Forthnight for Freedom 2015 preparations

In preparation for the Fortnight for Freedom: Freedom to Bear Witness, which will take place from June 21 to July 4, 2015, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ staff has once again prepared materials that you may use to celebrate the Fortnight. This year’s theme emphasizes the link between religious freedom and bearing witness to the truth of the Gospel, keeping in mind the sacrifice of so many martyrs for the faith, both past and present.

During the Fortnight, our liturgical calendar celebrates a series of great martyrs who remained faithful in the face of persecution by political power—St. John Fisher and St. Thomas More, St. John the Baptist, SS. Peter and Paul, and the First Martyrs of the Church of Rome. In the secular calendar, we anticipate that the U.S. Supreme Court will rule at some point during the Fortnight (likely around June 29) on four cases concerning the legal definition of marriage in the United States.

          

FORTNIGHT FOR FREEDOM RESOURCES

The materials below are publicly available (in English and Spanish) through the website www.Fortnight4Freedom.org, so please feel free to distribute widely or provide website links:

1. 14-Day Study Guide on Dignitatis Humanae (note that this is the 50th anniversary of the “Declaration on Religious Freedom” from the Second Vatican Council)

2. Parish Guide to celebrating the Fortnight (including 14 suggestions)

3. A series of examples of Current Threats to Religious Liberty in the U.S.

4. A series of examples of International Religious Freedom issues

5. Why the Religious Freedom Restoration Act Works

6. Frequently Asked Questions about Religious Liberty

7. Religious Liberty High School Lesson Plans (included as part of the 2015Catechetical Sunday materials)

8. Litany for Liberty

9. Prayers of the Faithful (part of the Call to Prayer for Life, Marriage & Religious Liberty)

10. Holy Hour Template (also part of the Call to Prayer)

Social media can also be an effective tool during the Fortnight; I would encourage you to use all  communications tools that you have access to in order to effectively spread the message in support of religious freedom.

Bishop Malone's Letter - Call to Prayer

 

May 17, 2013

My Dear Friends in Christ,

In December, when the bishops announced the Call to Prayer for Life, Marriage, and Religious Liberty, they also announced a second Fortnight for Freedom.  As last year, the Fortnight will take place from June 21 (the vigil of the feasts of St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher) to July 4 (Independence Day).

There are three reasons why this year’s Fortnight is so important:

·         First, the Supreme Court’s rulings on marriage redefinition, which could have grave implications for religious freedom, will almost certainly be issued during the Fortnight.

·         Second, by the time of the Fortnight, the effective date of the HHS mandate-August 1, 2013 will be scarcely a month away, and the Administration’s decision on the shape of a final rule will likely be imminent.   We are still far from receiving the relief we need through the regulatory process.  So it will be very important to keep the public pressure on.

·         Third, the success of a second Fortnight is essential to perpetuating a new movement for life, marriage and religious liberty, highlighting the full range of ongoing religious freedom issues, here and abroad, and in so many other areas of law, such as immigration, adoption, and disaster relief.  Similarly, it is important to show that it is not tied to any election year, but to the broader principle of religious freedom. 

During the fortnight, I ask you to call on your parishioners and other constituents to join me in prayer for religious freedom.  As we all know, prayer can be very powerful and every day during the fourteen day fortnight, I am asking that in every parish, during every Mass, a special Prayer of the Faithful be said.  You are also encouraged to sponsor adoration, special devotions and catechetical sessions as part of this national religious liberty campaign.

Attached you will find suggested prayers that you may wish to use during the fortnight.  Additional resources are available on the HHS Mandate page of the diocesan website (www.buffalodiocese.org) and USCCB Fortnight resources are available at www.Fortnight4Freedom.org.

I will begin the Fortnight of Prayer on Saturday, June 22 at 8:00 a.m. Mass at St. Rose of Lima Church, corner of Parkside and Parker Avenues, Buffalo, where I will be celebrating the Rosary Novena for Life Mass and then later that same day at 4:30 p.m. Mass at St. Joseph Cathedral.  Both of these Masses are open for anyone in the Diocese who would like to come and pray with me for the intentions of the Fortnight.

The Fortnight of Prayer will conclude on Wednesday, July 3 at 3:00 pm with a Holy Hour and Benediction at the Dominican Monastery.  Bishop Grosz will preside at this celebration.

Catholics in the United States have long advocated for religious liberty, and it is our solemn duty to continue those efforts today.  Please join me and our fellow Catholics as we pray for a new birth of freedom in this great land!

Be assured of my grateful prayers and best wishes,

 

Yours sincerely in Christ,

Most Reverend Richard J. Malone

Bishop of Buffalo

Fortnight at St. Ben's

St. Benedict’s is hosting Fr. Terrance Klein, S.T.D. from St. Bonaventure University on Tuesday, June 26 at 7PM to speak on the theological understanding of Religious Liberty.

Join us in church for his presentation, Adoration/Benediction, and prayer.

The United States bishops call the laity to action in defense of religious liberty and are urging all to protect the First Freedom of the Bill of Rights. The position of the U.S. bishops is outlined in "Our First, Most Cherished Freedom." 

The document lists the following major concerns:
The Health and Human Services (HHS) mandate forcing religious organizations to pay for morally objectionable services.

License revocation of Catholic foster care and adoption service programs that refuse to place children in situations against their moral teaching.

Requiring that the USCCB’s Migration and Refugee Services provide contraceptive and abortion services to victims of human trafficking.

Diocese of Buffalo events and information previous post - http://stbenedictsamherstnyblog.blogspot.com/2012/05/fortnight-for-freedom.html

A Prayer for Religious Liberty

Almighty God, Father of all nations, for freedom you have set us free in Christ Jesus (Gal 5:1).

We praise and bless you for the gift of religious liberty, the foundation of human rights, justice, and the common good.

Grant to our leaders the wisdom to protect and promote our liberties; by your grace may we have the courage to defend them, for ourselves and for all those who live in this blessed land.

We ask this through the intercession of Mary Immaculate, our patroness and in the name of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, with whom you live and reign, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Fortnight for Freedom update

“Fortnight for Freedom” to focus on prayer for religious liberty  Background information is available at http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/religious-liberty/our-first-most-cherished-liberty.cfm

For a two-week period, beginning June 21 on the vigil of the Feasts of St. John Fisher and St. Thomas More, to July 4, Independence Day, Catholics from the Diocese of Buffalo will join the faithful across the United States in the “Fortnight for Freedom,” described by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops as, “a great hymn of prayer for our country.” Among the martyrs of the Church, St. John Fisher and St. Thomas More remained true to their faith in the face of political persecution.

The fortnight is part of the bishops’ coordinated efforts to mobilize Catholics in response to government attacks on religious liberty. Earlier this year, the Obama administration endorsed a Health and Human Services mandate that will require Catholic organizations and institutions to pay for employee health coverage that includes contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs. The bishops have vigorously opposed the mandate on the grounds that the federal government is forcing the Catholic employers to provide coverage that is a contradiction of Church teachings and beliefs.

“During this two-week period, I call on Catholics throughout the diocese to join me in prayer for religious freedom,” said Bishop Edward U. Kmiec. “We know prayer can be very powerful and every day during the fortnight, in every parish, during every Mass, a special Prayer of the Faithful will be said.” Parishes and Catholic institutions are also free to sponsor adoration, special devotions and catechetical sessions as part of this national religious liberty campaign.


Bishop Kmiec will begin the fortnight on Thursday, June 21, at 3 p.m. with a holy hour at the Carmelite Monastery (75 Carmel Road, Buffalo). Bishop Edward M. Grosz, auxiliary bishop of Buffalo, will conclude the observance with a holy hour at the Dominican Monastery (355 Doat St., Buffalo) at 3 p.m. on Tuesday, July 3. The public is welcome to attend both prayer hours. “I believe the ‘Hour of Mercy’ at both of these powerhouses of prayer in our diocese will be the most effective and prayerful ways for Catholics to take part in the fortnight,” Bishop Kmiec said.

In addition to the “Fortnight for Freedom,” the bishops have designated the Solemnity of Christ the King (Nov. 25), as a day for bishops, priests and deacons to focus their homilies on religious freedom. The Feast of Christ the King is significant in that it was born out of resistance to totalitarian incursions against religious liberty. “We must be consistent in our message and in our teaching,” Bishop Kmiec said. “At every opportunity, we need to remind the faithful of the importance of defending our first freedom, our most cherished freedom: the freedom of religion.”

In their statement on religious liberty, the U.S. bishops wrote, “To be Catholic and American should mean not having to choose one over the other. Our allegiances are distinct, but they need not be contradictory and should instead by complementary. That is the teaching of our Catholic faith, which obliges us to work together with fellow citizens for the common good of all who live in this land.”

For more information on the “Fortnight for Freedom, visit the HHS Mandate page of www.buffalodiocese.org   Stay alert for updates on what our parish and neighboring parishes will be doing in particular.  We recommend frequent visits to our website www.saintbenedicts.com as well as subscribing to this blog via email by simply entering your email address in the upper right box where it says "follow by email," then click "submit."

Call to Action - Fortnight for Freedom

BISHOPS ISSUE CALLTO ACTION

TO DEFEND RELIGIOUS LIBERTY

Urge strong lay involvement

Outline threats to First Freedom at all levels of government and abroad

Call upon dioceses to pursue religious liberty fortnight, June 21-July 4

WASHINGTON—The U.S. bishops have issued a call to action todefend religious liberty and urged laity to work to protect the First Freedomof the Bill of Rights. They outlined their position in “Our First, Most Cherished Freedom.” The document was developed by the Ad Hoc Committee on Religious Liberty of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), approved for publication by the USCCB Administrative Committee March 13, and published in English and Spanish April 12.

            The document can be found at http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/religious-liberty/our-first-most-cherished-liberty.cfm

“We have been staunch defenders of religious liberty in the past.We have a solemn duty to discharge that duty today,” the bishops said in the document, “… for religious liberty is under attack, both at home and abroad.”

The document lists concerns that prompt the bishops to act now.  Among concerns are:

•           The Health and Human Services (HHS) mandate forcing all employers, including religious organizations, to provide and pay for coverage of employees’contraception, sterilization, and abortion-inducing drugs even when they have moral objections to them. Another concern is HHS’s defining which religious institutions are “religious enough” to merit protection of their religious liberty.

•          Driving Catholic foster care and adoption services out of business. Boston, San Francisco, the District of Columbia and Illinois have driven local Catholic Charities adoption or foster care services out of business by revoking their licenses, by ending their government contracts, or both—because those Charities refused to place children with same-sex couples or unmarried opposite-sex couples who cohabit.

•          Discrimination against Catholic humanitarian services. Despite years of excellent performance by the USCCB’s Migration and Refugee Services in administering contract services for victims of human trafficking, the federal government changed its contract specifications to require USCCB to provide or referfor contraceptive and abortion services in violation of Catholic teaching. Religious institutions should not be disqualified from a government contract based on religious belief, and they do not lose their religious identity or liberty upon entering such contracts. Recently a federal court judge in Massachusetts turned religious liberty on its head when he declared that such a disqualification is required by the First Amendment—that the government violates religious liberty by allowing Catholic organizations to participate in contracts in a manner consistent with their beliefs on contraception and abortion.

            The statement lists other examples such as laws punishing charity to undocumented immigrants; a proposal to restructure Catholic parish corporations to limit the bishop’s role; and a state university’s excluding a religious student group because it limits leadership positions to those who share the group’s religion.

            Other topics include the history and deep resonance of Catholic and American visions of religious freedom, the recent tactic of reducing freedom of religion to freedom of worship, the distinction between conscientious objection to a just law, and civil disobedience of an unjust law, the primacy of religious freedom among civil liberties, the need for active vigilance in protecting that freedom, and concern for religious liberty among interfaith and ecumenical groups and across partisan lines.

            The bishops decry limiting religious freedom to the sanctuary.

           “Religious liberty is not only about our ability to go to Mass on Sunday or pray the Rosary at home. It is about whether we can make our contribution to the common good of all Americans,” they said. “Can we do the goodworks our faith calls us to do, without having to compromise that very same faith?”

            “This is not a Catholic issue. This is not a Jewish issue. This is not an Orthodox,Mormon, or Muslim issue. It is an American issue,” they said.

The bishops highlighted religious freedom abroad.

            “Our obligation at home is to defend religious liberty robustly, but we cannot overlook the much graver plight that religious believers, most of them Christian, face around the world,” they said. “The age of martyrdom has not passed. Assassinations, bombings of churches, torching of orphanages—these are only the most violent attacks Christians havesuffered because of their faith in Jesus Christ. More systematic denials of basic human rights are found in the laws of several countries, and also in acts of persecution by adherents of other faiths.”

            The document ends with a call to action.

“What we ask isnothing more than that our God-given right to religious liberty be respected.We ask nothing less than that the Constitution and laws of the United States, whichrecognize that right, be respected.”  They specifically addressedseveral groups: the laity, those in public office, heads of Catholic charitableagencies, priests, experts in communication, and urged each to employ the gifts and talents of its members for religious liberty.

            The bishops called for “A Fortnight for Freedom,” the two-week period from June 21 to July 4—beginning with the feasts of St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher and ending with Independence Day—to focus “all the energies the Catholic community can muster” for religious liberty.  They also asked that, later in the year, the feast of Christ the King be “a day specifically employed by bishops and priests to preach about religious liberty, both here and abroad.”