New Zealand has voted in a referendum to legalise euthanasia. A concurrent vote to allow the recreational use of marijuana looks set to be rejected.
The vote on assisted suicide has already secured enough “yes” ballots – 65.2% – to become law, meaning New Zealand will become the seventh country in the world to legalise euthanasia. In Ireland, a vote recently moved a Private Member’s Bill that would permit assisted suicide to second stage.
As a result of the New Zealand vote, from November 2021 terminally ill patients deemed likely to have less than six months to live will be able to avail of assisted suicide.
They must be 18 and have the approval of two doctors, newly passed legislation states.
The final results of both referendums will be formally announced on 6 November.
The French Government have ordered that public worship cease during the latest coronavirus restrictions. Churches will not close until Monday November 2nd to allow traditional religious celebrations for All-Saints Day over the weekend.
The president of the Bishops’ Conference had written to President Macron asking to keep public worship in case of a new lockdown but after a meeting with religious representatives on Wednesday, the Minister for Internal Affair announced that religious celebrations would stop.
In Germany, Italy, Spain and many other European countries by contrast, churches will stay open.
Some Bishops have publicly contested the new rule.
Mgr Dominique Rey, the Bishop of Fréjus-Toulon, tweeted that freedom of worship is not negotiable. “If shops and schools remain open, Catholics must have the right to attend mass.”
The Geneva Consensus Declaration rejects claims that abortion is a human right.
It also defends countries from having gender ideologies imposed on them through UN agencies.
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops welcomed the move.
Kansas Archbishop, Joseph Naumann, said he hopes it will help nations to stand against powerful international forces that promote abortion and undermine the family.
An attacker killed three people at a church in Nice, police in the French city said Thursday.
The incident took place at the Basilica of Notre-Dame de Nice Oct. 29 at around 9am local time, according to French media.
The French newspaper Le Figaro reported that one of the victims, an elderly woman, was found “nearly beheaded” inside the church. It said that a man, identified as the sacristan, was also found dead inside of the basilica. A third victim, a woman, is said to have taken refuge in a nearby cafe, where she died from stab wounds.
Bishop André Marceau of Nice said that all churches in Nice had been closed and would remain under police protection until further notice.
Cardinal Robert Sarah wrote on Twitter: “Islamism is a monstrous fanaticism which must be fought with force and determination … Unfortunately, we Africans know this too well. The barbarians are always the enemies of peace. The West, today France, must understand this.”
Freedom of conscience’ is on trial’ at an upcoming case before the European Court of Human Rights.
The litigant who took Asher’s Bakery to court for refusing to furnish him with a cake that said “Support Gay Marriage” lost his case in the UK Supreme Court. Now he has appealed to Europe.
In support of the Bakery, Legal Counsel for ADF International, Lorcán Price, said nobody should be forced to act against their deeply held beliefs, or to choose between their conscience and their profession.
“The right to freedom of religion and conscience contains the right to act accordingly, including in a professional setting. In its judgment in 2018 the UK Supreme Court rightly upheld the religious rights of service providers.”
The UK Supreme Court drew attention to the fact that the Ashers Baking Company declined to create a particular message; they did not decline to serve the customer.
“If creative professionals are forced to create messages with which they profoundly disagree, the implications are wide-ranging for many others in society,” said Robert Clarke, Deputy Director of ADF International.
As protests against a ban on abortions for babies with disabilities gripped Poland, Pope Francis urged the people of the country to defend life.
Addressing Polish pilgrims during his weekly general audience Oct. 28, the pope invoked the memory of St. John Paul II, who “always urged a privileged love for the least and the defenseless and for the protection of every human being, from conception to natural death.”
The Pope prayed that God would “arouse in everyone’s hearts respect for the life of our brothers and sisters, especially of the most fragile and defenseless, and would give strength to those who welcome and take care of them, even when it requires a heroic love.”
Poland’s Constitutional Court ruled Oct. 22 that a clause in Poland’s 1993 abortion law allowing pregnancy terminations in cases of “severe and irreparable fetal damage” was unconstitutional.
The decision provoked outrage from some, prompting demonstrators to enter churches in protest during Masses Oct. 25 in Warsaw, Krakow, Poznan and other cities. They also sprayed graffiti on the walls of churches and blocked traffic in cities all over the country.
Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki of Poznan, conference president, said that “the vulgarities, abusive daubings, service disruptions and profanations seen in recent days are not a proper form of action in a democratic state, however much they may help certain people relieve their emotions.”
Rates of births, marriages and adoptions continue to fall in Ireland while the death rate increases.
The 2019 annual report of the Civil Registration Service, published on Tuesday, says there were 60,173 births in 2019, a drop of 1,728 on the 61,901 births registered during 2018, itself a decrease of 2.8 per cent on the 2017 figure. This steady decrease has continued from a peak in 2008, when more than 75,000 births were registered. Births registered in 2019 were a fifth less than in 2008.
In 2019, 20,335 marriages were registered in Ireland, a drop of 3.4 per cent on the 2018 figure and 7.7 per cent lower that the average for 2016-2018.
Meanwhile, Irish death rates continue to increase, with 32,084 registered in 2019. Of these, 52.5 per cent were male and 47.5 per cent female. Numbers dying in Ireland have shown a slight increase every year since 2016. In 2018 the figure was 31,232, in 2017 it was 31,385 and in 2016 it was 32,029.
The US Senate on Monday voted to confirm Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court.
Barrett is a Catholic mother of seven children, including two adopted from Haiti. She is a member of the ecumenical charismatic group People of Praise.
During confirmation hearings to an Appeals Court in 2017, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) questioned Barrett on her personal faith and values, saying that “when you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you. And that’s of concern.”
Barrett has said repeatedly that she would interpret the law according to the original meaning of the text of the Constitution, and would not impose her own moral or political preferences.
In 2006 she added her signature to an advertisement in her local newspaper that quoted the late Justice Byron White calling the Supreme Court’s 1973 Federal imposition of abortion an “exercise of raw judicial power.”
“It’s time to put an end to the barbaric legacy of Roe v. Wade and restore laws that protect the lives of unborn children,” the text stated.
In 2015, she signed a letter from Catholic Women to the Synod of Bishops in Rome that said the Church’s teachings, “on the dignity of the human person and the value of human life from conception to natural death; on the meaning of human sexuality, the significance of sexual difference and the complementarity of men and women; on openness to life and the gift of motherhood; and on marriage and family founded on the indissoluble commitment of a man and a woman—provide a sure guide to the Christian life, promote women’s flourishing, and serve to protect the poor and most vulnerable among us.”
The outgoing Bishop of Ferns has hit out at the closure of churches for daily and weekly religious services.
Bishop Denis Brennan says the country is at odds with the rest of Europe in this situation.
Speaking on South East Radio, Bishop Brennan called on the government to revisit the decision.
He expressed his disappointment that the churches were closed so quickly, something which had already been ordered during phase 3 of the coronavirus restrictions.
Among those who opposed that move was the Irish Council of Civil Liberties.
On Oct 9th, they tweeted: “It’s not often we find ourselves in agreement with the bishops, but we too think socially-distant religious gatherings could go ahead under level 3 restrictions. Government needs to protect our fundamental rights, including freedom of religion, during the pandemic.”
Meanwhile, over the weekend the Oireachtas passed and the President signed into law the legislation creating a criminal offence for breaking the phase 5 restrictions. The prohibited events subject to fines and arrest includes the holding of a public mass.
A group of 70 pastors attached to evangelical Christian denominations in Ireland have written to the Government warning of “severe” consequences if their churches are not opened up.
The letter, which has been sent to Taoiseach Micheál Martin and all TDs, says the continuing closure of places of worship is “counterproductive during a season when people desperately need the hope and community that so many find in church life and public worship”.
Pointing out that churches in the State are the only ones in Europe to remain closed, the pastors said the closures are “unwarranted” given the steps these churches have taken to ensure the safety of their congregations amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
The letter warned of “severe, unintended consequences [from the closures], particularly with regards to . . . [the] mental health” of people who attend these churches.
