FALL.•. IIVEIt" DICJCESA~ NE'NSP~EIt FOR SOUTHEAST ·MASSACHUSmS CAPE COD & THE ISLANDS VOL. 32, NO. 44
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Friday, November 4, 1988
FALL RIVER, MASS.
Southeastern Massachusetts' Largest Weekly
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$10 Per Year
Bishops to consider asking discard of Vatican draft
Michael Dukakis
George Bush
By Liz Schevtchuk PUEBLO, Colo. (NC) - Democratic presidential candidate Michael S. Dukakissaid Oct. 26 no issue "divides George Bush and me more" than that of fighting homelessness. He commented in an interview with National Catholic News Service during a campaign stop in Pueblo. In the interview, the Massachusetts governor also: - Emphasized that although he supports legal abortion, "I don't favor abortion" and is proud of his state's p~enatal care program for poor women. - Called for a national health " insurance program. - Criticized use of a "litmus test" based on abortion or capital punishment for selecting judges. - Expressed opposition to tuition tax credits, but added that he accepts other forms of aid to nonpublic schools. . Questions asked Dukakis paralleled those asked Vice President George Bush Sept. 30. "I don't know of any issue that divides George Bush and me more than this one" of homelessness, Dukakis said. "The reason we have homeless people today is because we have cut back 90 percent on our commitment to build affordable housing for families of low and moderate income." While there always have been mentally and emotionally ill peo pie living on the streets, said Dukakis, until recently "we didn't have this Turn to Page 18
By Julie Asher HARTFORD, Conn. (NC) Vice President George Bush said Sept. 30 that as president he would have no "litmus test" on the issue of abortion for his appointments to the Supreme Court or other courts. Bush commented in an interview with National Catholic News Service, Our Sunday Visitor and the National Catholic Register, during a campaign swing through Hart. ford. Regarding judicial appointees, Bush said, "There will not be a litmus test. There will be a conviction on my part that the man or woman to be appointed will have one fundamental commitment and that is to avoid legislating from the bench and simply interpret the Constitution... Bush also said: - Exceptions to an abortion ban for rape, incest or if the life of the mother isthreatened are necessary "because of the trauma to the mother." - He supports trying an education voucher system in a "model program" and said he was for tuition tax credits but would not pledge to enact them in a 'first term because of the cost. Asked about his and his platform's approval of capital punishment, Bush said he distinguished between "innocent and noninnocent life." He said the view may differ from the Catholic bishops' concept of a "consistent ethic of life" that all life issues should be seen as Turn to Page 18
NEWS STORIES relating to national, state or local political campaigns are reported for their news value and are not intended to constitute statements of endorsement or of opposition to any candidate.
The Anchor
WASHINGTON (NC) - The U.S. bishops, at their Nov. 14-17 general meeting, will be asked to approve a report urging the Vatican to throw out its first draft of a statement on the status of conferences of bishops - such as the National Conference of Catholic Bishops in this country - and start over. They also will be asked to approve an extensive paper analyzing and criticizing religious restrictions in Eastern Europe. The agenda for the Washington meeting includes 17 other issues awaiting decisions by the bishops, among them: - A call for normalization of U.S. relations with Vietnam. - A call to expand U.S.legalization of illegal immigrants and to
change laws that penalize employers of undocumented aliens. - A move to make the 19-yearold Campaign for Human Development a permanent part of the bishops' national activities. - Seven separate actions on liturgical texts or commemorations for particular U.S. feasts or special anniversary occasions. Statements and reports that the bishops must vote on take up nearly 450 typed pages. Information reports to the bishops, on which no action is required, are an additional 139 pages of singlespaced typed pages. "The draft Vatican document which U.S. bish'ops will discuss was sent out from Rome earlier this year and is on the theological
and juridical status of bishops" conferences. It takes a negative view of the collegial character and teaching authority of bishops' conferences and argues that such conferences, formed around the world at the urging of the Second Vatican Council, exist primarily for practical reasons and not because of any theological foundation. When the bishops met in Collegeville, Minn., last June, Archbishop John L. May of St. Louis, "NCCB-USCC president, argued in his presidential address that bishops' conferences do have a collegial character, do have teaching authority and do have a theological as well as practical foundation. The proposal to urge the VatiTurn to Page 19
Pro-lifers flex muscles Thousands arrested across nation WASHINGTON (NC) - In a nationwide Operation Rescue attempt to close abortion clinics Oct. 28-29, more than 2,000 people were arrested and thousands more demonstrated in 32 cities. Some 400 demonstrators planning to shut down a clinic in Boston went to nearby Providence, R.I., after it became obvious that with the preparation of Boston police they would not be effective. Providence police said arrests were in "the neighborhod of 250 people." Police Chief Walter Clark said it was the biggest demonstration of any kind in his city in the past decade. New York AuxiliaI:Y Bishop Austin B. Vaughan, who has been arrested in four Operation Rescue protests, told participants at an Oct. 28 rally in Holbrook that "there is no child that is not wanted by God." In the Bible, he said, there are two "slaughters of the innocent" children. In each case only one child survives: in the Old Testament it is Moses, and in the New Testament it is Jesus. The biblical lesson is that even if Operation Rescue saves just one child from an abortion, it is worth the effort, Bishop Vaughan said. Pro-abortion demonstrators also were present at many of the targeted clinics, and held large counterdemonstrations in BrOOkline and Austin, Texas. The Texas demo_nstration featured a rare public appearance by Norma McCorvey, who, using the name "Jane Roe," won the landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing most abortions.
Joan Andrews, the pro-life activist freed Oct. 18 after serving two years of a five-year sentence for a Florida anti-abortion action, was arrested at an Oct. 29 Operation Rescue in Toronto. Benedictine Father Paul Marx, president of Human Life International in Gaithersburg, Md., was also among 41 people arrested at the Toronto clinic of Dr. Henry Morgentaler, an outspoken practitioner of abortion. In Houston, four of 22 people arrested at the Houston Women's Clinic used bicycle locks to chain themselves to concrete-filled barrels. Police used welding equipment to free them. Retired Auxiliary Bishop George E. Lynch of Raleigh, N.C., was among more than 300 people risking arrest by blocking entrances to the Women's Medical Pavilion in Dobbs Ferry, N.Y. <;iting the cost
of arrests and court hearings, Dobbs Ferry police declined to arrest the protesters, who remained at the clinic until noon. Operation Rescue was founded by Randall Terry, an evangelical Christian from Binghamton, N.Y. Its first action was held in November 1987 in Cherry Hill, N.J., and more than 7,000 people have been arrested in the past year at hundreds of protests. Police arrested 364 Operation Rescue participants in Pittsburgh Oct. 29, including most of the 80 students from the Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, who joined the protest. In New Orleans Oct. 29, police arrested 208 protesters, including more than 25 Protestant clergy and three Catholic priests. In Atlanta, where more than 1,100 people were arrested from July 19 to Oct. 8 for Operation Rescue protests, police made 40 arrests Oct. 29. Other Operation Rescue protests included 227 arrests in Falls Church, Va.; about 250 arrests in Sunnyvale, Calif.; 50 arrests in Columbus, Ohio; 20 in Des Moines, Iowa; 34 in Mary Esther, Fla.; 81 in Buffalo, N.Y.; 125 in Philadelphia; and 133 in Deer Park, N.Y. Terry, founder of the movement, told reporters Oct. 29 that it was particularly significant that police made no arrests in Dobbs Ferry and other cities. The growirig number of people demonstrating will make it impossible for abortion clinics to continue operating, he said. "When we no longer consent to child killing, it's over."