September 23, 2022

A daily news briefing from Catholic News Agency, powered by artificial intelligence. Ask your smart speaker to play “Catholic News,” or listen every morning wherever you get podcasts. www.catholicnewsagency.com - In the aftermath of the fire that gutted a church in Cameroon, Bishop Aloysius Fondong of the Diocese of Mamfé entered the ruins to retrieve the Blessed Sacrament and found the sacred Hosts and the ciborium containing them to be intact. On the night of September 16, armed men set fire to Saint Mary’s church in the town of Nchang, located in the Diocese of Mamfé, and kidnapped five priests, a nun, and three lay people. The archbishop of Bamenda, Andrew Nkea Fuanya, said that the kidnappers have demanded a ransom. The prelate commented that there are groups that see the Church as an “easy target to make money.” https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/252363/blessed-sacrament-found-intact-in-tabernacle-of-church-burned-by-armed-men-in-cameroon President Joe Biden on Thursday appeared to erroneously suggest that the Catholic Church makes exceptions for rape and incest in its condemnation of abortion. Biden made the remarks at a fundraising event for the Democratic National Committee at a private home in New York City’s Central Park South neighborhood while discussing a Republican-backed congressional bill to ban abortions after 15 weeks into pregnancy. The president incorrectly said the bill has no exceptions for rape and incest. A White House spokesperson was not immediately available Thursday night to clarify what Biden meant. But any implication that the Catholic Church makes exceptions where abortion is concerned is incorrect. “Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion,” the Catechism of the Catholic Church states. “This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable. Direct abortion, that is to say, abortion willed as an ends or a means, is gravely contrary to the moral law.” https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/252367/president-biden-catholi