St. Joseph Catholic Church

Stained-glass window at the Cathedral Basilica in St. Louis. / Credit: Ella Manthey/Shutterstock

St. Louis, Mo., May 15, 2024 / 14:47 pm (CNA).

Two St. Louis parishes that appealed to the Vatican after Archbishop Mitchell Rozanski ordered them to merge last year have had their appeals upheld by the Holy See, reversing the archbishop’s prior decision.

As part of the archdiocese’s major pastoral planning initiative dubbed “All Things New,” Rozanski announced a year ago that the number of parishes would be reduced by nearly 50 by way of parish mergers and closures.

Under canon law, a diocesan bishop has the authority to alter parishes, but only for a just reason specific to each parish. Concern for souls must be the principal motivation for modifying a parish.

Amid the All Things New process, a number of parishes announced their intention to send appeals to the Vatican, putting aspects of the mergers planned for the parishes on hold until the Dicastery for the Clergy’s rulings. 

After studying the acts of the case for St. Angela Merici Parish in Florissant, Missouri, the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Clergy did not find just cause for the parish to be combined to form a single parish with St. Norbert and Holy Name of Jesus parishes, the archdiocese said in a May 14 statement. The dicastery was therefore unable to sustain Rozanski’s decree. 

While retaining their statuses as three separate parish communities, St. Angela Merici, St. Norbert, and Holy Name of Jesus parishes will all remain under the pastoral guidance of Father Peter Faimega, the archdiocese continued.

In addition, the Dicastery for the Clergy did not find just cause for St. Martin of Tours Parish in Lemay, Missouri, to be subsumed by St. Mark Parish, the archdiocese said.

The same day, the archdiocese announced that another appeal brought by St. Roch Parish in St. Louis had resulted in Rozanski’s decree being upheld. St. Roch was to be subsumed by Christ the King Parish, effective Aug. 1, 2023, and this month its school is set to close. 

Before announcing the changes in May 2023, the archdiocese held 350 listening sessions, with at least one in each of the 178 current parishes. It also considered feedback from 70,000 Catholics in the archdiocese who participated in a survey. Feedback was also solicited from 18,000 school parents, staff, teachers, donors, and community partners. The archdiocese also held focus groups and talked with civil and business leaders.

Rozanski had originally declined to revoke any of the 83 decrees he made regarding the final plans, leaving the parishes with recourse only to the Vatican. However, he did suspend his decree regarding St. Angela Merici and St. Martin of Tours prior to the decisions from the dicastery, so “no additional changes will be necessary,” the archdiocese said. 

According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the dicastery earlier this year overturned the closure decree for St. Richard Parish near Creve Coeur, Missouri, while also denying an appeal from the closed Blessed Teresa of Calcutta Parish in Ferguson. At least 11 parishes in the Archdiocese of St. Louis still have outstanding appeals regarding closings or mergers, the archdiocese has noted. 

The archdiocese has previously said that the widespread reassignment of 158 archdiocesan priests, which was announced along with the various mergers, will proceed as planned. 

The St. Louis parishes’ appeals to the Vatican are not unprecedented in the United States. In dioceses such as Cleveland, Buffalo, New York, Boston, and Springfield, Massachusetts, parishioners have issued appeals to the Dicastery for the Clergy to save their parishes after their bishops ordered them closed.

Outer details of Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Chicago. / Credit: Eric Allix Rogers

CNA Staff, May 15, 2024 / 12:12 pm (CNA).

Catholics and city preservationists in Chicago are scrambling to try to preserve a historic parish on the city’s North Side, one that has survived a century of the city’s development including being fully moved to a new location after it was first built. 

Our Lady of Lourdes Parish will hold its final Mass on Sunday, May 19, before the parish merges with nearby St. Mary of the Lake. The consolidation is part of the Archdiocese of Chicago’s ongoing “Renew My Church” initiative that has closed and merged dozens of parishes in order to address shrinking budgets and priest shortages. 

The archdiocese announced the Lourdes parish merger in 2021. Katerina Garcia, the president of the Our Lady of Lourdes Church Preservation Society, told “EWTN News Nightly” anchor Tracy Sabol this week that parishioners at the parish dispute the archdiocese’s reasons for closing the church, particularly the claim that Mass attendance had dropped steadily there. 

“We disagree with that statement because before the merge, Our Lady of Lourdes Church had the highest attendance compared to [other nearby churches],” Garcia told Sabol. 

“They decreased the Masses that we had. So of course that’s going to decrease attendance,” she argued.

Even as the parish’s final Mass looms, Garcia said efforts are underway to save the parish, possibly by purchasing it from the archdiocese. She noted the parish’s remarkable history, including its wholesale move from one side of the street to the other. 

The parish was “literally across the street on the east side of Ashland Avenue,” she told Sabol. “And Daniel Burnham, who was a prominent architect and urban developer in Chicago, wanted to widen the [city streets].” 

“In order for them to widen Ashland Avenue, they had to move the church literally across the street,” she said. “They had 150 men and horses, and they put the 10,000-ton church on top of 400 rails and 3,000 rollers and literally moved it across the street, inching it.”

Once the building was moved to its new location, builders “rotated it 90 degrees” and then “cut the church in half and added a 30-foot insert,” increasing capacity by roughly 50%.

“Back then, 1929, that’s such a very … I can’t even think of the word. It’s just an engineering feat,” Garcia said. 

‘It’s facing an uncertain future’

On its website, the Our Lady of Lourdes Preservation Society says its goal is to “preserve Our Lady of Lourdes Church as a historical landmark, reopen and revive it as a holy shrine.”

The group, formed in 2021 after the merger announcement, wrote on Facebook that it is “going full force to make sure [the property] is preserved as a historical landmark,” with group members aiming to “bring it back to its old glory with a new order in charge.”

Ward Miller, the executive director of the nonprofit Preservation Chicago, said his group has been working to get the building designated as a Chicago landmark. 

The group has highlighted the building’s historical qualities in the past. The parish was “modeled in the Spanish Renaissance-style architecture to resemble a church in Valladolid, Spain,” Preservation Chicago says. Among its many notable features includes a “faithful replica of the grotto in Lourdes, France,” which years ago was made a “perpetual adoration site” and remains ”the area’s only chapel open 24/7 for worship.”

The structure is “facing an uncertain future,” Miller told CNA on Wednesday. “We don’t know if it’s facing a demolition threat or not.”

The building is rated “orange” in the city’s Historic Resources Survey, Miller pointed out, which indicates that it “possesses potentially significant architectural or historical features.”

The Archdiocese of Chicago did not respond to a query on Wednesday regarding the status of the church building and what will become of it after the final Mass this week. 

The parish school, meanwhile — which closed in 2004 — has already been sold, with plans to turn the structure into apartments. 

Garcia told Block Club Chicago earlier this year that she attended the school and that her children were baptized in the parish.

The parish “just has a lot of memories,” she told the outlet. “I actually made the calligraphy on the sign by the grotto entrance, so there are parts of the church I was involved in. There’s so much history there for me and my family.” 

“Every part of that church is important to me,” she said. 

Gloria Purvis, Cardinal Robert McElroy, Bishop Daniel Flores, and Bishop Robert Barron discuss polarization in the Catholic Church during a panel discussion hosted by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Catholic Charities USA, Glenmary Home Missioners, and the Jesuit Conference on May 14, 2024. / Credit: The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' Live Stream YouTube channel

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 15, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).

Three Catholic bishops warned of a growing ideological polarization within the Church and the need for civil dialogue among those with disagreements during a livestreamed panel discussion on Tuesday afternoon.

“Politics is almost a religion and sometimes it’s a sport, [but] it’s not supposed to be either,” Bishop Daniel Flores of the Diocese of Brownsville, Texas, said during the discussion. 

“It’s supposed to be a civil conversation … to seek what is good and make the priority how to achieve it and how to avoid what is evil,” Flores said. “And I think if we could stay focused on that, we can kind of tone down the caricature and the rhetoric that seeks to dehumanize people.”

The panel discussion included Flores, Cardinal Robert McElroy of the Diocese of San Diego, and Bishop Robert Barron of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester, Minnesota. It was moderated by Gloria Purvis, the host of “The Gloria Purvis Podcast” at America Magazine, and co-sponsored by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), Catholic Charities USA, Glenmary Home Missioners, and the Jesuit Conference.

The panel discussion was part of the USCCB’s “Civilize It” initiative, which is meant to foster civility in important ideological debates. As part of the initiative, the bishops ask Catholics to sign a pledge to affirm the dignity of every human person — including those with different ideological beliefs — and to work with others in pursuit of the common good.

According to the panelists, American society and the Church have grown more polarized when it comes to ideological differences — and debates about those differences have become less civil.

Barron, who founded the Catholic media organization Word on Fire, said disagreements within the Church are nothing new, but the way people approach those disagreements has changed: “What’s broken down is the love that makes real dialogue possible.”

“It’s a tribalism that’s lost the sense of love in dialogue,” Barron said.

The bishop warned that people are more focused on winning arguments and being loyal to an ideological identity than on love. He said these problems are very noticeable in discussions on the internet and encouraged people to ask whether “this comment [is] an act of love” before saying anything. 

“Is it born of love?” Barron said people should ask themselves. “Is it born of a desire to will the good of the other? If it’s not, there’s like a thousand better things to be doing than sending that statement.”

McElroy said too much dialogue today “is meant to be confrontational” to the point at which people “can’t enter into a genuine dialogue.” 

“People are coming toward each other in the life of the Church looking first at that label: What are you? Where do you stand in the war-like culture politics of our country?” the cardinal said.

People focus on this “rather than [on] what unites us: where do we stand in terms of our identity as Catholics and with a Christological outlook,” he added. 

McElroy also built on the concerns Barron highlighted regarding dialogue on the internet.

“When you’re writing the Tweet, imagine Jesus is there with you and when you think through that question ‘should I do this?’” McElroy said. 

Similarly, Flores emphasized the need to remember what Christ would do. 

“He would not be unkind, especially to the poor and especially to those who had no standing in the world,” Flores said. “And also he would never commit an injustice in order to promote justice.”

Members of the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority, biological women’s sports activist Riley Gaines, and lawyers from the Independent Women’s Law Center approach the 10th Circuit Courthouse in Denver on May 14, 2024. / Credit: Photo courtesy of Independent Women’s Forum

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 14, 2024 / 18:11 pm (CNA).

Six members of Kappa Kappa Gamma at the University of Wyoming are suing their sorority for admitting a man who identifies as a woman.

Represented by the Independent Women’s Law Center (IWLC), the sisters argued their case before a three-judge panel of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver on Tuesday. 

The women are alleging that the sorority’s decision in fall 2022 to admit a man, Artemis Langford, violated its bylaws, which state that all members be women. The sisters have also said that Langford has harassed them in their sorority house by watching them change, taking photos, and asking “invasive” sexual questions. 

Allie Coghan, a Kappa Kappa Gamma alumna from the class of 2023 and one of the plaintiffs in the suit, told CNA that Langford’s admission into the sorority caused her and her sisters to feel very unsafe in their own home.

“We never used to lock our doors at night. I would sleep with my door open all the time and then all of a sudden it became me locking my door and just hoping that I wouldn’t hear heavy footsteps in the hallway while I’m sleeping because I knew who it would be,” she explained. “All of a sudden it became very uncomfortable to go to the bathroom and shower because you never know who’s going to be sitting there waiting or watching.”

Coghan said that some of her friends in the sorority caught Langford staring at them when coming out of the shower and that there were other instances that made them feel very scared.

“In the sorority house, there are women who have been sexually assaulted in the past, and so that’s why living in a sorority house is so comforting to them,” she explained. “It’s just a safe haven, and they were stripped of that. We were all stripped of it.”

Rather than listening to their fears and negative experiences, Coghan said, the sorority began ostracizing anyone who disapproved of Langford’s admission, labeling them “transphobic” and using “bullying tactics” to pressure them to agree.  

“Sororities are not meant to be political. One of the beautiful things about it is all the diversity that is in there,” she said, adding that “the one thing that holds us all together is that we are all women.”

In August 2023 federal Judge Alan Johnson dismissed the sisters’ lawsuit on the grounds that a woman is clearly defined in the sorority’s bylaws and is thus open to the group’s interpretation. 

The six sisters appealed the decision to the 10th Circuit Court in October, continuing to argue that Kappa Kappa Gamma “subverted their own bylaws and other governing documents and did so in bad faith by changing their membership criteria.” 

On Tuesday the three-judge panel appeared skeptical that they had jurisdiction to rule on the case. The panel pointed out that the lower court’s dismissal left open limited grounds for the sisters to refile their suit. 

May Mailman, an attorney for the sisters, admitted that they could possibly refile the suit but that would still not change the lower court’s decision that Kappa Kappa Gamma can interpret its bylaws to include biological men. 

Natalie McLaughlin, the attorney for Kappa Kappa Gamma, meanwhile maintained that the sorority is entitled to interpret its definition of a woman however it pleases.

A representative for Kappa Kappa Gamma told CNA that it “will continue to vigorously defend against attempts by plaintiffs to use the judicial system to take away a private organization’s fundamental rights and cause lasting damage to individuals and to our membership.”

“Today, Kappa Kappa Gamma defended in the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Colorado our right as a private organization to interpret our bylaws and standing rules,” the representative said, adding: “We are confident the federal court will uphold the decisive ruling of a federal judge in Wyoming and bring a swift resolution to this matter.”

Outside the courthouse, the Independent Women’s Forum and several other groups held a “Save Sisterhood” rally in which biological women’s sports activist Riley Gaines and several members of Kappa Kappa Gamma spoke out in support of the sisters’ lawsuit. 

Hannah Holtmeier, a current Kappa Kappa Gamma member and one of the plaintiffs in the case, also spoke at the rally, saying: “I can attest to the toll it takes on young women mentally knowing that at any point I could step out of the bathroom or walk out of the shower to a 6’2’’, 260-pound man is terrifying.” 

“To girls across our great country, and their mothers and fathers, if you think you’re in a situation where this won’t affect you, think again,” she went on. “Odds are if we don’t speak up to at least define women’s spaces, you, your daughter, or any other woman in your life will be affected.” 

null / Shutterstock

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 14, 2024 / 16:22 pm (CNA).

An English pediatrician who led a comprehensive review of the safety and efficacy of prescribing transgender drugs to children is warning that health associations in the United States may be misleading the public.

In an interview with the New York Times published on Monday, Dr. Hilary Cass warned there is no comprehensive evidence to support the routine prescription of transgender drugs to minors with gender dysphoria. 

Cass published the independent “Cass Review,” commissioned by the National Health Service in England, which prompted England and Scotland to halt the prescription of transgender drugs to minors until more research is conducted.

As England, Scotland, and other European countries scale back their use of transgender drugs for minors, most doctors’ associations and health associations in the U.S. continue to endorse these medical interventions. In more than half of the states in the United States, it is still legal to prescribe transgender drugs to children and to perform transgender surgeries on them.

“What some organizations are doing is doubling down on saying the evidence is good,” Cass said in the interview. “And I think that’s where you’re misleading the public. You need to be honest about the strength of the evidence and say what you’re going to do to improve it.”

Speaking specifically about the American Academy of Pediatrics — which is the largest pediatric association in the country — Cass said the group “does massive good for children worldwide” but also “is fearful of making any moves that might jeopardize trans health care right now.”

She added: “I wonder whether, if they weren’t feeling under such political duress, they would be able to be more nuanced, to say that multiple truths exist in this space — that there are children who are going to need medical treatment, and that there are other children who are going to resolve their distress in different ways.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics announced it would undertake a “systematic review” of its guidelines in August 2023 but also reaffirmed its support for “gender-affirming care” for children, which includes the prescription of transgender drugs. The organization did not respond to CNA’s request for comment.

“I respectfully disagree with them on holding on to a position that is now demonstrated to be out of date by multiple systematic reviews,” Cass said in her New York Times interview. 

Cass noted that her comprehensive review of studies related to the prescription of transgender drugs for minors found that “the evidence is very weak compared to many other areas of pediatric practice.”

“We have to stop just seeing these young people through the lens of their gender and see them as whole people and address the much broader range of challenges that they have, sometimes with their mental health, sometimes with undiagnosed neurodiversity,” Cass added. “It’s really about helping them to thrive, not just saying ‘How do we address the gender?’ in isolation.”

Mary Rice Hasson, the director of the Person and Identity Project at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, told CNA: “Cass’ rigorous evidence reviews, four years in the making, confirmed what Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and Norway — all early adopters of medical ‘gender transitions’ in minors — discovered.” 

“There’s no good evidence to support the use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones in identity-distressed kids,” Hasson said. “They need psychotherapy and holistic treatment — not the ‘fast-track’ to lifelong hormones and repeat surgeries.”

Hasson said: “The arrogance and deceit of the U.S. gender industry is shocking [because] they insist there’s nothing new in the Cass Review, which makes me wonder if they’ve even read it.” However, she said, “more likely, they are digging in their heels at the behest of trans activists and ideologically-driven funders.”

“It’s no secret that LGBTQ lobby groups have put tremendous pressure on U.S. health care to support ‘LGBTQ inclusion,’ particularly ‘transgender’ demands for body modification,” Hasson added.

In addition to the Cass Review — which was published in April — a series of other studies that were published this year call into question the efficacy of prescribing transgender drugs for and offering transgender surgeries to children.

For example, a Mayo Clinic study from April found that puberty-blocking drugs may cause irreversible damage to testicular cells in young boys. A study out of the Netherlands that was published in February found that most children who have transgender inclinations will outgrow those feelings. A third study out of Finland found that transgender surgeries for minors do not reduce suicides in children and young adults who struggle with their gender identity.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito speaks to graduates at Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, on May 11, 2024. / Credit: Franciscan University

CNA Newsroom, May 14, 2024 / 14:22 pm (CNA).

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito challenged graduates at Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, on Saturday to embrace vital life lessons about courage and personal values that he said can be found in the U.S. Constitution.

“The framers foresaw that troublous times would arise when rulers and people would become restive and the principles of constitutional liberty would be in peril unless established by irreparable law,” Alito said at the May 11 commencement.

“The Constitution of the United States applies to all classes of men at all times and under all circumstances,” he emphasized. “This same fundamental idea that there are certain principles that we cannot compromise without paying a fearsome price applies to our personal lives.” 

Speaking on campus at Finnegan Field, Alito urged the 896 graduating seniors — the largest graduating class at Franciscan in the private Catholic school’s 78-year history — to “go out boldly and change the world.” 

Alito stressed the importance of knowing one’s values.

“We can make the effort to keep in mind what is fundamental and what is permanent in our lives … that is absolutely critical,” he said.

“There are certain moral principles that are true and immutable. These principles of right and wrong are not relative or circumstantial. They are not of our making, and it is not within our power to change them even though at times we might find that convenient.”

Alito — a stalwart conservative of the U.S. Supreme Court known for authoring the majority opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which struck down Roe v. Wade — spoke at length about the law in his address, jokingly saying: “If you invite a lawyer to give a graduation speech you’re going to hear about the law.”

He pointed to the Constitution as more than a document, seeing it as a pure expression of the energy and spirit of the nation.

“Our Constitution has survived and flourished because it was designed to accommodate change. We are a nation of change. When Alexis de Tocqueville toured the United States in the 1840s he marveled at the restlessness of Americans. And since Tocqueville’s day, Americans have never stopped racing towards the future,” he said.

Alito tasked the graduating class with taking away two specific lessons from what the Constitution teaches every American.

“The first,” he said, “is respect for reason and civil discourse. Our legal system is built on the premise that it is possible for fair and open-minded people to solve their problems by reasoning together by a process of rational and respectful argumentation. I hope you will take that approach in your lives.”

The second lesson, he continued, is to pay deference to tradition and past wisdom. Specifically, Alito told students that their pasts can help ground them as they move through life and that friends who truly know the real you prevent you from giving way to the vices of pride and arrogance.

Alito took inspiration for his speech from a few different sources including comedian Rodney Dangerfield and St. John Henry Newman. Quoting Dangerfield from the movie “Back to School,” Alito bluntly told students: “It’s rough out there,” alluding to the adversity they will face as they move forward through life.

Citing St. John Henry Newman, the 19th-century English churchman who wrote and lectured extensively on the need for universities to provide “a comprehensive view of truth in all its branches,” Alito praised Franciscan as one of the “very few colleges” today that “live up to that ideal.”

Pro-life activist Lauren Handy listens during a news conference on the five fetuses found inside the home where she and other anti-abortion activists were living on Capitol Hill at a news conference at the Hyatt Regency on April 5, 2022, in Washington, D.C. / Credit: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

Washington D.C., May 14, 2024 / 13:22 pm (CNA).

Two pro-life activists were sentenced to years in prison in a Washington, D.C., district court today for their involvement in a “rescue” at a local abortion clinic. 

Lauren Handy, 30, was sentenced to four years and nine months in prison for organizing the rescue. John Hinshaw, 69, was sentenced to a year and nine months.

Attorneys from the Thomas More Society who are representing Handy said they will appeal her conviction. 

This comes nearly nine months after Handy, Hinshaw, and seven other pro-life activists were convicted on felony charges of conspiracy against rights and violation of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act for their involvement in an October 2020 rescue at the Washington Surgi-Clinic run by Dr. Cesare Santangelo. Both Handy and Hinshaw were immediately incarcerated and have been in prison since their conviction.

The sentences were ordered by U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, who chided Handy for prioritizing her activism above the “needs” of women, according to local news outlet WUSA9. 

“Neither you nor any of the other co-conspirators showed any compassion, empathy, toward those two women needing medical care,” Kollar-Kotelly said. “Your views took precedence over, frankly, their human needs.”

According to a previous DOJ statement, the activists involved in the rescue used “physical obstruction to injure, intimidate, and interfere with the clinic’s employees and a patient because they were providing or obtaining reproductive health services.”

The DOJ also said the activists “forcefully entered the clinic and set about blockading two clinic doors using their bodies, furniture, chains, and ropes.”

Handy is best known as one of the activists who in 2022 discovered the remains of five late-term aborted babies, known as “the D.C. five,” outside the Washington Surgi-Clinic.

Handy’s group, the Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU), claims that some of these babies bore signs that they were killed in partial-birth abortions, which is illegal under federal law. Despite requests by multiple members of Congress, the office of the D.C. medical examiner has refused to allow any independent investigation into the babies’ deaths. 

Steve Crampton, an attorney with the Thomas More Society, responded to the ruling by saying that “Ms. Handy’s 57-month sentence is a miscarriage of justice, plain and simple.” 

“As I’ve gotten to know Ms. Handy, I’ve seen up close her unwavering passion for pro-life advocacy and resolute dedication to nonviolence,” he went on. “But this fight is far from over, and we eagerly look forward to appealing for Ms. Handy and her co-defendants’ freedom, so that the FACE Act can never again be weaponized by the Department of Justice against its ideological opponents.”

In a statement released shortly before her sentencing, Handy said: “I am at peace with myself and my future. I will go into court with my head held high and heart open.”

“Yes, this time has been challenging, but I refuse to be jaded. Why? Because life goes on... even in jail,” she said. “So I might as well continue to love and cry and scream and dance. That is joy. The feeling of being fully alive without shame. Which is something no court can take from me.” 

The eight other activists — John Hinshaw, William Goodman, Herb Geraghty, Jonathan Darnel, Jean Marshall, Joan Bell, Heather Idoni, and Paulette Harlow — are set to receive their sentences over the next few days.

Signed by President Bill Clinton in 1994, the FACE Act prohibits obstructing access to or destruction of abortion clinics, pregnancy centers, or church property. The law has been criticized by several lawmakers for being unevenly applied against pro-lifers.

This story was updated at 5:59 p.m. ET to include the information on John Hinshaw’s sentencing.

Kansas City Chiefs’ placekicker Harrison Butker speaks to college graduates in his commencement address at Benedictine College on Saturday, May 11, 2024. / Credit: Benedictine College

CNA Staff, May 14, 2024 / 11:38 am (CNA).

Kansas City Chiefs’ placekicker Harrison Butker offered some pointed criticism of Catholic bishops and priests along with advice to college graduates in his commencement address at Benedictine College on Saturday.

Catholic bishops should be more like St. Damien of Molokai and less concerned about what civil and cultural leaders think about them, the three-time Super Bowl winner and outspoken Catholic said. 

St. Damien (1840–1889), a missionary priest from Belgium, spent nearly 16 years ministering to lepers in Hawaii before dying of their disease. 

“His heroism is looked at today as something set apart and unique when ideally it should not be unique at all,” Butker told the graduates at the Catholic liberal arts college in Atchison, Kansas, on May 11, the day after St. Damien’s feast day. “For as a father loves his child, so a shepherd should love his spiritual children, too. That goes even more so for our bishops, these men who are present-day apostles.” 

He said bishops are rightly “not politicians but shepherds,” but that they have given up their influence by not leading properly. 

“Our bishops once had adoring crowds of people kissing their rings and taking in their every word, but now relegate themselves to a position of inconsequential existence. Now, when a bishop of a diocese or the bishops’ conference as a whole puts out an important document on this matter or that, nobody even takes a moment to read it, let alone follow it,” Butker said. 

“No. Today, our shepherds are far more concerned with keeping the doors open to the chancery than they are with saying the difficult stuff out loud. It seems that the only time you hear from your bishops is when it’s time for the annual appeal, whereas we need our bishops to be vocal about the teachings of the Church, setting aside their own personal comfort and embracing their cross,” he said.

He also criticized President Joe Biden and other Catholic leaders. 

“Bad policies and poor leadership have negatively impacted major life issues. Things like abortion, IVF, surrogacy, euthanasia, as well as a growing support for degenerate cultural values in media all stem from the pervasiveness of disorder,” Butker said. 

He noted that Biden made the sign of the cross during a rally in Florida on April 23 in favor of legal abortion while an abortion supporter was criticizing Florida’s law banning abortions after six weeks.

“Our own nation is led by a man who publicly and proudly proclaims his Catholic faith, but at the same time is delusional enough to make the sign of the cross during a pro-abortion rally. He has been so vocal in his support for the murder of innocent babies that I’m sure to many people it appears that you can be both Catholic and pro-choice,” Butker said. 

“He is not alone,” he added. “From the man behind the COVID lockdowns to the people pushing dangerous gender ideologies onto the youth of America, they all have a glaring thing in common. They are Catholic. This is an important reminder that being Catholic alone doesn’t cut it.” 

Butker, 28, kicked the game-tying field goal for the Kansas City Chiefs late in the fourth quarter in Super Bowl LVIII this past February, a year after kicking the game-winning field goal late in the Super Bowl in February 2023.

A practicing Catholic who attends the Latin Mass, Butker is married and has two children. 

In May 2023, he drew attention with his commencement address at his alma mater, Georgia Tech, during which he advised graduates to avoid being “alone and devoid of purpose” and to combat loneliness, anxiety, and depression with what he called “one controversial antidote that I believe will have a lasting impact for generations to come: Get married and start a family.” 

Benedictine is a Catholic school in northeastern Kansas associated with the Benedictine religious order that has been endorsed by The Cardinal Newman Society as “a faithful Catholic college.” The school has about 2,100 undergraduates. 

Butker’s approximately 20-minute speech at Benedictine had little of the light banter and motivational encouragement typically found at graduation ceremonies, a point he noted. 

“I know that my message today had a little less fluff than is expected for these speeches, but I believe that this audience and this venue is the best place to speak openly and honestly about who we are and where we all want to go, which is heaven,” Butker said. 

To be faithful, he said, Catholics must address publicly hot-button cultural issues. 

“These are the sorts of things we are told in polite society to not bring up. You know, the difficult and unpleasant things. But if we are going to be men and women for this time in history, we need to stop pretending that the church of nice is a winning proposition,” he said. “We must always speak and act in charity, but never mistake charity for cowardice.” 

Butker said closing the churches during the coronavirus shutdowns of 2020 is an example of bishops shirking their responsibility. 

“As we saw during the pandemic, too many bishops were not leaders at all. They were motivated by fear, fear of being sued, fear of being removed, fear of being disliked. They showed by their actions, intentional or unintentional, that the sacraments don’t actually matter,” Butker said. “Because of this, countless people died alone, without access to the sacraments, and it’s a tragedy we must never forget.” 

Butker did not name any particular Catholic clerics. But along with bishops he also criticized priests. 

“There is not enough time today for me to list all the stories of priests and bishops misleading their flocks, but none of us can blame ignorance anymore and just blindly proclaim that ‘That’s what Father said,’” Butker said. “Because sadly, many priests we are looking to for leadership are the same ones who prioritize their hobbies or even photos with their dogs and matching outfits for the parish directory.”

“Focusing on my vocation while praying and fasting for these men will do more for the Church than me complaining about her leaders,” Butker said.

To all the graduates, he recommended that they evangelize wherever they go.

“Never be afraid to profess the one holy, Catholic, and apostolic Church, for this is the Church that Jesus Christ established, through which we receive sanctifying grace,” Butker said.

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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.