{"id":657,"date":"2012-07-27T18:07:00","date_gmt":"2012-07-27T18:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/news\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group\/"},"modified":"2012-07-27T18:07:00","modified_gmt":"2012-07-27T18:07:00","slug":"catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Catholic Relief Services tried to minimize risk of scandal with aid group"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Washington D.C., Jul 27, 2012 \/ 12:07 pm (CNA<\/a>).- Catholic Relief Services has said that it took steps to fight against the possibility of scandal due to its funding of an aid group that provides contraception in other countries.<\/p>\n

\tThe U.S. bishops' overseas relief agency responded to recent concerns over its funding of CARE, an international humanitarian organization that provides relief to the needy in developing nations but also offers contraception and early abortion-inducing drugs.<\/p>\n

\tThe funding from the bishops' group went towards programs providing food, water and sanitation to the poor and needy in Central America and Africa.<\/p>\n

\tCatholic Relief Services has said that this funding was carefully restricted to morally acceptable purposes and had been reviewed by Dr. John Haas of the National Catholic Bioethics Center, who found that it did not constitute \u201csupport of or involvement in immoral activities.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tWhile the bioethics center did have serious concerns over the possibility of scandal based on the mistaken assumption that the relief agency endorsed CARE\u2019s position on these issues, Catholic Relief Services said that it tried to counter this risk by working \u201cto publicly affirm our adherence to the teaching of the Church.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tA headline on a July 24 article by LifeSiteNews had originally indicated that Haas had advised Catholic Relief Services not to fund CARE. This headline was later changed to say Haas had warned the agency that \u201cscandal would be unavoidable\u201d with the grant.<\/p>\n

\tCatholic Relief Services responded by saying that Haas did not advise on any course of action, but left that decision to the board of the relief agency, which \u201cmade the decision to award the grants and took steps to minimize the risk\u201d of scandal due to misunderstanding.<\/p>\n

\tIn a July 25 online statement, the National Catholic Bioethics Center clarified that it does not \u201capprove\u201d grants for Catholic Relief Services, but instead gives occasional \u201cethical analyses\u201d of grant requests when asked to do so as part of a review process<\/p>\n

\tWhen asked to analyze Catholic Relief Services\u2019 grants to CARE, the bioethics center determined that the grants \u201cwould likely save lives\u201d and that no other agency without these problematic views was available as an alternative partner to achieve these goals.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

\tIt also concluded that the funds given to CARE do not go into a general pool that could be moved around to free up money for other purposes. Under federal law, the money given by Catholic Relief Services could be used for nothing other than the designated purpose of serving the poor and starving in other nations. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\tDue to the great good being achieved in saving lives, the lack of another effective way of achieving this good and the avoidance of contributing to the evil of contraception, the bioethics center determined that the grant was acceptable according to Catholic moral principles.<\/p>\n

\tHowever, the group \u201cwas gravely concerned about the risk of scandal that could arise\u201d from a Catholic agency\u2019s cooperation with an organization that disagreed with important Church teaching.<\/p>\n

\tTherefore, the bioethics center \u201cstrongly cautioned\u201d Catholic Relief Services about \u201cthe problems of misunderstanding that could arise with a grant to CARE\u201d and encouraged the aid organization to issue a public repudiation of CARE\u2019s positions on these issues.<\/p>\n

\tHaas told CNA that \u201cour position was, in a way, both\/and.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\u201cWe did not believe the awarding of the grant would involve CRS in immoral cooperation but we did fear that it would give rise to scandal,\u201d he said.\u00a0 \u201cHowever, this was a judgment that would have to be made by the board of CRS.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tCatholic Relief Services responded to these concerns by explaining in its mission statement that it is sometimes necessary to \u201cparticipate in humanitarian initiatives undertaken by a wide range of groups,\u201d including some that may not always be fully consistent with Church teaching.<\/p>\n

\tHowever, the agency stressed, its involvement with such groups is \u201calways and only focused on activities that are fully consistent with Catholic teaching.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tIt added that it \u201cneither facilitates, endorses nor enables any violation of those teachings\u201d and that it utilizes a review process to ensure that funds are used in compliance with Church teaching.<\/p>\n

\tRecent statements released by Catholic Relief Services emphasized that the group does not agree with CARE\u2019s position on contraception and does not \u201csupport any positions that would be in violation of Catholic teaching on human dignity and the sanctity of human life.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\u201cFaithfulness to Church teaching always has been and always will be our policy,\u201d the agency said.<\/p>\n

\n<\/a>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Washington D.C., Jul 27, 2012 \/ 12:07 pm (CNA).- Catholic Relief Services has said that it took steps to fight against the possibility of scandal due to its funding of an aid group that provides contraception in other countries.<\/p>\n

\tThe U.S. bishops&#39…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1031,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-us"],"yoast_head":"\nCatholic Relief Services tried to minimize risk of scandal with aid group<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Washington D.C., Jul 27, 2012 \/ 12:07 pm (CNA).- Catholic Relief Services has said that it took steps to fight against the possibility of scandal due to its funding of an aid group that provides contraception in other countries. The U.S. bishops&#39...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Catholic Relief Services tried to minimize risk of scandal with aid group\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Washington D.C., Jul 27, 2012 \/ 12:07 pm (CNA).- Catholic Relief Services has said that it took steps to fight against the possibility of scandal due to its funding of an aid group that provides contraception in other countries. The U.S. bishops&#39...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Catholic News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-07-27T18:07:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews?d=yIl2AUoC8zA\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"CNA Daily News\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"CNA Daily News\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/\",\"name\":\"Catholic Relief Services tried to minimize risk of scandal with aid group\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2012-07-27T18:07:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2012-07-27T18:07:00+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1\"},\"description\":\"Washington D.C., Jul 27, 2012 \/ 12:07 pm (CNA).- Catholic Relief Services has said that it took steps to fight against the possibility of scandal due to its funding of an aid group that provides contraception in other countries. The U.S. bishops&#39...\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Catholic Relief Services tried to minimize risk of scandal with aid group\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/\",\"name\":\"Catholic News\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1\",\"name\":\"CNA Daily News\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"CNA Daily News\"},\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/author\/cna-daily-news\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Catholic Relief Services tried to minimize risk of scandal with aid group","description":"Washington D.C., Jul 27, 2012 \/ 12:07 pm (CNA).- Catholic Relief Services has said that it took steps to fight against the possibility of scandal due to its funding of an aid group that provides contraception in other countries. The U.S. bishops&#39...","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Catholic Relief Services tried to minimize risk of scandal with aid group","og_description":"Washington D.C., Jul 27, 2012 \/ 12:07 pm (CNA).- Catholic Relief Services has said that it took steps to fight against the possibility of scandal due to its funding of an aid group that provides contraception in other countries. The U.S. bishops&#39...","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/","og_site_name":"Catholic News","article_published_time":"2012-07-27T18:07:00+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews?d=yIl2AUoC8zA"}],"author":"CNA Daily News","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"CNA Daily News","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/","name":"Catholic Relief Services tried to minimize risk of scandal with aid group","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website"},"datePublished":"2012-07-27T18:07:00+00:00","dateModified":"2012-07-27T18:07:00+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1"},"description":"Washington D.C., Jul 27, 2012 \/ 12:07 pm (CNA).- Catholic Relief Services has said that it took steps to fight against the possibility of scandal due to its funding of an aid group that provides contraception in other countries. The U.S. bishops&#39...","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2012\/07\/catholic-relief-services-tried-to-minimize-risk-of-scandal-with-aid-group-2\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Catholic Relief Services tried to minimize risk of scandal with aid group"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/","name":"Catholic News","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1","name":"CNA Daily News","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"CNA Daily News"},"sameAs":["http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/author\/cna-daily-news\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1031"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}