Sacred Heart Catholic Church

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CNA Staff, Sep 20, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).

Catholics in the U.S. don’t vote as a bloc, and this election cycle there has been considerable debate about whom Catholics should vote for. Even Pope Francis has weighed in, quipping that Americans in November must choose “the lesser evil” when deciding between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. 

The Catholic Church has long supported voting as part of participation in public life — as a contribution to a nation’s common good and to the flourishing of its people.

What the Church does not do is dictate to Catholics whom exactly they should vote for or exactly which policies to support. However, Catholics have been given numerous guiding principles for making decisions about voting. 

Here is an explanation of some of these principles. 

What does the Church teach about voting?

The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that it is “the duty of citizens to contribute along with the civil authorities to the good of society in a spirit of truth, justice, solidarity, and freedom.”

“The love and service of one’s country follows from the duty of gratitude and belongs to the order of charity. Submission to legitimate authorities and service of the common good require citizens to fulfill their roles in the life of the political community.”

It also states that “submission to authority and co-responsibility for the common good make it morally obligatory to pay taxes, to exercise the right to vote, and to defend one’s country.”

In 2007, the U.S. bishops’ conference issued “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship,” a guide to participation in public life, which includes a section on voting. The bishops have periodically updated it since, with the latest edition approved in late 2023.

In the document, the bishops wrote that “responsible citizenship is a virtue, and participation in political life is a moral obligation.” Quoting Pope Francis in Evangelii Gaudium, the bishops also note that public service, when it seeks the common good, is a “lofty vocation.”

The bishops envision voters who are guided by their moral convictions and not their attachment to any one party or interest group. A Catholic’s engagement in politics ought to be “shaped by the moral convictions of well-formed consciences and focused on the dignity of every human being, the pursuit of the common good, and the protection of the weak and the vulnerable.”

Catholics should vote for candidates to the extent that they will promote the common good, a concept defined in the catechism as “the sum total of social conditions which allow people, either as groups or as individuals, to reach their fulfillment more fully and more easily."

“Catholics have a serious and lifelong obligation to form their consciences in accord with human reason and the teaching of the Church,” the document continues.

“Conscience is not something that allows us to justify doing whatever we want, nor is it a mere ‘feeling’ about what we should or should not do. Rather, conscience is the voice of God resounding in the human heart, revealing the truth to us and calling us to do what is good while shunning what is evil. Conscience always requires serious attempts to make sound moral judgments based on the truths of our faith.”

Reasons not to vote for a candidate

“Forming Consciences” states in paragraph 34: “A Catholic cannot vote for a candidate who favors a policy promoting an intrinsically evil act, such as abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, deliberately subjecting workers or the poor to subhuman living conditions, redefining marriage in ways that violate its essential meaning, or racist behavior, if the voter’s intent is to support that position.”

“As Catholics we are not single-issue voters,” the bishops note, and “a candidate’s position on a single issue is not sufficient to guarantee a voter’s support.” At the same time, Catholics should not vote for a candidate if his or her “position on a single issue promotes an intrinsically evil act.”

However, the bishops say it could be possible to vote for someone who supports something intrinsically immoral, but only for “other morally grave reasons.” Before he became Pope Benedict XVI, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger described those as “proportionate reasons.”

In a 2004 letter to U.S. bishops, Ratzinger wrote: ”When a Catholic does not share a candidate’s stand in favor of abortion and/or euthanasia but votes for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons.”

The idea of “proportionate reasoning” recognizes that there are no perfect candidates. The job of Catholic voters is to weigh the positions of all candidates and to avoid choosing a candidate who supports something immoral, unless something good outweighs that immorality.

Nonnegotiable issues

In a 2006 address to a European parliamentary group, Pope Benedict XVI laid out several issues related to the public good that are “not negotiable” for Catholics.  

Those issues as laid out by Pope Benedict are as follows:

• Protection of life in all its stages, from the first moment of conception until natural death.

• Recognition and promotion of the natural structure of the family as a union between a man and a woman based on marriage, and its defense from attempts to make it juridically equivalent to radically different forms of union that in reality harm it and contribute to its destabilization, obscuring its particular character and its irreplaceable social role.

• The protection of the right of parents to educate their children.

The U.S. bishops further say that abortion and euthanasia — in their words, “preeminent threats to human life and dignity” — weigh heavily when deciding whether it is morally acceptable to vote for a candidate.

In 2019, the bishops said: “The threat of abortion remains our preeminent priority because it directly attacks life itself, because it takes place within the sanctuary of the family, and because of the number of lives destroyed.”

In acknowledging the importance of voting against abortion, the Church and Church leaders do not say that abortion is the only issue but that it is “preeminent” — a foundational consideration about the moral acceptability of a candidate.

Pope Francis asks in Laudato Si’: “How can we genuinely teach the importance of concern for other vulnerable beings, however troublesome or inconvenient they may be, if we fail to protect a human embryo, even when its presence is uncomfortable and creates difficulties?”

In Christifidelis Laici, St. John Paul II taught that “the right to health, to home, to work, to culture is false and illusory if the right to life, the most basic and fundamental right and the condition for all other personal rights, is not defended with maximum determination.”

In 2008, Bishop (now Cardinal) Kevin Farrell released a joint statement with Bishop Kevin Vann, saying that in their view, “there are no ‘truly grave moral’ or ‘proportionate’ reasons, singularly or combined that could outweigh the millions of innocent human lives that are directly killed by abortion each year.”

In 2008, Archbishop Charles Chaput said that Catholics who support pro-abortion candidates “need a compelling proportionate reason to justify it.”

“What is a ‘proportionate’ reason when it comes to the abortion issue? It’s the kind of reason we will be able to explain, with a clean heart, to the victims of abortion when we meet them face to face in the next life — which we most certainly will. If we’re confident that these victims will accept our motives as something more than an alibi, then we can proceed,” Chaput said.

So… whom to vote for?

The bishops say that well-formed Catholic voters could reach different conclusions about whom to support. The bishops also do not rule out the possibility of not voting, or of voting for third party candidates.

“When all candidates hold a position that promotes an intrinsically evil act, the conscientious voter faces a dilemma. The voter may decide to take the extraordinary step of not voting for any candidate or, after careful deliberation, may decide to vote for the candidate deemed less likely to advance such a morally flawed position and more likely to pursue other authentic human goods” (“Forming Consciences,” paragraph 36).

In 2016, Bishop James Conley offered this summary of the “Faithful Citizenship” guide’s voting advice: 

“In good conscience, some Catholics might choose to vote for a candidate who, with some degree of probability, would be most likely to do some good, and the least amount of harm, on the foundational issues: life, family, conscience rights and religious liberty. Or, in good conscience, some might choose the candidate who best represents a Christian vision of society, regardless of the probability of winning. Or, in good conscience, some might choose not to vote for any candidate at all in a particular office.”

This story was first published Sept. 18, 2020, and has been updated. Jonah McKeown contributed to the update.

Haitians sit down to eat their meal at a Haitian restaurant in Springfield, Ohio, on Sept. 12, 2024. / Credit: ROBERTO SCHMIDT/AFP via Getty Images

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 20, 2024 / 05:00 am (CNA).

Ohio’s Catholic bishops are urging the faithful and all people of goodwill to treat Haitian migrants in Springfield with “respect and dignity” as the small city seeks to dispel internet rumors about the population. 

“As the residents of Springfield, Ohio, struggle with violent threats and life disruptions fueled by unfettered social media posts, we exhort the Catholic faithful and all people of goodwill not to perpetuate ill will toward anyone involved based on unfounded gossip,” read a letter signed by bishops in all six Catholic dioceses in Ohio.

“Instead, we ask for prayers and support for all the people of Springfield as they integrate their new Haitian neighbors and build a better future together,” added the letter, published by the Ohio Catholic Conference.

Bishops of the Eastern Catholic eparchies also signed the message.

More than half of Haiti is Catholic and a large majority of the country belongs to some Christian denomination. 

“They’re eating the dogs — the people that came in,” Trump said. “They’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there. And this is what’s happening in our country and it’s a shame.”

The Springfield Police Division issued a statement to the media saying that there have been no credible reports of immigrants harming or abusing pets.

In the letter, the bishops noted that the Haitian migrants in Springfield were granted Temporary Protected Status to legally remain in the country. The letter states that Haitians and others are “feeling inhumane conditions in their countries” to enter the United States. 

“Like all people, these Haitians should be afforded the respect and dignity that are theirs by right and allowed the ability to contribute to the common good,” the bishops added. 

The bishops also wrote in the letter that the influx of migration “has caused a strain on the city’s resources.” However, they also emphasized that people can “view newcomers first as children of God” while also “understanding the need to enforce reasonable limits to legal immigration.”

“We applaud all those community groups working hard to advance the flourishing of Springfield, given the need to integrate newcomers into the social fabric,” the bishops wrote. “If we remain true to our principles, we can have a dialogue about immigration without scapegoating groups of people for societal issues beyond their control.”

The bishops warned: “Today, our nation is divided by partisanship and ideology, which blind us to the image of God in our neighbor, especially the unborn, the poor, and the stranger.” They added that “these negative sentiments are only exacerbated by gossip, which can spread quickly across social media with no concern for the truth or those involved.”

“From the beginning, the human race was made in the image of God, which distinguishes us from all other created things,” the bishops continued.

“The arrival of Jesus Christ in human history confirms the dignity God has given to each of us, without exception,” they added. “It is our belief in the dignity of human life that guides our consciences and rhetoric when engaging in politics or personal conversation. Each of us, therefore, must turn to God and ask for eyes to see the infinite dignity of every person.”

A man prays at the Candlelight Chapel at the National Shrine to Czestochowa in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, on April 2, 2005, the day Pope John Paul II died. / Credit: William Thomas Cain/Getty Images

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 19, 2024 / 17:15 pm (CNA).

Former President Donald Trump is no longer planning to attend an event with Polish President Andrzej Duda at a Catholic Marian shrine in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, on Sunday afternoon, Sept. 22.

The campaign’s scheduled stop at the National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa in Doylestown has been canceled. The reason for the change in Trump’s schedule is unclear.

On Sunday afternoon, the Polish-American Smolensk Disaster Commemoration Committee will unveil a monument at the shrine’s cemetery to commemorate the Polish solidarity movement and its fight for independence against the Soviet-backed communist regime of the 1940s through the 1980s.

A spokesperson for the shrine could not be reached for comment. 

The shrine pays homage to the historic Black Madonna icon in the southern Polish city of Czestochowa. According to legend, the original icon in Poland was painted by St. Luke the Evangelist on a tabletop that was built by Jesus Christ when he was a carpenter. The existence and veneration of the icon in Poland are well documented as early as the 1300s.

The eastern Pennsylvania shrine was constructed in 1955 and underwent renovations in the 1960s. The icon of the Black Madonna in Doylestown is a copy of the Polish icon and was blessed by St. John XXIII, according to the shrine’s website.

Bucks County is an important battleground in the swing state of Pennsylvania. President Joe Biden won the county by less than 4.4 percentage points in 2020 and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton won the county by about three-quarters of a percentage point in 2016.

Vice President Kamala Harris arrives to speak during her visit to a Planned Parenthood clinic in St. Paul, Minnesota, on March 14, 2024. / Credit: STEPHEN MATUREN/AFP via Getty Images

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 19, 2024 / 15:45 pm (CNA).

Catholic supporters of Vice President Kamala Harris’ 2024 presidential candidacy hosted a national organizing call with the campaign on Wednesday night in which speakers downplayed some of the faithful’s concerns about her support for abortion.

The “Catholics for Harris-Walz National Organizing Call,” held on Sept. 18 at 8 p.m., was designed to rally Catholic support behind Harris’ campaign. It was organized by a coalition of nonprofits, including Catholics Vote Common Good, which is part of the broader Vote Common Good organization that encourages faith groups to support progressive candidates.

Speakers on the call included Sister Simone Campbell, the director of NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice; Joe Donnelly, former United States ambassador to the Holy See under President Joe Biden; Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Connecticut; and Anthea Butler, chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

Campbell, who is a member of the religious community the Sisters of Social Service, contended that polls show most Catholics supporting legal abortion. 

“Our faith does not require the outlawing of abortion,” Campbell asserted in an apparent contradiction of what the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches.

“Protecting life is what we’re about, and we also trust each individual to have a well-formed conscience for making decisions — in this case, for her well-being, and [we trust] that a couple working together can make a good decision when this complicated, stressful horror of a difficult pregnancy is dealt with,” Campbell said.

Butler discouraged Catholics from being single-issue voters on abortion, saying that “we have to respect human dignity of all forms … [from] conception until the end of life,” adding: “You don’t get to pick which part of life is more important to you.” She argued that poverty, the preferential option for the poor, and education should be important issues for Catholics.

Additionally, Butler criticized former president Donald Trump for his assertion during the presidential debate that Haitian migrants are “eating the dogs” and “eating the cats” in Springfield, Ohio. She said that type of rhetoric is not “a way to respect human beings” and is “against a Catholic community,” noting that “many Haitians are Catholics.”

According to the catechism, “the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion” since the first century. It adds that abortion “is gravely contrary to the moral law” and that “life must be protected with the utmost care from the moment of conception.” It calls both abortion and infanticide “abominable crimes.”

“The inalienable right to life of every innocent human individual is a constitutive element of a civil society and its legislation,” the catechism further teaches.

In November 2023, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops approved a voter guide that calls “the threat of abortion” their “preeminent priority because it directly attacks our most vulnerable and voiceless brothers and sisters and destroys more than a million lives per year in our country alone.”

The U.S. bishops first issued “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship” in 2007 and have updated the voting guide every four years — in 2011, 2015, and 2019 — ahead of the next presidential election. At last year’s fall assembly, however, the bishops voted to postpone a full revision until after the 2024 election.

Campbell quoted Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation Gaudete et Exsultate, which says the human dignity of “those already born” is “equally sacred” to the lives of “the innocent unborn” and references poverty, euthanasia, and human trafficking as issues damaging to human dignity. 

In the same paragraph, the pontiff also says: “Our defense of the innocent unborn … needs to be clear, firm, and passionate, for at stake is the dignity of a human life, which is always sacred and demands love for each person, regardless of his or her stage of development.”

Francis said in 2022 that Biden supporting legal abortion as a Catholic is an “incoherence.” Biden’s bishop in Washington, D.C., Cardinal Wilton Gregory, said “the president is not demonstrating Catholic teaching” with his support for legal abortion.

Harris supports codifying the abortion standards set by Roe v. Wade, which would prevent states from passing laws that protect unborn life prior to fetal viability. In the Sept. 12 debate with Trump, Harris refused to say whether she supports late-term abortion in the seventh, eighth, and ninth months of pregnancy.

More than 9,000 late-term abortions are performed in the United States annually after the 21st week of pregnancy.

Other topics discussed on the call

Campbell also spoke positively of an interaction she had with Harris when receiving a presidential medal of freedom from Biden for her work on “economic justice, immigration reform, and health care policy.”

“We had a lovely conversation about what mattered,” Campbell said, noting that they discussed affordable health care and other issues.

Donnelly discussed working closely with Biden and Pope Francis while serving as ambassador to the Holy See. He said Harris “acts in the same exact way as President Biden has” by having a desire to “focus on those who are struggling” and “stand up for the least among us.” He asserted that “her work is driven by the Bible and God.”

Additionally, Donnelly criticized Trump’s debate comments about Haitian migrants, calling the president’s remarks “cruel, as un-Christian [and] as un-Catholic as I can think of.”

DeLauro said on the call that “this election is vital for the future” and that it is “essential that Catholic voices be present [and] truly represented in our public discourse.” She discussed issues such as expanding the child tax credit, expanding health care access, and providing paid leave. She also emphasized “welcoming the stranger.” 

“[This is the] Christian principle of caring for our neighbors,” DeLauro said. 

DeLauro alleged the Republican Party is “beholden to giant corporations” and that its policies would “exacerbate the inequality that already exists in this country.”

As a member of Congress, DeLauro has consistently voted in favor of abortion. She has an “F” rating from Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America.

Trump also launched a “Catholics for Trump” coalition earlier this month. The coalition lists its priorities as the defense of religious liberty, traditional values, and the sanctity of human life.

The religious groups challenging the abortion mandate include a group of Carmelite sisters, Catholic Charities, and the Sisterhood of St. Mary, an Anglican Episcopal monastic order (pictured here). / Credit: Becket Fund for Religious Liberty

CNA Staff, Sep 19, 2024 / 07:50 am (CNA).

A group of nuns and other religious groups with charitable missions are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to block a New York state mandate that would force them to cover abortions in their employee health insurance plans.

“New York’s abortion mandate is so extreme that not even Jesus, Mother Teresa, or Mahatma Gandhi would qualify for an exemption,” said Eric Baxter, vice president and senior counsel at Becket, the nonprofit religious liberty law firm that is arguing on behalf of the nuns. “The justices should exempt religious organizations once and for all so they can focus on caring for the most vulnerable.” 

The religious groups challenging the abortion mandate include a group of Carmelite sisters, the First Bible Baptist Church, the Sisterhood of St. Mary, an Anglican Episcopal monastic order of contemplative religious sisters, and Catholic Charities, which provide adoption and maternity services. 

The New York abortion mandate “imposes immense burdens on countless religious entities opposed to abortion as a matter of deep-seated religious conviction,” reads the Sept. 18 petition to the Supreme Court.

The petition notes that permitting some religious conduct for preferred subsets of religious groups but forbidding others “is a particularly pernicious form of discrimination under the First Amendment.”

The September petition follows a series of legal issues beginning in 2017, when a group of Anglican and Catholic nuns, Catholic dioceses, Christian churches, and other faith-based ministries sued over the mandate, which prohibited insurance policies from excluding coverage for abortions. The lower courts initially ruled against them, but Supreme Court justices reversed the lower court rulings in 2021 and told them to reconsider in light of Fulton v. Philadelphia, which brought up similar free exercise issues. The state courts ruled against the religious organizations again, so the religious groups have returned to the Supreme Court.

“Religious groups in New York should not be required to provide insurance coverage that violates their deeply held religious beliefs,” said Noel J. Francisco, partner-in-charge of Jones Day’s Washington office, which is also arguing on behalf of the nuns. “We are asking the court to protect religious freedom and make clear that the mandate cannot be applied to this diverse group of religious organizations.”

Initially, the proposed abortion mandate allowed all employers with religious objections to receive an exemption. However, New York redefined the exemption to include only religious groups that primarily teach religion and organizations that primarily serve and hire those who share their faith. Ministries such as the Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm, which runs a nursing home, do not qualify for the exemption because they serve those in need regardless of religious affiliation. 

“It thus places special burdens on religious traditions holding service of others to be a religious command,” the lawsuit noted.

In addition to the Carmelite sisters, Lutheran, Episcopalian, and Baptist groups are also “deemed insufficiently religious to qualify for a religious exemption — and so are forced to cover abortions in their employee health plans.”

The court will consider whether it will hear the case later this fall. 

null / Credit: Ivanko80/Shutterstock

CNA Staff, Sep 18, 2024 / 16:50 pm (CNA).

Vice President Kamala Harris on Tuesday amplified claims by several news outlets that a woman has died as the result of pro-life laws. But doctors say that the Georgia woman, Amber Thurman, died because of the abortion pill and medical malpractice. 

ProPublica’s disputed report claimed that Georgia’s restrictions on abortion delayed access to medical care, causing the death of a woman named Amber Nicole Thurman. Thurman died at age 28 in 2022 after being hospitalized due to an infection after she took abortion pills, according to the report.

Thurman received the abortion pills out of state in North Carolina because she was more than six weeks pregnant, the report says. Georgia law limits abortion after six weeks, but Thurman was about nine weeks pregnant when she procured the chemical abortion, according to the Washington Examiner. 

Harris blamed Thurman’s death on Donald Trump on Tuesday, saying: “Women are bleeding out in parking lots, turned away from emergency rooms, losing their ability to ever have children again. Survivors of rape and incest are being told they cannot make decisions about what happens next to their bodies. And now women are dying. These are the consequences of Donald Trump’s actions.” 

Harris’ campaign announced she will speak Friday about Thurman’s death in Atlanta as well as that of another Georgia woman, Candi Miller, who died after not seeking medical help following severe complications due to a chemical abortion. 

What caused Amber Thurman’s death?

Some news reports blamed pro-life limits on abortion for Thurman’s death, but Georgia state law explicitly allows abortions when the mother’s life or physical health is at risk. Thurman had a chemical abortion in North Carolina prior to her arrival in the emergency room, and when she arrived, her unborn twins had no heart activity.  

Dr. Christina Francis, CEO of the American Association of Pro-life Obstetricians and Gynecologists (AAPLOG) and a board-certified OB-GYN who has practiced for two decades, said that Thurman’s death “was caused by legal abortion drugs” as well as medical negligence. 

“Amber Thurman’s tragic death, recently covered by multiple news organizations, was caused by side effects of legal abortion drugs and medical negligence, not pro-life laws,” Francis said in a Tuesday statement.

Thurman went to the emergency room five days after she experienced complications from the abortion pill. Tissue from her deceased babies — unborn twins — remained in her uterus, causing an infection, according to ProPublica. As there was no cardiac activity in the fetuses when Thurman arrived at the hospital, her unborn babies were no longer alive. 

Doctors considered a dilation and curettage “D&C” procedure, which would have removed the twins’ remains. The following day, her doctors did not perform the D&C, and by the time she went to the operating room, more serious problems had developed, including hemorrhaging. From her arrival, it took the doctors 20 hours to operate. She died on the operating table.

ProPublica interviewed Thurman’s best friend, Ricaria Baker, who went with Thurman to obtain the abortion. According to Baker, Thurman missed her scheduled D&C abortion at the North Carolina clinic due to traffic and was told by an employee to have a chemical abortion using the drug regimen mifepristone and misoprostol. Baker notes that Thurman took the pills as she was directed.

“Despite taking the drugs as she was instructed and seeking timely care when she experienced complications, she still died,” Francis commented. “Rather than highlighting the dangers of these drugs, which have caused numerous deaths, abortion proponents are instead trying to blame Georgia’s laws in their push to protect induced abortion at all costs.”

According to the FDA warning label for the abortion drugs mifepristone and misoprostol, between 2.9% and 4.6% of women will visit the emergency room after taking the drugs.

Abortion pills have four times as many complications as surgical abortions, according to a 2023 report by the Charlotte Lozier Institute. As many as 1 in 5 women will suffer complications after a chemical abortion and as many as 15% will experience hemorrhaging, while 2% will experience infection. 

ProPublica, which first reported on the woman’s death, acknowledged in its initial report that “it is not clear from the record available why the doctors waited to provide a D&C” but cites Georgia’s abortion limitations as the cause. 

A state committee of 10 doctors said that Thurman’s death was preventable and the hospital’s delay played a role in the fatal outcome. 

In Francis’ opinion, it was the doctors’ negligence and the abortion pill complications that killed Thurman — not the state’s pro-life laws, which allow abortions and other lifesaving medical procedures in cases where the woman’s physical health or life is at risk. 

Georgia state law also has other exceptions for abortions, including exceptions for rape and incest for up to 22 weeks of pregnancy. 

There were also no fetal heartbeats detected in the 9-week-old unborn twins, meaning it would not have been an abortion.

“Amber Thurman’s state of Georgia clearly allows physicians to intervene in medical emergencies or when there is no detectable fetal heartbeat, both of which applied to her,” Francis said. “Don’t be misled by those who advocate for induced abortion over the health and safety of women.”

“This woman did not have to die,” said Dr. Susan Bane, another doctor with AAPLOG. “Based on the timeline and her symptoms, she should have had [the D&C procedure] done as soon as she could get to the hospital. It was medical negligence and had nothing to do with any sort of law in Georgia or elsewhere.” 

Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America called the rhetoric around the deaths of Thurman and Miller “deadly misinformation.”

“We mourn the senseless loss of Amber, Candi, and their unborn children. We agree their deaths were preventable. But let’s be absolutely clear: Georgia’s law and every pro-life state law calls on doctors to act in circumstances just like theirs,” said Katie Daniel, SBA’s state policy director. “If abortion advocates weren’t spreading misinformation and confusion to score political points, it’s possible the outcome would have been different.”

Do pro-life states ban emergency medical care for pregnant women? 

According to the Charlotte Lozier Institute, no pro-life states prevent emergency lifesaving medical treatments for pregnant women, according to one research institute.

“Make no mistake: All state abortion bans currently in effect contain exceptions to ‘prevent the death’ or ‘preserve the life’ of the pregnant person,’ according to KFF,” Francis noted. KFF, formerly known as the Kaiser Family Foundation, is a leading health policy organization.

KFF outlines state laws on abortion and details what exceptions pro-life states have.

Amid reports that women have been barred from medical care due to pro-life abortion limits, the Charlotte Lozier Institute investigated the claim and found that all pro-life states allow doctors to treat women with pregnancy emergencies according to their medical judgment.

“All pro-life state laws allow doctors to exercise their medical judgment to treat women with pregnancy emergencies. No law requires ‘imminence’ or ‘certainty’ before a doctor can act to save the patient’s life,” read the Sept. 13 Charlotte Lozier Institute fact sheet by Tess Cox, Dr. Ingrid Skop, and Mary Harned.  

The institute found that all pro-life states allow emergency treatments during pregnancy-related emergencies, following reports of women allegedly not receiving the medical care they require in cases of miscarriage, ectopic pregnancies, and other emergencies.

The institute found that all but five of these state laws included language allowing abortion when a woman’s health was in serious jeopardy, while in states without this language, the law permits doctors to use “reasonable” medical judgment to determine if an abortion is necessary. 

“Every state with a strong pro-life law permits doctors to treat women suffering from spontaneous miscarriages or ectopic pregnancies, and the treatment of these conditions is not considered an abortion under any law,” the institute noted. 

“Doctors and hospitals who fail to provide patients with necessary treatment in emergency circumstances may be committing malpractice,” the fact sheet noted. 

The institute cites recent cases that raise concerns that state laws may be preventing pregnant women from receiving necessary care. One woman was turned away from a hospital multiple times before an ectopic pregnancy ruptured her fallopian tube. Other articles report instances of hospitals turning away women who were suffering from ectopic pregnancies, incomplete miscarriages, premature rupture of membranes, and other circumstances.

“While it is not always easy to determine from a news article whether medical malpractice occurred, pro-life state laws are clear: Doctors can intervene in medical emergencies,” the authors wrote.

The Vatican on Sept. 16, 2024, unveiled a commemorative stamp to mark four decades of diplomatic relations with the United States.  / Credit: Governorate of the Vatican City State

CNA Staff, Sep 18, 2024 / 16:20 pm (CNA).

The Vatican this week unveiled a commemorative stamp to mark four decades of diplomatic relations with the United States. 

The two nations first announced diplomatic relations on Jan. 10, 1984. The U.S. Senate subsequently confirmed diplomat William Wilson as the first U.S. ambassador to the Holy See; he had previously served as then-President Ronald Reagan’s personal envoy to the pope. Wilson would serve as ambassador until 1986. 

The Vatican likewise named Archbishop Pio Laghi as the first apostolic pro-nuncio of the Holy See to the U.S.; he would serve in that role until 1990. 

In unveiling the stamp on Monday, Cardinal Fernando Vérgez Alzaga, the president of the governorate of Vatican City State, said the commemoration was “a sign of the attention and importance that the Holy See and the Vatican City State attach to these diplomatic relations.”

“In fact, entrusting a stamp with the celebration of an event is like making a small art object that will go around the world and convey the message entrusted to it as a sort of manifesto,” the prelate said. 

Alzaga noted that U.S.-Vatican diplomatic relations extend back to 1788, when George Washington allowed that the Holy See could freely appoint bishops in the newly minted country. 

“Since then, a long road has been traveled that has made it possible to arrive at the full diplomatic relations that we enjoy today, at the basis of which there are some common principles, such as the sharing of values and the spirit of goodwill,” the cardinal said. 

Laura Hochla, the deputy chief of mission at the Vatican embassy, said at the unveiling that the stamp symbolizes “the long friendship and close collaboration that unites our two countries.”

“The protection of human rights, the promotion of social justice, and the protection of the rights of vulnerable populations are the basis of this relationship of cooperation, a relationship that is increasingly strong,” she said.

The Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. / Credit: CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 18, 2024 / 15:50 pm (CNA).

Former president Donald Trump and Polish President Andrzej Duda will visit a Polish Marian shrine in the Bucks County suburbs of Philadelphia on Sunday, Sept. 22.

The National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa is located in Doylestown — about midway between the two most populated cities in eastern Pennsylvania: Philadelphia and Allentown. The Catholic shrine pays homage to the historic Black Madonna icon in the southern Polish town of Czestochowa.

The Trump campaign confirmed with CNA that both leaders will attend the same event at the shrine. 

Father Maximilian Ogar, the press secretary for the shrine, told CNA that Trump and Duda will both be present for the unveiling of a monument at the shrine’s cemetery, which will commemorate the Polish solidarity movement’s fight for independence against the Soviet-backed communist regime of the 1940s through the 1980s. 

The event was organized by the Polish-American Smolensk Disaster Commemoration Committee (SDCC). Ogar could not confirm the exact time of the event but said it would take place in the afternoon. 

Ogar said that Trump and Duda are “both invited guests of the committee” and emphasized that this is neither a rally nor a campaign event. He said the event will be open to “a very limited amount of people,” possibly about 1,000. 

“[Trump is] strictly coming here as a private citizen, as a pilgrim, to pay respect to the people,” Ogar said, adding that “most of the events will be at our cemetery.” 

Following the event, Trump will “spend some time in the shrine” and have the opportunity to answer media questions, according to Ogar. He said Duda would attend Mass at the shrine.

In 2020 Trump described himself as a “nondenominational Christian.” His wife, Melania, who was born in Slovenia, is Catholic.

The national shrine in eastern Pennsylvania was first constructed in 1955 as a wooden barn chapel. In 1960, the shrine purchased more land and constructed a larger shrine. The icon of the Black Madonna in Doylestown is a copy of the Polish icon and was blessed by St. John XXIII, according to the shrine’s website.

St. John Paul II, the first pope from Poland, visited the American shrine twice as a cardinal. While serving as pontiff, he blessed and signed the Black Madonna icon that is now displayed at the national shrine. Former President George H. W. Bush visited the shrine during his presidential campaign in 1980 and former President Ronald Reagan visited the shrine while serving as president in 1984.

According to legend, the original icon in Poland was painted by St. Luke the Evangelist on a tabletop that was built by Jesus Christ when he was a carpenter. The existence and veneration of the icon in Poland are well documented as early as the 1300s.

Millions of Catholics venerate the icon in Czestochowa every year. For centuries, there have been reports of miraculous events, such as healings, from pilgrims who venerate the icon.

Nearly one-fourth of Pennsylvania’s population is Catholic, slightly above the national average. Nearly 6% of Pennsylvania is of Polish descent, which is more than twice as high as the national average.

Trump has been trying to court Catholic votes during his 2024 presidential campaign. In July, the former president accused the Biden administration of “[going] after Catholics.” In a speech, he called for “stop[ping] the Biden-Harris administration’s weaponization of law enforcement against Americans of faith.” 

Trump has been critical of Vice President Kamala Harris for her aggressive questioning of his judicial nominees about being members of the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic fraternal organization. He has also criticized the Biden-Harris administration over a leaked Richmond FBI memo that called for an investigation into supposed ties between traditionalist Catholicism and white nationalism and has criticized the arrests of Catholic and other pro-life activists who are in jail for violations of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act.

Both campaigns have engaged in a contentious fight for the Catholic vote. The Harris campaign is hosting a “Catholics for Harris-Walz National Organizing Call” to court Catholic votes on Wednesday evening, Sept. 18. 

Bucks County is an important battleground in the swing state of Pennsylvania. President Joe Biden won the county by less than 4.4 percentage points in 2020 and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton won the county by about three-quarters of a percentage point in 2016.

Illinois state capitol building in Springfield. / Credit: Paul Brady Photography/Shutterstock

CNA Staff, Sep 18, 2024 / 15:20 pm (CNA).

A pro-life group in Illinois is urging state residents to vote against a question on their ballot related to in vitro fertilization (IVF). 

The advisory question, known as the “Assisted Reproductive Health Referendum Act,” which was approved for the Illinois ballot in May, asks Illinoisians if “all medically appropriate assisted reproductive treatments, including, but not limited to, in vitro fertilization” should be “covered by any health insurance plan in Illinois that provides coverage for pregnancy benefits, without limitation on the number of treatments.”

In Illinois, advisory questions are nonbinding and are designed to gauge public opinion and drive voter turnout. The questions approved for this election cycle are an attempt by state Democrats at “boosting turnout by party faithful,” according to the Chicago Tribune.  

Illinois Right to Life, a pro-life group active in the state, has expressed opposition to the question, noting that “in vitro fertilization is detrimental to the inherent value of life.”

“All children are equal in the eyes of God and one of the most beautiful vocations in life is becoming a parent. Life in all its stages is precious, including embryos. This absolutely includes children born from in vitro fertilization (IVF),” the group said in a Sept. 14 emailed statement. 

“However, it is important to recognize the IVF process can be harmful to new human lives, often commodifies children, and the procedure does not honor the sanctity of life.”

The Catholic Church teaches that while couples struggling to have children can use certain fertility treatments, the use of IVF is “morally unacceptable.” This is because IVF involves the use of artificial means to achieve pregnancy outside of sex between a husband and wife — the marital act — a disassociation that the Church teaches is contrary to the dignity of both parents and children.

In addition, to maximize efficiency, doctors create excess human embryos during the IVF process and routinely destroy or indefinitely freeze millions of undesired embryos.

“We sincerely ask and urge you to vote NO in the advisory referendum regarding in vitro fertilization on the Illinois general election ballot,” Illinois Right to Life said.

Illinois has some of the most permissive abortion laws in the United States, with Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker expanding access to abortion numerous times during his tenure and describing Illinois as an abortion “safe haven.”

In addition, Democratic Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth has led an effort in the U.S. Senate to promote IVF and require insurance companies to cover it. 

On Tuesday, U.S. Senate Republicans blocked the latest pro-IVF bill, which would have required that all individual and group health insurance plans that offer childbirth coverage also provide coverage for IVF. 

The bill did not include any exemptions for insurance plans provided by employers who have religious or other moral objections to IVF, such as the Catholic Church.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops had come out strongly against the federal legislation, saying that the solution to infertility “can never be a medical process that involves the creation of countless preborn children and results in most of them being frozen or discarded and destroyed.”

Bishop Michael Olson of Fort Worth, Texas, and Rev. Mother Teresa Agnes Gerlach of the Most Holy Trinity Monastery in Arlington, Texas. / Credit: Diocese of Fort Worth; Monastery of the Most Holy Trinity Discalced Carmelite Nuns

CNA Staff, Sep 17, 2024 / 18:45 pm (CNA).

After a string of controversies and disagreements with their local Fort Worth bishop, a group of Carmelite nuns in Arlington, Texas, announced on Saturday that they are associating with the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX), a traditionalist group that is not in full communion with the Catholic Church and has a canonically irregular status.

After making a “unanimous decision,” the Discalced Carmelite Nuns of the Monastery of the Most Holy Trinity in Arlington, Texas, said they have “completed the final steps necessary for our monastery to be associated with the Society of St. Pius X, who will henceforth assure our ongoing sacramental life and governance,” according to a Sept. 14 announcement on their website. 

Bishop Michael Olson of the Diocese of Fort Worth had offered to reinstate sacramental life at the monastery if the sisters agreed to disassociate themselves from Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, a controversial figure whom the Catholic Church excommunicated this summer for schism following his refusal to submit to the pope or the communion of the Church. 

Olson also offered to provide a priest of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP) — a group in communion with the Church that is dedicated to the Latin Mass — to offer sacraments for the sisters, provided they also acknowledge Mother Marie of the Incarnation, the prioress of the Carmel of the Most Holy Trinity, as their superior and recognize Olson as their bishop, and remove controversial content from the monastery website.  

Mother Marie is the president of the Association of Christ the King in the United States — an association of Carmelite monasteries that the Vatican tasked with overseeing the monastery in 2023 amid the feud.

Mother Marie of the Incarnation explained in a Sept. 7 statement released by the diocese that she “extended … Bishop Olson’s offer of a renewed sacramental life, according to their preferred liturgical form, but with deepest sorrow I report today that none of the sisters have made any response, either to me or to their bishop.”

Olson made the offer in a July 26 letter, which Mother Marie said she shared with the sisters the following day.

“Over the past six weeks since they received this offer, the nuns have given no indication that they desire the gift of the sacraments, nor have they shown openness to any dialogue with us,” Mother Marie wrote. “In addition to that, they have elected to maintain upon their website certain links and statements which manifest contempt for their bishop and which obscure their claim to being in union with Rome.”

Mother Marie asked the faithful of the Diocese of Fort Worth “to redouble your prayer and sacrifice for our beloved sisters of the Carmel of the Most Holy Trinity.”

In a statement released on Sept. 17, Olson called the nun’s rejection of leadership “scandalous,” saying it “is permeated with the odor of schism.”  

The monastery also announced that the nuns have reelected Mother Teresa Agnes Gerlach as prioress for a three-year term. Olson had dismissed Gerlach from religious life after she was investigated for alleged sexual misconduct with a priest. 

“Sadly, the deliberate and contumacious actions of Mother Teresa Agnes and the other members of the community have taken them further down the path of disobedience to and disunity with the Church and with their own religious order that they began to embark on so many months ago,” Olson said. 

Olson has since clarified that “the attempted elections were illicit and invalid” because they did not follow ecclesiastical law and the constitutions of the Order of Discalced Carmelites.  

Olson has since instructed Catholics not attend the daily Latin Mass at the monastery or offer the nuns any financial support.

“As your bishop I must plead with you … for the good of your souls you do not participate in any sacraments that may be offered at the monastery as such participation will associate you with the scandalous disobedience and disunity of the members of the Arlington Carmel,” Olson said.

The sisters said in their statement that in the past few years they have found “much joy and spiritual renewal in the rediscovery of the riches of the immemorial liturgical tradition of the Church,” a reference to the Latin Mass, the Roman liturgy that was used prior to the New Order of the Mass promulgated by Vatican II.

“The motto of Pope St. Pius X was: To Restore All Things in Christ,” the statement continued. “Such is the case for our community as well, which has prayerfully, over a period of many years, sought to return to the fullness of our Catholic tradition and to restore all things in Christ, in both our liturgical life and in the way we live our Carmelite vocation.”

“We share an affinity with the Society of St. Pius X in its emphasis on training holy, dedicated priests, willing to sacrifice all for Christ, which coincides with our own vocation of prayer and sacrifice at the heart of the Church, pouring out our lives for the Church and especially for priests,” the nuns continued. 

The late French archbishop Marcel-François Lefebvre formed the SSPX in the 1970s to promote the Latin Mass, but in 1988, he illicitly ordained four bishops without the permission of Pope John Paul II, leading to his excommunication along with the four bishops. Pope Benedict XVI lifted this excommunication in 2009 in the hopes of eventually bringing SSPX back into full communion with the Church, though he explained in a letter that SSPX does not have canonical status and therefore “its ministers do not exercise legitimate ministries in the Church.”

SSPX takes issue with the Second Vatican Council, according to its website, which reads: “[SSPX] is governed by the magisterium of the Church, which found its expression in the councils and teaching of the popes, and in light of which the Second Vatican Council and its subsequent popes must be judged, since what was true until 1965 cannot suddenly become wrong.”

Several Vatican statements in past years have cautioned Catholics against attending SSPX Masses except in serious circumstances, including 1995 and 1998 letters by Monsignor Camille Perl, then-secretary of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei. 

“The Masses they [SSPX] celebrate are also valid, but it is considered morally illicit for the faithful to participate in these Masses unless they are physically or morally impeded from participating in a Mass celebrated by a Catholic priest in good standing,” read the 1995 letter by Perl. 

A 1998 letter by Perl reiterates: “It is precisely because of this schismatic mentality that this pontifical commission has consistently discouraged the faithful from attending Masses celebrated under the aegis of the Society of St. Pius X.”

The nuns in April defied a Vatican decree by asking a judge for a restraining order against the parties that the Vatican had tasked with overseeing the monastery, an association of Carmelite monasteries and Olson. The April decree had entrusted the monastery to the Association of Christ the King in the U.S. and its president, Mother Marie. The Vatican instructed the nuns to accept Olson’s authority, as they made a statement earlier this year rejecting his authority.

The tensions with Olson followed investigations into the monastery. Olson investigated the Reverend Mother Superior Teresa Agnes Gerlach over alleged sexual misconduct with a priest and she was dismissed from religious life by the bishop. Gerlach allegedly admitted to inappropriate sexual conduct occurring via phone and video chats but later recanted the confession saying she was recovering from surgery and medically unfit at the time she was questioned.

The monastery filed a civil lawsuit in May 2023 against the bishop that was eventually dismissed by a judge. The bishop banned daily Mass and regular confessions at the monastery, which led to the nuns to issue a statement that appeared to reject his authority in governing the monastery. 

The Vatican’s letter required the monastery to accept Olson’s authority and thanked Olson for his service to the Church. In June 2023, the diocese released two photographs purported to show cannabis products inside the monastery. The monastery attorney denied the allegations, calling them “ridiculous.” 

“I invite the faithful of the Diocese of Fort Worth to join me in prayer and sacrifice for the nuns, for the restoration of order at the Arlington Carmel, and for the return to sober obedience and union with the Church by the members of the community,” Olson said in his Sept. 17 statement.

This story was updated Sept. 18, 2024, at 11:17 a.m. ET with information on the Sept. 17 statement from Bishop Olson.