In the American Congress, the preferential option for the rich prevails: Cut benefits to Social Security and Medicare but protect tax breaks for millionaires, billionaires, and large corporations. The following invitation is from the prophets at NETWORK.

Are you tired of the arguments about taxing people who are rich or cutting services for people who are poor? Do you wonder how we got to this point? 

We at NETWORK are convinced that government policies of the last 30 years have contributed to the huge and growing wealth gap in our country, and that this wealth gap is at the root of many of our current economic and social problems. As part of our Mind the Gap! campaign we have initiated a petition to President Obama, calling for a White House Summit on the wealth gap. We believe this issue needs to be examined in order to determine the best economic policies for all of us. 

Please help to make sure that this issue gets the attention it deserves. Please sign the petition, and also ask others to sign.

Here is the link to the petition: www.networklobby.org/petition-white-house-summit

(Note: Signing the petition will not put you on a list to get more e-mails, unless you indicate that you want to learn more when you sign the petition.)

You can find out more about the wealth gap at our Mind the Gap! campaign site.

___________________________________

Thomas C. Fox reports for NCR Today.

Vatican UN rep: 'Nuclear weapons no longer morally justified'

Speaking in Kansas City, Mo. July 1 Archbishop Francis Assisi Chullikatt, Apostolic Nuncio to the United Nations, said there is no longer a moral justification for the continued maintenance of nuclear weapons. He called for a comprehensive convention aimed at the phase out of all nuclear weapons from the world.

“Viewed from a legal, political, security and most of all moral perspective, there is no justification today for the continued maintenance of nuclear weapons,” the archbishop said. “This is the moment to begin addressing in a systematic way the legal, political and technical requisites for a nuclear-weapons-free world.”

… Chullikatt said that the current phase out of nuclear weapons, built on treaties between Russia and the United States, has been insufficient and, indeed, has led to permanent nuclear weapons deterrence systems.

“It cannot be considered morally sufficient to draw down the stocks of superfluous nuclear weapons while modernizing nuclear arsenals and investing vast sums to ensure their future production and maintenance,” the archbishop said. “This current course will ensure the perpetuation of these weapons indefinitely.”

“For far too long, nuclear weapons have threatened humanity and there has not been sufficient political will toward removing this scourge. Now is the time for a profound rethinking and change in our perception of nuclear weapons."
_______________________________

Kevin O’Rourke, O.P., writing in America, provides an excellent review of the role of the individual conscience when it is in conflict with the teachings of a bishop or the church.

Rights of Conscience: Responding to a bishop's disciplinary decisions

… A well-formed conscience is an important part of one’s spiritual life. Thus, any decision of conscience that seems to be contrary to a statement of a church authority, for example, of a local bishop, should be made with caution and a clear view of the common good as well as the personal good of the individual. Authoritative statements of church officials are not mere opinions based on hearsay or weak evidence. Rather, the issuing authority seeks to found them on sacred Scripture, prior teaching of the church and a desire to foster the common good of the particular communities to which they are directed. Disagreements with such teaching must be based upon fact, not opinion. Hence, the first inclination toward official statements should be to follow the teaching or disciplinary statement, even if the teaching is not an infallible statement.

The church, however, admits that statements of church teaching are not all of equal authority. Infallible statements are not frequent. Most statements, especially those of local bishops, are in the noninfallible category. Moreover, the church admits that statements issued even by the highest authority may be subject to revision or correction. The document of 1990, referred to earlier, states: “One must take into account the proper character of every exercise of the magisterium considering the extent to which its authority is engaged…. The authority of the intervention becomes clear from the nature of the document, the insistence with which the teaching is repeated, and the very way in which it is expressed.”

In regard to a moral decision involving facts and challenges of contemporary society, it seems bishops should not make statements based solely on their own experience and knowledge. The people immersed in a particular moral situation may have unmatched knowledge valuable for a sound decision. This is especially clear in regard to moral questions arising in modern health care. In addition, the principle of subsidiarity opts for the right of people other than the bishop to speak to moral issues. The teaching authority of bishops is recognized by members of the church, but in order for that authority to be effectively exercised it must include the voice and expertise of other individual members of the people of God.

_________________________________

Father Richard McBrien writes for the National Catholic Reporter.

Vatican II themes: The church as mystery, or sacrament

 “The best preparation for the new millennium,” the late Pope John Paul II wrote in his apostolic letter of 1994, Tertio millennio adveniente (“On the approaching third millennium”), “can only be expressed in a renewed commitment to apply, as faithfully as possible, the teachings of Vatican II to the life of every individual and of the whole Church.”

The problem is that many Catholics believe, not without reason, that the leadership of the Church has been in the process these past few decades of ignoring or even dismantling the reforms achieved at the Second Vatican Council.

… The first and most basic ecclesiological principle at Vatican II is that the Church is a mystery, or sacrament, and not only or even primarily an institution or organization.

To say that the Church is a mystery, or sacrament, means, in the words of the late Pope Paul VI, that it is “a reality imbued with the hidden presence of God.”

In other words, the Church is not just a religious organization to which we belong or which we serve, as good churchmen or churchwomen. Rather, the Church is the corporate presence of God in Christ, with a unity created and sustained by the Holy Spirit.

“I believe in the Church” does not mean “I believe in, am loyal to, the leadership or the rules of the Church.” Only God is the proper object of faith -- but in this case, God as present and active in the Church.

… “It is therefore by its conduct and by its life that the Church will evangelize the world, in other words, by its living witness of fidelity to the Lord Jesus–the witness of poverty and detachment, of freedom in the face of the powers of this world, in short, the witness of sanctity” (n. 41).

Those who insist on their role as teachers of the Church must take to heart those words of Paul VI. Their teaching is empty if it is not accompanied by a clear and compelling witness to the Gospel itself.

_____________________________

The Church in Ireland remains firm in its resolution to respond the abuse crisis, even to the point of questioning the seal of confession in abuse cases. See
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/republic-of-ireland/irish-government-stays-firm-on-catholic-church-abuse-vow-16027940.html