Detroit archdiocese cancels sporting events on Sundays

Baltimore, Md., Nov 13, 2017 / 02:30 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- As the conclusion of a lengthy discussion on migration, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops decided Monday to draft a statement from their president expressing the need for humane and just immigration reform.

The Nov. 13 proposal was first floated by Archbishop Michael Sheehan, Archbishop Emeritus of Santa Fe. After debating how to go about preparing a statement, it was agreed by oral assent that Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston, president of the conference, would issue a statement with the assistance of the Committee on Migration, chaired by Bishop Joe Vasquez of Austin, assisted by Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles.

The discussion followed brief presentations from Archbishop Gomez and Bishop Vasquez. The Los Angeles archbishop outlined the principles which guide the US bishops’ work on migration, which come from Strangers No Longer, a 2003 pastoral letter issued jointly by the US and Mexican bishops’ conferences.

“This is a time when newcomers [to the US] are fleeing violence or persecution or cannot find a livelihood in their own country,” he reflected, adding that the Trump administration has taken several steps on immigration that demand a response from the Church because they “have a direct impact on our pastoral care of immigrants, refugees, and DACA youth.”

The first of these is the decision to allow only 45,000 refugees in the coming fiscal year – the lowest level since the program’s founding in 1980, and the second consecutive year in which the number of refugees admitted will be reduced.

This move, Archbishop Gomez said, “is simply inhumane, particularly when our great nation has the resources and ability to do more” for those “fleeing tyranny and persecution.”

He urged the preservation of DACA, which provides reprieve from the threat of deportation for undocumented persons who were brought to the US as minors, many of whom only know the US “and are by every social measure, American youth.”

Bishop Vasquez then spoke, saying the bishops are advocating for a solution for the DACA youth in the form of the DREAM Act, which would provide those young people with residency in the US.

He encouraged the bishops to contact their legislators to pass the DREAM Act or similar legislation as a prompt and humane solution, noting that 85 percent of Dreamers have lived in the US 10 years or longer, 89 percent have gainful employment, and 93 percent have a high school degree.

The Bishop of Austin also addressed temporary protected status, which has been extended to migrants from El Salvador, Honduras, and Haiti because of acute conditions of insecurity in their home countries.

“It is not the proper time to return 300,000 individuals” to their home countries when they remain insecure due to natural and manmade disasters, he said. These individuals have jobs and support their families, many have mortgages, and they have some 270,000 children who are US citizens.

“ A longer term legislative solution for these brothers and sisters” is necessary, he said.

The US bishops’ “vigourous opposition” to many of the administration’s actions on immigration has been taken because the Gospels “compel us to do so,” Bishop Vasquez stated.

“ Along with the right choices on refugee resettlement, DACA, and TPS, we also need comprehensive immigration reform,” he added, saying there is a need for a path to legalization and citizenship, acknowledging at the same time that “our country also has the right, and the responsibility, to secure its borders.”

Responding to the migration committee’s presentation, Bishop Jaime Soto of Sacramento maintained that “the existence of the TPS population is in a certain sense a condemnation of the inability of Congress and administrations over the past 21 years to provide comprehensive immigration reform,” saying that having held them “in this holding pattern for decades is unconscionable.”

Archbishop Gomez stated that “all of us have to have a conversion, and that’s why it’s so important to talk about this, because people don’t know what the Church teaches,” which echoed comments made by Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago.

The Chicago archbishop had lamented the “the poisoning rhetoric that is degrading of immigrants, and even demonizing of them,” which “is having an effect on our own people, because they pick up that language … there’s something wrong in our churches when the gospel is proclaimed but people leave parishes with that rhetoric still in their hearts.”

Archbishop Gomez commented that “it’s important for us to call people to conversion, and explain to them what is it we teach; it’s so essential for the future of our country.”

Bishop Vasquez reiterated the importance of conveying the Church’s teaching, and also of fostering personal encounters with immigrants or refugees. “Once you do that you understand the situation of persons … just like us, therefore we empathize and are in solidarity with them; that’s what brings conversion and change of mind.”

Bishop Oscar Cantu of Las Cruces raised the question of how to counter charges that immigration policy is a matter of prudential judgement, and that the faithful may therefore in good conscience come to a judgement which differs from that of the bishops.

Bishop Thomas Wenski of Miami responded that “we’re making our prudential judgement, too … in the light of Catholic teaching.” He emphasized that “immigrants are not problems, but brothers and sisters; strangers, but strangers who should be embraced as brothers and sisters. We’re offering what we think is best, not only for the immigrants, but for our society as a whole. We can make America great, but you don’t make America great by making America mean.”

Immigration reform, he maintained, must “include the common good of everyone: Americans and those who wish to be Americans.”

Bishop Soto responded that deportations do not fall under the category of prudential judgement, but rather were included by St. John Paul II in his 1995 encyclical Evangelium vitae among the sins which cry out to heaven, and so is not merely “consistent with Church teaching,” but “to discard it as a prudential judgement doesn’t reflect our tradition.”

Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco recommended the five principles from Strangers No Longer as a sine qua non, on which “there can be no disagreement” among Catholics. “While there’s room for prudential judgement, it’s not something that can be taken lightly” because it “involves such basic considerations of justice.”

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Gallup, N.M., Feb 20, 2020 / 03:01 am (CNA).- After visiting with Pope Francis for two and a half hours during his region’s ad limina visit, Bishop James Wall of Gallup told CNA that he was encouraged by the Holy Father’s passion for the pro-life movement, his love for the vulnerable in society, and his willingness to discuss anything.

“The Holy Father just (said), ‘What would you want to talk about?’” Wall told CNA.

“So I saw an opportunity, and it was kind of funny. I said, ‘Holy Father, we’re pro-life.’ And he joked and he goes, ‘Well, so is the Holy Father.’”

Wall said he then told Pope Francis that he wanted to talk about how much of the Church, and society at large, has still rejected the message of Humanae vitae, St. Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical reaffirming the Church’s teaching on sexuality and against contraception, more than 50 years after it was written.

The rejection of Humanae vitae’s teachings has created a “vocational crisis,” Wall added, because parents are not learning to be generous with God, and therefore their children are not learning to be generous with God and to trust him with his plan for their lives.

Wall said Pope Francis responded that he especially sees this crisis in the disappearance of people with disabilities from society.

“(Pope Francis) said, ‘Yes, the question about why is it in our society that we see fewer and fewer people with disabilities?…Because we do tests of children in the womb, and if we see that they have a disability, then we abort them. This is a great evil.’”

People with disabilities are created in the image and likeness of God, as are all people, and they have “a unique role to play in society, because they help us to love and they teach us about love,” the Pope told the bishops.

“It’s a beautiful line from the Holy Father,” Wall told CNA.

The bishops of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Region XIII met with Pope Francis Feb. 10. The region includes the bishops of Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Arizona.

Wall said he discussed with Pope Francis that the Native American people in his diocese still value life – they care for children with Down syndrome, and they have great respect for their grandparents and elders.

Pope Francis then spoke about the importance of respecting life “from conception until natural death, the littlest to the oldest” and the need to protect the most vulnerable in society.

“It was awesome to see the Holy Father just really be so passionate about life, and passionate about life of people with disability. I thought that was beautiful,” Wall said.

One of the problems with the way society talks about life is that they use the term “quality of life,” Wall noted.

“That’s such a loaded term,” he said. “My quality of life could be different from your quality of life, but that doesn’t mean that my life is better or worth more than your life. Every life is worth it and worth living.”

“And whether somebody has a disability, whether somebody’s old and young, whatever the case is, or if somebody makes a lot of money or doesn’t, the quality of life is the same for everyone, (because) our quality of life is we’re all created in the image and likeness of God.”

Priests should be preaching the truth about Church teaching regarding contraception and human life in order to foster a deeper culture of life among Catholics, Wall added.

“That’s something that we shouldn’t shy away from preaching – preaching the truth of Humanae vitae, preaching the truth of the theology of the body, preaching the truth of what all the Church teaches when we talk about the sacredness of life,” he said.

“And we need to be able to name it for what it is,” he added. “So when we talk about abortion, or we talk about contraception, and we talk about embryonic stem cell research, euthanasia, physician-assisted suicide – we call it for what it is. We pray for an end to these intrinsic evils in our society.”

Parishes should also give couples who are living according to Church teaching a chance to share their testimonies, Wall said, in order to counter the perception that everyone is using contraception and that it must be okay because it is so widely used.

Wall said he would also encourage Catholics to read Humanae vitae.

“It was a prophetic document from Pope St. Paul VI…because, in terms of the negative things, he said, ‘If the Church were to go down this rabbit hole (of approving contraception), these are all the things that we’re going to see happen. We’re going to see an increase in abortion. We’re going to see an increase of violence, sexual acts of violence, sexual acts against women, men objectifying women. We’re going to see an increase in divorce.’ All these things happened (when) society gave into it.”

“But, in the positive sense, Pope St. Paul VI said, ‘If we’re faithful to God’s plan for marriage and God’s plans for life, what we’re going to see is we’re going to see a blossoming of marital life.’ So when we see couples that are open to God’s plan, what we see is anywhere from a 2 to 4% divorce rate. In other words, we see in 94 to 96% success rate, meaning couples are together. They’re being faithful to their marriage vows and staying together ‘til death do they part.”

Wall added that after his region’s ad limina visit, he felt very close to the Holy Father and appreciated his openness to discuss anything.

“We didn’t send him a list of questions and have him get prepared for it. He wanted to talk about things. So if you asked him a question, he would sit there and he would really think about it. You could tell he was very thoughtful and very prayerful…and I found that very inspiring. I took away a great love for the Church and a real closeness to him.”

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Parish-based Trinity House Community Groups are now active in 25 parishes in nine states, including 12 parishes within the Diocese of Arlington. Each parish pays an annual subscription cost to gain access to the turnkey program (videos, discussi… […]