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A man walks past an anti-racism mural by street artist Nath Murdoch in Peterborough, England, June 2, 2020. (CNS photo/Joe Giddens, PA Images via Reuters)
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Statement of U.S. Bishop Chairmen in Wake of Death of George Floyd and National Protests
WASHINGTON – Seven U.S. bishop chairmen of committees within the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops have issued a statement in the wake of the death of Mr. George Floyd and the protests which have broken out in Minneapolis and in other cities in the United States.
Bishop Shelton J. Fabre of Houma-Thibodaux, chairman of the Ad Hoc Committee Against Racism; Archbishop Nelson J. Pérez of Philadelphia, chairman of the Committee on Cultural Diversity in the Church; Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City, chairman of the Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development; Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann of Kansas City in Kansas, chairman of the Committee on Pro-Life Activities; Bishop Joseph C. Bambera of Scranton, chairman of the Committee for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs; Bishop David G. O’Connell, auxiliary bishop of Los Angeles, chairman of the Subcommittee on the Catholic Campaign for Human Development; and Bishop Joseph N. Perry, auxiliary bishop of Chicago, chairman of the Subcommittee on African American Affairs have issued the following statement:
We are broken-hearted, sickened, and outraged to watch another video of an African American man being killed before our very eyes. What’s more astounding is that this is happening within mere weeks of several other such occurrences. This is the latest wake-up call that needs to be answered by each of us in a spirit of determined conversion.
Racism is not a thing of the past or simply a throwaway political issue to be bandied about when convenient. It is a real and present danger that must be met head on. As members of the Church, we must stand for the more difficult right and just actions instead of the easy wrongs of indifference. We cannot turn a blind eye to these atrocities and yet still try to profess to respect every human life. We serve a God of love, mercy, and justice.
While it is expected that we will plead for peaceful non-violent protests, and we certainly do, we also stand in passionate support of communities that are understandably outraged. Too many communities around this country feel their voices are not being heard, their complaints about racist treatment are unheeded, and we are not doing enough to point out that this deadly treatment is antithetical to the Gospel of Life.
As we said eighteen months ago in our most recent pastoral letter against racism, Open Wide Our Hearts, for people of color some interactions with police can be fraught with fear and even danger. People of good conscience must never turn a blind eye
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when citizens are being deprived of their human dignity and even their lives. Indifference is not an option. “As bishops, we unequivocally state that racism is a life issue.”
We join Archbishop Bernard A. Hebda of St. Paul and Minneapolis in praying for the repose of the soul of Mr. George Floyd and all others who have lost their lives in a similar manner. We plead for an end to the violence in the wake of this tragedy and for the victims of the rioting. We pray for comfort for grieving families and friends. We pray for peace across the United States, particularly in Minnesota, while the legal process moves forward. We also anticipate a full investigation that results in rightful accountability and actual justice.
We join our brother bishops to challenge everyone to come together, particularly with those who are from different cultural backgrounds. In this encounter, let us all seek greater understanding amongst God’s people. So many people who historically have been disenfranchised continue to experience sadness and pain, yet they endeavor to persevere and remain people of great faith. We encourage our pastors to encounter and more authentically accompany them, listen to their stories, and learn from them, finding substantive ways to enact systemic change. Such encounters will start to bring about the needed transformation of our understanding of true life, charity, and justice in the United States. Hopefully, then there will be many voices speaking out and seeking healing against the evil of racism in our land.
As we anticipate the Solemnity of Pentecost this weekend, we call upon all Catholics to pray and work toward a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit. Let us pray for a supernatural desire to rid ourselves of the harm that bias and prejudice cause. We call upon Catholics to pray to the Holy Spirit for the Spirit of Truth to touch the hearts of all in the United States and to come down upon our criminal justice and law enforcement systems. Finally, let each and every Catholic, regardless of their ethnicity, beg God to heal our deeply broken view of each other, as well as our deeply broken society.
“Vatican official: Racism is ‘spiritual’ virus that must be wiped out
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Much like the coronavirus pandemic, racism is a “spiritual” virus that has spread throughout the world and must be eradicated, said Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life. “I would compare (racism) to COVID-19, but it is a virus of the spirit, a cultural virus that, if not isolated, spreads quickly,” Archbishop Paglia told Catholic News Service June 1. The Italian archbishop commented on the May 25 death of George Floyd while in police custody in Minneapolis and the subsequent protests throughout the United States. Floyd, 46, was arrested by police on suspicion of forgery. Once he was handcuffed, a white officer pinned him down on the street, putting his knee on Floyd’s neck for eight minutes. A now widely circulated video shows Floyd repeatedly saying, “I can’t breathe.” He appears to lose consciousness or die and was later declared dead at the hospital. Archbishop Paglia told CNS that just as people were called to self-isolate in order to care for one another, racism can only be defeated by people caring for each other.
Supreme Court rejects appeals to lift restrictions on congregation size By Carol Zimmermann Catholic News Service
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- A divided Supreme Court May 29 chose not to intervene in an emergency appeal by a church in Southern California to lift COVID-19 restrictions that limit congregation sizes.
The justices responded just before midnight with a 5-4 vote in the case filed May 26 by South Bay United Pentecostal Church in Chula Vista, California, near San Diego. The church had argued that California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s reopening orders violated the Constitution because they placed fewer restrictions on some secular businesses than they did on houses of worship.
The church wanted to hold its regular services Sunday, May 31, on Pentecost. Currently, the state’s restrictions limit church attendance to 100 attendees or 25% of the church capacity, whichever is lower.
“The precise question of when restrictions on particular social activities should be lifted during the pandemic is a dynamic and fact-intensive matter subject to reasonable disagreement,” wrote Chief Justice John Roberts in an opinion concurring with the unsigned ruling.
In his five-paragraph opinion, Roberts stressed these guidelines appear “consistent with the free exercise clause of the First Amendment.”
“Similar or more severe restrictions apply to comparable secular gatherings, including lectures, concerts, movie showings, spectator sports and theatrical performances, where large groups of people gather in close proximity for extended periods of time,” he wrote.
He also said the state’s order “exempts or treats more leniently only dissimilar activities, such as operating grocery stores, banks and laundromats, in which people neither congregate in large groups nor remain in close proximity for extended periods.”
The chief justice also noted that COVID-19 has killed thousands of people in California and more than 100,000 in the United States with still “no known cure, no effective treatment and no vaccine.” He also noted people “may be infected but asymptomatic” and could unknowingly infect others. The state’s order restricting crowd sizes, he said, was a means to “address this extraordinary health emergency.”
A three-page dissent written by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch, argued that restrictions on the number of participants at church services did violate the Constitution.
Kavanaugh argued that businesses that are not subject to size restrictions, such as supermarkets, restaurants, hair salons and cannabis dispensaries, are comparable to gatherings at houses of worship.
“The church and its congregants simply want to be treated equally,” he wrote, adding that California “trusts its residents and any number of businesses to adhere to proper social distancing and hygiene practices.”
Richard Garnett, law school professor at the University of Notre Dame and director of the university’s Program on Church, State and Society, said the court’s decision shows how “it can be challenging to identify discrimination or unequal treatment.”
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“It is well established that governments and officials may not discriminate against religious activities, even when it is regulating in the interest of the public good. Religious freedom is not absolute, and it is subject to limits, but regulations may not single out religious exercise for disapproval or disadvantage,” he said.
In a statement, Garnett said arguments about equality and discrimination involve the question: “compared to what?” And in this case, the justices disagreed about what kinds of activities church services should be compared to for public health purposes.
Kavanaugh said the same rules for stores should apply to churches and the court’s majority said the same restrictions on churches also are applied to gatherings like concerts, movie showings, spectator sports and theatrical performances.
Garnett said the ruling “does not necessarily mean that California’s current regulations are justified or constitutional or that they would be upheld after more developed and careful review.”
Charles LiMandri, special counsel to the Thomas More Society, a national nonprofit law firm based in Chicago that represented the California church, said the court’s ruling was disappointing, but the case is “far from over.”
He said the decision was based on “the high standard required to get an emergency injunction” but the case would likely make its way to the high court again and the next time it should get “a better result for religious liberty.”
On May 29, the court also, without noted dissent, turned down a request from two Romanian American Christian churches in the Chicago area arguing that Illinois’ reopening guidelines, with its 10-person limit for houses of worship, violated the Constitution.
In a two-paragraph order, the court said the state’s public health department had just issued new guidance on church-participation restrictions May 28 and the churches could file “a new motion for appropriate relief if circumstances warrant.”
Knights ‘praying for years’ for beatification, says Anderson
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Father Michael McGivney, the founder of the Knights of Columbus, may be an ideal prospective saint for the current age, said Carl A. Anderson, supreme knight of the international fraternal order. “We’ve been praying for years for this to occur, and finally this day has arrived,” he told Catholic News Service May 27. First, he’s a pro-life hero. The miracle recognized by the Vatican paving the way for his beatification CNS file photo occurred in 2015 and involved an U.S. baby, still in utero, with a life-threatening condition that, under most circumstances, could have led to an abortion. He was found to be healed after his family prayed to Father McGivney. “The Vatican likes to be the one to discuss more details than that,” Anderson said. The Vatican announced early May 27 that Pope Francis, who met with the board of directors of the Knights of Columbus in February, had signed the decree recognizing the miracle through the intercession of Father McGivney. Once he is beatified, he will be given the title “Blessed.”
Pope Francis has approved a miracle attributed to the intercession of Father Michael McGivney, founder of the Knights of Columbus, clearing the way for his beatification. Father McGivney is pictured in an undated portrait. (CNS file photo) See POPEMIRACLE-MCGIVNEY May 27, 2020.
Learn from people’s suffering, forge new ways of living, pope says
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- As pain, fear and anger fueled riots across the United States, Pope Francis wrote to the priests of the Diocese of Rome, urging them to learn from the suffering of the coronavirus and start building new communities of care for one another. “Dear brothers,” he wrote, “as a priestly community we are called to announce and prophesy the future, like the sentinel announcing the dawn that brings a new day: Either it will be something new, or it will be much, much worse.” Pope Francis said he wanted to write the letter, released by the Vatican May 30, the eve of Pentecost, because he had not been able to celebrate the Holy Week chrism Mass with the priests of his diocese. The letter made no mention of what was happening in the United States, but it did trace an outline of attitudes and actions Christians should have in facing the aftermath of the epidemic and forging a new way of relating to others. Pope Francis also said he had heard from many priests about the suffering and challenges they faced as they watched parishioners die from the coronavirus or work to the point of exhaustion in health care and other essential services, yet the lockdown meant they could not celebrate Mass with their people or, in most cases, visit face to face with people who were hurting.
Catholic leaders in COVID crisis encouraged by faith, others’ example WASHINGTON (CNS) -- In a May 28 Facebook Live discussion, two Catholic leaders stressed how the current pandemic is far from over and how in the midst of so much suffering they also have witnessed incredible moments of grace. The discussion, on the Facebook page of Faith in Public Life, a Washington-based advocacy group, was led by John Gehring, the group’s Catholic program director. He spoke with Sister Kathleen Gallivan, a Sister of Notre Dame de Namur and director of spiritual care services at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, and Kevin Ryan, president and CEO of Covenant House in New York, a global network that serves homeless and trafficked youth. When asked what the past few months have been like, Sister Kathleen said the hospital, in the heart of Boston, at one point had 200 COVID-19 patients. “It’s like you’re in a war zone is what it feels like a lot,” she said of the tests needed just to come in the building and the required masks and protocol. A priority for her office is to link patients, who are not allowed visitors, with their families, primarily through donated iPads or tablets. The office also has been providing staff support for medical personnel facing not only physical losses but personal challenges and fears when they go home each day, worried they could bring the virus with them. Ryan said Covenant House has faced the challenge of many of its young people and staff members alike suffering from COVID-19. The organization converted rooms, and an entire floor in its New York City location, to provide health care. A few staff members had to be hospitalized and two died from COVID-related symptoms.
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From Vatican Gardens, pope leads rosary to pray for pandemic’s end
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- With a religious sister who survived COVID-19 and a woman who lost her mother to the coronavirus, Pope Francis led the recitation of rosary and asked Mary to intercede to save the world from the pandemic. More than 100 people joined Pope Francis May 30 for the early evening prayer in the Vatican Gardens at a replica of the grotto at Lourdes,
Pope Francis prays at the Lourdes grotto during a Marian prayer service in the Vatican France. More Gardens May 30, 2020. CNS photo/Vatican than 50 Marian Media shrines around the world, including Lourdes and the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, were connected by satellite. Pope Francis did not make remarks or offer a meditation during the service. Instead he opened and closed the evening with the prayers he had asked Catholics to pray during the month of May, a month traditionally dedicated to Mary. He began by entrusting everyone to Mary under the title “Health of the Sick.” Each decade of the rosary was led by a person directly impacted by the virus, including COVID-19 survivors Giovanni De Cerce and Sister Zelia Andrighetti, superior general of the Daughters of St. Camillus.
VATICAN MUSEUMS REOPEN
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The Vatican Museums, Vatican Apostolic Archives and Vatican Library will reopen June 1, almost three months after being closed as part of the lockdown to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. The closure of the museums dealt a major financial blow to the Vatican; more than 6 million people visit the museums each year, generating an income of more than $100 million. The closure of the archives interrupted scholars’ long
A man wearing a protective face mask visits the Vatican Museums June 1, 2020. The museums had been closed for months in an effort to slow the spread of the coronavirus. (CNS photo/Guglielmo Mangiapane, Reuters)
anticipated access to the archives of Pope Pius XII. Material related to the pope and his actions during World War II became available to scholars March 2, but that access ended a week later with the lockdown. To reopen the facilities, the Vatican has instituted a series of precautionary measures in line with health and safety guidelines. Access to the museums, archives and library will be by reservation only, face masks are required, and social distancing must be maintained. A notice on the archives’ website informed scholars that while it would reopen June 1, it will close again June 26 for its usual summer break. Only 15 scholars a day will be admitted in June and only in the morning.
