Catholics Archives - The Minnesota Sun

Ban on ‘Male Physiology’ in Women’s Sports Could Hurt Catholics, Minnesota Supreme Court Suggests

December 4, 2024December 4, 2024 Just the News

The day before the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments in a case that could decide the availability of puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgical removal of healthy breasts and genitals for gender-confused minors, the Minnesota Supreme Court heard arguments on another transgender issue: eligibility rules in private athletic competition.

The hypotheticals from the justices got creative, with one speculating that bowling leagues could bar Catholics from competition if the high court upheld USA Powerlifting’s ban on athletes in women’s competition who have completed male puberty.

Christian Vote, Especially Catholics, Critical to Trump’s Historic Win

November 26, 2024November 25, 2024 The Center Square

Christians helped push President-elect Donald Trump across the finish line on Election Day, a survey found.

Trump received the majority of the Christian vote, while Vice President Kamala Harris received the majority of the non-Christian vote.

Commentary: Secularists vs. People of Faith

October 27, 2024 Minnesota Sun Staff

An amazing thing is happening in the 2024 presidential campaign. Religious beliefs and hostility toward religion are playing bigger roles than in any election in modern times.

Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz represent the anti-religious ticket. Their past actions and current statements communicate clear opposition to, and disdain for, religion in ways which would have been unthinkable a decade ago.

Commentary: Harris, Walz Seek to Up-End True ‘Choice’ for Pregnant Women

August 19, 2024 RealClearWire

Vice-presidential picks generally balance a ticket, but Kamala Harris’ selection of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate does anything but. And American Catholics and others who care about the poor and vulnerable should be alarmed.

Consider their attacks against their states’ life-affirming pregnancy care centers. For me, this issue is more than political. It’s personal. Like many Catholics across the country, I volunteer at our local pregnancy centers. I’m the medical director for the centers run by the Archdiocese of Miami and I read their fetal ultrasounds. Helping families and expectant mothers through my work there is one of the most rewarding ways in which I practice medicine.

Commentary: More Catholics Believe in the Eucharist than Previously Thought

June 23, 2024 Minnesota Sun Staff

A new study by Catholic market research company Vinea Research found that belief in the true presence of Christ in the Eucharist is greater than a 2019 Pew Research study previously estimated.

Pew Research had found that 69 percent of U.S. Catholics personally believe that “the bread and wine used in Communion ‘are symbols of the body and blood of Jesus Christ.’” By contrast, only 31 percent of Catholics said that they believe that “the bread and wine actually become the body and blood of Jesus.”

Commentary: The New Fundamentalism and the Religion of Politics

June 7, 2024 Minnesota Sun Staff

Those who would abolish religion and prohibit the free exercise thereof, are themselves religious. Those who would replace religion with the cult of reason, and sacrifice the soul before the altar of science, are unreasonable in the extreme: they are political extremists whose religion is politics.

This religion, with contempt for one nation under God, is in opposition to our civil religion. This religion, with contempt for the idea of God, that God exists, that God is true, that God is just, is without mercy. This religion, with contempt for the sons of Abraham, and of all who are children of God through faith, is a declaration of war against Jews and Christians

Catholic Churches Attacked 400 Times Since 2020, Tracker Finds

March 3, 2024 Minnesota Sun Staff

Catholic churches in the United States have been attacked at least 400 times over the past four years, according to data compiled by the Catholic advocacy organization CatholicVote.

The hundreds of attacks across the nation began in connection with widespread civil unrest in May 2020, CatholicVote said. Examples include church burnings, beheadings of statues of Jesus Christ or the Virgin Mary, swastikas painted on grave stones, satanic and blasphemous statements graffitied on walls, windows smashed, Masses disrupted, and even the murder of a Catholic priest.

Commentary: Terrorist Attack Heightens Fears for the Future of Turkish Christians

February 4, 2024 Minnesota Sun Staff

On Jan. 28, two terrorists wearing black balaclavas attacked Santa Maria Catholic Church in Istanbul, Turkey. The assailants entered the church as approximately 40 people were attending Mass. During the Liturgy of the Eucharist, the gunmen began firing. Tragically, Tuncer Cihan was killed. He was about to become a Christian, attended church regularly, and was described as “a good person.”

Thankfully, no one else was injured, as the terrorists fled due to one of the guns miraculously jamming.

Josh Hawley Blasts FBI Director Wray for Allowing the FBI to Target Catholics: ‘You Haven’t Fired Anybody!’

December 6, 2023 Minnesota Sun Staff

Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) tore into FBI Director Christopher Wray Tuesday for not firing anyone for targeting Catholics as potential domestic terrorists.

“You said, and I’m quoting now, ‘The FBI uses all tools available at its disposal to combat domestic terrorism,’ which now includes, apparently, the crime of being Catholic,” Hawley said during an FBI Oversight Committee hearing in the Senate. “Let’s talk a little bit about the FBI’s egregious targeting of Catholic Americans.”

Commentary: With Fewer than 1,500 Catholics in Mongolia, Pope Francis’ Upcoming Visit Brings Attention to the Long and Complex History of the Minority Religious Group

August 27, 2023 Minnesota Sun Staff

Pope Francis is set to make the first-ever visit to Mongolia, a country with fewer than 1,500 Catholics, all of whom have come to the faith since 1992. But the pope’s visit is a reminder that the country has a long and complex history with Christianity, among many other faiths.

Mongolia has only 3.4 million people, and at least 87.4% are Buddhists. The small Catholic community came into existence after this landlocked country, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south, began to abandon its communist ideology and embraced different religions. At that time, it also restored diplomatic relations with the Vatican and welcomed Catholic missionaries.

FBI Hands over Documents Relating to Targeting of Catholics

July 27, 2023 Minnesota Sun Staff

On Tuesday, the FBI handed over requested documents on its efforts to target Catholic Americans after another threat from Congress to hold Director Christopher Wray in contempt.

As reported by the New York Post, Congressman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, had subpoenaed the files in question and threatened to hold Wray in contempt of Congress if the documents were not delivered by the deadline of July 25th.

From January 6 Informants to FISA Abuses, FBI Boss Had Few Answers to Congress’ Most Pressing Questions

July 13, 2023 Just the News

FBI Director Christopher Wray declined to answer direct questions from lawmakers on several hot-button issues at a House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing.

The performance on Wednesday generated frustration on both sides of the political aisle, and a rebuke from FBI alumni.

FBI Refuses to Disclose Documents Regarding Agency’s Targeting of Catholics

July 13, 2023 Minnesota Sun Staff

The FBI responded on Friday to a lawsuit filed by an advocacy group and claimed that the group is “not entitled” to records regarding the agency’s targeting of Catholics in a memo from January, according to documents obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Catholic Vote (CV) filed a lawsuit in April against the agency after it failed to respond to Freedom of Information Act(FOIA) requests regarding the FBI’s targeting of Catholics. The FBI issued a seven-page response to the lawsuit and rejected CV’s assertion that the organization has a right to know about the FBI’s records regarding Catholics and a January memo that targeted Roman Catholics as potential domestic terrorists, according to documents reviewed by the DCNF.

Minnesota DFL Legislators Posed for Picture with Members of Anti-Catholic Hate Group

June 15, 2023June 14, 2023 Minnesota Sun Staff

Several DFL legislators posed for a picture in April with members of an organization that has been widely condemned as an “anti-Catholic hate group.”

The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, whose roleplaying as Catholic nuns has been described by some as “religious blackface,” are at the center of a national controversy that began when the Los Angeles Dodgers announced plans to present them with a “community hero” award.

Commentary: Breaking Down the Biden Administration’s Political Weaponization Higher Education

June 11, 2023 Admin

The Media Research Center (MRC) has revealed that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is using the “Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) Grant Program” to single out and vilify political opposition- effectively criminalizing freedom of thought and free association. This is the same DHS that has classified the American people’s personal “thoughts, ideas, and beliefs” as “critical infrastructure” and “cognitive assets.”

Commentary: New Study Shows American Religious Divides

April 2, 2023 Minnesota Sun Staff

America is a diverse country. In most cities, you can find people from nearly every ethnic or racial background imaginable. This is becoming the case in rural areas as well. But America is host to a considerable amount of religious diversity as well. And while race relations are often the subject of considerable discussion, understanding interreligious relations is a necessary part of understanding the country as a whole.

FBI Keeps Getting Burned by Reliance on Liberal Sources

February 13, 2023 Just the News

A dossier alleging Russian collusion funded by a Democrat presidential candidate. A suggestion that school parents were domestic terrorists from a left-leaning school board group. A list suggesting old-fashioned Catholics were extremists from a liberal watchdog on hate speech.

Three triggers for investigation. Three blunders that left America’s premier law enforcement agency reeling with a black eye.

United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Denies Media Reports That Vatican Told Bishops to ‘Hit The Brakes’ on Biden, Eucharist Discussions

June 27, 2021June 26, 2021 Minnesota Sun Staff

The Vatican did not tell bishops not to move forward drafting a document on the Eucharist, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops clarified this week.

The New York Times, The Washington Post, Vox and multiple other outlets have claimed that the bishops were flouting a Vatican warning when they approved a measure June 18 to draft a statement on the Eucharist.

In a document issued June 21, the USCCB explicitly said that the Vatican did not tell the bishops not to move forward with the document.

Commentary: Catholics Should Not Vote for Fake Catholic Joe Biden

September 4, 2020September 3, 2020 Minnesota Sun Staff

Democrat Joe Biden has built his half-century in politics largely on the myth that he is a faithful Catholic with working class roots. In reality Biden is neither a faithful Catholic, nor a friend of America’s blue-collar citizens.

‘Anti-Catholic Bigotry’: Rep Banks Demands Investigations into Anti-Catholic Crimes

July 19, 2020 Minnesota Sun Staff

Republican Indiana Rep. Jim Banks denounced incidents of vandalism of Catholic churches that have occurred throughout the United States in a Friday statement to the Daily Caller News Foundation, and called on the Department of Justice to investigate the attacks.

The Indiana representative spoke out Friday following repeated instances of apparently anti-Catholic attacks in Florida, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, and many more locations. Banks said that as hate crimes increase throughout the country, not every hate crime is given the same amount of attention.

Military’s Top Catholic Prelate: Navy’s Indoor Religious Services Ban ‘Odious’

July 7, 2020 Neil W. McCabe

The leader of the Archdiocese for the Military Services compared the Navy’s banning sailors from attending religious services to the treatment of the Catholics in 17th century Japan depicted in the movie “Silence.”

“The persecution was systematic and destined to eradicate the faith from the islands,” wrote Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio, who has led the Catholic military chaplaincy and its programs since 2008, in a public letter posted Sunday.

Court Approves U.S. Catholic Church’s Proposed $210 Million Payout To Sex Abuse Victims

September 29, 2018September 28, 2018 Admin

by Joshua Gill The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, which filed for bankruptcy in 2015 amid a flood of sexual abuse allegations, will pay $210 million to abuse victims. U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Robert Kressel approved the archdiocese’s proposed settlement Wednesday as part of its reorganization plan. The…