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WASHINGTON – Across the street from the Capitol Hill hotel where the annual Catholic Social Ministry Gathering was being conducted, a group of Koreans was protesting an impending free-trade deal with South Korea. The protest was complete with chanting and drums. Inside the hotel, Oblate Father Andrew Small, a policy adviser for the U.S. bishops who focuses on international economic development, shushed his audience at a Feb. 12 briefing on the 2007 U.S. farm bill. “Can you hear them?” he asked. People could.

WASHINGTON – Catholic social ministry leaders got an unusual message Feb. 12 as they were preparing for a day of lobbying on Capitol Hill: Thank your legislators for supporting the funding of a massive program to combat the spread of the global AIDS/HIV pandemic. On many issues that Catholic social activists bring up with their senators and representatives, they are challenging current legislation or seeking politically unpopular legislative reforms.

SYDNEY, Australia – The head of the Australian Catholic Social Justice Council has reiterated calls for the release of an Australian imprisoned at the U.S. detention facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Bishop Christopher Saunders of Broome, the justice council head, joined the increasing criticism of the Australian government’s efforts on behalf of David Hicks, a 31-year-old imprisoned at Guantanamo. U.S. forces captured Hicks in Afghanistan in 2001 and charged him with providing “material support” for the international terrorist organization al-Qaida.

A series of Lenten radio retreats is being offered to radio stations by the U.S. Bishop’s Catholic Communication Campaign in association with Franciscan Radio. The programs will also be streamed on the Internet for online listening and available in downloadable formats for saving and sharing.

“Come, See, Investigate. Who Do You Say That I Am?” is the theme of the ninth annual Central Maryland Formation Day to be held March 10 at Mount St. Mary’s University in Emmitsburg.

MOBILE, Ala. – Almost 18 months after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, the Little Sisters of the Poor still have not received a $1.4 million reimbursement from the Federal Emergency Management Agency for first responders’ emergency use of Mary Joseph Residence for the Elderly in New Orleans after the hurricane.

WASHINGTON – Pax Christi USA has been gathering signatures for an advertisement that will call for “a complete reversal of U.S. policy” in Iraq, including a withdrawal of U.S. troops. “The U.S. is not the honest broker who can craft peace among the Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds. Our continued military presence is counterproductive,” says the ad, which Pax Christi plans to run in the March 16 issue of the National Catholic Reporter. “Four years after launching an illegal and immoral war, it is time to bring the U.S. occupation of Iraq to an end,” the ad says.