Abortion ‘Junket’ Criticized by Population Watchdog

POPULATION RESEARCH INSTITUTE, Sept. 5—The Population Research Institute has condemned an “abortion junket” to China conducted by population-control advocates.

Because of Bush administration concerns about long-standing Chinese policies that force women to abort their children, Congress is likely to cut off funding to U.S.-based organizations that help China implement these policies. In response, a number of “religious” groups are sending representatives to China, supposedly to investigate these policies.

Population Research Institute president Stephen Mosher noted that every member of the group headed to China supports coercive population control. The attendees included Frances Kissling, former director of an abortion clinic and leader of Catholics for a Free Choice, which the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has described as “an arm of the abortion lobby”; Carlton Veazey of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, who “supports partial-birth abortion;” Meg Riley, lobbyist for the Unitarian Universalist Association, who led a proabortion “prayer” on the 30th anniversary of Roe v. Wade; and Nancy Kipnis of the National Council for Jewish Women, who organizes opposition to pro-life court appointments.

Mosher noted that no objective report could be expected from such a team.

Monk Imprisoned by Parishioners

REUTERS, Sept. 4—Capuchin Father Emilio Cucciella of Trasacco, Italy, was held prisoner by his own parishioners for several days, Reuters reported.

The imprisonment was in protest against the planned closure of the Franciscan monastery, which is short of priests. Angry townspeople bricked up one exit from the church, known as the Madonna of Perpetual Succor, and blockaded the other.

“I consider myself a prisoner of love,” Father Cucciella, 67, said by telephone from inside the church, noting that the villagers were deeply attached to the parish, one of only two in the town of 6,000.

“We Capuchins have been here since at least 1570,” he said. “St. Francis himself passed through here in the early 13th century. I have to obey orders, but I can understand why [the townspeople] are upset.”

Father Cucciella said he thought he had enough food for a while but was ready to go on a “hunger strike” in solidarity with the people.

Catholic Group Pushes Trade Justice

INDEPENDENT CATHOLIC NEWS, Sept. 5—The U.K.-based Catholic Agency for Overseas Development has thrown its support behind nations seeking to end generous agricultural subsidies to American and European farmers.

The agency hired the Mexican Mariachi band Los Charros to serenade British Secretary of State for Trade and Industry Patricia Hewitt before she went to the World Trade Organization summit in Cancun, Mexico, where the subsidies will be challenged.

Independent Catholic News quoted the agency's explanation for this tactic: “One of the major causes of poverty is an unfair system of global trade rules that damages poor countries. Those rules allow rich countries to support their farmers to the tune of $350 billion per year. This leads to dumping of cheap food on Third World markets and the undermining of poor farmers.”

As a result, they explained, many farmers are forced to emigrate.