Some of the new US President’s policies would advance moral evils and threaten human life and dignity, according to the head of the US Catholic Bishops.

In a statement released Wednesday, Archbishop of Los Angeles, José Gomez, cited concerns regarding family life and the freedom of believers to live according to their consciences.

Instead of more abortion and contraception, he urged Joe Biden to address the factors that are discouraging families and driving women to abort their unborn.

He also called for a family policy that acknowledges the importance of strong marriages and parenting for the well-being of children and the stability of communities.

The statement was criticised by Cardinal Blaise Cupich of Chicago who sent out a tweet calling it “ill-considered”.

Meanwhile, Pope Francis sent a message of hope and goodwill to the new US president. The Pontiff assured Joe Biden of his prayers that God grant him wisdom and strength in the exercise of his office.

He expressed hope that the President might build a society of authentic justice and freedom, with unfailing respect for the rights and dignity of every person, especially the poor, the vulnerable and those who have no voice.

He concluded by willingly invoking upon him, his family and the American people, an abundance of blessings.

Police in Pakistan have dropped an investigation into three men who allegedly kidnapped and abused a 12-year-old Christian girl claiming that she married one of her abductors of her own will.

Farah Shaheen, now 13, spent months in the yard of a 29-year-old Muslim man who allegedly raped her and shackled her by her hands and feet, forcing her to work all day clearing animal dung. She had been taken from the eastern city of Faisalabad in June, and was rescued by police last month.

Investigators have now dropped the charges, however, because, they say Farah testified that she had consented to marry her kidnapper and convert to Islam.

Her case has been taken up by a government committee and by charities that investigate the hundreds of Christian and Hindu girls allegedly kidnapped, trafficked, married off and forced to convert to Islam each year.

A police report suggested she was 16 or 17, but Farah’s birth certificate confirmed her age last June as 12. Her father, Asif Masih, dismissed the police report as “an utter fabrication” and accused officers of having ignored his report of her abduction for months. He told ACN, a Catholic charity, that his daughter was suffering severe mental trauma, and appealed to Imran Khan, the prime minister, for help.

Minister for Children Roderic O’Gorman has said he hopes local authorities will apologise for their roles and lack of action in addressing the abuse in mother and baby homes and county homes.

Meanwhile, Green Party Senator Pauline O’Reilly said she expected Galway County Council to make a “full apology” at its next council meeting on January 25th and to state how it will attempt to make amends for holding meetings in the grounds of the Tuam mother and babies home. Tuam mother and baby home was run in its name and it funded it also.

Ms O’Reilly told the Seanad that “no one can tell me that those politicians did not know of the appalling conditions”.

Speaking during a debate on the report of the Commission of Investigation into mother and baby homes, she said the report shows that the high death rates were known. I expect the same of other councils, particularly Westmeath County Council.”

France’s Catholic bishops have launched a national prayer campaign against government-backed bioethics legislation that would legalise surrogacy and extend abortion, and in vitro fertilization.

The bioethics bill, a flagship commitment by President Emmanuel Macron after his 2017 election, passed in the National Assembly in July and will have its second Senate reading Feb. 2.

It extends the abortion period from 12 to 14 weeks, and in some cases to term, while scrapping an eight-day reflection period and conscientious opt-out right for doctors in France.

Besides extending IVF rights, currently restricted to opposite-sex couples diagnosed with infertility, the measure will also permit surrogacy and authorize “savior siblings,” or embryos created for stem-cell treatment of older children, but the embryos die in the process.

At least a thousand people protested the bill in a Jan. 17 march, with 10,000 taking part via the internet because of Covid restrictions, in what organisers said was a bid supported by most French citizens to “bring a halt to bad policies.”

The bishops’ conference was represented by Archbishop Dominique Lebrun of Rouen at the march. Other church leaders, including Archbishop Celestino Migliore, Vatican nuncio, sent messages of support.

The body of a Catholic priest was discovered in Nigeria on Saturday, a day after he was kidnapped by armed men.

Agenzia Fides reported on Jan. 18 that Fr. John Gbakaan “was allegedly executed with a machete in such a brutal manner that identification was hardly possible.”

The priest of the diocese of Minna, in Nigeria’s Middle Belt, was attacked by unidentified men on the evening of Jan. 15. He was traveling with his younger brother along Lambata-Lapai Road in Niger State following a visit to their mother in Makurdi, Benue State.

Fides reported that the kidnappers at first demanded 30 million naira (around $70,000) for the two brothers’ release, later reducing the figure to five million naira (approximately $12,000).

Local media said that the priest’s body was found tied to a tree on Jan. 16. His vehicle, a Toyota Venza, was also recovered. His brother remains missing.

Following Gbakaan’s murder, Christian leaders called on Nigeria’s federal government to take action to stop attacks on clergy.

The incident is the latest in a series of abductions of clergy in Africa’s most populous country.

Single parents are calling for the Constitution to be amended to explicitly recognise families that are not based on marriage, and for all State documents such as passports to be updated to reflect that diversity of family life.

Louise Bayliss, co-founder of single parents group, Spark, said: “Every single parent has to say their home is not a family home due to the conveyancing form. Every single parent has to go through legal hoops to get a passport for their child. It’s stressful, demeaning and can be expensive.

“We want the Constitution to recognise single parents and their children as families.”

Section 2 of the Family Home Protection Act 1976 a “family home” is recognised as a “dwelling in which a married couple ordinarily reside”.

This section of the act was, legal experts advised, originally devised to protect a woman’s home if her husband tried to sell it.

However, the legislation has not been updated and doesn’t take into account single-parent families.

Likewise, under the Passports Act 2008, consent is sought from both parents or guardians for the issuing of a child’s passport, regardless if one parent is absent.

A former UK supreme court justice has been criticised for telling a woman with stage 4 cancer that her life was “less valuable” during a televised discussion of the costs of coronavirus lockdowns.

Appearing on the BBC One show The Big Questions on Sunday to discuss the question of whether lockdown was “punishing too many for the greater good”, Lord Jonathan Sumption, one of the most prominent anti-lockdown campaigners, said he did not accept that “all lives are of equal value”.

The former justice, who served on the supreme court until 2018, said he believed his children’s and grandchildren’s lives were “worth more because they’ve got a lot more of it ahead”.

Responding to Sumption’s remarks, Deborah James, who has stage 4 metastatic bowel cancer and hosts the BBC’s You, Me and the Big C podcast, said: “With all due respect, I am the person who you say their life is not valuable.”

Sumption then interrupted James, saying: “I didn’t say your life was not valuable, I said it was less valuable.”

The Catholic Archbishop of Armagh has said he would be disappointed if the religious congregations were scapegoated for their role in mother-and-baby homes.

Speaking on RTÉ’s ;This Week’ programme, Archbishop Eamon Martin said: “They were commissioned by the State and local authorities, county councils, and they were expected to intervene when the rest of society had basically banished these mothers and their unborn children”.

“They found themselves on the frontline.”

Dr Martin said there was “clear evidence that the day-to-day running of these institutions was very harsh,” but he said they were subject to inspection and oversight by the State.

“As soon as women and children went into these places, society didn’t seem to want to know any more, be they living or dead.

“If it’s just, proportionate and if it’s in account of the findings of the Commission, I do feel the church needs to do reparation for this. I accept that,” he said.

In relation to a redress scheme, Dr Martin said: “I think we can show our apologies are sincere by being willing to contribute in any way we can.

“Minister O’Gorman has asked for the church to make a contribution to whatever restorative scheme is put in place.

“I do think religious congregations will be willing to play their part generously.”

The two Church of Ireland archbishops have acknowledged “with shame” that their Church was “complicit, as with the rest of society at that time, in a culture of hypocrisy and judgment which stigmatised women and children and endangered their health and wellbeing”.

Responding to the report of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes, Church of Ireland primate Archbishop John McDowell and Archbishop of Dublin Michael Jackson said the women and children who passed through the homes “deserved much better”.

“We are sorry and apologise for the role that our Church played in shaping a society in which unmarried women and their children were treated in this way,” they said in a statement.

“We also want to pay tribute to those former residents of homes, and others, who have focused society’s attention on mother and baby homes. One of the most prominent groups was associated with the Bethany Home, which operated under a general Protestant ethos while being independently managed.”

Legislation should be introduced to seize assets from the Churches if they do not contribute to the state’s scheme for former residents of mother and baby homes, Alan Kelly has said.

The Labour leader made his comments on Wednesday after the Taoiseach gave a full state apology.

“In regard to redress, we cannot undo what happened before. We need to ensure, this time around, that the religious institutions make their contribution to redress for the families and women affected,” Mr Kelly said.

“Once they agree to that, or when they are made to agree, if they do not make their contribution, we will pass legislation – I will draft it myself – to enable us to take their assets and ensure they make that contribution.”

He also threatened to seize the records of the orders who ran the homes.

“We also need to ensure that all archives relating to social services provided by the religious institutions are nationalised. That is a very important point. They provided a service in lieu of the State. We need to nationalise all of their archives in order that everything can be preserved”.