|
|
|
|
News Briefs
|
NEWS BRIEFS Sep-28-2010
By Catholic News Service
U.S.
Suspect arrested in shooting death of Seton Hall University student
SOUTH ORANGE, N.J. (CNS) -- Police arrested one suspect and were seeking another Sept. 27 after a Seton Hall University student was killed and four other people were wounded during a shooting at an off-campus party two days earlier. Nicholas Welch, 25, was arrested and charged in connection with the shooting, which occurred early Sept. 25 when a gunman returned to a party where he reportedly had been refused entry and began firing into the room. Police said they also were looking for a second suspect, Marcus Bascus, 19, who allegedly gave Welch the gun used in the shooting. The two men face charges of murder and conspiracy to commit murder, according to news reports. Seton Hall sophomore Jessica Moore, 19, died from gunshot injuries sustained at the party in nearby East Orange. Those wounded were two other 19-year-old female Seton Hall students and two men not connected with the Catholic university. News stories identified the four victims as: Moore's roommate, sophomore Nakeisha Vanterpool, 19, of the Bronx in New York; Nicosia Henry, a freshman from Bolingbrook, Ill.; Yvan Christophe, 25, a graduate of New Jersey Institute of Technology and formerly of East Orange; and Xavier Lee, 20, of New York. Party-goers told reporters that Moore was killed when she moved between the gunman and her roommate to help her after Vanterpool was shot in the face.
- - -
Patients at Catholic hospital supply placentas for stem-cell research
CLEARWATER, Fla. (CNS) -- Women giving birth by cesarean section at a Catholic hospital in Florida can contribute to cutting-edge research that could benefit burn victims, diabetics and wounded soldiers. With the permission of the new mothers, St. Joseph's Women's Hospital in Tampa has been collecting placentas for use in stem-cell research by the regenerative medicine company Stemnion. The Pittsburgh-based Stemnion recently opened a research facility in Clearwater, so that cells can be extracted from the afterbirth tissue within a few hours of delivery. Since January, 77 women with prescheduled cesarean deliveries at St. Joseph's Women's Hospital have consented to the placental donations, and 63 placentas have been successfully donated. Stemnion officials gathered Sept. 23 at the Clearwater facility with church leaders, including Bishop Robert N. Lynch of St. Petersburg, Fla., and Sister Carol Keehan, president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association, to celebrate the collaboration, which started when Archbishop Donald W. Wuerl of Washington, then bishop of Pittsburgh, first heard about the fledgling company six years ago. Sister Carol, a Daughter of Charity, said she and the bishops "wanted to see morally upright, good stem-cell research being done in our many Catholic hospitals." St. Joseph's Women's Hospital was a good candidate for the program because about 7,000 babies are born there each year, nearly 3,000 of them by C-section, although many of those are not preplanned.
- - -
Archbishop says mass media today seems more hostile to Christian values
DENVER (CNS) -- A new sentiment in the mass media seems more hostile to Christian values, Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput told a conference of 150 religion reporters Sept. 24. He urged the journalists from across the nation and overseas "to understand believers and religious institutions as they understand themselves" and to have humility in their work. "Freedom of the press clearly includes the right to question the actions and motives of religious figures and institutions," the archbishop told the gathering. "But freedom doesn't excuse prejudice or poor handling of serious material, especially people's religious convictions," he said. "What's new today is the seeming collusion --or at least an active sympathy -- between some media organizations and journalists, and political and sexual agendas hostile to traditional Christian beliefs." Archbishop Chaput's talk, "Religion, Journalism and the New American Orthodoxy," was the keynote address at the Religion Newswriters Association 61st annual conference in Denver. "This new orthodoxy seems to influence the selection of religious news and how that news gets presented," he said. "It seems to frame which opinions are appropriate and which ones won't be heard. And it seems to guide the historical narrative that media present to their audiences. This new thinking seems to presume a society much more secular and much less religious than anything in America's past or warranted by present facts," he continued, "a society where people are free to worship and believe whatever they want, so long as they don't intrude their religious idiosyncrasies on government, the economy or culture."
- - -
New blow for border-area ranch family: Widow hit by a car after Mass
DOUGLAS, Ariz. (CNS) -- An Arizona woman who has become the face of border-area problems since her husband's murder in March was hospitalized with serious injuries in Tucson Sept. 25 after she and another woman were hit by a car as they crossed the street after Mass at St. Luke Church in Douglas. Sue Krentz, 58, was crossing the street with a friend, 80-year-old Shirley Gregory, when they were struck by a car driven by Ramon Parra Saucedo, according to the Cochise County Sheriff's department. He was charged with driving under the influence, two counts of aggravated assault and two counts of endangerment. Krentz and Gregory were taken by helicopter to a Tucson hospital. Friends told Arizona news media that Krentz had several broken bones, including her pelvis, and had surgery. Information was not available about Gregory's condition. The accident occurred almost exactly six months after Krentz's husband, Rob, was killed on their ranch outside of Douglas by an unknown gunman. Sheriff's investigators had said they were seeking a man thought to be a lookout for drug traffickers in connection with the case. Krentz told Catholic News Service in a July interview that she had been turning to her Catholic faith, particularly to Mary, in an effort to get through the daily struggles after her husband's death.
- - -
Survey shows big gaps in religious literacy
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Catholics know about as much as Americans in general about religion, getting right only half of the 32 questions in a survey for the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. In the U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey released Sept. 28 at a Washington symposium on religious literacy, Pew found that those most likely to answer the most questions correctly were atheists and agnostics. Panelists suggested that might be the result of the analytical process and study that many people go through before they decide to define themselves as atheist or agnostic. That group on average answered 20.9 of 32 questions correctly, compared to the total average of 16; Jews averaged 20.5 questions correct and Mormons, 20.3. White evangelical Protestants got an average of 17.6 questions correct, while white Catholics averaged 16 correct answers and Hispanic Catholics averaged 11.6 correct answers. Black Protestants got 13.4 questions correct, while white mainline Protestants answered 15.8 questions right. The questions tested general knowledge about various religions, about U.S. laws affecting religion and about key figures and beliefs of major religions. For instance, overall, at least two-thirds of those surveyed knew that public school teachers cannot lead a class in prayer; that Mother Teresa was Catholic; that Moses was the Bible figure who led the exodus from Egypt; that Jesus was born in Bethlehem; and that most people in Pakistan are Muslim.
- - -
Hundreds visit Capitol Hill to promote new poverty-fighting legislation
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Hundreds of Catholic Charities leaders and staffers took to Capitol Hill Sept. 28 to promote new legislation that they believe could transform the U.S. approach to fighting poverty. Participants in Catholic Charities USA's centennial gathering in Washington visited their senators and representatives on the convention's final day to urge support for the National Opportunity for Community Renewal Act, introduced that day by Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., and Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass. The $125 million bill, drafted by Catholic Charities USA itself, would set up 10 community demonstration projects, including three in rural areas and one near a military base, that would operate with more up-to-date poverty measures and create "individual opportunity plans" for each client. "With this legislation, today we tell the tens of millions of Americans living in poverty that there is a new hope," said Father Larry Snyder, president and CEO of Catholic Charities USA, in a breakfast talk Sept. 28. "That they are not destined to live in poverty for their entire lives. That with the help provided in this legislation, people in need will be propelled onto a path of self-sufficiency, enabling them to achieve new legacies of health and happiness for their families." Victoria Reggie Kennedy, the widow of Sen. Ted Kennedy, as well as Rep. Mike Conaway, R-Texas, and Casey also addressed the breakfast gathering before convention-goers boarded buses for Capitol Hill. In a fact sheet on the legislation, Catholic Charities USA acknowledged that the bill "will not make it through Congress this session," but added, "We feel that a conversation on poverty needs to be had, and your support for their bill will help start that conversation."
- - -
Minnesota bishops' DVD campaign urges traditional marriage be protected
ST. PAUL, Minn. (CNS) -- Minnesota's Catholic bishops have sent a letter and DVD to Catholics in the state about the church's response to measures recently introduced in the state Legislature that would change the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples. "As the chief pastor of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, I am writing to let you know of an important development that, if successful, will profoundly impact families throughout Minnesota," Archbishop John C. Nienstedt said. "That is, the organized effort to redefine marriage in our state." During the 2010 legislative session, five bills to redefine marriage were introduced. "Defining marriage as simply a union of consenting parties will change the core meaning of marriage in the public square for every Minnesotan," the archbishop said. "At best, so-called same-sex marriage is an untested social experiment and, at worst, it poses a dangerous risk with potentially far-reaching consequences." If same-sex marriage were legalized in Minnesota, the law would require public schools to teach children that same-sex marriage and traditional marriage are the same, the archbishop wrote. In the video, Archbishop Nienstedt calls for an opportunity for citizens to vote on a state constitutional amendment to preserve the traditional definition of marriage.
- - -
WORLD
Ethicist: Pro-euthanasia forces see Quebec as way into North America
OTTAWA, Ontario (CNS) -- International campaigners see Quebec as a vulnerable beachhead for legalizing euthanasia in Canada, then the rest of North America, said a prominent Canadian ethicist. Margaret Somerville, founding director of the Centre for Medicine, Ethics and Law at Toronto's McGill University, said she and others are keeping an eye on Quebec, where a legislative committee is holding public hearings on euthanasia. Though many Canadians outside of Quebec were reassured earlier this year by the resounding defeat of a Bloc Quebecois pro-euthanasia and assisted suicide private member's bill, Somerville said pro-euthanasia forces regroup after each defeat. "We used to think that's the end of it, but as soon as that's finished, the next one starts up," she said, noting pro-euthanasia campaigns are happening worldwide. She compared the pro-euthanasia movement to an incoming tide. "The tide comes in gentle, then stronger and stronger, and then it comes in and sweeps everything away," she said. "That's exactly what we're in danger of seeing here," she said, adding that surveys show about 79 percent of Quebec residents "think euthanasia is a good idea." "Many people are really asleep at the wheel," said McGill history professor John Zucchi, who presented a brief on behalf of 54 of his academic colleagues to Quebec's Select Committee on Dying With Dignity when it began its multicity sweep of the province in early September.
- - -
PEOPLE
U.S. Oblate provincial is elected superior general of order
ROME (CNS) -- Members of the general chapter of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate elected the provincial of the United States to be their new superior general. Oblate Father Louis Lougen was elected to a six-year term Sept. 28, his 58th birthday. The Oblate chapter included 89 delegates, representing the order's 4,000 missionaries who work in 66 countries around the world. Father Lougen, of Buffalo, N.Y., had served as the U.S. provincial superior since 2005. He succeeds Father Wilhelm Steckling, who served the maximum of two six-year terms as superior general. The new superior attended the Oblate-run Bishop Neumann High School in Buffalo and entered the Oblate's juniorate in Newburgh, N.Y., in 1970. He attended the novitiate in Godfrey, Ill., and continued his formation at Oblate College in Washington, D.C., earning degrees in philosophy and theology. After being ordained a deacon in 1978, he spent six months working in Brazil, and he returned to the South American country after his ordination to the priesthood in Washington in 1979. In Brazil, he worked in parishes and on the Oblate formation team, eventually serving as director of the pre-novitiate and as novice master. He also served on the provincial council for the Oblates in Sao Paulo from 1985 to 1994.
- - -
In Respect Life message, cardinal promotes world vigil for life Nov. 27
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- In a message marking Respect Life Month in October, the chairman of the U.S. bishops' Committee on Pro-Life Activities called on U.S. Catholics to join Pope Benedict XVI in a worldwide vigil "for all nascent human life" on the Saturday evening of Thanksgiving weekend. Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo of Galveston-Houston also encouraged Catholics to demonstrate their commitment to life "through a loving concern for the good of others" and to work to ensure that health care reform, in its implementation, "is not misused to promote abortion or to trample on rights of conscience. With each passing year, the need for personal and public witness grounded in God's boundless love for each and every human being grows more urgent," he said in a statement for Respect Life Month released Sept. 28. The cardinal cited three particular risks in today's society -- abortion, embryonic stem-cell research and "a renewed campaign for legalizing physician-assisted suicide. Instead of addressing (seriously ill) patients' real problems by providing love, support and relief of suffering, this agenda urges us to eliminate the patient as though he or she is the problem," Cardinal DiNardo said. "While critics want to portray the church's witness as a narrow and negative ideology, it is just the opposite: a positive vision of the dignity of each and every human being without exception, each loved equally by God and so equally deserving of our love and our nation's respect." He urged every Catholic to become "a voice for the child in the womb, and for the embryonic human being at risk of becoming a mere object of research, and for the neglected sick and elderly."
- - -
Oklahoma parishioner says he can't imagine a day without praying rosary
HARTSHORNE, Okla. (CNS) -- Charles Lee is never far from a rosary. There are three or four on an end table next to his recliner. He keeps one on a kitchen cabinet and a few more next to his bed. He seems always to have one or two in his pocket wherever he goes. Just in case he forgets, there is another in the glove compartment of his pickup, which, by the way, has a bumper sticker squarely in the middle of the tailgate that reads, "Pray the Rosary." Le said: "I have rosaries all over, but none of them is fancy or expensive. I give a lot of them away to people I pray with. Besides, it's what's in your heart when you pray that matters, not how much the rosary costs." Lee prays the rosary every day, and he has for more than 60 years. He said he started his daily devotion in fifth grade while attending Catholic school in his hometown of Hartshorne. "The school was run by Carmelite sisters, and we prayed the rosary and Our Father every day before class started. I just never stopped," he told the Eastern Oklahoma Catholic, monthly magazine of the Tulsa Diocese. Aside from eight years spent teaching vocal music at an elementary school in Missouri and four years in the Army, Lee has spent his life in Hartshorne and at Holy Rosary Parish. When his former music teacher retired, she helped him get a job in Hartshorne Public Schools, where he stayed until his retirement. Lee, 76, has been the organist at Holy Rosary and an active member of the parish for 50 years.
END
Copyright (c) 2010 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
CNS · 3211 Fourth St NE · Washington DC 20017 · 202.541.3250
|
|
|
|
