Month: January 2021

No Picture
News Briefs

Church in Australia to implement nationwide protocol for responding to abuse allegations

January 28, 2021 CNA Daily News 0

Canberra, Australia, Jan 28, 2021 / 04:15 pm (CNA).- Starting in February, the Catholic Church in Australia will have a national protocol for responding to allegations of sexual abuse, the bishops of Australia announced this week.

Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane, president of the Australian bishop’s conference, said the new protocol “demands an approach from the Church that is compassionate and just.”

“One of the strengths of the new protocol is that it provides a single national framework, which will ensure a consistent approach to the handling of concerns and allegations,” Coleridge said Jan. 28.

The National Response Protocol lays out principles that Church authorities must adhere to when responding to a child abuse allegation, as well as the concrete procedural steps that must be taken when an allegation is received.

These steps include mandatory reporting of criminal allegations of child abuse against current or former Church personnel to police.

The National Response Protocol will replace two protocols established in 1996, about which the Church had received criticism for their “inconsistent or incomplete application,” Coleridge said.

The existing protocols will continue to be in use until the end of the year, or the conclusion of matters currently being managed, Catholic Weekly reported.

A 2017 Royal Commission report on child sex abuse in the country’s institutions uncovered serious failings in the protection of children from abuse in institutions.

The Australian bishops’ conference responded positively to nearly all the Royal Commission’s recommendations, but has defended the sanctity of the confessional seal.

The new protocol was developed in response to recommendations in the Royal Commission report, and in two years of consultation with abuse survivors. The bishops’ conference of Australia adopted the new protocols at their November 2020 meeting.

The new protocols are based on National Catholic Safeguarding Standards which the Australian church adopted in May 2020.

The protocols also take into account Pope Francis’ motu proprio Vos estis lux mundi, which laid out universal norms on sex abuse reporting and took effect June 1, 2019, days after the adoption of the NCSS.

The norms of Vos estis lux mundi establish that clerics and religious are obliged to report sexual abuse accusations to the local ordinary where the abuse occurred. Every diocese must have a mechanism for reporting abuse. When a suffragan bishop is accused, the metropolitan archbishop is placed in charge of the investigation.

In December 2020, the Catholic bishops of Australia and two other Catholic entities launched Australian Catholic Safeguarding Limited, a company charged with the safeguarding of children against sexual abuse by clergy.

Catholic entities in Australia may— but will not be compelled to— “subscribe” to the ACSL. Those entities that subscribe will be expected to comply with its safeguarding standards, conduct reviews and audits of their abuse prevention systems at least every three years, and provide ACSL with a copy of their reviews, which will be published on the ACSL’s website.

The Church in Australia during July 2018 launched a compensation program for victims of institutional child sexual abuse, which is expected to run until June 30, 2027.


[…]

No Picture
News Briefs

Senators speak out for the unborn on the day before the March for Life

January 28, 2021 CNA Daily News 0

Washington D.C., Jan 28, 2021 / 03:45 pm (CNA).- The day before the March for Life, several senators emphasized protecting the human dignity of the unborn.

 

In remarks on the Senate floor on Thursday, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said that “being pro-life isn’t just the right to be born; it also means the right to live and to thrive,” arguing that policies like an expanded Child Tax Credit would help build a culture of life.

 

Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.), the founder and chairman of the Senate Pro-life Caucus, spoke in support of the 48th annual March for Life on Friday. 

 

“I believe every human being is created with God-given dignity and potential,” Daines said. “No court, no legislature, no law, can take that away.”

 

Senators also spoke out against President Joe Biden’s order allowing for funding of pro-abortion groups overseas. Biden repealed the Mexico City Policy, which prohibits taxpayer funding of foreign NGOs that perform or promote abortion.

 

The policy, originally enacted by President Ronald Reagan in 1984, has been in place during each Republican administration since, and repealed by each Democratic administration since. Critics of the policy sometimes refer to it as the “global gag rule.”

 

Rubio criticized Biden for prioritizing the repeal of the policy “[b]efore we even before we passed a bill to deal with the pandemic, or bring back good jobs back to the United States.”

 

Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), author of the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, said in a statement that “These pro-abortion executive orders from President Biden shock the conscience.”

 

“Our government shouldn’t be funding abortions at home, let alone overseas,” Sasse said. “Unity is important at times like these, but waging a culture war is only going to deepen divides and hurt innocent victims.”

 

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) also defended the Mexico City Policy in a statement, saying that its elimination “means our tax dollars will now fund groups that perform and lobby for abortion in foreign countries.” 

 

“[Biden] claims his foreign policy is about ‘championing America’s values and human rights,’ but there is nothing more hostile to America’s values and human rights than killing innocent children,” Cotton said. 

 

Daines also praised lawmakers for re-introducing a discrimination abortion ban, legislation that would ban abortion based on a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome. 

 

“It is our duty to protect every innocent life, no matter how small, no matter how many chromosomes they may have,” Daines said. 

 

Meanwhile, others praised Biden’s move to repeal the Mexico City Policy. 

 

Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) said Biden’s repeal was “a win for reproductive freedom.”

 

<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>This is a win for reproductive freedom – glad to see these promising first steps from <a href=”https://twitter.com/POTUS?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>@POTUS</a>. <a href=”https://t.co/NXjTnTbgic”>https://t.co/NXjTnTbgic</a></p>&mdash; Sen. Maggie Hassan (@SenatorHassan) <a href=”https://twitter.com/SenatorHassan/status/1354901668572360705?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>January 28, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>

 

Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) also praised Biden’s move. 

 

<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>I am thrilled President Biden is rolling back the <a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/GlobalGagRule?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#GlobalGagRule</a>. We've got to stop this vicious cycle where access to life-saving services is repeatedly removed and reinstated. It's time to pass the Global HER Act to PERMANENTLY repeal the global gag rule. <a href=”https://t.co/QqJDqmFgDJ”>https://t.co/QqJDqmFgDJ</a></p>&mdash; Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (@gillibrandny) <a href=”https://twitter.com/gillibrandny/status/1354872670022729730?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>January 28, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>

 

<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>A great step for reproductive rights—President Biden will put an end to the global gag rule, which has jeopardized women’s access to health care around the world.<br><br>It’s time to roll back this cruel Trump-era policy. <a href=”https://t.co/DV8A6do7Pe”>https://t.co/DV8A6do7Pe</a></p>&mdash; Senator Mazie Hirono (@maziehirono) <a href=”https://twitter.com/maziehirono/status/1354867910917971972?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>January 28, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>

 

 


[…]

No Picture
News Briefs

U.S. bishops deplore Biden’s ‘grevious’ repeal of pro-life policies

January 28, 2021 CNA Daily News 3

Washington D.C., Jan 28, 2021 / 03:00 pm (CNA).- Leading U.S. bishops decried President Biden’s repeal of pro-life policies on Thursday.

 

President Joe Biden, a Catholic, issued a presidential memorandum on Thursday afternoon repealing the Mexico City Policy. His act allows for the U.S. to again fund international pro-abortion groups through family planning funding and global health assistance.

 

The U.S. bishops’ conference (USCCB) warned that, under Biden’s order, the U.S. would be contributing to abortions and abortion advocacy in the developing world.

“It is grievous that one of President Biden’s first official acts actively promotes the destruction of human lives in developing nations,” Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City and Bishop David Malloy of Rockford stated on Thursday. Archbishop Naumann is the chair of the U.S. bishops’ pro-life committee, and Bishop Malloy is chair of the bishops’ international justice and peace committee.

 

“This Executive Order is antithetical to reason, violates human dignity, and is incompatible with Catholic teaching,” the bishops said.

 

In his sweeping order “Protecting Women’s Health at Home and Abroad,” Biden stated his administration’s commitment to promoting women’s “reproductive health.”

 

The Mexico City Policy, named for the location of the UN population conference where it was first announced in 1984, was instituted by President Reagan. It bars taxpayer funding of foreign NGOs that provide or promote abortion as a method of family planning. Presidents traditionally either repeal it or reinstate it as among their first actions upon entering office.

 

While the policy originally applied to several hundred million dollars of U.S. international family planning funding, the Trump administration expanded it to apply more than $8 billion in global health assistance.

 

Biden on Thursday repealed those actions and instructed several federal agencies, as well as the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), to begin reaching out to global health partners and instructing them that the previous prohibitions on abortion advocacy or referrals no longer apply.

 

In response, Archbishop Naumann and Bishop Malloy asked Biden to stop funding pro-abortion groups and work with the Church on “integral human development.”

 

“We urge the President to use his office for good, prioritizing the most vulnerable, including unborn children,” the bishops stated.

 

“As the largest non-government health care provider in the world, the Catholic Church stands ready to work with him and his administration to promote global women’s health in a manner that furthers integral human development, safeguarding innate human rights and the dignity of every human life, beginning in the womb,” the bishops said.

 

Through Biden’s order, the administration is also withdrawing from the Geneva Declaration, a statement signed by the U.S. and 31 other countries in October stating that abortion is not an international human right.

 

Additionally, the administration will once again fund the United Nations’ population fund (UNFPA). The Trump administration had stopped funding the UNFPA because of concerns that it partnered with China on family planning, and thus was complicit in forced abortions and sterilizations.

 

Pro-life advocates have long warned that China’s one-child policy—now a two-child policy—had resulted in women being forcibly sterilized or having to abort their child if they had too many children.

 

In a 2011 address at Sichuan University in China, then-Vice President Biden told his audience that “I fully understand” China’s one-child policy and that he was “not second-guessing” it, while also warning of the demographic challenges it posed.

In addition, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo recently declared that China was committing genocide against Uyghurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in the northwest province of Xinjiang; Pompeo cited reports of mass forced sterilizations, birth control, and abortion on Uyghur women in making his genocide determination.


[…]

The Dispatch

St. Joseph and the fatherhood crisis

January 28, 2021 Russell Shaw 7

Launched in December with modest fanfare, the Church’s observance of 2021 as a year to honor the fatherhood of St. Joseph seems to have dropped largely out of sight. True, a plenary indulgence (under the […]

No Picture
News Briefs

New York AG: COVID-19 nursing home deaths significantly underreported

January 28, 2021 CNA Daily News 0

Washington D.C., Jan 28, 2021 / 10:42 am (CNA).- New York’s health department may have underreported COVID-19 nursing home deaths by 50%, an investigation by the state’s attorney general found.

 

In a report released on Thursday, the office of New York Attorney General Letitia James said that the state undercounted the number of nursing home deaths due to the virus. In addition, certain actions by the state and by nursing homes put vulnerable residents at risk during the pandemic, the office claimed.

 

Charles Camosy, a theology professor at Fordham University, told CNA on Thursday that the report’s findings “demonstrate a classic instance of throwaway culture.” 

 

Nursing homes around the U.S. have seen some of the highest rates of death due to the coronavirus. In May, one report found that more than 40% of U.S. COVID-19 deaths occurred in nursing homes or assisted-living facilities.

 

Despite the high death tolls in nursing homes, the attorney general’s report found that the actual numbers may have been much higher than reported A “larger number of nursing home residents died from COVID-19 than DOH [New York Department of Health] data reflected, and may have been undercounted by as much as 50 percent,” the office found.

 

The report followed a months-long investigation by the office into the handling of the pandemic at nursing homes.

 

In addition, the report cited “a lack of compliance with infection control protocols” at nursing homes, as well as other problems such as a lack of both personal protective equipment and COVID-19 testing for residents and staff.

 

All these problems placed residents “at increased risk of harm,” the investigation found. 

 

The report also said that, due to Gov. Cuomo’s order in March requiring nursing homes to accept recovering COVID patients from hospitals, vulnerable nursing home residents may have been put at greater risk of contracting the virus.

 

“Government guidance requiring the admission of COVID-19 patients into nursing homes may have put residents at increased risk of harm in some facilities and may have obscured the data available to assess that risk,” the report stated. Cuomo’s administration issued this guidance in March. 

 

By his actions, Cuomo treated the state’s nursing home population as “expendable” and “essentially a dumping ground” for patients with active or suspected COVID cases, Camosy said. “And when he was caught, he lied about it.”

 

James said in a statement, “As the pandemic and our investigations continue, it is imperative that we understand why the residents of nursing homes in New York unnecessarily suffered at such an alarming rate.” 

 

“While we cannot bring back the individuals we lost to this crisis, this report seeks to offer transparency that the public deserves and to spur increased action to protect our most vulnerable residents,” James said. 

 

“Nursing homes residents and workers deserve to live and work in safe environments, and I will continue to work hard to safeguard this basic right during this precarious time,” she said. 

 

Camosy connected the story to “the upcoming infrastructure bill,” saying that the proposed legislation presents an opportunity to discuss appropriate elder care: 

 

<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>Looks like eldercare is going to become something very different from what it is now whether we like it out not. The only question is what it becomes and how we shape it. <a href=”https://t.co/nUk6XErdix”>https://t.co/nUk6XErdix</a><br><br>I just don't know how this can't be a focus of the coming infrastructure bill.</p>&mdash; Charlie Camosy (@CCamosy) <a href=”https://twitter.com/CCamosy/status/1354805958963122180?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>January 28, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>

Cuomo was awarded an International Emmy Founders Award last year for “leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic and his masterful use of television to inform and calm people around the world.” The International Academy Of Television Arts & Sciences had recognized him for the award.


[…]