1. Vatican imposes new investment policy amid financial scandal, By Nicole Winfield, Associated Press, July 19, 2022, 7:39 AM
The Vatican has centralized and overhauled its investment strategy after a botched deal lost tens of millions of euros, imposing a policy that prohibits investments in products such as pornography and weapons and prioritizes prudent investing in industries that promote the common good.
The new policy announced Tuesday by the Secretariat for the Economy bans speculative investments, short selling and investing in highly leveraged or complex financial products or in countries vulnerable to money laundering and terrorist financing.
Vatican offices have one year to come up with a divestment strategy if any of their investments fall under prohibited categories.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/vatican-imposes-new-investment-policy-amid-financial-scandal/2022/07/19/7d8f2b7a-0757-11ed-80b6-43f2bfcc6662_story.html
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2. Poll: Parental notification laws popular, By Kerry Picket, The Washington Times, July 19, 2022, Pg. A2
Most voters support parental notification requirements when minors seek abortions, according to a new poll.
The Rasmussen Reports survey found that 64% of likely U.S. voters want abortion providers to be required to notify parents before performing abortions on girls under age 18. About 25% opposed parental notification and 11% were unsure.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jul/18/overwhelming-majority-voters-tell-pollsters-they-w/
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3. Ahead of papal visit, Canadian bishops begin payouts to indigenous communities, By Elise Ann Allen, Crux, July 19, 2022
With Pope Francis’s visit to Canada just days away, the country’s bishops have announced that a special fund to support healing and reconciliation efforts with indigenous communities has begun accepting proposals.
The Indigenous Reconciliation Fund was established in 2022 to support and advance healing and reconciliation initiatives with Indigenous communities following a pledge to do so by the Canadian bishops last year.
In September 2021, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) announced a $30 million financial pledge over the next five years to support projects aimed at healing and reconciliation given the Catholic Church’s historic role in the abuse of Indigenous children at residential schools.
https://cruxnow.com/church-in-the-americas/2022/07/ahead-of-papal-visit-canadian-bishops-begin-payouts-to-indigenous-communities
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4. German “Synodal Way” a “conscious statement against Catechism”, says official, By AC Wimmer, Catholic News Agency, July 19, 2022, 3:21 AM
The German “Synodal Way” is aiming to change the Church’s teaching on homosexuality by proposing “a conscious statement against the current Catholic catechism”, according to a leading protagonist of the controversial process.
Marc Frings, the secretary-general of the Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK), said the “Synodal Way” –– sometimes referred to as “Synodal Path” –– was “a conscious statement against the current Catholic catechism, which has been critical and disparaging of homosexuality since the mid-1970s and still reproaches homosexual activity as sin.”
His comments were published on July 17 in German and English by “Outreach”, a website edited by Father James Martin SJ that describes itself as an “LGBT Catholic resource”.
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/251820/german-synodal-way-a-conscious-statement-against-catechism-says-official
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5. House bill to codify Roe is ‘unjust, extreme,’ say USCCB committee chairmen., By Catholic News Service, July 18, 2022
The chairmen of two U.S. bishops’ committees said a measure passed by the House July 15 is “the most unjust and extreme abortion on demand bill our nation has ever seen.”
They implored lawmakers “who see abortion as a legitimate ‘solution’ to the needs of women to abandon this path of death and despair,” urging them to join the U.S. bishops in prioritizing “the well-being of women, children and families” by providing material resources and “personal accompaniment” so “no woman ever feels forced to choose between her future and the life of her child.”
Archbishop William E. Lori of Baltimore, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities, and Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee for Religious Liberty, made the comments in a joint statement July 18.
In a mostly party-line vote of 219 to 210, House members approved an updated version of the Women’s Health Protection Act of 2022, which would codify a right to abortion in federal law. An earlier version was passed in March by the House, but it failed to pass in the Senate.
https://cruxnow.com/cns/2022/07/house-bill-to-codify-roe-is-unjust-extreme-say-usccb-committee-chairmen
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6. Abortion a ‘human rights issue’ more than a religious issue, Archbishop Naumann says, By Jonah McKeown, Catholic News Agency, July 18, 2022, 2:25 PM
Responding to claims that Kansas Catholics are seeking to impose their religion on their neighbors by voting to exclude a right to abortion from the state’s constitution, Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City in Kansas says “reason alone is sufficient to know that it is wrong to destroy an innocent human life.”
Kansas is set to become the first state to place abortion policy on the ballot after the Supreme Court’s June 24 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortion nationwide in 1973. Currently, Kansas restricts abortion after 22 weeks, but Kansas state lawmakers are generally prohibited from passing any type of new abortion restriction because of a 2019 state Supreme Court ruling which found that the state’s constitution protects a woman’s “right” to abortion.
The “Value Them Both” amendment, if approved by voters on Aug. 2, would enable state lawmakers to pass legislation to regulate or restrict abortion. The amendment would not itself change the legality of abortion in the state, but would, among other things, ensure a ban on state taxpayer-funded abortion.
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/251812/kansas-pro-life-abortion-amendment-archbishop-naumann-rabbi-op-ed
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7. Servants of the Constitution, By Ed Whelan, National Review, July 14, 2022, 4:21 PM, Opinion
By overturning Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization marks a crowning achievement of the conservative legal movement. After nearly 50 years of judicial usurpation, Justice Samuel Alito’s masterly majority opinion restores abortion policy to the democratic processes. That achievement was decades in the making, and for most of that time seemed a pipe dream. As we celebrate this momentous victory, let’s reflect on how it happened.
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In reaction against the intellectual aimlessness of the Court during Chief Justice Warren Burger’s tenure (1969–86), a burgeoning conservative legal movement was forming. At the center of this new movement was the Federalist Society, a little-known organization of law students and lawyers founded in 1982.
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This conservative legal movement coalesced around the twin concepts of originalism and textualism. Originalism arose in the constitutional context to counter the “living Constitution” approach and other freewheeling methods of inventing constitutional meaning. Textualism arose in the statutory context in response to purposivism and pragmatism, which appeal to a statute’s broad purposes or to notions of workability to trump the actual language of a statute. But despite the different labels, “originalism” and “textualism” describe essentially the same method: interpreting legal provisions — including, of course, constitutional amendments and statutory revisions — according to the meaning they bore when they were adopted.
The conservative legal movement flourished as Justice Scalia and Justice Clarence Thomas wrote powerful and entertaining opinions — too often, dissents — that confronted the lazy liberal orthodoxy and won the attention of new waves of law students. Law-school chapters of the Federalist Society fostered debate over contentious legal issues and challenged students to think through the fundamental questions of our constitutional system. Federalist Society students would go on to earn prestigious clerkships with outstanding conservative jurists, work in select legal positions in the White House or the Department of Justice (in Republican administrations) or on Capitol Hill, argue high-profile cases as state solicitors general, serve on state supreme courts, and themselves become federal judges and even Supreme Court justices.
Over time, the commonsense appeal of originalism and textualism, and the intellectual vacuity of the Left’s alternatives, also transformed the public debate over the role of the Court, mobilized the broader conservative political movement, and encouraged — indeed, compelled — Senate Republicans to fight for and against Supreme Court nominees on the ground of judicial philosophy.
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Candidate Donald Trump’s vow to select his nominee for the Scalia vacancy from his public list of originalist candidates was a critical ingredient in his stunning victory over Hillary Clinton. That fact bears powerful witness to the political impact of legal conservatism, even as many members of the conservative legal movement (myself included) were tepid at best about the prospect of a Trump presidency.
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The conservative legal movement has endured lots of disappointing Supreme Court rulings since its inception 40 years ago, in nearly all instances for the simple reason that the Court did not have a genuine majority of judicial conservatives. Many legal observers hoped or feared that the chief justice in Dobbs would sway one or two of his conservative colleagues to join him in contriving a reason not to overturn Roe and Casey. But in the face of intense pressure that few armchair critics could withstand, the five justices in the majority stood strong. For their fidelity to the Constitution and for their courage, we owe them our deep gratitude and admiration.
https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2022/08/01/servants-of-the-constitution/
__________________________________________________________TCA Media Monitoring provides a snapshot from national newspapers and major Catholic press outlets of coverage regarding significant Catholic Church news and current issues with which the Catholic Church is traditionally or prominently engaged. The opinions and views expressed in the articles do not necessarily reflect the views of The Catholic Association. |
