Hopefully with a view to establishing order, the Vatican has called together the worlds most prominent Catholic development organizations urging them to get back in touch with their “Catholic identity”. Recent support by the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace for pro-abortion initiatives like March of Women 2000 led many Catholics to question the organization’s Catholic identity. https://www.ewtn.com/vnews/getstory.asp?number=9949
Immediately following the uproar in Canada over the slamming of the Christianity of Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day, the Vatican’s top foreign-policy official, speaking to his European counterparts, has insisted that religious liberty must be seen “in its own right,” rather than “in the context of minority rights, or in denunciations of fanaticism.” Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran was speaking on Monday to the foreign ministers of the countries belonging to the Organization for European Security and Cooperation (OSCE). The archbishop decried the tendency to regard religious beliefs as secondary considerations, subordinate to other political forces. https://www.ewtn.com/vnews/getstory.asp?number=9875
Police in England are investigating the death of a baby girl following allegations that hospital staff withdrew her treatment against the wishes of her parents. The five-month-old was allowed to die says the mother since, “The doctors advised termination and said they would not operate if she was born. We were not having that. It is a life, as far as we were concerned.” She was diagnosed with a disorder similar to Down’s syndrome and was progressing well until the child was admitted to hospital with a throat infection. One day later medication was stopped as was breathing assistance. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,41955,00.html
At a recent gathering at the Vatican for lay people within the Church Harvard Law School Professor Mary Ann Glendon blasted the political phrase ‘Personally, I’m opposed to here you may fill in the blank—but I can’t impose my opinions on others.’ Glendon, the Vatican representative to the Beijing +5 UN conference, said that with this “diabolically clever little phrase . . . The wordsmiths of the culture of death … came up with one of the most insidious slogans ever invented.” She said “That slogan was the moral anesthesia they offered to people who are deeply troubled about cultural decline, but who don’t know quite how to express their views in public.” https://www.zenit.org/english/archive/0011/ZE001127.html#item2
Zenit News reports that a study in Belgium shows that more than 10% of the deaths in Belgium are due to euthanasia or drugs given by physicians to quicken death even though euthanasia is illegal in the country. https://www.ewtn.com/vnews/getstory.asp?number=9766
A study on Euthanasia and Physician-Assisted Suicide (PAS) in the Nov 15 Journal of the American Medical Association concludes: “In this survey, a small proportion of terminally ill patients seriously considered euthanasia or PAS for themselves. Over a few months, half the patients changed their minds. Patients with depressive symptoms were more likely to change their minds about desiring euthanasia or PAS.” https://jama.ama-assn.org/issues/v284n19/abs/joc01512.html
The British government is set to pump millions into providing free in vitro fertilization. https://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/health/newsid_1047000/1047726.stm
Toronto’s Globe and Mail reported this week that Ireland has classified the Levonelle-2 morning after pill as an abortifacient, prohibited by law. This was done despite pro-abortion medical practitioners who tried to claim that pregnancy begins at implantation rather than at fertilization.