News Roundup

US Bishops: Health law changes would be a ‘violation of religious freedom and bad medicine’

Proposed changes to implementing America’s Affordable Care Act are “a violation of religious freedom and bad medicine,” according to US bishops.

Chief among their concerns are regulations that would mandate healthcare workers to perform transgender surgeries and require health insurance providers to cover the procedures. They also fear that the Department of Health and Human Services will force healthcare workers to perform abortions, or risk their jobs.

“Catholic health care ministries serve everyone, no matter their race, sex, belief system, or any other characteristics,” said the USCCB chairmen in a statement this week. “The same excellent care will be provided in a Catholic hospital to all patients, including patients who identify as transgender, whether it be for a broken bone, or for cancer, but we cannot do what our faith forbids. We object to harmful procedures, not to patients.”

“Sadly, Monday’s proposed regulations threaten our ability to carry out our healing ministries, and others’ to practice medicine,” they continued.

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Exclusion zones derided as ‘unworkable’, ‘undemocratic’

Politicians and campaigners have slammed the Government’s decision to press ahead with legislation to ban pro-life gatherings near healthcare facilities that offer abortion. The ban is so wide it could even include silent prayer vigils.

The exclusion zone bill intends banning “displaying any item, whether symbolic or otherwise, with the intended or likely effect of influencing a person’s decision to access termination of pregnancy services”.

Aontú Councillor Sarah O’Reilly said the proposals are “totally undemocratic”.

“Everyone should be permitted to peacefully protest and demonstrate against practices or human rights abuses which they disagree with. Abortion ends the life of defenceless human beings – it is only natural for people to wish to protest against such a thing”, she said.

Eilís Mulroy of the Pro Life Campaign said the Government’s plan “sets a very dangerous precedent for denying freedom of expression and the right to peacefully assemble in public areas. The proposal being put forward is a wholly disproportionate response to the risk that a tiny number of people may at some point in the future engage in harassing behaviour close to an abortion facility”.

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Divorce applications hit record levels, new data reveals

Divorce applications hit record levels for the second year in succession in 2021, according to new data published by the Courts Service.

Some 5,856 divorce applications were filed last year, an 11pc increase on the previous record of 5,220 set in 2020.

While the vast majority of applications were made in the Circuit Court, 48 “big money” divorce cases, dealing with assets worth more than €3m, were filed in the High Court.

This figure is the highest since the Celtic Tiger years when a record 53 applications were made at High Court level in 2003. Back then the threshold for a High Court divorce case was just €1m.

The data is contained in the Court Service’s annual report for 2021.

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Cabinet considers abortion exclusion-zone legislation

Pro-life campaigners could be fined or jailed for demonstrating or holding silent vigils outside centres facilitating or conducting abortions, under proposed laws going to the Cabinet today. It would be one of the only such laws in Europe, if passed.

Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly is to seek approval to introduce legislation on so-called “Safe Access Zones”.

The laws propose buffer zones of 100 metres around any healthcare facilities that can provide or administer abortion, and not just those that do so.

This will, in effect, see the introduction of exclusion zones around all hospitals, GP practices and Wellwoman or Irish family Planning Association services.

The laws would prohibit, within these zones, any activity that is “intended to, or may reasonably have the effect of, influencing the decision of a person in relation to availing of or providing services relating to termination of pregnancy”.

A graduated system of penalties is proposed, starting with a warning from gardaí.

Some offences would be prosecuted summarily and more serous offences could be indictable before a judge and jury, with penalties including a jail sentence.

It is hoped the legislation can begin the process of pre-legislative scrutiny in September and can be introduced before the end of the year.

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Google asked to prove it’s not suppressing pro-life search results

Attorneys general from 17 US states are asking Google to provide assurances that the search giant isn’t suppressing results for pro-life crisis pregnancy centers and replacing them with results for abortion clinics.

The letter, part of a campaign spearheaded by Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares, asks Google to resist a June 17 call from Democratic lawmakers to “limit the appearance of pro-life clinics” in search results. The legislators had written to Alphabet chief executive officer Sundar Pichai about “disturbing” reports of Google’s search results for “abortion” and “abortion pill” directing people to crisis pregnancy centers, which attempt to steer women away from abortions.

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Chilean bishops warn new constitution places religious freedom at risk

The Catholic bishops of Chile have warned that religious freedom will be at risk if a proposed draft of a new constitution is approved this fall.

The constitution’s text will be voted on Sept. 4 in a plebiscite in which all Chileans will participate.

The prelates criticized that, according to the Article 67 Section 4 of the proposed constitution, the exercise of the right to religious freedom must be done “in conformity with the law, respecting the rights, duties, and principles established by this Constitution.”

Consequently, people or institutions “could be forced to adopt practices or convey values that contradict their faith,” the bishops said.

The bishops said the new constitution proposes “the right to abortion, adopting a questionable orientation to sex education where parents participate in a very insufficient way, and promoting a radical theory of gender.”

The Bishops also lamented that the proposal doesn’t give conscientious objection a constitutional status.

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Ministers discuss committee report on international surrogacy

A high-level ministerial meeting to advance legislation on international surrogacy has taken place. This comes despite commercial surrogacy being banned or not recognised anywhere in Europe, except Russia, Belarus and Ukraine.

The Ministers for Health, for Justice and for Children, together with officials from their departments, examined the recently published report of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on International Surrogacy.

They reiterated their broad welcome for the report and discussed how to advance its recommendations, including in legislation.

“The departments will finalise an agreed Policy Paper which can then form the basis for the development of legislative options, including consideration of whether some can be inserted into the Health (Assisted Human Reproduction) Bill 2022 at Committee Stage,” according to a press release.

“Key principles underpinning any new legislative measures will be the protection of the rights of all children born as a result of cross-border surrogacy arrangements and the safeguarding of the welfare of surrogate mothers”.

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US Judge dismisses life at conception as a ‘Christian and Catholic belief’

A circuit judge in Kentucky has blocked abortion restrictions from taking effect — in part because he said they adopt “a distinctly Christian and Catholic belief” about when life begins.

This is despite those same Churches maintaining that the beginning of life is a matter for science, not scripture.

The Kentucky laws would have banned abortion once a fetal heartbeat is detected, around the sixth week, and made exceptions for the life of the mother or disabling injuries.

“The laws at issue here adopt the view embraced by some, but not all, religious traditions, that life begins at the moment of conception,” Judge Mitch Perry of the Jefferson County Circuit Court wrote in an opinion issued Friday.

“The General Assembly is not permitted to single out and endorse the doctrine of a favored faith for preferred treatment. By taking this approach, the bans fail to account for the diverse religious views of many Kentuckians whose faith leads them to take very different views of when life begins,” he said.

“There is nothing in our laws or history that allows for such theocratic based policymaking,” he added.

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Catholic organisation welcomes new RSE focus on relationships

The Catholic Education Partnership (CEP) has welcomed proposed changes to the Junior Cycle SPHE curriculum, which will see more of a focus on “human relationships” and less on “mere biology”.

The changes drew controversy after The Irish Independent reported that pornography would be taught in classrooms, but CEP CEO Alan Hynes said the reports were “misleading”.

“We’re quite happy that it can be harmonised with the ethos of any Catholic school”, he said.

It’s important that young people develop “a critical sense” in dealing with “the flood of pornography”, Mr Hynes warned, quoting from Pope Francis’ encyclical Amoris Laetitia.

He added that he was aware there are pro-pornography use campaigners out there, “but that’s not what’s being proposed here at all”.

The CEP, an umbrella group for Catholic primary, secondary and tertiary institutes, also welcomes the new focus on the relationship element of RSE, Mr Hynes said.

“It’s based on feedback from students themselves. I think a lot of the feedback came to a request to move away from a mere biological treatment and to more human relationship focus,” Mr Hynes said.

Plans are currently underway for the Church to develop its own RSE curriculum for second level education, to compliment the Flourish programme used in Catholic primary schools.

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Free contraception for young women from September

Free contraception will be available for women aged 17-25 from September. This comes despite a 2019 Working Group on Access to Contraception, under the then Health Minister, Simon Harris, say the proposal would probably be a waste of public funds.

The legislation providing for the free contraception scheme was signed into law last Thursday by President Michael D Higgins.

The measure is scheduled to come into operation by “early September”, the Government said.

Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly said: “Free contraception is a cost-effective measure, reducing both crisis pregnancy and termination of pregnancy rates.

“Given that the costs of prescription contraception are typically faced by women, the scheme will impact positively on gender equity, reducing costs for women, but also benefitting their partners and families, starting with women aged 17-25.”

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