Washington D.C., May 6, 2021 / 21:01 pm (CNA).
A Catholic bioethicist has repeated his objection to the Biden administration’s decision that the National Institutes of Health no longer needs an ethics board’s approval before awarding funding to researchers who will use fetal tissue obtained from elective abortions.
“The current administration offers the pretense of acting ethically when they stress that the requirement for obtaining consent still stands, meaningless as it is, even as they adroitly eliminate any substantive ethical review by outside entities,” Father Tadeusz Pacholczyk, director of education at the National Catholic Bioethics Center, told CNA.
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases announced May 5 the elimination of the requirement for approval by an ethics advisory board for research proposing use of human fetal tissue from abortion.
A student poses after receiving a coronavirus vaccination dose at a University of Notre Dame clinic held April 8, 2021. The school in Indiana announced its COVID-19 vaccine requirement for the upcoming fall semester on April 7. (Courtesy of University of Notre Dame/Barbara Johnston)
Some two dozen Catholic colleges and universities have joined the growing list of institutions requiring COVID-19 vaccinations for students returning to campus this fall.
As among their secular counterparts, Catholic colleges requiring the inoculations are still a small minority, and the potential requirements have sparked debate about what Catholic colleges can and should require of their students.
According to a tracker maintained by the Chronicle of Higher Education, 21 Catholic colleges, of about 191 nationwide, had announced fall semester vaccine requirements as of May 4 including large schools like DePaul University, Georgetown University, Loyola University Chicago, Fordham Un
With their own inherent value quite apart from whatever good might come from our use of them, animals ought to be treated as the kinds of creatures they are. Image: A gorilla at The Bronx Zoo in New York City, May 23, 2014 (Flickr/Tammy Lo)
Over the past decade in Christian theological circles, there s been an explosion of concern for nonhuman animals. Not many people keep up with theological trends, so no shame if you ve missed this one.
But the fact is, while much of theology is by its very nature rather abstract, this one is relatable: Large majorities of us have animal companions, for instance. We all eat, and many of us think, talk and even obsess over what we eat more than we do over, say, God. And how we treat animals has a lot to do with what we put in our bodies and not just to eat.
Lake Placid Middle High School (News photo Andy Flynn)
LAKE PLACID Three people have been chosen as finalists in the search for Lake Placid’s new school superintendent. They will be appointed by the school’s Board of Education. The current superintendent, Roger Catania, is retiring at the end of this school year. Catania has been Lake Placid Central School District’s superintendent since 2013, though he worked at the high school as a counselor for several years before that, starting in 1997. The three candidates who are being considered as his replacement are Timothy Seymour, the current superintendent of the St. Regis Falls Central School District; Saranac Laker Dana Wood, former principal of the Lake Placid Middle-High School and current assistant superintendent for business, finance and support services at LPCSD; and Margaret Wright, a Canandaigua resident who has served in various administrative roles in school districts throughout the Finger Lakes region.
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On May 5, President Joseph R. Biden Jr. issued a proclamation on the National Day of Prayer, which was to be observed on May 6. Speaking to people of all religious backgrounds and acknowledging his own prayer life, the president stated: “I invite the citizens of our Nation to give thanks, in accordance with their own faiths and consciences, for our many freedoms and blessings, and I join all people of faith in prayers for spiritual guidance, mercy, and protection.”
After a year marked by the Covid-19 pandemic and other experiences of loss, Mr. Biden suggested that “the determination to overcome adversity, rise above our differences, and come together as one nation to meet this moment in history” could be found in prayer.