More Federal Funding Urged For Umbilical

Cord Blood

WASHINGTON – Lack of federal funding could jeopardize therapeutic advances made in using umbilical cord blood for curing diseases, said Richard Doerflinger, deputy director of the U.S. bishops’ Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities.

Doerflinger told Catholic News Service that the bishops supported the 2005 law which authorized funds for collecting and storing cord blood and for the establishment of a National Cord Blood Inventory which would enable doctors to match patients with compatible donors through a centralized computer data bank.
Although the 2005 law authorizes $15 million per year from 2007 through 2010, Congress has to approve the funding each year.

For fiscal year 2008, which begins in October, the Bush administration budget proposes only $2 million in funding.

Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., the main sponsor of the 2005 law, called on his congressional colleagues to approve the $15 million permitted by law.

Pennsylvania Is Latest to Approve ‘Life’ License Plates

PHILADELPHIA – Pennsylvania has become the latest state to approve the use of a “Choose Life” specialty license plate.

The plates were approved last November and became available for purchase in January.

The cost per plate is $40. The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation receives $20, and the other $20 is an annual membership fee in Pennsylvania Choose Life.
Every year, when people renew their registration, they will receive a reminder from the pro-life organization to renew their annual $20 membership.

Pennsylvania Choose Life will administer the funds it collects, using the money to support women in crisis pregnancies.

Money collected in each county is to go to “crisis pregnancy centers located in those counties,” said Mary Wurtz, the organization’s administrator.

Charge Polish Archbishop Ignored Child Sex Abuse

OXFORD, England – A Polish newspaper has reported that diocesan officials and an archbishop ignored cases of pedophilia and sex abuse of minors by priests in the Diocese of Plock, Poland.

The Rzeczpospolita daily reported that Archbishop Stanislaw Wielgus and other officials of the diocese had been kept informed for at least six years by pastors of victims’ parishes about priest sex abuse of minors.

Archbishop Wielgus was the head of the Plock Diocese from 1999 until he was appointed to head the Archdiocese of Warsaw in January.

He quickly resigned after admitting he had collaborated with the Communist secret police.

The newspaper said other priests had confirmed the claims and that it had received testimonies from several abuse victims since Rzeczpospolita published its first report.

Auxiliary Bishop Roman Marcinkowski of Plock, who said the diocese had received no official complaints of molestation, called the claims “fragmentary and based on gossip.”

Kosovo Approves Cathedral Dedicated to

Mother Teresa

PRIZREN, Kosovo – The government of the predominantly Muslim Kosovo has approved plans for a cathedral dedicated to Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta.
Bishop Dode Gjergji of Sape, Albania, who is the apostolic administrator of Prizren, Kosovo, said that all the documents were being finalized and the work will start this year.

“We’re working closely with the local government, which is encouraging the project, and we have support from people of all faiths and backgrounds in Kosovo,” he said.

Bishop Gjergji said the cathedral’s architectural design includes a Catholic cultural and educational center on the 32-acre compound in Pristina.

The cathedral had been approved before, but two days after a 2005 ground-breaking ceremony, the site was damaged by a grenade explosion.

Mexican People Forced to Emigrate Due to Unfair Trade

MEXICO CITY – A Mexican bishop said that indigenous and poor people in Mexico are suffering from poor health care, which is a consequence of being left out of the benefits of trade agreements.

“Indigenous people are neither lazy nor disorganized,” said Bishop Felipe Arizmendi Esquivel of San Cristobal de Las Casas in Mexico’s Chiapas state. “If they continue to be poor, it is due to the consequences of free trade agreements which favor the intermediary buyers and speculators on the stock exchanges.”

Poor Mexicans do not get a just price for the products they sell, said the bishop during Mass at St. Adalbert parish in Chicago.

His statements were published the same day on the Web site of the Mexican bishops’ conference.

U.S. Gives Vatican’s U.N. Mission Diplomatic Immunity

WASHINGTON – In an executive order March 7 President George W. Bush granted diplomatic immunity and privileges to the members of the Holy See’s Permanent Observer Mission to the United Nations.

Diplomatic immunity ensures safe passage for diplomats outside their home country. They are not subject to lawsuits or prosecution under the laws of the host country.

As host country for U.N. general headquarters in New York, the United States has extended diplomatic immunity and privileges to members of all U.N. member nations’ diplomatic missions in New York.

The Holy See is not a member of the United Nations, but its quasi-diplomatic permanent observer status, held since 1964, entitles it to participate in General Assembly debates, have its communications issued and circulated as official documents of the assembly, and co-sponsor draft resolutions and decisions that refer to the Holy See.

Egg Harvesting Can Damage Women’s Health

WASHINGTON – The damage caused by embryonic stem-cell research goes far beyond the embryos destroyed by treating “a great many women as egg factories, at great risk to their health and safety,” according to the U.S. bishops’ pro-life spokeswoman.

Deirdre A. McQuade, director of planning and information for the bishops’ Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities, was commenting on a congressional briefing at which scientists, ethicists and a grieving mother presented evidence about the dangers to women posed by egg harvesting.

“The embryonic stem-cell agenda is a threat not only to embryonic humans but to young women as well,” McQuade said in a statement.

“The drugs used in in vitro fertilization clinics to stimulate women’s ovaries for attempted reproduction have done great harm to some women,” she said.