An unborn child, a victim of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, is remembered at the 9/11 memorial in New York City. / Credit: Katie Yoder/CNA

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 11, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

Nearly 3,000 names are engraved in bronze at the 9/11 Memorial in New York City. But 10 of the victims in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks are different: They have no names. Instead, each is remembered as an “unborn child.” 

Among those memorialized this way are “Lauren Catuzzi Grandcolas and her unborn child.”

On Sept. 11, Jack Grandcolas lost the two people he held most dear: his wife, Lauren, and their unborn child. His pregnant 38-year-old wife died on United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in Pennsylvania after the passengers fought back against hijackers redirecting the flight to Washington, D.C. Grandcolas recounts his loss and search for hope in a memoir called “Like a River to the Sea: Heartbreak and Hope in the Wake of United 93.”

The book was published by Rare Bird on Sept. 6, 2022, and opens with a dedication to his lost child.

“Dear Son … or Daughter,” he begins. “I am writing this book at the advice of my therapist. She felt it would be helpful to share a little bit about your mom and dad, and why you will always have your place in history.”

Today, that child would be 22 years old. Her name would be Grace, if a girl — Gavin, if a boy.

Lauren was three months pregnant, Grandcolas recalls, when she flew from their home in California to New Jersey for her grandmother’s funeral. At her insistence, he stayed behind to care for their sick cat.

“We were giddy at the thought of becoming parents, having spent the previous decade trying to get pregnant,” he writes. “There had been plenty of heartbreak along the way, including a miscarriage in 1999, when Lauren was 36. Two years later, we had pretty much resigned ourselves to raising only cats ... and then a miracle happened.”

Lauren and their “miracle” were supposed to return to California on Sept. 11, 2001.

That morning, Grandcolas woke up to the sound of the answering machine. He fell back asleep, only to wake up again and spot what he calls the “shape of an angel.” 

Had someone he knew recently died?

It must be Lauren’s grandmother, he thought. Then he realized it was Lauren.

When he checked the answering machine, he heard a message that would change his life forever. 

“Honey, are you there? Jack? Pick up, sweetie,” he heard Lauren’s voice say. “Okay, well, I just want to tell you I love you. We’re having a little problem on the plane. I’m fine and comfortable and I’m okay for now. I just love you more than anything, just know that. It’s just a little problem, so I, I’ll … Honey, I just love you. Please tell my family I love them, too. Bye, honey.”

“In that moment I knew Lauren and our baby were gone,” he writes of his college sweetheart and their little one. 

His wife’s funeral was held at a Catholic church in Houston. Lauren, he says, was not a religious person. But in the months before her death, she began attending a weekly Bible study.

“One evening she came home and said, ‘I finally get it,’” he remembers. When he prodded her by asking, “Get what?” she responded: “The meaning of it all.”

While raised Catholic, Grandcolas struggled with his faith. 

“What kind of merciful God would take my sweet Lauren and our child?” he asked. He later concluded that it was not God but human ideology.

He encountered God again after a conversation with Bono, the lead vocalist of the famous rock band U2. Bono performed “One Tree Hill” — Lauren’s favorite U2 song — in her memory at a 2005 concert at the Oakland Coliseum. Afterward, Grandcolas opened up to the singer.

“Being brought up Catholic, you’re given all this guilt about things that you didn’t do right,” he told Bono. “I worry that I may have screwed up in this life and mortgaged my opportunity to see Lauren again.”

“You’ll see her again. I know it. We all screw up in life,” he says Bono reassured him. “That’s why God grants us forgiveness. It’s his most powerful gift.”

Bono’s words changed him and his faith, he says. 

“Ever since 9/11, I had questioned God and his plan for me,” he writes. “The night was a tribute to her but in a very important way it set me free, allowing me to be more forgiving of myself and rekindle my belief in God’s mercy.”

Grandcolas introduces readers to Lauren as a woman with a beautiful smile, radiant personality, and even a mischievous streak. They married after meeting in college and stayed together as he progressed with a career in the newspaper industry and she took charge as a marketing manager.

After losing her and their baby, he struggled with depression, PTSI (post-traumatic stress injury), heavy drinking, fear of abandonment, and survivor’s guilt. With the help of EMDR psychotherapy, he said, he discovered that “for all these years I had been mourning Lauren without fully grieving for the baby we lost.”

“Over the years that child grew up in my mind, growing older every year,” he writes. “I knew I would not be able to move on until saying goodbye to the baby I never got to hold.”

Today, the memory of Lauren and their unborn baby lives on at memorials across the country, through the Lauren Catuzzi Grandcolas Foundation, and, now, his book.

“[A]s I continue to reflect on the highs and lows of the last two decades, I’ve come to realize that I am very lucky indeed,” he says. “I found true love, twice. I’ve endured a pair of horrific tragedies but still have a resilient spirit and zest for life. I’ll always carry the emotional scars of losing Lauren and our child, just as I’ll always have the physical scars from my burns, but all of my wounds continue to heal.”

“We all suffer loss. We all endure heartbreak. It’s how you respond to these cataclysms that define you,” he concludes. “Sometimes the most beautiful things grow out of our hardest moments.”

This article was first published on Sept. 11, 2022, and has been updated.

St. Teresa of Calcutta. / Credit: © 1986 Túrelio (via Wikimedia-Commons), 1986 / Lizenz: Creative Commons CC-BY-SA-2.0 de

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 10, 2024 / 17:38 pm (CNA).

The “spiritual darkness” that Mother Teresa describes in her writings can be difficult to comprehend, but this feeling of emptiness was not caused by either depression or a loss of faith, according to a lecturer at an academic conference organized by the Mother Teresa Institute.

St. Teresa of Calcutta’s “dark night of the soul” was a distinct charism that helped her build her faith and serve others rather than a mere chemical imbalance that induces depression or an abandonment of the Catholic faith, said Loyola University Maryland philosophy professor Derek McAllister at a Sept. 6 symposium held at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., one day after the saint’s feast day. 

“If it’s a mental emotional problem, they do not of themselves promote virtue or increase depth of relationship with God,” McAllister said. “Whereas we know with the dark night, the nights do of themselves greatly increase love, humility, patience, and the like. And they decidedly prepare one for deeper prayer.”

The lecture focused on some of Mother Teresa’s letters, which describe an emptiness and a spiritual darkness — essentially an inability to feel the presence of God. St. Teresa, who founded the Missionaries of Charity, was an Albanian sister who spent most of her life serving the poor in Calcutta, India. She was canonized in 2016.

“The darkness is so dark, and I am alone,” St. Teresa wrote. “Unwanted, forsaken. The loneliness of the heart that wants love is unbearable. Where is my faith? Even deep down, there is nothing but emptiness and darkness. My God, how painful is this unknown pain? It pains without ceasing.”

St. Teresa wrote that “the place of God in my soul is blank, there is no God in me” and “I just long and long for God and then it is that I feel he does not want me — he is not there.”

McAllister noted that other saints have had such feelings and referenced St. John of the Cross’ 16th-century poem “Dark Night of the Soul” and his subsequent commentaries on that poem. It describes the Spanish mystic’s crisis of faith and an inability to feel the presence of God even though God was truly present and guiding the experience.

“In darkness and secure, by the secret ladder, disguised — oh, happy chance! — in darkness and in concealment, my house being now at rest,” St. John’s poem reads.

McAllister cited St. John’s descriptions of his experience, noting that “he identifies, by name, melancholy and says that’s not what I’m talking about.” McAllister argued that an “affective condition that overwhelms people” does not accurately describe those experiences, but rather that the experience actively pushed St. John to grow closer to God.

“While you may experience desolation of God’s felt presence of the senses, you’re being purgated and drawn closer to God, but you don’t feel that you are while you’re experiencing that,” McAllister explained.

In the case of Mother Teresa, McAllister compared and contrasted the symptoms described in her writing with the criteria used to diagnose major depressive disorder.

According to McAllister, depression often includes an unhealthy introspection and a lack of realism, which he said “advice does little to remedy.” Further, someone who has clinical depression, he noted, will often experience chronic fatigue, insomnia, and a depressive affect. He also argued that depression does not promote virtue in and of itself: “That’s why it’s called a disorder.”

He cited her writing to show that she was seeking answers to her spiritual darkness, as when she said to her confessor: “Each time your yes or no [to a question] has satisfied me as the will of God.” He also said that she did not experience the other symptoms that commonly accompany depression or depressive affect in everyday activities. The fruits of her experience, he noted, also do not point to a disorder such as depression. 

“What’s this [spiritual darkness] for in and of itself?” McAllister asked rhetorically. “Does it bring about humility, charity, kindness, and growth in Christ? And just look at what happened. Yes, absolutely [it did].”

The conference was attended by numerous sisters in the Missionaries of Charity along with lay members of the order, some priests, and a few professors and graduate students.

It was held a short walk from the St. John Paul II National Shrine, which is displaying a Mother Teresa exhibit until Nov. 11. The exhibit contains a first-class relic of St. Teresa and many of her personal items. 

Father Brian Kolodiejchuk, the president of the Mother Teresa Institute, told CNA that the organization functions as “the academic arm of the Mother Teresa Center” that focuses on her writings and her words. He said there is “a lot more depth to Mother Teresa’s holiness” than many realize. 

“I think she has a message for the Church,” Kolodiejchuk said. “She was one of the great figures of the last century.”

Pro-life protestors hold signs outside the Missouri Supreme Court on Sept. 10, 2024 advocating against Amendment 3, which would dramatically expand abortion access in Missouri if passed in November. / Credit: Courtesy of Thomas More Society

St. Louis, Mo., Sep 10, 2024 / 16:20 pm (CNA).

The Missouri Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that a proposed constitutional amendment to dramatically expand abortion in the state will remain on the Nov. 5 ballot after a circuit judge blocked the measure earlier this week.  

The ruling dealt a blow to pro-life activists in the state, who had argued that the final proposed language not only violates state law by failing to list which laws it would repeal but also misleads voters about the scope and gravity of what they will be voting for. A Catholic law firm led the legal effort to get the proposed amendment struck from the ballot. 

Missouri’s proposed Amendment 3, which originally qualified for the November ballot in August after garnering thousands of signatures, would mandate that the government “shall not deny or infringe upon a person’s fundamental right to reproductive freedom,” including “prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, abortion care, miscarriage care, and respectful birthing conditions.”

Missouri law currently protects unborn babies throughout all of pregnancy with the only exception being cases of “medical emergency.” With the Tuesday ruling, Missouri remains one of 10 states that will vote on abortion-related measures in November. 

In a brief order issued in the early afternoon Sept. 10 — just hours before the state deadline for finalizing the November ballot — the Missouri Supreme Court overruled a lower court’s opinion that held that the proposed amendment violates state law by failing to mention the specific laws to be repealed if voters approve the measure. The court, under Chief Justice Mary Russell, said opinions would follow. 

The Thomas More Society, a Catholic public interest law firm based in Chicago, had filed the lawsuit challenging the pro-abortion amendment language in August on behalf of Missouri state Sen. Mary Elizabeth Coleman, pro-life advocate Kathy Forck, state Rep. Hannah Kelly, and Peggy Forrest, president and CEO of Our Lady’s Inn, a St. Louis pro-life pregnancy center. 

The Missouri Catholic Conference (MCC) had urged Catholics to pray and fast for the amendment’s removal from the ballot. 

In a statement to CNA, MCC executive director Jamie Morris expressed disappointment with the court’s ruling.

“Missourians should have the right to know what laws will be overturned when they are asked to sign an initiative petition. The Missouri Catholic Conference will continue to educate the public on the dangers this amendment poses to women’s health by removing even basic safeguards currently in law,“ Morris said.

“We encourage the faithful to continue to pray for a conversion of hearts and minds so that the pro-abortion Amendment 3 is defeated.“

In his Sept. 6 ruling, Cole County Circuit Judge Christopher Limbaugh wrote that the defendants’ failure to “include any statute or provision that will be repealed, especially when many of these statutes are apparent, is in blatant violation of” state law. 

Ahead of the Supreme Court’s Tuesday ruling, Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft had on Monday decertified Amendment 3 from the November ballot, citing the lower court’s ruling. Following the Supreme Court’s opinion, Ashcroft will be required to recertify the proposed amendment. 

A hearing before the Missouri Supreme Court took place this morning at 8:30 a.m.

During the oral arguments before the Missouri Supreme Court, Charles Hatfield of Stinson LLP in Jefferson City, arguing for the pro-amendment side, said Article 3, Section 49 of the Missouri Constitution reserves to the people the right to propose amendments through an initiative process — a right that he said ought to be upheld.

Mary Catherine Martin of the Thomas More Society countered by arguing that voters need to be fully informed to exercise their rights properly and argued that the amendment’s failure to disclose significant impacts misleads voters.

Martin said in a statement following the ruling that the decision “is a failure to protect voters by not upholding state laws that ensure voters are fully informed going into the ballot box.“

“Missouri’s Amendment 3 will have far-reaching implications on the state’s abortion laws and well beyond, repealing dozens of laws that protect the unborn, pregnant women, parents, and children — a reality that the initiative campaign intentionally hid from voters. We implore Missourians to research and study the text and effects of Amendment 3 before going to the voting booth,“ Martin said.

This is a developing story. 

Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, chapel and statue. / Credit: Joseph Antoniello, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

CNA Staff, Sep 10, 2024 / 14:05 pm (CNA).

Franciscan University of Steubenville in Ohio is set to launch a Washington, D.C., program for its students, including residential and learning facilities, the university announced last week.  

The Ward and Kathy Fitzgerald Franciscan University Homeland Mission (FUHM) is part of the university’s new “Encounter” initiative, designed to extend Franciscan University’s mission and impact beyond its campus in Steubenville, Ohio. It is designed to equip students for “advancing the great global missionary cause of positively impacting the principles and policies guiding the United States government.”

The university has purchased a $3 million property on Massachusetts Avenue in the District of Columbia for the program thanks to a $10 million gift from Ward and Kathy Fitzgerald. Their donation helps fund the Outreach and Evangelization component of the university’s ongoing $110 million Rebuild My Church Capital Campaign. 

“The Franciscan charism of ongoing conversion, which invites everyone to continually and humbly draw closer to Christ, will be key to carrying out this mission,” said university president Father Dave Pivonka, TOR, in a Sept. 3 press release. 

“The Franciscan University Homeland Mission will invite others to deeper conversion through three pillars grounded in the university’s mission: Evangelization and Joyful Presence, Intellectual and Personal Formation, and Support for Human Dignity,” Pivonka said.

FUHM’s operation will be headed by Stephen Catanzarite, executive director of Encounter, along with the political science department and other Franciscan departments and partners. 

The program is intended to bring Gospel values as well as Catholic social teaching “to bear on the political and social atmosphere of Washington, D.C.,” the press release said. “This engagement will not only bring the Church’s witness to the legislative and political process, but it will also serve to draw more people to Christ and his Church.”

“Programs and events at the FUHM will challenge students to work and witness ongoing, systematic change in federal government, placing the sacred human dignity of all people at the center of the work.”

Ward Fitzgerald is the CEO of international real estate private equity firm fund investment group EQT Exeter. The Fitzgeralds are members of the Trustees to the Papal Foundation.

“We have been provided great Providence to be able to be vessels of the Holy Spirit by participating with such a worthy university and its students, faculty, and administration,” Kathy Fitzgerald said in a statement. “We are too well mindful that nothing we have created or hold is our own but graces and gifts from Our Lord to do his work.”

Student rotations at the new center in Washington, D.C., are set to begin this fall on a limited basis and expand in spring 2025. 

Cardinal Christoph Schönborn speaks at the launch of Amoris Laetitia at the Vatican on April 8, 2016. / Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/CNA

CNA Staff, Sep 10, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, OP, archbishop of Vienna, said in a recent interview with a French Catholic magazine that in the face of rising secularization and the growth of Islam in many historically Christian nations, Catholics should “trust in the work of grace” and remember that the Church is “an expert in humanity.”

“The Church is alive and will always be, albeit under different circumstances. We must accept the decline of Europe. We tend to gaze at our ecclesiastical navel, but it is an undeniable continental movement,” Schönborn said, speaking to Famille Chrétienne. 

“In 20 years, the European population will not be the same as it is today, and it is already not the same as it was 50 years ago. This is inevitable, above all due to the decline in the birth rate in Europe but also due to immigration and the increasing presence of Islam. This poses new challenges for us Christians. We must also not forget that the Lord is at work in his Church! Just think of the 12,000 baptisms of adults and young people in France this year.”

The Austrian cardinal, who helped to produce the Catechism of the Catholic Church, said that despite the decline of the Church’s influence in Europe, he is convinced that the Church “has not yet breathed its last.”

“Despite secularization, the great questions of men and women remain the same as before: birth, growth, education, illness, economic worries. And then there is the family, marriage, and death,” Schönborn noted. “There is a lot of talk about change, but too little attention is paid to the constants of society. The Church must remember that it is an expert in humanity, as Paul VI said.” 

The cardinal called the idea that France and Europe are “no longer Christian” because of Islam’s influence “absurd,” but he firmly stressed that “Catholics should return to the Church.” 

“If Catholics have left the Church, we should not be surprised that they are in the minority,” he continued, calling for a “fraternal rapprochement” with Islam, echoing the words of Pope Francis, noting that Christians “do not take up arms but trust in the work of grace.” 

“Both our religions have an absolute appeal. For Muslims, God has demanded that the whole world be subjected to him and the Koran. As for Christ, he has entrusted us with a universal mission: ‘Make disciples of all nations.’ Neither of them can therefore renounce their mission. But the Christians’ way of acting is not that of the Koran but the following of Christ in all dimensions of our lives,” he said. 

Addressing the ongoing Synod on Synodality — the final session of which will take place in October in Rome and is expected to produce a final report for the pope’s approval — Schönborn said “synodality is central to Francis’ pontificate, but there is continuity with previous synods, which have been about communion, participation, and mission.”

“You may be disappointed that the specific topics are a little up in the air, but this is first and foremost a synod about the ‘modus operandi’ within the Church,” Schönborn said. 

“In my diocese, I have experienced this synodality with the priests in small groups and tried to live it through spiritual conversation. Everyone agreed that the exchange had never been so deep.”

Asked about Fiducia Supplicans, a document published by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith in December 2023 that authorized nonliturgical blessings for same-sex couples and others in “irregular situations,” Schönborn said he believes the document shows “confusion” on the part of the Church. The cardinal had previously, in 2021, criticized the Vatican’s rejection of blessings for same-sex couples, saying the document was marked by a “clear communication error.”

“I experienced it as I experience things — concretely,” the cardinal said. “If friends say to me: ‘Our son has just announced to us that he is homosexual and that he has found a partner,’ I then ask them: ‘Is he still your son?’ Most often, the answer comes naturally. I believe that with the two successive documents from Rome [the 2021 Responsum ad Dubium and Fiducia Supplicans], the Church has shown its own dismay in the face of this question. These texts, in my eyes, are shaky. We are faced with a question for which there can be no right answer.”

“The path that Pope Francis proposes to us is that of discernment, trying to see what the Lord is showing us,” he continued. “Incidentally, the misfortune of the German [Synodal Way] is that they want sharp, unambiguous answers. And unambiguity does not work in concrete life.”

Asked about Pope Francis’ restrictions on the Traditional Latin Mass by way of the 2021 document Traditionis Custodes, Schönborn expressed the hope that the “new generation” might “easily” move from the TLM to modern movements and “prayer groups” such as the Emmanuel Community. 

The Austrian prelate added: “Let us accept that Francis has his reasons for closing the doors again, at least partially, just as we have accepted that Benedict XVI had his reasons for opening them. Let us trust that the Lord is leading the Church.”

Schönborn was finally asked what “profile” the next pope after Francis, who turns 88 in December, should have.

“On that day, the Holy Spirit will lead the Church. We should not worry. If it is an African, it will be an African. Maybe it will be an Asian or a man from old Europe. But the most important thing is that he believes that he is a servant of Christ and that he loves the Church. This is how the Church will move forward,” Schönborn said. 

James Earl Jones attends the "The Gin Game" Broadway opening night after party at Sardi's on Oct. 14, 2015, in New York City. / Credit: Jemal Countess/Getty Images

CNA Staff, Sep 9, 2024 / 18:15 pm (CNA).

James Earl Jones, a distinguished actor of stage and screen who was a convert to the Catholic faith, died Monday at age 93. 

Known for lending his booming voice to such characters as Darth Vader in the “Star Wars” saga and Mufasa in “The Lion King,” Jones’ career spanned nearly seven decades. 

He was one of the few entertainers, male or female, to have earned the coveted “EGOT” slate of acting awards: an Emmy (for TV), Grammy (for music), Oscar (for movies), and Tony (for the stage).

Born in poverty in Mississippi, Jones overcame a stutter early in life in part by discovering a gift for poetry. He joined the military after graduating from college, moving to New York after serving to pursue acting full time. 

A prolific stage actor who became well known as a Shakespearean, Jones also entertained generations of moviegoers with dozens of roles. These included perhaps his most famous voice performances — the unimpeachable lion monarch Mufasa and the inimitable Sith menace Darth Vader — as well as memorable live-action appearances in “The Sandlot” and “Field of Dreams.”

Jones did not talk much about his Catholic faith but said in a 1987 interview that he converted to the faith during his time serving in the military. He said that while discerning whether to stay in the military or pursue his true passion — acting — the only things that he had in his life that were “not geared toward the art of killing” were his Catholic faith “and the complete works of Shakespeare.''

In 1985, he voiced Pharaoh in the first episode of Hanna-Barbera’s “The Greatest Adventure: Stories from the Bible.” He also recorded an audio edition of the King James version of the New Testament.

Jones died Monday morning at his home in Dutchess County, New York, according to his agent.

Jim Gaffigan attends SiriusXM's “Unfrosted” Town Hall at SiriusXM Studios on April 30, 2024, in Los Angeles. / Credit: Emma McIntyre/Getty Images for SiriusXM

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Sep 9, 2024 / 17:06 pm (CNA).

Six-time Grammy-nominated Catholic comedian Jim Gaffigan will host the 2024 Al Smith Dinner on Oct. 17, an annual event organized by the Archdiocese of New York that the two major presidential candidates — former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris — are expected to attend.

Gaffigan posted a copy of an invitation on X that lists Trump and Harris as guests along with the stand-up comedian listed as master of ceremonies. In his post, Gaffigan joked that he was unfamiliar with the names of the two presidential candidates.

“I’m so honored to be MC-ing this year’s Al Smith Memorial Dinner on Oct. 17,” Gaffigan said. “Too bad I don’t recognize those two names in the middle of the invitation. Anyone ever heard of them?”

The Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, first held in 1945, is organized to raise money for charitable causes in the archdiocese. In 2023, the archdiocese raised $7.1 million for people in need. The black-tie affair is named after the first Catholic to be nominated for president by a major party — four-term New York Gov. Al Smith, who was the Democratic Party’s 1928 presidential nominee.

Gaffigan, who has acted in dozens of movies and has performed numerous stand-up comedy specials, has been a staunch critic of Trump.

Gaffigan frequently references his Catholic faith in his stand-up comedy. For example, in the 2018 comedy special “Noble Ape,” he discusses saints and patronage.

“Of course, I’m talking about Catholic saints because I’m Catholic,” he says in the special. “I’m not a good Catholic. Like if there was a test for Catholics, I would fail. But then again, most Catholics would fail, which is probably why there’s not a test.”

In September 2015, Gaffigan performed at the Festival of Families in Philadelphia, which was attended by Pope Francis during his papal visit to the United States. In June of this year, he met the pontiff at the Vatican with 100 other comedians, including Stephen Colbert and Chris Rock. 

At The New Yorker Festival in 2015, Gaffigan spoke about a “fear of being associated with being Catholic” in the entertainment industry. 

“I’m Catholic,” he said. “98% of my friends are atheist or agnostic. I was an atheist until I met my wife. I was raised Catholic.”

Gaffigan has deviated from Church teaching on at least one issue by promoting homosexual pride and civil marriages.

The comedian ventured into political discourse during the 2020 presidential election to criticize Trump. He Tweeted that Trump is “a traitor and a con man who doesn’t care about you” and called him “a liar and a criminal” in August 2020. Gaffigan also alleged that “Trump is not pro-life and obviously not Christian or a decent person” when a Twitter user asked Gaffigan whether he was still pro-life.

Both Trump and then-candidate Joe Biden attended the 2020 Al Smith Dinner, which was held a little more than a month before the election. Trump and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton both attended in 2016. At both events, following tradition, the two candidates delivered humorous remarks, skewering themselves and each other.

Ian Church, head of the “Launching Experimental Philosophy of Religion” grant project and a professor of philosophy at Hillsdale College, welcomes attendees of the capstone conference at Hillsdale’s Blake Center for Faith and Freedom in Somers, Connecticut. / Credit: Rebecca Dorsey

CNA Staff, Sep 9, 2024 / 16:06 pm (CNA).

A $2.3 million research grant intended to kickstart a multidisciplinary field of study known as “experimental philosophy of religion” concluded at the end of August after three years of study.

The John Templeton Foundation in September 2021 granted the “Launching Experimental Philosophy of Religion” grant to Ian Church, a professor of philosophy at Hillsdale College, who headed a team of academics and six sub-grant projects.

“Experimental philosophy of religion has seen a flurry of activity in recent years and is quickly emerging as a new and exciting area of scholarly research,” Church told CNA.

Experimental philosophers use empirical data — often gathered through surveys — to research philosophical questions. The budding area of experimental philosophy of religion applies experimental philosophy, as well as psychology and cognitive sciences, to various questions within the philosophy of religion.

“In a sense, experimental philosophy of religion is both old and new,” Church noted. “Old, insofar as the kind of questions that experimental philosophers of religion are typically interested in have been a part of philosophy of religion since its very inception. But experimental philosophy of religion is also new insofar as experimental philosophy has really only been flourishing in the philosophical literature over the past 20 or so years, with experimental philosophy of religion being a latecomer to that literature.” 

In other words, philosophers are using a new method to answer old questions. 

The Templeton Foundation wanted to launch the new field of interdisciplinary research through funding initiatives. The foundation reached out to various research institutions and scholars for sub-grant proposals, resulting in in six sub-grant research projects with academics from top universities.

“Philosophers of religion frequently rely on empirical claims that can be either verified or disproven but without exploring whether they are,” the Templeton website reads. “And philosophers of religion frequently appeal to intuitions which may vary wildly according to education level, theological background, etc., without concern for whether or not the psychological mechanisms that underwrite those intuitions are broadly shared or reliable.”

Experimental philosophy of religion can be instrumental for gathering the data behind these appeals to intuition.

“Experimental philosophy of religion is the project of taking the tools and resources of the human sciences — perhaps especially psychology and cognitive science — and bringing them to bear on important issues within philosophy of religion toward philosophical ends,” Church said. 

“Where do our religious intuitions come from? And do we have a reason to think the cognitive origins of such intuitions are reliable? How might culture, ethnicity, gender, religious tradition, and more shape how we engage with seminal arguments within philosophy of religion? And where intuitions diverge, do we have a principled reason to prioritize our own intuitions over the intuitions of others?” he asked. “These are some of the core questions at the heart of this emerging field of research.”

The program featured a research team at Hillsdale College led by Church as well as Hillsdale philosophy professor Blake McAllister, honorary professor of theology and the sciences at the University of St. Andrews Justin Barrett, Arete Professorial Fellows Paul Rezkalla and Jim Spiegel, project administrator Cindy Hoard, and a team of undergraduate research assistants.

A Catholic response to new philosophies 

When asked how Catholics should engage with new philosophies, Marshall Bierson, a philosophy professor with expertise in philosophy of religion at The Catholic University of America, noted that “Catholics should never be afraid to engage with any new discoveries.”

“Where there is truth, that truth is God's truth and it is something that we should embrace,” Bierson said. “Of course, there will be elements of any human philosophy that will be wrong. So just because we embrace truth does not mean we should embrace any new philosophy or methodology wholesale. But it does mean we should be eager to learn what truths we can.” 

Bierson explained that we should approach philosophies with both charity and discernment. 

“We should always approach views with charity. Concretely, what that means is that we should first and foremost be trying to figure out and embrace what is good and true in a new perspective. Only secondarily do we try to identify and reject what is false,” he noted. 

“That said, it is important to be discerning. It can always be tempting to adopt a new perspective because it seems new or cutting edge,” Bierson continued. “But mere newness itself does not count for anything. It is truth that we are after, and we need to remember that truth itself does not change (though of course, we can get better at discovering truths over time).” 

Experimental philosophy of religion is new, and it has its skeptics. Bierson himself is a skeptic, having “technical concerns” about the methodology of experimental philosophy as well as “broader skepticism” about how it applies to the realm of philosophy.

“The much greater source of skepticism from philosophers stems from the worry that [experimental philosophy] just does not tell us anything of philosophical interest,” he said. “For example, suppose that these studies show that most people cannot think of any good reason why God would allow this animal to suffer. Does that show that there is no good reason? It’s hard to see why maybe God has some reason we did not think of.”

But Church believes that experimental philosophy of religion can help us see past our blind spots to have better dialogue.

When asked why the study is important, Church said “it’s always good to reflect deeply on what can change our mind about important issues, to think about where we might be blind to evidence.”

“Looking into the cognitive mechanisms that underwrite our belief helps us to be reflective in this way and to better develop virtuous intellectual characters,” he explained.

“I think experimental philosophy of religion can help us better see where our perspective on the divine, purpose, evil, and humanity might be idiosyncratic,” Church continued. “This helps us dialogue across religious and cultural boundaries, and it also helps us to be more aware of our own presuppositions and biases. It helps us be more humble and modest.”

The Missouri Supreme Court building in Jefferson City. / Credit: Henryk Sadura/Shutterstock

St. Louis, Mo., Sep 9, 2024 / 14:40 pm (CNA).

A proposed constitutional amendment in Missouri that would dramatically expand abortion in the state could be removed from the Nov. 5 ballot after a judge’s ruling over the weekend teed up an expected Tuesday final decision by the Missouri Supreme Court. 

Missouri’s proposed Amendment 3, which qualified for the November ballot in August after garnering thousands of signatures, would mandate that the government “shall not deny or infringe upon a person’s fundamental right to reproductive freedom.” 

It would “prohibit any regulation of abortion, including regulations designed to protect women undergoing abortions and prohibit any civil or criminal recourse against anyone who performs an abortion and hurts or kills the pregnant women,” according to the secretary of state’s office.

A judge in Cole County — which includes the state capital, Jefferson City — on Friday ruled that the full text of Amendment 3 fails to mention the specific laws to be repealed if voters approve the measure. By Missouri law, a ballot measure text must “include all sections of existing law or of the constitution which would be repealed by the measure.” 

A hearing before the Missouri Supreme Court is scheduled for Tuesday morning with a quick decision expected by the high court ahead of a 5 p.m. deadline for finalizing the state’s November ballot. 

Missouri law currently protects unborn babies throughout all of pregnancy with the only exception being cases of “medical emergency.” Missouri is currently one of 10 states that will vote on abortion-related measures in November. 

In his Sept. 6 ruling, Cole County Circuit Judge Christopher Limbaugh wrote that the pro-abortion groups proffering the amendment argued that the only way to know which laws the amendment would affect was through future litigation challenging the constitutionality of a particular statute. That theory, “of course, is not an exception” to the state’s ballot measure requirements, he wrote. 

Limbaugh said his “opinion does not suggest that every initiative petition should speculate as to every single constitutional provision or statute that it could affect.” But, he said, the defendants’ failure to “include any statute or provision that will be repealed, especially when many of these statutes are apparent, is in blatant violation of” state law. 

The Thomas More Society, a Catholic public interest law firm based in Chicago, had filed the lawsuit challenging the pro-abortion amendment language in August on behalf of Missouri state Sen. Mary Elizabeth Coleman, pro-life advocate Kathy Forck, state Rep. Hannah Kelly, and Peggy Forrest, president and CEO of Our Lady’s Inn, a St. Louis pro-life pregnancy center. 

“We are confident the reviewing court will also hold that Missouri voters have a right to know what they are voting on and to vote on one matter at a time … We will not allow Missourians to be deceived into signing away dozens of current laws that protect the unborn, pregnant women, parents, and children,” Mary Catherine Martin, Thomas More Society’s senior counsel, said in a statement.

Missouri’s seven-member Supreme Court is made up of five Republican appointees and two Democratic appointees. The hearing on the abortion amendment is scheduled for 8:30 a.m.

The Missouri Catholic Conference, which advocates policy on behalf of the state’s Catholic bishops, has called the proposed ballot measure “an extreme constitutional amendment that legalizes abortion at any stage of pregnancy with no protections for the preborn child, even when the child is capable of feeling pain.” Pro-life leaders are leading a “vote no” campaign to counter the measure if it makes it to the ballot. 

Pro-abortion amendment efforts in other states, most recently Ohio, have demonstrated that the broad language of “reproductive freedom” can encompass far more than abortion, with advocates warning that the Missouri amendment could enshrine a “right” for minors to seek permanent gender-transition procedures.

Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York. / Credit: Jonah McKeown/CNA

CNA Staff, Sep 9, 2024 / 12:28 pm (CNA).

Catholic bishops in New York state are warning ahead of the November election that an “equal rights amendment” proposal on the ballot this year could have “dangerous consequences” if it is approved by voters. 

The state constitutional amendment would establish broad rights to “reproductive health care” by prohibiting any discrimination based on “pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive health care and autonomy.”

It would also prohibit discrimination based on a person’s sex, sexual orientation, “gender identity,” and “gender expression.”

In a statement from the New York State Catholic Conference last week, the New York bishops — including New York archbishop Cardinal Timothy Dolan as well as the state’s auxiliary and emeritus bishops — argued that the proposal was “a wolf in sheep’s clothing.” The statement was emailed to 35,000 mailing list subscribers and sent to parishes and diocesan media outlets for distribution.

The title of “equal rights amendment,” the bishops argued, “suggests a noble cause, as all children of God should be treated equally under the law.” 

“However, this proposed amendment to the state constitution is broadly written and could have dangerous consequences if enacted, which is why we oppose it and urge you to vote no,” the prelates said.  

The bishops noted that the amendment would effectively “permanently legalize abortion without restriction and up until the moment of birth in New York.” 

The state has already “stripped away all abortion limitations,” they pointed out, but the proposed amendment “would render impossible any change to the law if the hearts and minds of New Yorkers were ever to shift toward protecting the child in the womb.”

Furthermore, the amendment would forbid discrimination based on “age,” which the bishops said “could also lead to parents’ rights being stripped away.” 

“Courts could decide that parents have no authority over their minor children on important matters and permit children to make destructive and permanent decisions on their own, which they could well live to regret, including but not limited to so-called ‘gender affirming’ treatments and surgeries,” they said. 

The bishops said the measure “could lead to darkness for many New York families.” 

Catholics in the state “should consider these consequences and vote no” on the proposal, they said. 

A court in the state had earlier this year blocked the amendment from appearing on the November ballot after a judge ruled that lawmakers did not follow proper procedures for putting it before voters. 

An appeals court subsequently ruled that the measure could appear on the ballot, arguing that the statute of limitations to challenge the measure had passed.

New York is one of about a dozen states considering pro-abortion measures in the 2024 election.