Wearing a face mask in church will be mandatory in England, following an announcement by the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson. The Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales said it was updating its official guidelines.
Bishops in England and Wales with responsibility for health care have reiterated the Church’s support for vaccination without condoning the use of cell lines from aborted foetuses. However, they said that “the paramount importance of the health of a child and other vulnerable persons could permit parents to use a vaccine which was in the past developed using these diploid cell lines”.
Survivors of clerical abuse are among almost 5,000 people to share their stories with the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse’s Truth Project. The project encourages victims and survivors to relate their experience of abuse and its impact in their own words, written or recorded. More than one in 10 of the participants is speaking out about their experience for the first time.
The Church in Scotland has issued a statement condemning gay conversion therapy after campaigners accused the Catholic group Courage, which operates in Scotland, of endorsing it. A spokesperson for the Archdiocese of St Andrew’s and Edinburgh said: “Courage provides pastoral support for those experiencing same-sex attraction who want to grow in holiness by living chaste lives.”
The Catechism could be outlawed in Scotland under proposed hate crime legislation, the Scottish Bishops’ Conference has warned. The Hate Crime and Public Order Bill seeks to introduce a new offence of stirring up hatred and possession of inflammatory material. The Director of the Catholic Parliamentary Office, Anthony Horan, warned that the legislation could mean the Church becomes a victim of “cancel culture”.
Catholic organisations are marking the seventy-fifth anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with prayers and calls for disarmament. The Missionary Society of St Columban called for the abolition of nuclear weapons, as did the Sisters of St Joseph of Peace. In a message to peace workers in Japan, the National President of Pax Christi England and Wales, Archbishop Malcolm McMahon, said: “We are calling on our government to sign the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.”
Campaigners wanting to halt the closure of a residential care home owned by the Religious Sisters of Charity (RSC) have written to the Irish Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly, appealing to him to intervene. The RSC said in a statement that the decision to wind down St Mary’s (Telford) in Merrion Road, and two other homes in Dublin, St Monica’s at Belvedere Place, and the Caritas Convalescent Centre on Merrion Road, followed “a detailed review of their financial resources”.
Places of worship must be places where intolerance is shunned and respect is learned, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin said in his message to Ireland’s Muslim community for the Festival of Eid al-Adha. “Today our celebration is a gesture ... to recognise the contribution of your Muslim community to the Ireland of today and to the Ireland of tomorrow,” the archbishop said.
Caritas Bakhita House has helped to secure prison sentences for two traffickers in London, with the help of one of their victims. The woman, who was trafficked to the UK on the understanding that she would be working in a factory, was forced into prostitution and was pregnant when she was rescued and moved into Bakhita House.
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