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CNA Staff, May 14, 2024 / 07:48 am (CNA).

A priest in Chicago has apologized for the controversial way in which he blessed a same-sex couple in April, calling it a “very poor decision” that violated Catholic Church’s new guidelines.

In a statement dated May 8, Father Joseph Williams, the pastor of St. Vincent de Paul Parish near downtown Chicago, offered an apology in which the priest said he “regrets the language of the blessing and the use of vestments and the church itself, which he now recognizes were a violation of the norms approved by the Church.”

The priest blessed a same-sex couple in the city parish in April. In a video of the event posted to social media, Williams — wearing priestly vestments — can be seen asking the couple if they “freely recommit yourselves to love each other as holy spouses and to live in peace and harmony together forever.” The two women respond, “I do.”

Williams in the video asks God to “increase and consecrate the love” the two women have for each other, stating that the “rings that they have exchanged are the sign of their fidelity and commitment.” 

The priest had initially suggested that the Vatican’s December 2023 document Fiducia Supplicans allows the type of blessing he administered in April. That document said that Catholic priests can bless same-sex couples as an expression of pastoral closeness without condoning their sexual relations and without making the blessing seem like a wedding. 

The way in which he conducted the blessing “came about due to my attempt to provide for them a meaningful moment of God’s grace,” the pastor said in the statement.

“I wanted to do it well,” he said. “A week or so after the fact, I viewed the video. I immediately realized that I had made a very poor decision in the words and visuals captured on the video.”

The controversy “has been a valuable learning experience” for the priest, the statement said. 

“I am deeply sorry for any confusion and/or anger that this has caused, particularly for the people of God,” Williams said. 

The statement was issued by the Congregation of the Mission, also called the Vincentians, who administer the downtown Chicago parish. 

The Archdiocese of Chicago did not immediately respond to an emailed query on Tuesday morning.

Fiducia Supplicans generated global controversy after it was announced on Dec. 18, with bishops around the world either declaring their support for it or stating their intention not to implement it. 

The Vatican declaration, which also applies to Catholics civilly remarried without having received an annulment as well as to couples in other “irregular situations,” underscored that such blessings cannot be offered in a way that would cause any confusion about the nature of marriage.

“The Church’s doctrine on this point remains firm,” the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith said when the document was released.

Bishop Robert Pipta of the Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Parma, Ohio, celebrates a Divine Liturgy on Saturday, May 11, 2024, at the Byzantine chapel at Wyoming Catholic College, on the occasion of the installation and blessing of the new shrine. / Credit: Julian Kwasniewski/Wyoming Catholic College

Ann Arbor, Michigan, May 14, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).

Bishop Robert Pipta of the Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Parma, Ohio, dedicated a shrine and an icon on Saturday, May 11, at Wyoming Catholic College directed to prayer specifically for persecuted Christians. 

In a response to CNA, Pipta wrote of the event: “To be reminded that the Theotokos continues her motherly care for persecuted Christians throughout the world is of great value to the Catholic faithful in our communities.”

Pipta celebrated a Divine Liturgy in the Byzantine chapel at the college and was accompanied by its chaplain, Father David Anderson; Father Benedict Kiely; students; and faculty. 

Pipta blessed the chapel and an icon of the Virgin Mary of Persecuted Christians, which was painted by Syrian Melkite Greek Catholic Sister Souraya of the Basilian order, who resides in Lebanon. The icon is inscribed “Mother of the Persecuted” in Aramaic, the language spoken by Jesus. This is the fifth such chapel in the world, with a sixth to be dedicated next year in Spokane, Washington, at the request of Bishop Thomas Daly.

In an interview with CNA, Kiely said there are two reasons why Christians should take note of the dedication of the chapel and icon.

“The first and most important is that St. Paul, when he was Saul, was on the way to Damascus, he was knocked from his horse by Jesus,” he said. “To Saul’s question came Jesus’ answer, which should be one of the most important things in a Christian’s life. It was when Saul asked, ‘Who are you Lord?’ Jesus said, ‘I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.’ He didn’t say ‘You are persecuting my church.’ He said, ‘You are persecuting me.’ Anywhere in the world where a Christian is persecuted, it is Christ himself being persecuted. If that isn’t a priority in the so-called free West, then we have a problem.”

Kiely, 60, is a native of England and a priest of the Anglican Ordinariate who founded Nasarean.org, a charity based in Vermont that seeks to provide support to persecuted Christians.

With funds provided by the charity, Kiely said that Christians living in Iraq, for example, have been given the means to start small businesses to support their families. According to Kiely, the shrines are intended to assure persecuted Christians that their co-religionists in the West do care about them. The shrines, he said, offer opportunities to pray for the deliverance of Christians and encourage giving aid.

“As Christians, we believe that prayer is not the last resort but the first resort. I’ve been to Syria, Iraq, and elsewhere nine times in recent years. The very first thing that people ask me to do is pray for them and ask Christians to pray for them. They don’t ask first for aid but for prayer. A place specifically dedicated to pray for them is responding to those two things: that it is Jesus who is being persecuted and that they have asked for prayer,” Kiely told CNA.

In December 2023, on the feast of St. Stephen Protomartyr — the first martyr recorded in the Acts of the Apostles — Pope Francis observed: “Today, 2,000 years later, unfortunately we see that the persecution continues.”

Kiely said in the interview: “If enough people were praying for persecuted Christians, they might find freedom and peace.” In the past, Kiely has suggested that the current synodal process has not sufficiently focused on the issue. 

According to the Open Doors World Watch List, 317 million Christians face persecution and discrimination. One in seven Christians are persecuted worldwide, one in five Christians are persecuted in Africa, while two out of five Christians are persecuted in Asia, according to the group. Apart from the Middle East, which has been ravaged by war and groups such as ISIS, countries such as Pakistan, Nigeria, and China are of special concern.

“I only install an icon in a diocese where the bishop will bless it,” Kiely said. This is to signal the importance of prayers for the persecuted. The installation of the icon at Wyoming Catholic College was forwarded by Anderson, a Ukrainian Greek Catholic priest at the college, and approved by Pipta.

“This is the first dedication of the icon in a college, and it is especially important because young people, the students, will pray for the persecuted,” Kiely said.

The first shrine of the Blessed Mother dedicated in 2017 to persecuted Christians was at St. Michael Parish in New York City. This was followed by another shrine in London and in Worcester, Massachusetts. The most recent installation was at a Syriac Catholic parish in Stockholm. The dedication in Massachusetts was accompanied by the world premiere of the “Mass for Persecuted Christians” by Catholic composer Paul Jernberg.

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CNA Staff, May 14, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

Recent data from the federally administered National Survey of Family Growth shows large majorities of Catholics report using at least one form of artificial contraception — with over 90% having used condoms and more than 60% having used the hormonal birth control pill. 

Experts say this is “a crisis of catechesis within the Church” and one that requires both a compassionate response and a firm application of Catholic sexual ethics. 

The Catholic Church for centuries has taught that all forms of artificial birth control are illicit and forbidden to married couples. This teaching was formalized in 1968 by St. Paul VI, who in his encyclical Humanae Vitae declared that “any action … specifically intended to prevent procreation” was “absolutely excluded” as a lawful means of regulating the number of children in a Catholic marriage. 

Though Church teaching on the matter continues to be unambiguous, large numbers of Catholics have reported high usages of artificial contraception over the years. A 2011 Guttmacher study, for instance, found that “​​among women who are currently at risk of unintended pregnancy,” fully 87% of Catholics “use a method other than natural family planning.”

John Grabowski, a professor of moral theology and ethics at the Catholic University of America, told CNA that the data around Catholic contraception usage have been “known for some time.”  

“I think that this points to a crisis of catechesis within the Church,” he said. “Whatever we are currently doing to form people in the faith is not working well because this data shows that they are being catechized by the gospel of the sexual revolution rather than the Gospel proclaimed by the Church.”

Grabowski argued that Catholics who use artificial contraception “don’t realize that in choosing to contracept they are bringing something toxic into their marriages.” 

“In some cases, the contraceptives they use are physically toxic such as oral contraception, which has a whole range of negative health effects [both] physically and psychologically on women,” he said. 

“In some cases they are actually not genuinely contraceptive but actually work as abortifacients (such as some versions of the IUD),” he continued. 

“In almost every case, fertility is treated as a disease rather than a gift and a healthy function of the human body.”

The “gift” of one’s fertility has long been a part of Catholic sexual ethics; in Humanae Vitae St. Paul VI stressed the need to “experience the gift of married love while respecting the laws of conception.”

The “sexual faculties,” the pope wrote, are “concerned by their very nature with the generation of life, of which God is the source.”

Instead of artificial contraception, the Church promotes natural family planning (NFP) for both avoiding and achieving pregnancy. NFP methods, which are all based on the natural signs and symptoms of the fertile and infertile phases of a woman’s menstrual cycle, can include the use of fertility monitoring devices and apps. NFP respects both the unitive and procreative meaning of sex within marriage.

Gregory Popcak, the founder of the Pastoral Solutions Institute, which helps Catholics align their marriages and their lives with the Catholic faith, told CNA that there “isn’t a lot of quality research on NFP.” 

“According to the available data, the NFP usage rate among Catholics tends to be fairly consistently about 2%-3%,” he said.  

“That said, I believe there may be a small bounce in NFP usage because of the use of sophisticated apps that make NFP easier and (potentially) more effective to use,” he noted. 

Popcak argued that the Church’s teachings on birth control were “more front-and-center” under prior popes but that it has gone “largely silent” under Pope Francis. 

He argued that marriage advocates and Church leaders need to “recenter the conversation about NFP and stop making it about whether people are following the rules or not.” 

“That is the most superficial way we can have the conversation,” he said. “We have to proclaim the notion that marriage, along with all the other sacraments, is meant to be an instrument of healing. Matrimony is key to God’s plan for healing the generative nature of the human person.”

“We particularly don’t know — on our own — how to love another person the way God wants us to,” he said. “Matrimony exists to heal the damage sin does to our ability to love rightly — especially through our bodies.”

Birth control has ‘a long history’

Theresa Notare, the assistant director for the Natural Family Planning Program at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Secretariat for Laity, Marriage, Family Life, and Youth, acknowledged that contraception itself is nothing new. 

“The whole idea of birth control, of family planning, has a long history of tapping into what people think is good, what they think they need and want, not only for themselves but for their children,” she said. 

Notare pointed out that contraception has been practiced on a wide scale for centuries and for a variety of reasons. In many cases it was driven by the belief that parents “should be able to take care of the children they have” and not overtax potentially scarce family resources. 

The Church has regularly acknowledged the potential necessity of delaying childbearing for such reasons. St. John Paul II said in 1992 that husbands and wives are “deeply affected by social and economic circumstances” and that “conditions of poverty” can “cause a couple to be unprepared for the gift of new life.”

Though Church teaching has for years allowed for NFP in such cases, Notare said that our current technological zeitgeist has created “an impatience for anything that takes slow change.” 

Periodic abstinence as dictated by NFP “means you have to change your sexual behavior; that takes discipline,” she said. 

“People in the West, especially Americans, we just hate that sort of thing,” she said. “Why bother when you could pop a pill, open up a package, use a device?”

Notare argued that the laity “have not generally heard the Church’s good message on sex.” 

“For years they heard ‘guilt’ and didn’t hear the positive side of teachings,” she said. Once Humanae Vitae was promulgated, meanwhile, “too many priests had stopped speaking on the birth control issue.” 

“In that void, the culture imposed itself,” she said. “The majority of Catholics, at this point in time, are victims of the culture. They don’t know it. They’re absolutely ignorant of it.”

What can the Church do? 

Church leaders and lay advocates have for years been working to counteract the huge Catholic uptake in contraception. The U.S. bishops promote natural family planning through a variety of means, for instance, such as its directory of NFP instructors, while groups like the Couple to Couple League offer classes and resources for engaged and married couples. 

Grabowski said the Church needs to use its evangelization resources to better educate Catholics on Catholic sexual ethics. 

“As the Church in the U.S. is trying to better form people in the Catholic belief of Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist in this Eucharistic revival, we need a similar kind of effort to better form people in a Catholic vision of the human person and sexuality,” he said.

Notare suggested that the faithful should look to Humanae Vitae as a good start. “The language is easy. It’s so beautifully laid out, talking about the nature of married love and the gift of procreation,” she said. “I would encourage people to read that. It’s very clear.”

Popcak, meanwhile, acknowledged “the real challenges that NFP brings out in a relationship.”

The Church “needs to be providing actual pastoral support and guidance for couples” who are using it, he said. 

“We need to help couples understand that the challenges that NFP forces to the surface are the very problems that God is asking them to work through so that they can have healthier, happier, and holier relationships,” he said. 

Catholic couples who struggle with NFP and aren’t assisted by their spiritual leaders can often just give up on the practice altogether, he said, leading to widespread claims that natural family planning simply doesn’t work. 

“Frankly, that’s always been the case, but it’s particularly true now,” Popcak said. “Catholic couples deserve better.”

Pope Francis meets with members of the Syro-Malabar Church on May 13, 2024, at the Vatican. / Credit: Vatican Media

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 13, 2024 / 16:53 pm (CNA).

In a meeting with Major Archbishop Raphael Thattil and members of the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church at the Vatican on Monday, Pope Francis urged unity and obedience amid a long-simmering liturgical conflict that continues to rock the Eastern church.

As some fear an imminent schism in the ancient Eastern-rite church, the pope stressed the importance of unity, saying: “Apart from Peter, apart from the major archbishop, there is no Church.”  

He urged the faithful present at the Vatican’s Consistory Hall to “press forward” in obedience to the Church, saying: “You are obedient, and where obedience is present, there is the Church. Where there is disobedience, there is schism.”

What is going on in the Syro-Malabar Church?

The Syro-Malabar Church is an Eastern Catholic rite in full communion with the Roman Catholic Church. Members of the rite are often referred to as “St. Thomas Christians,” as its origins are believed to date back to the missionary preaching of St. Thomas the Apostle.

Today there are more than 5 million Syro-Malabar Catholics across the world in dioceses — or eparchies, as they are called — in India, the U.S., the U.K., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the Middle East. 

For decades Catholics in the rite have been bitterly divided over whether priests should face the altar (“ad orientem”) or toward the people (“versus populum”) during the celebration of the Mass, which Syro-Malabar Catholics call “the Holy Qurbana.” 

In 1999 the Synod of Bishops of the Syro-Malabar Archiepiscopal Church attempted to resolve the conflict by decreeing that all priests in the rite should uniformly face the people during the Liturgy of the Word and then face the altar during the Liturgy of the Eucharist. 

This decree did not end the dispute, however, as several dioceses have continued refusing to implement the change, preferring to celebrate Mass facing the people.

Finally, the pope himself got involved when he set a hard deadline on eparchies to implement the decree by Christmas Day 2023. 

Reportedly, most of the parishes in the rite complied with the pope’s deadline, but protests, Mass disruptions, and tensions persist.

Controversy over that question resulted in violence, caused hundreds of Syro-Malabar priests to defy their bishops, and led to fears of a new schism.

Pope addresses controversy 

The pope condemned the division emphatically on Monday, saying that such arguments over the Mass are “incompatible with the Christian faith” and show a “grave lack of respect for the Blessed Sacrament.” 

He called the rampant division within the rite the work of “the devil, the divider,” who he said “creeps in and thwarts the most heartfelt desire that the Lord expressed before dying for us: that we, his disciples, be ‘one,’ without division and without breaking communion.”

“The guiding criterion, the truly spiritual one that derives from the Holy Spirit, is communion: This requires us to do a self-examination of our dedication to unity and our faithful, humble, respectful, and obedient care for the gifts we have received,” he said.

Francis called on Thattil and other bishops and priests in the rite to foster discussion with dissenting forces, saying that “guarding unity is not a pious exhortation but a duty.”

“Let us meet and discuss without fear, that is fine, but above all, let us pray, so that the light of the Spirit, which reconciles differences and brings tensions back into unity, may resolve disputes,” he said, adding that the “dangerous temptation to focus on one detail, and an unwillingness to let it go, even to the detriment of the good of the Church … stems from a self-referentiality, which leads to listening to no other way of thinking but one’s own.”

In the same vein, he condemned previous efforts by “some members of the faith” to Westernize — or Latinize — the Syro-Malabar Church, which he called one of the “indispensable treasures in the life of the Church.” 

“The Christian East allows us to draw from ancient and ever-new sources of spirituality; these become fresh springs that bring vitality to the Church,” he said, urging Syro-Malabar Christians to retain their self-identity as a “sui iuris” — self-autonomous — rite, “so that your great liturgical, theological, spiritual, and cultural heritage may shine ever more brightly.” 

The pope also announced that he is officially granting the rite jurisdiction over Syro-Malabar immigrant Christians living in the Middle East.  

“I wish to help you, not supersede you,” the pope said before going on to add that “because the nature of your Church sui iuris empowers you not only to examine carefully the situations and challenges that you face but also to take appropriate steps to address them, with responsibility and evangelical courage.” 

Candlelight procession at Fátima, Portugal on May 12, 2024. / Credit: Screenshot/EWTN

ACI Digital, May 13, 2024 / 16:18 pm (CNA).

During the May 13 Mass that he offered on the feast day of Our Lady of Fátima at the shrine dedicated to her in Portugal, Cardinal Juan José Omella said the Virgin Mary asks of us today the same that she asked of the three visionaries 107 years ago, in 1917. 

The prelate is archbishop of Barcelona and former president of the Spanish Bishops’ Conference.

“What does Mary tell us today? The same thing she says in the Gospel, the same thing — prayer and sacrifice — she said to the little shepherds Francisco and Jacinta, 107 years ago, here in the Cova de Iría,” the cardinal said.

The archbishop also stressed that as Christians we must not lose “the virtue of prayer, of heart-to-heart dialogue with the Lord, personally and communally,” offering prayers such as the rosary and the Lord’s Prayer, “praying for the world, for the salvation of us all.”

“The second thing that Our Lady has asked of us and asks us today is to pray for peace” in a world racked by war in places like “Ukraine, Russia, the Holy Land, Africa, the Americas, Asia. How many countries need and appeal for peace!”

Omella also prayed for unity and fraternity in the Church because “a Church divided, some against others, is not close to the pope, to Jesus Christ, to all brothers. If we are not united, we will not be able to help and forgive each other, we will not evangelize.”

The archbishop of Barcelona noted on X on May 13 that “about 100,000 people are gathered today on the esplanade of this shrine” and that “a similar number of Ukrainian and Russian brothers have lost their lives because of the war. We pray for peace in Ukraine and for all the deceased so that, their sins forgiven, they may attain the glory of life in heaven with God and their brothers.”

“Happy feast day of the Virgin of Fátima!” he concluded. 

Attendance at the shrine 

According to the Fátima Shrine, on the evening of Sunday, May 12, about 250,000 pilgrims participated in the prayers and the traditional candlelight procession.

There were 186 groups of international pilgrims from 34 countries.

The rector of the Fátima Shrine, Father Carlos Cabecinhas, said at a May 12 press conference that there was an increase of 26.5% in pilgrims compared with 2023. In the first four months of the year, a total of 1,023,680 pilgrims participated in 304 events at the Cova da Iría.

Besides Portugal, the 10 countries from which the largest number of pilgrims came were Spain, Poland, Italy, the United States, Brazil, South Korea, the Philippines, Mexico, Croatia, and Ukraine.

This story was first published by ACI Digital, CNA’s Portuguese-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by ACI Prensa and CNA.

Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. visits “Fox & Friends” at Fox News Channel Studios on April 2, 2024, in New York City. / Credit: Roy Rochlin/Getty Images

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 13, 2024 / 15:31 pm (CNA).

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is walking back his recent statement of support for “full-term abortion” on demand and conceding to some restrictions on abortion once a fetus reaches viability, which occurs around 23 to 24 weeks of pregnancy.

The Catholic Democrat-turned-independent embraced the legality of on-demand “full-term abortion” in an appearance on “The Sage Steele Show” last Wednesday. The candidate told Steele — who is a Catholic — that abortion should be legal “even if it’s full term.” He said that he does not think “it’s ever OK” to abort a full-term child but that “nobody sets out to do that and there are always some kind of extenuating circumstances that would make a mother make that kind of choice.” 

After facing backlash from numerous pro-life organizations and eliciting confusion within his own campaign, Kennedy walked back that position. 

In a post on X late Friday night — just two days after his comments — Kennedy said he “would allow appropriate restrictions on abortion in the final months of pregnancy” and highlighted that even the now-defunct Roe v. Wade ruling allowed for such rules.

“Abortion has been a notoriously divisive issue in America, but actually I see an emerging consensus — abortion should be legal up until a certain number of weeks and restricted thereafter,” Kennedy said.

The presidential candidate wrote in his post that he trusts “women’s maternal instincts” and said he is “leery of inserting the government into abortion” because of instances such as the unborn child having “some fatal condition that ensures it will survive just hours or days after birth in intense suffering.” In those situations, he asked, “can we, should we, legislate such painful decisions and take them away from the mother?” 

“I had been assuming that virtually all late-term abortions were such cases, but I’ve learned that my assumption was wrong,” Kennedy continued. “Sometimes, women abort healthy, viable late-term fetuses. These cases of purely ‘elective’ late-term abortion are very upsetting. Once the baby is viable outside the womb, it should have rights and it deserves society’s protection.” 

Kennedy said in his statement that he “learned this because I was willing to listen — to my family, advisers, supporters, and others who shared their perspectives” and added that he promised to “continue to listen and incorporate what I learn into my decisions.”

The presidential hopeful added that he supports “the emerging consensus that abortion should be unrestricted up until a certain point” and that he believes “that point should be when the baby is viable outside the womb.”

Kennedy then referred back to previous statements he has made on abortion, claiming that “the biggest reason [women obtain abortions] according to studies is affordability.” He plugged his “More Choices, More Life” abortion reduction plan, which would seek to address affordability with government-subsidized child care so “abortion isn’t their only choice.”

In a statement to CNA last week, a Kennedy spokesperson said that the independent candidate also supports legislation to codify the abortion standards set in Roe v. Wade. This would make abortion legal nationwide and prevent states from implementing legal protections for unborn life in earlier stages of pregnancy. In an interview with EWTN last month, Kennedy said he opposes states being allowed to control their own abortion policies.

Pro-life groups react to Kennedy’s policy change

Following Kennedy’s shift on full-term abortion, Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, told CNA that Kennedy “has taken a variety of positions on abortion throughout his campaign.” 

“Most late-term abortions in the U.S. involve healthy moms and healthy babies, as even the abortion industry admits,” Dannenfelser added. “We’re one of only eight countries, alongside China and Vietnam, that allow abortion on demand with no national protections for unborn babies at any point in pregnancy.”

However, Dannenfelser said, “even Kennedy’s latest shift of no protections until a baby can survive outside the womb — well past the point when the child can feel pain — still leaves America as a global human rights outlier.” She encouraged legal protections for unborn children at the federal level at 15 weeks of pregnancy. 

National Right to Life President Carol Tobias told CNA that it appears Kennedy realized the unpopularity of on-demand abortion up until the point of birth.

“Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said the abortion decision should be up to the woman, even if that meant an abortion at any time up to birth,” Tobias said.

“He, obviously, received so much pushback that he again changed [his] position, moving it back to sometime around viability,” Tobias added. “Kennedy realized that the American public at large does not accept abortion for any reason throughout pregnancy. [President] Joe Biden is now the only candidate supporting that radical position.”

How Kennedy compares with Biden and Trump

Biden has backed efforts to codify the abortion standards previously held in Roe v. Wade. The language of the text would legalize abortion nationwide until the point of viability — however, it would not set a clear week-based limit but instead allow the unborn child’s viability to be determined by the woman’s treating physician, who may be the abortionist.

Kennedy did not say whether he would support a specific week-based limit to prevent late-term abortions or whether he would support the same language. 

Biden also supports repealing budget language that prevents federal agencies from directly funding abortion.

Former President Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, said in April that he would not sign a national abortion ban if Congress sent one to him. Rather, he supports states making their own laws regarding abortion. 

“Many states will be different,” Trump said in April. “Many will have a different number of weeks, or some will have more conservative [policies] than others, and that’s what they will be.”

After the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, more than 20 states passed pro-life laws that imposed stricter limits on abortion than were permitted under the now-defunct ruling.

Pope Francis opens the Holy Doors at St. Peter's Basilica to begin the Year of Mercy, Dec. 8, 2015. / Credit: L'Osservatore Romano

Rome Newsroom, May 13, 2024 / 14:43 pm (CNA).

The Vatican issued a decree on Monday outlining the many ways that Catholics can obtain a plenary indulgence during the 2025 Jubilee Year.

The decree signed on May 13 by Cardinal Angelo De Donatis, the new head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, provides Catholics with the opportunity to gain indulgences by making pilgrimages, prayerful visits to specific churches, or by practicing works of mercy during the holy year.

A plenary indulgence is a grace granted by the Catholic Church through the merits of Jesus Christ to remove the temporal punishment due to sin.

The indulgence applies to sins already forgiven. A plenary indulgence cleanses the soul as if the person had just been baptized. Plenary indulgences obtained during the Jubilee Year can also be applied to souls in purgatory with the possibility of obtaining two plenary indulgences for the deceased in one day, according to the Apostolic Penitentiary.

To obtain an indulgence, the usual conditions of detachment from all sin, sacramental confession, holy Communion, and prayer for the intentions of the pope must be met. (See end of article for more on this.)

Here are some of the many ways one can obtain indulgences during the 2025 Jubilee Year:

Make a pilgrimage to Rome

Catholics who make a pilgrimage to Rome during the 2025 Jubilee Year can obtain a plenary indulgence by visiting at least one of the four major papal basilicas: St. Peter’s Basilica, the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran, St. Mary Major, or St. Paul Outside the Walls.

In addition, an indulgence can be obtained by spending time in prayer in several other churches in Rome:

• Rome’s Basilica of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem  

• Basilica of St. Lawrence Outside the Walls

• Basilica of St. Sebastian

• Sanctuary of Divine Love (the “Divino Amore”)

• Church of the Holy Spirit in Sassia

• Church of St. Paul at Tre Fontane (the site of St. Paul’s martyrdom)

• The Roman Catacombs 

The Apostolic Penitentiary also grants a plenary indulgences specifically for making pilgrimage to churches in Rome connected to great female saints: 

• Basilica of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva (tomb of St. Catherine of Siena)

• St. Brigid at Campo de’ Fiori (St. Brigid of Sweden)

• Santa Maria della Vittoria (St. Teresa of Ávila)

• Trinità dei Monti (St. Thérèse of Liseux)

• Basilica of St. Cecilia in Trastevere (St. Cecilia)

• Basilica of Sant’Augustino in Campo Marzio (St. Monica)

Perform works of mercy

The jubilee year is a time when Catholics are especially encouraged to practice the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. The Apostolic Penitentiary lists visiting prisoners, spending time with lonely elderly people, aiding the sick or disabled, and helping those who are in need as instances to obtain an indulgence. Practicing the works of mercy, it says, is “in a sense making a pilgrimage to Christ present in them.”

Indulgences for works of mercy can be received multiple times throughout the jubilee year, even daily, according to the decree. 

If the indulgence is being applied to the deceased, two plenary indulgences can be obtained on the same day. 

The decree says: “Despite the rule that only one plenary indulgence can be obtained per day, the faithful who have carried out an act of charity on behalf of the souls in purgatory, if they receive holy Communion a second time that day, can obtain the plenary indulgence twice on the same day, applicable only to the deceased.”

Fast from social media, defend life, volunteer

Acts of penance can also obtain a plenary indulgence. The Vatican lists several options, including:

• Abstaining for at least one day a week from “futile distractions,” such as social media or television

• Fasting

• Donating “a proportionate sum of money to the poor”

• Supporting religious or social works, especially in the defense of life in all phases

• Offering support to migrants, the elderly, the poor, young people in difficulty, and abandoned children 

• Volunteering in service to your community

“The jubilee plenary indulgence can also be obtained through initiatives that put into practice, in a concrete and generous way, the spirit of penance which is, in a sense, the soul of the jubilee,” the decree states.

Visit your local cathedral

Catholics can also gain a plenary indulgence by making a pious pilgrimage to their cathedral or to another church or shrine selected by the local bishop.

The Apostolic Penitentiary asks bishops to “take into account the needs of the faithful as well as the opportunity to reinforce the concept of pilgrimage with all its symbolic significance, so as to manifest the great need for conversion and reconciliation.”

Vatican II formation

The Vatican decree also says that Catholics can get a jubilee indulgence “if with a devout spirit, they participate in popular missions, spiritual exercises, or formation activities on the documents of the Second Vatican Council and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, held in a church or other suitable place, according to the mind of the Holy Father.”

Pray in these basilicas

In addition to the churches already listed, other sacred places around the world have also been designated as places of pilgrimage where one can obtain a plenary indulgence:

In Italy:

• Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi

• Basilica of Our Lady of the Angels in Assisi

• Basilica of Our Lady of Loreto

• Basilica of Our Lady of Pompeii

• Basilica in St. Anthony in Padua

In the Holy Land:

• Basilica of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem

• Basilica of the Nativity in Bethlehem

• Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth

The decree further indicates that “any minor basilica, cathedral church, co-cathedral church, Marian sanctuary, any distinguished collegiate church or sanctuary designated by the diocesan bishop or Eparchy for the benefit of the faithful” can be designated. Bishops’ conferences can also indicate national or international sanctuaries as sacred sites for a jubilee indulgence.

Conditions in all cases

In order to obtain any of the plenary indulgences listed above, the following conditions must be fulfilled:

1. Detachment from all sin, even venial.

2. Sacramental confession, holy Communion, and prayer for the intentions of the pope. These three conditions can be fulfilled a few days before or after performing the works to gain the indulgence, but it is appropriate that Communion and the prayer take place on the same day that the work is completed.

A single sacramental confession is sufficient for several plenary indulgences, but frequent sacramental confession is encouraged in order to obtain the grace of deeper conversion and purity of heart.

For each plenary indulgence that is sought, however, a separate holy Communion and a separate prayer for the intentions of the Holy Father are required.

The prayer for the intentions of the Holy Father is left up to the choice of the individual, but an Our Father and Hail Mary are suggested.

Monument of the Guardian Angel of Portugal apparition to the three little shepherd children of Fatima. / Daniel Ibanez / CNA.

National Catholic Register, May 13, 2024 / 14:09 pm (CNA).

May 13 is the optional memorial of Our Lady of Fátima, arguably the most prominent approved apparition of the 20th century. It became famous the world over, particularly for its three-part “secret.”

Here are nine things to know about this Marian apparition.

1) What happened at Fátima, Portugal?

A young shepherd girl, Lucia dos Santos, said she experienced supernatural visitations as early as 1915, two years before the famous appearances of Our Lady of Fátima.

In 1917, she and two of her cousins, Francisco and Jacinta Marto, were working as shepherds tending their families’ flocks. On May 13, 1917, the three children saw an apparition of a lady from heaven. She told them, among other things, that she would return once a month for six months.

At her third appearance, on July 13, Lucia was shown the secret of Fátima. She reportedly turned pale and cried out with fear, calling Our Lady by name. There was a thunderclap, and the vision ended.

The children again saw the Virgin on Sept. 13.

In the sixth and final appearance, on Oct. 13, a dramatic outward sign was given to those gathered to witness the event. After the clouds of a rainstorm parted, numerous witnesses — some as far as 40 miles away — reported seeing the sun dance, spin, and send out colored rays of light.

2) What happened after the main apparitions?

As World War I raged across Europe, an epidemic of Spanish flu swept the globe. It erupted in America and was spread by soldiers being sent to distant lands. This epidemic killed an estimated 20 million people.

Among them were Francisco and Jacinta, who contracted the illness in 1918 and died in 1919 and 1920, respectively. Lucia entered the convent.

On June 13, 1929, at the convent chapel in Tuy, Spain, Lucia had another mystical experience in which she saw the Trinity and the Blessed Virgin. Mary told her:

“The moment has come in which God asks the Holy Father in union with all the bishops of the world to make the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means” (S. Zimdars-Schwartz, “Encountering Mary,” 197).

On Oct. 13, 1930, the bishop of Leiria (now Leiria-Fátima) proclaimed the apparitions at Fátima authentic and worthy of assent.

3) How was the “secret” of Fátima written down?

Between 1935 and 1941, on the orders of her superiors, Sister Lucia wrote four memoirs of the Fátima events. In the third of these, she recorded the first two parts of the secret, explaining that there was a third part she was not yet permitted by heaven to reveal. 

In the “Fourth Memoir,” she added a sentence to the end of the second part of the secret:

“In Portugal, the dogma of the faith will always be preserved, etc.”

This sentence has been the basis for much speculation that the third part of the secret concerned a great apostasy. 

Sister Lucia also noted that in writing the secret in the “Fourth Memoir”:

“With the exception of that part of the secret which I am not permitted to reveal at present, I shall say everything. I shall not knowingly omit anything, though I suppose I may forget just a few small details of minor importance.”

Upon the publication of the “Third and Fourth Memoirs,” the world became aware of the secret of Fátima and its three parts, including Our Lady’s request that Russia be consecrated (entrusted) to her Immaculate Heart by the pope and the bishops of the world.

On Oct. 31, 1942, Pius XII consecrated not only Russia but also the whole world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. What was missing, though, was the involvement of the world’s bishops.

In 1943, the bishop of Leiria ordered Sister Lucia to put the third secret of Fátima in writing. She did not feel at liberty to do so until 1944. It was then placed in a wax-sealed envelope on which Sister Lucia wrote that it should not be opened until 1960.

4) What happened to the “third secret” afterward?

The secret remained with the bishop of Leiria until 1957, when it was requested (along with photocopies of Sister Lucia’s other writings) by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. According to Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone the secret was read by both Pope John XXIII and Pope Paul VI (see “The Message of Fátima” [MF], “Introduction”).

“John Paul II, for his part, asked for the envelope containing the third part of the ‘secret’ following the assassination attempt on 13 May 1981” (ibid.).

He read it sometime between July 18 and Aug. 11.

It is significant that John Paul II did not read the secret until after the assassination attempt was made on his life. He notes in “Crossing the Threshold of Hope” (1994):

“And thus we come to May 13, 1981, when I was wounded by gunshots fired in St. Peter’s Square. At first, I did not pay attention to the fact that the assassination attempt had occurred on the exact anniversary of the day Mary appeared to the three children at Fátima in Portugal and spoke to them the words that now, at the end of this century, seem to be close to their fulfillment” (221).

After reading the secret, the Holy Father realized the connection between the assassination attempt and Fátima. He has since consistently attributed his survival of the gunshot wound to the intercession of Our Lady of Fátima.

“It was a mother’s hand that guided the bullet’s path,” he said, “and in his throes the pope halted at the threshold of death” (“Meditation from the Policlinico Gemelli to the Italian Bishops,” May 13, 1994).

5) Did John Paul II consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary?

As had Pius XII, John Paul II decided to consecrate not only Russia but also the entire world to her Immaculate Heart. After he read the third part of the secret, he decided to journey to Fátima on May 13, 1982, and there performed the Act of Entrustment.

This act, however, did not appear to satisfy the requested consecration, and so, “on 25 March 1984 in St. Peter’s Square, while recalling the fiat uttered by Mary at the Annunciation, the Holy Father, in spiritual union with the bishops of the world, who had been ‘convoked’ beforehand, entrusted all men and women and all peoples to the Immaculate Heart of Mary” (Bertone, MF).

“Sister Lucia personally confirmed that this solemn and universal act of consecration corresponded to what Our Lady wished (‘Yes it has been done just as Our Lady asked, on 25 March 1984’: Letter of 8 November 1989). Hence any further discussion or request is without basis” (Bertone, MF).

6) Is Fátima related to the fall of Russian communism?

After it became public that there was a secret of Fátima and that it mentioned Russia, many pondered Fátima in the light of Russian communism.

1917 was a year of turmoil for Russia. Besides fighting in World War I, the country experienced two civil wars known as the February Revolution and the October Revolution. The former led to the creation of a provisional government that proved unstable. On Oct. 24–25, less than two weeks after the final appearance of Our Lady of Fátima, the second revolution resulted in the creation of the Soviet government.

In the ensuing years, Russia expanded its sphere of influence, exporting communist ideology and revolution to other lands and martyring Christians wherever it spread. Once Pope John Paul II’s 1984 consecration took place, first the Soviet bloc and then the USSR itself crumbled from a variety of social, political, and economic factors.

As the pope himself noted:

“And what are we to say of the three children from Fatima who suddenly, on the eve of the outbreak of the October Revolution, heard: ‘Russia will convert’ and ‘In the end, my [Immaculate] Heart will triumph’ ... ? They could not have invented those predictions. They did not know enough about history or geography, much less the social movements and ideological developments. And nevertheless it happened just as they had said” (CTH, 131; emphasis in original).

Though he did not reveal the third part of the secret until the year 2000, six years earlier John Paul II hinted at its contents. Immediately after he meditated on the fall of communism in connection with Fátima, he went on to write:

“Perhaps this is also why the pope was called from a ‘faraway country,’ perhaps this is why it was necessary for the assassination attempt to be made in St. Peter’s Square precisely on May 13, 1981, the anniversary of the first apparition at Fátima — so that all could become more transparent and comprehensible, so that the voice of God which speaks in human history through the ‘signs of the times’ could be more easily heard and understood” (CHT, 131-132).

By the year 2000, the Holy Father felt able to reveal the final part of Fátima’s secret, since “the events to which the third part of the ‘secret’ of Fátima refers now seem part of the past” (Sodano, MF, “Announcement”).

The pontiff selected the beatification of Francisco and Jacinta on May 13, 2000, in Portugal as the occasion to announce this fact.

7) What is the essence of Fátima’s three-part “secret?”

Then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI), prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, pointed out that the key to the apparition of Fátima is its call to repentance and conversion (MF, “Theological Commentary”).

All three parts of the secret serve to motivate the individual to repentance, and they do so in a dramatic way.

8) What is the first part of the secret?

The first part of the secret — the vision of hell — is the most important, for it reveals to individuals the tragic consequences of failure to repent and what awaits them in the invisible world if they are not converted.

9) What is the second part of the secret?

In the second part, Mary says:

“You have seen hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart.”

Ratzinger explains:

“According to Matthew 5:8, the ‘immaculate heart’ [of Mary] is a heart which, with God’s grace, has come to perfect interior unity and therefore ‘sees God.’ To be ‘devoted’ to the Immaculate Heart of Mary means therefore to embrace this attitude of heart, which makes the fiat — ‘your will be done’ — the defining center of one’s whole life. It might be objected that we should not place a human being between ourselves and Christ. But then we remember that Paul did not hesitate to say to his communities: ‘imitate me’ (1 Corinthians 4:16; Philippians 3:17; 1 Thessalonians 1:6; 2 Thessalonians 3:7, 9)” (op. cit.).

After explaining the vision of hell, Mary spoke of a war that “will break out during the pontificate of Pius XI.”

This latter war, of course, was World War II, which Sister Lucia reckoned as having been occasioned by the annexation of Austria by Germany during the reign of Pius XI (J. de Marchi, “Temoignages sur les apparitions de Fatima,” 346).

Our Lady also mentioned that this would happen after a night of the “unknown light.” Sister Lucia understood this to refer to Jan. 25, 1938, when Europe was witness to a spectacular nighttime display of light in the sky. In her third memoir she wrote:

“Your Excellency is not unaware that, a few years ago, God manifested that sign, which astronomers chose to call an aurora borealis. ... God made use of this to make me understand that his justice was about to strike the guilty nations.”

Our Lady added:

“If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred; the Holy Father will have much to suffer; various nations will be annihilated. In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me, and she shall be converted, and a period of peace will be granted to the world.”

Much has been made of the statement “Russia will be converted.”

Many people have assumed this meant the Russian people as a whole would become Catholic. But the language of the text does not require this.

The Portuguese word “converterá” doesn’t necessarily mean converted to the Catholic faith. It can mean simply that Russia will stop its warlike behavior, and thus “there will be peace.”

This interpretation seems to be the one understood by John Paul II in a passage cited above from “Crossing the Threshold of Hope.”

This story was first published by the National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news parter, on May 13, 2020, and has been adapted by CNA.

Father Timothy Furlow speaks from the ambo at St. Patrick’s Church in Portland, Oregon. / Credit: St. Patrick’s Church in Portland, Oregon

CNA Staff, May 13, 2024 / 11:16 am (CNA).

A pastor in Portland, Oregon, recently urged his parish to pray for a vandal who defaced the church building with vulgar graffiti, arguing that the controversy gets to the “core message” of the Gospel itself. 

A vandal tagged St. Patrick’s Church in Portland with several graffiti in April that read “[expletive] you, my body my choice,” a popular slogan for the pro-abortion movement. 

In his homily the morning the graffiti was discovered, the parish’s pastor, Father Timothy Furlow, told parishioners that he deliberately left the vulgar message visible for the faithful to see on their way to Mass. 

“I wanted you to see it,” he said. “Somebody said, ‘Oh, we got to cover this up.’ And then I’m like, nope. I want them to see that.” 

“And the reason is because it fits kind of perfectly with what the core message of the Gospel is,” he continued. “The core message here is pretty simple: We can’t do anything good apart from God. Not a thing. We can’t pull a good thing off. It’s just absolutely impossible.”

The pastor indicated the perpetrator is a known vandal around Portland. Furlow said he himself has felt a desire to see the criminal “get his comeuppance.”

“But the other part of me, the part of my heart that the Holy Spirit is working in — that I let him work in — thinks what I really want is for him to be an usher,” he said. 

“I want him to come to my door and say, ‘I have no idea what’s going on. I have never experienced anything like this in my life. But somehow in the core of my being, I know that God is real and Jesus is God.’”

The pastor said he hopes that the vandal would follow that impulse “all the way through OCIA and the sacraments of initiation, into the door that he once cursed and spray-painted.”

Furlow reminded the assembly of Jesus’ command to “pray for those who persecute you.”

“Christianity and Catholicism [is] utterly unlike anything else on the earth because it runs directly contrary to the logic of the world, the flesh, and the devil,” he said. 

The pastor then asked the parish to take a minute to “sincerely pray for that guy and every single person like him in Portland, Oregon, that’s hurting with a broken heart and is turning to the darkness to try to fix it rather than the Lord who is healing himself.” 

“Pray that he’d actually be able to receive that grace and that one day he would be welcoming you at the door to Mass,” he said. 

“That’s being a Christian. That’s truly living our supernatural Catholic faith.”

The new rule authorizes border agents to screen asylum seekers for “national security, criminal, or other public safety concern[s]” at the “earliest stage possible.” Those flagged as potential threats to the U.S. and its citizens can be denied entry into the U.S. immediately. / Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 13, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).

As communities on the U.S. southern border continue to face a record surge of migrants, the Biden administration has proposed a new rule meant to stop people who pose national security threats from remaining in the country.

The Biden administration said the rule, which is set to be entered into the Federal Register today, will “enhance operational flexibility” and help the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) “more swiftly remove certain noncitizens who are barred from asylum.”

“The proposed rule we have published today is yet another step in our ongoing efforts to ensure the safety of the American public by more quickly identifying and removing those individuals who present a security risk and have no legal basis to remain here,” said Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas.

What does the rule do? 

The rule authorizes border agents to screen asylum seekers for “national security, criminal, or other public safety concern[s]” at the “earliest stage possible.” Those flagged as potential threats to the U.S. and its citizens can be denied entry into the U.S. immediately. 

By screening asylum seekers for national security concerns when they first enter, the rule would enable border agents to remove threats from the country immediately rather than waiting months or even years later as is often the case under the current rules. 

Notably, the rule states that it “would not require” agents to conduct the screenings but instead only authorizes them to use their “discretion” when processing asylum requests. 

This comes as there has been an unprecedented surge in migrants crossing the southern border and applying for asylum under the Biden administration. According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) statistics, border agents encountered a record high of close to 2.5 million migrants at the border in the 2023 fiscal year. With well over 1.3 million encounters already in fiscal year 2024, the number of migrants crossing the border this year is on track to exceed the number in 2023. 

The Biden administration admits the rule will likely not reduce the migrant surge in a significant way and that “the population to which this rule will apply is likely to be relatively small.” However, the administration claims that the rule will allow them “to quickly screen out” non-meritorious asylum claims and promote greater national security by removing those who present a threat or concern.

DHS is allowing 30 days for the public to submit comments after which point the administration will consider making changes before allowing the rule to take effect.

U.S. bishops emphasize due process

Chieko Noguchi, a spokesperson for the U.S. bishops, told CNA that the conference is “reviewing the proposed rule carefully.” 

She pointed out that the U.S. bishops have “reiterated several times in recent months that ensuring due process for noncitizens remains an important component of this.” 

“Church teaching clearly acknowledges the right of countries to maintain their borders and regulate immigration, consistent with the common good. That same teaching also recognizes the right of those fleeing persecution and other conditions to seek protection,” Noguchi said. 

“The bishops remain committed to supporting policies that respect the sanctity of human life wherever it may be found, to include both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border.” 

Some Catholic leaders, meanwhile, have spoken out against the proposed rule more strongly. 

Jesús de la Torre, a research fellow at the Catholic aid group the Hope Border Institute, said that if implemented as is, the rule “would undermine due process, send potential refugees back to danger, and do nothing to address humanitarian needs at the border.” 

According to Torre, “this new rule does nothing but increase the pain and confusion exerted against people seeking safety at the U.S.-Mexico border.” 

“Currently, many people are having fear screenings in CBP detention, in rushed and often not private procedures, without accessing counsel, and not knowing what they are going through,” he explained. “Adding another bar to an already cruel, faulty process may send more bona fide asylum seekers into danger.” 

‘This rule does nothing’ 

Andrew Arthur, a former immigration judge and resident fellow in law and policy at the Center for Immigration Studies, told CNA that the rule essentially re-implements a version of a Trump-era policy that was reversed in the early days of the Biden administration. 

Though he believes the rule is “partially a political document” meant to show the administration is concerned about the border, Arthur also expressed concern that the rule “suggests” there is an imminent national security threat to the U.S. 

“It doesn’t make any sense for the current administration to do this, because they’d already made the determination that they weren’t going to do it unless there is a serious national security or law enforcement threat that they are concerned about,” he said.

Selene Rodriguez, a native of South Texas and policy leader on border security and immigration at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, told CNA that “this rule does nothing” and is essentially political theater on the part of the Biden administration.

She described the current conditions at the border as a narco culture in which drug cartels are in control. Among those most affected, she said, are the people already living in border communities.

“This border crisis has raged on for four years now,” she said. “When you pull members of any of these communities together, the stories are merging, the experiences are merging, the feelings of those experiences are merging. Whether you talk to Republicans or Democrats, at the end of the day, they’re like, ‘We just want our home back.’”