US bishops oppose Trump move to exclude undocumented in forming House districts

Alumni of Loyola Marymount University have launched a petition drive calling for the Los Angeles-area Catholic school to stop encouraging students to use preferred pronouns tied to their gender identity. / Shutterstock

CNA Staff, Oct 13, 2023 /… […]

Cheyenne, Wyo., Aug 14, 2019 / 02:30 pm (CNA).- Police in Wyoming have recommended that two clerics accused of sexually abusing male juveniles in the 1970s and ’80s be criminally charged, the Casper Star-Tribune reported Wednesday.

A press release from the police said its investigation “stems from a case initiated in 2002 that was reopened in 2018,” the Casper daily reported Aug. 14.

The clerics whom the police have recommended charging were unnamed in the release.

In July 2018 the Diocese of Cheyenne announced that Emeritus Bishop Joseph Hart had been credibly accused of sexually assaulting two boys after he became Bishop of Cheyenne in 1976, following an investigation of charges ordered by its current bishop.

In 2002, a Wyoming man accused the bishop of sexually abusing him as a boy, both during sacramental confession and on outings. The alleged abuse took place after Hart had become a bishop.

The Natrona County district attorney in 2002 had put forward a report saying there was no evidence to support the allegations that originated in Wyoming.

The Cheyenne diocese said in July 2018 that it “now questions that conclusion.”

According to the diocese, Bishop Steven Biegler, the present ordinary, had ordered a “fresh, thorough investigation” because the claims against Hart had not been resolved.

In December 2017, the bishop retained an outside investigator who obtained “substantial new evidence” and who concluded the district attorney’s 2002 investigation was flawed. The investigator concluded that Bishop Hart had sexually abused two boys in Wyoming.

The diocesan review board, after reviewing the report, concurred with the investigator, finding the allegations “credible and substantiated.” The diocese reported the alleged abuse to the Cheyenne district attorney in March 2018, and Cheyenne police opened an investigation.

The diocese said it reported the allegations of abuse as required by its own policy, the national Catholic Church policy, and Wyoming law.

In August 2018, the diocese announced it had found credible a third allegation of child sexual abuse committed by Bishop Hart.

“A third individual reported that he, too, was sexually abused by Bishop Hart in 1980,” the diocese said. This third person reported the abuse after the diocese’s announcement there was “credible and substantiated” evidence that Bishop Hart had abused two Wyoming boys.

This third allegation was also reported to the Cheyenne Police Department.

Bishop Hart has denied accusations of abusing minors.

His first accusers came forward in 1989, when he was alleged to have abused boys while serving as a priest in Kansas City. Ten individuals named Hart in lawsuits related to child sexual abuse claims dating from the 1970s. These accusations were part of settlements the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph reached in 2008 and 2014, though Bishop Hart denied the accusations, the Missouri diocese said July 2.

Bishop Hart was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Kansas City – St. Joseph in 1956, where he served until he was named an auxiliary bishop in Cheyenne in 1976, and appointed to lead the diocese two years later. He served as Bishop of Cheyenne until his resignation in 2001 at the age of 70.

In June the Cheyenne diocese released a list of substantiated allegations of sexual abuse against minors or vulnerable adults. The release listed allegations against 11 clerics who had served in the diocese.

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Washington D.C., Jan 21, 2021 / 05:45 am (CNA).- While President Joe Biden has nominated a number of Catholics to serve in his cabinet, some of them have publicly contradicted Church teaching on abortion.

Joe Biden on Wednesday became the 46th president of the United States and only the second Catholic to hold that office. 

While U.S. bishops offered him their prayers and congratulations upon his inauguration, and noted areas of agreement such as immigration and protecting the environment, the bishops’ conference also noted that Biden had promoted “policies that would advance moral evils and threaten human life and dignity, most seriously in the areas of abortion, contraception, marriage, and gender.”

Like Biden himself, many of the Catholics he has nominated to cabinet roles have also publicly supported pro-abortion policies–and they could further these policies in their administrative roles. 

Xavier Becerra, Biden’s nominee for Secretary of Health and Human Services, was previously attorney general of California. In that role he defended the state’s law mandating that medically licensed pro-life pregnancy centers advertise where clients could obtain abortions. 

The Reproductive FACT Act was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2018. Kamala Harris, now the vice president, also defended the law as attorney general of California before she was elected to the U.S. Senate. 

Becerre also defended a state mandate of abortion coverage in employer-provided health plans; pro-life and Catholic groups, including the religious community Missionary Guadalupanas of the Holy Spirit, challenged the mandate.

Becerra previously served as a congressman from California, where the National Right to Life Committee gave him a 100 percent pro-abortion score. Politico reported in December that pro-abortion groups view their “pressure campaign” towards Biden as “wildly successful,” in part because of Becerra’s nomination. 

Should Becerra be confirmed as health secretary, his role at HHS would allow him to roll back certain pro-life rules and policies, as well as conscience protections for health care workers. 

Biden nominated Boston Mayor Marty Walsh to serve as Secretary of Labor. During his campaign for mayor in 2013, Walsh’s campaign website said that the disparity in the number of pro-life pregnancy centers to abortion clinics in Boston was detrimental to women’s health.

“In terms of reproductive choices, crisis pregnancy centers outnumber women’s health providers in Boston three to one, seriously undermining women’s access to quality family planning, appropriate counseling, and overall choice,” the website said. 

Walsh also recieved a “Men for Choice” award from NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts in 2016, according to the Boston Globe. Walsh stressed to that “I’m a pro-choice candidate, I’m a pro-choice mayor, I was a pro-choice legislator.

Three other cabinet nominees–Gina Raimondo, Tom Vilsack, and Jennifer Granholm–all backed pro-abortion measures in their roles as governor of Rhode Island, Iowa, and Michigan, respectively. Raimondo has been tapped to lead the Commerce Department, Vilsack the Agriculture Department, and Granholm the Department of Energy.

Denis McDonough, Biden’s nominee for Secretary of Veterans Affairs, served as White House chief of staff under President Barack Obama, who held pro-abortion policy positions. 

McDonough was reportedly among the administration staff who pushed Obama to soften the rules on the HHS contraceptive mandate in 2012, to accommodate objecting religious groups. However, many groups including the Little Sisters of the Poor and the USCCB still opposed that revised rule, saying it required unacceptable participation in the immoral provision of contraceptive coverage.

Gen. Lloyd Austin, Biden’s nominee to serve as defense secretary, has not taken a public policy position on the issue of abortion in his military roles. Austin is also a Catholic, and has ties to the Biden family through the president’s late son Beau Biden, with whom he served in Iraq.

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