Rome Newsroom, May 8, 2020 / 02:00 pm (CNA).- After the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith ruled that the hospitals of the Brothers of Charity in Belgium can no longer be considered as Catholic, the religious order is seeking to prevent the hospital network from using its name, their general superior told CNA. 

Br. René Stockman, general superior of the Congregation of the Brothers of Charity, said he fought to keep the Catholic identity and mission of the hospitals intact. But when the Brothers of Charity Organization, the non-profit group which manages the hospitals, approved pro-euthanasia guidelines 2017, he immediately referred the matter to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which issued its decision at the end of March.

The CDF decision was communicated in a letter dated March 30, stating that "with deep sadness" the "psychiatric hospitals managed by the Provincialate of the Brothers of Charity association in Belgium will no longer be able to consider themselves Catholic institutions."

Stockman said he was now working to stop the 15-hospital network run by the Brothers of Charity Organization, the non-profit which brought in the pro-euthanasia policy, from continuing to use the order’s name.

“As a congregation,” Br. Stockman said, “we will clearly ask them not to use the name Brothers of Charity anymore for the psychiatric hospitals,” adding that ”we will do everything to come to clear arrangements without going to legal fight.” 

“We hope that we can make it [work] in that way,” he said, but the non-profit’s board have signalled resistance. 

Raf De Rycke, president of the Brothers of Charity Organization, said on May 5 that he intends to continue using the order’s name, and claimed the hospitals fulfil the same mission, and the same vision as ever, despite bringing in euthanasia.

The Stockman said the order was always adamant that they would never accept the possibility of euthanasia in their hospitals, but only a few brothers remain working in the hospitals, mostly in management roles. The order has asked them to leave their positions, now that they can no longer be considered Catholic. 

But, he said, “there are many doctors who don’t agree with the situation and they made their objection of conscience, but it becomes more difficult for them in an environment where the management is developing clear guidelines on how to perform the process and moving towards euthanasia when a psychiatric patient is asking for it.”

Belgium has ushered in ever-expanding access to euthanasia in recent years, including for mental health patients, even minors, suffering from conditions like depression. Belgian law prohibits contractual clauses or other provisions prohibiting doctors working in institutions to euthanize patients. A doctor or nurse still has the individual freedom of conscience to refuse to euthanize or participate to euthanasia, but the same freedom is no longer afforded to insitutions. 

Stockman said there was no question of not complying with Rome’s decision, and he hoped it would inspire others to reconsider the gravity of the spread of euthanasia.

“We hope that also others will reflect on it, especially in the field of mental health care. It is the first time that the Holy See through the CDF has given a clear answer on the growing practice of euthanasia in the field of mental health care,” he told CNA.  

Belgium has ushered in ever-expanding access to euthanasia in recent years, including for mental health patients, even minors, suffering from conditions like depression.

In an official statement published on their website, the Brothers of Charity Organization has accused Stockman of using the issue of euthanasia "within a broader and longer-lasting conflict” between the order and the non-profit on the use of assets. 

The non-profit suggested that Stockman has long wanted to devote more resources to the Brothers’ missions in Africa and Asian, as vocations have dried up in Belgium, where most of the order’s members are over eighty. Meanwhile, in the developing world, the congregation is growing; last year Br. Stockman welcomed 27 new novices in Nairobi.

The Brothers of Charity Organization frames the dispute as one of control over assets, and its statement said they "do not see the need to adapt our operations after this [CDF] letter because we are convinced that we are acting correctly."

The situation is being monitored closely by other Catholic organizations in the country who see it as a possible test case. So far, the bishops have remained circumspect.

In a May 6 statement, the Belgian Episcopal Conference said that "the bishops experience this as an excruciating and complex affair, in which different types of topics and different lines of responsibility meet." 

The conference called for "a prolonged dialogue between all those involved,” while stressing their "utmost appreciation for the commitment of the Brothers of Charity in Belgium and all their employees to the benefit of mentally disabled, sick or injured people."

Calls for dialogue, however, may prove wishful thinking. As part of its review of the situation, the CDF sent Bishop Jan Hendriks, auxiliary of Amsterdam, as an apostolic visitor to try to resolve the situation, but, the Congregation said, he was unable to find "a viable solution that avoids any form of responsibility of the institution for euthanasia."

The conference also said that "based on their pastoral responsibility, the bishops will continue to work for unity and solidarity in the ecclesial community. They maintain their trust and will continue to cooperate with all the health institutions of Christian civil society."

Stockman did not comment on the bishops’ conference statement.

“Of course,” he said, “we feel, as a congregation, alone [in this fight], but [we are proceeding] in line with the doctrine of the Church, with the clear statement made by our general chapter in 2018 and with our charism of charity.” 

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 8, 2020 / 03:10 pm (CNA).- The Diocese of Springfield, Illinois, said that the Church must return to “normal life” after the governor announced plans to ban large gatherings until a COVID-19 vaccine or treatment is available.

Earlier in the week, the state’s Governor JB Pritzker unveiled a five-phase “Restore Illinois” plan that bans gatherings of more than 50 people until a vaccine or treatment is available, or the virus has stopped spreading for a sustained period of time. Health officials have said that a vaccine for the new coronavirus (COVID-19) might not be available for 12 to 18 months. 

Currently, people in the state are allowed to attend religious services of 10 or fewer people, but no gatherings of more than 10 people are permitted until phase 4 of Pritzker’s plan, and the state wouldn’t even be able to “advance” to phase 3 until May 29.

“The Church has certainly done her part in making great sacrifices to slow the spread of this virus,” Andrew Hansen, director of communications for the diocese of Springfield, Illinois, told CNA on Friday.

“That said, the Church must return to her normal life of liturgy and communal worship,” Hansen said, while emphasizing precautions such as social distancing “will likely be the appropriate path longer term for the return to some version of normalcy for the Church.”

Previously, in-person or drive-in religious services were banned in the state. The Thomas More Society filed a lawsuit on behalf of a church in Lena, Ill., on April 30. Later that evening a paragraph was added to the governor’s executive order allowing for people to leave their homes to attend religious services of ten or fewer people, the society’s president Peter Breen told CNA.

The next day, May 1, the archdiocese of Chicago announced it would be resuming public Masses with 10 or fewer people.

According to the “Restore Illinois” plan, there could not be any gathering of between 11 and 50 people in size until phase 4 of the plan—“Revitalization.”

That phase can start only when certain conditions have been met: the positivity rate of COVID tests is at or under 20% and doesn’t rise by more than 10 points over 14 days; hospital admissions don’t increase for 28 days; and hospitals have at least 14% “surge capacity” in ICU beds, medical and surgical beds, and ventilators.

Pitzker clarified in a Wednesday press conference that religious services would be part of this 50-person limit in phase 4, and schools would not be allowed to reopen until then, raising questions of how tuition-dependent Catholic schools might fare in the fall if remote learning is still widely utilized.

The state’s superintendent of education has said that at least some schools might have to begin the new school year with remote learning, or with students attending classes in-person only on certain days.

“So we continue to hope and pray schools will reopen next school year. Certainly, when our schools reopen, new measures and precautions will be in place,” Hansen told CNA.

The president of DePaul University, located in Chicago, announced earlier this week that the university already plans to “minimize our footprint on campus this fall,” and that an announcement of the fall plans could happen by June 15.

CNA Staff, May 8, 2020 / 04:15 pm (CNA).- As parishes and dioceses across the country deal with a drop in collections and the prospects of layoffs amid the pandemic, many parishes have managed to avail themselves of government loans designed to cover eight weeks of payroll expenses.

CBS News reported Friday that an estimated 12,000-13,000 of the 17,000 Catholic parishes in the U.S. had applied for Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) payroll loans from the Small Business Administration (SBA), and 9,000 so far had received them.

Guidance from the SBA on eligibility for the loans states that “no otherwise eligible organization will be disqualified from receiving a loan because of the religious nature, religious identity, or religious speech of the organization.”

Religious organizations are eligible for the loans as long as they meet the requirements of Section 501(c)(3) nonprofit and employ 500 or fewer people, the SBA said.

“The PPP isn't about the federal government assisting houses of worship or churches,” Pat Markey, the executive director of the Diocesan Fiscal Management Conference, told CBS News.

“PPP is about keeping people on payrolls, and a large segment of our society [in] the not for profit world...are churches and houses of worship. And they have people on payrolls too. So, if what this is about is keeping people on payrolls, then we all should have availability to do that.”

The Diocesan Fiscal Management Conference did not reply by press time to CNA’s request for additional comment.

Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act March 27 to help relieve the economy during the coronavirus pandemic.

The CARES Act initially authorized some $350 billion in loans to small businesses, intended to allow them to continue to pay their employees. The loans were given on a first come, first serve basis.

The second round of funding, with some $310 billion in additional funds available, began April 27.

The loans were capped at $10 million, were open to businesses with fewer than 500 employees per location, and were intended to cover two months of payroll costs.

The federal government promised to forgive the loans if a business used at least 75% of the funds to maintain its payroll at “pre-pandemic levels” for eight weeks after the loan is disbursed, the New York Times reports.

The remaining money could be used only to pay for certain expenses, such as a mortgage, rent, and utilities, according to the Times.

A survey of Protestant pastors by LifeWay Research found that about 40% had applied for PPP loans with more than half of them reporting being approved.

NPR reports that synagogues have also applied for government funding, though in a smaller proportion— of nearly 4,000 synagogues in the United States, about 250 were approved for PPP loans in the first round of lending, according to surveys by the Jewish Federations of North America and the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America.

The PPP has been subject to some criticism since its launch, including from those who say business owners with criminal records have been excluded from the program thus far.

In addition, several large companies, such as Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse, have received multi-million dollar loans through the program. Some of these large companies, such as Shake Shack, have since returned their loans.

Two New York dioceses— Rochester and Buffalo— are suing the Small Business Administration for access to PPP funds, after they were denied loans because of their bankruptcy status.

An SBA rule stipulated that the funds would not go to bankruptcy debtors. Both the dioceses of Rochester and Buffalo have filed for bankruptcy in the past several months, after being named in hundreds of clergy sex abuse lawsuits filed under New York Child Victims Protection Act.

 

Denver Newsroom, May 8, 2020 / 05:29 pm (CNA).- Mother’s Day is going to look different for most families this year, due to the coronavirus pandemic.

For Catholics, some churches are in the process of slowly re-opening public Masses, but the dispensation from the Sunday obligation continues to stand, as the virus has not gone away and a cure or vaccine has yet to be found.

While most Catholics are eager to return to Mass, a small group of Catholics are relieved that they will not be sitting in a public pew this Mother’s Day.

“We actually heard from one woman who said, ‘I kind of feel badly about saying this, but I'm sort of glad that we won't be in the pews this year for Mother's Day,’” Ann Koshute, founder of Springs in the Desert Catholic ministry, told CNA.


“That's something that we hear and that everybody I think on the team has experienced at one point in this journey,” she said - the desire to avoid Mass on Mother’s Day. That’s because Koshute, along with other members of her ministry, have had painful experiences with infertility, and the customary Mother’s Day blessing given to mothers at many parishes that day can bring their grief and sense of loss poignantly to the fore.


“I think that so often people in our own families, our friends, and even our pastors don't really understand the full extent of the pain and the grief or even the full extent of the issue of infertility, of how many couples are really dealing with it,” she said.


The pain of infertility, and the lack of resources available to Catholics on the subject, was why Koshute and her friend, Kimberly Henkel, founded Springs in the Desert, a Catholic ministry to spiritually and emotionally support women and couples experiencing infertility and infant loss. Originally, Henkel and Koshute, who have both experienced infertility, thought they might write a book. But they decided to start with a ministry website and a blog that could bring people together and allow for other women and couples to share their experiences. The group is relatively new, and held its first retreat in Philadelphia in December. They were set to hold a second one this weekend - Mother’s Day weekend - in the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, when, well, the pandemic hit.

Now, they’ve moved the retreat online and opened it up to Catholics across the country - and they’ve been overwhelmed by the response.

“We thought that we would be really excited if maybe a couple dozen people found out about it and came. We are over 100 participants now. And it's free and it's going to be available all weekend,” Koshute said. The retreat is trying to address the emotional and spiritual experience of infertility and loss for a broad range of people, Henkel said - from mothers who have miscarried, to women who are past child-bearing years and still grieving the loss of infertility, to women “who feel like their biological clocks are ticking and just haven’t met the right guy.” But now that it's a virtual, pre-recorded, watch-at-your-leisure retreat, it also has the potential to reach a population that is often more reluctant to gather in groups and talk about their experiences of infertility: men. “It's mostly women who are emailing us (about the retreat), although we know that many of their husbands will watch with them. But we've also had a few men email us,” Koshute said.


“One in particular, it just really touched my heart. And he said that he was searching the web for help for his wife on Mother's Day. And I was just so filled with praise and thanksgiving to God for that, for a husband to see that hurt in his wife and to want to find a way to help her,” she added. Men and women typically experience the grief of infertility quite differently, Koshute noted. “For us women, it's so visceral because life is conceived within us and we carry that life. But for a man, it's so different,” she said.

“(Men are) kind of distant from that experience until the child is actually born. And so I think many times men, the grief and the burden that they carry is their wife's. They really carry her sadness and I think feel at a loss because they want to make everything right. They want to fix this, and they want to make her whole. And the mystery of infertility is that it's not that simple. And that's one of the things that makes it so difficult,” she said. Henkel said she experienced her own difficulties in trying to discuss infertility with her husband. Now that they’ve experienced the joy of growing their family through adoption, she said, he is much more open to inviting other men to share their experiences. Henkel said she is hoping that an additional benefit of this retreat being online is that it will facilitate discussions between couples watching the videos together. Both Henkel and Koshute said that while the experience of infertility and loss is painful, and they want to help couples acknowledge and accept that pain, they also want Springs in the Desert to be a positive and supportive experience for couples and women, where they can find hope and redemption even in their suffering. One of the topics they focus on is how all women are called to motherhood in their lives, whether it is spiritual or biological.

“My experience has shown me that my motherhood is really engaged in so many ways that I never considered before,” Koshute said.

“Not just with my godson or with other children in my family, but with women who are older than I who are friends and who might come to me with a difficulty or problem and I can help them,” or by helping family members in need or through charitable works, she added. “That's one of the messages that we try to get across to women and to couples as well, that those kinds of things, what we would maybe refer to as spiritual motherhood, is not illegitimate,” she said.

“It's not second-place. It's a real way of engaging and living out our motherhood. It's also not a replacement for a baby. So it's not as if you go out and volunteer in your community and now you won't have this longing for a child anymore. But we've really found through our own experience and through talking with other women that the more we kind of put ourselves out there and give ourselves to others, the more that we can begin to see that motherhood enacted in us.”

Henkel said she also likes to encourage couples to look at the ways God is calling them to be fruitful in their marriages outside of biological children.

“We really encourage these couples that they are not forgotten, they're not being punished. That God loves them so much and that he has something amazing for them. He's using this to draw them near to him and to allow them to cry out to him and ask for him to guide them, to lead them, to give them his love and show them what fruitfulness he has for them, what place in ministry and mission he has for them.” Henkel and her husband in particular like to share with couples their experience of foster care as one example of where God might be calling them to be fruitful. After a frustrating and expensive experience with some adoption agencies, Henkel and her husband decided to look into giving a home to children through foster care.

“Here is a situation where these children really need families,” she said. “It's hard because there's no guarantee you're going to get to keep this child, so there's a sense of this new greater level of having to learn how to trust God.” “I think that with a couple discerning that fruitfulness, it's also discerning - where is God really calling you? There's so much need in this world. And he wants to use us.”

Couples interested in the Springs in the Desert Mother’s Day weekend retreat can sign up for free online at the Springs in the Desert website. Content will be uploaded and available for anyone who registers, Henkel said, even if they register late. The retreat team will also be hosting a live talk on Sunday, May 10 at 2 p.m. Eastern on the ministry’s Facebook page.

“There's a place for you in Springs of the Desert,” Henkel added. “There's so many women who have reached out to us in Philly. We added several more women to our group, to our team, our official team, women who came to the retreat. One woman had come there and she said she had had a miscarriage, and neither one of us has experienced that. So we said, please join us. We want your voice.”

“We're trying to really bring the voices of many different women to our team so that people will feel there is somebody that is talking they can really relate to. Because there are all of these different situations, but they've got obviously a very similar undercurrent.”

Vatican City, May 9, 2020 / 04:00 am (CNA).- The devil uses envy to try to thwart the proclamation of the Gospel, Pope Francis said at his morning Mass Saturday.

In his homily in the chapel at Casa Santa Marta, May 9, the pope reflected on the day’s first reading, Acts 13:44-52, in which the Jewish community at Antioch rejects St. Paul’s preaching about Jesus. 

He said: “On the one hand there is the Lord, there is the Holy Spirit who makes the Church grow, and it grows ever more: this is true. But on the other hand, there is the evil spirit that seeks to destroy the Church.” 

After citing other examples in the Acts of the Apostles where the apostles faced rejection, the pope asked: “And what is the devil's instrument to destroy the Gospel proclamation? Envy. The Book of Wisdom [2:24] says it clearly: ‘Through the devil's envy sin has entered the world’ -- envy, jealousy, here. Always this bitter, bitter feeling.” 

Reflecting on this enduring struggle, Pope Francis quoted St. Augustine of Hippo, who wrote in “The City of God” that “the Church progresses on her pilgrimage amidst this world's persecutions and God's consolations.”

“A Church that has no difficulty lacks something,” he said. “The devil is too calm. And if the devil is calm, things are not going well. Always the difficulty, the temptation, the struggle... the jealousy that destroys. The Holy Spirit creates the harmony of the Church, and the evil spirit destroys. Until today.” 

The pope noted that in the first reading the community at Antioch turned the leading women and men of the city against the apostles. He observed that temporal powers are often an instrument through which envy is stirred up against Christians. 

He said: “Let us be careful with the preaching of the Gospel: never to fall, to put our trust in temporal powers and money. The trust of Christians is Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit that He sent, and it is precisely the Holy Spirit who is the leaven, it is the strength that makes the Church grow.” 

“Yes, the Church goes ahead, in peace, with resignation, joyful: between ‘the consolations of God and the persecutions of the world.’”

The pope led those watching via livestream in an act of spiritual communion, composed by St. Alphonsus Liguori, founder of the Redemptorists.

He prayed: “My Jesus, I believe that you are present in the most Blessed Sacrament. I love You above all things and I desire to receive You into my soul. Since I cannot now receive You sacramentally, come at least spiritually into my heart. I embrace You as if You were already there, and unite myself wholly to You. Never permit me to be separated from You.”

The pope ended the celebration with adoration and benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. The congregation then sang the Easter Marian antiphon “Regina caeli.”

At the start of Mass, the pope noted that May 9 is the feast day of St. Louise de Marillac, the French founder of the Daughters of Charity. Her feast normally falls on March 15 but was transferred this year because it fell on a Sunday in Lent. A painting of the 17th-century saint was brought to the pope’s chapel to mark the occasion. 

The Daughters of Charity belong to the Vincentian family. Vincentian nuns live at the Casa Santa Marta, the pope’s residence, and run a pediatric dispensary at the Vatican.

At the start of Mass, the pope said: “Today is the commemoration of St. Louise de Marillac: let us pray for the Vincentian sisters who have run this clinic, this hospital, for almost 100 years and have worked here, in Santa Marta, for this hospital. May the Lord bless the sisters.”

Between 17 and 23 December 2010, the team of OM Mexico and a group of volunteers gave away 200 sandals to children in the poor Mexican farming state of Chiapas.

A group of fourteen OM volunteers recently started organising meetings for ten- to thirteen-year-olds in Mexico: the ‘Butterfly Club’. It´s a weekly gathering of thirty young girls in Hermosillo, Mexico. They come from a vulnerable environment with broken families that lack many basic resources.

God miraculously provides food for a much larger crowd than OM Mexico had planned for during their July outreach to a prison in Oaxaca.

OM Mexico meets with young people seeking to serve God in missions during Expomision in Sonora, Mexico.

Participants in OM Mexico's clothing exchange swop clothing items and support missions at the same time.

Times are changing for OM Mexico, with new staff and a new office.

New OM team members feel encouraged to be an instrument of God in Mexico.

It's an unforgettable experience!” OM Mexico’s missions training impacts one participant’s life, who then returns to the training as a staff member.

Participants from seven churches share the Gospel in an outreach organised by OM Mexico in Monclova, Coahuila—a city known for drug trafficking.

Marco Salas and his wife SeRah Kim have taken on the leadership of OM Mexico. They were encouraged by many fellow OM workers.

For 10 years she was forced into prostitution by her husband. With the help of OM Mexico, Rocio is now building a new life.

Veracruz, Mexico :: Logos Hope is welcomed to Mexico with fanfare and excitement as people get behind the endeavour of sharing knowledge, help and hope.

Missionaries share the gospel and bring freedom in a little farming village.

Veracruz, Mexico :: Visitors to Logos Hope are delighted to learn they have longer to visit the ship than originally scheduled.

Veracruz, Mexico :: An overview of the various initiatives crewmembers have dispersed to while Logos Hope undergoes her annual maintenance.

Veracruz, Mexico :: A team from Logos Hope points homeless people to Christ at a church outreach.

Tampico, Mexico :: Children visiting Logos Hope learn that spreading love and helping others can make the world a better place.

Progreso, Mexico :: A stalwart captain who's served on all four vessels reflects on 38 years of incredible experiences for his family at sea.

OM worker discovers unlikely friendships among a group of 'misfit toys' in North Africa.

Sometimes in ministry in North Africa it's the small acts of obedience that make the biggest difference.

An OM writer spends a week in North Africa sipping café crème and learning about friendship evangelism.

A teacher in North Africa uses a special dessert to explain the concept of grace.

A worker becomes friends with twin sisters and sees God transform both lives.

God uses a new believer in North Africa to release legal paperwork for the first missions training centre in the district.

Weekly prayers with cleaning ladies allows long-term worker to build relationships and share Jesus.

Long-term OM workers organize weekends of intercessory art, helping community connect creativity and prayer.

Professional experience as a teacher and personal relationships on the field equipped one long-term worker to teach at a start-up English-speaking school.

Long-term worker teaches Transform seminar about loving Muslim women, encouraging two participants to deepen relationships with Muslim friends back home.

Transform participants travel to North African countries, experiencing the culture and learning about different ways to share God’s love.

By offering a creative class for women, an OM worker finds ways to transform broken tiles into art and make relationships where she can share God’s truth.

Workers from the Middle East North Africa Area share how they use strategic prayer to prepare the way for God to move across the region.

When a worker apologises for a loud in-home worship gathering, her neighbour responds with the desire to attend church.

Workers encourage new believers to persevere in their faith despite facing persecution from their families.

Two North Africans first experience OM on short-term outreaches; now they lead others to do the same.

God uses a Latino-American couple to gather and train local believers, who form a small church in North Africa.

God uses a Latino-American couple to gather and train local believers, who form a small church in North Africa.

A new generation of Sudanese church planters, trained by an Arab OMer in North Africa, revive OM’s ministry in north Sudan.

OM Ships’ Logos Hope is back in the water after 90-day dry dock marathon but more work is needed to sail again.

Name: Lynchee Buakham Home: Chaing Rai,Thailand Born in: April 1983 Joined OM Ships: January 2013 Previous employment: Marketing assistant Current job on board: Hotel Services team member

The story of a Dutch/Finnish family aboard Logos Hope

The last crew of the Logos reunites for a never-to-be-forgotten weekend.

OM Ships International celebrates five years of God’s faithfulness through the ministry of Logos Hope around the world.

OM Ships is in final preparations for the Power Up Logos Hope technical project as the four millionth visitor comes aboard in Kaohsiung, Taiwan.

OM Ships completes the ‘Power Up’ project and re-launches Logos Hope into active ministry.