Denver, Colo., May 22, 2019 CNA.- A new study examining the correlation between religion and marital happiness found that women who are part of a highly religious, traditional couple are most likely to report being happy in marriage, as well as sexually satisfied in their relationship.
Read more
Baton Rouge, La., May 21, 2019 CNA.- The governor of Louisiana - a Catholic Democrat - says he will sign a bill banning abortions after the detection of a fetal heartbeat, if the legislation arrives on his desk.
Read more
Philadelphia, Pa., May 21, 2019 CNA.- A Catholic church in Pennsylvania was vandalized with pro-choice graffiti over the weekend as the abortion debate escalates around the country, following the passage of a major abortion law in Alabama.
Read more
Dallas, Texas, May 21, 2019 CNA.- The Bishop of Dallas says that a May 15 police raid on diocesan offices was sensationalism, traumatic, and a waste of resources. “This event was most traumatic for those who were present in the building at the time, as some of the approximate 40 law enforcement agents approached employees in ski masks and SWAT gear,” Dallas Bishop Edward Burns said in a statement.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- During his installation ceremony as the new archbishop of Washington, Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory acknowledged the struggles that have recently impacted the Catholic Church and urged Catholic leaders and laity not to lose faith.
Read more
LOS ANGELES (CNS) -- Church officials are urging Catholics to continue to oppose a California bill that would force priests to disclose information about child sexual abuse that they hear in the sacrament of confession.
Read moreTALLAHASSEE, Fla. (CNS) -- The Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops called on Gov. Ron DeSantis to commute the death sentence to life in prison for a man scheduled to be executed for a 1984 murder.
Read more
Washington D.C., May 16, 2019 CNA.- Earlier this week, the state of Alabama passed legislation to make abortion a felony. The measure is the nation’s strongest prohibition on abortion. It directly contradicts Roe v. Wade and is intended as a challenge to the Supreme Court case that established a nationwide “right to abortion” in 1973.
Read more
VIENNA, Va. (CNS) -- When her friend's daughter was diagnosed with cancer, Holly Christensen, an Alaskan mother and oncology nurse, decided to make the little girl something pretty to wear. She created a Rapunzel-style wig made of soft yellow yarn with flowers strewn throughout the long braid. The gift was a hit.
Read more
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (CNS) -- The sponsor of the Missouri bill to ban abortions after eight weeks of pregnancy described how the measure moved through the Legislature as being like human life itself.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Five U.S. bishops, chairmen of U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' committees or subcommittees, said May 17 they were "gravely disappointed" with the U.S. House of Representatives passage of the Equality Act.
Read moreThe United States Conference of Catholic Bishops released the following Q and A May 9 -- Editor. Q. What does the new Motu Proprio do? A. The new Motu Proprio Vos estis lux mundi is a significant move forward for the universal Church, one that echoes many of the practices established in the U.S. Bishops' Essential Norms and the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People that have been in force in the United States since 2002. For example, it affirms the existing:
Read more
PROVIDENCE (CNS) -- A bill that pro-life legal analysts said would have turned Rhode Island into an "abortion haven" failed to pass the Senate Judiciary Committee May 14. Hundreds of pro-life activists who gathered at the Statehouse erupted into cheers as news spread that the committee voted 5-4 against the Senate version of the bill that supporters claimed would have enshrined Roe v. Wade -- the Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion nationwide -- into state law.
Read more
LOS ANGELES (CNS) -- A bill making its way through the California Legislature would make the state the first since 1999 to require priests to choose between violating the law or violating the seal of the confessional.
Read more
DALLAS (CNS) -- Dallas police executed search warrants at three sites in the Diocese of Dallas May 15, saying the process was an extension of their ongoing investigation of sexual abuse allegations into five current or former priests, including one accused of sexually abusing at least three minors and who is believed to have fled the country to his native Philippines.
Read more
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (CNS) -- By passing a bill to ban abortion in nearly all circumstances, the Alabama Legislature has recognized that abortion is "the extinguishing of a unique human life," said the president and CEO of Americans United for Life.
Read more
Montgomery, Ala., May 14, 2019 CNA.- The Alabama Senate approved a bill Thursday that will outlaw nearly all abortion in the state. The bill, which is expected to be signed by Gov. Kay Ivey, is intended to be a direct challenge to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that declared unconstitutional state measures prohibiting abortion.
Read more
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. (CNS) -- New York Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan offered a heartfelt homily on Staten Island on Mother's Day in memory of the victims of the Easter terrorist bombings in Sri Lanka that left more than 250 dead and hundreds wounded.
Read more
ALBANY, N.Y. (CNS) -- The numbers are so staggering that it has been called "torture." Solitary confinement is in widespread use in prisons across the United States and, in New York state alone, more than 3,000 inmates are isolated in 6-by-10 cells for over 23 hours a day.
Read more
LOS ANGELES (CNS) -- Auxiliary Bishop Robert E. Barron of Los Angeles said his new book addressing the church's sexual abuse crisis and urging Catholics to "stay and fight for the body of Christ" comes from his "pastor's heart."
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The archbishop of Chicago apologized to the local Jewish community after a priest in the city invited the leader of the Nation of Islam to speak at his church, days after he was banned from Facebook for what it called hate speech.
Read more
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (CNS) -- When news of a school shooting May 7 at STEM School Highlands Ranch reached St. Mark Parish, just two miles away, parish staff members immediately began calling the nine families from the parish known to have children at the school.
Read more
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (CNS) -- Of all the designer clothes, quirky conversation pieces and valuable antiques that have rotated through the thrift shop, Archangel Attic, maybe the greatest treasure to come from this modest Anchorage shop is the $1 million it has made for Lumen Christi High School in Anchorage.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- U.S. church leaders welcomed the norms issued by Pope Francis May 9 giving clear direction to the global Catholic Church about reporting abuse and holding church leaders accountable, saying it confirms what they already have in place and also gives them a way forward.
Read moreWASHINGTON (CNS) -- Four U.S. bishops, chairmen of U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops committees or subcommittees, have signed on to a letter voicing religious freedom concerns with the Equality Act, introduced in the House this year.
Read more
Philadelphia, Pa., May 8, 2019 CNA.- Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia called for broad participation in a pro-life rally this week, scheduled in response to a Penslyvania state representative’s livestreamed harassment of a woman praying outside of a Planned Parenthood clinic.
Read more
Albany, N.Y., May 8, 2019 CNA.- New York’s faith leaders gathered in protest of solitary confinement this week, pushing for a bill that seeks more humane ways to treat prisoners. “We believe solitary confinement is a form of torture, and it has been vastly overused historically in New York State. Even with some recent reforms, not enough has been done,” Dennis Poust, communications director for the New York State Catholic Conference, told CNA.
Read more
ATLANTA (CNS) -- Georgia Republican Gov. Brian Kemp signed legislation May 7 to ban abortions in the state once a fetal heartbeat is detected, which is around six weeks. The bill's signing comes after weeks of protests and amid outcry for legal action against it.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- During the last days of April, a section of the student hub on the campus of The Catholic University of America in Washington displayed a gallery of tales of pain but also of recovery and healing featuring Catholics from around the country who had experienced sex abuse by clergy. They were men and women, younger and older, of various ethnicities -- profiles of Catholics who had survived torment by trusted members of the church but who also were helped to recover by Catholic communities of faith.
Read more
DUBUQUE, Iowa (CNS) -- The film "Otto Neururer: Hope through Darkness," based on the life of the first Austrian priest killed in a Nazi concentration camp, had its world premiere recently in Iowa. The film, which recounts the true story of Blessed Neururer, was screened April 24-26 at the Julien Dubuque International Film Festival in Dubuque. Austrian filmmaker Hermann Weiskopf, who produced and directed the work with German co-producer Ottfried Fischer, was on hand for the first screenings.
Read moreWASHINGTON (CNS) -- The announcement of a new conscience protection rule May 2 protecting health care workers who object to abortion procedures on religious grounds was welcome news to U.S. Catholic bishops and the president of the Catholic Health Association.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Leaders from the Pontifical Mission Societies spent a day of their national meeting bending the ear of members of Congress, urging action on climate change, the protection of immigrants and religious freedom.
Read more
NEW ORLEANS (CNS) -- In 1985, when the HIV-AIDS tsunami was crashing ashore in every American city, Father Paul Desrosiers was burying one more person at Holy Trinity Church in New Orleans. Burying the dead during an epidemic is about as tough as it gets among the corporal works of mercy, but Father Desrosiers had another, perhaps even more difficult, challenge: counseling surviving family members in their grief, some of whom were angry, confused, unreachable and intransigent.
Read more
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (CNS) -- Jockey Mike Smith, a Catholic who rode Justify last year to a Triple Crown victory, prays before every race, but he doesn't pray to win. The 145th Run for the Roses on May 4, when he will try for his third Kentucky Derby win, will be no different.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- In a memo released late on April 29, President Donald Trump ordered changes for how refugees may apply for asylum to the U.S., requesting an application fee from asylum-seekers and denying them permission to work depending on how the applicant entered the country. Though the changes are not immediate, he gave administration officials 90 days to work on new regulations.
Read more
NEW YORK (CNS) -- The anguished phone calls started arriving shortly after 1 a.m. on Easter Sunday morning. Sri Lankan immigrants on Staten Island and Long Island spent the rest of the day anxiously waiting for news of family and friends after terrorists linked to the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for bombing three churches and three luxury hotels.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Patrick Creadon, who made the new documentary "Hesburgh" about Holy Cross Father Theodore Hesburgh, the priest who led the University of Notre Dame for 35 years, said that film wouldn't have been possible had it not been for a feature he made three years earlier for ESPN, "Catholics vs. Convicts."
Read more
Sacramento, Calif., Apr 30, 2019 CNA.- If California moves forward with its proposed law trying to force priests to violate the seal of Confession, it is not just Catholicism but all religions that will suffer, said a Dominican priest in a recent op-ed.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- More than 2,000 people attended an April 26 organ concert at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington to benefit restoration and rebuilding efforts of Notre Dame de Paris, the famous French cathedral severely damaged in the April 15 fire.
Read more
Washington D.C., Apr 27, 2019 CNA.- The founding principles of American politics are at risk, Utah’s Senator Mike Lee told CNA April 26. “There's the problem of people's reluctance these days to recognize truth--when it's not accompanied by air quotes,” the senator told CNA.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- For the past three centuries, Western societies have worked hard to "to construct a harmonious moral life through human reason alone, without God," but "it doesn't work," Philadelphia Archbishop Charles J. Chaput told a New York audience April 27.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Catholic bishops from around the U.S. were quick to condemn the April 27 attack on a Jewish community gathered at a synagogue near San Diego, which left one person dead and three others injured.
Read moreCLEVELAND (CNS) -- A carefully orchestrated plan netted email hackers $1.75 million from a Diocese of Cleveland parish. Father Bob Stec, pastor of St. Ambrose Parish in suburban Brunswick, told parishioners in an April 27 letter distributed at weekend Masses that the theft was discovered April 17 when a construction company working on church renovations inquired why it had not received the two most recent monthly payments for the project.
Read more
NEW YORK (CNS) -- All Sri Lankans "are going through one of the saddest and most devastating periods of our history," Father Nalaka Silva told those gathered at an evening interfaith memorial service April 24 in New York for the victims and all people affected by the Easter terrorist attacks.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- When the elderly men and women at the Jeanne Jugan Residence for senior care pray the rosary with Sister Constance Veit, they see her as more than one of the caregivers at the facility.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- In introductory remarks during a conference examining the laity's role in helping the church move forward from the clergy abuse crisis, a speaker pointed out that what has happened impacts, and continues to affect, the whole church.
Read more
Washington D.C., Apr 24, 2019 CNA.- In a decision that could have potentially far-reaching consequences, the U.S. Supreme Court has said it will hear cases involving claims that sexual orientation and gender identity should be included under current federal protections barring sex discrimination.
Read more
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- In a unanimous ruling April 19, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld the long-standing requirement of the House of Representatives that it open each day it is in session with a prayer.
Read more