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As more people get their COVID-19 shots, many are finding themselves in a position of having to ask others about their vaccination status. Some are wondering if this violates the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA. Ellen Cihak has not been asked if she is vaccinated against the coronavirus. She also hasn't been asked to show proof in Appleton stores. "I would like to see that happen. I don't know if it's legal to do that," said Cihak. Like many others, Cihak doesn't know if the question violates HIPAA. John Fisher is a health care attorney who specializes...

The idea that Catholics should be allowed to remarry and receive communion did not begin with the letter signed by Cardinal Kasper and other members of the German episcopate in 1993. Another country’s episcopate – England’s – pioneered this experiment in Christian doctrine nearly 500 years ago. At stake then was not just whether any Catholic could remarry, but whether the king could, since his wife had not borne him a son.As with those who advocate for communion for the civilly remarried, the English bishops were uncomfortable with embracing divorce and remarriage outright. Instead, they chose to bend the law...

[Dignare Me Laudare Te, Virgo Sacrata began four years ago on 4 October 2004. This post is therefore 10 days late, but I still want to mark this occasion by posting a commentary on Psalm 129, my favorite psalm, from the 1948 reprint of a 1914 edition of the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, printed by E.J. Dwyer, from which I found a commentary on the Ave Maris Stella.] Psalm 129 De profúndis clamávi ad te, Dómine: Dómine, exáudi vocem meam. Fiant aures tuae intendéntes: in vocem deprecationes meae. Si iniquitátes observaveris, Dómine: Dómine, quis sustinébit. Quia...

[Taken from Saint John Fisher, by Michael Davies, The Neumann Press, 1998. Also available at St. John Fisher, Bishop and Martyr] Statue of St. John Fisher outside St. John Fisher Church, Rochester, England The Martyrdom of St. John Fisher The last four days of the saint's life were sunshine. All his depression of soul had left him, so that his jailors marvelled at the joy and sense of freedom which possessed him. At five o'clock in the morning of 22 June, the Lieutenant of the Tower [of London] came to his bedside and found him fast asleep. Waking the prisoner...

A Brief History of the Cause of the English and Welsh MartyrsThe BeginningsThe first official movement for the canonization of the 'great cloud of witnesses' (cf. Hebrews 12:1) who gave their lives in defence of the Catholic religion, from the time of the schism under Henry VIII (1534) until the end of the seventeenth century, began during the pontificate of Urban VIII (1623-44). In 1643, at the request of the English Benedictines in exile, the Pope appointed the Archbishop of Cambrai in northern France (in default of the existence of Catholic Bishops in England and Wales) to set up an...

Defensor Matrimonii - St. John Fisher On 22 June 1535, St. John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, England, who had been just made Cardinal Priest of Saint Vitalis by Pope Paul III, was beheaded on Tower Hill in London. Officially, he had been convicted of treason for refusing to recognize King Henry VIII as the new head of the Church of England. This was, however, a culmination of an eight year battle that St. John fought with the king over his marriage with Queen Catherine of Aragon. In the summer of 1527, Bishop Fisher was summoned to Westminster Palace for an...

English Martyrs "I am come here to die for Christ's Catholic Church" Malcolm Brennan When Henry VIII began to dally with the idea of putting away his Queen Catherine and replacing her with Anne Boleyn, it was only natural that one of his earliest bids for support should go to John Fisher, one of the most eminent men of the day. He had been a model bishop of the Diocese of Rochester for twenty-three years, in an age when the lives of many bishops were less than edifying. For the same length of time he had been Chancellor of the...

SAN FRANCISCO Prop. 82 backers picket Gap store Backers of Proposition 82, which would offer free preschool to all California 4-year-olds, called for a boycott of Gap Inc. because of its owners' opposition to the June ballot measure. About two dozen Prop. 82 supporters set up a boisterous but peaceful picket outside the Gap's San Francisco flagship store at Powell and Market streets on Thursday. John Fisher, whose father is Gap founder Don Fisher and who manages the family's multibillion-dollar investment portfolio, gave $25,000 to the campaign opposed to Prop. 82. Family members also have contributed to business groups campaigning...

June 22, 2005Wednesday of the Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time Psalm: Wednesday 28 Reading IGn 15:1-12, 17-18 The word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: "Fear not, Abram!I am your shield;I will make your reward very great." But Abram said,"O Lord GOD, what good will your gifts be,if I keep on being childlessand have as my heir the steward of my house, Eliezer?"Abram continued,"See, you have given me no offspring,and so one of my servants will be my heir."Then the word of the LORD came to him:"No, that one shall not be your heir;your own issue shall...