Washington D.C., Jul 29, 2018 / 04:38 pm (CNA).- Alleged abuse victims are “courageously stepping forward” with new claims of abuse by former cardinal and retired Archbishop Theodore McCarrick, but these claims weren’t previously know… […]
Lviv, Ukraine, Jul 29, 2018 / 04:02 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- “I can honestly say that the labor camp was the best place to understand what ‘love your enemy’ really means,” said Myroslav Marynovych, a Ukrainian Catholic who spent seven years in a Soviet gulag in the Perm region of Russia.
After receiving the 2018 Charles J. Chaput Award at the Napa Institute conference this month, Marynoych explained to CNA how the gospel came to life for him in the gulag, and how a stint in solitary confinement led him to write a letter to St. John Paul II.
Marynovych is currently vice-rector for university mission at the Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv.
Marynovych was sent to the labor camp in 1977, one year before Karol Wojtyła was elected Bishop of Rome. He was arrested for leading the Ukrainian Helsinki Group, the first non-underground group in Ukraine tasked with documenting human rights abuses and monitoring the implementation of the Helsinki Accords.
He spent 1977-1984 in forced labor camps in Perm, and then three years of exile in Kazakhstan.
Marynovych learned early on in his gulag experience that he needed to guard against an unchristian contempt for the KGB officers and guards.
After an outburst while interacting with a guard when he was in solitary confinement, Marynovych reflected on his actions in his cell.
“This incarnation of anger – is it me? What about my Christianity? I didn’t want to transform myself into a ‘man of hatred.’”
“I started to pray. I started to walk in the cell back and forth, and…I decided, ‘No, I don’t want hatred to overcome my heart.’”
After that realization, “I behaved in a way that is acceptable as a Christian. I don’t need to hate people to say something that they have to hear,” said Marynovych.
The Catholics in his labor camp celebrated Easter twice in a sign of solidarity with their Orthodox brethren, who follow a different liturgical calendar. “That was a sort of prison ecumenism,” Marynovych explained. It also made it more difficult for the KGB officers to pit the two groups against each other.
Any sort of religious practice was strictly forbidden in the Soviet camps. In 1982, the camp administration issued a warning on Holy Saturday that anyone gathering to celebrate Easter would be punished.
“And, for us Christians, to be punished for celebrating the Easter is okay. So of course we ignored these warnings,” said Marynovych.
“We gathered and we prayed. There were people of different confessions. We started to eat some simple food that we had at that moment, and the guards arrived and took all of us to the penal isolation cell for 15 days,” he continued.
“That was the time when in Europe Christian peace marches were very popular, and the Soviet Union supported these Christian peace marches because they stood for disarmament etc. It was useful for the Soviet propaganda.”
“The Soviet Union supported Christian movements in Europe, on one hand, and punished Christians for just celebrating Easter on the other hand. We had to inform the world about that.”
The prisoners decided to write a letter to the pope.
When the news that Wojtyła had been elected reached the gulag, there was “total enthusiasm in the labor camp,” explained Marynovych.
“We all understood that as a Polish citizen, he knew the nature of communism from within, not as some Italian bishops-cardinal from outside. They knew communism as a grassroots activity of Italian communists, but he knew communist crimes from within.”
Marynovych was the man selected by the prisoners to pen the letter.
“We described the situation and asked John Paul II to make this moment known for Christians in the world – that we were punished simply for celebrating the Easter. We shared the text of this letter later when we were released from this punishment cell, and the text was agreed upon by the other prisoners.”
“We smuggled this letter secretly to Moscow, and then from Moscow to Rome.”
“After several months, we received a secret information from our relatives that John Paul II had received this letter and prayed a Mass for the signatories of this letter, including me.”
“There was a storm of positive emotion, and gratitude to John Paul II for that because this support was very important for us.”
“It was suggested that the election of the John Paul II as pope was the end of communism. And actually it happened during his papacy. The Soviet Union fell down.”
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Marynovych had a chance to meet the pope and thank him personally, more than ten years later after he had written the letter.
“Of course, I was deprived of many joys of life – just imagine, I was arrested when I was 28 and released at 38. And yet, I am an illustration of the very important truth: God never takes anything away from a human being without compensating him or her even more abundantly. That’s why I have never considered my imprisonment as a curse,” Marynovych said in this remarks that the Napa Institute conference July 14.
“Yes, the Soviet regime did want to make my life hell. However, it was God who transformed the camp experience into a blessing.”
Vatican City, Jul 29, 2018 / 07:03 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The love with which individuals and communities treat the poor, the weak, and the hungry, is the best measure of faith, Pope Francis said in his Angelus address Sunday.
“Faced with the cry … […]
Phoenix, Ariz., Jul 28, 2018 / 04:01 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- More than 100 Catholics will attend the 2018 People of Life awards next week to honor three pro-life individuals for their dedication to the Gospel of Life.
The awards will go to Janice Benton, a proponent for disability rights; Monsignor Joseph Ranieri, an advocate for post-abortion healing; and James Hanson, who campaigned against medically assisted-suicide and who will be honored posthumously.
The awards will be presented in Phoenix as part of the Diocesan Pro-Life Leadership Conference July 29 – Aug. 1, sponsored by the US bishops’ Secretariat on Pro-Life Activities.
More than 125 people are expected to attend, including Bishop Thomas Olmsted of Phoenix, Bishop Brendan Cahill of Victoria in Texas, and Bishop Eduardo Nevares, Auxiliary Bishop of Phoenix.
The awards are given to men and women who have made significant and longtime contributions to the pro-life movement, promoting a culture of life and respect for the human person.
Janice Benton has served as the executive director of National Catholic Partnership on Disability for 15 years. Before that, she spent 25 years ministering to people with disabilities, working in areas such as a camp counselor for people with intellectual disabilities.
She also worked for the American Coalition of Citizens in Washington D.C., beginning in 1979, where she advocated for Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act and Education for All Handicapped Children Act.
Monsignor Ranieri has served as a parish priest of the Archdiocese of Washington for more than 60 years. There, he involved himself with Project Rachel Ministry, a post-abortion resource group.
According to the Catholic Anchor, Monsignor Ranieri encouraged priests, who will hear about abortions in the confessional, “to listen, to be open and to be patient. These people need to talk about what happened, often more than once.”
James Hanson was a U.S. Marine Corp veteran and president of the Patients Rights Action Fund, a strategic and financial support group advocating against assisted suicide legislation. Hanson suffered from glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer. Before he passed away in December 2017, Hanson campaigned against legislation permitting assisted suicide.
The People of Life award was established in 2007 by the Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities. The award seeks to honor Catholics dedicated to the pro-life movement as described by St. John Paul II in his 1995 encyclical on the value and inviolability of human life, Evangelium Vitae.
According to the USCCB website, the People of Life award “is presented to individuals who have consistently answered this call of the Gospel of Life.”
“Recipients are recognized because, through their personal or professional contributions, they have demonstrated their lifetime commitment to the pro-life movement, to promoting respect for the dignity of the human person, and to advocacy for an end to the culture of death in this nation.”
Fort Worth, Texas, Jul 28, 2018 / 03:33 pm (CNA).- Former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick’s alleged crimes might merit removing him from the clergy entirely—and they require accountability for all Church leaders who knew of his alleged misconduct and did nothing, Bishop Michael F. Olson of Fort Worth, Texas has said in a letter to the faithful of his diocese.
“The Church needs to do more than have a serious conversation about these issues, it needs to discern in light of the Truth and to act intentionally,” Olson told CNA July 28. “If conversation does not lead to decision, it quickly devolves into chatter.”
“An important ministry for us as bishops is to ‘see, judge, and act.’ It’s not enough to see. Yet, seeing clearly leads to sound judgment that requires fortitude for us to act,” he added. “If we don’t do that as pastors we sell our vocation as shepherds in exchange for a career as hirelings.”
The Pope accepted Cardinal McCarrick’s resignation from the College of Cardinals on Friday. The Pope directed McCarrick, the 88-year-old former Archbishop of Washington, to observe “a life of prayer and penance in seclusion” until the end of the canonical process against him.
A substantial and credible allegation of child sexual abuse against McCarrick was made public in June.
In recent weeks, McCarrick has faced several additional allegations of sexual abuse and misconduct. These include charges that he pressured seminarians and priests into sexual relationships, and another reported allegation that he had a serially sexually abusive relationship with a child.
Bishop Olson’s July 28 letter said the former cardinal’s alleged crimes have caused “such further damage to the integrity of the hierarchy and mission of the Church” that his prompt laicization should be “strongly deliberated.” Such a move would serve “reconciliation and healing in the light of the justice and merciful redemption as won by Christ and promised to all who are alienated by the corruption of sin.”
“Justice also requires that all of those in Church leadership who knew of the former cardinal’s alleged crimes and sexual misconduct and did nothing be held accountable for their refusal to act thereby enabling others to be hurt,” the bishop continued.
Olson’s letter said McCarrick’s alleged crimes were “scandalous” and resulted in violation of trust and “grave damage” to the lives and health of his reputed victims.
“This scandal and pain are compounded by the horrific fact that reportedly one of his victims was his first baptism after his priestly ordination,” he continued, noting that the claims also include crimes against his subordinates including priests, seminarians and lay Catholics.
“The evil effects of these actions were multiplied by the fact that financial settlements were arranged with victims without transparency or restrictions on the former cardinal’s ministry,” Bishop Olson said.
“Please continue to pray for the reported victims and the families who have been hurt by the alleged crimes and sins of former Cardinal McCarrick and others. Pray also that we can work together to respond not only in word but in action to prevent further crimes and transgressions.”
Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston, president of the U.S. bishops’ conference, on Saturday morning thanked Pope Francis for “his leadership in taking this important step” of accepting the cardinal’s resignation and ordering him to prayer and penitence.
“It reflects the priority the Holy Father places on the need for protection and care for all our people and the way failures in this area affect the life of the Church in the United States,” Cardinal DiNardo said.
A letter sent this week to priests of the Archdiocese of Washington claims that its current archbishop, Cardinal Donald Wuerl, did not know until recently about settlements made by two New Jersey dioceses in response to allegations misconduct on the part of former cardinal Theodore McCarrick. The letter was sent by by archdiocese’s vicar general Monsignor Charles Antonicelli.
Sources close to the Archdiocese of Washington have told CNA that Wuerl was not informed of settlements until June.
The two New Jersey legal settlements involving McCarrick were reached in 2005 and 2007 by the Diocese of Metuchen, the Archdiocese of Newark, and two men who claim they were sexually assaulted by McCarrick while they were seminarians and young priests.
McCarrick was Bishop of Metuchen from 1981-1986, Archbishop of Newark from 1986-2000, and Archbishop of Washington from 2000-2006.
In his letter, Bishop Olson stressed the Fort Worth diocese’s “zero tolerance” for sexual abuse against minors and vulnerable adults perpetrated by clergy, staff and volunteers, “including me, as bishop.” He said he has taken prompt action in response to credible allegations and added that the diocese has sought transparency in calling for victims to come forward, showing respect for protecting victims’ identities.
“Our seminarians, priests, deacons, and religious and lay staff are taught to recognize and to report boundary violations without fear of retribution, no matter the status of the perpetrator,” the bishop said.
Pope Francis named Olson to head the Fort Worth diocese in November 2013. He was ordained and installed as bishop in January 2014.
Washington D.C., Jul 28, 2018 / 09:54 am (CNA).- A letter sent this week to priests of the Archdiocese of Washington claims that Cardinal Donald Wuerl did not know until recently about settlements made by two New Jersey dioceses in response to allegations misconduct on the part of former cardinal Theodore McCarrick.
“Neither the Archdiocese of Washington nor Cardinal Wuerl knew about these confidential settlements until this most recent credible and substantiated allegation against Cardinal McCarrick was made public,” said the July 25 letter, sent to Washington priests by archdiocesan vicar general Monsignor Charles Antonicelli.
“For clarity, the Archdiocese of Washington did not participate in, make any contributions to, nor was invovlved in any way with these settlement agreements,” the letter added.
The settlements in questions were reached in 2005 and 2007 by the Diocese of Metuchen, the Archdiocese of Newark, and two men who claim they were sexually assualted by McCarrick while they were seminarians and young priests.
McCarrick was Bishop of Metuchen from 1981-1986, Archbishop of Newark from 1986-2000, and Archbishop of Washington from 2000-2006. Wuerl succeeded McCarrick in Washington and is the current Archbishop of Washington.
The first settlement took place while McCarrick was still Archbishop of Washington, and the second was reached after Wuerl had taken the helm of that archdiocese. Neither settlement, according to Antonicelli’s letter, was reported to Wuerl.
The letter also said that the Vatican is “overseeing any further decisions,” regarding McCarrick, and added that “our offices are aware only of the same information regarding these allegations that you are seeing in media reports…We know from past experience with failings of the Church, that this is not an issue that will simply fade away.”
Wuerl, according to the letter, encouraged anyone with information regardin abuse of harrassement to “bring it forward as soon as possible so that it may be promptly and fully investigated.”
Sources close to the Archdiocese of Washington have also told CNA that Wuerl was not informed of settlements until June, when a substantial and credible allegation of child sexual abuse against McCarrick was made public.
In recent weeks, McCarrick has faced several additional allegations of sexual abuse and misconduct, including charges that he pressured seminarians and priests into sexual relationships, and an another reported allegation that he had a serially sexually abusive relationship with a child.
On July 28, Pope Francis accepted McCarrick’s resignation from the College of Cardinals, and consigned him to a period of prayer and penance until a canonical process regarding the investigations is concluded. McCarrick is 88.
Buenos Aires, Argentina, Jul 28, 2018 / 06:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Dozens of women clad in outfits reminiscent of “The Handmaid’s Tale” took to the streets of Buenos Aires Wednesday to protest for legalized abortion, the AP reported.
… […]
Vatican City, Jul 28, 2018 / 04:23 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Saturday Pope Francis accepted the resignation of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick from the College of Cardinals, and suspended him from the exercise of any public ministry.
Pope Francis accepted Card… […]
Dublin, Ireland, Jul 27, 2018 / 06:01 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- To maintain state funding, a Catholic marriage counseling group in the Republic of Ireland, Accord, will reportedly begin to counsel same-sex couples.
Earlier this year, the Irish government threatened to remove state funding from counseling services which did not accept same-sex couples.
Same-sex marriage was legalized in Ireland in 2015.
Accord has now signed a new service agreement with the Irish government.
“Accord Catholic Marriage Care Service CLG has assured Tusla they will provide counselling services regardless of sexual orientation and comply with the agreement,” said a spokeswomen for Ireland’s child and family agency, Tusla, according to the Times.
“Tusla will monitor service providers including Accord Dublin Catholic Marriage Care Service to ensure they comply with the terms of their service level agreement,” she said, noting that if the agreement is not followed through, funding may be withdrawn.
Accord receives the largest amount of public funding among counselling services in the Republic of Ireland.
Tusla is allocating more than 1.59 million euros ($1.86 million) for Accord’s services. The agency has 55 counseling centers in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
Accord also teaches relationship and sex education classes in schools, where it does not teach about contraception or same-sex relationships.
Founded in 1962 by the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference, Acccord had offered its services only to opposite-sex couples.
The Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference failed to provide CNA with comment on the decision.
Harrisburg, Pa., Jul 27, 2018 / 05:20 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Friday ordered that a redacted version of a grand jury report detailing sex abuse in six of the state’s eight Catholic dioceses be released next month.
News outlets, victims, and the state attorney general have pressed for the release of the report.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court had stayed the release of the report June 20, after numerous individuals named in the report objected to its release, citing concerns of due process and reputational rights guaranteed by the state constitution.
Lawyers for the media outlets requesting the report’s release have said a redacted version could be released to respond to those concerns, while the court considers challenges to the full report’s release.
The court’s July 27 order effectively adopted that suggestion.
“The Commonwealth is directed to prepare a redacted version of Report 1, which removes specific and contextual references to any petitioner who has an appellate challenge pending before this Court,” read the opinion of the supreme court.
Petitioners who have appeals pending with the court can appeal over the redactions by Aug. 7. If no challenges are made, the interim report and responses are to be publicly released by Aug. 8; but if challenges are made, the public release of the redacted report can be delayed until Aug. 14.
The supreme court wrote that the grand jury had undertaken “the salutary task of exposing alleged child sexual abuse and concealment of such abuse, on an extraordinarily large scale, which the grand jurors have pronounced was perpetrated by trusted members of a religious institution.”
“Thus, the grand jury submitted a report for publication specifically finding that more than 300 people, identified by name, committed criminal and/or morally reprehensible conduct,” the supreme court wrote.
“Ideally, living persons so identified would have been afforded the opportunity to appear before the grand jury and to respond, in some reasonable fashion, to the grand jury’s concerns. For those among the present challengers who were denied such opportunity, and who otherwise have submitted proper appeals seeking the remedy of a pre-deprivation hearing, we hold that they are entitled to this Court’s further consideration of whether additional process can and should now be provided as a curative measure.”
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