Catholic Church, Jewish community to bring 40,000 Christmas dinners to Mexicans in need

St. Helier, Jersey, Mar 12, 2021 / 05:01 pm (CNA).- Jersey has formed a citizens’ jury to determine whether assisted suicide should be allowed on the island.

Out of 477 people who applied to sit on the jury, 23 were “randomly selected to provide a broadly representative sample of the Island’, Channel 103 reported the government as saying.

An expert advisory team to the group includes several university professors from mainland universities such as Oxford and the University of Bristol.

The jury will meet virtually ten times over two months, starting March 18, to hear evidence and consider and debate the legal, ethical, and medical implications of legalizing assisted suicide.

Lawmakers in Jersey will ultimately make the decision whether to legalize assisted suicide, taking into account the jury’s recommendation, which is due in June.

Jersey is a British crown dependency, with its own government and legal system, though the British monarch remains head of state. It has a unicameral legislature called the States Assembly.

One of the expert advisors to the jury is Dr. David Jones, an Oxford bioethicist who is a member of the Healthcare Executive Group and the Department of Social Justice of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, as well as a corresponding member of the Pontifical Academy for life.

Jersey, along with Britain’s other channel islands, is part of the Diocese of Portsmouth. Bishop Philip Egan of Portsmouth has spoken out in recent years against proposals to legalize assisted suicide on another channel island, Guernsey.

In a 2018 Palm Sunday letter, Egan wrote that assisted suicide is “fundamentally incompatible with a doctor’s role as healer.”

“Someone near the end of life needs emotional support, comfort and care, good pain control, respect and loving communication – not suicide on prescription…Let us redouble our efforts to offer this support, not least to anyone tempted to suicide or a hurried death,” he wrote.

Guernsey’s parliament ultimately rejected the proposal to legalize assisted suicide during May 2018. Had the island passed the measure, Guernsey would have been the first place in the British Isles to allow assisted suicide.

During the early stages of the Guernsey bill’s proposal, a number of Christian leaders voiced their opposition to the measure in a joint letter signed by 53 pastoral ministers and 41 churches.

Assisted suicide and euthanasia are illegal in mainland Britain. Several countries in Europe, including Belgium and the Netherlands, have legalized the practice.

More than a half-dozen states in the U.S., including Oregon, have legalized assisted suicide, with New Mexico poised to be the latest. H.B. 47, which would legalize assisted suicide in New Mexico, is quickly moving through the legislature, drawing dismay from Santa Fe Archbishop John Wester.

The Australian island of Tasmania is expected to soon become the third Australian state to legalize assisted suicide and euthanasia, after a bill to do so passed the lower house of the state’s parliament in early March.

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British media executive Sir Nicholas Coleridge, journalist Fraser Nelson, classical pianist Dame Mitsuko Uchida, author Tom Holland, and human rights advocate Bianca Jagger in a July 2, 2024, letter in the London newspaper The Times called upon the Holy See to preserve what they describe as the “magnificent” cultural artifact of the Catholic Church’s Traditional Latin Mass. / Credit: ANDREW MATTHEWS/POOL/AFP via Getty Images; David M. Benett/Dave Benett/Getty Images for Spectator Life; Ian Nicholson/WPA Pool/Getty Images; David Levenson/Getty Images; and Dave Benett/Getty Images for Harry’s Bar

CNA Staff, Jul 3, 2024 / 12:45 pm (CNA).

A distinguished cadre of British public figures is calling upon the Holy See to preserve what they describe as the “magnificent” cultural artifact of the Catholic Church’s Traditional Latin Mass.

In 2021 Pope Francis placed sweeping restrictions on the celebration of Mass using the 1962 Roman Missal, known also as the extraordinary form of the Roman rite and the Tridentine Mass. Rumors have circulated in recent months that the Vatican is preparing to clamp down further on the celebration of that ancient liturgy.

No new directives on the Latin Mass have yet been promulgated amid the rumors. In a Tuesday letter to the London newspaper the Times, meanwhile, a wide cross-section of English cultural fixtures openly implored the Vatican to refrain from restricting the rite further.

“Recently there have been worrying reports from Rome that the Latin Mass is to be banished from nearly every Catholic church,” the letter said. “This is a painful and confusing prospect, especially for the growing number of young Catholics whose faith has been nurtured by it.”

The signatories, which included actress and human rights advocate Bianca Jagger, author Tom Holland, musical eminence Julian Lloyd Webber, and media executive Sir Nicholas Coleridge, described the Latin Mass as a “cathedral” of “text and gesture” that developed over many centuries.

“Not everyone appreciates its value and that is fine,” the writers said, “but to destroy it seems an unnecessary and insensitive act in a world where history can all too easily slip away forgotten.”

“The old rite’s ability to encourage silence and contemplation is a treasure not easily replicated, and, when gone, impossible to reconstruct,” they said.

The writers in their letter pointed to a 1971 petition from a similar cross-section of prominent Britons that had also asked the Vatican to preserve the Latin Mass in England.

That petition led to the “Agatha Christie indult” allowing the extraordinary form to continue there; the indult was named after the famous author who was among the signatories.

In their letter this week the British celebrities said their petition, like the 1971 request, was “entirely ecumenical and nonpolitical.”

“The signatories include Catholics and non-Catholics, believers and nonbelievers,” they wrote. “We implore the Holy See to reconsider any further restriction of access to this magnificent spiritual and cultural heritage.”

In issuing the 2021 guidelines, the pope had said he was saddened that the celebration of the extraordinary form was now characterized by a rejection of the Second Vatican Council and its liturgical reforms.

To doubt the council, he said at the time, is “to doubt the Holy Spirit himself who guides the Church.”

[…]

The loss of St. Bernard’s Church in Grouard, Alberta, Canada, on May 22, 2023, makes a sad moment for those with memories of the church, said Grouard-McLennan Archbishop Gerard Pettipas. Two men have been arrested in connection with the fire. / … […]