St. Mary's Church

En los últimos días, la Eucaristía ha sido objeto de burlas en la televisión y de condenas por parte de activistas con megáfonos durante las procesiones públicas del Santísimo en Estados Unidos

A un año de la desaparición del pequeño Loan Peña en Corrientes (Argentina), el Arzobispo local, Mons. José Adolfo Larregain, celebró una Misa y llamó a tomar conciencia sobre el drama de la trata de personas.

Los Legionarios de Cristo se pronunciaron sobre la detención de uno de sus sacerdotes, acusado de presunto abuso sexual contra un menor, que habría ocurrido hace unos 20 años.

Bernardo García, director ejecutivo de la Declaración de Casablanca que pide la abolición universal de los vientres de alquiler o maternidad subrogada, afirmó que esta práctica en realidad “es explotación de mujeres pobres y venta de niños”.

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jun 12, 2025 / 18:08 pm (CNA).

A parental rights group has filed formal complaints against the YMCA with three federal agencies, requesting an investigation of the organization for allegedly violating the law by permitting biological males to use girls’ locker rooms, bathrooms, and overnight cabins.

The American Parents Coalition (APC), led by Alleigh Marré, sent letters on June 10 to the secretaries of the Department of Education, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. She requested an investigation into possible Title IX violations on the part of the YMCA.

“The YMCA has betrayed the families it claims to serve,” Marré said in a statement. “Girls are expected to share teams, locker rooms, bathrooms, and overnight cabins with biological males, while parents are often kept in the dark.”

“As a federally funded institution receiving more than 600 million taxpayer dollars, the YMCA is legally obligated to protect girls, not sacrifice fairness, safety, and privacy to promote gender ideology,” she added.

The APC alleges that because the YMCA is a recipient of federal funds, it is required to adhere to Title IX rules, which ban sex-based discrimination. President Donald Trump issued executive orders clarifying that federal anti-discrimination rules are based on a person’s “sex” and not self-purported “gender identity,” instructing agencies to safeguard “intimate spaces” reserved for girls and women such as locker rooms and bathrooms.

The APC accuses the YMCA of maintaining “discriminatory policies” that go against Title IX rules and “imperil vulnerable children.” It alleges the YMCA embraces “radical gender ideology” through its policies.

“Under such an ideology, a man can walk into a YMCA locker room where young girls are changing because he feels like a woman,” the complaint alleges. “The YMCA policies prioritize the man but not the young girls in the locker room.”

The letter cites a since-deleted 2017 document on the American YMCA’s website about “how to create a safe space for LGBTQ+ campers.” One of the recommendations in the document was to “ensure all campers and staff have access to the facilities aligned with their gender identity and comfort within facility and resource limitations” as opposed to separating facilities on the basis of biological sex.

Marré told CNA that these recommendations are not “just theoretical” and cited examples in which YMCA facilities forced women and girls to “share that space with a man.”

In 2022, an 80-year-old woman was banned from a YMCA pool in Washington after expressing concerns about a biological male being present in a female locker room while young girls were changing. An article from the Daily Mail this week detailed an ongoing dispute at a YMCA gym in California in which several women have complained about a biological male who frequently uses the female locker room.

In April, police in Missouri launched an investigation into reports that a biological male exposed himself to children in a girls’ locker room at North Kansas City YMCA. North Kansas City YMCA told the local Fox affiliate that it was cooperating with the investigation but that “individuals are allowed to use the locker room or restroom that they identify with” according to state and local law.

Some YMCA summer camps include information on their websites that state that facilities are separated on the basis of self-asserted “gender identity” rather than biological sex. Camp Olson in Minnesota, for example, states that cabin assignments are based on “gender preference.”

YMCA disputes APC’s letter

The YMCA is disputing some of the APC letter’s characterizations of its policies.

A spokesperson for the YMCA dismissed the now-deleted 2017 document about separating facilities on the basis of gender identity as simply a “blog” that “had a number of ideas for camps that were interested in being more inclusive,” telling CNA this was never a mandatory policy.

“Y-USA does not have a nationwide policy around locker room and bathroom facilities,” according to an official statement from the YMCA provided to CNA.

“State laws about transgender inclusion in gendered spaces remain an ever-evolving topic,” the statement added. “Considering this, Y-USA advocates for the personal safety and privacy of all members and participants.”

Marré told CNA that the YMCA’s response is “insufficient” and criticized the American YMCA for quietly removing the 2017 document and several other webpages that discuss gender ideology and homosexual pride without providing a public explanation or officially revising its policy.

“Until they explicitly say that their locker rooms, private spaces, and sports teams are [separated based on] biological sex, we have no reason to believe that’s actually the case,” Marré said.

Marré said the YMCA should “respect and follow Title IX as it is written,” but if the organization chooses not to, it should not “delete those policies” from its website but instead should “clearly communicate [it] to [its] members.”

APC is urging parents to question local YMCAs about their policies before allowing their children to participate in activities there. The organization has provided sample questions to help parents inquire about gender-related policies.

CNA Staff, Jun 12, 2025 / 17:38 pm (CNA).

Twenty-two states and various religious freedom and free speech advocates have filed friend-of-the-court briefs on behalf of two Vermont couples who are suing the state after their licenses to be foster parents were revoked due to their religious beliefs concerning human sexuality. 

Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) is suing on behalf of Brian and Katy Wuoti and Bryan and Rebecca Gantt after the Vermont Department for Children and Families informed the two families that their belief that persons cannot change biological sex and that marriage is only between a man and a woman precluded them from serving as foster parents in the state.

Despite describing the Wuotis and the Gantts as “amazing,” “wonderful,” and “welcoming,” state officials revoked the couples’ foster care licenses after they expressed their commonly-held and constitutionally-protected religious beliefs. The state said these beliefs made them “unqualified” to parent any child, regardless of the child’s age, beliefs, or identity. 

In 2014, the Wuotis became foster parents, eventually adopting two brothers from foster care. The Gantts started fostering in 2016, caring for children born with drug dependencies or fetal alcohol syndrome, and have adopted three children.

Attorneys general from 21 states and the Arizona Legislature filed an amicus curiae, or friend-of-the-court brief, on June 6 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on behalf of the families, writing that the state is burdening the couples’ “free speech and free exercise rights.”

In another friend-of-the-court brief, The Conscience Project director Andrea Picciotti-Bayer decried Vermont’s “ideological intolerance,” writing that Vermont’s stance is “nothing other than an ideological snare set to identify and exclude anyone — especially those with religious convictions — unwilling to embrace gender ideology.”

Picciotti-Bayer told CNA that the Vermont policy is especially egregious because there is a tremendous need for foster families in the state and nationwide. Because of the huge shortage, Picciotti-Bayer said children are being placed in “crazy situations” like hotels and sheriff’s offices.

She criticized the Vermont Department for Children and Families, saying the state’s “priorities are so far off,” because excluding Christian families like the Wuotis and the Gantts prevents foster children from “finding safe, loving, and stable homes.”

ADF Senior Counsel Johannes Widmalm-Delphonse agreed, saying in a statement that “Vermont’s foster-care system is in crisis: There aren’t enough families to care for vulnerable kids. Yet instead of inviting families from diverse backgrounds to help care for vulnerable kids, Vermont is shutting the door on them, putting its ideological agenda ahead of the needs of suffering kids.”

According to Picciotti-Bayer, Christians have an “incredible track record in fostering,” saying Christian families are more likely than the general population to foster and are also more likely to foster more complex placements.

“Hard-to-place kids often find the best homes in families of faith,” Picciotti-Bayer told CNA, because of the “deep bench of community support” found in churches and faith communities, who support foster families by providing food, clothes, and respite support. 

“When you know these Christian families make stellar foster families,” she continued, “for the state to categorically exclude them seems nonsensical, apart from the possibility of grave discrimination.”

A friend-of-the-court brief was also filed by Concerned Women for America, the First Liberty Institute, the Foundation for Moral Law, and professors Mark Regnerus, Catherine Pakaluk, Loren Marks, and Joseph Price.

A friend-of-the-court brief was even filed by the left-leaning Women’s Liberation Front, whose attorney, Lauren Bone, wrote that “gender ideology is religious in nature,” and mandating that foster parents adopt such ideology is akin to an “unconstitutional establishment of religion.”  

Bone also wrote that gender ideology, rather than being “progressive,” is actually a “regressive approach to sex stereotypes and sexuality” that “harms children, women, and LGB [lesbian, gay, and bisexual] people” by “leading often troubled children to question their sex, by subverting the basis for necessary sex separation, and by confounding the meaning of same-sex attraction.”

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jun 12, 2025 / 14:47 pm (CNA).

The United States’ first Center for Sainthood Studies has opened at St. Patrick’s Seminary and University in Menlo Park, California.

The center announced that its goal is to “provide a roadmap for advancing candidates for canonization and increasing the chances of American candidates achieving sainthood” and aims to “make sainthood causes less intimidating and encourage more people to initiate causes,” according to the center’s website.

San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone specifically commissioned the center to foster “a deeper understanding of the processes involved in recognizing the holiness of individuals and their potential for sainthood.”

The resources offered by the center include expert consultation, a digitization service, networking opportunities, promotion of popular piety around a cause, assistance with grant writing, and a certification program that consists of a six-day course that guides participants through the sainthood application process and canonical procedures.

The center’s first certification course, to be held Feb. 16–21, 2026, at the Vallombrosa Retreat Center in Menlo Park, will be taught by two postulators and canon law experts from Rome: Emanuele Spedicato and Waldery Hilgeman. The program is open to clergy, religious, and laity. 

Michael McDevitt, a spokesperson for the center, told CNA that while canon law provides a framework for the process leading up to sainthood, it lacks practical guidance for the laity. “Canon law has a clear set of rules to follow, but it’s not a how-to guide. It doesn’t take [people] step by step,” McDevitt said.

McDevitt himself has worked particularly closely with the cause for Servant of God Cora Evans, a former Mormon and American housewife.

“There’s so many stories out there that could be told, and if we can help people with that process, more stories will come to light,” McDevitt said. “We all know that only God can make us saints, but it does take people to move this forward.”

CNA Staff, Jun 12, 2025 / 13:43 pm (CNA).

Pro-life advocates are warning of the need to protect vulnerable patients, including the elderly and terminally ill, as New York prepares to legalize assisted suicide.

New York will become the 12th state in the country, along with the District of Columbia, to allow doctors to prescribe lethal doses of medication to terminally ill patients in order to allow them to kill themselves. The measure passed the state Legislature this week and is expected to be signed by Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul.

New York’s law defines a “terminal illness or condition” as “an incurable and irreversible illness or condition that has been medically confirmed” and will “within reasonable medical judgment” result in death within six months.

Catholics, pro-life allies speak out against the bill

A chorus of pro-life advocates has spoken out against New York’s passage of the bill, calling on Hochul to veto it. 

The New York State Catholic Conference warned that the measure would bring about an “assisted suicide nightmare,” with the bishops urging the governor this week to recognize that the law “would be catastrophic for medically underserved communities, including communities of color, as well as for people with disabilities and other vulnerable populations.”

Brooklyn Bishop Robert Brennan said the bill’s passage “while not completely unexpected, is truly disappointing.” 

“We turn to the governor urging her to act boldly, consistent with her efforts to combat the suicide crisis in our state, and veto this bill,” the bishop said. 

The New York Alliance Against Assisted Suicide, meanwhile, called the measure “a grave mistake for New York.”

“It brings our state dangerously close to a public policy that many in the medical, disability, and mental health communities consider deeply flawed and unjust,” the group said, adding that the law “contains no requirement that a person seeking a lethal prescription receive a mental health evaluation.”

Kathryn Jean Lopez, currently the chair of New York archbishop Cardinal Timothy Dolan’s pro-life commission, told CNA that those opposed to euthanasia and assisted suicide in the state should be prepared for a tough road ahead, saying it is virtually certain that Hochul will sign the legislation. 

“She’s so enthusiastic about abortion, it would seemingly take a miracle to say no to her caucus on this,” said Lopez, who is also the religion editor at National Review. 

Lopez expressed doubt that the law, if signed, will generate much sustained pushback. “There’s not going to be a march on the street to reverse assisted suicide,” she lamented. 

She said that raising awareness of assisted suicide is nevertheless key, stressing the need for family and friends to defend the most vulnerable, such as the terminally ill and the elderly. 

“Being advocates, that’s the most important thing at this point,” she said. “Because this is the reality we’re living in.”

Increases in suicides, reported abuses worldwide

Critics of euthanasia and assisted suicide have pointed to countries that have already legalized the procedure and which have seen both huge increases in suicides and reported abuses. 

Eve Slater, a physician and former assistant secretary for health and human services under President George W. Bush, told CNA that in every case where euthanasia has been legalized, suicide numbers have soared.

She pointed out that suicide currently accounts for 5% of Canadian deaths, a number that rises to the double digits in some provinces. She also cited rapid rises of suicide in some European countries after the practice has been legalized.

The Canadian government in 2016 legalized “medical aid in dying.” Less than a decade later suicide accounts for roughly 1 in 20 deaths there. In some cases the suicide program has been expanded to include those who cannot consent to the procedure at the time, while hundreds of violations of the law are allegedly going unreported. 

In the Netherlands last year, meanwhile, the government permitted the assisted suicide of a physically healthy 29-year-old woman with mental health issues. Other countries, such as France and England, are also actively considering allowing euthanasia. 

In an op-ed last month in National Review, Slater wrote that huge increases in euthanasia are “enabled by wording that includes ambiguous eligibility criteria and then by gradual liberalization of interpretation.”

“[I]n each state where [euthanasia] has been legalized, amendments to widen eligibility either have been granted or are under discussion,” Slater wrote. “The amendments include provisions for tourism, the possibility of self-injection, a shortening of the reflection period, reduction of informed-consent safeguards, and the ability of certain nonphysicians to prescribe.”

Legal suicide ‘irrational’

Slater told CNA that New York’s willingness to embrace suicide conflicts directly with state laws requiring doctors to prevent suicide itself. 

“If a patient comes in to see me, and even hints of thoughts of suicide, I am obligated — we teach this, it’s standard practice — to recommend they see a psychiatrist immediately. And if they are hesitant, we have to call security,” she said. “Now what do I do?”

Lopez also pointed out the inconsistency in how, even as assisted suicide becomes more accepted, there are still official efforts to discourage suicide in general. 

“If you or I Google ‘assisted suicide’ because we’re looking for the latest news stories, we’ll get the number for a suicide hotline in response,” she said. “Someone’s still concerned you want to kill yourself and they want to talk you out of it.” 

“That’s good,” she pointed out, “but it’s also irrational,” given the increasing mainstream acceptance of euthanasia.

Slater said this is “different from normal pro-life politics.” 

New York residents “have to be aware of the gravity and the damage to human dignity that these laws do,” she said.

Speaking of doctors, Slater stressed that even if the doctors themselves are not explicitly pro-life, they in particular should know that the laws are “a total violation of our oath as physicians to take care of patients to the very end.”

“Doctors have to be aware that it’s effectively state-sanctioned suicide and that it sends the message that suicides under certain conditions are legitimate,” she said.

CNA Staff, Jun 12, 2025 / 10:59 am (CNA).

Catholic families in Pennsylvania won a victory at federal court this week when a local school district agreed to allow students of parochial schools to participate in district sporting events and other activities.

The Thomas More Society, a public interest law firm based in Chicago, said in a press release that multiple Catholic families had won the “major victory” in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania after bringing the suit in July 2023.

The State College Area School District had originally said that parochial school students were not allowed to participate in district extracurricular activities, though it allowed home-schooled and charter school students to take part in those events.

The Catholic school families had sued the district arguing that the policy violated their constitutional rights to freedom of religion and equal protection.

In December 2023, U.S. District Judge Matthew Brann allowed the challenge to proceed, agreeing that the rule appeared to violate the defendants’ constitutional rights.

In a filing on June 10, the Catholic families and the school district agreed to a consent order stipulating that the Catholic students “are generally entitled to the same generally available benefits as those provided to home-schooled and charter school students” in the district.

The district said it agreed to “make available to parochial school students … the same extracurricular and co-curricular activities (including athletics) and educational programs offered to home-schooled students and charter school students.”

Thomas Breth, special counsel for the Thomas More Society, said in the press release that school districts in Pennsylvania “cannot discriminate against students and exclude them from activities simply because they choose to attend a religious-based school.”

“Religious discrimination has no place in our society, but especially in our public schools,” Breth said.

He argued that the order “strengthens the ability of parents to prioritize their family’s religious beliefs when making educational decisions without being forced to sacrifice educational and athletic opportunities that are offered to other students and paid for with their tax dollars.”

In an interview with CNA, the lawyer said that though the consent order does not apply statewide, it will likely help to ensure that other districts do not exclude parochial students from district activities.

“I fully expect that many, many school districts are going to fall in line and decide not to litigate the issue,” he said.

The district ended up paying $150,000 in legal fees to the plaintiffs, Breth noted. He urged parents of Catholic school students to consider pressing their districts to allow their children access to extracurricular activities.

“I’ve already been in contact with parents in other school districts,” he added. “They’re in similar situations. We’re going to push hard in other districts if they don’t recognize they have a constitutional obligation to let parochial school students participate in the same manner as charter and home-schooled students.”

“Hopefully, it’s not going to take litigation. Hopefully, it will take letters,” he said. “Hopefully, the district will do what’s right for the kids, because ultimately that’s what this is about.”

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jun 12, 2025 / 07:00 am (CNA).

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) issued a report that surveyed reproductive-age adults and recommended “reproductive autonomy” as a solution to global fertility rate decline, a solution that received pushback from pro-family experts.

The UNFPA, along with YouGov, surveyed more than 14,000 adults in 14 countries: the United States, India, Germany, Hungary, Sweden, Italy, Mexico, Brazil, Thailand, South Korea, Indonesia, Nigeria, Morocco, and South Africa.

The report, “The Real Fertility Crisis: The Pursuit of Reproductive Agency in a Changing World,” found that about 39% of people in the survey who want children said financial limitations affected their family size, with many citing a lack of job security, housing limitations, and child care options as reasons. About 19% of respondents said fears about the future contribute to their expectation of having fewer children. Almost one-third reported they or their partner had an unexpected pregnancy.

About 45% of respondents were not sure whether they would have their desired number of children or did not answer the question. Only 37% responded that they expect to have the amount of children they want.

Nearly one-fourth of respondents said they were unable to fulfill the desire of having a child at a time they desired. 

The dissatisfaction and uncertainty reported by many adults about the number of children they will have comes as “global fertility rates are declining,” the report acknowledged. Fertility has drastically declined in the United States and other parts of the Western world for more than half of a century and has also trended downward in other parts of the world in recent decades.

“One in 4 people currently live in a country where the population size is estimated to have already peaked,” it explained. “The result will be societies as we have never seen them before: communities with larger proportions of older persons, smaller shares of young people, and, possibly, smaller workforces.”

UNFPA blames lack of ‘reproductive autonomy,’ prompting pushback

Although the UNFPA recognized concerns about an aging population caused by the lack of children, the report concluded “the real crisis” the findings uncovered is a lack of “reproductive autonomy,” noting that people “are unable to realize their fertility aspirations,” with some having more children than desired and others having fewer.

“We find that when we ask the right questions, we can see both the problem and solution clearly,” the report stated. “The answer lies in reproductive agency, a person’s ability to make free and informed choices about sex, contraception, and starting a family — if, when, and with whom they want.”

To increase “reproductive agency,” the UNFPA report endorsed more sex education in schools, stronger access to contraceptives and abortion, adoptions by homosexual couples, access to assisted reproductive technology, and the dismantling of traditional gender norms.

“There are real risks to treating fertility rates as a faucet to be turned on or off,” the report stated.

The report also criticized campaigns that encourage people to start families. It claimed that tax credits for parents “can offer critical help” but can also stigmatize people who get the benefits and that incentives for larger or smaller families can “lead to constraints on reproductive choice by increasing men’s and women’s vulnerability to coercion from partners, families, or in-laws.”

“What is the alternative to policies seeking to influence fertility rates? Policies that expressly — in letter and spirit — affirm the rights of individual women and men to make their own choices,” the report claimed.

The U.N.’s purported solutions to the fertility crisis have faced pushback. 

Rebecca Oas, the director of research for the Center for Family and Human Rights (C-Fam), told CNA that “low fertility is an important and timely topic to address” but said the report is, “like all of [the UNFPA] reports, packaged as a way to promote UNFPA’s typical priorities and values.”

Oas, whose organization promotes pro-life and pro-family values at the global scale, said that UNFPA’s “north star” is “sexual and reproductive health and rights,” including abortion. She said the report ignored the main argument against abortion: opposition to “the taking of innocent human life.”

According to Oas, the report’s arguments were mostly “presented with a presumptive antipathy toward anything that might point toward traditional values, gender norms, and understandings about the family.”

“UNFPA’s definition of what constitutes human flourishing involves the redefinition of the family, the micromanagement of care within the home by the state, and legal, government-subsidized access to contraception and abortion, and for this reason, it falls well short of the ideal,” she said.

Catherine Pakaluk, an economics professor at The Catholic University of America and author of the book “Hannah’s Children: Women Quietly Defying the Birth Dearth,” bluntly called UNFPA’s conclusions “laughably pathetic.”

“I don’t think they really have a clue why people aren’t choosing children,” Pakaluk told CNA regarding the UNFPA. “... The difficulty is not controlling your fertility — we know how to do that.”

She criticized the report for besmirching traditional family and gender norms, noting that many parts of Europe have done that and “we just don’t see that there’s a rebound in birth rates.” 

She said communities that tend to have high birth rates are ones based on “traditional and biblical religion — people who are incredibly religious.”

“People who believe that God loves children … and wants to bless you with children … seem to have a lot more kids,” Pakaluk added.

Although Pakaluk said some people may delay children for financial reasons, she said this also cannot explain lower fertility rates because “as countries have gotten wealthier, people have had fewer children.” She argued it is more about “lifestyle affordability, not cash flow affordability.”

“They are not able to prioritize children in that basket of things they are pursuing,” Pakaluk said.

“I think we can make a difference,” she added. “... The place to make a difference is to work on helping people see the value of children.”