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EDITOR'S NOTE: The following is a news release from the Diocese of Peoria. It was distributed to the media on Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2014. ----- It is with immense sadness that the Most Reverend Daniel R. Jenky, CSC, Bishop of Peoria and President of the Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen Foundation, announced today that the Cause for Sheen’s beatification and canonization has for the foreseeable future been suspended. The process to verify a possible miracle attributed to Sheen had been going extremely well, and only awaited a vote of the Cardinals and the approval of the Holy Father. There was every...

If reports are to be believed, a compromise is in the works that will amount to nothing less than an endorsement of the gay identity in the 2015 NYC St. Patrick's Day parade. The Irish Times reports that under pressure from NBC, not only will a group be allowed to march in the parade with a gay identity banner (something previously banned) but that none other than Timothy Cardinal Dolan will be Grand Marshal. Read more: http://www.ncregister.com/blog/pat-archbold/cardinal-dolan-and-the-nyc-st.-patricks-gay-parade#ixzz3CGn0Y6ia

Fencing, an Olympic sport sponsored by more than 30 NCAA schools, involves two athletes engaging in what is effectively a sword fight with a foil, saber, or épée. The equipment is blunted and does not have any actual blades or sharp tips. Unfortunately, for the newly-formed club fencing team at North Dakota State University, fencing equipment counts as a weapon, and the club has been barred from practicing on campus.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo says the current “schism” in the state Republican party is a smaller version of the split causing so much damage in Washington, D.C., and that “conservative Republicans … have no place in the state of New York, because that’s not who New Yorkers are.”

These stunning images are early photographs of some of the men who bravely fought for their country in the Revolutionary War some 237 years ago. Images of Americans who fought in the Revolution are exceptionally rare because few of the Patriots of 1775-1783 lived until the dawn of practical photography in the early 1840s. These early photographs – known as daguerreotypes – are exceptionally rare camera-original, fully-identified photographs of veterans of the War for Independence – the war that established the United States. Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2356524/Faces-American-revolution-Amazing-early-photographs-document-heroes-War-Independence-later-years.html#ixzz2j9ggoFAd Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

ALBANY – Gay marriage will come to a pivotal vote in the state Senate tonight, Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos (R-Nassau) said in a statement released just moments ago. The statement was distributed after Republican senators spent hours huddled behind closed doors weighing several remaining issues, including stronger religious exemptions they insisted be included in the same-sex marriage legislation. Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/state_senate_sends_gay_marriage_DQSIxEbfqKshtUoI32M8YL#ixzz1QF5zVgiQ

Today is the dreaded April 15, but at least in Oregon it's even going to cost you more to drown in your tax sorrows. In their sober unwisdom, the state's pols plan to raise taxes by 1,900% on . . . beer. The tax would catapult to $52.21 from $2.60 a barrel. The money is intended to reduce Oregon's $3 billion budget deficit and, ostensibly, to pay for drug treatment.

The news about the Wal-Mart worker has me thinking about evil and cruelty. Not in the grand sweeping sociology way. I'm thinking particularly about how excellent at cruelty I can be. When I was younger I was a mean kind of cruel. God blessed me with a decent intellect and a quick draw ability to insult. And I used it. Often. You see, in my father's house sarcasm and insults were mother's milk. Six Irish boys and one girl all with thick skins and sharp tongues. The dinner table was like playing minor league hockey. Fast, fun, high scoring, inevitable...

AUGUSTA, Maine - While in a small southern Maine grocery store with his mother last June 12 to buy sandwiches, Shane St. Pierre picked up a miniature baseball bat and flicked the switch to see what would happen. A flame shot out, singeing the 6-year-old’s eyebrow and burning part of his face. His parents called the state fire marshal’s office and were surprised to learn that Maine had no law banning so-called novelty lighters. That’s no longer the case. Today, Shane stood next to Gov. John Baldacci as he signed legislation that makes Maine the first state to outlaw the...

September 21, 2007 -- ALBANY - Illegal immigrants will be able to obtain driver's licenses under a controversial new policy to be announced today by Gov. Spitzer, The Post has learned. Under the change, the Department of Motor Vehicles will no longer require applicants provide Social Security numbers or proof that they are eligible for Social Security cards, a source said.

<p>March 19, 2004 -- It was shamrocks and stogies for some guests at a St. Patrick's Day gala who illegally fired up their cigars during the black-tie event at a Midtown hotel. That took McChutzpah since butt-buster Mayor Bloomberg and Gov. Pataki, who signed the state's anti-smoking law, both were seated on the dais at the Society of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick's dinner at the Sheraton New York Wednesday night.</p>

Get Ready For the Twinkie Tax Mark Tatge, 02.16.04 Apparently unsatiated by their huge claims on booze and cigarettes, the tax police are planning a major snack attack. Potato chips, cookies, sodas, candy--a $30 billion-a-year business--are being targeted by more than a dozen revenue-starved states under the misguided impression that by charging a few extra cents per can or bag they can trim their budget deficits and encourage the rest of us to slim down. Fat chance. Among the assaults: NEW YORK plans a new sales tax (one-quarter of 1%) on sweets and snacks, on top of a bill to...

<p>November 24, 2003 -- Two legislators said they are leading a move to have the state's bar and restaurant anti-smoking laws rolled back by permitting qualified establishments to set their own smoking policy. Deputy Minority Leader Howard Mills (R-Rockland) and Assemblyman Matthew Mirones (R-S.I.) said under their bill, any bar of food-service establishment that already has a liquor license would be able to apply for a license that for $100 would permit on-premise smoking.</p>

Knock Off That Noise! Party quietly in this town, or else . . . By Víctor Manuel Ramos Staff Writer October 22, 2003, 9:15 PM EDT North Hempstead residents should forget about watching loud, late-night TV or partying past 10 p.m. If a neighbor can hear it, a new town law makes it illegal. Vibrations that "a normal person" can sense "by touch or visual observation" in his property also are illegal. So the blast of bass speakers would be a no-no. And leaf blowers that sound like giant mosquitoes can be used only at specific daytime hours. Residents also...

His Dreams Go Up in Smoke Smoking ban forces tavern owner to sell a family institution By Merle English STAFF WRITER October 12, 2003 In the horse-and-buggy days of the early 19th century, when a tavern was the mainstay of many a man's social life, men tied up their rides outside Petersen's, then a two- story saloon at the intersection of what is now 20th Avenue and College Point Boulevard in College Point. Petersen's was a place for drinking, eating, smoking and camaraderie, and so it remained when Theodore Lauterborn's stepgrandfather, Otto Roesch, bought the establishment in 1902 and changed...

Every Sunday morning at Lord of Life Lutheran Church in Fairfax, Va., more than 200 people gather at the 9:45 service to sing modern hymns led by a pop band and to hear a conversational sermon given from the floor in front of the pulpit by a pastor wearing street clothes. It's a very different scene at the 8:30 and 11 a.m. services, when the congregants chant responsively from worship books, an organist plays traditional hymns, and the same minister, in robe and stole, delivers a formal homily. Look at the worshipers lined up to take Communion, and you will...

June 13, 2003 -- THE film has yet to be released. But top Catholic and Jewish scholars who've read a script for Mel Gibson's $40 million "The Passion" - his self-financed epic about Jesus' death - told me they fear depictions of 1st-century Jews as money-grubbing Christ-killers will foment anti-Jewish violence. The script has been reviewed by five advisory-board members of the U.S Conference of Catholic Bishops, along with four members of the Jewish Anti-Defamation League. The result was a blistering report, in which the scholars uniformly condemned the script. A copy of the "confidential" report was obtained by Eric...

<p>May 9, 2003 -- TRENTON - Motorists who talk on cell phones, eat or read while driving could be slapped with tickets under a bill approved yesterday by New Jersey's Assembly Transportation Committee. Lawmakers expanded legislation that would ban the use of the hand-held phones while driving to include other distractions, saying those behaviors can be just as dangerous on the road.</p>

Study Links Obesity To Certain Cancers Researchers Unsure Why Connection Exists UPDATED: 10:34 a.m. EDT April 24, 2003 BOSTON -- New research suggests carrying extra pounds could increase the risk of certain cancers. A study published in Thursday's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine shows that not only does being overweight increase the likelihood of diabetes and heart disease, it also increases the risk of cancer. "This is really important," said Dr. Graham Colditz, of the Harvard School of Public Health. "We can unequivocally say 14 percent of cancer in men and 20 percent in women is due...

<p>April 25, 2003 -- Foster parents who smoke will undergo extra scrutiny before the city places kids in their homes, the head of the child-welfare agency said yesterday. The latest development in Mayor Bloomberg's crusade against smoking came even as the city announced a plan to recruit more foster parents.</p>