June 24, 2025 // National

News Briefs: June 29, 2025

OSV NEWS

Three Years After Dobbs Decision, States Still Navigating Abortion Policy Changes

WASHINGTON, D.C. (OSV News) – Three years after a landmark decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn its prior abortion precedent, states have enacted or considered differing legislation surrounding the issue of abortion. Since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision was issued on June 24, 2022, 12 states, including Indiana, have banned abortion, while another six limit it at some point between six to 12 weeks gestation. “As we are celebrating, we are also getting ready for the work that we have left to do,” said Kelsey Pritchard, state public affairs director for SBA Pro-Life America. While many states have wrapped up their regular legislative sessions for the year, Pritchard pointed to some that have enacted laws her organization supports, including what advocates call a medical education or “med- ed” bill that directs the state to clarify its abortion regulations for health care professionals and the general public. “Those are bills that essentially make it clear that if you are in a pro-life state under your pro-life law and you are pregnant, you can continue to receive emergency care for ectopic pregnancy, for miscarriage, for any other medical emergency, as you did prior to the Dobbs decision,” Pritchard said.

Pope: Resist ‘Temptation’ of Embracing Weapons

VATICAN CITY (CNS) – The world must resist the allure of modern weapons that threaten to give conflicts a ferocity surpassing that of previous wars, Pope Leo XIV said. “The heart of the Church is torn apart from the cries that arise from places of war,” he said at the conclusion of his general audience in St. Peter’s Square on Wednesday, June 18. “In particular from Ukraine, from Iran, from Israel, from Gaza.” The pope said, “We must not become accustomed to war. Rather, we must push against the allure of powerful and sophisticated weapons as a temptation.” Quoting the Second Vatican Council’s Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World (Gaudium et Spes), Pope Leo said that in modern-day warfare “scientific weapons of all kinds are used,” and consequently “its atrocity threatens to lead the combatants to a barbarity far greater than that of past times.” He added, “Therefore, in the name of human dignity and international law, I repeat to those responsible that which Pope Francis used to say: ‘War is always a defeat.’” And, quoting another of his predecessors, Pope Pius XII, he added: “Nothing is lost with peace. All can be lost with war.”

‘Never-Ending Tragedy’ in Gaza Continues amid Iran-Israel Conflict

JERUSALEM (OSV News) – As the bombardment between Israel and Iran continued in mid-June, Catholic clergy in both countries called for peace and an end to further bloodshed in the Holy Land and the Middle East. “It seems like we have fallen into a new nightmare,” Franciscan Father Francesco Patton, custos of the Holy Land, said in an interview with Vatican News published on Monday, June 16. The following day, Israeli tanks fired into a crowd trying to get aid from trucks in Gaza, killing at least 59 people, according to medics, as reported by Reuters. Father Gabriel Romanelli, pastor of Holy Family Church, the only Catholic parish in the Gaza Strip, warned that the suffering of the Palestinians in the enclave is being forgotten. Israel launched a June 13 preemptive strike against Iran and said the country’s nuclear ambitions posed an “existential threat.” Not long after Israel launched its attack, the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, which is led by Italian Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, tweeted a prayer for peace on its X account. “We lift our weary hearts to you, Lord, longing for your light amid the shadows of fear and unrest,” the prayer read. “Teach us to be peacemakers.”

Supreme Court Upholds Tennessee’s Gender Transition Ban for Minors

WASHINGTON, D.C. (OSV News) – The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday, June 18, upheld a Tennessee state law banning certain types of medical or surgical gender reassignment procedures for minors who identify as transgender. The question at issue in the case – United States v. Skrmetti, the Biden administration’s challenge to a law in Tennessee restricting gender transition treatments, including puberty blockers for minors – was whether Tennessee’s law, Senate Bill 1, violates the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. The high court’s ruling said that it did not. At least 25 Republican-led states have adopted laws restricting or banning gender reassignment surgery or related hormonal treatments for minors, although not all of those bans are currently in effect amid legal challenges, according to data from the Movement Advancement Project, an LGBTQ+ policy group. But the court’s decision will likely offer protection to those laws. Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti said that “the common sense of Tennessee voters prevailed over judicial activism.”

British Parliament ‘Effectively Decriminalizes’ Abortion Up to Birth

LONDON (OSV News) – U.K. lawmakers voted 379 to 137 to decriminalize abortion up to birth in England and Wales. The House of Commons vote on Tuesday, June 17, backed an amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill that removes criminal liability from women who self-administer abortions at any stage of pregnancy. Archbishop John Sherrington, lead bishop for life issues in England and Wales, was “deeply alarmed” by the vote, warning it will increase harm to both unborn children and vulnerable women. The amendment, introduced by Labour MP Tonia Antoniazzi, was justified as a response to recent prosecutions involving late-term abortions. Critics, including Right to Life UK, argue the change was rushed without public consultation and could lead to more dangerous, unregulated abortions. Catherine Robinson of Right to Life, a U.K. pro-life group, accused Antoniazzi of hijacking a government bill to pursue a radical abortion agenda. “There has been no consultation with the public on this seismic law change,” she said. The bill now heads to the House of Lords for further debate. If unopposed, abortion would be effectively removed from the criminal code for the first time since 1861.

USCCB President: Bishops Stand with Immigrants in ‘This Challenging Hour’

WASHINGTON, D.C. (OSV News) – “No one can turn a deaf ear to the palpable cries of anxiety and fear heard in communities throughout the country in the wake of a surge in immigration enforcement actions,” said the leader of the nation’s Catholic bishops in a June 16 statement that assured all impacted of their shepherds’ support. Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio of the Archdiocese for the Military Services, the president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, issued a reflection ahead of the USCCB’s weeklong retreat in California, expressing “a profound concern in the hearts of the shepherds of the Church in our country” regarding the Trump administration’s immigration policies. While he commended law enforcement actions “aimed at preserving order and ensuring community security” as “necessary for the common good,” Archbishop Broglio said, “The current efforts go well beyond those with criminal histories.” Pointing to the nation’s “gravely deficient immigration system,” he said that “the mass arrest and removal of our neighbors, friends, and family members on the basis of immigration status alone, particularly in ways that are arbitrary or without due process, represent a profound social crisis before which no person of goodwill can remain silent.” Speaking on behalf of the nation’s bishops, Archbishop Broglio said, “I want to assure all of those affected by actions which tear at the fabric of our communities of the solidarity of your pastors.”

Pope Leo XIV signs an image of Blessed Carlo Acutis in St. Peter’s Square after his general audience at the Vatican June 18, 2025. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)