Vancouver, Canada, Mar 6, 2020 / 08:19 pm (CNA).- A Vancouver-based bicycling charity broke a long-standing partnership with a local Knights of Columbus group this week and rejected their donations of bikes over the Knight’s “anti-LGBTQ+&rd… […]
Bogotá, Colombia, Mar 3, 2020 / 04:06 pm (CNA).- Colombia’s Constitutional Court ruled Monday to maintain the country’s status quo on abortion, neither banning the practice entirely nor legalizing elective abortion up to 16 weeks.
The court maintained its 2006 decision that legalized abortion on the grounds of risk to the life of the mother, rape, and fetal deformities.
In its 6-3 decision March 2, the court declined to rule on two lawsuits brought before it in January by law professor Natalia Bernal, which sought to outlaw abortion entirely.Bernal argued abortion violates the rights of unborn children and of women, and amounts to torture.
The majority said that Bernal had “not presented sufficient arguments” to justify reconsidering the 2006 decision, and her petition was characterized by “substantial ineptitude.”
Three judges voted that the court should rule on the lawsuit, and authored dissenting opinions favoring the legalization of abortion.
One of the three, Alejandro Linares, had proposed legalizing elective abortion during the first 16 weeks of pregnancy. His proposed ruling was presented to the court last week, and had been leaked to the media.
Unidos por la Vida Colombia, a prolife platform, lamented that the court “did not rule on the merits and will not consider Dr. Bernal’s lawsuits.”
“The tide is turning in favor of the most defenseless: the unborn babies, their mothers and fathers, Colombian society has woken up and will continue until the right to life is fully respected, from the moment of conception until natural death,” it said.
The group also asked that the court implement “jurisprudence that safeguards the constitution and the lives of all Colombians,” and that it “respect Article 11 of the constitution,” declaring unconstitutional its 2018 decision.
The court had recognized abortion as a right in 2018, while the eleventh article of the Colombian constitution bars capital punishment, saying that “the right to life is inviolable.”
The Colombian Ministry of Health is drafting regulations to comply with the 2018 ruling.
Jesús Magaña, president of Unidos por la Vida Colombia, told ACI Prensa that the court’s decision this week was “a victory that gives hope.”
“We have won a battle but not the war with the abortion lobby, which sought to expand the time frame for this practice to 16 weeks. Although we can say we’re in a tie, this can in fact be considered a defeat for the abortion lobby, which was unable to further advance its agenda.”
Erika Guevara-Rosas, Americas Director at Amnesty International, said the group “regrets the Court’s decision to continue restricting women’s sexual and reproductive rights instead of setting a positive example for the region.”
Managua, Nicaragua, Mar 2, 2020 / 05:06 pm (CNA).- Fr. Ernesto Cardenal, a Nicaraguan poet and Marxist liberation theology activist whose priestly faculties were long suspended for his assuming a public office, died Sunday at the age of 95.
Fr. Cardenal died March 1 after a brief hospitalization.
His wake will be at the Mount of Olives funeral home, and a funeral Mass will be said March 3 Managua’s Immaculate Conception Cathedral.
Fr. Cardenal was born Jan. 20, 1925 in Granada, Nicaragua. He studied literature and was for a time at the Trappist’s Gethsemani monastery in Kentucky, but he returned to Nicaragua and was ordained a priest in 1965.
The following year he founded an artists colony on an archipelago in Lake Nicaragua.
When the Sandinista National Liberation Front ousted Nicaragua’s Somoza dictatorship in 1979, Fr. Cardenal was named Minister of Culture in the new government. Canon law forbids clerics from assuming public offices which entail a participation in the exercise of civil power.
St. John Paul II publicly reprimanded Fr. Cardenal when he visited Nicaragua in 1983.
The priest continued to serve as Nicaragua’s culture minister until 1987, and he later distanced himself from the FSLN.
He was absolved of all canonical censures one year ago. The Nicaraguan apostolic nunciature announced Feb. 18, 2019 that Pope Francis had accepted the request recently made by Fr. Cardenal “to be readmitted to the exercise of the priestly ministry.”
Toronto, Canada, Mar 2, 2020 / 11:30 am (CNA).- Canada is embracing “death on demand” in its healthcare laws, according to Cardinal Thomas Collins. The Archbishop of Toronto issued a strong denunciation of the Medical Assistance in Dying (M… […]
Ottawa, Canada, Feb 27, 2020 / 09:35 am (CNA).- The Catholic bishops of Canada issued a statement on Wednesday, condemning parliament’s efforts to further expand medically assisted suicide to those who do not have terminal illnesses.
The l… […]
Camagüey, Cuba, Feb 26, 2020 / 02:30 pm (CNA).- Accompaniment for seminarians is critical in Cuba, a priest has said, reflecting that Cubans are “a tired people, a people without hope, it’s a people that really feels helpless.”
Fr. Alberto Reyes Pías, a priest of the Archdiocese of Camagüey and spiritual director for the archdiocesan seminary, told ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish language new partner, that “The two words Cubans live with are survive or leave.”
“There are a lot a people for whom the Church is the only thing that gives them some hope, gives them some meaning. There are lot of people going through an interior process in the Church, which gives them meaning.”
Pias spoke to ACI Prensa at the Feb. 18-22 Night of Witnesses event organized by the pontifical foundation Aid to the Church in Need in Mexico to draw attention to persecuted Churches.
He emphasized that “there’s a feeling of stagnation” in Cuba, but that “there’s this feeling that ‘I can count on the Church’” among Cubans, which “is something that means a lot to the Cuban people.”
Turning to priestly formation in particular, he said there is a particular need to accompany seminarians, since “often there are really good, nice people, but sometimes guys also come who are very broken.”
He lamented that “the situation of the family in Cuba is quite disastrous. They come to us very broken. I believe the most important thing is ‘we’re going to live what one day you will have to help others experience.’ Then it’s to accompany them, to listen to them.”
“One thing I usually say is ‘don’t hold anything back.’ I’m not here to judge you, I’m here to accompany you, but you also have to heal things yourself if you want to be a healer later on. You’ve got to go through a process.”
“The seminary can’t be a tunnel, something you go through to become a priest, because the problem is not becoming a priest, what’s at stake here is your happiness, your fulfillment. You’ve got to go through a process. And processes are painful,” the spiritual director noted.
Pías explained that “we would like them to have done some previous work, so they don’t come to the seminary to discern, although it’s true that the seminary is a time of confirming what you have seen. We try to have them have done some previous work, of accompaniment, of working with the priests.”
“We meet with them ahead of time such that we don’t admit anyone to the seminary who doesn’t have a certain level of discernment. Because there are things it’s better to do on the outside, beforehand,” he added.
Pías explained that “the majority of the seminarians don’t come from Christian families. In fact, it Cuba there’s a very interesting phenomenon going on. In many places in the world children are brought to the Church by their parents, but not in Cuba. In Cuba a lot of children go to catechism class, adolescents, young people, go on their own, and in fact there are parents who have started coming to church because of their children.”
“Most of our vocations are young people who one day encountered Jesus Christ and are fascinated,” he said.
He also noted that Cuba is marked by emigration.
“I’m in a parish where I’ve been for 15 years now. Out of that community I was with 15 years ago, I think 95% of them are in the United States. In fact, when I have gone to the United States, to Miami, they tell me, ‘Father, come here, because we’re all here.’”
“What’s beautiful is that very many of these people are still practicing, they’ve become catechists in the United States, they’re leading couples’ groups, so the seed has borne fruit. But there’s continual emigration,” he said.
The priest also reflected that in Cuba, “we’ve lived in a system in which the absolute value has been fidelity to the system.”
“In fact there are young people whom I would not say are immoral, I’d have to say they’re amoral. They don’t know where there’s good and where there’s evil,” he noted.
For Pías, “one of the greatest works of the Church, obviously besides evangelization, that you encounter Jesus Christ, is to discover values, so that whatever happens, you can be a person who can later build something with his life.”
“Something very beautiful is how there are guys who enter the Church broken and you see them continue on the journey and they end up having a Christian family, where values are lived and a different kind of education is given to the children, giving them something that was never given to them. When you see something like that, you say it’s all worth it,” he concluded.
Ottawa, Canada, Feb 25, 2020 / 03:00 pm (CNA).- A bill has been introduced by the Canadian government that would further liberalize the country’s “Medical Assistance in Dying” (MAiD) laws and allow those without terminal illnesses to … […]
Bogotá, Colombia, Feb 23, 2020 / 10:00 am (CNA).- A late term abortion case has made national headlines in Colombia after a father lost a court appeal to save the life of his unborn son.
Juan Pablo Medina became a national figure in Colombia in the first week of February, after he went public with his efforts to prevent his girlfriend from procuring the abortion of their eight-month-old unborn child.
The 25-year-old law student had dated his girlfriend, Angie Tatiana Palta, 22, for 14 months when they mutually agreed to have a baby together.
Medina says he supported Palta throughout the pregnancy, which was healthy. A Dec. 6 ultrasound with Medina present showed the baby, close to eight months old, doing fine and with no deformities.
But, he says, the situation changed when Palta’s mother and family found out about the pregnancy on Dec. 27. Medina claims the family pressured Palta to have an abortion. He was then told that Palta was in the hospital, supposedly in critical condition, in great mental distress, and that the baby had deformities – grounds for abortion in Colombia.
In a Jan. 31 interview with Semana.com, Medina said “that seemed strange to me because the last ultrasound on Dec. 6 showed the baby was in optimal condition, which makes you wonder.”
When he visited Palta in the hospital, he was told that the baby was fine and that Palta was requesting an abortion on the legal grounds of danger to her mental health. But, he said, the hospital’s psychological evaluation indicated she was not suffering psychological trauma but was confused.
After Palta was discharged from the hospital, Medina lost all contact with her for eight days, prompting him to take legal action to protect his unborn child. Medina filed a criminal complaint alleging attempted homicide, and made an emergency appeal for guardianship of the child. He bought a crib and other necessities, anticipating the need to care for the baby as a single father.
On Jan. 31, Medina posted on Twitter that he was trying to save his son, whom he had named Juan Sebastián, or JuanSe for short. The hashtag #SalvemosaJuanSe (Let’s save JuanSe) was soon trending among Colombians on Twitter.
Medina was interviewed by Semana.com. on the same day, and the story became headline national news.
In the interview, Medina said Palta was unwilling to talk and that he had lost all contact with her. Through contact with relatives, Medina said he learned that Palta intended to abort because she was “not ready to welcome the child, wants to finish her career and doesn’t have the financial means.”
Meanwhile, Palta went to a ProFamilia abortion clinic, which claimed that she was “in psychological distress and was having suicidal thoughts and so on,” Medina said.
He told Blu Radio Feb. 11 that he only found out she had procured the abortion on Feb. 7, when he reviewed the case file for the criminal complaint he had filed.
As a law student who suspended his studies to deal with the situation, Medina had lost his emergency appeal for guardianship. The judge in the case requested the psychological examination from Palta’s healthcare provider which had earlier determined she was not experiencing psychological trauma but was confused. Instead, ProFamila sent the judge a psychological evaluation conducted by a gynecologist, not by a psychologist or a psychiatrist, who verified that an abortion could be done on the grounds of the mental health of the mother.
The judge ruled that that evaluation was insufficient and ordered a new one. However, ProFamilia, an affiliate of International Federation of Planned Parenthood, ignored the order and went ahead with the abortion, claiming it was a “fundamental right” and that, according to National Health Services guidelines, it should normally be done within five days.
In a Feb. 11 statement, the Colombian bishops’ conference said that “in addition to the pain of knowing that Juan Sebastián was already past seven months gestation and that he was in perfect health, we have been perplexed by how the institutions of this country did not guarantee the rights of the father who persistently and tenaciously fought for the life of his son through the applicable channels.”
“We join the suffering of Juan Sebastián’s family, especially that of his parents, and the pain that so many brothers feel for this tragic event.”
The bishops also called abortion “an injustice that cries out to heaven.”
Prayer vigils and rallies were held outside ProFamilia clinics Feb. 11 in Bogotá, Cartagena, Medellín, and other cities.
Jesús Magaña, president of the United for Life platform, told ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish language news partner, that “we’re in a very serious situation promoted and supported by seven judges on the Constitutional Court.”
Magaña said that “it’s impossible for this to continue happening.”
“We call on the Congress of the Republic of Colombia to take action on the matter and we call on the Constitutional Court to stop its judicial activism and once again respect the Constitution.”
Medina want to know what happened to his son’s body and wants to recover it for a Christian burial.
Columbia’s Constitutional Court legalized abortion in 2006 in cases of rape, fetal deformities and when a doctor determines there is a risk to the life or health of the mother. In a 2018 ruling, the court affirmed its 2006 decision, and declared abortion to be a “human right,” and asked the government to issue further regulations defining the legal circumstances for abortions to be performed. The Ministry of Health is currently working on developing those regulations.
Natalia Bernal Cano, a doctor of constitutional law, filed two lawsuits last year seeking to recognize the unborn as having human rights and to completely ban abortion on the grounds that it “does serious harm to the babies and the pregnant mothers” involved.
A version of this story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.
Mexico City, Mexico, Feb 22, 2020 / 10:00 am (CNA).- The Church in Mexico has expressed its support for several bills to eliminate the statute of limitations for the sexual abuse of minors, which stands now at ten years. The bills were introduced in the country’s Federal Congress and would only apply to future, not past cases.
The Mexican bishops do not anticipate that reported abuse cases will be comparable in number to those seen by the Church in the United States, and the Church in Mexico has not seen lawsuits filed on a comparable level.
Speaking to ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish language news partner, Bishop Alfonso Miranda Guardiola, secretary general of the Mexican bishops’ conference, said the country’s bishops support lawmakers’ efforts to eliminate the statute of limitations for the sexual abuse of minors and have been “respectfully proposing to members of the House and Senate to introduce this kind of proposal.”
“These new legislative proposals are a good thing for the nation,” he said, since “they are legal instruments to take actions, correct, eradicate the evil, care for the victims and prosecute the perpetrators,” Miranda said.
Mexico’s House of Representatives unanimously passed a bill Feb. 6. That bill would the Federal Criminal Code to sanction public officials who “cover up” the sexual abuse of minors. Anyone found guilty would be expelled from office and barred from holding public office in the future.
The bill also eliminates the statute of limitations for public officials and has been sent on to the Senate for approval.
Various legislators have also filed bills to eliminate the statute of limitations for pedophilia, including pro-life senator Lilly Téllez, a member of President López Obrador’s National Regeneration Movement Party (Morena).
Téllez posted on Twitter that her proposal also seeks to double the sentence for child abusers with a close relationship to the victim.
The senator’s bill also states that abusers “lose any legal rights he or she has with the victim” and that “local legislatures would have to adjust their laws to comply with the aims of the initiative.”
Bishop Miranda called the sexual abuse of minors “a cancer worldwide” and said it occurs in the Church as well as “in the family, in one’s own home, in education, sports, the arts, and many other environments.”
“When an abuser does not face a civil criminal trial, possible new victims are put at risk, inside or outside the Church,” Miranda said.
Noting that a canonical trial can result in the laicization of an abuser priest, Miranda said that, if the statute of limitations prevents civil authorities from acting, the perpetrator “goes free with the possibility of getting into school or work environments etc. and putting new victims at risk.”
“We are very pleased with the progress these bills are making in the legislatures ,” Miranda said, “and reiterated that “those changes will help protect children, avoid abuse by whoever — a priest or in the family or school environment — and contribute to the healthy development of children.
A version of the story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.
Lima, Peru, Feb 22, 2020 / 06:01 am (CNA).- A Dominican province in Peru has converted its formation house for aspirants in Lima into a hospital.
The Hospital of the Charity of Saint Martin de Porres was blessed at a dedication ceremony Jan. 23.
The hospital is headed by Fr. Luis Enrique Ramírez Camacho and Fr. Rómulo Vásquez Gavidia, the current prior provincial.
Speaking to ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish language news partner, Ramírez explained the inspiration for the hospital came from the charitable example of both their founder St. Dominic and St. Martin de Porres.
The Dominicans did not want “just to devote ourselves to academic and intellectual affairs but also to dedicate ourselves to serving those most in need.”
Ramirez said that for years they have been conducting free healthcare campaigns but that they wanted to do something “more concrete and developed,” which led to the idea of the new hospital.
“Everything the Church does in general and that we Dominicans do in particular is done on a non-profit basis (…) Charity is ultimately the guide that all we, in general, Catholic Christians, are called to. And St. Martin de Porres set a particularly great example that we are invited to follow,” said Ramírez. “I think he understood perfectly what our father St. Dominic did,” he added.
Ramirez encouraged the hospital’s staff always to bear in mind the humanity of the people they are serving, that “this is a human being who is suffering, who came to where you are to get relief.”
“Let us hope that here in our small hospital of the Charity of Saint Martin De Porres that people really experience that, just as St. Martin recognized in the suffering and needy person the face of our Lord Jesus who needs us,” he said.
The hospital’s director, Dr. Valiery Cersso Vergara, recalled that St. Martin de Porres “didn’t hesitate to transform the Saint Dominic convent where he worked into an infirmary,” and that the saint “had a deep sense of charity. And that is what charity is, to look after other people, for their health and well-being … That’s what struck me when they called on me to set up the hospital.”
“Specialists will be coming here who are going to give their time to care for people in complete charity and it’s that sense of charity that leads us to the quality of the healthcare services,” Cersso said.
The hospital operates on a management model that allows it to cover the cost of caring for low income people. Some of the staff will work for less than what they normally receive, while others are able to work pro bono.
“That is the meaning of the Hospital of the Charity of St. Martin de Porres,” Ramirez explained, adding that added that “the charges are very moderate, but if the social worker determines that someone really can’t pay, then there’s a way to be treated for free.”
© Catholic World Report
