NEWS ABOUT THE CHURCH & THE VATICAN

British House of Lords
Rejects "Mercy Killing" Measure

LONDON, MAY 12, 2006 (Zenit.org).- The right to die could easily become "a duty to die," three religious leaders in Britain warned as a controversial "mercy killing" bill underwent debate.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor of Westminster, Anglican Archbishop Rowan Williams of Canterbury and Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks published a joint letter today in the Times against the Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bill.

The bill, in fact, was defeated in a vote in the House of Lords today. It would have allowed terminally-ill patients to request their own death.

The three religious leaders previously issued joint statements, but rarely on legislation up for debate in Parliament, reported the Times.

Their letter states: "We are opposed to this bill and to any measure that seeks to legalize assisted suicide or euthanasia. We believe that all human life is sacred and God-given with a value that is inherent, not conditional."

The religious leaders called on peers to withhold support during the debate, and warned that a right to die could become, for the terminally ill, a "duty to die."

They said: "Were such a law enacted, the elderly, lonely, sick or distressed would find themselves under pressure, real or imagined, to ask for an early death."

Some 90 members of the House of Lords spoke in the debate on the bill, including many medical doctors and disabled persons who spoke strongly against the measure.

Paul Tully, secretary-general for the London-based Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, commented that the "bill runs counter to the right to life of gravely ill and dying people, and would undermine the status of elderly and disabled people."

Cardinal expects 2 million for Spain congress on families

May. 12 (CWNews.com) - The president of the Pontifical Council for the Family is hoping for massive attendance at the World Congress for the Family in Valencia this July.

Speaking to the I Media news agency after a talk at the pontifical University of the Holy Cross, Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo said that the conference in Spain-- which Pope Benedict XVI will attend-- could draw as many as 2 million participants.

The Pope's appearance will be "without doubt important," the cardinal said, because it will provide an occasion for the Pontiff to address the challenges confronting Christian families today. He suggested that the Congress could launch "a renewed and even more profound evangelization" through which the Church will encourage and support strong families. The challenges to family life, he said, have become a critical matter in Spain, in Europe, and in the Church.

Cardinal Lopez Trujillo said that preservation of healthy family life is a goal that demands "greater involvement and investment on the part of all families, governments, states, and all of society."

[The latest on this subject from the New York Times.]

A Bitter Game: Beijing Battles With Vatican


By JIM YARDLEY and KEITH BRADSHER
Published: May 13, 2006

SHENYANG, China, May 9 — From the moment in 1978 when China reopened itself, conditionally, to the outside world, the Roman Catholic Church has been painstakingly working to get back in. Hopes have been raised, then dashed, but this year Rome and Beijing finally seemed close to a historic deal to normalize relations.

Then, unexpectedly, a public spat last week over China's installation of two bishops without the Vatican's approval changed everything. Now, the debate is over how much damage has been done, and why efforts to end 55 years of diplomatic isolation have again gone wrong.

"It is potentially a huge problem," said the Rev. Jeroom Heyndrickx, a Belgian priest who has acted as an emissary between the sides. "It's a confrontation. There was an informal dialogue going on. This has been cut off now. The question is, can we go on from here?"

The Communist Party and the Catholic Church, whose last missionaries were ordered out of China in the early 1950's, make formidable adversaries, each reluctant to give up authority.

The dispute, at its core, is about how much each side is willing to cede in a struggle for control of the hierarchy of China's official Catholic Church.

It is also a battle between old acquaintances: Cardinal Joseph Zen Ze-kiun, who is bishop of Hong Kong, and Liu Bainian, a government official nicknamed "China's Pope." They are outspoken men in their 70's, Cardinal Zen an ardent democracy advocate, Mr. Liu the embodiment of the Chinese system of state-sanctioned religion. They even once lived briefly in the same seminary in Beijing.

The squabble between them, played out publicly in recent months, has threatened the secretive high-level talks that began in the last months of Pope John Paul II's life and had continued under Pope Benedict XVI.

"I think it is chess," said Sister Janet Carroll, an American nun long involved in China, who regards the latest impasse as a tactical standoff, serious and worrisome but not necessarily an irrevocable breach.

Unquestionably, there are many moveable pieces, played at different levels and often shifted in contradictory directions. The pawns, in effect, are Chinese bishops. China has 97 Catholic dioceses, of which 42 have no bishop. Whoever fills these vacancies, and other positions currently held by aging bishops, will shape the future of the Catholic Church in China.

The immediate question is whether there will be more confrontations in the coming months. Though the Vatican has no formal relations with China, the two sides have had an unspoken agreement in recent years under which Beijing has not objected when prospective bishops quietly sought approval from Rome. Father Heyndrickx said other applications for new bishops were already pending.

Yet China could inflame the situation by installing more bishops without papal consent.

On Sunday, authorities in Fujian Province are expected to conduct a ceremony for a bishop named several years ago without papal approval.

Last weekend, however, Pei Junmin, a new auxiliary bishop whose appointment was approved by the Vatican and the Chinese government months earlier, was consecrated in the soaring Gothic cathedral here in this northeastern industrial city.

The ceremony was a jubilant, remarkable display in a country where almost all mass gatherings are illegal. At least 1,000 people, unable to find seats in the packed cathedral, watched on a large outdoor screen. Police and undercover security agents watched as people knelt on the pavement to pray and sing along with hymns played over loudspeakers. Emerging from the cathedral, the new bishop was mobbed.

"Today's consecration affirmed my belief in serving the Lord," said a 34-year-old nun standing in the plaza outside the cathedral. But she also knew that the two other bishops had been installed days earlier without the pope's blessing. "The government appointed people," the nun said. "This violates the laws of the church."

The election of Pope Benedict XVI had raised optimism for a possible deal. While Pope John Paul II made normalization with China a priority, ultimately, analysts say, the government distrusted the man who helped bring down Communism in Eastern Europe. He came close to a breakthrough in 1999, but in early 2000 China, as now, unexpectedly named a handful of bishops without consulting the Vatican.

Benedict started with a clean slate and quickly focused on China. The Chinese church had been largely isolated since Mao ordered Chinese Catholics to cut ties with the Vatican in 1951. The country now has as many as 12 million Catholics, divided between state-sanctioned and "underground" churches. Church leaders say healing this internal split would be an immediate priority if a normalization deal could be cut.

In February, Benedict chose the longtime bishop of Hong Kong, Joseph Zen Ze-kiun, as one of his 15 new cardinals.

Cardinal Zen, who had called for greater democracy in Hong Kong, was popular with Catholics on the mainland, but the government considered him an enemy.

Always outspoken and brash, Cardinal Zen quickly established that he intended to be a strong voice in dealing with Beijing. When named cardinal, he said China was not a "normal" country and needed to respect religious freedom.

Beijing responded a month later with a broadside from Liu Bainian, whose official title is general secretary of the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association.

Mr. Liu denounced the selection of Cardinal Zen as "a hostile act" toward China. His attack drew a retort from Cardinal Zen, who questioned whether Mr. Liu truly "loved his country."

As a young man, Mr. Liu lost his opportunity to become a priest when the Communist Party closed seminaries during the Cultural Revolution. He eventually joined the Patriotic Association and is now the dominant force in the agency, established by Mao to control the church.

"Many people consider him as the devil, as the man who causes all the havoc," said Father Heyndrickx, director of the Verbiest Institute, which promotes exchanges with China.

He has known Mr. Liu for 20 years and spent several hours with him last week in the midst of the consecration controversy. "I think he does for the church whatever is possible in the given circumstances. He also follows instructions from the government."

Mr. Liu and Cardinal Zen clashed when Mr. Liu tried to install Ma Yinglin, his protégé, as the bishop of Kunming.

Father Ma, 40, a priest who was secretary of the Chinese Bishops Council, has a reputation as an amiable administrator, if someone considered more loyal to the government than to the church. His application and that of another prospective bishop from Anhui Province had been pending in the Vatican.

"Rome said it just takes time," Father Heyndrickx said.

Rome apparently had doubts. In an interview, Cardinal Zen said the Vatican had received reports that Father Ma planned to live in Beijing, not Kunming, and continue helping Mr. Liu run the Patriotic Association, rather than tend to his parishioners on the other side of China.

"That is against canon law," the cardinal said.

The installation went forward on April 30, despite warnings that Rome would consider the move a serious breach, as did the May 3 ceremony for a new bishop in Anhui.

Mr. Liu suggested that China was following standard protocol. "China has chosen and consecrated its own bishops for 50 years," he said in a telephone interview. "We are doing this for the sake of spreading the Gospel. I believe the pope will not object."

But a day later, Benedict objected vehemently. His spokesman called the consecrations a "grave wound to the unity of the church" and raised the possibility of formally excommunicating the bishops involved. Father Heyndrickx said the Vatican was also offended at China's public justifications, which he said amounted to a sarcastic slap.

The damage was significant. The arrangement on consecrations, which emerged after the diplomatic breakdown in 2000, had reduced tensions on the pivotal issue of who controls the hierarchy. Last year, all three bishops consecrated in China earned papal approval after their applications were forwarded to Rome.

The diplomatic collapse has brought criticism to Cardinal Zen and Mr. Liu.

Sister Carroll, the former director of the United States Catholic China Bureau, at Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J., said that many Catholic groups active in China felt Cardinal Zen was too provocative and outspoken to be effective in normalizing relations.

The cardinal, though, said he did not regret his conduct because he felt Mr. Liu had insulted the pope with his initial remarks last March.

Mr. Liu has been widely depicted as a Machiavellian figure willing to wreck normalization negotiations in order to protect the bureaucratic turf of the Patriotic Association.

But Father Heyndrickx, who is critical of Mr. Liu's handling of the situation, believes that he is not completely responsible.

"If you blame him only, you are wrong," he said, noting that the Patriotic Association is a weak quasi-governmental body governed by the State Administration of Religious Affairs. "He doesn't have the clout."

The immediate signs are that neither side wants the breach to widen. Benedict, for example, has not gone ahead and decreed any excommunications.

This week, China signaled a more conciliatory tone through government spokesmen. But no one expects a breakthrough anytime soon.

In any case, Cardinal Zen and Mr. Liu may not be on the scene much longer. The cardinal will reach the usual retirement age, 75, in January, though he may be given a position at the Vatican. Mr. Liu, in his 70's, is said to be nearing retirement, and of the handful of prospective successors, one is familiar: Ma Yinglin, the new bishop of Kunming.


Jim Yardley reported from Shenyang for this article, and Keith Bradsher from Hong Kong.

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Scritto da: benefan 13/05/2006 17.27
[The latest on this subject from the New York Times.]

A Bitter Game: Beijing Battles With Vatican
...

Sister Carroll, the former director of the United States Catholic China Bureau, at Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J., said that many Catholic groups active in China felt Cardinal Zen was too provocative and outspoken to be effective in normalizing relations.

The cardinal, though, said he did not regret his conduct because he felt Mr. Liu had insulted the pope with his initial remarks last March.

Mr. Liu has been widely depicted as a Machiavellian figure willing to wreck normalization negotiations in order to protect the bureaucratic turf of the Patriotic Association.

But Father Heyndrickx, who is critical of Mr. Liu's handling of the situation, believes that he is not completely responsible.

"If you blame him only, you are wrong," he said, noting that the Patriotic Association is a weak quasi-governmental body governed by the State Administration of Religious Affairs. "He doesn't have the clout."

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I do not agree with what Father Heyndrickx said about Liu having no clout. He has enough clout to stop bishops from attending the synod even though the government body itself has given its unofficial nod. He has enough clout to push for ordinations even though government is in the process of discussing with Vatican without his involvement.

And, a storm is brewing...I've just seen some news confirming the ordination of another bishop today who has not obtained Vatican approval.

I am worried for PAPA - I don't know how he is going to act this time...

I only wish that the 2 "troublemakers" be removed (Liu Bainian and Cardinal Zen) so that both government and Vatican can talk properly.

Spanish bishops decry European resolution on homophobia as excuse to legitimize same-sex couples

Madrid, May. 15, 2006 (CNA) - The executive committee of the Spanish Bishops’ Conference has warned against a recent resolution from the European Parliament condemning homophobia and rejecting discrimination against homosexuals, could threaten marriage and the entire social order in Europe.

“This resolution, under the pretext of preventing discrimination against homosexual persons, directly promotes the idea that unions between a man and a woman and unions between same-sex couples must be treated equally,” the bishops said in a statement.

The resolution, which was passed on January 18, 2006, “falsifies the truth founded upon the nature of man, who is created male and female,” the bishops continued. Although the member states are not obligated to alter their laws on same-sex unions, the resolution “represents moral pressure” to do so.

In addition, the bishops warned that using the educational system to discourage “homophobia” “carries with it the danger of introducing this deformation of the truth into the minds of children and young people.”

The bishops expressed their unity with other episcopal conferences and individuals who have spoken out “against this resolution that attacks the correct functioning of the European Union.” They also called on the members of the EU Parliament to “avoid actions in the future that would endanger freedom of conscience in the Union.”

Pro-life groups in Colombia prepare legal challenges against high court ruling legalizing abortion

Bogota, May. 15, 2006 (CNA) - Two pro-life associations in Colombia have expressed their rejection of a ruling by the country’s Constitutional Court legalizing abortion in certain cases and said they are committed to preparing legal challenges to overturn the unjust decision.

Ilva Hoyos, president of Red Futuro Colombia, deplored the high court’s ruling and said it was legally unacceptable to defend the thesis that the mere existence of a human being is a violation of the fundamental rights of another. Hoyos called for Colombians to act “as an army of citizens in defense of the Constitution, which rests upon the respect for human dignity. We should also demand that the media faithfully keep its constitutional mandate to inform and to receive truthful and impartial information.”

Martha Saiz de Rueda, president of Cultural Foundation for Human Life—an organization affiliated with Human Life International, said she hopes people will take the necessary actions and refuse “to march to the beat of the drums of death that hail from the UN and certain organizations in the United States.”

She said the high court justices have ignored the more than two million people who signed petitions and the more than 30,000 letters sent by children calling on the court to “protect its tradition of respect for human dignity.”

Euthanasia Bill defeated in British House of Lords

London, May. 15, 2006 (CNA) - The British House of Lords voted 148-100 against a measure that would have legalized assisted suicide in the European nation. The vote is a huge victory for pro-life advocates, disability groups and doctors who campaigned together to stop the bill from becoming law.

The Lord Joffe bill would have allowed physicians to prescribe lethal drugs to terminally ill patients with less than six months to live. It would have had Britain join the Netherlands, Belgium and Switzerland as well as the state of Oregon in legalizing the grisly practice.

Peter Saunders, director of the Care Not Killing campaign group that included various organizations, agreed and said before the vote, "We believe that this is a very bad bill and one that would create great problems for old and sick patients and the medical and nursing professions."

The Vote that occurred on Friday, came the same day religious groups wrote letters to members of the House of Lords condemning the legislation, among them Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, Catholic Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, and Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks, wrote letters to members of the House of Lords condemning the legislation.

"Such a bill cannot guarantee that a right to die would not, for society's most vulnerable, become a duty to die," they wrote.

Together the groups presented petitions of more than 100,000 British residents to Prime Minister Tony Blair urging opposition to the bill.

A Dissenter Speaks After Meeting Pope Benedict

May 14-20, 2006
by EDWARD PENTIN
National Catholic Register

Cherie Blair is known as a dissenter.

Britain’s first lady, who is herself a human rights lawyer, has views of the Catholic faith — even on matters of life and death such as abortion — that are profoundly at odds with the Church. But she recently has shown a softening to Catholic belief on matters like women’s ordination and the magisterium.
After her recent visit to the Vatican, she told Register Correspondent Edward Pentin a little of what’s going on.

A few years ago, you suggested that the Vatican change its approach to women. Did that form part of your meeting with Pope Benedict XVI on April 28? Do you still feel the same way?
That was said in the context of wider remarks. If I recall correctly, I said that I was not a theologian and as such did not have a theologically considered view on the question of the ordination of women — ultimately that is a matter for the Holy Father and the magisterium rather than the faithful to decide. However, I did say that I thought that more could be done to give women positions of power and influence in the Church. For example, I recall meeting some women who were chancellors of dioceses or served as judges on canon law courts. So in answer to your question — I think there is movement — positive movement and women are increasingly found in a cross section of posts in the Church.

Pope Benedict XVI recently completed one year as Pope. How do you feel about his pontificate so far? What would you like to see him do/change in the future?
The Holy Father has one of the most challenging tasks in the modern world. He is a courageous leader who thinks deeply and teaches and writes with great authority. His first encyclical, Deus Caritas Est (God Is Love), is marvelous and has quite rightly been very widely praised. I was delighted and moved that he chose to begin his teaching apostolate with a consideration of the nature and importance of God’s gift of love.

As for what I would or would not like to see him do or change — for me the papacy is not like that. The Pope is not a politician with a manifesto. The Pope, we Catholics believe, is chosen in and through the wisdom of the Holy Spirit. The nature of leadership in the Church is quite different from that found in other walks of life. It is not a question of what I or any other Catholic might like or dislike about a particular pastor. It is the office which is important — in this instance the papacy.
Pope Benedict is following in the footsteps of what was a lengthy papacy. I think that Pope Benedict is already making his mark in very subtle ways. I have no doubt that he, too, will have a unique contribution to make to the life of our Church and world.

Do you plan on taking an even more active role in the Church in the future?
Yes, I would like to but it isn’t always easy to balance competing demands. My faith is certainly very important to me.
My politics and feminism come out of my faith. When I look back, it is faith that has formed me more than anything else. I would not be the person I am without it. So in answer to your question, I intend to keep on trying — there is always more that any of us can do to better live out our faith and provide a witness. With God’s grace I’ll try to do more.

You are in Rome to give an address to the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences on the subject of children in need. Why is this area of interest to you and what are your greatest concerns?
I think it is a fascinating theme for the plenary meeting of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. In my speech I chose to address it from three perspectives — first and mainly from what I have gleaned from 22 years of motherhood; second from my professional stance as a human rights lawyer and, third, what it means to me from a standpoint of faith.

In terms of my concerns, I think it is how best to articulate the communion of care and love between our youth and ourselves; how better to live it out in the world and in our Church; and how to negotiate some of the major challenges and threats that we face together, young and not so young.

The title of the plenary meeting mentions “vanishing youth,” but in many cultures — especially in the West — it is us, the adult population who are vanishing into full-time, all consuming jobs and selfish pursuits of limited value to us or our children; in other words into our egos. Yes, our children are in danger of following our footsteps into increasingly meaningless preoccupations. But we should blame ourselves, not them. And reform must begin here with us, not there with them. We need to rediscover the calling of parenthood, of responsible adulthood, of the caring and nurturing, of time “spent with,” which is the bedrock of every life-giving community, both sacred and secular, beginning with the family.

Our young people will be faced with even more challenging moral issues around the meaning of life, of death and of the preservation, not just of health but even youth and cosmetic appearance than faced us when we were young. And I am not sure we can put our hands on our hearts and say, collectively, that we have helped them a great deal in even beginning to resolve such dilemmas now and in the future. I speak with some passion and a deepening sense of concern, not only as a Catholic and a mother of four children but also as a human rights lawyer grappling with the complexities of a morally conflicted and increasingly secular world.

How can the Vatican and the wider Church improve its care of poor children?
I think few bodies do as much for the care of the poor or the young as the Church. Some 52 million children are in Catholic schools each year — nearly 12 million of those in Africa. The best means to eradicate poverty is to give a child an education. Rather than put the onus on the Vatican or the Church — in its institutional form — I think the onus should be put back on us, the People of God. The question should be: What can we do to improve our care of poor children?

In today’s globalized world, I think the answer rests in a globalization of values, a growing sense of solidarity with the other, with the stranger. Is this a new challenge? No it isn’t. Any social history of the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions will talk about the tremendous upheaval and social turbulence of the time. The Industrial Revolution heralded a way of life that led to the creation of national consciousness and asked society to think beyond family and village life — to extend compassion.

Eighteenth-century citizens had to think nationally — to find solidarity with the stranger not just those known to them. The idea of kinship once so intimate was stretched from the immediately familiar and given a new expanse. Today, globalization asks for the same shift of perceptions. The dynamic is similar, but the scale is different, but perhaps no different to the scale which our forefathers had to embrace moving from village to national consciousness.

There is a continuum at work here, from family to village to town to nation to world. That challenge to think globally, while an emerging reality for us, is real for our children. In summary, I think the Vatican and the Church are leading the way in a whole range of issues from trade justice to climate change, which is doing much to enhance our human consciousness.

China provokes Pope by naming bishop without Vatican blessing
From Jane Macartney in Beijing
Times Online UK

CHINA threw down a fresh challenge to the Vatican yesterday by installing a third bishop in its state-approved Catholic church in defiance of Rome.

Zhan Silu, 45, became bishop of the Mindong diocese in southeastern Fujian province, where the Catholic Church is particularly strong but where most of the faithful are members of an underground church loyal to Rome.

His appointment is controversial because it was sanctioned by China’s state-approved church but has not been blessed by Pope Benedict XVI. It jeopardises any progress achieved in recent tortuous and quiet contacts with the Vatican towards normalising relations, which have been frozen since the 1949 Communist takeover.

China’s state church has twice angered Rome in recent weeks. It unilaterally consecrated a bishop in Wuhu, in the eastern province of Anhui, and another in Kunming, in southwestern Yunnan, drawing warnings from the Vatican that both could be excommunicated....

www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-2180675,00.html

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Scritto da: benefan 15/05/2006 19.27
A Dissenter Speaks After Meeting Pope Benedict

May 14-20, 2006
by EDWARD PENTIN
National Catholic Register

Cherie Blair is known as a dissenter.

...

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Does anyone know whether Tony Blair is himself a catholic or a protestant? I've seen a CNN article sometime ago in which he reluctantly said that he is a christian and it is out of a clear conscience that he was all for Iraq war....

Simply: Blair is not a Catholic but the news media keep speculating that he plans to convert soon.

[Is this politically correct or what to say women are being imported to make men's lives "nicer"?]


Polish nuns issue anti-prostitution leaflets for World Cup

By Jonathan Luxmoore
Catholic News Service

WARSAW, Poland (CNS) -- Polish nuns, anticipating an increase in human trafficking and prostitution during the World Cup in Germany, have issued anti-prostitution leaflets in multiple languages for circulation during the competition.

"Our resources are extremely limited, but we're doing what we can," said Ursuline Sister Jolanta Olech, president of Poland's Conference of Superiors of Female Religious Orders. "We're deeply concerned at reports that men's lives are to be made nicer by importing 100,000 young women from Europe's poorest countries."

Plans for the leaflets were approved in late April, and in a May 5 interview with Catholic News Service, Sister Jolanta said the Union of European Conferences of Major Superiors had asked national organizations to campaign against prostitution during the World Cup, the world's largest soccer tournament, which will be held in 12 German cities June 9-July 9.

Sister Jolanta said the leaflets were being supported by Caritas in Poland and would be circulated in Polish, Bulgarian, Romanian, Russian and other languages and would list telephone numbers for women seeking help.

"We don't have contacts with those directly engaged in this trade, but there are signs the message is getting through," Sister Jolanta said. "A woman at risk who has a few seconds to memorize the number can get in touch with us, while those going for the work may think twice. But the leaflets should also affect prostitutes' clients, so they'll know some of these women have been forced into sex by criminals."

In February, international nongovernmental organizations and the German police union launched a campaign, "Red Card for Forced Prostitution," against human trafficking during the World Cup. The event is expected to attract 3 million sports fans.

Germany's National Council of Women, a co-sponsor, said national players will be asked to support the initiative in the country, where prostitution is legal.

Meanwhile, the president of the German Police Union, Konrad Freiberg, told Germany's international broadcaster Deutsche Welle that anti-trafficking measures will be coordinated with other European forces as part of general security.

In 2005, the German government passed legislation to increase penalties for crimes related to human trafficking.

German newspapers have reported that wooden "sex huts," equipped with condoms and showers, had been erected for the World Cup in Dortmund and Cologne, which already houses a 12-story brothel, Europe's largest, with 120 rooms for rent. The newspapers reported that a $4 million brothel had recently opened in Berlin to accommodate up to 100 prostitutes and 650 male clients.

A background memorandum prepared for a U.S. congressional committee hearing on the World Cup and human trafficking said that "Germany is generally viewed as one the leading countries in combating human trafficking."

The memo, prepared in part by members of the Congressional Research Service, said that, since prostitution is legal in Germany, European governmental, nongovernmental and church officials have expressed concern that prostitutes from other countries will come to Germany in large numbers during the World Cup.

The memo said the German government has said some estimates of the number of expected prostitutes were wildly exaggerated and said the number 40,000 had been "plucked from the air." It said some experts and officials believe the human trafficking numbers might actually be lower than during other periods due to the heightened security and preventive measures by Germany and its neighbors.

[Modificato da benefan 15/05/2006 22.50]

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Scritto da: benefan 15/05/2006 22.39

Simply: Blair is not a Catholic but the news media keep speculating that he plans to convert soon.

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Ah, thanks, benefan, now I understand why he is all for war.

Pope names new archbishop of Washington


VATICAN CITY (AFP) - Pope Benedict XVI on Tuesday named Donald Wuerl as archbishop of Washington to replace Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, who has reached retirement age.

Wuerl, 65, will move from Pittsburgh, where he is currently bishop, to the US capital to succeed McCarrick, who has been one of the most prominent members of the Catholic Church in the United States, and a staunch opponent of the war in Iraq.

Wuerl has extensive experience at the Vatican, where he studied at the Pontifical North-American college and the Gregorian University before being appointed priest in his native Pittsburgh in 1967. He later served as private secretary to the then-bishop John Wright, and followed the bishop to the Vatican when he became a cardinal.

Wuerl later worked at the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy from 1969-1980. He was named auxiliary bishop of Seattle in 1985, and transferred to Pittsburgh in 1988.

The media-friendly McCarrick won a reputation for firmness in his handling of the paedophile scandals which has rocked the Church in the US over the past five years.

Catholic doctors in Spain say defense of human life must be a priority in medical practice

Barcelona, May. 17, 2006 (CNA) - The new president of the International Federation of Catholic Medical Associations, Jose Maria Simon Castellvi, said this week that since its Hippocratic origins, the essence of the practice of medicine demands respect for the life of every human being.

“We should not employ euphemisms such as ‘voluntary interruption of pregnancy’ or ‘death with dignity,’ which cover up sordid realities that many do not want to hear,” Castellvi said at the conclusion of the Federation’s 22nd annual gathering.

“Leaving aside the progress and the advances we have experienced in recent years, we cannot forget about right and wrong. And despite everything that can be said, doctors and the health-care sector cannot work against human life,” he added. Castellvi said he would continue to work to ensure that “the principles that have made the medical community one of the most respected in society” are not lost.

The Spanish doctor also addressed the issue of poverty in the countries of the southern hemisphere and noted that in that region “medicine should not be a business.” He denounced the “institutions and companies related with the medicine of the privileged first world that do not commit to fighting poverty in the world.” Castellvi said the pharmaceutical industry should reach out to poor countries and provide assistance even though it would be economically beneficial.

Cardinal Renato Martino, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and peace, was also in attendance at the Federation’s annual gathering. He expressed his disappointment that only five European countries have kept their commitment to dedicate 0.7% of their GDP to aid for poor countries.

Idle Speculation
AIDS, condoms, and the Catholic Church.

By Father Thomas D. Williams

Now that the dust is beginning to settle around the most recent Vatican-condom pother, we can take a dispassionate look at what happened in Rome several weeks ago and where the Church is going on this question.

The media blitz was triggered by comments from two high-ranking prelates. Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, the retired archbishop of Milan and a known biblical scholar, gave an interview to the Italian weekly L’Espresso in which he suggested that condom use by married couples could be a “lesser evil” when one of the spouses is infected by AIDS.

Martini’s April 21 statement was immediately followed by an April 23 interview with Cardinal Javier Lozano Barragán, head of the Vatican office for healthcare, in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, where he announced that Pope Benedict had commissioned his office to study the question of condom use by those with AIDS and other infectious diseases.

As was to be expected, these comments unleashed a new avalanche of speculation concerning the Church’s position on condoms, with headlines generally suggesting that the Vatican may soon be lifting or relaxing its “ban on condoms.” For the sake of clarity, a few principles should be restated.

First, the present debate has little or nothing to do with contraception itself. The Church is not re-examining its position on birth control “in certain cases,” so nothing like a relaxation of Catholic opposition to contraception is in the cards. In the case of AIDS prevention, the contraceptive side-effect of condom use would be an unintended consequence, not the purpose of the action. Something similar happens when women are prescribed the birth-control pill for medical reasons, and this results in the unintended prevention of conception as well (though in the case of the morning-after pill, there's a possible abortfacient effect to be considered as well).

Second, the central moral issue at stake in the use of condoms as a means of HIV-prevention within marriage revolves around the question of whether or not condom use substantially changes the nature of the marital act itself. Since with a condom the husband no longer deposits his sperm within the woman’s body but in a latex sack, many moral theologians believe that such an act no longer constitutes conjugal relations, but more closely resembles essentially infertile sexual acts such as anal or oral sex.

Third, current debates only concern the use of the condom by married couples. The Catholic Church has no official teaching on the use of condoms outside of marriage, where the sexual act is already vitiated. It is clear, for example, that the use of a condom in the case of homosexual relation adds no further moral evil to the act. Similarly, many moral theologians argue that condom use in the case of prostitution or casual sex adds no moral evil to an already disordered act.

One thing is abundantly clear: the Church will never “promote” condom use as the remedy to the AIDS problem in Africa. The reason for this policy is twofold. First, promotion of condoms inevitably means the sanctioning of promiscuity, and consequently, the increasing of AIDS itself. Second, existing data suggests that condom promotion simply doesn’t work, while abstinence programs have more of a shot. As much as we may wish to shout about “safe sex,” condom distribution first and foremost sends a message about sex itself: it is perfectly fine to be promiscuous. And only as a side note: oh, and be safe.

I have spoken to a number of Africans who find the Western supposition that “they’re going to do it anyway” to be insulting and, frankly, racist. Prejudice against Africans as primitive peoples with no self-discipline or control over the sex drive simmers just beneath the surface of much anti-abstinence propaganda. Behind the cries for “realism” stands the unspoken assumption that Africans are naturally and incorrigibly promiscuous.

This supposition, however, besides its thinly veiled racism, flies in the face of statistics. If we truly want to be “realistic” and objective, we should look to Uganda, the only African nation that has substantially curbed the rate of AIDS infection. Through an intense abstinence-based campaign, Uganda managed to reduce the infection rate from 29 percent to 4 percent in just ten years. As South African Cardinal Wilfred Napier put it, the unified message in Uganda, beginning with the president, was “Change your behaviour ... change your behaviour.”

Compare Uganda’s success with the dismal failure of the two most condom-flooded African nations, Botswana and South Africa. South Africa has been inundated with condoms and its rate of AIDS infection continues to soar at 22 percent of the entire population. Botswana’s situation is even worse, with 37 percent of the adult population infected by AIDS. Professor Norman Hearst, of the University of California at San Francisco, notes that in Botswana condom sales rose from one million in 1993 to 3 million in 2001, while HIV infection among urban pregnant women rose from 27 percent to 45 percent. In Cameroon, as well, condom sales rose from 6 million to 15 million, while HIV prevalence rose from 3 percent to 9 percent.

Moreover, despite critics’ accusations that Catholic moral teaching is the cause of Africa’s woes, the facts demonstrate the contrary. The World Health Organization puts the figure for HIV infection in Swaziland at 42.6 percent of the population, where only 5 percent of the population is Catholic. Similarly, in Botswana, where 37 percent of the adult population is HIV infected, only 4 percent of the population is Catholic. Compare this to Uganda, where 43 percent of the population is Catholic, and the number of HIV-infected adults has dropped to only 4 percent.

For those who wish to pay more than lip service to the problem of HIV-AIDS in Africa, the Catholic Church’s considered position merits more than cavalier dismissal.

— Father Thomas D. Williams, LC, is a moral theologian and dean of the theology school at Rome’s Regina Apostolorum University, and also serves as Vatican Analyst for NBC News and MSNBC.

[This is going to cause Papa all sorts of grief. Fr. Marcial has a lot of supporters, many in high places in the church; however, his accusers are reputable people too and, in interviews, they sound very truthful.]


Vatican restricts ministry of Legionaries priest founder

Move seen as confirmation of sex abuse allegations against Maciel

By John L. Allen Jr.
National Catholic Reporter, Rome
Posted Thursday May 18, 2006 at 9:12 a.m. CDT

Capping a decade-long on-again, off-again investigation of accusations of sexual abuse, the Vatican has asked Fr. Marcial Maciel Degollado, the founder of the Legionaries of Christ, to observe a series of restrictions on his ministry.

In effect, Vatican sources told NCR this week, the action amounts to a finding that at least some of the accusations against the charismatic 86-year-old Mexican priest are well-founded.

Maciel has not been laicized, but the restrictions issued shortly before Easter by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith limit Maciel's public activity, such as his capacity to celebrate public Masses, to give lectures or other public presentations, and to give interviews for print or broadcast.

The restrictions have been approved by Pope Benedict XVI, and the Vatican is expected to issue a brief statement shortly.

Vatican sources stressed that the action against Maciel should not be read as an indictment of the Legionaries of Christ or its lay branch, Regnum Christi.

A spokesman for the Legionaries, asked to comment on the development, replied in an e-mail, "We have nothing to say. We don't know anything about this."

According to sources who spoke to NCR, the congregation's investigation was closed sometime toward the end of 2005. In the early months of 2006, the cardinal members of the congregation in Rome were invited to review the documentation. The decision to impose restrictions was then reached sometime before Easter.

Sources described the documentation collected by the congregation as involving the testimony of at least 20 accusers. The acts in question, according to these sources, reached into the 1980s.

One cardinal who serves on the congregation told NCR that, in his view, the material left little doubt as to the validity of the charges, though he said he was less clear how Maciel understood what he had done. Under canon law, intent and state of mind are sometimes taken into consideration in meting out punishment.

Within the Vatican, the Maciel case has long been seen as particularly sensitive, in part because it could tarnish the reputation of the late John Paul II, who warmly praised and repeatedly honored Maciel. The case could also call into question the action of Benedict XVI, who as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith stopped the case against Maciel in 1999. However, he reactivated the case in 2004 and ultimately approved the disciplining of Maciel.

A senior Vatican official told NCR that the decisive break came only in late 2004, when a number of additional accusers came forward. Prior to that, he said, both John Paul and then-Cardinal Ratzinger, now Benedict XVI, were operating on the assumption that the charges were not justified.

Maciel becomes perhaps the highest-profile priest in the Catholic church to be disciplined for allegations of sexual abuse.

He has a distinguished Catholic lineage. Two of Maciel's great-uncles were Mexican bishops during the anti-clerical persecutions of the early 20th century. One, Bishop Rafael Guízar Valencia of Veracruz, was beatified by John Paul II in 1995, and a decree recognizing a miracle that clears his path to sainthood was signed by Benedict XVI April 28. Maciel's uncle, Jesús Degollado Guízar, was the last commander-in-chief of the Cristeros army that took up arms in defense of the church.

Founded by Maciel in 1941, the Legionaries of Christ has become one of the most influential and rapidly growing communities in the church. Today the order numbers some 650 priests and 2,500 seminarians worldwide. The lay branch of the Legionaries, Regnum Christi, reportedly has 50,000 members worldwide.

The case against Maciel has followed a circuitous path.

Rumors of various sorts have long dogged the Legionaries' founder. In 1956, he was deprived of his faculties to govern the Legionaries and sent into exile in Madrid while a canonical investigation was carried out. Charges at the time did not include sexual abuse but other matters such as excessive control over seminarians, theft and drug abuse. In 1959, the investigation cleared Maciel, and he was restored to his functions as superior general.

Maciel later referred to this period of trial as "the Great Blessing."

Complaints of sexual abuse first surfaced in the late 1990s, when nine former members of the Legionaries filed a canonical complaint against Maciel with the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, alleging that they had been abused by Maciel as seminarians and young priests. Those acts, according to the accusers, dated to a period from 1943 to the early 1960s.

The Legionaries, and Maciel personally, strenuously denied the charges.

"Before God and with total clarity of conscience I can categorically state that the accusations brought against me are false," Maciel wrote in April 2002.

One of the original accusers later recanted; another died.

The accusations became public through 1997 articles in The Hartford (Conn.) Courant by Jason Berry and Gerald Renner and in the National Catholic Reporter, based on the Courant story. The two reporters filed another major piece on the case for NCR in December 2001, noting that canon lawyers in Mexico and the Vatican had found the accusations to be credible but that then-Cardinal Ratzinger had halted the investigation of the charges in 1999.

According to Renner's and Berry's earlier reporting, the nine who originally brought accusations claimed that Maciel "first abused them when they were between the ages of 10 and 16, sometimes telling them he had permission from Pope Pius XII to engage in sexual acts with them in order to gain relief from pain related to an unspecified stomach ailment."

After the case was reopened in 2004, the congregation's promoter of justice, Maltese Msgr. Charles Scicluna, began to collect additional testimony. Sources told NCR that the eventual number of accusers who came forward against Maciel was "more than 20, but less than 100."

On Jan. 20, 2005, Maciel declined reelection as the superior of the Legionaries of Christ and was succeeded by Fr. Álvaro Corchera Martinez del Rio. Around the time of the death of Pope John Paul II in 2005, Scicluna traveled to Mexico to collect testimony from additional accusers. Later, Scicluna prepared a final dossier, which went before the cardinal members of the congregation and eventually Pope Benedict XVI.

Even for those convinced of Maciel's guilt, the outcome of the case was long in doubt because of his strong track record of papal support.

Maciel accompanied John Paul II on visits to Mexico in 1979, 1990 and 1993. During the 1993 trip, it was John Paul's public tribute to Maciel as an "efficacious guide to youth" that prompted the original nine accusers to come forward.

As late as 2002, when John Paul visited Mexico City, Maciel was in the front row at a papal Mass at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and was greeted by the pope. In a 2004 letter, John Paul II congratulated Maciel for 60 years of "intense, generous and fruitful priestly ministry." The pope said he wanted to join in the "canticle of praise and thanksgiving" for the great things he had accomplished.

In a book-length 2003 interview with journalist Jesús Colina of the Zenit news agency published as Christ is My Life, Maciel described dining with John Paul in the Apostolic Palace on several occasions. John Paul also appointed Maciel as a delegate to three synods of bishops, as well as to the 1992 meeting of the Latin American bishops in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. In 1994, John Paul made Maciel a consultor to the Congregation for Clergy.

Vatican observers suggest that at the time John Paul II regarded the charges against Maciel as malicious, ascribing them largely to hostility to Maciel's doctrinal conservatism and his tenacious defense of the papacy.

The original accusers, however, earlier told NCR that they tried for many years to reach John Paul II with information about Maciel. Two of them said they sent letters in 1978 and again 1989, both by diplomatic pouch, but received no reply.

Other Vatican officials have also spoken positively of Maciel.

"Dear Father, I've seen the great work that you do," Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Vatican's Secretary of State, said to Maciel while embracing him during a November 2003 visit to Regina Apostolorum.

On May 20, 2005, the Secretariat of State under Sodano released a statement indicating there was no canonical case against Maciel, nor was one foreseen. It is the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, however, that has responsibility for sex abuse cases, and the congregation continued its inquest.

Now-Cardinal Franc Rodé, a Slovenian and the Vatican's top official for religious orders, celebrated a Mass marking the conclusion of the Legionaries' General Chapter at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in January 2005, and used the occasion to praise Maciel.

Rodé called Maciel "the instrument chosen by God to carry out one of the great spiritual designs in the church of the 20th century."

Speaking on background, Vatican officials explained these comments in much the same way as they did John Paul's praise for Maciel. At the time, they argued, the evidence against Maciel was not yet complete, and looking at what these officials regarded as the positive works of the Legionaries and Regnum Christi, they assumed "by their fruits you shall know them."

The Legionaries maintain a Web site defending Maciel, which can be found here: www.legionaryfacts.org/FATHERMACIEL.html.

[Modificato da benefan 18/05/2006 21.42]

[This is the 2008 conference that the pope has been invited to.]


Young people in Canada preparing for 2008 International Eucharistic Congress

Quebec City, May. 18, 2006 (CNA) - Catholic young people in Canada have begun a program of spiritual preparation for the 49th International Eucharistic Congress which will take place in Quebec June 15-22, 2008, on the theme, “The Eucharist, gift of God for the life of the world.”

According to the Fides news agency, the Archdiocese of Quebec has organized a first preparatory meeting for May 19-22 for young people of all the diocese of the country. The meeting was called for by Cardinal Marc Ouellet in order to encourage young people to spiritually prepare for the Eucharistic Congress, reminding them that they are called to fully participate in this event that has as its purpose the celebration and proclamation of Jesus Christ present in the Eucharist as the heart of the Church.

During the meeting, which will be held at the Jèsus-Marie College of Sillery, young people will participate in catechesis, liturgical celebrations and works of charity, and they will hear an address by Cardinal Ouellet. The meeting will culminate on Sunday, June 22, with a procession to the tomb of the three founders of the Church in Canada.

The International Eucharistic Congress will coincide with the 400th anniversary of the foundation of the city of Quebec, where the first Catholic diocese north of Mexico was established.

Regardless of Maciel's high-placed supporters in the Vatican, if the CDF did conclude that the charges against Maciel were not unfounded, then it would be a great moral as well as PR victory for the Church to discipline him.

There must have been enough compelling evidence gathered after 1999 (when Cardinal Ratzinger stopped the investigation) for him to order it resumed in 2004 and for it to now come to this apparent conclusion.

And the story is right to point out that John Paul II and the other Curia prominents who have praised Maciel greatly in public were praising him for the work of the Legionaries of Christ, while rightly giving him the presumption of innocence till proven guilty on personal charges that had been made against him.

John Paul II is no longer here for anyone to fault or reproach - if they wish to - for his public support of Maciel which was justifiable in the context just described. As for the other Curia officials like Sodano and Rode, are they going to come out and publicly dispute the findings of the CDF (which is the only responsible authority in this case) if indeed the report is unfavorable for Maciel? I don't think so.

If this story is true, I pray that Father Maciel be guided by the Holy Spirit in how he reacts to all this.

Vatican to Issue Statement on Sex Abuse
By NICOLE WINFIELD,

VATICAN CITY - The Vatican said Thursday it would issue a statement on its investigation into allegations the Mexican founder of the conservative order Legionaries of Christ sexually abused seminarians decades ago.

The statement is expected to be issued Friday, Vatican officials said. The National Catholic Reporter said on its Web site Thursday that the Vatican had asked the Rev. Marcial Maciel to limit his public activity by not celebrating public Masses or giving lectures or interviews.

The reported action was taken after the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith concluded its long-running investigation into allegations by former seminarians that the 86-year-old Maciel sexually abused them. Nine former seminarians accused Maciel in the 1990s of having abused them when they were boys or teenagers from the 1940s to 1960s.

The Vatican officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the statement had not been issued, declined to say what the Vatican's findings were or what action, if any, was taken against Maciel.

Maciel and the Legionaries have strongly denied the allegations.

"Before God and with total clarity of conscience I can categorically state that the accusations brought against me are false," Maciel said in a 2002 statement. "I never engaged in the sort of repulsive behavior these men accuse me of."

Asked Thursday to comment on the reports of the Vatican action against Maciel, Jay Dunlap, spokesman for the Legionaries in the United States, said in an e-mail: "We have nothing to say. We don't know anything about this."

The order is based in Orange, Conn.

The case against Maciel has been followed closely by victims of the clerical sex abuse scandal because Maciel in particular, and the Legionaries in general, curried such favor in the Vatican under Pope John Paul II.

In January 2005, John Paul hailed Maciel for his "paternal affection and his experience." A few months earlier, the late pope praised Maciel on the 60th anniversary of his ordination, citing his "intense, generous and fruitful" priestly ministry.

Maciel declined last year to be re-elected head of the order, citing his age.

Any Vatican sanctions against Maciel, who founded the Legionaries in 1941 in Mexico City, also would be significant since this represents the first major sex abuse discipline case decided by the Vatican under Pope Benedict XVI. The former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger headed the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith until his election as pope last year.

The Rev. James Martin, associate editor of the Jesuit magazine America, said the Legionaries had enormous support in the Vatican because of their loyalty to the church, their conservative views and their success in recruiting candidates for the priesthood.

"So to take action against their founder is absolutely stunning," Martin said. "Benedict shows his independence by taking on a darling movement of the conservative right."

Victims groups hailed the reported sanctions.

"It would have been easy to let this case quietly go unresolved, as so many similar cases have," said David Clohessy, national director of the Survivors Network of those Accused by Priests. "We deeply appreciate that, at the highest levels of the church, action has been taken against such an extraordinarily high-ranking Catholic leader."

Jason Berry, who along with Gerald Renner wrote "Vows of Silence" about the abuse claims against Maciel, said church officials must have felt compelled to take action when the allegations against Maciel spread and prompted additional accusers to come forward after the original nine seminarians unsuccessfully lobbied the Vatican to take action.

Berry said any punishment of Maciel would be "a stain on John Paul's legacy" because the late pope had praised him so "extravagantly."

The Vatican investigated Maciel in the 1950s for alleged drug use, trafficking and misuse of funds but not for sexual misconduct. He was suspended from his duties as head of the order then reinstated after being cleared of all allegations.

The status of the sex abuse investigation into Maciel has been particularly confusing. In May 2005, the Vatican's Secretariat of State informed the Legionaries there was no canonical process underway against Maciel, implying the investigation had been closed.

However, it was the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith that was actually responsible for the case and was continuing its investigation at that time, the Vatican officials said Thursday in explaining the discrepancy.