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The Southern Cross, Page 2
House votes to give
Congressional Medal
to Father Hesburgh
Washington (CNS)
H oly Cross Father Theodore M.
Hesburgh, president emeritus of
the University of Notre Dame and
one of the most honored men in
recent U.S. history, might soon get
another honor from the U.S. Con
gress. The House of Representatives
voted October 12 to award the Con
gressional Gold Medal to the 82-
year-old Father Hesburgh, who has
held 15 presidential appointments
and received more than 130 honorary
degrees.
Father Theodore Hesburgh
On bishops’ agenda:
EDUCATION NORMS, AGE,
CHARITY, JUBILEE
Washington (CNS)
W hen the U.S. Catholic bishops
meet in Washington November
15-18, they plan to vote on Catholic
higher education norms, pastoral
messages on charity and on the bless
ings of age, and a message for the
jubilee year. They also plan to vote
on a pastoral plan for adult faith for
mation and a series of proposals to
restructure the National Conference
of Catholic Bishops-U.S. Catholic
Conference and revise its statutes.
The agenda calls for them to dis
cuss—without voting on—a draft
document on church art and architec-
H
ture, a draft basic plan for the ongo
ing formation of priests and a project
report on ecclesial lay ministry.
African-American
GROUP RALLIES FOR LIFE
Washington (CNS)
A three-day march organized by
African-American Protestants
and Catholics took about 100 black
pro-lifers from New Jersey to the
nation’s capital to declare abortion
“the greatest deception leveled on
African-Americans.” The October 8-
11 march began in Newark, NJ, made
stops at Lawnside, NJ, Philadelphia,
Wilmington, DE, Catonsville, MD,
and ended at the steps of the U.S.
Supreme Court. The Rev. Clenard
Howard Childress, a Baptist pastor
from Montclair, NJ, and an organizer
of the march, said “abortion on
African-Americans is nothing more
than black genocide.”
Scottish church
defends help for
PREGNANT 12-YEAR-OLD
Manchester, England (CNS)
T he Catholic Church in Scotland
defended its financial help for a
pregnant 12-year-old following criti
cism that the church was bribing the
girl not to have an abortion. The girl,
who cannot be named for legal rea
sons and lives in the north of
England, has been helped by a fund
set up by Cardinal Thomas Winning
of Glasgow, Scotland, to help women
who would otherwise be considering
abortion. Josephine Quintavalle of
the Pro-Life Alliance said the church
program offered “real choice.”
Bishop comments on
BIRTH OF 6 BILLIONTH
HUMAN
Washington (CNS)
T he birth of a child designated the
world’s 6 billionth person is
being used to push an aggressive
population-control agenda, a bishop
said. Coadjutor Bishop James T.
McHugh of Rockville Centre, NY, a
longtime population expert for the
Vatican, commented on the birth of
Adnan Mevic in Sarajevo, Bosnia-
Thursday, October 21, 1999
Herzegovina. Bom at 12:02 a.m.
October 12, Adnan was designated
the world’s 6 billionth person by
United Nations’ demographics
experts. In a column syndicated by
the U.S. bishops’ Secretariat for Pro-
Life Activities, Bishop McHugh said
that as the 6-billion day approached,
“the population controllers have
already pushed the panic buttons,
claiming that population growth is
the cause of poverty, disease, famine,
stifled development and a host of
other ills.”
Court rejects cases on
SCHOOL VOUCHERS,
SPECIAL DISTRICT
Washington (CNS)
T he Supreme Court has declined
to review a Maine law that pays
for mral students to attend private
schools as long as they are not
church-affiliated. A week after letting
Arizona’s program of tax breaks for
contributions to religious schools
continue, the court on October 12 let
stand a Maine Supreme Court mling
that supporters of vouchers for
parochial schools hoped to have
reversed. It also refused to intervene
in a Pennsylvania case in which the
state Supreme Court said a sales tax
exemption for religious publications
was unconstitutional.
U.S. cardinal: Bishops
MUST CORRECT ERRORS
Vatican City (CNS)
B ishops have a serious responsi
bility to courageously proclaim
the truth and correct errors, even if it
causes suffering, a U.S. cardinal told
the Synod of Bishops for Europe.
“Among the grave problems of today
are widespread ignorance and confu
sion,” Cardinal William W. Baum,
head of the Apostolic Penitentiary,
said in a written submission to the
synod, released by the Vatican
October 13. Errors even in funda
mental church teachings “are not
found only in theological faculties
but today at all levels: exegesis of the
sacred Scripture, priestly formation,
preaching, catechesis, popular reli
gious publications,” Cardinal Baum
said.
Father Ritter dies;
Covenant House head
RESIGNED AMID SCANDAL
New York (CNS)
F ather Bruce Ritter, a former
Franciscan and the founder of
Covenant House who resigned in
1990 amid sexual and financial scan
dal, died October 7 at age 72. Father
Ritter had suffered from Hodgkin’s
disease, a cancer of the lymph nodes.
An October 12 Associated Press
story said that Benjamin Meyers, a
funeral director, reported the priest’s
death and said a memorial Mass for
him was celebrated October 9 at a
farmhouse in Decatur, N.Y., where
the priest lived after his resignation.
Best-selling author
Morris West dead at 83
Washington (CNS)
M orris L. West, the best-selling
author whose novels foresaw
the election of an East European
pope (The Shoes of the Fisherman)
and a papal assassination attempt
(The Clowns of God), died October 9
at his home in Sydney, Australia. He
was 83. A lifelong Catholic, West
told Catholic News Service in a 1996
interview that since heart surgery in
the early 1990s he was “a man who
lives necessarily in the shadow of
eternity.”
Springfield, Illinois,
bishop resigns;
Saint Louis priest
is SUCCESSOR
Washington (CNS)
P ope John Paul II has accepted the
resignation of Bishop Daniel L.
Ryan of Springfield, Illinois, and
named Monsignor George Lucas, rec
tor of the Kenrick-Glennon Seminary
in Saint Louis, to succeed him.
Archbishop Gabriel Montalvo, apos
tolic nuncio to the United States,
announced the changes October 19 in
Washington. Bishop Ryan, who
turned 69 on September 28, has
served as head of the Illinois diocese
since January 1984.
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