Argentine president Alberto Fernández Religious schools must accept ‘gender identity’, LGBT activists tell Biden
A leading LGBT activist group is calling for the Biden administration to create accreditation regulations of religious schools that would enforce acceptance of so-called transgender rights.
The pro-LGBT Human Rights Campaign (HRC) issued its list of policy priorities for the incoming Biden administration, The Daily Signal reported on December 14.
Among its priorities, the group’s Blueprint for Positive Change 2020 calls for the Education Department to update its regulations on school accreditation— including requiring religious schools to accommodate students based on their sexual orientation or gender identity.
Record low births the future for Italy
Italy’s national statistics institute is predicting that the country will see a significant decline in births in the years immediately following the coronavirus pandemic.
In a July report, Istat said that the climate of uncertainty and fear caused by the coronavirus may result in 10,000 fewer births in Italy in 2020 and 2021. It also predicted that if unemployment rises as expected, the birth rate could drop even further.
In 2019, births in Italy already hit a historic low since Italian unification in 1861. Across Europe, countries are facing what has been dubbed a “demographic winter.”
That year, Italy’s birth rate was 1.29 children per woman – just ahead of Malta and Spain’s rates of 1.23 and 1.26 respectively for the lowest rate in Europe.
Argentina lawmakers pass abortion bill amid pressure from activists
The lower house of Argentina’s legislature has passed a bill that would legalise abortion-on-demand up to 14 weeks in pregnancy, drawing dismay from pro-life groups and Catholics in the country.
The bill would permit abortions up to 14 weeks of gestation for any reason. The bill now proceeds to the upper house, the Senate, where it is expected to face greater opposition.
Fulfilling a presidential campaign promise, Argentine president Alberto Fernández introduced the bill to legalise abortion into the country’s legislature November 17. Mr Fernández took office a year ago and has made abortion legalisation a focal point of his tenure as president.
Following a 20-hour debate, the country’s lower house, the Chamber of Deputies, passed the measure 131-117, with six abstentions.
St John Paul II: 1,700 professors respond to ‘wave of accusations’ against Polish Pope
Hundreds of professors have signed an appeal defending St John Paul II following criticism of the Polish Pope in the wake of the McCarrick Report.
The “unprecedented” appeal was signed by 1,700 professors based at Polish universities and research institutes. The signatories include Hanna Suchocka, Poland’s first female prime minister, former foreign minister Adam Daniel Rotfeld, physicists Andrzej Staruszkiewicz and Krzysztof Meissner, and film director Krzysztof Zanussi.
“An impressive long list of John Paul II’s merits and accomplishments is being challenged and erased today,” the professors said in the appeal.
“For young people, who were born after his death, the deformed, false and belittled image of the Pope could become the only one they will know.”
The professors acknowledged the importance of carefully investigating the lives of significant historical figures. But they called for “balanced reflection and honest analysis,” rather than “emotional” or “ideologically motivated” criticism.