Category: 2025 News

WASHINGTON (OSV News) – President Donald Trump on Jan. 24 used executive authority to block taxpayer funds from paying for elective abortion procedures both in the U.S. and abroad.

Trump reinstated a policy, commonly referred to as the Mexico City Policy, which bars taxpayer funds from going to nongovernmental organizations abroad that perform or promote abortions. He also signed an executive order to further enforce a ban on federal funding for abortion known as the Hyde Amendment.

The Mexico City Policy, referred to as the “global gag rule” by opponents, was first enacted by former President Ronald Reagan in 1984. Each Republican president since that time has authorized it, and each Democratic president has rescinded the policy. In 2021, the Trump administration expanded the policy’s family-planning scope to cover most federal global health assistance, renaming it the “Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance” policy.

Trump’s executive order to enforce the Hyde Amendment alleged that “the previous administration embedded federal funding of elective abortion in a wide variety of government programs.” It rescinded some executive orders issued by former President Joe Biden including one directing strict enforcement of the Federal Access to Clinic Entrances Act, or FACE Act, which prohibits actions including obstructing the entrance to an abortion clinic, and another defining abortion as “healthcare.”

The order said federal statutes “protecting access to emergency medical care for pregnant women under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) and protecting personal health information under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) remain in full effect.”

RealClear Politics first reported that he did so while aboard Air Force One, just hours after delivering a virtual, prerecorded message to the Jan. 24 March for Life earlier the same day.

Neither Trump nor Vice President JD Vance, who addressed the national March for Life in person, mentioned his plans to do so in their comments to the annual pro-life demonstration in Washington.

Mini Timmaraju, president and CEO of Reproductive Freedom for All, formerly NARAL Pro-Choice America, argued in a statement that as a candidate, “Trump tried to downplay his role in overturning Roe v. Wade. And now he has spent his first week in office handing down anti-abortion directives gutting federal protections.”

“These policies inflict harm on those who need access to reproductive health care, including abortion, in our country, and around the world — and we will fight back,” Timmaraju said.

But Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, which works to elect pro-life candidates to public office, praised the orders in a statement, arguing, “With this action the president is getting American taxpayers out of the abortion business and restoring sanity to the federal government.”

“This is a big win for babies and mothers, and it reflects the will of the majority of Americans who strongly oppose bankrolling the abortion industry at home and abroad,” Dannenfelser said. “On behalf of pro-life Americans and the moms and babies that will be saved from the tragedy of abortion, thank you, President Trump.”

In a Jan. 26 statement, Bishop Daniel E. Thomas of Toledo, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee for Pro-Life Activities, praised the actions, saying, “A significant majority of Americans oppose being forced to support abortion through their tax dollars. I am grateful for the strengthening of policies that protect us from being compelled to participate in a culture of death, and that help us to restore a culture of life at home and abroad.”

The Catholic Church teaches that all human life is sacred from conception to natural death, and as such, opposes direct abortion.

After the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization in June 2022, church officials in the U.S. have reiterated the church’s concern for both mother and child and called to strengthen available support for those living in poverty or other causes that can push women toward having an abortion.

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Communication is something divine with the power “to build — build communities, build up the church,” Pope Francis told thousands of journalists and people working in media and communication.

“To know how to communicate displays great wisdom,” he said in brief remarks during an audience in the Paul VI Audience Hall Jan. 25.

He encouraged participants in the Jan. 24-26 Jubilee of the World of Communications to remember that it is not enough to communicate the truth, they also must be true and authentic people in their hearts and in the way they live their lives.

The midday encounter came after thousands of the pilgrims walked through the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica and made the profession of faith at the tomb of St. Peter, and after the pope had had a full morning of meetings.

The pope held up his written speech and said, “I have in my hands a nine-page speech” and “at this time of day when the stomach starts rumbling, to read nine pages would be torture.”

He gave the prepared text to Paolo Ruffini, prefect of the Dicastery for Communication, to be distributed and published.

In his text, the pope made an urgent appeal for the release of unjustly imprisoned journalists, which, according to Reporters without Borders in 2024, numbered more than 500 people.

“The freedom of journalists increases the freedom of us all,” he wrote, asking those with the power to do so to release during the Jubilee Year those who were detained merely “for wanting to see with their own eyes and for trying to report what they have seen.”

Freedom of the press and freedom of thought must be “defended and safeguarded along with the fundamental right to be informed,” the pope wrote.

Without “free, responsible and correct information,” he wrote, “we risk no longer distinguishing truth from lies; without this, we expose ourselves to growing prejudices and polarizations that destroy the bonds of civil coexistence and prevent fraternity from being rebuilt.”

“We need media literacy,” his text said, “to educate ourselves and to educate others in critical thought, the patience of discernment necessary for knowledge, and to promote the personal growth and active participation of every one of us in the future of our own communities.”

“We need courageous entrepreneurs, courageous information engineers, so that the beauty of communication is not corrupted,” he wrote. “Great change cannot be the result of a multitude of sleeping minds but rather begins with the communion of enlightened hearts.”

“Not all stories are good, and yet these too must be told,” he wrote. “Evil must be seen in order to be redeemed, but it is necessary to be told well so as not to wear out the fragile threads of cohabitation.”

The pope’s text also reflected on the talks given before his arrival by Maria Ressa, a Filipino-American journalist who was awarded the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize jointly with a Russian journalist for their efforts to safeguard freedom of expression, and Colum McCann, an Irish writer and co-founder and president of Narrative 4, an international educational NGO. The two speakers had both been given loud, long applause and a standing ovation for their talks.

“This Jubilee comes at a time when the world is upside down: when what’s right is wrong; and what’s wrong is right,” Ressa said in her speech.

An MIT study showed in 2018 that “lies spread six times faster on social media,” and if a lie is told enough times, “it becomes a fact. If you make people believe lies are facts, then you can control them,” she said.

“Without facts, you can’t have truth. Without truth, you can’t have trust. Without these three, we don’t have a shared reality” and “we can’t have journalism; we can’t have democracy,” much less “solve existential problems like climate change,” she added.

“Information warfare,” Ressa said, is a “geopolitical power play (that) is exploiting these platforms’ design. Remember, the goal is not to make you believe one thing; it’s to make you doubt everything, so you’re paralyzed.”

Religion and faith are more important than ever for fighting back because of what they hold in common with the golden rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” she said.

There are four things people in the world of media and communication can do, she said: collaborate; speak truth with moral clarity; protect the most vulnerable and prevent the normalization of hate; and “recognize your power” driven by love.

“Hope is not passive; it’s active, relentless and strategic. Our faith traditions carry centuries of resilience; we need to share those stories of transformation,” she said.

McCann said in his speech that “stories matter. They can change the course of history. They can rescue us. Stories are the glue that hold us together: we are nothing if we can’t communicate.”

When people share who they are and then listen generously in turn, it reminds everyone of their shared humanity, he said.

“The crux of our contemporary dilemma is not so much silence, as it is the act of silencing,” which happens “when we refuse to listen to the stories of others, or more poignantly, when we refuse to let others tell their stories at all” or “annihilate” their stories, he said.

A refusal to hear the stories of “those who don’t look like us, or sound like us, or vote like us, is at the core of our possible doom,” he said.

McCann encouraged teachers and journalists to use storytelling, “not something designed to win an argument, but something that stirs the soul,” as a path to repair what is broken in the world.

“Young people soon realize — through personal storytelling — that we are so much more alike than we are different” and “we recognize one another’s common humanity.”

Just being interested in one another is a triumph, he said. “Imagine how many triumphs come about when we learn to understand, or even like, or maybe even love, one another.”

Storytelling and story listening may or may not save the world, he said, but it will let in “a ray of light and understanding” to pierce the darkness.

WASHINGTON (OSV News) – On the eve of the national March for Life rally in Washington, President Donald Trump announced Jan. 23 he was issuing pardons for 23 protesters arrested for violating the federal Freedom of Access to Clinics (FACE) Act.

Trump signed the pardons in the Oval Office.

“They should not have been prosecuted. Many of them are elderly people,” he told reporters. “This is a great honor to sign this.”

The Thomas More Society, the Chicago-based public interest law firm, had earlier in January announced it had submitted formal requests to pardon 21 pro-life activists convicted under the FACE Act. They included Joan Bell, Coleman Boyd, Joel Curry, Jonathan Darnel, Eva Edl, Chester Gallagher, William Goodman, Dennis Green, Lauren Handy, Paulette Harlow, John Hinshaw, Heather Idoni, Jean Marshall, Father Fidelis Moscinski, Justin Phillips, Paul Place, Paul Vaughn, Bevelyn Beatty Williams, Calvin Zastrow, Eva Zastrow, and James Zastrow.

The two other convicted pro-life activists pardoned by Trump are Herb Geraghty of Pennsylvania and Jay Smith of New York.

Many are still incarcerated. Lauren Handy, a Catholic convicted for her participation in a 2020 abortion clinic blockade in Washington, has been serving the longest sentence: 57 months.

According to a list maintained by Citizens for a Pro-Life Society, Handy is currently in a federal prison in Florida. Idoni is incarcerated in Florida; Marshall and Goodman in Connecticut; Darnel and Calvin Zastrow in Illinois; Hinshaw in Massachusetts; Geraghty in Pennsylvania; and Williams, who was arrested for protesting outside an abortion clinic in New York City, in Alabama.

“Today, freedom rings in our great nation,” said Steve Crampton, senior counsel for the Thomas More Society. “The heroic peaceful pro-lifers unjustly imprisoned by Biden’s Justice Department will now be freed and able to return home to their families, eat a family meal, and enjoy the freedom that should have never been taken from them in the first place.”

Father Fidelis, a member of the Franciscan Fathers of the Renewal, issued his own statement expressing gratitude to President Trump for the pardons.

“The pardons corrected the injustice of our prosecutions and incarceration but the daily and horrific injustice of abortion continues,” he said. “And it must be stopped.”

At the same time, the Catholic priest leveled criticism at the president over his position that the states should decide abortion policy.

“Although it might be politically expedient to say that each state should make its own laws about abortion, this position is morally incoherent,” he said. “We invite President Trump to abandon this incoherence and show himself to be a president of all Americans — born and unborn.”

(OSV News) – Several Catholic leaders are speaking out against the Trump administration’s reversal of a longstanding policy limiting where immigration officials could make arrests.

On Jan. 21, the Department of Homeland Security announced that previously designated “sensitive locations” such as churches and schools would no longer be off-limits for such arrests. The agency said in a statement that “criminals will no longer be able to hide in America’s schools and churches” to evade law enforcement.

The move followed several executive orders on immigration issued by President Donald Trump hours after his Jan. 20 inauguration, based on campaign pledges to tighten border security and ensure mass deportations of undocumented migrants.

But allowing for immigration arrests at houses of worship and other previously protected locations threatens human dignity, religious liberty and society itself, said several Catholic leaders in a joint statement issued Jan. 23 by Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso, Texas, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration; Sister Mary Haddad, a member of the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas and president and CEO of Catholic Health Association of the United States; and Kerry Alys Robinson, president and CEO of Catholic Charities USA.

“We recognize the need for just immigration enforcement and affirm the government’s obligation to carry it out in a targeted, proportional, and humane way,” they said. “However, non-emergency immigration enforcement in schools, places of worship, social service agencies, healthcare facilities, or other sensitive settings where people receive essential services would be contrary to the common good.”

The three said that they were “already witnessing reticence among immigrants to engage in daily life, including sending children to school and attending religious services.”

“All people have a right to fulfill their duty to God without fear,” they said.

According to Pew Research Center, Christians “are the largest religious group in the world among both migrants and nonmigrants,” and are “overrepresented among international migrants, accounting for 30% of the world’s overall population and 47% of all people living outside their country of birth, as of 2020.”

In their statement, Bishop Seitz, Sister Mary and Robinson said, “Through our parishes, shelters, hospitals, schools, and other Church institutions, we recognize that this dignity is not dependent on a person’s citizenship or immigration status.”

“Catholic health care, Catholic Charities agencies, and the Church’s other social service ministries work daily to feed, house, heal, educate, and meet people’s needs in communities across our nation,” they said. “Through these ministries — together with the Church’s responsibility to proclaim the Gospel and celebrate the sacraments — we uphold the belief that all people are conceived with inherent dignity, reflecting the image of God.”

“The charitable services we provide are fundamental to who we are as Christians,” they added, quoting Pope Benedict XVI’s 2005 encyclical, “Deus Caritas Est”: “For the Church, charity is not a kind of welfare activity which could equally well be left to others, but is a part of her nature, an indispensable expression of her very being.”

The policy of “turning places of care, healing, and solace into places of fear and uncertainty for those in need, while endangering the trust between pastors, providers, educators and the people they serve, will not make our communities safer,” they said.

“Our organizations stand ready to work on a better path forward that protects the dignity of all those we serve, upholds the sacred duty of our providers, and ensures our borders and immigration system are governed with mercy and justice,” they said.

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – Whether one needs a fresh start or simply time for “recalculating the route,” the Holy Year 2025 is an opportunity for all Christians to set off on a pilgrimage, Pope Francis said.

“The destination is not just any goal, but a place of as much sharing, fraternity and joy as possible in this world with its lights and its trials,” and where people are “open to the ultimate happiness in the company of Jesus, Mary and all the saints,” the pope told members of the Italian Automobile Club.

Pope Francis focused on the meaning of jubilee pilgrimages in his meeting with the club members Jan. 23 and in audiences that day with the Italian police who patrol the area around the Vatican and with leaders of the foundation that supports the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network.

On the pilgrimage through life, he told the auto club, people do risk “taking the wrong road – it’s true – or of finding oneself in difficulty or feeling lost.”

Especially in those situations, he said, “the Jubilee can be an opportunity to start again, to recalculate the route of one’s life, identifying the landmarks that should not be missed and those that might instead become obstacles to reaching the goal.”

Even worse than getting lost, though, is not moving at all, he said. “We were not made to stand still.”

“Do not get discouraged, but always start again,” the pope told them.

In his meeting with the Italian national police unit responsible for the area around the Vatican, Pope Francis thanked them for guaranteeing his safety and that of his collaborators and the pilgrims and tourists who visit the Vatican.

But he also encouraged them to take advantage of the Jubilee and the holy doors opened in St. Peter’s Basilica and the basilicas of St. Mary Major, St. John Lateran and St. Paul Outside the Walls.

“Going through the Holy Door is not a magical act — no, it is not — it is a symbol, a Christian symbol; Jesus himself says, ‘I am the door,'” the pope told them, quoting the Gospel of John.

Making a pilgrimage and crossing the threshold of the Holy Door is “a sign that expresses the desire to begin again,” the pope said. A wise person recognizes the need “to begin again. Always going one step forward. The desire to be renewed, and to let God find you.”

Pope Francis prayed that even “those who may not recognize that they have the gift of faith, let them equally take advantage of this Jubilee Year to go forward.”

The Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network, a longtime Jesuit ministry that shares the pope’s monthly prayer intentions, has a more obvious Jubilee connection since pilgrims must pray for the pope’s intentions, go to confession and receive the Eucharist to receive a Holy Year indulgence.

The pope told the group that the network also can contribute to the Jubilee by “helping individuals and communities to live the spirit of the Holy Year as a journey in which prayer and compassion, prayer and closeness to the least among us, prayer and works of mercy are inseparably combined.”

(OSV News) – “Let me say very simply: I want more babies in the United States of America,” Vice President JD Vance told a cheering crowd at the 52nd National March for Life Jan. 24.

“I want more happy children in our country, and I want beautiful young men and women who are eager to welcome them into the world and eager to raise them,” he said. “And it is the task of our government to make it easier for young moms and dads to afford to have kids, to bring them into the world, and to welcome them as the blessings that we know they are, here at the March for Life.”

In his first public appearance following Inauguration Day, Vance was the final speaker at the annual march’s two-hour rally preceding attendees’ walk from the Washington Monument grounds to the U.S. Supreme Court Building. Other speakers included Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La. It is the first time both leaders of Congress’s chambers attended a March for Life.

While most speakers — policymakers and pro-life advocates — spoke specifically about making abortion “illegal and unthinkable” in post-Dobbs America, Vance championed a pro-family vision that not only rejected abortion, but also supported raising children.

Noting his own three young children, Vance, who is Catholic, said, “The task of our movement is to protect innocent life. It’s to defend the unborn; and it’s also to be pro-family and pro-life in the fullest sense of that word possible.”

As in years past, the march drew tens of thousands, many of them young adults. Some traveled more than a day on buses, missing high school and college classes to join others along the National Mall in the mid-Atlantic cold. They held signs reading “Love them Both,” “Life is our Revolution” and “Defund Planned Parenthood,” the largest U.S. abortion provider.

The 2025 march also commemorated a leadership change for the event’s organization, with longtime president Jeanne Mancini handing off her role to March for Life’s incoming president, Jennie Bradley Lichter. While Mancini emceed the 2025 march, both women spoke, with Bradley Lichter also introducing Vance.

The march was founded to protest Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion in all 50 states. That decision was overturned in 2022 with the court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, thus returning abortion policy to lawmakers. At the rally, March for Life leaders addressed the march’s role in the changed abortion landscape, with abortion laws now varying widely by state. The march, they insisted, must continue.

“Today we affirm that the pro-life generation will not rest until every single abortion facility in our nation closes its door for good. We will march until every child is protected by federal law, until abortion is unthinkable, and until every pregnant woman receives excellent prenatal care,” said Hannah Lape, president of Wheaton College Voice for Life. Her group carried the 2025 march’s iconic banner.

“With the new administration and the fall of Roe v. Wade, the next four years of America’s history will be defined either by courage or by cowardice,” she said. “Abortion is not a state’s rights issue to be ignored. It is a fundamental human rights crisis weighing on America’s shoulders. Our country cannot be great until the preborn are protected, and are protected (with) the right to life.”

The march came four days after President Donald Trump was sworn in for his second term, following a campaign that disappointed many pro-life advocates in certain respects. Trump was hailed for pro-life actions during his first term. Since then, he reversed support for a federal abortion ban, stating he believes U.S. states should determine their own abortion laws. He also posted on social media positively about “reproductive rights,” and indicated he would not restrict access to mifepristone. The drug, while it is prescribed in some miscarriage care protocols, is widely used for nearly two-thirds of abortions in the U.S.

How Trump’s campaign statements on abortion affect policy-making remain to be seen. But many pro-life leaders appear optimistic about the new administration. The day before the March for Life, Trump pardoned 23 pro-life activists convicted of violating the federal Freedom of Access to Clinics (FACE) Act. The activists, many of whom Trump said were elderly, had been convicted for blocking access to abortion clinics. An executive order on gender Trump issued earlier in the week also defined life as beginning at conception, a point House Speaker Johnson noted at the march rally.

Johnson was among House members who passed the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act Jan. 23, the day after Democrats blocked a companion bill in the Senate.

In a video played at the march, Trump touted his pro-life record and said that in his second term “we will again stand proudly for families and for life.”

“We will protect the historic gains we have made and stop the radical Democrat push for a federal right to unlimited abortion on demand, up to the moment of birth and even after birth,” he said.

A majority of Americans support some legal limits on abortion, while keeping the practice largely intact, according to a Knights of Columbus-Marist poll released Jan. 23. The annual survey found that 83% of Americans supported pregnancy resource centers and 67% of Americans support some legal limits for abortion. But 60% support limiting abortions to the first three months of pregnancy — a limit that would leave most abortions legal as nine out of 10 abortions occur in the first trimester.

“All of you here — all of you — have the power to change minds,” Lila Rose, a Catholic and longtime pro-life advocate, told the crowd during the march rally. “You are the voice for those who have no voice. Remember, science is on our side. The truth is on our side. We must simply have the courage to speak the truth with love.”

The March for Life was preceded by two large-scale events: Life Fest 2025 at EagleBank Arena in Fairfax, Virginia, held the evening before and the morning of the march; and the National Prayer Vigil for Life at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington.

The Sisters of Life, the Knights of Columbus and the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia, united to present the two-day Life Fest event, which drew almost 8,000. At the national shrine, Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann of Kansas City, Kansas, was the main celebrant and homilist at the prayer vigil’s opening Mass Jan. 23, with Bishop Robert J. Brennan of Brooklyn, New York, the main celebrant of the closing liturgy Jan. 24. Archbishop Naumann also gave an opening prayer at the March for Life.

Marcela Rojas, who lives in the Archdiocese of New York, said that she attended the march with a group of 75 people, many of them mothers who brought their small children.

“Within our being, in our womb, there is a life,” she said of pregnant mothers. “It is a life that we cannot choose for. It is already another life that does not belong to us, and we are not the ones to decide whether it lives or not.”

SCRANTON – The Most Reverend Joseph C. Bambera, Bishop of Scranton, will celebrate Mass for the 33rd World Day of the Sick on Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025, at 12:10 p.m. at the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Scranton.

The commemoration of the World Day of the Sick not only provides an opportunity to devote special attention to those who are ill, but is also a celebration of God’s works of mercy, especially through those who work tirelessly in the healthcare field.

The World Day of the Sick Mass at the Cathedral of Saint Peter will feature the Liturgy of the Anointing. Any person who wishes to receive the Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick will be invited to approach the bishop/priest with their hands open and palms facing up. The bishop/priest will anoint both the forehead and hands of the sick person.

Last year, Pope Francis reminded all faithful that the sacrament of the anointing of the sick is not just for those who are nearing the end of their life.

“Let us remember that the anointing of the sick is one of the ‘sacraments of healing,’ of ‘restoration,’ that heals the spirit,” the pope said in a video message released in July by the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network.

For the month of July 2024, the pope dedicated his prayer intention to the pastoral care of the sick.

“The anointing of the sick is not a sacrament only for those who are at the point of death,” the pope said, emphasizing “it is important that this is clear.”

Having a priest or bishop give the sacrament does not necessarily mean saying “goodbye to life,” he said. “Thinking this way means giving up every hope.”

“When a person is very ill, it’s advisable to give them the anointing of the sick. And when someone is elderly, it’s good that they receive the anointing of the sick,” Pope Francis said, underlining how there is no need to wait until a person experiencing a serious illness is at the point of death to receive the sacrament.

“Let us pray that the sacrament of the anointing of the sick grant the Lord’s strength to those who receive it and to their loved ones, and that it may become for everyone an ever more visible sign of compassion and hope,” he said.

CTV: Catholic Television of the Diocese of Scranton will provide a live broadcast of the Mass for those unable to attend.

SCRANTON – In advance of National Disability Awareness Month in March, the Diocese of Scranton will hold its annual Mass for Persons with Disabilities on Sunday, Feb. 9, 2025, at 10 a.m. at the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Scranton.

All people, including those with special abilities, have gifts to contribute to the life of the Church. The Diocese of Scranton embraces and welcomes the talents of all individuals in building up the Kingdom of God.

The Most Reverend Joseph C. Bambera, Bishop of Scranton, will serve as principal celebrant and homilist at this special Mass.

The Mass is open to everyone. It will be broadcast live on CTV: Catholic Television of the Diocese of Scranton. The Mass will also be livestream on the Diocese of Scranton website, YouTube channel and links will be provided on all Diocesan social media platforms.

A lite reception will be held following the Mass at the Diocesan Pastoral Center, 330 Wyoming Avenue, Scranton.

Partners in the annual Mass for Persons with Disabilities include Saint Joseph’s Center in Scranton and the Order of the Alhambra. For more information, visit dioceseofscranton.org.

HAZLETON – Despite a storm on Jan. 19 that dropped several inches of snow in the Hazleton area, roughly 900 people gathered to celebrate a special Mass in honor of the Feast of Our Lady of Altagracia.

The Most Rev. Joseph C. Bambera, Bishop of Scranton, served as principal celebrant of the Mass, which was held in the gymnasium of Holy Family Academy to accommodate the large crowd.

“We’re a joyful people and it shows,” parishioner Rafael Perez of Annunciation Parish, explained. “This is what brings us together … It is our faith that makes us one. That is what we celebrate.”

Three parishes that regularly hold Spanish Masses – Annunciation Parish in Hazleton; Queen of Heaven Parish in Hazleton; and Holy Name of Jesus Parish in West Hazleton – work together to plan all aspects of the liturgy.

“This is a great day,” parishioner Eugenio Sosa of Queen of Heaven Parish, said. “It is a great tradition. It is a great celebration around the world, and as you can see in Hazleton, it’s a big celebration.”

Our Lady of Altagracia is the patroness of the Dominican Republic. Under that title, the Blessed Virgin Mary continues to be revered by people of Dominican heritage in the United States.

The feast of Our Lady of Altagracia (which is Jan. 21 each year) derives from a popular image of Mary painted in the 16^th century which shows a woman’s image in front of her child, and behind her is Joseph, as it is written in Revelation 12:5.

(OSV News) – The State Department has canceled all refugee travel to the U.S., following a Jan. 20 executive order by newly inaugurated President Donald Trump.

In addition, a Biden administration program that enabled private U.S. citizens to sponsor refugees has also been halted.

“Preventing any access to asylum and other protections will only endanger those who are most vulnerable and deserving of relief, while empowering gangs and other predators to exploit them,” Bishop Mark J. Seitz of El Paso, Texas, and chair of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration, said in a Jan. 22 statement. “Likewise, indefinitely halting refugee resettlement is unmerited, as it is already proven to be one of the most secure legal pathways to the United States.”

In a statement issued Jan. 22, the USCCB president, Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio of the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services, said Trump’s executive orders on the treatment of immigrants and refugees were among those the bishops found “deeply troubling and will have negative consequences, many of which will harm the most vulnerable among us.”

“No matter who occupies the White House or holds the majority on Capitol Hill, the Church’s teachings remain unchanged,” he said in his statement. “It is our hope that the leadership of our Country will reconsider those actions which disregard not only the human dignity of a few, but of us all.”

Trump’s executive order on refugees gave the State Department until Jan. 27 before suspending refugee processing and travel, which had been overseen by the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program. USRAP has been offlined by the order until “further entry into the United States of refugees aligns with the interests of the United States,” the executive order declared.

Trump said the nation “lacks the ability to absorb large numbers of migrants, and in particular, refugees, into its communities in a manner that does not compromise the availability of resources for Americans, that protects their safety and security, and that ensures the appropriate assimilation of refugees.”

While the suspension was slated for Jan. 27, internal documents reviewed by The Associated Press showed the suspension took immediate effect Jan. 21.

Guidance reviewed by CBS News and reported by its media partner, BBC News, also indicated that the suspension, at present, does not impact Special Immigrant Visa holders. Those visas are granted to those who have assisted the U.S. military as translators and interpreters.

While often used interchangeably, the terms “migrant” and “refugee” are separately defined under international law, with refugees specifically protected due to perilous conditions — such as war or persecution — that make returning to the country of origin impossible. No uniform definitions of “migrant” or “forced migration” exist at the international level, according to the United Nations. However, migrants are nonetheless protected as human persons under international human rights law.

Under the U.S. Immigration and Nationality Act, refugees are persons who have left their countries of origin and are unwilling or unable to return, due to actual or well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, social group or political opinion. Asylum is a form of protection extended by the U.S. to refugees who are already in the U.S. or seek admission at a port of entry.

“The U.S. refugee program helps some of the most vulnerable people on earth, refugees whose lives are literally in danger,” J. Kevin Appleby, senior fellow for policy and communications at the Center for Migration Studies of New York, told OSV News in a Jan. 22 email.

“To shut the door on refugee families who have already been processed, vetted, and prepared to travel is the height of cruelty,” said Appleby, who served as the USCCB’s director of migration policy and public affairs from 1998-2016.

“The program has successfully resettled refugees in the U.S. over the decades without a security breach,” said Appleby. “There is no justified reason to halt it, other than to serve an anti-immigrant agenda.”

Bishop Seitz explained in his statement that the Catholic Church “is committed to defending the sanctity of every human life and the God-given dignity of each person, regardless of nationality or immigration status.”

“Church teaching recognizes a country’s right and responsibility to promote public order, safety, and security through well-regulated borders and just limits on immigration,” Bishop Seitz explained. “However, as shepherds, we cannot abide injustice, and we stress that national self-interest does not justify policies with consequences that are contrary to the moral law.”

While the Trump administration has made a welcome emphasis on fighting human trafficking, the bishop said several of Trump’s executive orders were “specifically intended to eviscerate humanitarian protections enshrined in federal law and undermine due process, subjecting vulnerable families and children to grave danger.”

He also condemned the “use of sweeping generalizations to denigrate any group, such as describing all undocumented immigrants as ‘criminals’ or ‘invaders,’ to deprive them of protection under the law.” Bishop Seitz said this behavior “is an affront to God, who has created each of us in his own image.”

Bishop Seitz called on the president to “to pivot from these enforcement-only policies to just and merciful solutions, working in good faith with members of Congress to achieve meaningful, bipartisan immigration reform that furthers the common good with an effective, orderly immigration system.”