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BELFAST, Northern Ireland — A Catholic bishop said he is dismayed that one of the world’s largest family planning organizations is scheduled to open the first abortion clinic on the island of Ireland.
Bishop Noel Treanor of Down and Connor, whose diocese includes Belfast, expressed dismay that Marie Stopes International was scheduled to open a clinic in Belfast Oct. 18.
VATICAN CITY — Rosemary Goldie was a historic figure for the church in many ways. With her 1966 appointment as undersecretary of the Council for the Laity, she became the first woman to hold a senior management position in the Roman Curia.
Even before that, she was one of the first women appointed to attend the Second Vatican Council. Pope Paul VI eventually named a total of 23 women, 10 of them members of religious orders, as official observers at the council’s last two sessions in 1964 and 1965.
Here are the 16 documents approved by the Second Vatican Council, which ran from Oct. 11, 1962, to Dec. 8, 1965, and their dates of promulgation:
• Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (“Sacrosanctum Concilium”), Dec. 4, 1963. It ordered an extensive revision of worship so that people would have a clearer sense of their own involvement in the Mass and other rites.
Catholic News Service
Extravagant musical TV shows and movies are all the rage, from the campy “Glee” to the stern-faced “Step Up Revolution.”
Some of these productions are calculated to appeal exclusively to aspiring entertainers. Others attempt to use song and dance to proclaim a message, whether it be the importance of self-confidence or of social justice.
Catholic News Service
ST. LOUIS — A federal court ruling that rejected a Catholic St. Louis business owner’s challenge to the federal mandate that employee health insurance cover contraceptives will be appealed to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
U.S. District Judge Carole Jackson Sept. 28 granted the Obama administration’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit filed by Frank O’Brien, who sued the Department of Health and Human Services over a requirement that all employee health insurance plans include coverage for contraceptives, including some that can cause abortions, and sterilization.
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY — Paolo Gabriele, the papal butler on trial in the Vatican, told judges that for 20 days he was held in a tiny cell where he could not even fully extend both arms and where Vatican police kept the lights on 24 hours a day.
Gabriele’s testimony about the conditions of his detention after his arrest in May came in response to questions posed by his lawyer Oct. 2, the second day of his trial on charges of aggravated theft for allegedly stealing reserved papal correspondence and leaking it to a reporter.
TROYES, France — Cardinal Angel Amato, prefect of the Congregation for Saints’ Causes, presided over the Sept. 22 beatification of French Father Louis Brisson, founder of the Oblates and the Oblates Sisters of St. Francis de Sales.
Some 2,500 people, including a dozen bishops and more than 200 priests, filled the Troyes Cathedral in France for the beatification Mass. Hundreds more watched the ceremony from the cathedral steps.
Two prominent U.S. Catholic leaders wrote the head of the Nigerian bishops’ conference to express solidarity after a bombing at the cathedral in Bauchi.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with those who have lost loved ones in this attack and with the scores of others who were wounded,” said Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and Bishop Richard E. Pates of Des Moines, Iowa, chairman of the bishops’ Committee on International Justice and Peace.
Catholic News Service
The Second Vatican Council was the biggest stage in the history of the church.
There were more bishops present than at any of the 20 previous councils stretching from the First Council of Nicaea in 325 to the First Vatican Council in 1870. The bishops present came from more countries, more cultures, more languages than the church had ever experienced.
PHILADELPHIA — Philadelphia archdiocesan officials said a new round of civil lawsuits filed Sept. 18 “are not the best mechanism to promote healing in the context of the very private and difficult circumstances of sexual abuse.”
“We have not received copies of the cases that the plaintiffs have said they intend to file, so we cannot provide more detailed information on those particular lawsuits at this time,” said a brief statement posted on the archdiocesan website the same day.
