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Photo: Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I embrace.
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JERUSALEM, APRIL 16, 2007 (Zenit.org).- Despite protests over a photo caption that implicates Pope Pius XII in the Holocaust, the apostolic nuncio to Israel attended the day of remembrance at the Yad Vashem museum.
Archbishop Antonio Franco told the Italian news service ANSA that he reversed his decision to attend the official Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony Sunday in Jerusalem after he received a letter earlier that afternoon from the president of Yad Vashem, Ayner Shaley, promising to "reconsider the way Pius XII is presented."
"My action was not to distance myself from the celebrations, but to call attention to the way the Pope was presented," the nuncio told Vatican Radio on Sunday. "My goal was achieved."
Archbishop Franco added: "I have no reasons to keep this tension going, and therefore I will participate in the ceremony."
The caption in question first appeared when the Holocaust Museum was inaugurated at Yad Vashem in 2005. It says that Pius XII had "recognized" the Nazi regime, and that "even when reports about the murder of Jews reached the Vatican, the Pope did not protest."
Pius "maintained his neutral position" with two exceptions, the caption says, criticizing "his silence and absence of guidelines." The exceptions were appeals to the rulers of Hungary and Slovakia toward the end of the war.
The Italian bishops' SIR news agency announced Thursday Archbishop Franco's "painful renunciation" of the invitation to the annual celebration at the Holocaust museum.
The previous nuncio, Archbishop Pietro Sambi, had also requested, in 2005, that the caption be changed.
Not true
Jesuit Father Peter Gumpel, the relator of the cause for Pius XII's beatification, told ZENIT that the Pontiff "is esteemed and honored by millions of persons, even among the Jews."
He added: "What is stated in that caption does not correspond to the truth."
In response to the criticism that those who defend Pius XII are apologists, and not historians, Father Gumpel said: "There are many noted and famous historians, many of those Jews, who have shown the good that Pius XII did. Among these include Sir Martin Gilbert, Michael Burleigh and Rabbi David Dalin."
These people "do not seem apologetic at all to me," he said.
The priest added: "And what about Golda Meir, Albert Einstein, Israel Zolli and all the heads of the main international Jewish associations who thanked Pius XII at the end of World War II. Are they also apologists?
"Not to mention the directors of the Jewish papers published during the Second World War in most areas of the world. They too show Pope Pius XII as the light opposing Nazism. Are they too apologists?"
The accusations against Pius XII, Father Gumpel pointed out, "are always the same arguments, which are repeated without adding any historical facts in support."
He added: "Those criticizing Pius XII quote each other, and systematically avoid the entire historical Jewish source supporting Pope Pacelli."
Code: ZE07041601
Date: 2007-04-16
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By Father John Flynn
ROME, APRIL 16, 2007 (Zenit.org).- Even as in vitro fertilization becomes more popular, some of the practices involved in its use are causing concern. Health authorities in Britain recently initiated a public consultation regarding putting limits on the number of embryos that can be implanted.
According to information on the Web site of the Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority (HFEA), currently around 1 in 4 pregnancies achieved using in vitro fertilization (IVF) ends in the birth of twins. This is more than 10 times greater than the naturally occurring twin birthrate.
The HFEA declared that it was convinced by the arguments made in the report "One Child at a Time," carried out by an independent expert group, that being born as part of a set of multiples is the biggest known risk to the health and welfare of children born as a result of IVF.
The report, published last October, recommended that only one embryo be transferred to those IVF patients who have the highest chance of conceiving, and therefore the highest risk of conceiving twins.
The HFEA has just published a consultation document entitled "The Best Possible Start to Life" to start off the public inquiry of the British health authorities. The text observes that it is not only children who suffer from the excessive number of multiple pregnancies. Mothers are also more likely to have dangerous complications during their pregnancy.
As for the children, the document said, while many of the births are without problems, nevertheless, a high proportion of twins are very vulnerable at the beginning of their lives, because they are born too early and too small.
A recent study cited by the HFEA found that 126 infant fatalities could have been avoided in 2003 alone, had all the IVF babies born in the United Kingdom been singletons.
The larger numbers of multiple births also places strains on the health system. Between 40 and 60 out of every 100 IVF twins are transferred to neonatal intensive care units when they are born. This compares to around 20% of singleton IVF babies.
The inquiry by the HFEA is now open to submissions from the public. After a process of study, new guidelines for clinics may be introduced in 2008.
There is concern in the United States over the issue of multiple births resulting from IVF treatment, reported the Boston Globe on March 26. Many patients ask for the implantation of multiple embryos, in the desire to ensure pregnancy.
According to Dr. Elizabeth Ginsburg, the medical director for the IVF center of Brigham and Women's Hospital, only about 10% of the 1,800 IVF cycles performed at the clinic last year were single-embryo transfers.
This is higher than many other clinics. The article cited data for 2005, from the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology, showing that only just over 2% of IVF cycles performed by its member clinics across the nation involved single-embryo transfers.
Ova for sale
Questions are also being raised about the practice of paying women for ova donations. In the past, donations were limited to providing ova for use in IVF treatments. With the rise of stem cell research using human embryos, the demand for donated ova is rising sharply.
The drugs used by clinics to stimulate ovaries have done great harm to some women, declared Deirdre McQuade, spokeswoman for the Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities of the U.S. bishops' conference.
"The embryonic stem cell agenda is a threat not only to embryonic humans but to young women as well," she said in a statement released March 8. McQuade also drew attention to the dangers caused by paying women for ova donation. This could well lead to the exploitation of women who suffer from poverty or come from ethnic minorities, she said.
The temptations involved for women to donate ova are not small. Women can be paid from $5,000 and up in the United States for donating ova, the Associated Press reported Jan. 20. The article also noted that regulations regarding payment vary widely and that the issue is also causing divisions among researchers and women's groups.
Meanwhile, young women are increasingly being targeted by ads offering payment for ova donations, the Chicago Tribune reported March 4.
Advertisements appear on city buses, in campus newspapers, and on the radio. The prices offered for donations also rise notably for women with desired academic or physical qualities. One ad cited by the article quoted an offer of $100,000 for ova from a woman with proven collegiate athletic ability.
Risks involved
The risks of ova donation, however, are very real. The London-based Telegraph newspaper reported Feb. 18 that, according to a study published in the journal Thrombosis and Thrombolysis, Italian researchers from the University of Padua found that among all women undergoing infertility treatment, 1 in 10 will suffer mild forms of adverse reactions. Another 1% are at risk of life-threatening blood disorders.
Another UK paper, the Independent, cited research in a March 2 article on the dangers of women being subjected to overly aggressive procedures in IVF treatments. Research from the University Medical Center in Utrecht, Netherlands, published in The Lancet, a UK medical journal, found that high doses of drugs used to stimulate the ovaries
causes unpleasant side effects. Moreover, a combination of milder treatments and the implantation of only one embryo reduces costs.
Other dangers involve the children conceived using IVF. Babies resulting from fertility treatments have higher rates of birth defects, the Associated Press reported Feb. 9. The information comes from a study of more than 61,000 births in Canada.
Researchers examined 61,208 births in Ontario during 2005, including 1,394 that resulted from fertility treatments. They looked at rates of birth defects and adjusted estimates of risk to reflect differences in the ages of the mothers, whether or not they smoked, gender of the babies, birth complications and other factors.
Nearly 3% of babies born through fertility treatments had a birth defect. This compares with a rate of just under 2% for babies conceived naturally. Overall, there was a 58% greater risk of defects.
The chances of problems increased according to the complexity of treatment given. The rate of defects was highest with IVF, and lowest when limited to just giving medications to help a woman's ovaries produce more eggs.
Abandoning the weak
The Catholic Church's opposition to the use of IVF is long-standing. These techniques, observes No. 2376 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, "infringe the child's right to be born of a father and mother known to him and bound to each other by marriage."
Moreover, the following number continues, "They dissociate the sexual act from the procreative act." This domination of technology over the origin and destiny of the human person "is in itself contrary to the dignity and equality that must be common to parents and children."
More recently, Benedict XVI addressed the issue of technology and the human person, speaking Feb. 12 to participants in an international congress on natural law. The Pontiff said: "I feel the duty to affirm yet again that not all that is scientifically possible is also ethically licit.
"Technology, when it reduces the human being to an object of experimentation, results in abandoning the weak subject to the arbitration of the stronger."
Continuing his comments, the Pope warned: "To blindly entrust oneself to technology as the only guarantee of progress, without offering at the same time an ethical code that penetrates its roots in that same reality under study and development, would be equal to doing violence to human nature with devastating consequences for all." A timely warning for a world often reluctant to accept ethical limits.
Code: ZE07041629
Date: 2007-04-16
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The director of the Vatican press office, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, confirmed Saturday that the former president will visit the Vatican on May 4.
The politician from Tehran will be in Rome to participate in the meeting "Intercultural Dialogue: A Challenge for Peace." The event is organized by the Anastasis Association, an international association for Christian art and intercultural dialogue, and in collaboration with the Pontifical Gregorian University and Iran's Embassy to the Holy See.
Khatami, a strong promoter of Benedict XVI's visit to Turkey last November, saw the trip as an opportunity to promote dialogue between Muslims and Christians.
Khatami served two terms as president, spanning the years 1997 to 2005. He is also the president of the Foundation for the Dialogue Between Civilizations.
Code: ZE07041622
Date: 2007-04-16
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Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, director of the Vatican press office, said Saturday that Bush will visit the Pope on June 9 or 10, after participating in the G8 meeting in Germany from June 6 to 8.
Bush, together with his wife Laura, met Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, then dean of the College of Cardinals, on the occasion of the funeral for Pope John Paul II in April 2005.
Laura Bush was received in a private audience by Benedict XVI in February 2006 while she was passing through Rome.
Code: ZE07041602
Date: 2007-04-16
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VATICAN CITY, APRIL 16, 2007 (Zenit.org).- Jewish and Muslim representatives congratulated Benedict XVI for his 80th birthday.
Giuseppe Laras, president of the Assembly of Rabbis of Italy, said today on Vatican Radio: "My wish is that he may continue on the road begun and intensify his work in favor of dialogue between the members of the various religions, and I am not only thinking of the Jewish religion, but also Islam and many other religions."
"The wish for the Pope is for him to give a substantial contribution to the cause of pacification and peace among all people," the rabbi added.
Mario Scialoja, director of the Muslim World League in Italy, said on Vatican Radio that he wished Benedict XVI "a long and happy pontificate, and this wish comes truly with complete sincerity and from the heart."
Scialoja, who is a convert to Islam, continued: "I believe, from what Benedict XVI has done till now, that he means to follow along the path of dialogue with the religions, in particular with the great religions of Abraham, meaning Islam and Judaism; a dialogue which in today's world is always more multicultural, multireligious, in evermore mixed societies, not a hoped-for thing, but a necessity."
Referring to the Pope's Regensburg speech last September, he said: "Unfortunately, the mass media took a few phrases from the Holy Father's long and complex speech out of context, which clearly could seem offensive to Islam."
Scialoja acknowledged: "However this was certainly not the Pontiff's intention.
"The Holy Father's travels to Turkey, especially the fact that he went to the Blue Mosque in Istanbul and pronounced the invocations from the Kiblah with the imam, which is our traditional direction for prayer, is an extremely strong sign."
Code: ZE07041607
Date: 2007-04-16
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VATICAN CITY, APRIL 16, 2007 (Zenit.org).- On his 80th birthday, Benedict XVI received in audience Metropolitan Ioannis Zizioulas of Pergamum, who delivered a letter from Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople.
According to statements made to the press today by Metropolitan Zizioulas, the letter from the patriarch proposes that the Pope support the meeting in the Italian city of Ravenna to inaugurate the working sessions of the Catholic-Orthodox Commission for theological dialogue that will take place Oct. 7-15.
The metropolitan added that representatives from all the Orthodox Churches will be present at the meeting.
"Among ourselves we have the same faith and the same tradition. The more important theme that we have to face is the primacy of the bishop of Rome, that is to say, the role of the Pope," he told the Italian newspaper La Repubblica.
"For some it is a problem without solution," the metropolitan added. "I, however, believe that a solution can be found."
Metropolitan Zizioulas continued: "The issue is to define well the place of the bishop of Rome in the structure of the universal Church. The Orthodox are prepared to accept the idea of a universal primate and, according to the cannons of the ancient Church, the bishop of Rome is the 'primus.'"
"According to the Orthodox vision," he clarified, "it is a universal primate that always acts in communion with the synod" of the various Churches.
The Orthodox patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, Alexy II, also sent birthday greetings to the Pope, wishing him in a letter good health, a long life and the help of God in his spiritual ministry.
Code: ZE07041606
Date: 2007-04-16