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NEWS BRIEFS Feb-8-2010

By Catholic News Service

U.S.

Cardinal: Group's support of gay marriage not authentic church teaching

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has denounced a Maryland-based organization for its criticism of Catholic efforts to defend marriage as the union of one man and one woman and said it does not offer "an authentic interpretation of Catholic teaching." Cardinal Francis E. George of Chicago said in a Feb. 5 statement that "no one should be misled by the claim that New Ways Ministry provides an authentic interpretation of Catholic teaching and an authentic Catholic pastoral practice.," He added that "New Ways Ministry has no approval or recognition from the Catholic Church and ... cannot speak on behalf of the Catholic faithful in the United States." New Ways Ministry, based in Mount Rainier, Md., describes itself as a "gay-positive ministry of advocacy and justice for lesbian and gay Catholics and reconciliation within the larger Christian and civil communities." Francis DeBernardo, executive director of New Ways Ministry, said in a statement posted on his organization's Web site that the cardinal's words "will not impede or slow us in our efforts to work for justice for lesbian/gay people in the church and society." Although he made no reference to the issue of same-sex marriage, DeBernardo said "for more than three decades, New Ways Ministry has had its programs reviewed by scores of Catholic bishops, theologians and pastoral leaders, and we have always been found to be firmly in line with authentic Catholic teaching." In March 2009 DeBernardo testified before a Maryland House of Delegates committee against a proposed constitutional amendment that would have limited marriage to a man and woman and in favor of the Religious Freedom & Civil Marriage Protection Act, which would have given same-sex couples the right to marry. DeBernardo said he was "astonished that Cardinal George released such a statement" without contacting New Ways or informing the organization that it was being released to the press.

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WORLD

Adequate nutrition is a fundamental right for all people, pope says

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Adequate food supply is a fundamental right for all people, said Pope Benedict XVI. Working to ensure proper nutrition for all means bringing dignity to human lives and should be a top priority, he said in a speech Feb. 6 welcoming Alfonso Roberto Matta Fahsen, Guatemala's new ambassador to the Vatican. Beyond the need for appropriate policies and resources dedicated to ensuring food security for everyone, "it's necessary to have men and women with feelings of compassion and solidarity who walk together toward reaching this goal," he said. Adequate nutrition for the most vulnerable, like children, should be a primary international concern, he said. Without proper nutrition, children's physical and emotional health is compromised, he said. Often, he added, in exchange for food children are "exposed to work that is inappropriate for their age" or plunged into tragic situations. Pope Benedict expressed his concern and prayers for increased episodes of drought in Guatemala, which have caused crop loss, malnutrition and poverty. He encouraged the country to continue addressing the many factors that lead to a number of social ills in Guatemala like drug trafficking, violence, emigration, illiteracy, sects, and the lack of a solid moral foundation for young people.

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Church committed to children, defends the right to a family, pope says

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Despite the deplorable behavior of a few priests, the Catholic Church continues to be a leading promoter of the rights of children and of their well being and education, Pope Benedict XVI said. "The harsh words of Jesus against those who would scandalize one of the little ones requires the commitment of all to never lower the level of respect and love" for children, the pope said Feb. 8 during a plenary meeting with members of the Pontifical Council for the Family. Before turning to the importance of a united family in the life of a child, the pope acknowledged that some priests have violated children, "a behavior which the church does not and will not hesitate to deplore and condemn." The U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child says the family is the natural environment for a child's growth and well being, the pope said, and the greatest help the church can offer children is to work to ensure that they are welcomed lovingly into a family based on the marriage of a man and a woman united for life. Children "want to be loved by a mother and a father who love each other, and they need to live and grow with both parents because the maternal and paternal figures are complementary in the education of children and in the construction of their personality and identity."

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Makeshift studio in the back of van keeps Haiti's Radio Soleil on air

PETIONVILLE, Haiti (CNS) -- Radio Soleil, Catholic radio in Haiti, is on the air -- broadcasting from the back of an immobilized van. Except when staffers enter the crowded compact studio in the van, all work is conducted outdoors. The van is parked in a courtyard of an office building in a quiet part of suburban Petionville, located in the hills above Port-au-Prince. Its tires are flattened so that no one can drive off with the van and its recycled radio equipment. The popular Catholic radio station, knocked off the air by the Jan. 12 earthquake, resumed broadcasting Jan. 24. Father Desinord Jean, station director and general manager, said getting back on the air was a priority for staffers even as they mourned the loss of two colleagues who died when the station collapsed during the quake. The radio station recovered quickly because its engineer, Adonis Mendez, was in the Dominican Republic at the time of the quake and was able to find enough basic equipment to bring to Haiti. Outside of the equipment in the van, the station has nothing, Father Jean said. "We tried to save some equipment but the looters came and took everything," he said.

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Shelter kits provide short-term solution for 35,000 homeless Haitians

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (CNS) -- A pregnant Germaine Sylace struggled to get control of the two tarps, a plastic bin of nails and 100 feet of nylon rope. Nothing was going to stop her from making sure her family of five would be sleeping under something better than a couple of thin bed sheets tied together with string. Sylace, 44, was trying not to drop the supplies being delivered Feb. 5 and 6 by Catholic Relief Services to thousands of families forced from their homes by January's earthquake. Isaac Boyd, an American-born shelter expert summoned from Kenya, where he handled crisis housing for refugees for Catholic Relief Services, said the shelter kits are not meant to be a permanent solution for thousands of Haitians left homeless by the quake. CRS provided up to 7,000 kits to the estimated 35,000 people at the camp at the Petionville Club, a local golf course. Some of the kit materials had been in storage in Dubai and were assembled in the Dominican Republic. Boyd said CRS officials decided against providing tents to people because of a lack of space and because they hope to begin moving people to other locations as soon as possible. Even as the kits were distributed, Boyd and CRS shelter experts were looking for alternatives to housing people on the golf course. Its hilly terrain and lack of sanitation facilities are not ideal, especially once the rains begin next month. CRS staffers fear the land could become a quagmire of unimaginable proportions. "The next step will be some kind of transitional shelter program," until permanent housing can be constructed, Boyd said.

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Catholic leaders outline steps they say are key for Haitian adoptions

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The heads of five Catholic agencies that work with Haitian earthquake victims have outlined steps they say the U.S. government should take to protect children left alone after the Jan. 12 earthquake. In a Feb. 4 letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, the heads of Catholic refugee, immigrant and relief organizations urged specific steps to be followed before "children are brought to the United States and placed in any legal adoption proceedings." In any humanitarian crisis, they said, "many children are left without anyone to care for them. Whether parents or guardians are killed or families are separated by war or natural disaster, these children are in dire need of special assistance or protection. In order to properly serve these children and to ensure that their special needs are met, safeguards and procedures must be established that preserve the best interest of each individual child." The Catholic leaders stressed that Haitian children who are not already matched with U.S. adoptive parents should only be brought to this country if it is determined to be in the best interest of those children. The letter was signed by Johnny Young, executive director of the Migration and Refugee Services of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops; Maria Odom, executive director of Catholic Legal Immigration Network; Father Larry Snyder, executive director of Catholic Charities USA; Ken Hackett, president of Catholic Relief Services, the U.S. bishops' overseas relief and development agency; and Johan Ketelers, secretary-general of the Geneva-based International Catholic Migration Commission.

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PEOPLE

Metuchen opens sainthood cause for Venezuelan mystic who died in US

METUCHEN, N.J. (CNS) -- The sainthood cause has formally opened for Maria Esperanza Medrano de Bianchini, a Venezuelan woman believed to have seen 31 apparitions of Mary, who spread worldwide a message of family reconciliation and fraternal unity that she said Mary relayed to her. "We gather together as a people filled with faith believing in the gift of God," said Bishop Paul G. Bootkoski, who presided at the ceremony at St. Francis of Assisi Cathedral in Metuchen Jan. 31. "We believe God gives us men and women of fine example who show us the way to Jesus Christ. Today, we begin the cause for Maria Esperanza, a woman of faith and we pray as this faith community that God will recognize her through his church as one of his saints," he said. The Mass, which was concelebrated by 29 priests, drew more than 1,400 people, including family members, a 60-member choir and others from Bianchini's native Venezuela. Bianchini reportedly first saw an apparition of Mary in 1976, but she became a world-renowned figure after Mary reportedly appeared to her and 150 others at a farm named Finca Betania in Venezuela on March 25, 1984. Mary is said to have appeared under the title "Mary, virgin and mother, reconciler of all people and nations." Bianchini died in New Jersey in 2004 after a long illness.

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Salvadoran bishops to write Vatican to support Romero's sainthood

SAN SALVADOR (CNS) -- As the 30th anniversary of the murder of Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero approaches, El Salvador's bishops have agreed to write a letter to the Vatican supporting Romero's canonization. "As church, it is our great desire that Archbishop Romero be canonized as soon as possible," San Salvador Archbishop Jose Escobar Alas told reporters Feb. 7. Archbishop Escobar said the Vatican Congregation for Saints' Causes is considering the matter. "We have had no communication from the congregation about dates or how things are going," he said. "This is a process that the church does with privacy. The process demands silence, secrecy and respect for the person being examined." Archbishop Romero was gunned down while celebrating Mass March 24, 1980, shortly after a radio broadcast in which he urged Salvadoran soldiers to stop turning their weapons on civilians in El Salvador's civil war. The canonization cause entered the verification phase in 2000. In 2005, around the 25th anniversary of the prelate's death, the Vatican informed the Salvadoran bishops that the cause had passed the first phase of verification. Although formal canonization is a slow process, many Salvadorans have considered the archbishop a saint since his murder. His image hangs in many churches, and there are icons of "St. Romero." In May 2007, en route to Brazil, reporters asked Pope Benedict XVI about Archbishop Romero's cause. The pope said the archbishop was "certainly a great witness of the faith, a man of great Christian virtue who worked for peace and against the dictatorship."

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Cardinal asks dialogue partners if an ecumenical catechism might work

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- A Vatican official has floated the idea of a shared "ecumenical catechism" as one of the potential fruits of 40 years of dialogue among Catholics, Anglicans, Lutherans, Methodists and members of the Reformed churches. "We have affirmed our common foundation in Jesus Christ and the Holy Trinity as expressed in our common creed and in the doctrine of the first ecumenical councils," Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, told representatives of the churches. Opening a three-day symposium at the Vatican to brainstorm on the future of ecumenism, Cardinal Kasper said it is essential "to keep alive the memory of our achievements" in dialogue, educate the faithful about how much has been accomplished and prepare a new generation to carry on the work. He said the members of his council "proposed an ecumenical catechism that would be written in consultation with our partners," but "we do not yet have any idea how such a catechism could be structured and written." One thing for sure, he said, is that there is a need for "an ecumenism of basics that identifies, reinforces and deepens the common foundation" of faith in Christ and belief in the tenets of the creed. He also called for "a people-centered ecumenism" that would support and give new energy to the theological dialogues.

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