Rome, Italy, May 24, 2015 / 04:02 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Zhang Xihuan doesn't know what was going through her mind when she swallowed a mouthful of the pesticide stored behind the staircase in her home in rural Shandong province.    Maybe she was thinking of her neighbors who had ostracized her when she was diagnosed with hepatitis B. Or perhaps she was thinking of the hours spent scraping a living by collecting coal that had fallen on the road en route to nearby mines. Regardless, when Xihuan brought the bottle of Yang Hua Le Guo pesticide to her lips in May 2009, she was doing what countless Chinese women had done before her and would do after: taking their own lives rather than face the harsh reality of their society. The only difference was that Xihuan would live to tell her story to the World Health Organization.   China accounts for 26 percent of suicides worldwide, according to WHO estimates. Suicide is the fifth leading cause of death in the country and the suicide rate in women is 25 percent higher than in men. Young rural women are most at risk and their poison of choice – or convenience – is pesticide. So why are hundreds of Chinese women taking their own lives every day? Women's rights activist Reggie Littlejohn told CNA that in addition to domestic violence and discrimination, women in China are traumatized by the Chinese Communist Party’s brutal enforcement of its one-child policy. Since its inception 35 years ago, China’s one-child policy has killed between 360 and 400 million people. Littlejohn, who is the founder and president of the organization Women's Rights Without Frontiers, believes the Chinese Communist Party is using its one-child policy as a means of social control “masquerading as population control.” “I would absolutely say that (the CCP) are maintaining their grip on power through shedding the blood of innocent women and children,” Littlejohn said. She warned the policy is also subtly breaking down relationships and trust in Chinese society through its system of paid informants who expose illegally pregnant neighbors and family members. And, Littlejohn warned, the infrastructure of China’s Family Planning Police stamps out any form of dissent in the country. Littlejohn called on the international community to speak out against China’s one-child policy, particularly in light of the 35th anniversary of the policy’s inception. She said any international effort against the policy would bring hope to persecuted women in China. To see that the international community “is standing by their rights” would give women a lot of hope “since clearly the people within China are not doing so,” Littlejohn said. “It would give (women) a hope and something to hold onto, that maybe these atrocities will end.” This year also marks the 20th anniversary of a conference in Beijing hosted by the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. Conference participants outlined twelve priorities for the advancement of women’s rights in China; including forced abortion. However, Littlejohn told CNA that since the 1995 conference “Beijing has completely ignored the issue of women’s rights” and has made “no progress whatsoever toward women’s rights.” “In the last 20 years (China has) done hundreds of millions of abortions, most of them forced, hundreds of millions of sterilizations, most of them forced, hundreds of millions of contraceptive coils inserted into women, many of them forced,” she said. “It’s very important for the United Nations, the U.S. congress and the entire international community to grab hold of this and hold a mirror up to them and say this is what you promised in Beijing (in 1995), and this is what you’ve done, which is nothing.” Littlejohn specifically called for an increase in the “political will” to act on a 2013 agreement of the U.N. women’s commission asking governments and NGOs to condemn “state-sponsored, coercive population control,” including forced abortion, forced sterilization and forced contraception. Although European Parliament has also passed a resolution condemning forced abortion in China, Littlejohn said to have a commitment on paper isn’t enough, and that governmental bodies need to take a greater stand in putting pressure on China to end the one-child policy. She also called on the international community to cut funding for the United Nations Population Fund, which she said has been working “hand-in-hand” with the CCP since the policy’s inception. The UNFPA “has been entirely opaque in terms of their activities in China. They argue that they don’t do forced abortions. What are they doing to counter it? If you’re not actively fighting against an atrocity, but are in a very secretive way somehow supporting a structure that forcibly aborts women, you are complicit with those forced abortions,” she said. “So I think we can put a lot of pressure on the UNFPA either to pull out of China or to be transparent about their activities in China and demonstrate that they are actively and effectively advocating against coercive population control, because if they are advocating against it, it’s completely ineffective.” Littlejohn’s organization Women’s Rights Without Frontiers combats gendercide, sex slavery, and forced abortions and sterilizations in China. Littlejohn spoke with CNA in Rome, where she met with Vatican officials to discuss her April 30 congressional hearing on China’s one-child policy. She is also presenting this weekend at the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace’s two-day conference on women and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Read more

Rome, Italy, May 23, 2015 / 04:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- With 3-4 months of heavy rain at their doorstep, Nepal citizens who have been without shelter for nearly a month due to several massive earthquakes are desperate to find some sort of sturdy housing. “The greatest need right now is shelter, because within a month, the monsoon rains will start…that is going to change the situation totally,” director of Caritas Nepal, Father Pius Perumana, said. “All these hills which are shaken, when the rain starts coming there are going to be a lot more landslides. Even in normal conditions we have massive landslides every monsoon, and with the entire hilly region shaken, it is going to be terrible,” he said. Fr. Perumana was in Rome for the charity organization’s annual international general assembly May 12-17. He spoke with CNA the day after his country was hit by their third massive earthquake in less than two weeks. On April 25, a quake that measured 7.9 on the Richter scale ripped through Nepal's capital, Kathmandu, killing more than 8,000 people. “We saw right in front of our eyes, the houses shaking and crumbling, people crying for help and running in all directions…I myself felt helpless, I didn’t really know what to do,” Fr. Perumana said. In addition to the many aftershocks that came, the priest said the situation was complicated even further when the next day another earthquake measuring 6.9 hit the country. When the third, 7.4 quake shook the country again May 12, it only brought “more destruction,” he said. As the frightening scene unfolded the day the first earthquake hit, Fr. Perumana said that he and the other Caritas workers tried to make it to their office and gather the staff in order to “start some sort of help.” “We were all lost because our own staff, many of them lost their own houses,” he said, explaining that with electricity and phone lines down they weren’t able to do much the first night apart from hand out sheets to the people they found gathered around their office and the city’s cathedral. The priest said that, according to the experts, the pattern of the first two quakes was unusual, since the first struck from north to south, while the second went east to west. The earthquakes, he noted, “literally shook Kathmandu Valley, and Kathmandu was shifted to the south by 10 feet – that is more than 3 meters.” “It also raised the Kathmandu Valley by nearly 1 meter. The whole Kathmandu Valley came up and they also say Everest lost some inches of its height, so it literally shook the entire Nepal.” Roughly 8 million people have been affected by the quakes, and more than 400,000 houses have been destroyed. Numerous schools have also fallen, and 14 districts in Nepal reported that more than 80 percent of their houses were gone. In addition to the high number of deaths, close to 25,000 people have been injured. With many roads gone due to landsides, the logistics of making it to remote areas have been perplexed, and the situation is further complicated by the fact that Nepal only has 1 small airport handling all of the materials that come in, Fr. Perumana said. “The main problems we are facing are problems of shelter, medicine, food, wash materials,” as well as reaching the far out villages. Fr. Perumana said that since day-one several other Caritas branches have come to their assistance, including Caritas Asia, Australia, Belgium and India, who were gathered for a farmers conference when the first quake struck. Since then they have organized a coordination committee, and appointed Caritas Australia as the facilitator for other Caritas branches coming from all over the globe. While Caritas Nepal is playing the leading role, “we are organizing the help together,” the priest said. However, he expressed his concern that the situation would quickly spiral down without finding more shelter, food and medicine for those who have been left without a home. “These three have to go together, because as I said, they are great needs right now.” Nepal is one of the poorest countries in Asia, and has an estimated population of 27 to 28 million. The epicenter of the first earthquake was 80 km northwest of the country’s capital, Kathmandu, where the force of the quake toppled a 100-year-old temple, split roads, and destroyed houses and buildings. Tremors could be felt as far away as New Dehli in India, and aftershocks continued to shake the area for hours after the initial quake. It was the second-worst earthquake in Nepal since 1934, when an 8.0 magnitude earthquake all but destroyed the cities of Kathmandu, Bhaktapur and Patan. Read more

Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, May 22, 2015 / 03:17 pm (CNA).- Pope Francis’ one-day trip to Bosnia and Herzegovina this June will not include a visit to Medjugorje, the location of controversial alleged Marian apparitions, according to a coordinator of the visit. Monsignor Ivo Tomasevic, communications officer for the papal trip, confirmed to CNA May 22 that the Pope is only going to Sarajevo on June 6, and not the southern town near the Croatian border where six people claim to have seen apparitions of the Virgin Mary. Msgr. Tomasevic could not confirm whether any visionaries would be at the papal Mass, but he said any delegation from Medjugorje would be treated like any other parish delegation. He stressed that Medjugorje is “one of the parishes of the Diocese of Mostar-Duvno, and its faithful will take part in the celebration like faithful of the other parishes of the area, with an equal number of places assigned.” Enzo Manes, the editor of the Magazine “Medjugorje, the presence of Mary,” told CNA May 21 that he has been informed that “some of the visionaries will take part in the Mass.” He predicted a “strong” presence from Medjugorje. The alleged apparitions originally began June 24, 1981, when six children in Medjugorje began to experience phenomena which they have claimed to be apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary. According to these six “seers,” the apparitions contained a message of peace for the world, a call to conversion, prayer and fasting, as well as certain secrets surrounding events to be fulfilled in the future. These apparitions are said to have continued almost daily since their first occurrence, with three of the original six children – who are now young adults – continuing to receive apparitions every afternoon because not all of the “secrets” intended for them have been revealed. Since their beginning, the alleged apparitions have been a source of both controversy and conversion, with many flocking to the city for pilgrimage and prayer, and some claiming to have experienced miracles at the site, while many others claim the visions are non-credible.   In April 1991, the bishops of the former Yugoslavia determined that “on the basis of the research that has been done, it is not possible to state that there were apparitions or supernatural revelations.” On the basis of those findings the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith directed in October 2013 that clerics and the faithful “are not permitted to participate in meetings, conferences or public celebrations during which the credibility of such 'apparitions' would be taken for granted.” In January 2014, a Vatican commission completed an investigation into the supposed apparitions' doctrinal and disciplinary aspects, and was to have submitted its findings to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.   A source within the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith told CNA May 19 that “the conclusions have not been discussed yet at the congregation, neither in a special meeting nor in a regular meeting.”   Once the congregation analyzes the commission’s conclusions and finalizes a document on the phenomena, the Bishop of Rome will be able to make a final decision.   Speculations about the possible conclusions of the commission led some local residents to think that the Pope might visit the shrine during his one-day trip to Bosnia and Herzegovina. However, Cardinal Vinko Puljic of Sarajevo, a member of the commission which investigated the apparition, completely dismissed this possibility. Cardinal Puljic told a May 13 press conference in Sarajevo that the Pope’s visit to Sarajevo “has nothing to do with Medjugorje” and its alleged apparitions.   Regarding the investigating commission, Cardinal Puljic stressed: “I cannot speak about it, as I was part of it and I am bound to secrecy.” According to CNA’s source in the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican's caution around the supposed apparitions is also due to “the exceptional nature of the apparitions.” “It was never the case in history that the Virgin Mary appeared so continuously and so constantly over the years,” he said, noting that “the tradition of Marian apparitions show that they are limited to a given period in the life of any visionary.” Read more