Month: October 2020

Washington D.C., Oct 8, 2020 / 02:19 pm (CNA).- Members of Congress are supporting a Washington, D.C., Baptist church in its court case against the city’s enforcement of its COVID restrictions on outdoor religious services. 

Capitol Hill Ba… […]

CNA Staff, Oct 8, 2020 / 02:01 pm (CNA).- The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops on Wednesday urged the Trump administration to resume negotiations for further COVID-19 financial relief, after President Trump reportedly ordered negotiations to cease T… […]

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Oct 8, 2020 / 12:30 pm (CNA).- The chair of the U.S. bishops’ religious freedom committee responded Thursday to the ongoing scrutiny of Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett’s religious beliefs.

“The Constitution specifically says there should be ‘no religious test for office,’” Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami told CNA on Thursday of Barrett, whose confirmation hearings for the Supreme Court are set to begin Oct. 12 before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Those who are “raising the issue” of Barrett’s religious beliefs during consideration of her nomination to the Supreme Court, he said, “are not honoring the principals of our Constitution and thereby contribute to undermining the rule of law in our nation.”

Barrett, a judge on the Seventh Circuit appeals court and a Catholic mother of seven, is also a former Notre Dame law professor and member of the ecumenical group People of Praise.

Her religious beliefs have received scrutiny in the press and by Democratic senators.

This week, The Guardian and the Washington Post reported that Barrett, while a law student, resided at the home of the co-founder of People of Praise, a charismatic ecumenical group founded in 1971 in South Bend, Indiana.

The Guardian called the group “secretive” and said it “has been criticized for dominating the lives of its members and subjugating women.”

On Tuesday, the Washington Post noted Barrett’s position of “handmaid” in People of Praise. The paper interviewed former members of the group who alleged that women held lesser positions in the group to men, and that wives were expected to cede decision-making in the home to husbands.

Other recent reports on Barrett’s membership in People of Praise in Newsweek and Reuters—since corrected—either connected or asked if a connection existed between the group, its discontinued use of the term “handmaiden,” and the 1985 dystopian novel and later TV series “The Handmaid’s Tale.”

The group’s use of the term “handmaiden,” however, was rooted in Scripture—and Archbishop Wenski spoke out against the secular appropriation of the word.

“The word ‘Handmaiden’ – ‘ancilla’ in Latin – has deep biblical roots and in the New Testament refers especially to Mary, the Mother of Jesus, who declares herself to be the ‘handmaiden of the Lord’,” Wenski said.

“That a novelist would ‘culturally appropriate’ this word to use in a distorted way to promote an ideology hostile to the Judeo-Christian patrimony of Western civilization only points to the growing biblical illiteracy of our elites and is indeed very disappointing,” he said.

In 2017, during Barrett’s confirmation hearings for the appeals court, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said she was concerned that Barrett’s religious views on abortion and other issues might influence her rulings on the court.

Feinstein told Barrett that “when you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you. And that’s of concern.” The senator accused Barrett of having “a long history of believing that your religious beliefs should prevail” over the law.

Some Democratic senators have continued to warn that Barrett’s Catholic beliefs in issues such as abortion and assisted reproductive technology could influence her decision-making on the bench.

“Her faith is irrelevant,” Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) said of Barrett at a Sept. 30 press conference. “What the real issue her is whether her closely-held views can be separated from her ability to make objective, fair decisions with a lifetime appointment.” 

“I fear that, if confirmed to the nation’s highest court, Judge Barrett would be unable to resist the temptation of overturning decades of judicial precedent in an effort to force every American family to adhere to her individual moral code,” Sen. Tammy Duckworth said in an Oct. 2 “dear colleague” letter.  

Duckworth noted that Barrett signed on to a 2006 letter by St. Joseph County Right to Life that supported the right to life “from fertilization.” The group, Duckworth said, opposes in vitro fertilization (IVF), the same treatment Duckworth used to have her children.

“I fear that if a case involving ART [Assisted Reproductive Technology] were to be brought before the bench, families like mine would not be able to trust that her [Barrett’s] opinions would be based on facts, laws and the Constitution rather than swayed by her personal beliefs,” Duckworth said.

On Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said that “It is the definition of discrimination to assert that Justice Barrett’s particular faith makes her uniquely unqualified for this promotion,”

McConnell condemned the suggestions “that Judge Barrett is too Christian, or the wrong kind of Christian, to be a good judge.”

“Every Supreme Court Justice in history has possessed personal views,” he said.

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CNA Staff, Oct 8, 2020 / 08:30 am (CNA).- Vice President Mike Pence and Democratic vice-presidential nominee Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) sparred over accusations of anti-Catholic bias and filling a Supreme Court vacancy before election day. The candidates spoke during the in-person debate held on Wednesday evening at the University of Utah.

Amy Coney Barrett, a Catholic judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, was nominated by President Trump to fill the Supreme Court vacancy created by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Barrett is a mother of seven and a former law professor at the University of Notre Dame.

Debate moderator Susan Page, Washington bureau chief of USA Today, brought up Barrett’s pending confirmation to the Supreme Court as a possible prelude to more abortion restrictions at the Court, including the repeal of Roe v. Wade.

Pence praised Barrett’s “lifetime of experience and a sizable American family.” Although baptized Catholic, Pence began attending an evangelical church with his family.

“We particularly hope that we don’t see the kind of attacks on her Christian faith that we saw before,” Pence said of Barrett, noting that the Democratic chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), told Barrett to her face at her 2017 confirmation hearing for the Seventh Circuit that “the dogma lives loudly within you, and that’s a concern.”

Pence then turned to Harris. “Senator, I know one of our judicial nominees, you actually attacked because they were a member of the Catholic Knights of Columbus, just because the Knights of Columbus holds pro-life views and pro-marriage views.”

In December of 2018, CNA first reported that Harris asked Brian C. Buescher, a nominee for the U.S. District Court for the District of Nebraska, if he was aware of the group’s opposition to abortion when he joined it, and if he agreed with it. 

Harris, together with Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), asked a number of questions of Buescher regarding his membership of the Catholic charitable group, with the senators referring to it as “an all-male society” that “has taken a number of extreme positions.” They asked Buescher if he was aware of the group’s opposition to abortion and “marriage equality” when he joined, and if he would quit the group if confirmed to the court “to avoid any appearance of bias.”

Harris actually questioned three different judicial nominees in 2018 over their membership in the Knights; in May of 2018, she asked district court nominee Peter Phipps if he had to “swear an oath” to join the Knights, and if he would “carry out” the Knights’ mission of the defense of the right to life as a judge.

“When your group’s organizational values conflict with litigants’ constitutional rights, how can litigants in your court expect a fair hearing?” she asked.

Harris, on Wednesday, responded that “Joe Biden and I are both people of faith, and it’s insulting to suggest that we would knock anyone for their faith.” As she noted, if elected Joe Biden would become only the second Catholic president in U.S. history. Harris herself, in a column in Deseret News this week, mentioned attending a Church of God growing up and said her faith has inspired her to serve others.

On Wednesday, Page noted that Barrett’s confirmation “would cement the Court’s conservative majority” and “would make it likely open to more abortion restrictions,” including the repeal of Roe, thus sending the issue of abortion restrictions to the states.

Harris refused to answer questions on whether a Biden-Harris administration would support adding additional justices to the Supreme Court following a Barrett confirmation.

Pence, when asked if he would like to see Indiana ban abortions should Roe be repealed, first pivoted to a previous topic and explained why the administration’s decision to kill top Iran general Qasem Soleimani via drone strike in January made Americans safer. Christian advocacy groups had warned that the strike could create more tension in the region and provoke counterattacks on minority Christian communities, especially in Iraq.

He then brought up Barrett’s faith and Harris’ questioning of Knights of Columbus member Brian Buescher.

Harris, discussing the court, said that “there’s the issue of choice, and I will always fight for a woman’s right to make a decision about her own body. It should be her decision, and not that of Donald Trump and the Vice President Mike Pence.”

In an following question about how the Trump administration would protect people with pre-existing health conditions if the Affordable Care Act is repealed, Pence then used some of his time to address abortion.

“I couldn’t be more proud to serve as vice president to a president who stands without apology for the sanctity of human life,” he said. “I am pro-life, I don’t apologize for it.”

He then highlighted the Biden-Harris ticket’s support for taxpayer-funded abortion and increased funding of Planned Parenthood.

Neither Pence nor Harris said specifically what they wanted their home state to do on abortion if Roe is overturned at the Supreme Court.

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