A daily news briefing from Catholic News Agency, powered by artificial intelligence. Ask your smart speaker to play “Catholic News,” or listen every morning wherever you get podcasts.
www.catholicnewsagency.com
-
Pope Francis’ prayer intention for the month of November is for children who suffer, including war victims and orphans. “There are still millions of boys and girls who suffer and live in conditions very similar to slavery,” the pontiff said. “They aren’t numbers. They are human beings with names, with a face of their own, with an identity that God has given them. Let us pray for children who are suffering, especially for those who are homeless, orphans, and victims of war,” the pope said in a video message published October 31.
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/252691/why-pope-francis-november-prayer-intention-is-for-children-who-suffer
More than 10,000 unborn babies are alive today because of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v Wade, a new report by a pro-abortion group suggests. Society of Family Planning’s #WeCount initiative reported Friday that there were 5,270 fewer abortions in July and 5,400 fewer in August after the court’s June 24 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe and freed individual states to decide abortion policy. As the New York Times pointed out in an article on the #WeCount study, abortions declined almost to zero in states with bans, but they increased in many states where abortion remained legal. In August, fewer than 10 abortions were performed in each of the following states: Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. #WeCount also identified some of the states with the largest increases in abortion as North Carolina (37%), Kansas (36%), Colorado (33%), and Illinois (28%). In the two months after Dobbs, the number of women getting abortions decreased by 10,670, or 6%, the group reported. If those numbers were to continue, more than 60,000 lives could be saved from abortion in one year alone. Pro-life research organizations applauded the finding.
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/252698/total-abortions-decreased-by-6-percent-in-the-us-after-roe-v-wade-was-overturned
Lawyers defending Cardinal Joseph Zen and five other Hong Kong democracy activists took the floor Monday in the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Court, the same courthouse where a Protestant pastor was sentenced to one year in jail for sedition last week. In the third court date this month, Zen’s defense argued before Principal Magistrate Ada Yim Shun-yee on October 31 that the charges against the trustees of the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund should be dismissed. The 90-year-old cardinal and the fund’s other trustees have been charged with failing to apply for local society registration for the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund between 2019 and 2021. The fund helped pro-democracy protesters pay their legal fees until it dissolved itself in October 2021. Cardinal Zen is the bishop emeritus of Hong Kong and a strong critic of the 2018 Vatican-China deal on the appointment of bishops.
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/252695/cardinal-zen-trial-update-defense-calls-for-charges-to-be-dismissed
Today, the Church celebrates the Solemnity of All Saints. It was instituted to honor all of the saints, both known and unknown, and, according to Pope Urban IV, to supply any deficiencies in the faithful's celebration of saints' feasts during the year.
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/saint/all-saints-day-40