Merry Christmas!

 Merry Christmas to everyone! 

The NCW in Saipan

 Below is a video clip from Better Catholics about the Neocatechumenal Way.  Those in the interview are from the Diocese of Chalan Kanoa. As stated by Father Jason, the Catholic Church is rich with many different charisms. The Way is part of that many riches in the Catholic Church.

The Rights of the Unborn

Surprisingly, the Guam Heartbeat Act (Bill 291-36) was passed by the 36th Guam Legislature.  The Guam Heartbeat Act aims to ban abortion once a fetal heartbeat is detected, or within about six weeks.  The bill made exceptions for medical emergencies or when it endangers the life or health of the mother.  Nevertheless, abortion has often been used as a birth control method rather than as a women's health care issue.  Statistics show that most abortion are done due to other factors other than medical reasons, rape, or incest.  Results in one study in the United States, dated 2005, stated:

The reasons most frequently cited were that having a child would interfere with a woman's education, work or ability to care for dependents (74%); that she could not afford a baby now (73%); and that she did not want to be a single mother or was having relationship problems (48%). Nearly four in 10 women said they had completed their childbearing, and almost one-third were not ready to have a child. Fewer than 1% said their parents' or partners' desire for them to have an abortion was the most important reason. Younger women often reported that they were unprepared for the transition to motherhood, while older women regularly cited their responsibility to dependents.

It would be interesting to see the reasons why women in Guam chose to abort their child.  I do not think medical or health issue is the number one reason.  So, how is abortion about women's health care if the reason for aborting the child has nothing or little to do with health care?  I would hope Governor Lou Leon Guerrero, who is a nurse, would take this into account.  I know that she supports abortion, so it would not be surprising if she vetoed the bill.  Nevertheless, I can only hope and pray that Governor Lou Leon Guerrero would somehow be enlightened and pass the bill into law so that abortion can stop being used as a birth control method.  

 Furthermore, hoping that the Governor would sign the Heartbeat bill into law does not mean that I support abortion until a fetal heartbeat is detected.  Even the bill itself does not say that abortion is okay until a heartbeat is detected.  According to the Guam Heartbeat Bill:

§91B106. CONSTRUCTION OF CHAPTER. 

(a) This chapter does not create or recognize a right to abortion before a fetal heartbeat is detected

The main purpose of government is to protect individual rights.  This government has spoken out for the rights of women, homosexuals, and the LGBTQ+ community.  But what about the rights of the unborn?   

In this season of Christmas, let us remember that Christ was born of the Virgin Mary. He was in the virgin's womb for nine months.  Christ our savior was a person in Mary's womb.  Likewise, every pregnant woman carries a living person in her womb.  Every Christmas, our Catholic Churches in Guam are full of people, coming to celebrate the birthday of our Lord Jesus Christ.  As they celebrate our Lord's birthday, let us remember that every child in the womb is also a gift from God (Psalm 127:3).   

      

Freedom of Expression

  

The letter of Father Romeo Convocar, the Vicar General of the Archdiocese of Agana, can be found here for those who are interested in reading it. According to his letter: 

"The Catholic Church is often errantly criticized by those who say, "The church should stay out of political matters."  Rather, Catholics and other Christians are citizens of our beautiful country.  As citizens, the Church and its people have a right and responsibility to contribute to the common good of our society.  We help the common good of our communities by practicing our right to free speech and helping to shape public policy through dialogue and active community."

Many people often cite "Separation of Church and State" to silence the Church and to keep her out of political discussions.  However, the legal definition of "separation of Church and State" is: the separation of religion and government mandated under the establishment clause and the free exercise clause of the U.S. Constitution that forbids governmental establishment or preference of a religion and that preserves religious freedom from governmental intrusion.

Freedom of Expression is vital in our community, and the Church has a responsibility to transmit morality to the people for the salvation of souls.  There are four reasons why Freedom of expression is important in our society.  

1.  Individual development and human dignity.  It is important to our growth as a person to have the right to present our ideas and to consider other points of view. Our dignity as a person should be respected by allowing us the freedom to say what we think and to hear what others think.

2.  Advancement of knowledge.  It is easier for new discoveries to be made when ideas can be discussed freely.  Even if one disagrees with someone, that person may say something that helps one to test his/her knowledge and increase his/her understanding. 

3.  The maintenance of representative democracy.  Individual citizens participate in running our country through their power to vote for government officials and make choices about government policies.  In order to make wise choices, one would need to have good information.  Free expression never guaranteed complete or accurate information, but it increases the chances of getting such information.  The individual determines which and what information are accurate.  That cannot happen if free expression is suppressed, allowing individuals to hear only one side of the story.  

4.  Peaceful social change.  Free expression allows one to try to influence public opinion by persuasion without feeling you have to resort to violence to make changes.  

Therefore, Father Romeo was correct that the Church has a duty and responsibility to express her stance on the abortion issue.  In fact, the Church should come out more to catechize the faithful on the sanctity of life because many have been led astray on the abortion issue.  He and Archbishop Michael Byrnes are also correct in supporting the Guam Heartbeat bill, which does not contradict the teachings of the Church that human life begins at conception.  Whether the Guam Heartbeat bill passes or not is irrelevant and left in the hands of the Guam Legislature.  The important thing is that the Church be able to express herself, so that she can save souls by persuading some people into believing the sanctity of life.  If we are to change public policy, it starts first with winning the hearts of the people, which is done through free expression and proper catechesis.   

Carmen Hernandez Remembered for Virtues, Vices

The cause of the canonization of Carmen Hernandez was held on December 4th in Madrid, Spain.  At the event, Kiko shared his difficult relationship with Carmen as they worked together.  However, this kind of relationship can also be found in the Neocatechumenal Way communities.  According to Kiko, Carmen had always looked down on him until she saw the Bishop next to Kiko.  The article below can be found here. 

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An ‘unbearable’ saint? Neocatechumenal Way’s Hernández remembered for virtues, vices

CNA Newsroom, Dec 6, 2022 / 14:30 pm

The diocesan phase of the cause for the canonization of Carmen Hernández, co-founder of the Neocatechumenal Way, was held in Madrid Dec. 4.  

At the ceremony, Kiko Argüello, who co-founded the movement with Hernandez and worked together with her for more than 50 years, shared some candid remarks about the difficulties of their relationship.

“The Lord united Carmen and me together for 52 years in a wonderful mission of evangelization,” Argüello said as he began his reflection on her life.

But their journey together wasn’t always easy, Argüello continued, departing from his text, describing the co-founder of these communities of Christian initiation as someone “unbearable.”

“I had a hard time accepting Carmen, until the Lord spoke within me that Carmen was … unbearable. Well, you all know her, right?” he said, to the smiles of many of those present.

“She was a not very likable woman from Soria [a town in Spain] and she told you the truth every time she saw you. She said: You’re part of the Cursillo, man. So, for her, being in the Cursillo was contemptible,” Argüello went on.

Getting back to his text, Argüello said that in reality God revealed to him that she was “a very great grace” and that he had placed him alongside her so that “she would tell me the truth.” And so Argüello was able to accept Hernández “as sent by the Lord.”

“I suffered until I realized that she came from God,” reiterated Argüello, who then lavished praise on her.

“Carmen was a stupendous woman, an extraordinary woman who did a lot of good not only for the members of the Neocatechumenal Way but [also] for the entire Church,” he said.

Hernández was “a masterful genius for freedom and love for the Church,” he said, and noted that he never flattered her.  

“She always told me the truth” and “was clearly aware that the mission God had given her was to support, defend, and correct me for the good of the Neocatechumenal Way,” Argüello acknowledged.

Consequently, outside of Church circles, she was not known because she “never sought prominence.”

The co-founder of the Neocatechumenal Way also highlighted that Hernández was “a true prophet, a true missionary, who lived the faith to a heroic degree. An exceptional woman, very important for the Church.”

‘She looked down on me’ until she saw the bishop

Argüello also told how Hernández didn’t have a high opinion of him when they met in the 1980s in the poor neighborhoods on the outskirts of Madrid.

He had felt a call from the Lord to live with the poor and social outcasts in the shantytowns of Palomeras Altas near Madrid.

“The providential presence of the archbishop of Madrid [Casimiro García Morcillo] who went to the shantytowns was what made Carmen definitively collaborate with me,” he recalled. “Until she saw the bishop in my shack, Carmen looked down on  me.”

“When she saw the bishop in my shack, from that moment on, she changed, as if to say: ‘The Church accepts Kiko.’ How difficult!” he exclaimed wryly.

“Carmen saw the presence of the Church in the archbishop and completely changed her attitude towards me. With the presence of Morcillo, she saw the promises that God had made to her in Israel come true,” he stressed.

Argüello recalled that the presence of Hernández in that place “was like a farm field that God had prepared to place within the Church. What God made us experience in the midst of a world of poverty, the Holy Spirit had already prepared for his entire Church.”

‘Thank you, Carmen’

Argüello concluded his reflection by saying that he hoped the canonization process serves to thoroughly examine the life of Hernández, “which was often a crucified, silent, and suffering life, like a dark night.”

So that “her virtues come to light, many of them hidden, many to a heroic degree,” he added.

Argüello said he was grateful “to have known her” and to have “been able to work with her in the hard work of the Gospel.”

Abortion Empowers Men

Abortion has been in our local news lately.  The reality behind abortion is that it empowers men over women and enslaves children. The modern slaves today are the children whose status is similar to those of the African slaves prior to the American Civil War.  Slaves were dehumanized and treated as objects., without any human rights  The unborn child is treated the same way. 

Abortion has always been disguised as "women's health care" or "women's equal rights."  Whenever abortion is discussed, very few people understand that abortion only empowers men over women.  It does not liberate women from anything.  In fact, it does the opposite.  In a society that allows women to choose not to become mothers, is it any wonder then why some men are choosing not to become fathers? How is it that feminists, the abortion industry, and the advocates of abortion rights get away with their claim that abortion liberates women? In truth, the availability of abortion has only served to liberate irresponsible men from duty, morality, and responsibility. And of course, the greater tragedy is the death of unborn children by the millions. 

The following article can be found here   

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Her choice, her problem: how abortion empowers men

This summer, President Obama proclaimed again that we "need fathers to recognize that responsibility doesn't end at conception." In a sense, of course, he is absolutely right. But the problem is that, in another sense, he is completely wrong: Male responsibility really does end at conception. Men these days can choose only sex, not fatherhood; mothers alone determine whether children shall be allowed to exist. Legalized abortion was supposed to grant enormous freedom to women, but it has had the perverse result of freeing men and trapping women.

The likelihood of this cultural development was foreseen by the radical feminist Catherine MacKinnon, one of the critical voices responding to Roe v. Wade's extension of the right of privacy to cover abortion. In an essay called "Privacy vs. Equality," MacKinnon argued that "abortion's proponents and opponents share a tacit assumption that women do significantly control sex. Feminist investigations suggest otherwise. Sexual intercourse ... cannot simply be presumed coequally determined." Indeed, she added, "men control sexuality," and "Roe does not contradict this."

"Abortion facilitates women's heterosexual availability," MacKinnon pointed out: "In other words, under conditions of gender inequality [abortion] does not liberate women; it frees male sexual aggression. The availability of abortion removes the one remaining legitimized reason that women have had for refusing sex besides the headache." Perhaps that is why, she observed, "the Playboy Foundation has supported abortion rights from day one." In the end, MacKinnon pronounced, Roe's "right to privacy looks like an injury got up as a gift," for "virtually every ounce of control that women won" from legalized abortion "has gone directly into the hands of men."

At the time, MacKinnon's work may have seemed little more than a curiosity on the left, but, as the years have passed, some of the essay's claims have proved prescient. I recall a law student who would admit when pressed, "I'm in favor of keeping abortion legal because I don't like using condoms." Since abortion could now come between conception and birth, he saw no benefit to missing any portion of sexual pleasure, even though it imposed a risk of surgery on his partner. He may have assumed a rational partner would choose abortion either freely or under pressure. With less deliberate callousness, under the influence of passion almost any male may think quite simply: "At least there's a way out if the unlikely happens and pregnancy occurs."

I've also met a clever female undergraduate student living with her boyfriend, who thought she had solved this problem. When I asked whether she was for or against abortion, she answered: "I'm pro-choice, but you can bet I tell him I'm pro-life!" She reasoned that, in light of her warning, he would be careful not to fool around in ways that could lead to pregnancy.

Such a lie may not provide protection for every young woman in her situation, however. If she says she is pro-life so that he thinks abortion is not an option for her, he might decide to keep her from getting pregnant by leaving her for someone more open to abortion, a woman who doesn't insist on his using a condom. That is, the presence in the sexual marketplace of women willing to have an abortion reduces an individual woman's bargaining power. As a result, in order not to lose her guy, she may be pressured into doing precisely what she doesn't want to do: have unprotected sex, then an unwanted pregnancy, then the abortion she had all along been trying to avoid. Even though her abortion in this case is not literally forced, it would be, in an important sense, imposed on her. And, far from alleviating her overall situation, it would merely return her to the same sexual pressures, made worse by a new assurance to her boyfriend that she is willing to take care of a pregnancy.

Perhaps it was difficult to foresee such cultural trends back in 1973, when Roe v. Wade was handed down by the Supreme Court. But they simply track the inner logic of choice and the market. Economists have shown that such scenarios have in fact become common since abortion was legalized in the United States. Easy access to abortion has increased the expectation and frequency of sexual intercourse (including unprotected intercourse) among young people, making it more difficult for a woman to deny herself to a man without losing him, thus increasing pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections. (See, for instance, Jonathan Klick and Thomas Stratmann's 2003 study, "The Effect of Abortion Legalization on Sexual Behavior," in the Journal of Legal Studies.)

Furthermore, if a woman attempts to choose birth instead of abortion, she may well find the child's father pushing the other way. Her boyfriend's fear of fatherhood would once have been focused on intercourse itself and could have led him either to be careful to avoid conception or else (overcoming that fear) to commit himself beforehand to equal responsibility for the child. His fear now will turn to getting her to choose abortion. One investigator, Vincent M. Rue, reported in the Medical Science Monitor, that 64 percent of American women who abort feel pressed to do so by others. Another, Frederica Mathewes-Green in her book Real Choices, discovered that American women almost always abort to satisfy the desires of people who do not want to care for their children.

Catherine MacKinnon seemed to suggest that abortion leads to greater male sexual aggression only "under conditions of gender inequality," which implies more equality for women could reduce the male exploitation caused by Roe v. Wade. That makes sense in theory. To the degree that individual women are economically, educationally, and in other ways empowered, they should be more able to stand up to male pressures to have unwanted sex (and to have unwanted abortions in order to give the guys still more unwanted sex).

But counteracting the negative forces of sexual competition is difficult. Even if women were universally to agree to refuse sex without condoms, for example, enforcement of this agreement in such an intimate sphere would be nearly impossible. Women would always be tempted to increase their individual sexual competitiveness by consenting to sex without a condom, while relying on abortion as a backup, thus causing female solidarity and power to collapse. Only women strong enough to forgo boyfriends altogether might be likely in the end to resist.

Furthermore, if MacKinnon is right, wherever women have not yet overcome gender inequality, involuntary sex and involuntary abortion will tend to be more frequent, precisely as a result of abortion's availability. To the degree that a culture is built on machismo, for example, the legalization of abortion will make women relatively worse off by giving men another tool to manipulate women as sex objects. Again, to the degree that an economy employs mainly men, leaving women dependent on economic handouts, women will be much less likely to resist male pressures to make use of abortion. Wherever men make women's decisions for them, the option of abortion will be a man's choice, regardless of how the law may label it.

Human-rights activists in developing nations must learn to consider this fact. In those countries, only a thin, elite layer of truly independent and powerful women may be relatively unharmed by the availability of abortion, because only for them is the abortion option more nearly their own. Proclaiming a right to abortion in developing countries may mean just adopting the viewpoint of these well-to-do professionals--which ought to be no surprise. Those elites are often the only voices for women heard in the transnational political arenas where abortion is debated.

Moreover, the availability of abortion may make all societies less open to empowering women in other ways. MacKinnon may well be right that stronger women would more often resist male pressures to risk pregnancies and have abortions. But, perhaps paradoxically, the option of abortion actually makes sympathy and solidarity--and thus women's empowerment--less likely.

When birth was the result of passion and bad luck, some people could sympathize with a young woman who was going to need help with her baby, though the stigma of bastardry was genuine. If money or a larger place to live were going to be necessary for her to stay in school, a sense of solidarity would likely lead friends and family to offer assistance. The father would feel strong pressure as well, for he was as responsible as she for the child. He might offer to get a second job or otherwise shoulder some of the burdens of parenting.

But once continuing a pregnancy to birth is the result neither of passion nor of luck but only of her deliberate choice, sympathy weakens. After all, the pregnant woman can avoid all her problems by choosing abortion. So if she decides to take those difficulties on, she must think she can handle them.

Birth itself may be followed by blame rather than support. Since only the mother has the right to decide whether to let the child be born, the father may easily conclude that she bears sole responsibility for caring for the child. The baby is her fault.

It may also seem unfair to him that she could escape motherhood (by being legally allowed to prevent birth), while he is denied any way to escape fatherhood (by still being legally required to pay child support). If consenting to sex does not entail consenting to act as a mother, why should it entail consenting to act as a father? Paternity support in this context appears unjust, and he may resist compliance with his legal duties.

Prior to the legalization of abortion in the United States, it was commonly understood that a man should offer a woman marriage in case of pregnancy, and many did so. But with the legalization of abortion, men started to feel that they were not responsible for the birth of children and consequently not under any obligation to marry. In gaining the option of abortion, many women have lost the option of marriage. Liberal abortion laws have thus considerably increased the number of families headed by a single mother, resulting in what some economists call the "feminization of poverty."

The mother is even worse off if, during pregnancy, tests show that the child will have a disability: Doctors often press for abortion, in order to be sure that she does not later blame and sue them for the costs of raising her child. Some have suggested that health-care plans should provide no postbirth coverage for a handicapped child whose mother refuses a paid abortion. If she does not abort, after all, she will be causally responsible for the costs and the alleged burdens that the child brings. Even her friends and neighbors may make her feel ashamed for not choosing to abort her child.

Employers may likewise react negatively to maternal needs where abortion has been available. If they (or the state) pay for abortions, they may feel less obligated to shape labor practices to the needs of mothers. If maternity causes problems with work routines or job schedules, the employer may well consider these to be private or personal problems that female employees brought on themselves. The availability of abortion makes women's claims for better working conditions lose a measure of legitimacy.

Throughout human history, children have been the consequence of natural sexual relations between men and women. Both sexes knew they were equally responsible for their children, and society had somehow to facilitate their upbringing. Even the advent of birth control did not fundamentally change this dynamic, for all forms of contraception are fallible.

Elective abortion changes everything. Abortion absolutely prevents the birth of a child. A woman's choice for or against abortion breaks the causal link between conception and birth. It matters little what or who caused conception or whether the male insisted on having unprotected intercourse. It is she alone who finally decides whether the child comes into the world. She is the responsible one. For the first time in history, the father and the doctor and the health-insurance actuary can point a finger at her as the person who allowed an inconvenient human being to come into the world. The deepest tragedy may be that there is no way out.

By granting to the pregnant woman an unrestrained choice over who will be born, we make her alone to blame for how she exercises her power. Nothing can alter the solidarity-shattering impact of the abortion option.

Richard Stith teaches at Valparaiso University School of Law in Indiana.

Stith, Richard

Opening Ceremony of Beatification for Carmen Hernandez

 The following is the video of the opening ceremony of Beatification of Carmen Hernández, which can be found in YouTube. The video is long but worth watching.