Washington D.C., May 24, 2016 / 05:30 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- After sending the Little Sisters’ HHS mandate case back to the circuit courts on May 16, the Supreme Court voided two more mandate cases with Catholic plaintiffs on Monday. The court was... Read more

Washington D.C., May 23, 2016 / 04:18 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- As the U.S. lifted its decades-long arms embargo with Vietnam during President Barack Obama’s visit there, human rights advocates argued that the country had not sufficiently improved its human rights record to warrant the deal.   The advocacy group Human Rights Watch expressed serious disappointment over the deal. “President Obama just gave Vietnam a reward that they don't deserve,” John Sifton, Asia policy director for the group, said May 23. After the U.S. had pressured Vietnam “for years” to improve its “human rights record,” he continued, it had not responded in kind. “It has not repealed any repressive laws, nor released any significant number of political prisoners, nor made any substantial pledges,” he said. Weeks in advance of President Obama’s visit to Vietnam, human rights advocates were insisting that the U.S. make any deal with the country contingent upon human rights concessions. Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) asked that the trip not even be made unless the Vietnamese government released religious prisoners. There should be no agreement struck “until there is significant, verifiable, and irreversible improvements in human rights in Vietnam,” he said. At a joint press conference on Monday, President Obama said the lifting of the embargo stemmed from “a lengthy process of moving towards normalization with Vietnam.” Human rights, he continued, were “not directly tied” to the lifting of the embargo, and he admitted that “this is an area where we still have differences.” Vietnam’s President Quang said, through an interpreter, that “the consistent position and viewpoint of the Vietnamese state and government is to protect and promote human rights.” The White House has said that it is pushing Vietnam to improve its record. “During the April 25-26 annual U.S.-Vietnam Human Rights Dialogue, the United States called on Vietnam to release all prisoners of conscience and cease harassment of individuals exercising their fundamental freedoms, including those relating to expression, assembly, and religion,” the White House said Monday. Yet human rights advocates say that words have not been supported by actions from the administration.   Shortly before the president’s visit, the government released a Catholic priest and well-known religious prisoner, Fr. Nguyen Van Ly, two months away from the end of his sentence. However, “the Vietnamese government has insulted the president by detaining or harassing dissidents yesterday and today,” Sifton said Monday. The release of Fr. Ly was no “major human rights breakthrough,” cautioned Rep. Smith. And overall, the human rights situation in Vietnam remains “dire,” Human Rights Watch reports, because the Communist government “maintains a monopoly on political power” and the state is responsible for widespread human rights abuses like torture, seizing of private property “without adequate compensation,” and the jailing of human rights and democracy activists. As for religious freedom in the country, the overall situation is “nuanced and complex,” the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom noted in its 2016 annual report, and because of the government’s maltreatment of certain religious groups, the commission has recommended it as a “country of particular concern” since 2001. That term is an official State Department designation given to countries “the government of which has engaged in or tolerated systematic, ongoing and egregious violations of religious freedom.” Vietnam meets this criteria because government harassment, imprisonment, and physical abuse of members of certain religions has continued for years and has not stopped, the report explained. While the Vietnamese government has allowed for the opening of new churches and a new Catholic university in the country, and “relations between the Vietnamese government and the Vatican improved in 2015,” the report noted, not all Catholics enjoy religious freedom. There have been reports of Catholic schools being threatened with destruction by authorities, and “Catholics, including nuns” have been attacked in the Gia Lai province. Other Christian pastors or priests have been imprisoned, attacked, or threatened by the government; some activists were attacked even after they were released from prison. Vietnam reportedly has between 100 to 150 “prisoners of conscience” detained for their religious beliefs. The wife of an imprisoned Christian human rights lawyer, Vu Minh Khanh, testified before the House Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations on May 10. In her written testimony, she said her husband was arrested in 2007 for “conducting propaganda against the state.” After his prison sentence – four years in prison and four more years in house arrest – he was taken again by authorities in December and faces anywhere from 3 to 20 years in prison, she said. “My husband has been detained for almost 5 months now, yet I have not received any information about him,” she stated, noting he has no access to lawyers or family. She added that “if in fact my husband has been tortured physically and/or mentally, or even given false information, I would not know.” Now that the arms deal is in place, the U.S. must work with it “to create incentives for Vietnam to improve its human rights record,” Sifton stressed in his statement. “President Obama and the US Congress will need to tell Hanoi clearly that specific arms sales will be restricted if the government doesn't start releasing political prisoners, repealing the laws that are used to prosecute them, and easing up on harassment and restrictions on dissidents and journalists.”Photo credit: Dejan Lazarevic via www.shutterstock.com.  Read more

Washington D.C., May 23, 2016 / 12:08 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Evangelical and socially conservative leaders are planning a meeting with presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump to discuss their concerns and decide on future action. Organizers of the meeting plan to bring together about 400 leaders to meet with the candidate, Time Magazine reports. The organizers include former presidential candidate Ben Carson and Family Research Council president Tony Perkins. “The main thing here is to have a conversation,” Perkins said, adding that the goal of the meeting is to have “an honest conversation so that these leaders know what they need to do.” Carson is the only meeting organizer who endorsed Trump in the Republican primary. He is organizing the meeting in his capacity as the chairman of MyFaithVotes, an organization founded by California lawyer Sealy Yates to mobilize Christian voters. Many of the likely attendees did not support Trump in the Republican primaries. Another meeting organizer is Bill Dallas, who heads the group United in Purpose, which aims to unify conservative organizations to bring about “a culture change in America based on Judeo-Christian principles.” Its partners include Americans United for Life, Concerned Women for America, Catholic Vote, and the Faith and Freedom Coalition. On May 4 Catholic Vote said it would not yet endorse Trump. The group said he remains “problematic in too many ways” for them to endorse, given his record, his lack of “clear guiding principles,” and his “history of unpredictability.” A related steering committee for the planned meeting, which the Trump campaign has not confirmed, includes Gary Bauer of American Values, Focus on the Family founder James Dobson, and Family Leader president Bob Vander Plaats. Ronnie Floyd, president of the Southern Baptist Convention, said Perkins had invited him to the planned meeting. He told Time Magazine he wanted to understand the candidate’s positions on Supreme Court nominations, abortion, racial justice, and religious liberty. Unlike candidates Jeb Bush and Ted Cruz, neither Trump nor his campaign has reached out to him. Tom McClusky, vice president of March for Life Action, told Time there is “a lot of concern” in the pro-life movement with Trump as the prospective Republican nominee. He said the March for Life theme for 2016 had emphasized that the pro-life cause is a pro-woman cause. Some Trump statements have been “misogynist,” he said. Pro-life advocates have also questioned Trump’s April statements that he would change the Republican platform to allow abortion in cases of rape, incest, and threats to the life of the mother. Ralph Reed, who heads the Faith & Freedom Coalition, has said he will support Trump in a personal capacity. Latino Christian leaders are also weighing their decision. Both Trump and Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton sent a video message to the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference’s Latin Leader Fest held last weekend in Anaheim, Calif. Samuel Rodriguez, an Evangelical pastor who heads the Evangelical Christian leadership conference, opposes the Democratic Party’s position on abortion and same-sex marriage. He has led a prayer at the 2012 Republican national convention and praised several Republican presidential candidates. He told the Washington Post, however, that Trump’s calls for mass deportations “have offended me and my community.” “Those are our parishioners,” he said. Eddie Rodriguez, a pastor who leads an Assemblies of God congregation in South Florida, backed Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Florida) in the Republican primary. He said he thinks Trump has damaged race relations; he also cited Trump’s past support for abortion, his tone towards women, and his statement that he has never asked God for forgiveness. “In good consciousness, I just can't vote for him,” said the pastor, who has said he will vote for Clinton. Trump campaign supporters are organizing a more official faith advisory committee. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is a possible national chairman for this group. Trump supporter and televangelist Paula White, senior pastor of the New Destiny Christian Center in Florida, has been organizing the group with Tim Clinton of the American Association of Christian counselors, Time reports. Read more

Washington D.C., Dec 27, 2016 / 04:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- With high divorce rates among Catholic couples – and marriage rates plummeting among millennials – Church leaders are scrambling to address the problem.   But long before Pope Francis' apostolic exhortation on “The Joy of Love” was written, one marriage prep ministry was already putting the Holy Father's message into practice. The U.S.-based Witness to Love marriage prep ministry seeks to challenge engaged couples to a greater and more fulfilling life of virtue through an intensive, multi-faceted program. It's something that's called for distinctly in the Pope's document when he says that “marriage preparation aimed at giving couples a genuine experience of participation in ecclesial life and a complete introduction to various aspects of family life.” However, tough conversations about an engaged couple's spiritual situation often fail to happen in marriage prep. “In most marriage preparation, we don't expect them (couples) to accept the challenge, and we don’t give them the challenge,” Mary Rose Verret, founder of Witness to Love, told CNA in an interview. Verret and her husband realized that many Catholic couples – even those who were receiving marriage prep – saw their marriages fall apart. “Most of us in marriage prep have lost hope,” she admitted. But couples, she said, “are capable of great things.” The Witness to Love marriage prep ministry is intensive. It involves engaged couples working with a priest or deacon who catechizes them and a “mentor couple” at the parish who befriends them. Thus, they not only receive the basic teaching on the sacrament, but they are invited into a deeper participation in the life of the Church through the friendship and witness of their married “mentors.” Pope Francis noted a need for stronger marriage preparation in “Amoris Laetitia.” He wrote that “learning to love someone does not happen automatically, nor can it be taught in a workshop just prior to the celebration of marriage.” He added that catechesis must continue after a couple’s marriage, and shouldn’t stop when they make their vows. Witness to Love, founded in 2012, seeks to do just this, to invite couples to be fully involved in a parish and not simply to disappear from the church once they have said their vows, as is all too common today. Most couples don't get married at their current parish, Verret noted, which means that priests and wedding coordinators at the parish venue might not know the couple at all. There might only be a pre-nuptial inquiry and a confirmation of the baptismal certificates of the man and woman without any significant investigation into the emotional and spiritual health of the couple. Consequently, many couples are “falling between the cracks,” Verret said, and when they encounter marital difficulties they were not prepared for, they may have no one in their parish to turn to. Through interviewing hundreds of couples before they began their ministry, Verret and her husband Ryan realized that many Catholic couples who were even receiving marriage prep saw their marriages fall apart. “Amoris Laetitia” instructs Catholics to “find the right language” and “invite” couples “to take up the challenge (of marriage) with enthusiasm and courage.” So the Verrets realized that friendship is the answer so many couples need when preparing for marriage.   A couple, at the beginning of Witness to Love marriage prep, is asked to pick a “mentor couple,” a married couple they admire and look up to, to accompany them as friends not only through the engagement but into their own marriage. The mentor couple is then trained by parish staff or volunteers to ensure they are up to the task. By friendship with this married couple, an engaged couple has both a good example and a mentor they can confide in. “The only way we’re going to be able to offer true accompaniment,” Verret said, “is if there’s someone already involved in the process before the wedding.” Someone “who’s been formed, who’s been coached, who’s been growing in virtue with (the couple), who’s been connecting them to the parish, and then prior to the wedding there’s an invitation to parish life, invitation to small groups, a follow-up after the wedding where both of those couples are invited into small groups together.” Many couples who otherwise might have faded away from active participation in the church after their wedding now have a connection to the Church through their new friends. And, Verret noted, they have someone experienced to talk to when they encounter difficulties early in their marriage. “Amoris Laetitia” affirms the very practice of mentor couples: “With the help of missionary families, the couple’s own families and a variety of pastoral resources, ways should also be found to offer a remote preparation that, by example and good advice, can help their love to grow and mature.” It is “equally beneficial” for both parties, Verret said. The engaged couples like to spend time with mentors they admire, and the mentors are awed that they would be chosen for the task, and take their responsibility seriously. Many couples who otherwise might have faded away from active participation in the Church after their wedding now have a connection. This friendship is a critical component of the marriage prep program; priests are then able to focus more on catechesis, and the program becomes more than just a conference or series of classes which provide a brief “shot in the arm” for couples that fades in time. “A gradual process where you do tell them the truth in love and within the context of a relationship is more likely to be successful,” the Verrets noted in their program training outline. “You can't really witness without a relationship,” Verret told CNA. “Conversion happens in a relationship.” Dr. Peter Martin is a psychologist who works at Catholic Social Services in Southern Nebraska. The Verrets relied on his input for their ministry. In an interview published in the training program, he explained why a mentor couple is so important to marriage prep. Engaged couples, once they marry, undergo serious role changes from man and woman to husband and wife, and to father and mother, he noted. This can intensify existing insecurities and bring about new ones, he said. The guidance and advice of a parish and a married couple can bring significant support to a newly-married couple’s struggles, he said. Yet for a friendship to even exist, there must be trust, Verret said. This is hampered by a wide gulf that currently separates many engaged couples from living in accordance with Church teaching.   The mentor couple is there to bridge this gap between an engaged couple’s situation and Church teaching which can seem daunting at first glance, Verret said. The friendship and witness of the mentors makes the Christian life more livable and concrete. “That’s what we need to be doing,” she said, but “it’s not what’s happening…there's such a disconnect between engaged couples and those preparing them.” Some parishes worry about challenging engaged couples with an intensive marriage prep program because they don't want the couple to be overwhelmed and switch church venues. “We can't not have the revenue,” one marriage prep coordinator told Verret of her fear of losing couples. Yet “the buck has got to stop with somebody,” Verret said. If the parish doesn't reach out to invite the couple to full participation in the life of the Church, who will? On another occasion, a priest told her that it was “unrealistic and impossible to expect engaged couples” to return to Mass after marriage prep. However, St. John Paul II's 1981 apostolic exhortation “Familiaris Consortio” made it clear that Catholics must “integrate couples into their church, into their parish,” Verret said. From what she had seen before she and her husband started their ministry, that exhortation was largely being ignored. “How can we expect couples to come to church if they’re not invited, and if we don’t even expect them to be able to come?” she asked. “If we’re not building friendships with them, they’re not going to come.” Another big problem today, Verret noted, is that engaged couples visit the church venue and pick out a wedding date before they even begin marriage prep. “We always say the first person they meet with absolutely, absolutely always must be Father or Deacon,” she insisted. “It cannot be the wedding coordinator ever. They can’t come scope out the church and get their date first. No. That’s backwards.” Rather, couples should meet with the pastor or deacon first, complete a “pre-marital questionnaire,” choose their mentor couple, and talk with the marriage prep coordinator. Otherwise, Verret said, significant problems might not get discovered until months into the process and after the wedding invites have already been sent out. By then, “everybody knows this shouldn’t have happened, but what was in place to prevent it from happening?”  This article was originally published on CNA May 22, 2016. Read more