The California Catholic Conference (Conference) has released the following statement in response to the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Mayor of Anaheim re-issuing and issuing, respectively, invitations to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence:

The Los Angeles Dodgers and the Mayor of Anaheim’s invitation to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence (SPI), a group that intentionally ridicules and encourages the intolerance of Catholicism and its women's religious orders for its own purposes, is wildly offensive.  

To advance its agenda, SPI uses egregious ridicule, hostility, and open desecration to mock Catholicism and Christianity – behaviors they claim to renounce. What would be said if the mockery was of our Muslim or Jewish brothers and sisters? 

For the Dodgers to not only re-issue the invitation to the SPI but award them a ‘Community Hero Award’ for using unquestionably offensive Christian antics is far from fulfilling the intention of “inclusivity for all.” It is the promotion of choosing who is culturally acceptable and who is not – a common form of hate. 

Our Catholic women’s religious orders are comprised of individuals who devote their lives to Christ by serving the poor, the underprivileged, and the marginalized. They deserve the same consideration and respect that the SPI says it is working to secure for the LGBTQ+ community. 

It is absolutely possible to celebrate inclusivity without promoting bigotry. Working to celebrate diversity can be done without ridicule and mockery. 

The Conference endorses that we should be leading with love and inclusion in California rather than sowing division and is stunned by the LA Dodgers and the other statewide organizations and elected officials choosing to condone the double standard of this offensive behavior. 

Gov. Gavin Newsom released his May Revision to his proposed 2023-2024 state budget, which includes spending reductions and deferrals to help mitigate his projected $31.5 billion shortfall, up from a projected $22.5 billion shortfall in January. However, the budget also includes $2.9 billion in new, discretionary spending proposals. 

The non-partisan Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO) responded to the budget's revised proposal, cautioning that the budget problem is “$6.2 billion larger than the administration’s estimates.” This amount is more than the entire operating budget of many countries. The LAO also pointed to the budget’s “$11 billion in one-time or temporary spending planned for 202324—amounts that appeared affordable when enacted in previous years but appear less so today.”

The California Catholic Conference noted several changes to the budget in areas of concern, such as the $30 million previously committed to fighting human trafficking over the next three years was not included. An estimated 26 providers are likely to close due to pressures from the pandemic and the lack of this funding.

The budget also reduced spending for climate and environmental commitments, decreasing spending by $6 billion and $5.5 billion, respectively.

While Newsom made additional cuts to arts, music, and other school grants, he did include allocations for mandated dyslexia screening in early grades.

In addition, $40 million over the next two years for CASA recruitment and training was restored in the May Revise. A bipartisan group of legislators urged the governor to restore this critical funding after it was proposed for reductions in the January Budget.

Childcare providers were allocated $183 million to enact an 8% Cost of Living Adjustment, much lower than the 25% increase requested by providers and the Legislature.

Proposition 98 funding for public K-12 schools and community colleges dipped from $108.8 billion to $106.9 billion between the January budget and the May revision. Overall per-pupil funding dropped by about $14 to $23,706. 

California’s public schools can expect a hefty 8.2% cost-of-living adjustment — up from 8.13% in January — to help them carry the burden of inflation. As for higher education, Newsom reduced the amount reserved for building maintenance at CA universities by $500 million while retaining his commitment to a 5% increase in funding to UCs and CSUs.

The state continues to focus on strengthening local collaboration between cities, counties, and their service providers to prevent and address homelessness. The May Revision continues to include $3.7 billion in funding for homelessness programs. Since 2019, the state has invested over $17 billion to aid local governments in addressing homelessness. These long-term investments have been complemented by flexible homelessness aid that provides services and supports to result in an effective model of housing and services.

Housing the May Revision includes $27.5 million in reductions and $345 million in deferrals related to housing programs. Despite these reductions, housing program funding remains at approximately 88 percent of the allocations made in 2022-23.  As proposed in the Governor’s Budget, if there is sufficient money in 2024, $350 million of these reductions will be restored.

The California Catholic Conference is excited to report that the Legislature’s Appropriations Committees took action on several key bills this week. Advocacy work on these bills has been taking place in Sacramento and by dioceses in local legislative offices throughout the state for Advocacy Month.

AB 315 and AB 710, both of which targeted pregnancy crisis centers, died in the Assembly Appropriations Committee, a hopeful first for abortion-related bills in California since the Governor’s commitment to make California a beacon for expanding abortion after the fall of Roe last year.

AB 315 would have allowed lawsuits against a pregnancy center for undefined speech “considered false or misleading advertising” about the provision of abortion. AB 710 would have created a statewide “public awareness campaign” to single out pregnancy crisis centers that do not offer abortions as such.

“This is a victory for the state of California,” said CCC Associate Director for Healthy Families Molly Sheahan. “Our state has 87 centers medically licensed by the State of California and 64 pregnancy resource centers offering the referrals and support our most vulnerable families need. These wonderful nonprofit centers and clinics do incredible work for women, children, and families and should be praised, not slandered.”

The Assembly Appropriations Committee passed AB 238, which would award grants to teacher credential candidates to compensate the candidates while they perform their required student teaching. This is vital to address the current teacher shortage and provide and support the recruitment and retention of qualified and dynamic educators by compensating them while they complete their required 600 clinical hours.

The CCC is pleased that the Senate Appropriations Committee passed SB 4, which will make building affordable housing easier, faster, and cheaper on land owned by faith-based institutions and nonprofit colleges. This bill will allow places of worship to build 100% affordable housing projects, creating a valuable option amid the state’s housing and homelessness crisis.

Senate Appropriations also cleared SB 2, which concealed carry in sensitive spaces, including schools, houses of worship, parks, and stadiums. It would also update licensing criteria for concealed carry, raise an applicant's age to 21, and impose new training and gun storage regulations.

Thank you to all who have participated in meetings in your local legislative offices!

“It really is incumbent upon Catholics to step in and say, ‘We have space in our home and in our heart to help some of these children,'” said Domingo. “God is calling some of you — not all of you, but some of you — to be foster families.” - CCC Executive Director Kathleen Domingo

The following appeared in Our Sunday Visitor on May 12, 2023.

(OSV News) — “There are no unwanted children,” an anonymous inspiring quote declares, “just unfound families.” If that’s so, the almost 400,000 children in the U.S. foster care system — approximately 100,000 of whom are legally adoptable — need only wait. But the reality, especially in post-Roe v. Wade America, presents a more complex and challenging scenario — one in which foster care must, Catholic experts urge, be viewed as a pro-life issue.

“What we’re trying to do,” said Kimberley Henkel, a Ph.D. who is executive director of Springs of Love — a ministry that “encourages, equips and educates Catholics to discern and live out the call to foster and adopt,” according to its website — “is to help create a culture of fostering and adoption in the Catholic Church. And we see fostering and adoption, clearly, as a very significant pro-life issue.”

Continue Reading at OurSundayVisitor.com

Laudato Si’ Week 2023 will be celebrated May 21-28 with the film “The Letter” to mark the eighth anniversary of Pope Francis’ landmark encyclical on care for creation.

This global celebration unites Catholics to celebrate the progress made in bringing Laudato Si’ to life and show how the protagonists of “The Letter” are already doing so.

You can sign up to host a screening event here.

You can explore other celebration ideas on the Ladauto Si’ Action Platform. Your unique “culture, experience, involvements, and talents” are needed on our journey towards greater love for our Creator, each other, and the home we share (LS 14).

The California Catholic Conference of Bishops released a pastoral statement in 2019, on the fourth anniversary of Ladauto Si’, which “invites everyone to reflect upon the call to contribute to the ecological well-being of our state based on our own ‘ecological vocations’—and to live them out fully, with prayer and joy, to foster integral ecology and the common good.”