Posted on 10/10/2024 09:00 AM (CNA Daily News - US)
Lia Garcia, director of Hispanic Ministry at the Archdiocese of Baltimore, speaks at a panel discussion exploring the impact of U.S. Latinos on the 2024 election hosted by Georgetown University's Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life on Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. / Credit: Georgetown University/Art Pittman
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Oct 10, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).
As a record number of Hispanic Americans will be eligible to vote this November, many are asking what impact Latinos — and Latino Catholics in particular — will have on the 2024 election.
Several Hispanic Catholic experts explored this question Monday night at a panel discussion hosted by Georgetown University’s Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life in Washington, D.C.
Though acknowledging the great diversity in culture and thought among American Hispanic communities, the panelists posited that the overarching values of family, faith, and care for the poor will factor largely into Latinos’ decisions at the ballot box this November.
“We are big on family, family values … We want to be welcoming and be very attentive to the needs of others,” said Lia Garcia, one of the panelists and the director of Hispanic ministry at the Archdiocese of Baltimore.
“We throw big parties, we eat a lot of food,” she added, laughing. “Everybody is invited to our gatherings, so our faith teaches us that we are built to be in communion in relationship with God and in relationship with one another.”
Speaking with CNA after the panel, Garcia said that in her work with Hispanic Catholics, she has heard “a lot of anxiety about what is going to happen” and “about who is going to win” the presidency.
She said that many Hispanic voters “feel pinned” between conflicting priorities held by Trump and Harris.
“They feel that they have to choose between the issue of abortion and defending immigrants,” she said. “Latino Catholics are very much for life. You can see that in our big families. But they also have a concern about the immigration issues. Even if immigration doesn’t directly affect them because now they’re documented, but they know someone, they know a family member, they know a colleague … it’s really scary to people how Latinos are portrayed to the rest of the world as criminals.”
Hispanic voters have historically favored Democrats in national and local elections. The panelists noted, however, that Republicans have been faring better with Latinos in recent elections and polls, giving credence to predictions that the Hispanic vote is no longer a monolith.
Recent polling on Hispanics backs up this theory. Newsweek reported this week that while Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris is still leading among Hispanics by a wide margin, 56% to 38%, her lead has shrunk from the 59% Joe Biden held in 2020 and even further from the 66% held by Hillary Clinton in 2016.
Instead of loyalty to a party, panelists said Hispanics appear motivated mostly by their family values and concern for the poor and downtrodden.
Father Agustino Torres, a priest with the New York-based Franciscan Friars of the Renewal, said that in his ministry to young Latinos he has witnessed that Hispanic youth “have this fire” for caring for the downtrodden, especially for poor migrants.
“Sometimes we’re American Catholics rather than Catholic Americans. We allow our politics to inform our faith rather than our faith informing our politics,” Torres said. “But this is the reality: I’m responsible for you and you’re responsible for me. If I see someone falling down on the sidewalk, like, I am obligated because of my baptism, and this is a good thing … This is the Gospel.”
“When we teach this, they are just like, ‘yes,’ and it unites their worlds, family, faith, outreach,” he said.
To be clear, like most Americans, U.S. Hispanics are most concerned with the economy. EWTN published a poll of U.S. Catholics in September that found that most of the country’s Hispanic Catholics — 56.8% — said the economy (including jobs, inflation, and interest rates) is the most important issue deciding their vote this election cycle.
The next-highest priorities were border security/immigration at 10.5%, abortion at 9.7%, health care at 5.3%, and climate change at 5%.
Yet, according to panelist Santiago Ramos, a Catholic philosopher at the Aspen Institute, even when it comes to their approach to economic issues, Hispanics do not easily fit into the political right or left.
Ramos said Hispanics challenge the “nationalist, right-wing” as well as progressivist categorizations.
“There is a community aspect to our existence, family-oriented, dare I call it socially conservative aspect to our existence that doesn’t always mesh with mainstream liberal institutions,” he explained. “So, there are all sorts of ways that we pop up in American politics and force people to see things they don’t want to see.”
Aleja Hertzler-McCain, a reporter on Latino faith and American Catholicism for Religion News Service, pointed out that half of the new voters who have become eligible to vote since 2020 are Hispanic.
According to the Pew Research Center, there will be 36.2 million eligible Hispanic voters this year, up almost 4 million from 2020. While noting that U.S. Hispanics historically have low voter turnout, Hertzler said the sheer volume of new Hispanic voters could have a “big impact” on the election.
Whatever the outcome of the election, Garcia said she is “really excited” to see the Hispanic community have its voice heard in the democratic process.
“I can’t wait to see that. I’m really excited about the election for that particular reason,” she said.
“The beauty of our culture,” Garcia went on, “is we can draw from our own experiences growing up with big families, big celebrations, and also with our faith that draws us to relationship with one another. And I think that is where we can sense how [concern for] the common good is not only something that comes from God but comes from our culture as well.”
Posted on 10/9/2024 19:10 PM (CNA Daily News - US)
null / Credit: Pavel1964/Shutterstock
CNA Staff, Oct 9, 2024 / 16:10 pm (CNA).
A United Nations report on violence against women and girls in sports defended spaces for women on Tuesday by calling for separate sports for biological males who identify as “transgender persons.”
The United Nations special rapporteur on violence against women and girls in a presentation of the report on Oct. 8 demanded that member countries preserve female spaces, noting that testosterone suppression for biologically male athletes “will not eliminate the set of comparative performance advantages they have already acquired.”
The U.N. special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, Reem Alsalem from Jordan, appointed by the United States Commission on Human Rights in 2021, presented the 24-page report presented to the General Assembly’s Third Committee in New York. The report cited cases of severe injuries to women and girls forced to compete against biological males participating in female divisions as well as violations of privacy in the locker room and public consequences against women who speak out.
“Male athletes have specific attributes considered advantageous in certain sports, such as strength and testosterone levels that are higher than those of the average range for females, even before puberty, thereby resulting in the loss of fair opportunity,” the report read.
The report highlighted “an increased encroachment on female-only spaces in sports,” noting that female-only divisions in sports ensure “equal, fair, and safe opportunities in sports” for female athletes.
May Mailman, director of the Independent Women’s Law Center, a group that advocates for women’s rights and spaces, said the statement was heartening, though she noted it was from just one branch of the “unwieldy organization.”
“We are heartened that it recognized the obvious: that women deserve sports. This should embarrass the many organizations in the United States that fail to do the same,” Mailman told CNA. “But, it does not make the U.N. at large a reasonable organization. There are too many failures to name, including that UN Women seems to care little about the rapes, murders, and kidnapping of Israeli women.”
The special rapporteur’s office, since it was established in 1994, has addressed domestic violence, trafficking and migration, armed conflict, HIV/AIDS, violence against women, and has also advocated for abortion under the guise of “reproductive rights.” Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state, recently called out the U.N. for promoting abortion and gender ideology.
The report highlighted that female safety and privacy are threatened when biological men are invited into female spaces such as sports practices, games, and locker rooms.
Female athletes are “more vulnerable to sustaining serious physical injuries when female-only sports spaces are opened to males, as documented in disciplines such as in volleyball, basketball, and soccer,” the report noted, citing cases of severe injuries ranging from knocked-out teeth and broken legs to skull fractures and neurological impairment from concussions.
For instance, the IWF statement noted that Payton McNabb was 17 when she became partially paralyzed after a biologically male “transgender” athlete spiked a volleyball into her face.
McNabb has brain damage and paralysis on her right side and has difficulty walking without falling.
“If leaders in the United States care at all about the treatment of women like the special rapporteur on violence against women and girls cares, then this should give them cover to finally do right by women,” Mailman told CNA, referencing the U.N. report.
The U.N. report highlighted the danger of sexual assault when opening up female locker rooms to males, noting that it could “increase the risk of sexual harassment, assault, voyeurism, and physical and sexual attacks in unisex locker rooms and toilets.”
“Female athletes also reportedly experience forced dissemination of nonconsensual sexual images offline and online and exhibitionism, including as a result of a failure to maintain single-sex changing rooms,” the report said.
Violating female-only spaces can not only negatively affect “the mental health and sense of personal safety” of women in sports, the report noted, but it can also “damage their public image and have long-term career repercussions.”
The loss of women’s spaces also has psychological consequences for female athletes. Knowing she has to compete against a male “causes extreme psychological distress due to the physical disadvantage, the loss of opportunity for fair competition and of educational and economic opportunities, and the violation of their privacy in locker rooms and other intimate spaces,” the report said.
The U.N. noted that “sex screenings” can be “necessary, legitimate, and proportional in order to ensure fairness and safety in sports.” The report cited the 2024 Paris Olympics, where female boxers competed against two boxers “whose sex as females was seriously contested, but the International Olympic Committee refused to carry out a sex screening.”
The inclusion of men in women’s sports has resulted in the persecution of women who stand up for themselves, the U.N. report said.
Women who speak out against the dangers of men in women’s spaces are often unjustly treated, “accused of bigotry, suspended from sports teams and subjected to restraining orders, expulsion, defamation, and unfair disciplinary proceedings,” the report said.
“Female athletes and coaches who object to the inclusion of men in their spaces due to concerns about safety, privacy, and fairness are silenced or forced to self-censor; otherwise, they risk losing sporting opportunities, scholarships, and sponsorships,” the report noted.
Mailman said many leaders have let name-calling “overcome their duty to promote fairness, safety, and equality.”
“U.S. leaders have shown tremendous cowardice in standing up for women because they don’t want to be called anti-trans,” Mailman said.
“The more people who show how to do the right thing should give followers cover to finally do the same,” she added.
The U.N. report noted that “transgender” people should still be able to participate in sports, noting that through open categories, “fairness in sports can be maintained while ensuring the ability of all to participate.”
Protecting women’s spaces “does not automatically result in the exclusion of transgender persons from sports,” the report added.
Mailman highlighted that “the solution is not to dissolve women’s sports but to create an open category or to make the men’s category an open category.”
“The U.N. report addressed safety and fairness, including that testosterone suppression does not equalize the playing field and is arbitrary in any case. It addressed privacy in the locker room. It addressed the harassment women face for standing up for themselves,” Mailman told CNA. “These are all important. The only thing regrettable is that this comes from a specialized body and hasn’t percolated higher yet.”
Posted on 10/9/2024 18:05 PM (CNA Daily News - US)
Anti-death penalty activists, including members of MoveOn.org and other advocacy groups, rally outside the U.S. Supreme Court to prevent the execution of Oklahoma inmate Richard Glossip on Sept. 29, 2015, in Washington, D.C. / Credit: Larry French/Getty Images for MoveOn.org
CNA Staff, Oct 9, 2024 / 15:05 pm (CNA).
The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Wednesday in the case of an Oklahoma man on death row who may have been wrongfully convicted — a case the Oklahoma City archbishop has said could help further respect for “the dignity of life.”
This is the second time Richard Glossip’s contentious death sentence has come before the Supreme Court. According to news reports, Glossip has lived through nine execution dates and at least three “last meals.”
Glossip was convicted in 1998 for allegedly ordering a handyman at a motel Glossip managed to murder the motel owner, who was found bludgeoned to death with a baseball bat. Justin Sneed, the handyman, confessed to killing the man while on meth and is currently serving a life sentence.
Glossip, who has maintained that he had no involvement in the murder, was convicted for the murder for hire chiefly on Sneed’s testimony, which Sneed had agreed to give in order to avoid the death penalty himself.
Since his initial conviction, two independent investigations uncovered serious problems with his trial, including allegations of police misconduct and what were reportedly incorrect instructions given to the jury in the case.
The state of Oklahoma, via Oklahoma’s Republican Attorney General Gentner Drummond, has admitted that it had erred in sentencing Glossip to death.
The state asked the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals (OCCA) to overturn Glossip’s conviction and grant him a new trial. That court in April 2023 refused to do so, however, and ordered Glossip’s execution to proceed. Drummond called that decision “remarkable and remarkably flawed.”
Writing to the Supreme Court justices in May 2023, Drummond said that “based on careful review of new information that has come to light, including a report by an independent counsel appointed by the state, Glossip’s capital sentence cannot be sustained.”
The Supreme Court subsequently granted a stay of Glossip’s execution that same month, overruling the OCCA.
In an order announced in January, the Supreme Court agreed to decide whether the state of Oklahoma violated Glossip’s constitutional rights when prosecutors suppressed evidence that their key witness, Sneed, was under a psychiatrist’s care, and also that prosecutors failed to correct Sneed’s false testimony, SCOTUSBlog reported. The Supreme Court will also consider the question of whether it has the power to review the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals’ decision at all, or whether it is a state matter.
A decision in the case isn’t expected until June 2025. Justice Neil Gorsuch has recused himself from the case because he sat on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals when that court decided one of Glossip’s earlier appeals, NPR reported.
In January, when the Supreme Court agreed to take up the case, Archbishop Paul Coakley of Oklahoma City, who often speaks out against the death penalty, said in a statement to CNA that the Supreme Court’s agreement to review Glossip’s case “offers hope in furthering the cause toward one day abolishing the death penalty.”
“With new evidence and the state of Oklahoma’s admission of errors in the case prompting the Supreme Court review — issues that seem to be more and more prevalent — we can clearly see reason to reconsider institutionalized violence against the incarcerated as we hopefully move to respect the dignity of life for all human persons,” Coakley told CNA.
Since 1976, Oklahoma has carried out the highest number of executions per capita of any state, according to Catholic Mobilizing Network (CMN), a national advocacy organization that demonstrates against the death penalty.
Glossip was party to a previous lawsuit that made it to the Supreme Court in 2015, wherein the court ultimately ruled in favor of the continued use of the sedative midazolam, a drug that critics contended had caused excruciating pain in several controversial state executions in Ohio, Arizona, and Oklahoma. Glossip had argued along with two other inmates that midazolam was not certain to work properly and could result in a painful execution that violated the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church, reflecting an update promulgated by Pope Francis in 2018, describes the death penalty as “inadmissible” and an “attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person” (No. 2267). The change reflects a development in Catholic doctrine in recent years.
St. John Paul II, calling the death penalty “cruel and unnecessary,” encouraged Christians to be “unconditionally pro-life” and said that “the dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the case of someone who has done great evil.” The bishops of the United States have spoken frequently in favor of life sentences for convicted murderers, even those who have committed heinous crimes.
Posted on 10/9/2024 17:05 PM (CNA Daily News - US)
Bishop Michael Martin prays with victims of Hurricane Helene while surveying storm damage at Swannanoa, North Carolina, Friday, Oct. 4, 2024. / Credit: Diocese of Charlotte
CNA Staff, Oct 9, 2024 / 14:05 pm (CNA).
Charlotte Bishop Michael Martin recently toured several locations in his diocese ravaged by last month’s Hurricane Helene, offering spiritual and material aid to the “stunned” population working to rebuild after the devastating storm.
Western North Carolina over the last few weeks has been dealing with the aftermath of devastating flooding caused by the remnants of the hurricane, which dumped torrential rain on mountain communities there, leaving serious damage and dozens dead.
Catholic agencies have been mobilizing to help with relief efforts as many major roads remain impassable and residents remain stranded in mountain homes and rural areas.
Immaculata Catholic School in Hendersonville — about half an hour south of Asheville — has become a “distribution center” for aid supplies, with volunteers working around the clock to route critical supplies to those without power and drinking water.
The state government on Tuesday reported that there have been 89 confirmed storm-related deaths in the state, with the number expected to rise in the coming days.
Martin told CNA that he and diocesan staff recently took a trip to several of the harder-hit areas in the Charlotte Diocese to survey the destruction and offer aid to stricken residents, including in Hendersonville and Swannanoa.
The bishop said he was struck by “the sheer power of the storm.”
“One particular thing we saw spoke volumes,” he said. “We saw large rolls from a warehouse, rolls of carpet, up on a hill. It was just so out of place — how did they get where they are?”
“We turned a corner, drove up a little further, and there was a carpet warehouse. It still had its roof and I-beams and still had the concrete slab, but all the walls were totally ripped away. The concrete slab was completely clear. It had taken every roll of carpet out of the building along with the walls.”
“Imagine how heavy those rolls are, even more so when they’re waterlogged — that’s how powerful the water was,” he said.
The bishop said that “people are stunned” in the wake of the tragedy.
“They’re just stunned,” he said, noting “the stunning nature of, one day everything’s fine, and the next day, your town is gone, and your home is gone.”
Yet Martin noted that the population responded by reaching out and helping each other. He said that many people were fortunate enough not to lose their homes and that “those folks are working at the distribution center,” helping others who had lost more.
It was wonderful “just seeing that community connection,” the bishop said. Also affecting, he said, was how so many people flocked to their churches amid the crisis.
“One of the beautiful things is realizing how people come to their parish as a locus for healing and meaning and to be empowered to go out,” he said.
The bishop said the diocese itself has been “remarkably blessed in that, for the most part, our properties suffered relatively minor damages.”
“Obviously, there have been downed trees, roof issues,” he said. “But all of them are still standing.”
“We feel tremendously blessed in that, OK, this we can repair,” he said. “The cost to do that, obviously, is going to be considerable. But we’re more focused on rebuilding the lives of the folks in these communities.”
The bishop encouraged the faithful to donate to Catholic Charities Diocese of Charlotte. He said there is a great need for resources, particularly for local undocumented immigrants who may be fearful of approaching official government sources for help.
The bishop noted that others are still suffering from the effects of extreme weather, including Florida, which as of Wednesday was on the verge of being hit by the extremely dangerous Hurricane Milton. “No one has cornered the market on misery,” Martin said.
Yet “just as God transformed Jesus’ death on the cross into the Resurrection, he transforms our misery into something greater, if we allow his grace to be at work,” the bishop said.
Posted on 10/9/2024 16:35 PM (CNA Daily News - US)
null / Credit: Billy Hathorn, Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0
CNA Staff, Oct 9, 2024 / 13:35 pm (CNA).
The Vatican has authorized the Diocese of Scranton, Pennsylvania, to remove a priest from the clerical state after an investigation found he sexually assaulted two children years ago.
Martin Boylan “has been dismissed from the clerical state at the conclusion of a disciplinary process authorized by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) at the Holy See,” the Diocese of Scranton said in a press statement on Tuesday.
Boylan, 76, was removed from priestly ministry in 2016 after he was accused of sexual assault of a minor. The diocese would subsequently receive four more allegations against the priest, all of which were investigated and submitted to the DDF.
The Holy See authorized the Scranton Diocese to adjudicate the matter. The priest was ultimately found guilty of two instances of sexual abuse of a minor. The DDF “reviewed the findings and authorized the Diocese of Scranton to impose the permanent penalty of dismissal from the clerical state on Boylan,” the diocese said.
The priest appealed twice to the Vatican, which in both cases upheld the diocese’s findings.
Scranton Bishop Joseph Bambera said in the release that there is “no place in our Church for such heinous acts.”
“We must ensure that our Church is a safe haven for all, and it is our collective duty to protect, to listen, and to stand against any form of abuse,” the prelate said.
“I ask all people to join me in praying for the victims and their families,” the bishop said. “No one should ever have to endure such trauma, and it is our responsibility to ensure that all survivors are heard, supported, and empowered to heal.”
Boylan, who was ordained in 1980 and served at numerous parishes and schools, was among the priests identified as sexual abusers in the bombshell 2018 Pennsylvania grand jury report on sexual abuse in most of the state’s Catholic dioceses. No criminal charges have been filed against him regarding the allegations.
Dismissal from the clerical state is “the most severe penalty that the Catholic Church can impose on a cleric,” the Scranton Diocese noted.
As a laicized priest, Boylan “will never again exercise priestly ministry in any capacity,” the diocese said.
“He may no longer celebrate Mass, hear confessions, or administer any of the Church’s sacraments,” it said. “His relationship with the Diocese of Scranton in any official capacity is now permanently ended.”
Posted on 10/9/2024 15:35 PM (CNA Daily News - US)
Maureen McKinley helps her children through some study exercises in her family's dining room in Phoenix. McKinley and her husband, Matt, home-school their five children and offer the older children a curriculum that includes Latin. / Credit: Jake Kelly
CNA Staff, Oct 9, 2024 / 12:35 pm (CNA).
Home schooling continues to grow even as the pandemic is no longer a contributing factor, according to a September study that found multiple states reaching all-time-high numbers of home-schooled students.
The Johns Hopkins School of Education’s Homeschool Research Lab in its 2023-2024 report on home school growth found that 90% of states that shared numbers with the institute reported that home schooling had increased since the previous school year.
The report, published in September, found that while the total number of students is declining nationwide in part due to declining birth rates, the number of home-schooling students is increasing.
The increase can no longer be attributed to the pandemic, according to researcher Angela Watson.
“While home schooling grew rapidly during the pandemic, most people thought that students would return to more traditional schools when the pandemic disruptions abated,” Watson wrote.
“Some states did show a decline, but few have returned to normal, even four years after the onset of the pandemic,” she said. “What we see with the most recent increases in state-reported home school participation is something new — these numbers are not driven by the pandemic.”
Several states reported record-high numbers of home-schoolers in the 2023-2024 school year. North Dakota had a 24% increase in home-schooled students from the prior year, while Rhode Island reported a 67% increase and Wyoming had an 8% increase.
Louisiana, South Carolina, and South Dakota have had continued growth since the start of the COVID-19 crisis. Home schooling has grown without interruption in these three states with no “post-pandemic decline.”
Sixteen states had a “rebounding trend,” according to the report. This means that after the pandemic was over, the number of home-schoolers decreased before experiencing a renewed surge in home schooling numbers.
Only two states in the study — New Hampshire and Vermont — reported a decline in the number of home-schooled students in 2023-2024, which in New Hampshire could be attributed to changing methods of categorizing home-schooled students.
New Hampshire’s state Education Freedom Account (EFA) allows home-schooled students to receive public funding, but students receiving this public funding are not considered part of the total home schooling number, the report noted.
The program launched in 2021, with the state subsequently reporting a lower number of home-school students than its pre-pandemic count.
Home schooling models may include microschools, hybrid schools, and home schooling cooperatives, according to the report. Twenty-one states responded to the study and the group is set to publish more data in the coming months, though only 30 states record home schooling participation.
Last October, the Washington Post called home schooling the “fastest-growing form of education” in the United States, with double-digit increases in home school enrollment seen in a majority of U.S. states over roughly the past five years.
“While there is a clear growth trend in home schooling, the reason for that growth is unknown,” Watson noted.
“What is clear is that this time, the growth is not driven by a global pandemic or sudden disruptions to traditional schooling. Something else is driving this growth.”
Posted on 10/9/2024 09:00 AM (CNA Daily News - US)
Adele Brise. / Credit: National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion
CNA Newsroom, Oct 9, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).
In early June, the U.S. Catholic bishops voted unanimously to begin the process of officially declaring Adele Brise a saint. Brise, an immigrant from Belgium living in northern Wisconsin, witnessed the first and only approved Marian apparition in the United States in 1859. Today, Oct. 9, is the solemnity of that apparition known as Our Lady of Champion.
In 2022, the Vatican gave its formal stamp of approval to the apparitions Brise witnessed, recognizing the newly named National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion in Champion, Wisconsin, as an approved apparition site.
Bishop David Ricken of the Diocese of Green Bay, who initiated the formal investigation into the apparitions, told CNA at the June bishops’ meeting in Louisville, Kentucky, that the number of pilgrims traveling to the shrine has increased from 10,000 a year to more than 200,000 a year today since the apparitions were approved.
“The Blessed Mother is calling people to come to the shrine to experience the peace there, the simplicity; the basics of the Gospel, the catechism are exposed there,” Ricken said.
Our Lady of Champion was the patroness of the Northern Marian Route of the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage, which stopped a the National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion on June 16 on its way to the National Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis.
On Oct. 9, 1859, the Belgian-born Brise reported seeing the first of three apparitions while walking in the woods in Champion, Wisconsin. Brise, who was 28 at the time, said a woman who was dressed in white and wearing a crown of gold stars on her head asked her to pray for the conversion of sinners and teach children about the faith.
Brise immediately set out to visit families within a 50-mile radius of her home to share the Gospel with them and teach them the catechism. They were Belgian immigrants like herself, but unlike Brise, they had lost their faith since coming to America.
“She’s really current for now because we’re facing the same problems — people not knowing the faith, people having fallen away from the Church. She’s a model for us of what it means to be an evangelizing catechist. She’s very pertinent for today as well,” Ricken told CNA in June.
“From the moment of the apparitions, Adele furiously traveled the wild country of northeast Wisconsin teaching children. She would go so far as to do the household chores for the families in exchange for simply having some time to instruct the children,” Ricken said.
Brise went on to gather other women to help her with her mission and establish a schoolhouse and convent. Brise’s father built a chapel at the site of the apparitions, which eventually became a shrine to Our Lady of Good Help. The name was taken from the words the Blessed Mother said to Brise: “I will help you.”
After Brise reported seeing the first apparition, her parish priest advised that if she were to appear again she should ask: “In God’s name, who are you and what do you want of me?”
“I am the Queen of Heaven who prays for the conversion of sinners, and I wish you to do the same. You received holy Communion this morning and that is well. But you must do more. Make a general confession and offer Communion for the conversion of sinners. If they do not convert and do penance, my Son will be obliged to punish them,” the apparition said.
According to the shrine’s website, the apparition “gazed kindly” upon Brise and her companions (who could not see her) and said: “Blessed are they that believe without seeing.” Then, looking toward Brise, the Queen of Heaven asked: “What are you doing here in idleness while your companions are working in the vineyard of my Son?”
“What more can I do, dear Lady?” Brise asked, weeping.
“Gather the children in this wild country and teach them what they should know for salvation.”
“But how shall I teach them who know so little myself?” Brise said.
“Teach them their catechism,” the woman in white replied, “how to sign themselves with the sign of the cross, and how to approach the sacraments; that is what I wish you to do. Go and fear nothing; I will help you.”
In his address to his fellow bishops at the meeting in June, Ricken shared the testimonies of people who said they had received healing thanks to the intercession of Brise.
Candidates for beatification and canonization normally require two miracles attributed to their intercession as well as evidence that they were holy and virtuous.
“As we examine Adele’s life more closely and gather testimonies of people who attest to the life of the growing virtue and possession of Adele, two stories of healing speak out to the most,” Ricken said.
He recounted the story of a woman named Sharon, who while hospitalized for depression saw a vision of a woman she believed to be Brise who gave her the will to live a joyful life of faith.
The second person to testify, a man named John, was diagnosed in 2018 with colorectal cancer, which had metastasized to his lungs. He received what he believes to be a miraculous cure after he prayed for Brise’s intercession.
“‘As of January 2022, I was declared with no evidence of disease, and I have been without cancer detected through my last scans all the way through April 2024,’” Ricken quoted the man’s testimony.
“‘I pray every day, and I’m convinced that my visit to the Champion shrine, my deepening relationship with Mary through Adele, has really blessed me,’” the bishop quoted John as saying.
Following a couple of days of prayer events and festivities, the National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion is celebrating the solemnity of Our Lady today, Oct. 9, with a Mass, rosary procession, adoration, and other prayer opportunities for those gathered to celebrate the solemnity.
This article was originally published on June 14, 2024, and has been updated.
Posted on 10/9/2024 07:00 AM (CNA Daily News - US)
Our Lady of Champion statue at the national shrine in Champion, Wisconsin. / Credit: EWTN
National Catholic Register, Oct 9, 2024 / 04:00 am (CNA).
A new film called “Return to Our Lady of Champion” will premiere on EWTN on the day the national shrine dedicated to Our Lady of Champion celebrates the second annual solemnity of Our Lady of Champion — Oct. 9. The documentary focuses on three bishops most responsible for bringing the shrine to national attention.
The film follows Bishop David Ricken of Green Bay, Wisconsin; Bishop David Zubik of Pittsburgh; and Bishop John Doerfler of Marquette, Michigan, as they return to the shrine to discuss their part in the events leading up to Our Lady of Champion being declared the only approved Marian apparition in the United States and this shrine being raised to national status.
In the film, the bishops also share their own Marian stories, highlighting how their devotion to Our Lady began in their youth and how that devotion eventually tied into their roles as these events progressed. In the film, viewers hear firsthand the bishops’ vivid memories.
“I have to say there’s no question in my mind that this is an act of divine providence,” Zubik said, recounting his own introduction to this holy ground in Champion and learning about the three apparitions of Our Lady to Adele Brise in 1859.
Neither Zubik (who shepherded the Diocese of Green Bay from 2003 to 2007) nor Ricken had ever heard about the apparitions in Champion before they were appointed to head the Green Bay Diocese.
“I say to people, even today, the Queen of Heaven touched down right here — not quite fully — but she touched down right here. She loved us so much,” Ricken said.
When he arrived in the diocese in 2008, he immediately wanted to learn all about the shrine. In the film, he recalls those early days, learning about Brise, the “seer” of Our Lady of Champion, and the area, and seeing the providential connections, such as the name of this Dairy State town being the same name as Brise’s hometown of Champion, Belgium. “So there’s a lot to study here, a lot to get to know,” he said.
“It’s just a beautiful tapestry, a Mary tapestry, to see what she does,” Ricken emphasized. This includes how the lives and devotions of the bishops played into the whole process of bringing the devotion and the shrine to prominence. Their personal stories of how they came to love Mary were part of their personal preparation, not realized at the time, for when they arrived here. Ricken shares a heartwarming example: how, as a young child, he learned of Mary and the rosary from his mother — and how that all became part of overcoming asthma attacks.
As close-up listeners to the conversation of the three bishops, viewers hear their thoughts about Brise’s simplicity and call to teach the faith. Highlights of these segments include shots of the apparition chapel and the shrine grounds.
The bishops also speak clearly and conversationally about the theology of Marian apparitions.
“It was the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and the nudging of Our Lady that moved me in the direction to say we should take a look at this a little further,” Zubik noted. He then recalled giving then-Father Doerfler, who was his chancellor and vicar general at the time, the task of researching the apparitions. Later, Doerfler also became rector at the shrine for two years when it was first known as the Shrine of Our Lady of Good Help.
When Ricken arrived, the approval process ramped up.
“What a wonderful gift this is as a bishop to be able to walk into a place where Our Lady appeared,” he said joyfully. He also recounts some of the stories of answered prayers and healings from people he encountered during visits to the shrine. “I like to listen to people,” he said.
Following are his recollections about the steps to declaring these authentic apparitions and establishing the national shrine.
Viewers learn from the bishops’ conversations fascinating personal connections between them and these Marian appearances.
For example, Ricken shared that he attended seminary at the American College in Louvain, Belgium. He discovered it “was only 11 kilometers [7 miles] from Champion, Adele’s hometown, where she was going to join the convent. I thought, ‘Well, that’s a strange coincidence.’ And so I understood something of the Belgian culture by my three years there and studying the faith of the people there and understanding what their approach was. Then I could start to see maybe I was chosen because of that background,” he recalled.
In Wisconsin “this town is named after Champion [Belgium], which is where Adele made her promises,” Ricken added. “And she felt she lived out her promises here in this place in Champion, Wisconsin.”
The bishops also discuss the “heavenly peace,” as pilgrims describe it, found at the shrine. Some beautiful insights on Jesus and Mary healing divided hearts are also presented.
Doerfler observed that the “answer to so many divisions we’re experiencing is a return to the Lord, and … this is what Mary wants. She wants to bring people to her Son, to heal the divided human heart.”
Ricken shared how he goes to the apparition room, which contains a chapel, and tells “the Blessed Mother this, this, this, this. … I’m kneeling there before the statue, and she just looks at you — I’ve had experiences where those eyes seem alive, and a lot of people do. … She always centers you back on, ‘Follow me. Follow me as I lead you to peace. Follow me.’ That’s what Jesus said, ‘Follow me. I’m the giver of peace. Come to the Giver.’ We work here. We’re at her service. So when she tells us she wants this, we’ll do it. The future is in her hands. We don’t know how to do it [but] we’ll take a step of faith and do it.”
The other bishops also discuss the poignant moments of prayer while walking the perimeter of the property praying the rosary, as Brise and other local faithful did during the Peshtigo fire in 1871.
The engrossing and enlightening conversation of this trio of bishops closest to the Shrine of Our Lady of Champion draws viewers ever closer to the shrine and to our Blessed Mother, who reminded the faithful in rural Wisconsin: “Go and fear nothing; I will help you.”
WATCH
“Return to Our Lady of Champion” will premiere on EWTN on Oct. 9 at 10 p.m. ET.
VISIT
Here is the schedule of events for the solemnity at Our Lady of Champion Shrine, Oct. 7–9.
This article was first published by the National Catholic Register on Oct. 8, 2024, and has been adapted by CNA.
Posted on 10/8/2024 20:30 PM (CNA Daily News - US)
U.S. Supreme Court. / Credit: PT Hamilton/Shutterstock
CNA Staff, Oct 8, 2024 / 17:30 pm (CNA).
A charter school in Oklahoma is aiming to be the first publicly-funded religious charter school in the United States after it appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday after lower courts ruled against it this summer.
St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School and Oklahoma’s charter school board filed separate petitions Oct. 7 with the Supreme Court after the Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled last summer that the Oklahoma Statewide Virtual Charter School Board could not authorize a charter with a Catholic school.
The court in its ruling said that extending public funding to a religious school would be a “slippery slope” that could lead to “the destruction of Oklahomans’ freedom to practice religion without fear of governmental intervention.”
The court subsequently ordered the Oklahoma Statewide Virtual Charter School Board to rescind the school’s contract.
St. Isidore petitioned the Supreme Court to review the Oklahoma decision on the basis of Supreme Court precedent and the free exercise clause of the First Amendment on Monday. The school was represented by the Lindsay and Matt Moroun Religious Liberty Clinic of Notre Dame Law School, a teaching law practice that trains Notre Dame law students.
The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a legal nonprofit that defends First Amendment rights, filed a petition the same day on behalf of the Oklahoma Statewide Virtual Charter School Board.
In the Oct. 7 petition, ADF argued that the Oklahoma Supreme Court had ruled contrary to the precedent set by the U.S. Supreme Court, which “has repeatedly struck down states’ attempts to exclude religious schools, parents, and students from publicly available benefits based solely on their religion.”
For instance, a 2022 Supreme Court ruling found that Maine couldn’t exclude religious schools from a tuition aid program because it violates the free exercise clause.
Michael Scaperlanda, chancellor of the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and chairman of the board of St. Isidore, said that a mission of Catholic education “is to serve the whole community by building new learning opportunities so that every child can thrive in a school that suits her own needs.”
“Too many children in our state don’t have that chance,” Scaperlanda said in an Oct. 7 statement. “We want to help solve that problem by opening a school for children who find the available options unable to meet their needs and who lack the resources to consider other choices.”
Oklahoma ranked 49th in education in the U.S. in 2024, according to the Annie E. Casey Foundation, with 84% of its eighth graders testing “not proficient” in math and 76% of its fourth graders “not proficient” in reading.
“Oklahoma parents and children are better off with more choices, not fewer. There’s great irony in state officials who claim to be in favor of religious liberty discriminating against St. Isidore because of its Catholic beliefs,” ADF senior counsel Phil Sechler said in an Oct. 7 statement. “The U.S. Constitution protects St. Isidore’s freedom to operate according to its faith and supports the board’s decision to approve such learning options for Oklahoma families.”
Sechler said the case is about “bolster[ing] religious freedom across Oklahoma.”
Posted on 10/8/2024 19:30 PM (CNA Daily News - US)
null / Credit: ivanko80/Shutterstock
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Oct 8, 2024 / 16:30 pm (CNA).
A group of 10 scientists is suing the publisher that retracted their studies showing the health risks associated with abortion drugs.
The suit against Sage Publications, filed on Oct. 3 in the Superior Court for Ventura County, California, alleges that the researchers’ studies were retracted simply because of the scientists’ pro-life views.
At the center of the lawsuit are three studies that Sage published in the scientific journal Health Services Research and Managerial Epidemiology (HSRME) in 2019, 2021, and 2022.
One of the articles was cited heavily in the recent Supreme Court case AHM v. FDA in which a coalition of doctors from the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine and several other groups sought to compel the FDA to revoke its approval of the abortion drug mifepristone because of its associated dangers to women’s health and well-being.
The scientists argue that while their studies were peer-reviewed and had previously been praised for their academic rigor, the publisher retracted them in bad faith for political reasons.
The scientists are being represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom and Consovoy McCarthy PLLC.
The 2021 study cited in AHM v. FDA said that emergency room visits “are at greater risk to occur following a chemical rather than a surgical abortion.”
It showed that in a study cohort of 423,000 women undergoing chemical abortions between 1999 and 2015, there were 121,283 subsequent emergency room visits occurring within 30 days of the procedure.
The study concluded that “the incidence and per-abortion rate of ER visits following any induced [chemical] abortion are growing, but chemical abortion is consistently and progressively associated with more postabortion ER visit morbidity than surgical abortion.”
The study also said that there is a “distinct trend of a growing number of women miscoded as receiving treatment for spontaneous abortion in the ER following a chemical abortion.”
As AHM v. FDA was working its way through the courts in 2023, Chris Adkins, a professor at the South University School of Pharmacy in Savannah, Georgia, submitted a concern to Sage in which he accused the scientists associated with the three studies of exaggerating their findings and misrepresenting the data in ways that were “grossly misleading.”
States Newsroom, which first reported on Adkins’ accusations, reported him saying of the researchers: “I can’t prove that there was intent to deceive, but I struggled to find an alternative reason to present your data in such a way that exaggerates the magnitude.”
States Newsroom also reported that Adkins was worried about the legal status of abortion after the overturn of Roe v. Wade.
“I now have a daughter that is born in a world where there is no Roe v. Wade, no federal recognition that women have the right of bodily autonomy,” Adkins said, adding: “I’m going to support her in whatever way I can.”
After learning of Adkins’ concerns Sage discovered that all but one of the article’s authors had an affiliation with one or more of the pro-life organizations the Charlotte Lozier Institute, Elliot Institute, and the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists. Sage claimed that this presented a conflict of interest regarding the studies concerning abortion.
Sage also conducted a post-publication peer review in which they claimed to have identified “fundamental problems with the study design and methodology, unjustified or incorrect factual assumptions, material errors in the authors’ analysis of the data, and misleading presentations of the data.”
Sage concluded that the studies demonstrated a “lack of scientific rigor” that “invalidate[s] the authors’ conclusions in whole or in part.”
In their lawsuit, the studies’ authors claim that they “complied with all submission guidelines and all requirements in Sage’s publishing agreements.”
The suit said that “following each submission, HSRME conducted a double-blind peer review of each article, which Sage claims is thorough and rigorous” and that “after peer review, HSRME accepted all three articles for publication.”
According to the suit, the authors’ attempts to respond to the accusations and to prove the scientific validity of their studies were rebuffed and ignored by Sage.
In addition to retracting the studies, the lead researcher associated with the articles, Dr. James Studnicki, was removed from the board of the HSRME without any prior notice and with no explanation other than his association with the retracted articles.
The researchers allege that Sage intentionally sought to discredit them and ruin their reputations because of their pro-life views.
“Sage’s wrongdoing,” the suit states, “has been causing enormous and incalculable harm to the authors’ professional reputations, as Sage intended.”
Phil Sechler, a senior counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom, said in a statement announcing the suit that “politics should never sway science, especially when that science is vital for saving and protecting lives.”
“Sage punished these highly respected and credentialed scientists simply because they believe in preserving life from conception to natural death,” he continued. “These actions have caused irreparable harm to the authors of these articles, and we are urging Sage to come to the arbitration table — as it is legally bound to do — rescind the retractions, and remedy the reputational damage the researchers have suffered at the hands of abortion lobbyists.”
