Kathmandu, Nepal, Oct 19, 2018 / 07:10 pm (CNA).- Nepal has introduced a ban on pornography as part of a government initiative to stem the country’s high rate of sexual assault.
By Oct. 14, internet providers in Nepal had already blocked … […]
Wellington, New Zealand, Oct 19, 2018 / 12:00 am (CNA).- The Catholic bishops of New Zealand have countered reports that say they are backing away from an upcoming government inquiry into sexual abuse cases in state and religious institutions in the country.
“Listening to individuals who have been harmed is critical in ensuring the Church’s response will be thorough, effective and compassionate, and forms part of our experience for developing safeguarding for today and into the future,” the bishops said in a statement published on their website.
They wrote responding to reports that they had backed away from a royal commission inquiry, which will examine historical cases of sexual abuse at institutions of care in New Zealand between the years 1950-1999.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced the royal commission of inquiry into sex abuse cases in January 2018, the highest form of long-term investigation available in the country.
While the original terms of the inquiry included youth detention centers, psychiatric hospitals and orphanages, as well as any government care services contracted out to private institutions, the Catholic bishops of New Zealand published a letter in March 2018 calling for an expansion of the inquiry’s terms to include Catholic care institutions.
In that letter, the bishops said they would be “active contributors and learners within the Royal Commission of Inquiry.”
“We assure you once again of our support and our desire to learn from this national undertaking which we are confident will contribute positively to the strengthening and safeguarding of our whānau, communities and society,” they wrote.
In their recent statement, the bishops referenced their March letter and reiterated their support of the inquiry.
“The Bishops and representation from Catholic Religious orders wrote to Prime Minister Ardern, Minister Martin, and Sir Anand Satyanand in March this year. That letter explicitly sought the broadening of the draft Terms of Reference to include Church institutions and was made publicly available and reported in the media,” the bishops said.
The statement comes amid pressure from two New Zealand men who are publicly calling for the release of Church files on Father Cornelius O’Brien, an Irish priest who moved to New Zealand in 1963 and served at least seven parishes until 1976, at which point he was accused of indecency against a 10 year-old and returned to the UK. He is reportedly believed to have sexually abused multiple children during his time in New Zealand. O’Brien died 6 years ago, his priestly faculties having never been removed.
The New Zealand Royal Commission inquiry is expected to take several years and is similar to the recently-concluded five-year Royal Commission inquiry in Australia, which examined sex abuse in Australian schools, churches, and sports clubs, and set up a government program to financially compensate victims.
The bishops of Australia said in August that while they have accepted hundreds of specific recommendations from the final report, they reject the recommendation that priests violate the seal of confession in cases of sexual abuse disclosed during confession.
Vatican City, Oct 18, 2018 / 09:45 am (CNA).- South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in met with Pope Francis today after praying for peace on the Korean peninsula in St. Peter’s Basilica. The visit marked the 55th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Seoul and the Vatican.
“I come to you as president of South Korea, but also as a Catholic. My baptismal name is Matthew,” Moon said as he greeted Pope Francis in the Vatican Apostolic Palace Oct. 18.
The Korean president and the pope discussed their common commitment to fostering initiatives to overcome the tensions that still exist in the Korean Peninsula, according to the Holy See Press Office.
After the papal meeting, Moon met with Archbishop Paul Gallagher, Secretary for the Relations with States, and Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin.
The evening before the visit, Moon also participated in a “Mass for Peace” on the Korean peninsula celebrated by Cardinal Parolin in St. Peter’s Basilica.
“Peace is built with the choices of every day, with a serious commitment to the service of justice and solidarity, with the promotion of the rights and dignity of the human person, and especially through the care of the weakest,” Cardinal Parolin said in his homily.
The chief Vatican diplomat prayed that “even in the Korean Peninsula, after so many years of tensions and division, the word peace can finally resound fully.”
President Moon said after the Mass that their prayers in St. Peter’s will “resound as echoes of hope in the hearts of the people of the two Koreas as well as the people of the whole world who desire peace.”
“Just as your holiness prayed before the U.S.-North Korea summit, we are paving a desirable way toward assuring a peaceful future for the Korean Peninsula and the world,” Moon said.
The pope and the Korean president exchanged gifts, including a medallion of olive branches as a message of peace and a Korean image of the Virgin Mary.
When Pope Francis saw Moon’s gift of a sculpture of the face of Jesus by a Korean artist, he remarked that he could see the suffering of the Korean people in Christ’s crown of thorns.
Last month, Moon traveled to Pyongyang for the third inter-Korean summit with North Korean leader Kim Jung Un. The leaders of the two Koreas pledged to make a joint bid for the 2023 Summer Olympics.
During their meeting, Kim Jung Un asked the South Korean leader to extended an invitation to Pope Francis for a papal visit to North Korea. Kim told Moon that he would “greatly welcome” the pope in Pyongyang, according to South Korea’s presidential office.
A South Korean bishop attending the 2018 Synod of Bishops said last week that a papal visit to Pyongyang would be “a giant step forward for peace on the Korean peninsula,” but cautioned that there must be “some sort of religious freedom” before such a visit takes place.
North Korea has consistently been ranked the worst country for persecution of Christians by Open Doors. Christians within the atheist state have faced arrest, re-education in labor camps, or, in some cases, execution for their faith.
A United Nations investigation in 2014 produced a 372-page report that documented crimes against humanity, including execution, enslavement, torture, imprisonment, forced abortions, and knowingly causing prolonged starvation.
The U.S. State Department estimates that there are currently an estimated 80,000 to 120,000 people in North Korea’s six political prison camps.
“Only those who have experienced the inscrutable mystery of the apparent absence of God in the face of suffering, oppression and hatred can fully understand what it means to hear the word peace resound again,” Cardinal Parolin said at the Mass for the Korean peninsula.
“I and all my people hold dearly the pope’s message that ‘dialogue is the only solution in every conflict.’ [We] will solemnly walk toward democracy, lasting peace on the Korean Peninsula and an inclusive nation,” Moon wrote in an article published by Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano Oct. 17.
President Moon expressed hope that “exchange between the Vatican and North Korea will further increase.”
Vatican City, Oct 15, 2018 / 02:00 pm (CNA).- Taiwan’s government has issued a second invitation for Pope Francis to visit the country, a move which follows new developments in the Holy See’s relations with its rival in mainland China.
The… […]
Vatican City, Oct 11, 2018 / 02:00 pm (CNA).- There must be “some sort of religious freedom” in North Korea before a papal visit to Pyongyang, a South Korean bishop said Thursday.
Bishop Yoo Heung Sik of Daejeon, who has made multiple trips to North Korea on behalf of the South Korean Bishops Conference, originally welcomed the news that South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in and Chairman Kim Jong Un had discussed inviting Pope Francis to visit the DPRK during their meeting in late-September.
“It would be a giant step forward for peace on the Korean peninsula,” Bishop Yoo told reporters at an Oct. 11 Vatican press conference.
The bishop cautioned that “in order for him [Pope Francis] to go there, some things in North Korea should change.”
“For example, there are no priests in North Korea,” he continued.
Pyongyang was once referred to as the “Jerusalem of the East” and was considered a center of Christianity in Northeast Asia.
Just before the Korean War broke in 1950, most of the priests in North Korea were captured, killed, or disappeared, according to the Korean Bishops Conference. The beatification process has begun for 40 monks and sisters of Tokwon Benedictine Abbey who were martyred by the Communists.
In 1988, the “Korean Catholic Association” created by the Communist government registered 800 members. This association is not recognized by the Vatican, but is one of three state-sponsored churches that operate in North Korea under strict supervision of the Communist authorities.
Mass is occasionally celebrated in Pyongyang’s Changchung Cathedral when a foreign priest is on an official visit to the country, but on Sundays a liturgy of the word is usually celebrated by state-appointed layperson. The Catholic See of Pyongyang is vacant and the last bishop was appointed in March 1944. There are no native Catholic clerics in North Korea.
North Korea has consistently been ranked the worst country for persecution of Christians by Open Doors. Christians within the atheist state have faced arrest, re-education in labor camps, or, in some cases, execution for their faith.
A United Nations investigation in 2014 produced a 372-page report that documented crimes against humanity, including execution, enslavement, torture, imprisonment, forced abortions, and knowingly causing prolonged starvation.
The U.S. State Department estimates that there are currently an estimated 80,000 to 120,000 people in North Korea’s six political prison camps.
On June 12, President Donald Trump and Chairman Kim Jong Un met in Singapore and signed a joint-statement making commitments “to build a lasting and stable peace regime on the Korean Peninsula.”
Human rights were “discussed relatively briefly compared to denuclearization,” according to President Trump, who also said that North Korea’s abduction of Japanese citizens and the regime’s persecution of Christians were brought up in his 45 minute conversation with Kim.
Earlier this week, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with Kim Jong Un in North Korea to discuss details for a second summit between President Trump and Chairman Kim to continue negotiation of the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, according to the State Department.
If President Trump helps Koreans achieve “a peaceful, united Korea” then “he will become an American president who makes history working for world peace,” Bishop Yoo told CNA.
The South Korean bishop said that the de-escalation of nuclear tensions on the Korean Peninsula this year is “thanks to the Holy Spirit.”
Canberra, Australia, Oct 9, 2018 / 04:01 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Two pro-life activists are challenging Australian “buffer zone” laws in the country’s high court in Canberra. The laws in the states of Victoria and Tasmania bar any protes… […]
Seoul, South Korea, Oct 9, 2018 / 05:40 am (CNA/EWTN News).- North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un has invited Pope Francis to meet in Pyongyang, a South Korean spokesman said Tuesday.
Pope Francis is already set to meet with South Korean President Moon Jae-in Oct. 18 for an audience at the Vatican Apostolic Palace, where Moon will personally deliver the invitation from Kim Jong Un.
President Moon, a Catholic, will also participate in a Mass for peace on the Korean peninsula in St. Peter’s Basilica on Oct. 17 celebrated by the Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin.
During the most recent summit between Korean leaders in September, Kim told Moon that he would “greatly welcome” the pope Pyongyang, according to South Korea’s presidential office.
On Oct. 7, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with Kim Jong Un in North Korea to discuss details for a second summit between President Donald Trump and Chairman Kim to continue negotiation of the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, according to the State Department.
“One of the key pillars of the statement between Chairman Kim and President Trump was that we would have better relationships, confidence-building measures. We would fundamentally change the nature of North Korea’s relationship with the rest of the world,” Secretary Pompeo told press in South Korea on Oct. 8 after the meeting with Kim.
Vatican Secretary for Relations with States Paul Gallagher visited the Joint Security Area on the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea on July 5, where he said, “it is a very historic period, a period of hope and the Holy Father is supporting that movement.”
“I am sure with the prayers and support of Christians and other men and women in good faith around the world that many good things will be achieved in the coming months. We pray for that,” Archbishop Gallagher said during the visit.
Diplomatic negotiations continued at the third inter-Korean summit between Kim and Moon, which took place on Sept. 18 in Pyongyang during a week in which Catholics in South Korea celebrated the peninsula’s martyr saints.
The First Lady of South Korea, Kim Jung-sook, participated in the Mass with Korean bishops as a part of the festivities. She asked for prayers for the diplomatic negotiations at Seoul’s Myeongdong Cathedral days prior to heading to Pyongyang for the summit.
Twenty-five million people live in North Korea, which has one of the worst human rights records in the world. A United Nations investigation in 2014 produced a 372-page report that documented crimes against humanity, including execution, enslavement, torture, imprisonment, forced abortions, and knowingly causing prolonged starvation.
There are currently an estimated 80,000 to 120,000 people in North Korea’s six political prison camps, in which the U.S. State Department has found evidence of starvation, forced labor, and torture.
South Korean bishops have been leading Catholics in prayer for the reconciliation and unity of the divided Korean peninsula for decades.
“Since 1965, the Korean Catholic Church has been praying for the true peace of the two Koreas and the reconciliation of the nation,” Archbishop Kim Hee-Jung of Gwangju wrote in April following the first meeting between the Korean leaders. chairman of the Korean bishops’ conference in April.
“Through these prayers, something miraculous is happening in this land by the help of God for whom nothing will be impossible,” Archbishop Kim continued.
“Until the day when complete peace is established on the Korean peninsula and divided peoples are united, the Catholic Church of Korea will accompany the journey for reconciliation of the people in unity.”
Brisbane, Australia, Oct 8, 2018 / 04:22 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A parliamentary committee reportedly supported a proposal Oct. 5 to significantly expand abortion in the northeastern Australian state of Queensland.
The proposed law, set to be debated in Queensland parliament this month, would allow women to terminate pregnancies up to 22 weeks gestation and until birth with the permission of two doctors. The proposed changes are based on a June report from the Queensland Law Reform Commission, which recommended removing abortion from the Criminal Code.
The proposal would also enforce 150 meter “safe zones” around clinics and medical facilities that perform abortions in order to exclude protesters.
Under the proposal, doctors would be permitted to refuse to perform abortions if they have moral objections to doing so, but they must refer patients to another doctor.
Although the Labor party controls the majority of Queensland’s parliament, Health Minister Steven Miles urged the opposition Liberal National Party to allow a conscience vote on the bill. Miles said if the LNP allows a vote to take place, “the bill will likely pass,” and “if they don’t it will be very difficult for it to pass,” as reported by the Australian Associated Press.
Tim Mander, deputy leader of the LNP, has refused to confirm or deny if his party would allow a conscience vote, saying it would be decided at a party room meeting Oct. 9. He said the Health Minister’s demands indicated that the majority party was uncertain whether they had enough votes from its own members to pass the bill.
Abortion is currently illegal in Queensland except when a doctor believes a woman’s physical or mental health to be in serious danger.
Opponents of the bill have argued that while the legislative proposal is being presented as a matter of health, it will instead legalize abortion based on financial, social, or eugenic reasons.
Dr. Jovina James, a general practitioner from Queensland, objected to the bill’s inclusion of a requirement for conscientious objectors to abortion to refer women to another doctor for the procedure.
“Do they even know what conscientious objection means?” she said in September as reported by the diocesan newspaper The Catholic Leader.
“It is not a distaste for abortion. It’s a deep, unshakeable belief that this act is contrary to the human good…that this is not healthcare, and this is not what I signed up for when I promised to ‘do no harm.’”
Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane weighed in on the proposed legal changes in August.
“According to the draft bill, abortion will be permitted until the moment of delivery if two doctors consider that ‘in all circumstances, the termination should be performed’,” Archbishop Coleridge told The Catholic Leader.
“So, it’s not a health issue. It’s an essentially moral issue that concerns the good of society as a whole because it touches on questions of life and death.”
He cautioned that many women choose abortion out of desperation, believing that they have no other options, because those who support abortion do not present other choices.
“Those MPs who favor the legislation should say why they can accept that Queensland babies who may have reached 40 weeks gestation can be aborted when health isn’t a factor,” he said.
Islamabad, Pakistan, Oct 8, 2018 / 01:01 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pakistan’s Supreme Court has reserved judgement on the verdict of Asia Bibi, a Roman Catholic woman who was sentenced to death for blasphemy, several Pakistani news sources reported on Monday.
The three-judge bench who was assembled to hear Bibi’s final appeal of her 2010 conviction declined to announce their decision on the verdict, and it is unknown when they will do so.
The reasons for the delay were not immediately made clear.
In 2009, Bibi was accused of making disparaging remarks about the Islamic prophet Muhammad after an argument stemming from a cup of water. Bibi was harvesting berries with other farm workers when she was asked to get water from a well.
Another person saw her drinking water from a cup that had previously been used by Muslims, and informed Bibi that it was not proper for a Christian to use that cup, as she was unclean. An argument ensued, and Bibi was reported to a Muslim cleric five days later for her supposed blasphemy. Bibi and her family were the only Christians in the area, and had faced pressure to convert to Islam.
She was convicted of blasphemy in 2010, and was sentenced to death by hanging. She immediately appealed. The Lahore High Court upheld conviction in 2014, which she then appealed to the country’s Supreme Court. The Supreme Court agreed to hear her appeal in 2015.
Since her arrest, Bibi has garnered international support from numerous world leaders calling for her immediate release, including Benedict XVI and Pope Francis. In 2015, Pope Francis met with her daughter and offered prayers.
In Pakistan, Islamic hardliners have been calling for her execution since her initial conviction. Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan said that he supports the country’s harsh blasphemy laws.
If her appeal fails, Bibi would become the first person in Pakistan to be executed for blasphemy. In Pakistan, the crime of defaming Muhammad carries a mandatory death sentence.
Pakistan’s blasphemy laws impose strict punishment on those who desecrate the Quran or who defame or insult Muhammad. Pakistan’s state religion is Islam, and around 97 percent of the population is Muslim.
Although the government has never executed a person under the blasphemy law, accusations alone have inspired mob and vigilante violence.
Blasphemy laws are reportedly used to settle scores or to persecute religious minorities; while non-Muslims constitute only 3 percent of the Pakistani population, 14 percent of blasphemy cases have been levied against them.
Many of those accused of blasphemy are murdered, and advocates of changing the law are also targeted by violence.
Islamabad, Pakistan, Oct 8, 2018 / 11:09 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Catholic Relief Services is among the 18 international organizations ordered closed by Pakistan’s new government without explanation. The move follows allegations related to the U.S. government’s pursuit of Osama bin Laden, in which a doctor’s false vaccination campaign claimed to be linked to the NGO Save the Children.
Most of the groups under the order are U.S.-based, with the rest from the U.K. and the European Union, the Associated Press reported Oct. 5.
World Vision and International Relief and Development are among the other U.S. groups affected, while the U.K.-based ActionAid and the Denmark-based Danish Relief Council are also under orders to close, the Associated Press reports. According to the Pakistani newspaper The Nation, the Pakistani branch of George Soros’ Open Society Foundations is among the organizations.
Pakistan’s Interior Ministry issued the order. The organizations have 60 days to end operations in Pakistan.
Catholic Relief Services declined comment on the matter.
Beginning in 2015, the Interior Ministry required stricter and more detailed online registration application for NGOs. The move was prompted by fears that some NGOs were using their charitable status to spy on Pakistan – and one observer said it is connected to the U.S. government’s hunt for bin Laden.
Muhammad Amir Rana, director of the Islamabad-based Pakistan Institute of Peace Studies, told the AP that ahead of the 2011 U.S. Navy Seal operation that killed bin Laden in Pakistan, a Pakistani doctor used a fake vaccination scam to attempt to identify the al-Qaeda leader’s home using DNA acquired from his relatives.
The Pakistani doctor, Shakil Afridi, said he was working for the NGO Save the Children to gain access to the bin Laden compound.
According to Reuters, he had been recruited by the CIA to help find bin Laden. He has been in jail since 2011.
Save the Children has denied any links to the CIA, and said the doctor’s claimed link with the NGO was false, but its non-Pakistani staff were forced to leave the country, Agence France Presse reports.
In 2012 the NGO’s then-country representative David Wright charged that intelligence agencies had broken international law and put at risk the safety of aid groups around the world.
“The blame lies squarely with the CIA which use humanitarian work for intelligence gathering or worse,” he said, according to the U.K. newspaper The Telegraph. “If it continues then we won’t be able to do our jobs at all in 10 years’ time.”
Rana said that Pakistan, including its intelligence agency, also views many international aid organizations as advocates of “liberal, secular voices.”
In December 2017 Pakistan’s previous government ordered 10 other foreign-funded aid groups to close, including the Pakistani branch of the Open Society Foundations. That order was not enforced in time.
The U.K.-based Plan International also faces a denied registration. The NGO focuses on education and child rights and often partners with the government on water and sanitation projects and disaster management.
Imran Yusuf Shami, Plan International’s country director, said the NGO employs dozens of people, all of whom are Pakistani, and aids tens of thousands of the poorest people in the country.
Shami said the NGO closures will affect hundreds of thousands of people.
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