Good News

My latest Zenit issue had some good articles to share. I don't have enough room to publish the full text of all the articles, but if you log on to www.Zenit.org, you can look for the following headlines and read the whole story yourself. If you are not a subscriber, I highly recommend!

The Fizzling Population Bomb
U.N. Report Points to Slowing of Growth
NEW YORK, MARCH 12, 2005

"The elderly population in developed countries has already surpassed the number of children in the age bracket of 0-14 and by 2050 there will be two elderly people for every child. In the developing world, the proportion of the population aged 60 or over is expected to rise from 8% in 2005 to close to 20% by 2050. These forecasts and the experience of recent years show just how erroneous were the prophecies of past years about imminent disaster due to the 'population bomb.' This, however, has not stopped family planning advocates from continuing to push abortion and contraceptives."

Pope Urges Resistance to Imposed Sterilization and Contraception
Writes Message to Bishops of Tanzania
VATICAN CITY, MARCH 11, 2005

U.N. Should Have Done More to Ban Cloning, Says Bishop
Vatican Official Wishes Declaration Were Binding on Nations
VATICAN CITY, MARCH 9, 2005

"Bishop Elio Sgreccia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, lamented that the declaration, though a formal pronouncement, 'then is not respected by countries with less scruples.' The bishop said on Vatican Radio that it is a 'grave symptom' that the U.N. General Assembly 'does not have the strength, the courage, to assert certain principles of humanity which are essential.' There are economic interests that hide behind patents that 'abuse the human being as if he were a medicine,' contended the prelate. Yet, Bishop Sgreccia regarded the declaration's ethical character as a 'positive event,' as 'it means that the majority of nations that are in the U.N. regard cloning as a threat against the human being.' It is not necessary to take recourse to the elimination or cloning of human lives, he said, as 'scientific research is having marvelous successes with all the somatic stem cells, namely, those that come from the umbilical cord, or from several parts of the adult body.' "

Divinization of Nature as Ecological Sin
A Professor Outlines Traditions of Christian Thought on the Environment
ROME, MARCH 9, 2005

Mary Ann Glendon at Beijing+10
For Women Worldwide, "the Picture Is Mixed"
NEW YORK, MARCH 7, 2005

Q: What do you say to those who accuse the Church of being old-fashioned and obscure when confronting issues on women?
Glendon: What is clearly "old-fashioned" today is the old feminism of the 1970s -- with its negative attitudes toward men, marriage and motherhood, and its rigid party line on abortion and gay rights. Where the Church is concerned, there is always room for improvement, but it is hard to think of another institution that has done more, concretely, to advance the well-being of more women. The Church's longstanding dedication to women's education is well known. With the largest private health care and educational systems in the world, the Church keeps in close touch with women's everyday concerns; it "walks the walk" with them, while others often only "talk the talk."
Q: In light of the third millennium having just begun, how is the "feminine genius" valued in the Christian sense?
Glendon: Interestingly, the new feminisms that are emerging these days have much in common with the Catholic vision of men and women working together in complementarity to bring about a culture that is pro-woman and pro-family. A central concern for increasing numbers of women is that advancement in the economic, social and political spheres should not come at the expense of family life. That is a problem to which no society has yet found a solution, and it is a problem to which the "old" feminism of the 1970s was largely indifferent.

Man-Woman Relationship, a Good Thing in Need of Healing
Interview With Biblical Exegete Anne-Marie Pelletier
PARIS, MARCH 8, 2005