Posted on 04/24/2024 20:19 PM (Detroit Catholic)
Posted on 04/24/2024 20:15 PM (CNA Daily News)
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Apr 24, 2024 / 16:15 pm (CNA).
A divided Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Wednesday in a case that will determine whether federal law requires pro-life states to have broader exceptions for women who seek abortions in emergency situations.
The crux of the case focuses on whether Idaho’s Defense of Life Act conflicts with a federal rule that requires hospitals to provide stabilizing health care that is consistent with standard medical practice in certain emergency situations.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a lawsuit that argues Idaho’s law prevents hospitals from providing this care in some situations because it only allows abortions in cases of rape, incest, and when “necessary to prevent the death of the pregnant woman.”
The lawsuit, Moyle v. United States, is based on the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA), which Congress enacted in 1986 to ensure that everyone has access to emergency medical care even if they can’t afford to pay for that care.
Under EMTALA hospitals that receive Medicare funds must provide stabilizing care when the absence of care could put the patient’s health in serious jeopardy or cause the impairment of bodily functions or serious dysfunction of bodily organs. The law does not specifically reference abortion, but the Department of Justice is arguing that an abortion will sometimes be the standard care necessary to meet these rules.
According to the DOJ, Idaho’s threshold for when it permits abortion is too strict, because it only permits abortions when necessary to prevent the death of the mother and does not include any exceptions that would cover the other health risks considered in EMTALA.
The Supreme Court’s decision in this case could have far-ranging effects on protections for unborn children in Idaho and more than 20 other states that have passed pro-life laws in the past few years.
In oral arguments presented to the justices, Idaho’s lawyer Joshua Turner said Idaho’s law does not conflict with EMTALA in any way and claimed the DOJ is “misreading” the statute when it makes that assertion.
Turner argued that states can legally regulate the practice of medicine and that they frequently impose such regulations. As an example, he noted that states control medical licensing and the legality of certain treatments. He referenced the different approaches among states related to how long a doctor can prescribe opioids to someone who is dealing with chronic pain and said there are “countless examples” of this.
The DOJ’s interpretation, according to Turner, would prevent the state from enforcing any of these regulations because it “lacks any limiting principle” and essentially “leaves emergency rooms unregulated under state law.” He further said that proper “professional standards” change from day to day and that it is limited to available treatments, according to the text: “Illegal treatments are not available treatments.”
Turner added that the provisions in EMTALA have never been used to challenge a state regulation or criminal statute. He claimed that for EMTALA to override a state’s criminal law, it would need to be very clear.
“Congress must speak clearly,” Turner said. “It has not done so here.”
Some of the judges challenged Turner on his interpretation and probed him with questions about when abortions would be allowed under Idaho’s law. Justice Elena Kagan argued with Turner about whether EMTALA was clear, claiming “the federal government has plenty to say about [when care must be provided] in this statute.”
Justice Sonia Sotomayor pressed Turner with questions about whether Idaho’s law would permit an abortion in various hypothetical situations. Turner said the law permits an abortion when the life of the mother is threatened, which is based on “the doctor’s good-faith medical judgment” but was repeatedly interrupted when he sought to explain further.
The line of questioning and frequent interruptions provoked the ire of Justice Samuel Alito, who commented that Turner was presented with quick hypotheticals and “asked to provide a snap judgment of what would be appropriate” and “hardly given an opportunity to answer.”
U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, who provided the legal arguments on behalf of the DOJ, said Idaho’s law conflicts with the text of EMTALA, which has real implications for what is “happening on the ground.” She asserted that Turner is “gravely mistaken” in saying that there is no conflict.
“This case is about how [EMTALA] applies to pregnant women in a medical crisis,” Prelogar said.
Prelogar challenged Turner’s interpretation that the DOJ’s position would threaten all state medical regulations, asserting that EMTALA is “textually very narrow.”
According to Prelogar, if abortion is necessary to provide stabilizing care for a woman under the conditions set in EMTALA, “the statute protects her and gives her that choice.” She said the patient must “be offered pregnancy termination [when it is] the necessary treatment.”
Some of the justices challenged Prelogar’s interpretation of the law. Justice Clarence Thomas noted that EMTALA imposes a rule on hospitals as a condition to receive Medicare funding but that the law does not make demands of the state.
“In this case, you are bringing an action against the state, and the state’s not regulated,” Thomas said.
Thomas and other judges noted that EMTALA concerns spending and questioned Prelogar on whether it would preempt a state’s criminal laws.
“Congress has broad power under the spending clause to impose [these rules],” Prelogar responded.
The judges also questioned Prelogar about whether EMTALA respects conscience objections made by doctors and hospitals who have moral objections to providing abortions, and she said those protections are still in place. They also asked her whether a mental health crisis could ever permit an abortion under EMTALA, to which she replied that abortion is “not the accepted standard of practice to treat any mental health emergency.”
Posted on 04/24/2024 20:15 PM (Detroit Catholic)
Posted on 04/24/2024 20:04 PM (Detroit Catholic)
Posted on 04/24/2024 19:45 PM (CNA Daily News)
Ann Arbor, Michigan, Apr 24, 2024 / 15:45 pm (CNA).
Muslim extremists set on fire several homes of Christians in Minya, a province in southern Egypt, in a continuation of anti-Christian violence less than two weeks before Orthodox Christians celebrate Easter.
According to The New Arab, when anti-Christian fanatics failed to dispossess Christians of their homes in retribution for attempting to build a church in Al-Fawakher village, they proceeded to burn down the houses on the evening of April 23.
On his official Twitter account, Coptic Orthodox Bishop Anba Macarius wrote on April 24 that Egyptian security forces “brought the situation under control, arresting the instigators and perpetrators,” and that the government “will compensate those affected and hold the perpetrators accountable.”
After noting that calm now reigns in Al-Fawakher, Macarius added: “May God protect our dear country, Egypt, from all harm.”
CNA reached out to authorities of the Coptic Orthodox Church but did not receive a response by the time of publication. Video of the burning homes was shared on social media that featured celebratory music and Arabic lyrics.
Mobs are out on the streets and burning down homes of Egyptian Coptic Christians in Al-Fawakher in Minya.
— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) April 24, 2024
🇪🇬 https://t.co/ALzEgjWeDm
Christianity in Egypt dates to the very beginnings of the faith and nearly 10% of the country’s population of 111 million are Christian. Most Egyptian Christians belong to the Coptic Orthodox Church, while about 2.5% belong to the Coptic Catholic Church and other particular churches.
Christians constitute the largest minority in Egypt, and Macarius leads the Coptic Christians of Minya Province, where approximately one-third of the country’s Christians live. He narrowly survived an assassination attempt more than 10 years ago.
The Open Doors organization, which monitors persecution against followers of Christ, ranks Egypt as the 38th most dangerous country in the world to be a Christian. In 2018, seven Christians were killed by Muslim terrorists who attacked a bus carrying pilgrims. In 2017, Islamic State terrorists bombed two Coptic Orthodox churches, killing over 40 people. And in December 2016, a terrorist detonated a bomb killing himself and 189 worshippers at Sts. Peter and Paul Church, injuring more than 400 others.
On his 2017 visit to Egypt, Pope Francis celebrated a Mass for the small Catholic community and called on Christians to forgive the atrocities. Relations between the Vatican and the Coptic Orthodox Church, the leader of which is Pope Tawadros II, have improved in recent years.
Earlier this year, Pope Francis recognized the Coptic Orthodox Church’s canonization of 21 Coptic Orthodox Martyrs of Libya.
Last year, Pope Tawadros II celebrated a Divine Liturgy at the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran, where he delivered a homily on Christian unity. Since then, however, Tawadros II has reduced relations with the Vatican following the December 2023 publication of Fiducia Supplicans.
The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), while noting that President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi’s government has appointed the first-ever Christian to the Supreme Constitutional Court and also sentenced a extremist Muslim murderer of a priest, has criticized the “slow pace of approvals for the backlog of legalization applications,” which would allow the construction of new churches. Egypt is on the USCIRF Special Watch List for tolerating severe violations of religious freedom.
In 2016, Egypt’s legislature passed the Church Construction Law, ostensibly to legalize such construction with permits.
Posted on 04/24/2024 19:15 PM (CNA Daily News)
CNA Staff, Apr 24, 2024 / 15:15 pm (CNA).
Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond this week asked the Supreme Court to halt the execution of a condemned man whose death sentence has been criticized by an archbishop and other Catholic advocates.
Drummond announced the filing on his website on Tuesday. In his petition to the Supreme Court the attorney general detailed “why the execution of Oklahoma death row inmate Richard Glossip should be halted and his conviction remanded back to district court.”
Glossip was first convicted in 1998 for allegedly ordering a handyman at a motel Glossip managed to murder the motel’s owner. Glossip was largely convicted on the handyman’s testimony.
Since his initial conviction, two independent investigations have uncovered serious problems with his trial, including allegations of police misconduct and what were reportedly incorrect instructions given to the jury in the case. Prosecutors had also reportedly failed to correct false testimony in Glossip’s trial.
The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals upheld Glossip’s death sentence in April of last year, even though the state had previously admitted error and asked the appeals court to overturn the sentence. Drummond called that decision “remarkable and remarkably flawed.”
By “dismissing this extraordinary confession by the state,” Drummond’s office said this week, the appeals court engaged in a “flawed whitewashing of federal constitutional violations.”
The court should “vacate the judgment of conviction and order a new trial” for Glossip, Drummond’s filing said.
The U.S. Supreme Court announced in January that it would review Glossip’s case. At the time, Oklahoma Archbishop Paul Coakley told CNA that the high court’s decision “offers hope in furthering the cause toward one day abolishing the death penalty.”
“With new evidence and the state of Oklahoma’s admission of errors in the case prompting the Supreme Court review — issues that seem to be more and more prevalent — we can clearly see reason to reconsider institutionalized violence against the incarcerated as we hopefully move to respect the dignity of life for all human persons,” Coakley told CNA.
The Death Penalty Information Center says on its website that Oklahoma has the highest number of executions per capita of any U.S. state since the death penalty’s reinstitution in 1976. It is second only to Texas in total number of inmates put to death.
Glossip’s case has drawn support from other anti-death penalty Catholics. Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, the executive director of Catholic Mobilizing Network, said last year that Glossip “should not be put to death … not ever.”
“No state should have the power to take the lives of its citizens,” she said at the time. “As we see in Mr. Glossip’s case, the system is too broken, too cruel, too disrespecting of human dignity."
“We give thanks to God that Richard Glossip has been granted a temporary stay of execution,” Vaillancourt Murphy said shortly thereafter, “and we pray the Supreme Court decides to formally take up his case.”
The Catechism of the Catholic Church, reflecting an update promulgated by Pope Francis in 2018, describes the death penalty as “inadmissible” and an “attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person” (No. 2267).
St. John Paul II, meanwhile, called the death penalty “cruel and unnecessary” and encouraged Christians to be “unconditionally pro-life.”
The former pope argued that “the dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the case of someone who has done great evil.”
This is not the first time Glossip’s case has been to the highest court in the land. In 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court in Glossip v. Gross ruled that lethal injections using midazolam to kill prisoners on death row do not constitute cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Posted on 04/24/2024 18:15 PM (CNA Daily News)
CNA Staff, Apr 24, 2024 / 14:15 pm (CNA).
As euthanasia and assisted suicide are legalized in more jurisdictions throughout the U.S. and the rest of the world, one Catholic-focused ministry is promoting end-of-life resources that the group’s founder says will help Catholics finish their earthly journeys while remaining faithful.
Aging with Dignity, a nonprofit that for years has been promoting end-of-life support in line with Church teaching, announced this month the release of “Finishing Life Faithfully,” a booklet that “makes complex end-of-life decisions easier.” The materials address “basic questions” on how to approach end-of-life topics such as pain management, feeding tubes, and other matters surrounding death.
The document “summarizes the Catholic Church’s guidance on end-of-life decision-making and the ethical considerations involved and helps patients and families better understand these teachings and follow them,” the group said this month.
Jim Towey, the founder and CEO of Aging with Dignity who previously served as legal counsel to Mother Teresa, told CNA this week that he launched the nonprofit in 1996 “to give people a hopeful vision for end of life that helps them practice their faith and that doesn’t treat dying like it’s just a medical moment.”
For years Aging With Dignity has distributed its “Five Wishes” legal document, which helps Catholics and others “express [their] wishes ahead of a serious illness.” A form of what’s known as an “advanced directive,” Towey said it lets the faithful “address their personal, emotional, and spiritual needs” before the final weeks and days of their lives.
The Five Wishes program has been immensely popular; the group has distributed over 40 million copies of the guide in 33 languages. But, Towey said, “it needed a companion guide to help Catholics understand what the Church teaches on feeding tubes, anointing of the sick, hospice, and pain management.”
Towey said he spent all of last year working with various collaborators, including priests, to develop the guide. The group says the document offers “a positive vision of care at the end of life that contrasts with the euthanasia/assisted suicide movements.”
The guide provides information on the ethical questions that often surround end-of-life concerns. It notes, for instance, that Catholics “can take or increase pain medication to lessen suffering” even if such medication might hasten the onset of death, so long as “death is not willed as either an end or a means.”
Elsewhere it notes that Catholics are not “obliged to accept or continue every medical intervention available” and that waiving “disproportionate medical treatments” that promise “only a precarious or painful extension of life” is “not the equivalent of suicide or euthanasia.”
The organization distributes the materials through more than 5,000 distributing organizations, including health care providers, churches, and employers. Individuals often request the documents to distribute to family or friends.
Both euthanasia and assisted suicide have been legalized in more and more jurisdictions throughout the U.S. and Western Europe. Assisted suicide is legal in nine U.S. states and under consideration in several more. Numerous countries, meanwhile, allow euthanasia and/or assisted suicide, including Canada, Belgium, Spain, and several others.
Towey said when he founded the organization nearly 30 years ago, there were already warning signs on the horizon regarding those deadly procedures.
“What I saw back in 1996 were the clouds gathering in favor of assisted suicide,” he said. “Now the storms have begun.”
“We’re seeing more and more people, including Catholics, deceived by the arguments in favor of assisted suicide,” he said.
Both the advanced directive and the end-of-life guide have been touted by U.S. Church leaders, including Cardinal Timothy Dolan and Cardinal Sean O’Malley of the Archdioceses of New York and Boston. O’Malley described the documents as “grounded in the primacy of protecting God’s gift of life.”
Of the group’s end-of-life advocacy, meanwhile, Towey told CNA: “We’re just getting started.”
“Assisted suicide isn’t the solution,” he said. “Good end-of-life care and healthy family discussions are.”
“The Church needs to make this easier for families. We don’t make it easy for them to access some of this information,” he said.
“The Church needs to help people in this critical transition in their life to eternity, to remain faithful and to be assured by the accompaniment of the Church.”
Posted on 04/24/2024 18:07 PM (Detroit Catholic)
Posted on 04/24/2024 18:05 PM (Detroit Catholic)
Posted on 04/24/2024 17:54 PM (Detroit Catholic)