who have fostered more than 40 children and who partnered with Catholic Social Services, brought the case against the city that is currently before the Supreme Court.

Writing in the Philadelphia Inquirer on Sunday, Archbishop Nelson Perez said that the city’s intransigence was excluding Catholics from living out a vocation of service, and leaving the most vulnerable children without a loving home.

“Essentially, we are being told that the Catholic Church must leave its faith at the door if it wants to serve those in need,” Nelson said. “But our faith compels us to do this work, and we have a right to conduct ourselves according to the tenets of our faith.”

“Each of our families is an agent for peace and healing, not just in the lives of the children they so generously bring into their homes, but in the neighborhoods they help to build up one person at a time,” he said.

“We do much more than temporarily fill a gap in the lives of vulnerable children in need of a loving home. We work to empower individuals seeking to restore their communities by making a difference in the lives of young people.”

On Wednesday morning, justices and attorneys both brought up the city’s relationship with Catholic Social Services, probing whether the arrangement was a contract or a license.

If it was merely contractual, attorneys for the city argued, then the city could be free to set the requirements without having to balance its interests with the rights of religious agencies.

However, if the city were effectively granting foster care licenses to prospective partners, then it could be accused of discriminating against Catholic Social Services as the religious beliefs of the ministry disqualified it from the program.  

“What the city is asking Catholic Social Services to do here is to certify, validate, and make statements that it cannot make,” Lori Windham argued for the plaintiffs. The Catholic organization could not in conscience “evaluate, assess, and approve” a same-sex couple for foster care placements, as required by the city.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who heard arguments in her first major religious freedom case at the court since her confirmation last week, asked if an entity could even participate in foster care without a contract with the city.

Lawyers argued for the city that contracts were essential because the city has a lawful interest in overseeing the entire foster care system. “This is about the city’s own kids,” the court was told.

Barrett posed a hypothetical scenario of a city overseeing its health care system, and a Catholic hospital being required to provide abortions to contract with the city. She asked if the situation was a licensing or a contracting scenario, given that the hospital could not participate in health care without abiding by the requirement.

Justices Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh both had strong language for the city’s attempts to impose compliance on Catholic Social Services, with Kavanaugh referring to the city’s position as “absolutist and extreme.”

The case, Alito said, is not about the city ensuring opportunities to be foster parents but rather shows its disdain for beliefs in traditional marriage. He said “the city can’t stand the message” of Catholic Social Services “continuing to adhere to the old-fashioned view about marriage.”

Kavanaugh said that it “seems like” Philadelphia was “looking for a fight” in requiring the ministry to contradict its religious beliefs on marriage even though it had not denied a same-sex couple the opportunity to be foster parents.

“I fully appreciate the stigmatic harm” of same-sex couples denied opportunities to adopt, he said, adding that “we need to find a balance that also respects religious beliefs.”

“This is a system that has worked effectively and worked well for many years,” he said of Catholic Social Services.

New York’s Cardinal Timothy Dolan also weighed in on the successful history of social service to wider American society. 

Writing in USA Today on Nov. 4, Dolan noted the long history of Catholic agencies and individuals in America working to alleviate suffering and need, especially in times of crisis like the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

“Most of the Church’s ministry was established in the face of crises and epidemics, much like what we are experiencing today,” said Dolan. “And yet our charitable work seemingly never escapes the ageless adage that “no good deed goes unpunished.” 

Noting the more than 8,000 faith-based adoption agencies working with government bodies across the U.S., “not to mention the countless thousands of Catholic soup kitchens, homeless shelters, prison ministries, immigration legal services, and other social services supported by the Catholic Church.” 

“The Church serves these children without discriminating on the basis of sex, sexual orientation, religion, or race.” 

“Indeed,” Dolan said, “the only discrimination to be found is that of Philadelphia officials who target our ministries because they disagree with what the Church believes.” 

“Our nation has slowly but surely rooted out such bigotry. It should finish the job.”

[…]