Currents News Staff
In Beijing, at least 29 neighborhoods are under lockdown after a new cluster of coronavirus cases emerged linked to a food market.
The latest cluster of COVID-19 infections has spread to nine of the city’s 16 districts, Chinese broadcaster CCTV reported.
All students from kindergarten to middle schools will have suspended classes, while final year students of junior and high schools will return to online courses.
By Jessica Easthope
Ten month old Emma Josephine just started crawling. She’s even mastered repeating sounds, and it’s something her mom Camille Sajecki is especially excited about.
“She’s talking and babbling more than ever, every day and it’s amazing to watch her grow and do different things every day,” Camille said.
Though Emma’s home comes complete with her favorite toys and the love of her parents, she hasn’t had as much stimulation as she would have before the COVID-19 pandemic.
“She was seeing family on a regular basis, her cousins every Friday, and now she’s seeing those people through a small screen on a phone,” said Camille, who started to worry about the effects on Emma’s development.
“If this wasn’t going on we’d do ‘Mommy and Me ‘classes, seeing other families who have small babies, but it’s difficult to do any of those things because we’re scared,“ Camille added.
Doctor Robert Tiballi, an infectious disease expert with the Catholic Medical Association, says Camille’s concerns are valid.
“Any delay they may have in their development in their psycho-motor, interactions or their physical abilities, they will be able to pick up on that later,” said Dr. Tiballi.
But it’s not physical development Dr. Tiballi is worried about. He says babies and children can pick up on the stress and fears of their parents.
“Children could be overwhelmed by anxiety and fear parents have, and they can take that on as an attribute of their personality,” said Dr. Tiballi.
Camille says Emma’s becoming more aware by the day, so at home she and her husband Sean keep it positive, no matter how stressed they might feel.
“We definitely try to keep things as positive as they were before this started, because we know that she feeds off us and she feels what we feel,” Camille said.
Dr. Tiballi says until things are back to normal, his advice for parents is to put themselves in the mindset of a baby like Emma just learning to crawl: be careful, but have no fear.
By Emily Drooby
The Meehan family now wears masks as they play outside their Bay Ridge, Brooklyn home. It’s just one of many obvious effects of the pandemic. These are changes that can be confusing for children.
“It’s more different than the way it was a long time ago,” five-year-old Sofie Meehan told Currents News, talking about the world.
Sofie noticed a big change on her fifth birthday, when she has a car parade instead of a classic party.
To help children like Sofie understand what’s going on around them, her mom, Kristen, wrote a book explaining the pandemic.
“The kids had so many questions about what’s going on and why is this all happening, that I feel like a book was the perfect way to explain that,” Kristen explained.
She’s been tackling questions about the masks, closed schools and a whole lot more, and talking to kids about the pandemic has been a tough job for many parents.
To help make it more manageable, KidsHealth, a nonprofit health system with doctor reviewed tips, has some suggestions:
Find out what children already know, and work from there. Help them feel like they’re in control, like teaching them how to properly wash their hands. Make sure it’s an ongoing conversation, and offer comfort and honesty about the situation.
That’s what Kristen is trying to do with her 24-page book called “This is Not Forever,” a title that is meant to project hope.
The Catholic woman is using her background as a mom and a public school teacher to educate children and help parents.
“They really do understand a lot, but there’s a very delicate balance between giving them the information and not scaring them,” Kristen said. “I feel like this book was a good balance of that, to give a little bit of information, but also to give that comfort that things are going to be okay and this is not forever, and we will go to grandma’s house soon.”
Kristen wrote and illustrated the book in just three weeks. She has sold almost 500 copies. Until September she is donating the proceeds to the Robin Hood Foundation, which supports vulnerable New Yorkers.
Currents News Staff
As America responds with the killings of George Floyd and Rayshard Brooks by police, there’s unrest across the land.
Protesters are demanding racial justice and an end to police wrongdoing. Police, sworn to serve and protect, are feeling under fire.
Father Jayson Landeza is a chaplain to the Oakland, California police department and the pastor of a largely African American parish.
After George Floyd’s death, he said, “At this point, at this time, at this juncture, black lives matter,” and is sharing that message with the officers he ministers to.
Police on the street are sometimes faced with making split-second life-and-death decisions.
Many black people say they don’t trust the police.
Years ago, children often looked at police officers and saw heroes.
Fr. Landeza is speaking to the men and women in blue about rebuilding the relationship between themselves and civilians.
In Minneapolis, Minnesota, a majority of the city council wants to “dismantle” the police department, and in New York, some politicians are calling for a big bite to be taken out of the NYPD’s budget.
The California priest shares how he counsels an officer who’s been involved in a shooting while on duty.
Currents News reports secular and religious news from the Catholic perspective.
Some of the top stories on this newscast:
President Trump is overhauling police practices for cops around the country.
Team coverage on our kids and how they’re coping with the coronavirus pandemic.
A police chaplain is here to tell us what he’s telling the cops he serves.
Currents News Staff
After meeting with families whose loved ones were victims of police violence and racial profiling, President Trump signed an executive order to change some police practices, “to deliver a future of safety and security for Americans of every race, religion, color and creed.”
“All Americans mourn by your side,” he told the families. “Your loved ones will not have died in vain.”
Among the reforms, the order establishes a national database to track the excessive use of force by officers and any convictions or judgments against officers for improper use of force.
It also provides more funding to departments which have received or are seeking accreditation for training officers in use of force and de-escalation techniques and bans chokeholds, except in instances when an officer’s life is in danger and the use of deadly force is allowed by law.
The order encourages police departments to add social workers or mental health professionals to respond to calls related to mental health, including drug addiction and homelessness.
The president, who prides himself on promoting law and order, also strongly defended police.
“Americans know the truth,” he said. “Without police, there is chaos. Without law, there’s anarchy. And without safety, there is catastrophe”
But some say this action isn’t enough.
“It will not do anything to correct police brutality, which is the real issue,” said Joe Ested, a former Richmond, Virginia police officer.
President Trump is now punting to Congress to put more police reforms into law.
“Hopefully they’ll all get together, and they will come up with a solution that goes even beyond what we’re signing today, but this is a big, big step,” he said.
By Emily Drooby
Matthew Campbell says the sin of racism forces him to always be on guard.
“Every time I go to the park, it’s hard knowing you might not come home that night,” he explained.
He is a long-time parishioner of St. Clare Church in Rosedale, Queens.
Matthew and his mom, Althea, are trying to stamp out the evil with the help of their community, fellow parishioners and their church.
“This church stands for peace, equality, and justice and the Church is against racism in any form, and we want to show that,” said Althea.
In order to do that, Althea, who runs the church’s women’s ministry, organized a peaceful protest outside the church on June 12. It was a safe space to stand up to racism and police brutality.
The protest was originally supposed to be silent, but there were moments of chanting.
“I want to be able to as I grow up or as I have kids of my own, I’m able to tell them how I fought and how my friends fought for equality when equality wasn’t a thing that was always present,” said teenager Ethan Jameer when explaining why it was important for him to be there.
“I’ve never experienced racism until I came to the United States,” said Norma Grannum, who is originally from Jamaica, “I’ve never seen violence like that. I’ve never seen violence, it hurts my heart to see the destruction of another human being.”
Norma has attended St. Clare for over 40 years, and was inspired to protest for racial justice after watching footage of George Floyd’s last moments.
Even the church’s pastor, Father Andrew Struzzieri, joined the group outside.
“Most of my parishioners are black and they’re beautiful and I just can’t understand racism anymore,” he explained. “It’s just illogical. It doesn’t make sense, so it’s important that I be here with my parishioners.”
It was a very emotional day. Many talked about their own experiences with racism, sharing stories about being followed while in the store shopping and being questioned for crimes they never committed.
Althea said she knows a lot of really great police officers, and even has some in her family.
She said it’s important that the police in their community know they’re appreciated, but that there needs to be more accountability.
Currents News reports secular and religious news from the Catholic perspective.
Some of the top stories on this newscast:
New York State has suspended evictions, but there are some loopholes you need to know about. Catholic Charities is stepping in to stop people from getting kicked out.
A black man killed by police in Atlanta is fueling new unrest while Catholics in queens are coming together to protest.
A landmark ruling from the Supreme Court. It’s about LGBT workers on the job.
Alice Marie Johnson is here. She spent decades behind bars until President Trump set her free.
Currents News Staff
As protests continue across the country since George Floyd’s death, calls for police to change their ways have grown louder. Tensions have heightened even more by the police shooting death of Rayshard Brooks in Atlanta, Georgia on June 13.
Protesters have started a “defund the police” movement, and police departments around the country are looking at reforms.
In New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo is giving the more than 500 departments around the state until April first to come up with a plan for reform.
To prevent the spread of coronavirus, since March, some inmates at New York City’s Rikers Island were released. According to the New York Post, some 10 percent have since been arrested, some of them multiple times.
Due to bail reform, they’re being re-released. Out of the roughly 2,500 inmates let go, 250 have allegedly committed nearly 450 new crimes.
In New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo is giving the more than 500 departments around the state until April first to come up with a plan for reform.
A former convict turned advocate for criminal justice reform joins Currents News to lend her perspective.
Alice Marie Johnson was granted clemency by President Donald Trump after spending 21 years of a life sentence in prison for her role in a drug trafficking ring.
She shares her thoughts on the ongoing protests and her vision for the future of criminal justice reform.
By Jessica Easthope
A change is coming for renters in New York City. The eviction moratorium has been extended to August 20, but it won’t include everyone.
“That extension of the moratorium only covers tenants who have been affected by the pandemic and the only way they can prove they were affected is by showing they applied for unemployment insurance benefits,” said Antonio Garcia, the Director of Catholic Charities of New York’s Eviction Prevention Program.
Starting on June 20, those who were struggling to pay rent and facing eviction before the pandemic will once again be at risk.
“Nobody knows the magnitude of the problem yet, what we could see is a spike in people facing eviction in New York City,” said Antonio.
According to Catholic Charities, there are more than 200,000 non-payment cases in New York City Housing Court every year. Nine percent of those cases result in evictions. Anthony projects courts will have double that amount once the moratorium is lifted, leaving the city’s low-income renters with an uncertain future.
“It doesn’t seem to be happening for everybody but it is for some? That doesn’t seem fair,” said Tatiana, a direct support professional working with adults who have developmental disabilities.
Many of her clients are out of a job because of COVID-19, but they don’t qualify for unemployment because they don’t make enough. The moratorium will be extended for them if they can prove their unemployment is because of the pandemic, but in the meantime they’re struggling and Tatiana is fighting for them.
“They have to feed their families, they have to feed their families and they have bills that they can’t catch up on,” she explained.
Catholic Charities is doing everything it can to be a resource for these at-risk tenants.
“We help clients find the resources to pay the rental arrears, we also mediate with landlords to find a solution, sometimes landlords are willing to abate some of those rental arrears,” said Anthony.
Catholic Charities is also presenting tenants with long-term solutions to their rent-payment-problems.
“We have employment specialists who can help them, we also have a tenant education program that helps people with budget management,” said Garcia.
The eviction moratorium will be lifted for those whose unemployment was not affected by the pandemic on Saturday, June 20.