Vatican Excommunicates Some in Canadian Sect

VATICAN CITY – The Vatican has announced the excommunication of certain members of the Army of Mary, a sect in Canada whose teachings have been deemed dangerous and erroneous by Church authorities.

The Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, acting with the approval of Pope Benedict XVI, declared the excommunication after the Army of Mary performed ordinations without Church permission, the Canadian bishops’ conference said.

The Army of Mary was founded in Quebec in 1971 by Marie-Paul Giguere, who said she was receiving visions from God.

The organization’s publications suggested that Giguere was the reincarnation of Mary, a claim that led Church leaders in 1987 to warn the faithful that the group could not be considered Catholic.

The Army of Mary defied Church authorities earlier this year when it ordained several new priests.

Archdiocese Warns Against Meetings with Arch. Milingo

SEOUL, South Korea – The Seoul Archdiocese has cautioned Catholics against meeting or consulting with an excommunicated African archbishop residing in South Korea.

Lay Catholics are to consult with their parish priests if they are invited to any meeting with Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, former archbishop of Lusaka, Zambia, the archdiocesan bulletin advised.

The Asian church news agency UCA News reported the bulletin told Catholics, “Former Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, who married a member of the Unification Church and caused a scandal, was excommunicated by the Vatican.”

The bulletin pointed out that the excommunicated archbishop is promoting his U.S.-based Married Priests Now! movement in South Korea.

The movement that he founded in July 2006 advocates that the Roman Catholic Church allow married priests in active ministry.

Under Church law, Latin-rite Catholic priests must remain unmarried and are bound to celibacy.

Australian Bishops Dismayed At A.I.’s Pro-Abortion Policy

SYDNEY, Australia – The Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference has expressed dismay at the failure of the human rights group Amnesty International to reverse its new pro-abortion policy, describing the move away from neutrality on abortion as “deeply regrettable.”

Archbishop Philip Wilson of Adelaide, president of the bishops’ conference, said the new policy put at jeopardy Catholics’ long association with Amnesty in “fighting injustice, ending human rights abuses and standing in solidarity with the imprisoned and the oppressed.”

The Amnesty policy was changed in mid-August by the group’s International Council – made up of more than 400 delegates from 75 countries – which approved proposals to abandon the group’s neutral policy on abortion as part of its Stop Violence Against Women campaign.

The council voted to “support the decriminalization of abortion, to ensure women have access to health care when complications arise from abortion, and to defend women’s access to abortion, within reasonable gestational limits, when their health or human rights are in danger.”

USCCB Urges Greater U.S. Resettlement for Iraqis

WASHINGTON – The U.S. government should provide resettlement aid for 25,000 Iraqi refugees in the next fiscal year, 10 times the number expected to arrive by the end of the year, said one recommendation of a new report by the U.S.

Conference of Catholic Bishops on the Iraqi refugee crisis in the Middle East.

“Iraqi refugees with relatives in the United States should be considered for U.S. resettlement on the basis of family reunification, dropping the requirement that they enter as refugees or migrants,” said the report, “Escaping Mayhem and Murder: Iraqi Refugees in the Middle East.”

The report, issued Sept. 10 in Washington, was based on a seven-member USCCB fact-finding mission undertaken July 2-13.

Among the seven participants were Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington, and Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of Brooklyn, chairman of the U.S. bishops’ domestic policy committee.

The delegation visited Istanbul, Turkey; Beirut, Lebanon; Amman, Jordan; and Damascus, Syria.
These countries currently host an estimated two million Iraqi refugees.

Santa Rosa Diocese Settles With Priest’s Abuse Victims

SANTA ROSA, Calif. – The Diocese of Santa Rosa reached a settlement of more than $5 million to resolve sex abuse claims against a fugitive priest, Father Francisco Ochoa-Perez, who was an assistant pastor in Sonoma.

The settlement will be paid to 10 people and is being funded by insurance coverage and the sale of a piece of property next to the Cathedral of St. Eugene, according to a statement from Deirdre Frontczak, a spokeswoman for the diocese.

The sum of $5 million will come from those sources and an additional $20,000 will be paid personally by Santa Rosa Bishop Daniel F. Walsh from stipends he receives when he officiates at baptisms and weddings.

Last year in late April, the priest, who also goes by the name Francisco Xavier Ochoa, admitted to Bishop Walsh and other top diocesan officials that he had had inappropriate contact with children.

The bishop suspended him immediately.

About a week later Father Ochoa-Perez fled the area. It is believed he has been living in Mexico since that time.

Vatican Cardinal Urges Respect for Tridentine Mass

VATICAN CITY – As Pope Benedict XVI’s decree on the Tridentine Mass went into effect, a Vatican cardinal called on bishops and pastors to respect the “right of the faithful” to have the liturgy offered in the 1962 rite.

“Let’s give thanks that the Holy Father has recovered this treasure for the Church,” Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos, head of the Pontifical Commission “Ecclesia Dei,” told Vatican Radio.

In July, a papal document said Mass celebrated according to the 1962 Roman Missal, commonly known as the Tridentine Mass, should be made available in every parish where groups of the faithful desire it.

It also said any priest could freely celebrate the rite. The decree went into effect Sept. 14.

Cardinal Castrillon said the relaxation of restrictions was not “a step backward,” but a move to give greater liturgical freedom to priests and the faithful.

“Nothing is being imposed on anyone. The pope imposes no obligation; but the pope does impose that this possibility be offered where the faithful ask for it,” the cardinal said.

Pope Puts Away Traveling Shoes for Fall and Winter

VATICAN CITY – After a three-day trip to Austria in early September, Pope Benedict XVI is putting away his traveling shoes and settling in for a long fall and winter at the Vatican.

The next foreign trip fixed firmly on the pope’s calendar is mid-July of 2008, when he plans to fly to Australia for World Youth Day celebrations.

Vatican officials say the pope also expects to visit the United Nations and New York in 2008, and April now looks like a likely time frame. He could easily add one or two other eastern U.S. cities.