CF News

 

News service of the National Association of Catholic Families

 

Prayer intentions for August

Pope Benedict's general prayer intention for August is: 'That the human family may know how to respect God's design for the world and thus become ever more aware of the great gift of God which Creation represents for us'.

His mission intention is: 'That the answer of the entire people of God to the common vocation to sanctity and mission may be promoted and fostered, with careful discernment of the charisms and a constant commitment to spiritual and cultural formation'.[Vatican Information Service] 1470.1

 

A message for the Olympic Games

Pope Benedict XVI has sent his greetings to China ahead of the Olympics, expressing hope that the games would offer an example of coexistence between people from different places.

He expressed hope that sports could be 'a pledge of brotherhood and peace among people.'

The pope said he would follow the Olympics with a sense of deep friendship.

Benedict spoke Sunday during the traditional Angelus prayer. He was delivering it from the town of Bressanone, in the Italian Alps, where he is vacationing. [AP] 1470.2

 

A Pauline visit to Syria?

A top Islamic leader has issued an invitation for Pope Benedict XVI to visit Syria during the current Pauline year, the Italian Apcom news agency reports.

Sheik Ahmad Badereddine Hassoun, the grand mufti of Syria, told reporters that he hoped the Pope would visit 'in the footsteps of St. Paul.' He volunteered to travel to Rome to help the Pontiff prepare for such a trip.

The Vatican acknowledged the invitation without making any commitment. Father Federico Lombardi, the director of the Vatican press office, observed that the invitation was a sign of warm relations between the Holy See and Syria's Islamic leadership.

The Syrian grand mufti has not always been so cordial in his attitude toward Pope Benedict. Following the Pope's Regensburg lecture, Hassoun said that the text revealed the Pope's 'ugliness and extremism.'

More recently, however, Hassoun joined the other Islamic officials in the 'Common Word' initiative designed to encourage talks between Catholic and Islamic leaders. The first session of those talks is now scheduled to take place in Rome in November. [CWNews] 1470.3

 

International AIDS Conference

In hopes of combating 'ignorance' about the Catholic Church's response to AIDS, the Catholic charity Caritas Internationalis will take part in the 27th International AIDS Conference to be held this August in Mexico City. At the conference the charity will join 25,000 participants who include internationally-known experts and decision makers.

Rev. Msgr. Robert J. Vitillo, the Special Advisor on HIV for Caritas Internationalis, will participate in the conference. Speaking in a press release, Monsignor Vitillo described the conference as an opportunity to share as much new knowledge and experience as possible.

He also said one challenge facing Caritas Internationalis is the 'ignorance' of the Catholic Church's response to AIDS.

'We need to learn better how to let our light shine and not hide it under a bushel basket,' Monsignor Vitillo advised.

Recently, dissenting Catholics published an open letter in a major U.S. newspaper claiming that Catholic teaching on contraception is hindering AIDS prevention efforts.

Monsignor Vitillo noted that Caritas Internationalis has offered leadership and education about HIV and AIDS for the past twenty years. Caritas has opposed AIDS-related stigma and discrimination and promoted access to treatment for all disease victims, in cooperation with the United Nations and other organizations, he said.

He explained that securing funding for Catholic AIDS relief work is a major challenge because only a small amount of pledged money goes to religious organizations, even though they provide a large proportion of care for people with HIV and AIDS.

The monsignor said Caritas Internationalis has worked to obtain more equitable funding.

'Because of our motivation and roots in Catholic teaching,' he said, 'Caritas is not just professionally competent, but we are interested in the whole person and we try to help each person realize their God-given dignity. That requires attention to physical, emotional, social and pastoral needs.'

The Mexico City conference will last from August 3-8. On August 5, Caritas Internationalis, Caritas Mexico, the Catholic HIV/AIDS Network and the Jesuit community in Mexico will host Catholic organizations' delegates in an evening of prayer and discussion. [CNA] 1470.4

United Nations

 

CEDAW appointments, UNFPA report

The Catholic Family Institute (C-Fam) reports from New York on the election of new CEDAW members which took place this week at UN headquarters in New York. Surprise, surprise: pro-abortion women were elected. They also report on UNFPA's new annual report which doesn't mention clean water, a problem affecting billions of the world's poor, while reproductive health was mentioned 80 times! UNFPA uses the term reproductive health as a euphemism for abortion and continues to deny they support abortion!

CEDAW Committee Holds Elections; Pro-Abortion Members Re-Elected

Samantha Singson writes : 'States' parties to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) convened at United Nations headquarters in New York this week to elect new members to the 23-member CEDAW Committee. Nineteen nominees vied for eleven vacancies. In a secret ballot, private citizens from Cuba, India, France, Finland, China, Brazil, Romania, Jamaica, Kenya, Spain and Afghanistan were selected to fill the slots.

The CEDAW committee is charged with monitoring governments on their compliance with the treaty. According to the convention, committee members are elected by States' Parties from among their nationals, but serve in their personal capacity. Members of the committee should be 'independent' and 'of high moral standing and competence.'

CEDAW critics have become increasingly concerned about the work and composition of the committee. The committee has taken it upon itself to question nations on their abortion laws, even though the abortion is not mentioned in the treaty. The CEDAW Committee created their own 'general recommendation' that reads abortion into the text, and in recent years CEDAW committee members have pressured more than 60 nations on their abortion legislation.

Prior to this week's election, a survey of the committee revealed that half of the CEDAW committee members are direct employees of such radical non-governmental organizations as the Latin America and Caribbean Committee for the Defense of Women's Rights, the International Council of Women, the Global Fund for Women and the and the International Women's Rights Action Watch (IWRAW).

Radical feminists also ran campaigns to get their colleagues elected to the committee.

The International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) urged its members to help reelect some of the CEDAW Committee's most outspoken pro-abortion members, Silvia Pimentel of Brazil and Malaysia's Maria Shanthi Dairiam. IGLHRC's action alert stated, 'There is some concern that conservative states might do their best to ensure that partial experts are elected to the Committee because they do not want the CEDAW Committee to be too progressive, particularly regarding issues around culture, religion and reproductive and sexual rights.'

While Shanthi Dairiam was denied another term on the committee, Silvia Pimentel will continue on for another four years. During the last CEDAW committee session alone, Pimentel questioned a number of states on the abortion laws, pushed wider access to contraception, pressed Finland on 'women of sexual minorities' access to health services,' took issue with Slovakia's concordat with the Holy See that protects the right of health care workers to conscientiously object to taking part in abortions, and complained that heterosexual marriage perpetuated the stereotype of women as childbearers.

The CEDAW Committee will next meet again in Geneva in October to review the reports from Bahrain, Belgium, Cameroon, Canada, Ecuador, El Salvador, Kyrgyzstan, Madagascar, Mongolia, Myanmar, Portugal, Slovenia and Uruguay.

The new members will fill the vacancies that expire in December and they will serve a four-year term beginning January 2009. Other members on the CEDAW Committee include individuals from Bangladesh, Algeria, Thailand, Ghana, Netherlands, Egypt, Israel, Slovenia, Mauritius, Japan and Croatia.

UNFPA's Annual Report Focuses Almost Exclusively on 'Reproductive Health'

Stephen Braunlich writes : 'The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) recently released its annual report for 2007, touting principally the organization's work in the field of 'sexual and reproductive health.' The radical nature of the document is revealed in the number of times certain issues are mentioned. In a 36 page document 'reproductive health' or 'reproductive rights', which are used as euphemisms for abortion, are mentioned 80 times. Widespread killers like malaria and tuberculosis do not receive any mention at all. Clean water, clearly one of the chief problems of the world's poor, does not receive a mention and safe sanitation, the lack of which is a leading killer in the developing world, received one mention.

The annual report reveals that in 2007, over half of UNFPA's program expenses went to reproductive health programs, at a cost of $146.6 million. Region by region, more funds were spent on reproductive health initiatives than any other program. Though UNFPA refuses to release detailed accounting of its programs and the annual report lacks the detailed financial accounting commonplace in annual corporate filings, it provides anecdotes of agency expenditures.

Examples of last year's UNFPA initiatives include developing 'guidelines and protocols for reproductive health services' in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia. One needs to look elsewhere for specifics about on-the-ground practices, however. UNFPA press releases report that mobile reproductive health teams in Georgia distribute contraceptive devices, including intrauterine device (IUD) insertion kits. IUDs can cause abortions by changing the lining of the uterus to prevent a fertilized egg from implanting. UNFPA consistently denies they support abortion in any way.

The report also reveals techniques used to promote UNFPA's agenda among minors. UNFPA collaborated with the Lebanese government to create lebteen.com, a site that encourages teenage use of the 'morning-after-pill.' Though promoted as 'emergency contraceptives,' the pills can function as abortifacients by causing the expulsion of fertilized eggs.

Among the more significant initiatives downplayed in the report is UNFPA's new 'strategic 'master plan.'' It receives only passing reference though it will guide the agency through 2011.

One of the plan's major goals is universal access to reproductive health by 2015 through promotion of 'reproductive rights' - a term defined on UNFPA's website as encompassing a right to privacy, which is commonly understood as a euphemism for abortion.

The plan also focuses on mental health as an 'integral aspect of reproductive health.' In the United States and elsewhere 'mental health' has been used radically to expand abortion rights beyond cases where a mother's physical well-being is at issue. Indicators that UNFPA will use to gauge success toward meeting this goal include increasing the number of countries that provide public funding for reproductive health services and the prevalence of contraceptive usage.

A second master plan goal is for women and adolescent girls to exercise 'reproductive rights.' This objective includes using human rights systems to expand 'reproductive rights' and integrate these rights into national policies. Measures of successful implementation include enlarging the number of countries that enshrine 'reproductive rights' among the fundamental human rights recognized by their courts, and an increase in the number of laws incorporating such rights.

The United States under the Bush administration has withheld funding from UNFPA because of its complicity in China's forced abortion and sterilization programs. [C-FAM] 1470.5

 

'Lots of condoms, lots of drugs'

In its 2008 report, released on Tuesday, UNAIDS, the UN body responsible for preventing and treating HIV/AIDS globally, presents the results of years of research, on-the-ground experience and hundreds of millions of dollars in funding.

And so, you ask, what are the intricate details of UNAIDS' carefully thought-out and heavily researched multi-phase program to respond to the AIDS epidemic? First phase: condoms. Lots and lots of condoms. Heaps of condoms. Bajillions of condoms. Condoms for every man, woman, and child.

Second phase: in the eventuality that the condoms break, fail or aren't used every single time (as, statistics show, they usually aren't), UNAIDS is prepared with…drugs. Lots of drugs. Lots and lots of expensive drugs. And what miracles of modern science can these drugs accomplish? They can postpone the inevitable lingering death of the infected (for some additional 4-12 years anyway).

A great accomplishment, this plan of theirs.

A search of the 362 page 2008 UNAIDS report shows 149 uses of the word 'condom.' And each time condoms are mentioned, they are presented as being the weight-bearing pillar in any successful AIDS-prevention strategy. Education, of course, is also frequently mentioned as being very, very important. But education seems to primarily consist of teaching Africans how, when (always), and where (everywhere) to use a condom.

On the other hand, a search of the word 'abstinence' results in six hits. One of those references is in the bibliography. Two of the others are found in the chapter on AIDS-prevention and are there only to be ridiculed. Abstinence programs are bad because they discourage 'forthright discussions about condoms and safer sex.' And anyway, 'studies show' that 'programmes that exclusively promote abstinence do not reduce the risk of HIV infection.'

The other three mentions of abstinence are all passing remarks about how in some backward cultures women don't have jobs and aren't therefore 'empowered' to demand abstinence from their husbands. But as we aren't told why abstinence is a good thing in the first place, the significance of this point is unclear.

Finally, in the entire 362 page document the word 'fidelity' is mentioned once, and again, it's only to point out how women don't have independent economic means and therefore don't have the leverage to demand fidelity from their husbands because their husbands might leave them, without any means of support, if they do demand it.

Now, let's just stop and think about that for a moment. I don't care how extreme your agenda is, it seems pretty obvious that having sex with one person who is also your life's companion (a pretty common event until recent decades) who isn't infected, will ultimately lead to an infection rate of…well, 0%. Zero percent, to spell things out, is very, very low. It's a lot lower than, well, anything else. In fact, if the whole world had a 0% AIDS infection rate, there wouldn't be any AIDS. But then UNAIDS officials would be out of a job, the AIDS drug companies would have no sales, the condom manufacturers would be selling vastly fewer condoms, and who would want that?

If I didn't know better (which I'm not sure that I do) I'd think that everybody at the UN thinks that Africans are nothing but a bunch of wild beasts driven by blind instinct. This newest UNAIDS report basically comes right out and says that if an African feels the urge to have sex, be it with a young, barely pubescent girl, or with multiple partners, or with someone known to be HIV positive, then an African will have sex. The most we can ever hope to do is to interrupt their foreplay long enough to get them to put a condom on.

What's that? You think I exaggerate?

Consider this. In what can only be interpreted as a spit in the eye of Uganda, the UNAIDS report includes this line, breathtaking in its sheer, bitter effrontery: 'In Uganda, the African country that has been most successful in lowering HIV prevalence, surveys have documented an increase in risky sexual behaviours in recent years.'

This proves, says the report, that people just can't be expected to significantly change their risky sexual behaviours, as 'they frequently fail to sustain safer behaviours for longer periods.' Uganda they smugly cite as a case in point: You can't expect Africans to change. The dog returns to its vomit.

Uganda, if you recall, was one of the few African countries that massively reduced its HIV/AIDS infection rate from 21% in 1991, to 6% in 2002. Uganda was Africa's success story. And it claimed this position entirely by pioneering the ABC program, which puts heavy emphasis on A (Abstinence) and B (Be faithful), with C (Condom use) presented as a last resort. And it worked, for what I should think are very obvious reasons.

But, as the co-chair of Uganda's AIDS-Prevention Committee, Sam Ruteikara, wrote recently in the Washington Post, it was at the height of his country's AIDS-prevention success that Western 'advisors' stepped in, told Uganda they 'had it all wrong' and systematically hijacked the Committee's documents.

'Repeatedly,' laments Ruteikara, 'our 25-member prevention committee put faithfulness and abstinence into the National Strategic Plan…Repeatedly, foreign advisers erased our recommendations. When the document draft was published, fidelity and abstinence were missing.' The Western 'experts, had the financial power to force their casual-sex agendas upon us.'

Now AIDS rates in Uganda are climbing once again. And UNAIDS has only itself to thank.

But these Western 'experts' will not, of course, admit their error. They abide by the rule of the oligarch: 'Heads I win, tails you lose.' Whatever way the coin drops, its bad for the other guy. Ruteikara relates: 'Western media have been told this renewed surge of HIV infection is because there are 'not enough condoms in Uganda,' even though we have many more condoms now than we did in the early 1990s, when our HIV rates began to decline.'

In the end the UN's AIDS-prevention strategy amounts to nothing more than a global game of Russian roulette. Throwing your arms up and telling people that they'll never change their risky sexual lifestyles, and then going on to give them nothing but a razor-thin layer of porous latex as a barrier between life and a slow, lingering death, is in effect to hand them a loaded gun.

In this case the only difference between the UN and the mob is that the UN has provided a first-aid kit (heaps of expensive anti-retroviral drugs) to patch up the victims they helped to create, who find they have pulled the trigger on a loaded chamber.

Indeed, as Sam Ruteikara observes, a great deal of the AIDS-prevention and treatment 'relief' effort has become nothing more than a very profitable industry. If I had absolutely no morals whatsoever, I'd be kicking myself for not having invested in condoms and anti-retroviral drugs years ago. Groups like UNAIDS are buying up condoms in the hundreds of millions and, (sometimes quite literally) dumping them all over the African continent with open-handed liberality. And when those condoms fail, the drug companies step in with their product. (Now, I should clarify that obviously anti-retroviral drugs are one of the best things ever to happen to AIDS sufferers. But when these drugs are treated as an answer, and not as an unfortunately necessary companion to rigorous AIDS-prevention strategies based upon abstinence and fidelity, then they become an enemy of the effort to eradicate AIDS.).

Take Namibia, for instance. UNAIDS expresses its pleasure in its report that in Namibia 25 million condoms are distributed annually by the government - or, as the report puts it, 'equivalent to seven condoms per male aged 15-49.' Twenty-five million. Every year. The UN announces with great pride that this brilliant plan, together with widespread HIV testing and education, 'appears' to have 'stabilized' adult HIV rates in the country. Appears. Stabilized. Wow. There was a dream that was Uganda, and in that dream AIDS did not 'appear' to be 'stabilized,' but was actually being eradicated.

I conclude with one of the most powerful lines I have seen written on the question of AIDS-prevention. It is by Sam Ruteikara. 'Hear my plea, HIV-AIDS profiteers,' he begs. 'Let my people go. We understand that casual sex is dear to you, but staying alive is dear to us. Listen to African wisdom, and we will show you how to prevent AIDS.' Indeed. [LifeSiteNews] 1470.6

 

Europe

 

 

Irish abortion laws

An Irish lawyer predicts that the European Court of Human Rights will find fault with his country's abortion law when it considers a case brought by three anonymous women. Dr Adam McAuley of Dublin City University points out that the court has ruled that a mother's right to life and health over-rides her unborn child's rights. The court had found that the application of Polish law was improper in the case of a woman whose sight was affected by pregnancy. Dr McAuley says the women will win in the forthcoming case because Ireland's law is stricter than Poland's. He calls for Irish legislation which specifies the circumstances in which women may seek an abortion. Liam Gibson of SPUC Northern Ireland said: 'It is questionable whether the case of the three women known as A, B and C will even be heard by the European Court of Human Rights.

Two years ago the Court refused to hear a very similar case brought by another Irish woman claiming the same violations of her rights, because that case had not been considered by the domestic courts. However, even if the ABC cases were to reach the European court, it is very unlikely that it will find any discrimination has taken place. Irish abortion law is not open to arbitrary interpretation nor can it be applied in a way which discriminates against some women. The verdict in case of Tysiac v Poland therefore does not mean that the court will force Ireland to legalise abortion. It is also highly unlikely that any of the women will be able to show that she had been subject to inhuman or degrading treatment simply because abortion is strictly prohibited in Ireland.' [Irish Times, SPUC] 1470.7

 

The radical onslaught

SHAME!

Offensive Planned Parenthood website

1470.8 ~ A new web site produced by the Columbia/Williamette, Oregon Planned Parenthood affiliate features videos in which a middle-aged man 'dressed something like Mr. Rogers' advises teens in the middle of suggested sex acts about sexually transmitted diseases. The site, which also presents songs with obscene lyrics, has been criticized for providing erroneous information, sexualizing young people, targeting very young 'tweens,' and undermining the sanctity of sex.

The videos on the Columbia/Williamette Planned Parenthood's web site 'TakeCareDownThere.org,' variously show two teenage boys purportedly engaged in a deviant sex act, advise two other teens how to be tested for disease after intercourse and instruct how to use condoms. One of its videos features a song with a long list of slang terms for male and female genitalia set to music.

Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, told Cybercast News Service that in one video the middle-aged man appears as a teenage boy and girl embrace and kiss.

'Guys, guys, it looks like it's getting a little hot and heavy in here,' he says to them. 'Before we take this to the next level we want to make sure that you know how to use a condom.'

Wright said that Planned Parenthood has developed a reputation for controversy with another of its websites, teenwire.com.

Marie Hahnenberg, a researcher with the American Life League, said 'TakeCareDownThere.org' was another example of Planned Parenthood activities that 'attempt to sexualize our young people.'

'It seems to make fun of sex, making it as some kind of game, as Planned Parenthood claims, when sex is something so sacred that it should only be between a married man and woman,' she stated.

Liz Delapoer, marketing director at the Columbia/Williamette Planned Parenthood, told Cybercast News Service that the new site was meant to be 'fun' and 'playful' and was designed to discuss with 'the younger demographic' the topic of sexually transmitted diseases.

'We wanted to empower people to really take care of their own reproductive and sexual health,' Delapoer commented. 'Through the Web site and the videos, we wanted to speak in a language that would be non-threatening to a younger demographic.

Katie Collins, a journalism scholar with the Clare Booth Luce Policy Institute, said the site seems to be aimed at 'tweens' or even younger demographics.

'This Web site was especially repulsive to me because it appeals first to very young teenagers, and contains scientifically inaccurate information but also because it denigrates sexual intimacy,' Collins explained.

She said one skit presents the human papillomavirus (HPV), which is a major cause of cervical cancer in women, as something that can be combated by regular testing.

'For men especially, regular testing does not show threat information on human papillomavirus (HPV) or herpes,' she argued. [CNA] 1470.8

 

International news

 

 

 

Austria  March for the unborn

Last week hundreds of Austrian pro-lifers held the first annual '1000 Crosses Funeral March' for the unborn.

March participants met at the Cathedral Square in Salzburg where they were given a large white cross before setting out to begin their peaceful procession through the city. When march participants reached the city's State Bridge, dozens of roses were thrown into the river in memory of lives lost to abortion in Austria. At the end of the march, participants joined together to celebrate a special 'Mass of Atonement' for those who promote the scourge of abortion.

This pro-life march follows several accounts of aggressive intimidation tactics earlier this year in Vienna by hired 'escorts' who are employed by abortion mills to keep pro-lifers from influencing their clientele - by whatever means necessary.

On numerous occasions, video cameras outside of Vienna abortion mills have captured instances of verbal, sexual and psychological abuse on the part of these hired antagonists, without any legal repercussions or police interference. Moreover, the Austrian Parliament is considering legislation to ban all pro-life activists from the public property outside abortion clinics, even if they are only praying silently. [LifeSiteNews] 1470.9

Brazil  Leonardo Boff praises President-elect

The controversial ex-priest and leader of Marxist liberation theology, Leonardo Boff of Brazil, said this week that the former bishop and President-elect of Paraguay 'fully identifies with liberation theology and plans to implement it in his government, the preferential option for the poor.'

Boff made his comments after a meeting with Lugo, according to the Paraguayan daily 'Ultima Hora.' He said it was also 'important that policies be adopted to make citizens aware of the importance of conservation in order to protect the environment' and that he met with Lugo 'as an environmentalist seeking support for regional environmental projects.'

On July 28, Lugo attended a talk by Boff on education in environmental issues at the National University of Asuncion in the city of San Lorenzo.

'Boff's teaching not in keeping with Catholic Church'

Bishop Rogelio Livieres Plano of Ciudad del Este spoke with the Paraguayan daily La Nacion about Boff's views: 'It's not that liberation theology opts for the poor, as if the Catholic Church did not opt for the poor. Their manner of opting for the poor is exclusionary. For this reason John Paul II said the option for the poor is not exclusive or exclusionary, and he was referring to liberation theology.'

Bishop Livieres explained that Boff 'is free to go where he pleases, I don't agree at all with his theological opinions. He was condemned by the Holy See in 1985 and he left the Church in 1992. I would ask him not to go to the Catholic University because that is where the teaching of the Catholic Church is imparted and Boff's teaching is not that of the Catholic Church.'

Commenting on the relationship between Lugo and Boff and the eventual application of Marxist liberation theology in Paraguay, Bishop Livieres said the two 'have a relationship that goes back years. Liberation theology is an internal problem of the Church; it is not a guerrilla movement. It is a mistaken way of understanding the priesthood and all theology. Lugo has fallen into this error for many years, but it is not a political error; it is a doctrinal one,' he said.

The bishop also denied suggestions that there would be friction between the Church and the incoming government in Paraguay, as long as Fernando Lugo 'does not meddle in Church affairs or the Church in State affairs.' [CNA] 1470.10

Costa Rica  Same-sex 'marriage' protest

Over 20,000 people gathered in the streets of San Jose last Saturday to voice their opposition to a legislative proposal that, if passed, will legalize same-sex 'marriage' in Costa Rica.

Despite heavy pressure from homosexual activists, Costa Rican courts ruled homosexual 'marriage' unconstitutional in 2006; but the issue is now being re-examined by the legislative assembly.

'We're calling out against the law that the Legislative Assembly is considering, to allow for homosexual civil unions,' said march participant Reynaldo Salazar, according to CostaRicapages.com.

Earlier this month, the Bishop's conference of Costa Rica addressed a letter to the country's law-makers explaining that 'laws favourable to homosexual unions are contrary to correct reasoning because they confer legal guarantees proper to the institution of marriage to unions between people of the same sex. Considering the values in question, the State cannot legalize these unions without failing in its duty to promote and protect an essential institution for the common good, which marriage is.'

Though three-quarters of Costa Ricans are Roman Catholic, Catholics are not alone in expressing their concern over the matter, as last week's march was organized by the Costa Rican Evangelical Alliance.

In a 2006 poll by Universidad Costa Rica, it was revealed that 71.4 percent of the respondents were against the legalization of same-sex 'marriage.'

The bishops said that in changing the marital laws to favour same-sex 'marriage,' the government would be making changes that are 'contrary to the common good of the entire social order.' The bishops also called on Catholic lawmakers to 'speak out and vote against this measure, and to those who do not share our faith, to examine the arguments we have laid out. And in conformity with the rules of correct reasoning, of human nature and of life in society, not to cast their vote for a bill that clearly goes against the common good of the residents of our country.' [LifeSiteNews] 1470.11

 

India  Population control

The Law Reforms Commission of Kerala, India, which is a government commission, has proposed a law that would penalize any family that has a third child. The Catholic Church in India has spoken out against this proposal, which it says reflects the ideologies of the 'Marxist' government currently in power in Kerala.

According to AsiaNews, if enacted, the law will fine any family that has a third child the equivalent of 150 Euros, as well as exclude the family from free health care and education.

The law ensures that no one's religion or race will grant them an exception and gives 'any person or a public organization or institution associated with or carrying on the work of family planning and birth control' the right to take an offender of the law to court.

Cardinal Varkery Vithayathil, president of the Indian Catholic bishops' conference, told AsiaNews that the 'the Catholic Church will oppose to the end' the 'state dictatorship of the Marxist government' of Kerala.

'In Kerala, there are two different ideologies, the ideology of supremacy of the state, and the other ideology being freedom, respect, and the dignity of the human person,' said the Cardinal.

'Who has the right to decide the number of children? Human beings are born for the world, and the Indian government has tried before and this was opposed by everyone; even the poorest person knows intrinsically that a child is a gift of God. The government is proposing such draconian measures to limit the number of children for demographic reasons.'

Cardinal Vithayathil concluded by reflecting on the 40th anniversary of Humane Vitae, proclaiming the need to defend the right to life:

'We want to promote and encourage a pro-life policy, as we are celebrating 40 years of the encyclical Humane Vitae. We need to reaffirm the importance of life in the face of such a proposed law. No legislation can stop or even hinder the faithful from being generous in having more children and open to life.' [LifeSiteNews] 1470.12

India  Abstinence

The National AIDS Control Organization-- India's federal HIV/AIDS monitoring agency-- has unveiled a new AIDS-awareness curriculum that will focus on abstinence instead of condoms and 'safe sex' strategies.

'There will be no mention of condom or safe sex in the revised module on life-skill education program,' Sujatha Rao, NACO director-general, said on Tuesday while releasing the new program, which is being circulated for feedback from all partners including government officials, parents, and teachers.

The new curriculum for spreading awareness on HIV/AIDS among school students and youth comes after sex-education manuals in several states-- drafted by the state AIDS-control societies-- were widely criticized as encouraging promiscuity among young people by advocating condom as a safeguard against AIDS prevention.

India has one of the world's highest number of HIV/AIDS infections with an estimated 3 million cases. [CWNews] 1470.13

Spain  94.5% of Down's syndrome babies aborted

The National Association for the Defence of the Right to Conscientious Objection is deploring new data this week that indicates that 9 out every 10 babies diagnosed with Down's syndrome are aborted by their parents in Spain.

General coordinator of the Association, Jose Antonio Diez, said that in 94.5% of the cases that a prenatal diagnosis indicates the presence of Down's syndrome, the baby is aborted.

He said such diagnoses are often used to 'eliminate children with more or less serious defects. The doctor is not free to offer alternatives,' and for this reason many parents are now conscientiously objecting to prenatal diagnosis that is not intended for medical treatment, Diez said.

Spanish law does not permit abortion in cases in which the fetus is presumed to have 'serious physical or mental defects,' such as Trisomy 21, spina bifida or anencephaly.

According to the 'Women's Help Line Foundation' (Linea de Atencion a la Mujer), allowing the abortion of handicapped persons is discrimination 'incompatible with the Convention on the rights of handicapped persons approved by the UN in New York on December 13, 2006. Spain signed that Convention on December 3, 2007, and it took effect on May 3.'

Article 10 of the Convention affirms that 'the signatory States reaffirm the inherent right to life of all human beings and shall adopt all necessary measures to guarantee the effective enjoyment of that right by handicapped persons equal to all others.' [CNA] 1470.14

Turkey   'No alternative to democracy'

'There are no alternatives to democracy,' said the apostolic vicar in Anatolia, the day after Turkey's deadliest terrorist attack in five years killed 17 people.

Bishop Luigi Padovese, president of the Turkish episcopal conference, spoke with L'Osservatore Romano on Monday, expressing his apprehension as Turkey awaited a decision from the Constitutional Court about whether to ban the ruling party, accused of trying to move the nation away from its secular status toward an Islamic state.

Wednesday, the court decided not to ban the party, but withdrew several million dollars worth of state aid.

Speaking before the court had made a decision, the bishop contended: 'The purpose of the bombs is obvious: to destabilize a situation that is already quite unsettled. Clearly, this is the way to interpret such an incident a day before the decision.'

Sunday's attack in Istanbul killed 17 people when two bombs exploded.

Bishop Padovese lamented that an appeal from the Church -- in a nation where Christians and Jews combined are only 0.2% of the population -- will not be clearly heard.

'The appeal we can launch is of little value, as we are not such a representative reality,' he said. 'Nevertheless, the appeal is made to enable democracy to prevail in this country.'

According to Bishop Padovese, the problems that exist 'are linked to positions of power. There is a need to safeguard secularism and at the same time the right to give this secularism a democratic expression. Democracy always represents risks, but there are no alternatives to democracy.

'The situation in Turkey has remained in this immobility until now precisely because of the opposition between the forces of power. It is a bit like pulling a rope in which neither party is able to prevail, so things remain stuck in the middle.' [Zenit] 1470.15

 

Uganda  'Miss HIV'

At the premiere of the soon-to-be-released documentary 'Miss HIV' in Kampala, the wife of Uganda's president, Janet Museveni, lamented the rise in dangerous sexual behaviour in the country and the resultant rise in HIV-AIDS rates.

According to New Vision, Musevini said that Ugandans are abandoning behaviour-based solutions to HIV-AIDS in favour of methods, imported from the West, that only serve to perpetuate the disease.

'It is not too late to reverse the trend,' she said. 'We can adopt our own indigenous solutions, which are less expensive and are 100% sure of preventing the spread of this deadly disease. I find it very baffling how we could throw away what worked, and embrace ideas from elsewhere. Then we watched as rates of infection soared again to claim lives.'

Musevini's words echoed those of anti-AIDS crusader Sam Ruteikara, who wrote in the Washington Post several weeks ago that Western methods of combating AIDS, which strive to protect casual sex at all costs, are being imported into Uganda and are resulting in a rise in risky sexual behaviour and the overall HIV-AIDS rate.

Ruteikara lamented that the West's encouragement of dangerous behaviours leads to an increase in the need for expensive anti-retroviral drugs. Foreign aid money, he said, could be better spent on successful AIDS-prevention strategies. 'For every African who gains access to HIV treatment, six become newly infected,' he said. 'To treat one AIDS patient with life-prolonging anti-retroviral drugs costs more than $1,000 a year. Our successful ABC campaign cost just 29 cents per person each year.'

The ABC program heavily emphasizes abstinence and fidelity as a sure means to AIDS-prevention, and promotes condoms only as a distant last resort. Under the ABC program Uganda successfully reduced its HIV-AIDS rate from 21% to 6%.

However, at the same time as Uganda's first lady has draw attention to the recent increase in HIV-AIDS due to dangerous sexual practices, a prominent Western activist has demanded that foreign aid should be withdrawn from the country on account of its 'homophobia.'

On Friday July 18, Peter Tatchell, the well-known founder of the pro-homosexual organization Outrage!, called for an end to US aid for, 'viciously homophobic countries like Jamaica, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Uganda, Iraq and Nigeria.'

'Tyrannies should not be rewarded: No US aid for anti-gay regimes,' he said.

Earlier this month Tatchell, along with Ugandan homosexualist activist, Kizza Musinguzi, protested a meeting of traditional Anglicans in London, over their stance in favour of traditional Christian sexual morality. The two activists singled out the Ugandan church for its efforts to curb homosexual activity.

The Anglican Church in Uganda, including such well-known anti-AIDS figures as Pastor Martin Ssempa and Rev. Sam Ruteikara, strongly oppose homosexuality. As part of its AIDS-prevention activism the Church has long worked to discourage dangerous homosexual sex.

Statistics show that the HIV-AIDS infection rate is by far the highest amongst homosexual men. The most recent UNAIDS report reveals that in the Kenyan port city of Mombasa, a incredible 43% of men who only have sex with men were infected with HIV. The numbers were similarly high in Zambia, where 1 in 3 men who only have sex with men were found to have HIV. A 2006 report from the Public Health Agency of Canada revealed that this trend is not only isolated to developing nations, with 51% of Canadians infected with HIV found to be homosexual men.

According to New Vision, earlier this month Uganda's president, Yoweri Museveni, expressed his disagreement with homosexual behaviour. Marriage, Museveni said at a betrothal ceremony, is meant for the continuation of the human race. [LifeSiteNews] 1470.16

UK  Uganda prelate accuses Dr. Rowan Williams

An Anglican prelate from Africa has accused the Archbishop of Canterbury of betraying fundamental Christian principles, and questioned why the leader of the Anglican communion is chosen by the British government.

In a provocative essay that appeared in the London Times. Archbishop Henry Orombi of Uganda said that the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, was guilty of 'deep betrayal' because he opened the Lambeth Conference to prelates who had shown their contempt for Christian moral teachings. Archbishop Orombi said that the Anglican leader should not have invited bishops of the Episcopal Church in the US, 'in the face of the unrelenting commitment of the American church to bless sinful behaviour.'

Archbishop Orombi was repeating arguments that have been raised frequently by Africa's more conservative Anglican leaders, who have objected strenuously to the willingness of the Episcopal Church to bless homosexual unions. However, the Ugandan prelate raised a new issue by questioning the way the Archbishop of Canterbury is chosen.

The selection process that produces the worldwide leader of the Anglican communion is 'a remnant of British colonialism, and it is not serving us well,' the African archbishop said. 'Even the Pope is elected by his peers, but what Anglicans have is a man appointed by a secular government.' [CWNews] 1470.17