News Briefs

Washington D.C., Dec 18, 2019 / 06:00 pm (CNA).- The U.S. Supreme Court will decide two religious freedom cases concerning Catholic schools during its upcoming term, the court announced on Wednesday, Dec. 18.

The court consolidated the cases Our Lady … […]

Washington D.C., Dec 18, 2019 / 03:00 pm (CNA).- A Georgia congressman’s office defended a claim made Wednesday that Jesus Christ was afforded more rights during the trial that led to his crucifixion than President Donald Trump has been given during impeachment proceedings.

“Before you take this historic vote, today, one week before Christmas, I want you to keep this in mind: When Jesus was falsely accused of treason, Pontius Pilate gave Jesus the opportunity to face his accusers,” Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA) said on Wednesday on the House floor, amid House debate on a motion to impeach Trump.

“During that sham trial, Pontius Pilate afforded more rights to Jesus, than the Democrats have afforded this president in this process,” he added before yielding his time.

“…When Jesus was falsely accused of Treason, Pontius Pilate gave Jesus the opportunity to face his accusers. During that sham trial, Pontius Pilate afforded more rights to Jesus, than Democrats have afforded this president in this process.” #ShamImpeachment pic.twitter.com/n8FZRe64eo

— Barry Loudermilk (@RepLoudermilk) December 18, 2019

“Congressman Loudermilk was simply making a comparison about the process; that Pontius Pilate allowed Jesus face his accusers, but the Democrats refused to allow the president or Republicans to even know who the accuser was, much less the right to question him or her,” Brandon Cockerham, Loudermilk’s press secretary, said in an email to CNA.

The 23rd chapter of the Gospel of St. Luke recounts that Jewish religious leaders took Jesus, who had been arrested while praying in Jerusalem’s Garden of Gethsemane, to the home of Pontius Pilate, who was then governor of the Roman empire’s Judean province.

“We found this man misleading our people; he opposes the payment of taxes to Caesar and maintains that he is the Messiah, a king,” the crowd with Jesus told Pilate, according to St. Luke’s Gospel.

While Luke’s Gospel recounts that Pilate found “no guilt” after questioning Jesus and sent him to be questioned by Galilean tetrarch Herod Antipas. Pilate eventually acquiesced to repeated insistence that Jesus be executed.

Christ, subsequent to that execution, rose from the dead, ascended to heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father.

Loudermilk’s Dec. 18 remarks also took issue with Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), who said in November that if Trump had proof of his innocence, “he should make that known.” The congressman claimed that Trump has repeatedly been denied his Constitutional rights throughout the impeachment process.

“The Constitution also guarantees that the accused can call witnesses to testify on their behalf,” said Loudermilk. “But the Republicans and the president were continually denied that right throughout this process.”

The congressman’s remarks refer to a “whistleblower,” who earlier this year accused the president of abusing the power of his office by apparently implying to Ukranian president Volodymyr Zelensky that military aid to the country would be withheld unless the president worked to assure an investigation into former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter.

The “whistleblower” and as such, Trump has not been able to question the party. This, said Loudermilk, is a violation of the Sixth Amendment of the Constitution, which states that people have a right to a fair trial and to face their accuser.

The impeachment process officially began on September 24, 2019, and concerns whether or not Trump abused his power. The two articles of impeachment filed against Trump accuse him of “abuse of power” and “obstruction of Congress” regarding the legislative body’s investigation of Ukraine.

The House of Representatives is set to vote on Wednesday evening to impeach Trump. There will be separate votes for each of the two articles of impeachment that were filed against the president. If the vote passes, the Senate will then hold a trial to decide whether or not to remove Trump from the presidency.

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Denver, Colo., Dec 18, 2019 / 03:01 am (CNA).- After a prominent archbishop commented to journalists last week that he would hold the hand of a person dying of assisted suicide, two priests and a cardinal offered their perspectves to CNA on what a priest ought to do if faced with a person wishing to commit assisted suicide.

“Sitting there holding their hand as if it is no big deal is a huge mistake. I think it’s in fact quite cruel…I think we need to as a culture think more about preaching about why suicide is wrong,” Father Pius Pietrzyk, chair of pastoral studies at St. Patrick’s Seminary in Menlo Park, California, told CNA.   

Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, made headlines Dec. 10 by say he would be willing to hold the hand of someone dying from assisted suicide, and that he does not see that as lending implicit support for the practice.

“In this sense, to accompany, to hold the hand of someone who is dying, is, I think a great duty every believer should promote,” he said, adding that believers should also provide a contrast to the culture of assisted suicide.

Paglia spoke at a Dec. 10 press conference preceding a two-day symposium on palliative care, being sponsored by the Pontifical Academy for Life and the WISH initiative, part of the Qatar Foundation.

If faced with a situation of a person who is resolved to commit assisted suicide, priests must continue to do whatever they can to dissuade them, Pietrzyk said, and remind them that their eternal soul is at stake.

Beyond that, he said, a priest must do anything in their power to stop a person from committing suicide by any means, even if it means subjecting themselves to civil punishment.

“We stand up for life even at the cost of civil punishment,” Pietrzyk said.

“To do otherwise is to deny the sanctity of life. To sit there passively and stroke someone’s hand instead of actively trying to prevent them is to deny the dignity of their life, is to deny the gift that God has given them in their life. We as a Church refuse to do that.”

He said it is a good idea to invite those family members of the person committing suicide who are opposed to the decision to come together and pray.

He also said he thinks priests need to remind the faithful from time to time, whether in catechesis or in homilies, that committing suicide is gravely immoral and that the people who do so risk their souls.  

“There’s no question that, at least in this country, the suicide rate has increased. And I think, again, this false sense of mercy is what’s behind it…I think our failure to condemn suicide has led and will continue to lead to a greater number of suicides.”

Father Thomas Petri, a moral theologian at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington D.C., told EWTN News Nightly that accompaniment should always be governed by love, and love is guided by truth.

“I think [Paglia is] just looking to show that Christ doesn’t abandon anyone, that’s how he started his response. I do think, however, that it was imprudent to suggest that a priest could hold the hand of someone engaged in assisted suicide,” Petri told EWTN News Nightly.

“It’s important not to normalize or regularize this as though it’s some other medical treatment. I wouldn’t hold somebody’s hand if they were about to shoot themselves, or about to hang themselves, I would stop them, which is what a priest ought to do if he’s in that situation.”

Pietrzyk echoed Petri’s point, adding that a Catholic would not “hold the hand” of a woman having an abortion, nor of the executioner flipping the switch on an electric chair.

“There’s a fundamental misunderstanding about pastoral ministry, especially with regards to suicide,” he continued.

“Accompaniment isn’t directionless. Accompaniment is to accompany people to heaven. When you’re in a situation where you’re accompanying someone into Hell, you’ve done something terribly wrong…and I think we as a Church have to say no to that,” Pietrzyk said.

Modern culture tends to associate dignity with ability, Petri said, and thus it can be tempting to think that a bedridden or suffering person has lost their dignity.

“Christianity says, on the contrary, your dignity has not been erased, in fact you have more dignity precisely because we follow a God who became man to suffer. And so God redeems suffering and makes it dignified,” Petri said.  

Cardinal Willelm Eijk of Utrecht told CNA this week that a priest cannot be present when voluntary euthanasia or assisted suicide is performed as this might imply that the priest has no problems with the decision.

While not denying the possibility of spiritual accompaniment, Eijk stressed that “the priest must not be present when euthanasia or assisted suicide are performed. This way, the presence of the priest might suggest that the priest is backing the decision or even that euthanasia or assisted suicide are not morally illicit in some circumstances.”

Eijk also explained that a priest can celebrate the funeral of a person who died by assisted suicide or voluntary euthanasia only in some circumstances, including in some cases of psychiatric illness, though suicide is always illicit.

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Los Angeles, Calif., Dec 18, 2019 / 12:47 am (CNA).- As Planned Parenthood prepares to open as many as 50 centers in Los Angeles public high schools, critics are warning that the organization will not help teens receive the formation they need for prac… […]

Columbus, Ohio, Dec 17, 2019 / 06:01 pm (CNA).- An Ohio state representative told the Cincinnati Enquirer Dec. 17 that he did not consult with doctors before crafting a bill that would allow insurance providers to pay for procedures to “reimplant” embryos removed from ectopic pregnancies – a procedure that does not yet exist.

State Representative John Becker (R-Union Township, Clermont County) introduced House Bill 182 in April, which would prohibit insurers from covering abortions. It provides an exception for “a procedure for an ectopic pregnancy, that is intended to reimplant the fertilized ovum into the pregnant woman’s uterus,” allowing insurance providers to cover such a procedure.

An ectopic pregnancy occurs when an embryo implants outside the uterus, usually in the fallopian tube. Once implanted, the embryo’s growth is likely to rupture the Fallopian tube, which can cause the death of both mother and child.

Both pro-life and pro-choice advocates have noted that no standard procedure currently exists to reimplant the embryo.

According to the Enquirer, Becker consulted Barry Sheets, a lobbyist for the Right to Life Action Coalition of Ohio, in crafting the bill. Neither Becker nor Sheets responded to CNA’s calls for comment by press time.

HB413, also in the Ohio Legislature and cosponsored by Becker, includes a provision that doctors must attempt to “reimplant” ectopic pregnancies in a woman’s uterus “if applicable.” The bill, which has garnered attention around the world, is currently in committee.

“I heard about it over the years,” Becker reportedly told the Enquirer, referring to the reimplantation procedure.

“I never questioned it or gave it a lot of thought.”

There is dubious evidence of two cases of successful reimplantation, in 1917 and in 1980. The 1917 case is poorly documented, and the 1980 case used falsified research.

Dr. Mary Jo O’Sullivan, a high-risk obstetrician and Professor Emeritus of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Miami, is sceptical of the 1917 case, with the doctor’s case report the only evidence that it occurred.

“You have no way of proving that happened. You have to accept what the guy wrote,” she commented.

Dr. Lorna Cvetkovich, an OB-GYN with the pro-life medical practice Tepeyac Center, told CNA in May that the 1980 case was found to have used falsified research.

Becker reportedly told The Enquirer he hadn’t seen the two studies until after The Enquirer requested examples of research in May, and now acknowledges that there is no standard operating procedure for reimplanting ectopic pregnancies, WOSU radio reports.

“[Reimplantation] is so theoretical at this point, that I can’t imagine how anybody would vote to approve this,” O’Sullivan told CNA in an interview earlier this month.

“It’s food for thought, no question about that. Maybe it will stimulate some kind of research to see whether this can actually be done, at least in animals.”

There are three common medical procedures to address ectopic pregnancies, she noted, only one of which is widely considered to be moral.

The patient may be offered methotrexate, which is an anti-cancer drug that stops the embryo’s cells from dividing; the Fallopian tube can be opened and the embryo “scooped” out, a salpingostomy; or the segment of the tube can be transected on each side and removed completely, a salpingectomy.

In all of the procedures, the embryo dies. However, in the first two, the procedure itself is an act to end the life of the embryo. A salpingectomy, in contrast, is an act to remove the damaged portion of the fallopian tube.

For this reason, salpingectomies are generally considered moral under the principle of double effect: the objective of the surgery is the removal of the affected tube, and the embryo dies as an undesired –  although foreseen – side effect. Since there are no alternative procedures that can save the life of the embryo, this process is considered morally acceptable.

O’Sullivan said in her view, the methotrexate treatment and the salpingostomy are both abortions.

“What you’re doing this time [in a salpingectomy] is you’re taking out damaged section of tube, and since it’s removed it’s cut off from its blood supply, and ultimately the little baby, the little fetus, will die,” O’Sullivan explained.

“In the other two cases, the baby is going to die, too. But both of them are direct attacks on the baby itself. In this latter one, you primary intent is to remove the diseased section of the tube, and you know that the outcome of that will be the loss of the pregnancy.”

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