Jimmy Lai's godfather discusses trial: 'He's a real champion of freedom'

"We think of these stories of saints that have withstood all this persecution as belonging to the Middle Ages," said Bill McGurn, godfather of Jimmy Lai. "It's going on right now, and we can see it." / Credit: "EWTN News Nightly"/ScreenshotCNA Staff, Nov 21, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).After Catholic media mogul and human rights activist Jimmy Lai took the stand on Wednesday in a yearslong Hong Kong national security trial, Bill McGurn, Wall Street Journal columnist and godfather of Lai, told "EWTN News Nightly" that Lai is "a real champion of freedom."Lai, 76, was first arrested in August 2020 under China's newly instituted Hong Kong national security law. Since his arrest, he has faced multiple trials and has been convicted on multiple charges of unlawful assembly and fraud. The allegations are widely condemned as politically motivated. McGurn, friend and godfather to Lai, told "EWTN News Nightly" anchor Tracy Sabol that Lai's charisma on the stand worries the Hong Kong author...

Wyoming governor pledges to appeal after judge blocks state pro-life laws

null / Credit: KieferPix/ShutterstockCNA Staff, Nov 21, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).Here is a roundup of recent pro-life and abortion-related news.Wyoming judge blocks state pro-life lawsWyoming Gov. Mark Gordon plans to appeal to the state Supreme Court after a county judge blocked two pro-life laws in Wyoming. The judge blocked the Life Is a Human Right Act, which protected unborn children except in cases when the mother's life was at risk or in cases of rape or incest, as well as a law prohibiting chemical abortions via abortion pills, a law signed by Gordon in March 2023. Gordon said on Tuesday that the ruling was "frustrating" and that he instructed his attorney general to prepare to appeal the decision to the Wyoming Supreme Court.Teton County District Judge Melissa Owens ruled on Monday that the two laws violated the state constitution by restricting medical decisions. Owen has blocked Wyoming abortion laws three times since the U.S. Supreme Court...

What do we know about the presentation of Mary?

Alessandro Allori, "The Presentation of Mary," 1598. / Credit: Public domainNational Catholic Register, Nov 21, 2024 / 04:00 am (CNA).It's easy to conceptualize the presentation of the Lord because we find it in Scripture. Luke's Gospel tells of the Holy Family's journey to the Temple when Jesus was 8 days old. According to Jewish custom, Jesus was to be circumcised and Mary purified. There Mary and Joseph meet the prophets Anna and Simeon, who recognized the child as the Messiah who would bring about the fall and rise of many and become a sign of contradiction and the cause of a sword that would one day pierce Mary's heart. We celebrate the feast of the Presentation of the Lord annually on Feb. 2.The presentation of Mary, however, is not found in Scripture. Instead, we learn about Mary's presentation from accounts that have come to us from apostolic times. What we know is found mainly in Chapter 7 of the "Protoevangelium of James," which has been dated by historians before the...

Nearly half of 2,500 anti-Christian hate crimes in Europe were in France, report says

The historic Church of the Immaculate Conception in Saint-Omer, in the Pas-de-Calais department of northern France, was ravaged by arson on the night of Sept. 2, 2024. / Credit: Courtesy of Father Sébastien RousselWashington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 20, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).A recently released report from a European watchdog group has found nearly 2,500 documented instances of hate crimes against Christians living in Europe. Approximately 1,000 of these attacks took place in France. According to the Observatory on Intolerance and Discrimination Against Christians in Europe (OIDAC) report, which drew on both police and civil society data, 2,444 anti-Christian hate crimes and acts of discrimination and intolerance occurred across 35 European countries from 2023 to 2024.Of these, 232 constituted personal attacks of harassment, threats, and physical assaults against Christians.Most affected countries: France, England, and GermanyNearly 1,000 of the anti-Christian ha...

Vietnam, with one of the highest abortion rates, leads UN initiative on premature births

Senior fellow at the National Catholic Bioethics Center Joseph Meaney speaks to "EWTN News Nightly" anchor Tracy Sabol on Tuesday, Nov. 19, 2024. / Credit: "EWTN News Nightly"CNA Staff, Nov 20, 2024 / 14:30 pm (CNA).Vietnam, a country with one of the highest abortion rates in the world, spearheaded a United Nations initiative this week on the health care needs of infants born prematurely.While the event in honor of World Prematurity Day aimed to spotlight the need for better care for preterm infants, a bioethicist is pointing to the irony of a country grappling with widespread abortion leading the charge."It's a completely mixed message," Joseph Meaney, a senior fellow at the National Catholic Bioethics Center, told "EWTN News Nightly" on Tuesday.Advances in neonatal intensive care have made possible the survival of smaller and younger infants. The world's most premature surviving baby is Curtis Zy-Keith Means, who was born at 21 weeks and one day in Birmingham, Alabama. V...

Nairobi archbishop declines Kenyan president's donations to Catholic parish

Archbishop Philip Anyolo of the Nairobi Archdiocese in Kenya. / Credit: Nairobi ArchdioceseACI Africa, Nov 20, 2024 / 17:30 pm (CNA).The archbishop of Kenya's Archdiocese of Nairobi has turned down financial donations that the country's president offered to a Catholic parish, stating that the Church will not be compromised by offers from politicians who seek to use church fundraising events for self gain.In a Nov. 18 statement widely circulated on social media platforms, Archbishop Philip Anyolo Subira declined over 5 million Kenyan shillings ($38,500) that President William Samoei Ruto offered to Soweto Catholic Church on Nov. 17. The cash gift was meant for the construction of a new rectory at the parish.The president further gave the parish choir and the Pontifical Missionary Childhood a 600,000 Kenyan shilling ($4,600) cash reward and promised to donate a bus to the parish, both of which the archbishop has also declined. In the statement, the archbishop explained that the "...

Jimmy Lai takes the stand in yearslong Hong Kong national security trial

Jimmy Lai's wife, Teresa (left), and retired Chinese Cardinal Joseph Zen Ze-Kiun arrive at the West Kowloon Magistrates' Courts to attend Hong Kong activist publisher Lai's national security trial in Hong Kong on Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024. / Credit: AP Photo/Chan Long HeiCNA Staff, Nov 20, 2024 / 16:00 pm (CNA).Catholic human rights activist Jimmy Lai on Wednesday took the stand in his national security trial in Hong Kong, arguing in his own defense as he faces life in prison over allegations of sedition against the communist Chinese government. Lai, 76, was first arrested in August 2020 under China's newly instituted Hong Kong national security law. He has faced multiple trials since his arrest and has been convicted on multiple charges of unlawful assembly and fraud. Advocates have argued that the charges are politically motivated. Lai, through several media enterprises including the long-running Apple Daily newspaper, has for years been a vocal pro-democracy voice i...

America's pro-life movement readies 2025 federal- and state-level policy efforts

null / Credit: Orhan Cam/ShutterstockWashington, D.C. Newsroom, Nov 19, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).Pro-life advocates plan to push federal- and state-level legislative and policy reforms on abortion when the United States Congress and many state legislatures enter into session in January 2025.Many plans look toward regulating the abortion drug mifepristone, which is used in chemical abortions. According to the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion policy group, chemical abortions accounted for 63% of all abortions in 2023, which is an increase of 10 percentage points from 2020 and more than double what it was in 2014.Other efforts will include rolling back the abortion policies of President Joe Biden's administration, supporting conscience protections for doctors and hospitals opposed to abortion, and backing a federal law that restricts abortion by a certain point in pregnancy. There is currently no federal abortion cutoff, and nine states permit elective abortion for any reason thr...

Pro-life group asks Supreme Court to throw out abortion 'buffer zone' laws

Sarah Richardson, a sidewalk counselor with Coalition Life in Carbondale, Illinois. / Credit: Photo courtesy of Thomas More SocietySt. Louis, Mo., Nov 19, 2024 / 09:15 am (CNA).A St. Louis pro-life group has petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to declare unconstitutional a rural Illinois town's now-defunct "buffer zone" law, which previously impeded the group's peaceful protests and counseling outside the town's abortion clinics. The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to decide whether or not it will take up the case on Nov. 22.The case, Coalition Life v. City of Carbondale, Illinois, concerns a law restricting protests outside three abortion clinics in Carbondale, a small college town about two hours southeast of St. Louis and three hours north of Memphis, Tennessee, both major cities in states that currently have strong pro-life protections in place. Since the overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022, Illinois leaders have leaned in to the state's status as a destination for wo...

Pope Francis laicizes schismatic Argentine priest 

null / Credit: natatravel/ShutterstockBuenos Aires, Argentina, Nov 19, 2024 / 15:05 pm (CNA)."With a supreme and definitive decision," Pope Francis expelled from the clerical state for the crime of schism Fernando María Cornet, an Argentine who served as a priest in the Archdiocese of Sassari, Italy.Cornet, 57, wrote a book titled "Habemus Antipapam?" ("Do We Have an Antipope?"), published in 2023 by the publishing house Edizioni del Faro, the Argentine newspaper La Nación reported. In his book, Cornet asserts that Pope Benedict XVI's resignation was invalid and, consequently, so was the election of Pope Francis.In announcing the decision, the archbishop of Sassari, Gian Franco Saba, urged the community to pray for the unity of the Church."The members of Christ must not be in conflict with each other; all those who form his body must each fulfill their own office ... so that there may be no divisions," he said.The archdiocese also announced that the vicar of the Historic Urban ...