<p><span>By&nbsp;</span><a href="http://www.southernstudies.org/users/sue-sturgis" title="View user profile.">Sue Sturgi</a>, The Institute for Southern Studies</p>
<p>Under a proposed rule released this week by the Department of Labor, number of Americans who would be newly eligible for overtime pay of&nbsp; time-and-a-half when they work over 40 hours in a week:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.npr.org/2015/07/02/419153342/new-rules-could-create-a-new-class-of-overtime-workers">5 million</a></strong></p>
<p>Current upper annual income limit for overtime eligibility:<strong><a href="http://www.nelp.org/news-releases/on-the-proposed-reform-of-federal-overtime-rules/">$23,660</a></strong></p>
<p>Limit under the proposed rule, which would also be&nbsp;<a href="http://www.epi.org/blog/what-the-new-proposed-overtime-rules-mean-for-workers/">indexed for inflation</a>:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.nelp.org/news-releases/on-the-proposed-reform-of-federal-overtime-rules/">$50,440</a></strong></p>
<p>Percent of the U.S. workforce eligible for overtime in 1975:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.epi.org/blog/an-updated-analysis-of-who-would-benefit-from-an-increased-overtime-salary-threshold/">65</a></strong></p>
<p>In 2013:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.epi.org/blog/an-updated-analysis-of-who-would-benefit-from-an-increased-overtime-salary-threshold/">11</a></strong></p>
<p>Rank of the South among regions where the workforce would benefit most from the rule change:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-do-obama-overtime-rules-mean-2015-6">1</a></strong></p>
<p>Portion of 25- to 34-year-olds who the rule would make eligible for overtime, the age group that would benefit most:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-do-obama-overtime-rules-mean-2015-6">1 in 20</a></strong></p>
<p>Percent of the rule&#39;s beneficiaries who would be male:<strong><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-do-obama-overtime-rules-mean-2015-6">&nbsp;2.7</a></strong></p>
<p>Who would be female:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-do-obama-overtime-rules-mean-2015-6">3.9</a></strong></p>
<p>Number of mothers who would benefit from the rule change:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-new-overtime-law-means-for-everyone-2015-6">3.1 million</a></strong></p>
<p>Number of fathers:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-new-overtime-law-means-for-everyone-2015-6">3.2 million</a></strong></p>
<p>Number of children:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-new-overtime-law-means-for-everyone-2015-6">12.1 million</a></strong></p>
<p>Once the proposed rule is published in the Federal Register next week, number of days the public will have to submit comments:&nbsp;<strong><a href="http://www.dol.gov/whd/overtime/NPRM2015/">60</a></strong></p>
<p>Original article can be found <a href="http://www.southernstudies.org/2015/07/institute-index-new-overtime-rule-a-boon-for-south.html">HERE</a></p>
<p><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/overtime_rule_map.png" /></p>
<p><span>Map&nbsp;</span><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-do-obama-overtime-rules-mean-2015-6">by Business Insider/Andy Kiersz</a><span>&nbsp;based on White House data.</span></p>

<p>Soli Salgado &nbsp;| <a href="http://ncronline.org/">National Catholic Reporter</a></p>
<p>As the Supreme Court upheld that the current procedure for lethal injection is constitutional in a 5-4 decision, Catholics, attorneys, and both proponents and opponents of the death penalty weighed in on the outcome of Glossip v. Gross.</p>
<p>The case, which tackled an unusually technical discussion on pharmaceutical options, ruled that Oklahoma&#39;s use of midazolam was not a form of cruel and unusual punishment when administered as the first of three drugs in the lethal cocktail, despite being a sedative rather than anesthetic.</p>
<p>But those on both sides of the debate -- including the Supreme Court justices in both the majority opinion and dissent -- agreed that this case transcended that specific issue indirectly.</p>
<p>Capital punishment is constitutional; therefore, there must be a constitutional way of carrying it out, Justice Samuel Alito wrote. Alito and proponents of the death penalty said challenging the use of midazolam was a tactic in unraveling the legality of the death penalty. While Justice Stephen Breyer&#39;s dissent -- joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg -- leaned toward its abolition, the majority maintained its lawfulness.</p>
<p>The Catholic church denounces capital punishment when other methods that respect human dignity are available to protect society. And Pope Francis has gone so far as to call for an end to life sentences.</p>
<p>&quot;It&#39;s hard to imagine what could be crueler than a prolonged, torturous death, or more unusual, given that 80% of the executions in the United States last year took place in just 3 states,&quot; the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty wrote in a statement following the ruling.</p>
<p>Opponents of the death penalty told NCR that how cruel and unusual this form of punishment is highlights the moral question: Can we find valid, ethical comfort in administering painless executions?</p>
<p><span class="maroon">&quot;We need to be clear that there is no humane way to put a person to death,&quot;</span> said Alex Mikulich, a Catholic theologian at the Jesuit Social Research Institute at Loyola University New Orleans. <span class="maroon">&quot;[Lethal injection] violates basic human dignity, and by imposing that kind of torture, it diminishes all of us. It dehumanizes us.&quot;</span></p>
<p><span class="maroon">&quot;I think people of faith who are against the death penalty -- we&#39;re at a point where we need to redouble our efforts to end this practice in our country,&quot; he continued. &quot;We clearly cannot rely on the courts to end it.&quot;</span></p>
<p>The Glossip v. Gross decision fell on the anniversary of Furman v. Georgia, the 1972 case that first ruled capital punishment as unconstitutional; however, the court then suggested legislation that would make death sentences constitutional again, such as standardized guidelines for juries. This makes the United States one of nine nations that Amnesty International lists as &quot;persistent executioners,&quot; joined by China, Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Sudan, Bangladesh and North Korea.</p>
<p>Under public pressure, European pharmaceutical companies that had provided states with the lethal drugs have stopped selling them for executions, forcing states to turn to alternates with unproven efficacy.</p>
<p>&quot;The one thing that [this case] does show on the political side is that the campaign to make these drugs inaccessible has worked,&quot; said David Burge, an attorney and leading member of Georgia&#39;s Republican Party. &quot;I&#39;ll be curious to see if these drugs will become harder to get.&quot;</p>
<p>Robert Blecker, a professor of criminal law, constitutional history, and the Eighth Amendment at New York Law School, told NCR that the question of midazolam was merely a make-way controversy that happens to be the &quot;issue of the moment.&quot;</p>
<p>&quot;Now that&#39;s passed, so we move back to the more vital question, which is the legitimacy of the death penalty,&quot; he said. &quot;If you&#39;re going to say it&#39;s unconstitutional, then say it&#39;s unconstitutional. But to pretend that it&#39;s an open question, and then at the same time say, &#39;Well, any previous method would of course be inhumane&#39; -- it&#39;s absurd.&quot;</p>
<p>Despite being a public supporter of the death penalty, Blecker, who wrote The Death of Punishment: Searching for Justice among the Worst of the Worst, has long been against lethal injection, &quot;not because it might cause pain, but because it certainly causes confusion; it conflates punishment with medicine. This is killing we&#39;re talking about. This is not medicine.&quot;</p>
<p>For that reason, he advocates for firing squads, saying they are &quot;more overtly and honestly presenting what they really are, which is punishment. ... Let&#39;s acknowledge what we&#39;re doing, and if we can&#39;t stomach it, then abolish it.&quot;</p>
<p>Over the past 30 years, Blecker -- a self-described retributivist -- has visited more than two dozen prisons in 10 states and said the comfortable living arrangements for those sentenced to life without parole is largely why he supports the death penalty. For example, some prisons allow inmates to participate in softball leagues or have vacation days. &quot;This is the living hell that awaits them if you abolish the death penalty.&quot;</p>
<p>&quot;The problem is we declare &#39;let the punishment fit the crime,&#39; then in the actual administration of criminal justice, we do everything we can to undermine it. The death penalty is the only self-avowed punishment we have left,&quot; he said, noting that not a single mission statement in any U.S. correctional facility includes the word &quot;punishment.&quot;</p>
<p>Agreeing with Alito&#39;s opinion on Glossip v. Gross, Blecker added that the Constitution should not have to guarantee a painless death for the condemned, as nobody gets that assurance when experiencing natural death.</p>
<p><a href="http://ncronline.org/news/politics/supreme-court-decision-adds-ongoing-debate-about-lethal-injection">FULL ARTICLE&gt;&gt;</a></p>

<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCEPxeH42bQ"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/dp listen.jpg" /></a></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>To listen to a full version of the broadcast please click <a href="https://www.youtube.com/redirect?q=http%3A%2F%2Fmedia.wwl.com%2Fa%2F106999087%2F6-30-6am-tommy-death-penalty.htm&amp;redir_token=5GgwoKfRmdhpM1asVCqpnSrval18MTQzNTc3MDM5OUAxNDM1NjgzOTk5">HERE</a></p>

<p><a href="http://www.cbpp.org/status-of-state-medicaid-expansion-in-2015-0"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/health image.png" style="width: 700px; height: 642px;" /></a></p>

<p>Today, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a key provision of the Affordable Care Act, ruling in a 6-3 decision that the federal government can continue to subsidize health policies in states such as Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida that refused to set up their own insurance marketplaces. &nbsp;This is a victory for millions of people who otherwise could not afford health insurance. &nbsp;The case is described by the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/26/us/obamacare-supreme-court.html">The New York Times</a> in this story:</p>
<p><em>The case concerned a central part of the Affordable Care Act, Mr. Obama&#39;s signature legislative achievement. The law created marketplaces, known as exchanges, to allow people who lack insurance to shop for individual health plans. Some states set up their own exchanges, but about three dozen allowed the federal government to step in to run them. Across the nation, about 85 percent of customers using the exchanges qualify for subsidies to help pay for coverage, based on their income .The question in the case, King v. Burwell, No. 14-114, was what to make of a phrase in the law that seems to say the subsidies are available only to people buying insurance on &quot;an exchange established by the state.&quot;</em></p>
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<p><span class="green">The Jesuit Social Research Insitute is deeply saddened to hear of Harold Baquet&#39;s passing into eternal life. We share our deepest affection, prayers, and sorrow with his family. We, and the entire Loyola community, remember Harold with gratitude, love and joy. As President Wildes rightly said, Harold is &quot;the epitome of a man with and for others in the great Ignatian tradition.&quot; He exuded what Pope Francis calls the &quot;joy of the Gospel.&quot; We were touched gently, joyfully, and lovingly in every way by his presence. May our tears turn to joy in memory of his gifts of gratitude, joy, and love. May his divine gifts overflow in us.&nbsp;</span></p>
<p><span class="green"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/harold-baquet-new-orleans-photographerjpg-5392320f602762a4.jpg" /></span></p>

<h4>
Reforms Open Way for Smarter, Comprehensive Sentencing in the Future</h4>
<p>by Alex Mikulich, Ph.D.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>A collective sigh of relief emanated from the statehouse at 6:00 pm on June 11, 2015. The Louisiana legislature passed a last-minute budget-bill that appears to avoid fiscal disaster&mdash;at least for now. Legislators performed political acrobatics that enable the Governor to claim this budget is revenue neutral when in fact, and by necessity, businesses will pay more taxes.[1] &nbsp;&nbsp;</p>
<p>Yet there is reason to hope beyond all the legislative antics. Governor Jindal says he intends to sign a package of significant criminal justice reform bills that actually save money and make our state a better place.[2] &nbsp;</p>
<p>HCR 82, authored by Representative Walt Leger, creates the Louisiana Justice Reinvestment Task Force to develop sentencing and corrections policy recommendations. HCR 82 sets Louisiana on a path toward more comprehensive sentencing reform that reduces over-incarceration, saves money, and makes our state safer. &nbsp;&nbsp;</p>
<p>The legislature gave strong bi-partisan support to a bill easing penalties for marijuana possession. Originally authored by Senator J.B. Morell (SB241) and Representative Austin Badon (HB149) (both of New Orleans), this sentencing reform will save the state nearly $17 million over five years according to the state&rsquo;s fiscal analyst.[3] &nbsp;</p>
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<p>Instead of sentencing a first-time offender to eight years in prison at high cost to the state, HB 149 means that an individual caught with less than 14 grams of marijuana (less than half an ounce) would face up to 15 days in jail and up to six months if caught with less than 2.5 pounds. A second-offense conviction would drop from a felony to a misdemeanor with a sentence of no more than six months. If a second offense occurs more than two years after the first conviction, the violation will be treated as a first offense. &nbsp;</p>
<p>The Jesuit Social Research Institute joined the Louisiana Conference of Catholic Bishops, the ACLU of Louisiana, and the Pelican Institute in supporting these criminal justice reforms. This broad coalition of groups and interests pushing criminal justice reform bodes well for future reform. The future will be even brighter if Louisiana elects a Governor this Fall who will champion comprehensive sentencing and criminal justice reforms. &nbsp;</p>
<p>Sheriffs and district attorneys defeated reform in the past. While their willingness to compromise and not block sentencing reductions this year is encouraging, they could stand in the way of future reform. Advocates will need to continue to press for more comprehensive policy change.</p>
<p>Louisiana is getting smart on crime. Now is the time to get even smarter and follow the lead of neighboring states like Texas and Mississippi that have enacted comprehensive sentencing legislation.[4]</p>
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<p>[1] Stephanie Grace, &ldquo;Businesses will pony-up more taxes, but Bobby Jindal saves political face, claims no tax hikes,&rdquo; The Baton Rouge Advocate, June 12, 2015 online at http://theadvocate.com/news/12626682-123/stephanie-grace-quick-take-on</p>
<p>[2] Kevin Litten, &quot;Bobby Jindal says he&rsquo;ll sign pot penalties legislation.&quot; The Times-Picayune, online at http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2015/05/medical_marijuana_jindal_sign.html</p>
<p>[3] Louisiana Legislative Fiscal Office online at https://www.legis.la.gov/legis/ViewDocument.aspx?d=958424 [4] Alex Mikulich, &ldquo;Smart Criminal Justice Reform: Texas and Mississippi Leading Gulf South States,&rdquo; JustSouth Quarterly &nbsp;(Fall 2014) online at https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/JSQ%20Fall%202014%20Criminal%20Justice_1.pdf</p>
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<p><a href="https://t.e2ma.net/webview/j2soi/3aca22e277d5fe27c4717e56a3642199">MORE&gt;&gt;</a></p>
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<p>Brian Roewe &nbsp;| &nbsp;Jun. 18, 2015</p>
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<p>Happiness, hope and gratitude greeted Pope Francis&#39; long-awaited encyclical, &quot;Laudato Si&#39;, on Care for Our Common Home,&quot; in the U.S. church after its official release Thursday afternoon in Rome.</p>
<p>&quot;Very excited, very pleased,&quot; said Patrick Carolan, executive director of the Franciscan Action Network (FAN). &quot;It&#39;s a wonderful, awesome, hopeful document.&quot;</p>
<p>Social Service Sr. Simone Campbell, executive director of NETWORK, a national Catholic social justice lobby, said her &quot;heart is singing&quot; because the encyclical shows how interconnected everything is.</p>
<p>&quot;Pope Francis puts this in a holistic context,&quot; Campbell said. &quot;It allows us to see the integration of issues of housing and cities and violence, all in the context of ecology and the environment.&quot;</p>
<p>For Dan DiLeo, project manager of the Catholic Climate Covenant, his hope and excitement for a global response to climate change peaked after reading the encyclical, he said in an op-ed piece.</p>
<p>&quot;After finally reading Laudato Si, I am absolutely convinced that Francis will indeed inspire humanity to save ourselves from ourselves and avoid catastrophic climate change. And I am unexpectedly peaceful about it,&quot; he wrote.</p>
<p>In the 184-page document, Francis outlined his vision of the global environmental state, one in which climate change is a reality and where excessive behaviors in consumption, profit and growth require recalibration and reassessment. The encyclical is divided into six chapters: the current state of the planet; the Gospel of creation; human roots of the ecological crisis; integral ecology; approaches and actions; and ecological education and spirituality.</p>
<p>&quot;The urgent challenge to protect our common home includes a concern to bring the whole human family together to seek a sustainable and integral development, for we know that things can change,&quot; Francis wrote. &quot;... I urgently appeal, then, for a new dialogue about how we are shaping the future of our planet.&quot;</p>
<p>Boston Cardinal Sean O&#39;Malley, one of the Francis&#39; closest advisers, said he welcomed &quot;with joy and gratitude&quot; the encyclical, noting that as the first pope to take the name of St. Francis of Assisi, the pope carried the saint&#39;s spirit and wisdom throughout the document.</p>
<p>O&#39;Malley, a Capuchin Franciscan, identified two ideas emanating throughout Laudato Si&#39;: the environment as a common home that &quot;needs immediate protection and healing at the global, national and local levels of life&quot;; and those most in danger of environmental degradation are those already poor and vulnerable.</p>
<p>&quot;This constant linkage throughout the encyclical of the dual need to respect and protect &#39;Our Common Home&#39; and the need to respect and protect the dignity and lives of the poor may be regarded as the distinctive characteristic of this powerful message of Pope Francis. Both of these themes have been evident since the beginning of Pope Francis&#39;s pontificate but this letter joins them with new depth and specificity,&quot; the cardinal said in a statement.</p>
<p><strong>Returns church to its roots</strong></p>
<p>Franciscan Sr. Dawn Nothwehr, a professor at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago and author of Ecological Footprints: An Essential Franciscan Guide for Faith and Sustainable Living, said the encyclical returns church thinking to its roots.</p>
<p>&quot;In reality, this is nothing new in all of Christianity,&quot; Nothwehr said. &quot;If you go back to our Jewish roots, that&#39;s a very holistic approach. Look at Leviticus ... in all those early mandates, the legal was not separate from the moral. We&#39;re deeply turning back to some of those themes.&quot;</p>
<p>Bishop Emeritus William Skylstad of Spokane, Wash., described the encyclical in a single word: &quot;Marvelous!&quot;</p>
<p>&quot;Pope Francis shares with us in this encyclical how [church teaching on the environment] applies to us in the modern world. We live in an increasingly connected world, and Laudato Si&#39; shares in a remarkable way really how profound this connection should and must be,&quot; he told NCR in an email.</p>
<p>What especially resonated with Skylstad were aspects of Laudato Si&#39; that addressed relationships people have with and for one another (particularly the poor) and humans&#39; relationship with and responsibility for the environment.</p>
<p>&quot;One of the great challenges in our world community today is the need for a revolution in relationships. Pope Francis does a remarkable job in challenging all of us. No one is to be excluded,&quot; he said.</p>
<p>The bishop served as director of the 2001 Columbia River pastoral project, a joint endeavor of U.S. and Canadian bishops that examined a bevy of environmental issues in the Pacific Northwest. He said the encyclical addresses many of the same issues as that pastoral and reinforced the bishops&#39; work in the Columbia watershed.</p>
<p>&quot;In addition, our world community is becoming much more sensitive to environmental degradation and the urgent need to do something about it. The high degree of interest in anticipating this document indicates a common concern about how we need to take care of the environment and the significant challenges we face in doing so,&quot; he said.</p>
<p>On the issue of climate change, Skylstad said the pope did not &quot;shy away&quot; from the expected controversy or in providing &quot;recommendations to spur fresh political and economic thinking.&quot;</p>
<p>&quot;In our polarized world, his teaching in this encyclical transcends the political controversy with a moral foundation for action, not a set of political prescriptions,&quot; he said.</p>
<p>Dan Misleh, executive director of the Catholic Climate Covenant, said it appeared the pope had the climate in mind throughout the encyclical, even outside the sections that addressed it directly.</p>
<p>&quot;It seems like that was fairly prevalent even if it wasn&#39;t stated over and over again, although it appeared quite a bit,&quot; he told NCR.</p>
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<p><strong>Conversation changing &#39;from fear to love&#39;</strong></p>
<p>Maryann Cusimano Love, a fellow at the Institute for Policy Research &amp; Catholic Studies at The Catholic University of America, said the pope is changing the climate conversation &quot;from fear to love.&quot;</p>
<p>&quot;Francis calls us home, to love our neighbors and our common home, our gift from God. Yes, he calls us to energy conversion, but from energies of despair and denial to God&#39;s sustainable energy of generous love and sharing,&quot; she said.</p>
<p>That Francis did not mince words in addressing climate change -- &quot;It represents one of the principal challenges facing humanity in our day&quot; -- didn&#39;t surprise Misleh given the pope has at his disposal one of the top scientific academies in the world in the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.</p>
<p>&quot;That scientific information is easily accessible to him and to many others, and so he took it to heart and said, There is a limited amount of time to deal with this, we better hurry up,&quot; he said.</p>
<p>Misleh and several others who spoke to NCR saw as a central theme of Laudato Si&#39; the emphasis on the interconnections among people across geography and generations and among the various environmental and societal issues Francis addressed.</p>
<p>In his discussion of &quot;integral ecology,&quot; Francis links one of Catholic tradition&#39;s largest theological themes -- all are intimately one in God&#39;s being -- &quot;with the nitty gritty of loving our neighbor and caring for the smallest and most vulnerable creatures,&quot; said Alex Mikulich, a research fellow at the Jesuit Social Research Institute at Loyola University New Orleans.</p>
<p>&quot;We all share one life, one earth. One cannot and will not thrive unless all thrive in the interdependent and interconnected web of life,&quot; he said.</p>
<p>&quot;[Francis] points to not just the environment in a silo of its own, but how the problems that we&#39;re having with the environment and the climate are affecting the people of the world. So not just the environment for the environment&#39;s sake, but really in how our fellow human beings are being affected by it,&quot; said Janine Walsh, FAN communications coordinator.</p>
<p>&quot;He framed it the way the Franciscans do, so we&#39;re really happy about that, in that it&#39;s about all of creation,&quot; Carolan said.</p>
<p>Along those lines, Carolan said for him, one of the more powerful aspects of the encyclical addressed the connections between the largest emitters of greenhouse gases and those most impacted.</p>
<p>&quot;The warming caused by huge consumption on the part of some rich countries has repercussions on the poorest areas of the world, especially Africa, where a rise in temperature, together with drought, has proved devastating for farming,&quot; Francis wrote.</p>
<p>The pope called not only for a scaling back of fossil fuel usage, but also for a cutback on consumption among developed countries.</p>
<p>&quot;We all know that it is not possible to sustain the present level of consumption in developed countries and wealthier sectors of society, where the habit of wasting and discarding has reached unprecedented levels. The exploitation of the planet has already exceeded acceptable limits and we still have not solved the problem of poverty,&quot; he wrote.</p>
<p>That message is an important one for Americans to deeply consider, Misleh said, but also one that may be hard to digest. He said the pope appeared to be describing a richness in getting away at times from technology, which can distract from interpersonal connections with family, neighbors and the poor, but also distract from addressing real problems.</p>
<p>&quot;We&#39;ve got such a culture of waste, where very six, eight months there&#39;s a new cell phone on the market. And why? Why are we continuously grabbing that new cell phone when the old one is working just fine?&quot; Walsh said.</p>
<p><strong>Nobility in little daily actions</strong></p>
<p>Conversations about actions have to address the global, community and individual levels, Carolan said. In Laudato Si&#39;, Francis heralded the small steps as a piece of environmental solutions: &quot;There is a nobility in the duty to care for creation through little daily actions.&quot;</p>
<p>Carolan noted that the simple acts common to scaling back energy usage -- turning off lights, choosing a bike or public transportation, eating local or occasionally abstaining from meat -- can reduce individuals&#39; consumption and carbon footprints but also help change mindsets.</p>
<p>While she loved the encyclical, Fransiscan Sr. Ilia Delio, visiting professor at Georgetown University, said she also fears it will produce little change in that it falls short of providing a model for how things should be.</p>
<p>&quot;He&#39;s saying, Here&#39;s a negative, we are destroying ourselves, we are destroying our planet. But I&#39;ve never seen anyone change because of a negative, except when they&#39;re children being disciplined by their parents,&quot; she said. &quot;We change because of allure. So what&#39;s the attraction to us? Without that, I think people are going to say, &#39;Great guy, great points,&#39; but they&#39;re not going to change.&quot;</p>
<p>Looking ahead, events are already planned to ensure that the encyclical conversation doesn&#39;t end with its release. FAN has planned a Meatless Fridays campaign, while the Catholic Climate Covenant has mailed and emailed homily helps to each of the 17,000-plus parishes in the country to use during four Sundays this summer.</p>
<p>The covenant has also planned a series of programs -- including regional events in Florida, Iowa and New Mexico and a theology and ministry conference at CUA ahead of the bishops&#39; annual meeting in November -- to carry the encyclical conversation through Francis&#39; U.S. visit in September and the United Nations&#39; climate negotiations in December in Paris.</p>
<p>&quot;Keep the dialogue going, keep the encyclical in people&#39;s minds and talk about not only what the encyclical means but what the local impact or local solutions might be,&quot; Misleh said.</p>
<p><a href="http://ncronline.org/news/faith-parish/us-church-grateful-pope-francis-marvelous-encyclical#">MORE&gt;&gt;</a></p>
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_82ZLC0vHA4">REPEAL THE DEATH PENALTY A SERIES: Introduction</a></h2>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_82ZLC0vHA4&amp;list=PLLa_i3Rl2cCsgUqkqbYR1uqKCoam4m49H"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/intro_0.jpg" /></a></p>
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<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvwqdlpPx-o&amp;list=PLLa_i3Rl2cCsgUqkqbYR1uqKCoam4m49H&amp;index=2"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/part 1.jpg" /></a></p>
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<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDhSITZq90Y&amp;index=3&amp;list=PLLa_i3Rl2cCsgUqkqbYR1uqKCoam4m49H"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/part 2.jpg" style="width: 619px; height: 342px;" /></a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Z5I9iYhNJ0&amp;index=4&amp;list=PLLa_i3Rl2cCsgUqkqbYR1uqKCoam4m49H"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/thumbnail_1.jpg" style="width: 619px; height: 341px;" /></a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPQXoEfeq1U&amp;index=5&amp;list=PLLa_i3Rl2cCsgUqkqbYR1uqKCoam4m49H"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/episode 4.jpg" /></a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvQRLetjdJs&amp;index=6&amp;list=PLLa_i3Rl2cCsgUqkqbYR1uqKCoam4m49H"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/part 5.jpg" style="height: 350px; width: 635px;" /></a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVipzQG6x-s&amp;list=PLLa_i3Rl2cCsgUqkqbYR1uqKCoam4m49H&amp;index=7"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/part 6.jpg" style="width: 619px; height: 350px;" /></a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fBtwCa3yw0"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/part 7.jpg" style="width: 619px; height: 322px;" /></a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gn3u8v2jUpE&amp;feature=youtu.be"><img alt="" src="https://jsri.loyno.edu/sites/loyno.edu.jsri/files/Excluded Juries.jpg" style="width: 619px; height: 324px;" /></a></p>

<p>by&nbsp;&nbsp;Bruce Alpert, NOLA.com | Times-Picayune&nbsp;</p>
<p>WASHINGTON &ndash; The Obama administration is releasing new numbers Thursday (June 4) it says shows significant health and economic benefits if Louisiana and 21 other states reverse earlier decisions to reject federal funding for a major Medicaid expansion included in the Affordable Care Act.</p>
<p>The report, relying on data from the Urban Institute, says expanding Medicaid coverage would increase health coverage for 193,000 low-income Louisiana residents in 2016. &nbsp;It estimates that 4.3 million in the 22 states that didn&#39;t expand Medicaid &ndash; including Alabama, Texas, Mississippi and Florida -- would lose out on health coverage next year -- barring a reversal of policy.</p>
<p>The projection for Louisiana is lower than earlier estimates that 242,000 residents would gain coverage by expanding Medicaid.</p>
<p>In March, Families USA, a pro-Affordable Care Act research group, reported that 362,000 state residents would gain coverage from a Medicaid expansion, and that 56 percent are working. The breakdown of the 56 percent who are working, the report says, are 34,000 people employed as food service workers; 25,000 in sales; 17,000 in office and administrative support jobs; 24,000 in construction, 22,000 in cleaning and maintenance; 14,000 in transportation, including bus drivers and taxi drivers; and 14,000 in personal care, including child care workers,</p>
<p>Even with the lower numbers in the White House report, Obama administration officials said the benefits are substantial.</p>
<p>The report cites research that access to health care through Medicaid increases the probability that enrollees will have access to clinic care &ndash; including a primary care physician -- by 23.8 percentage points. It says women over 50 would have a 29.7 percent greater possibility of receiving a mammogram in a 12-month period, and that access to a pap smear would increase by 14.4 percent.</p>
<p>For low-income workers, having access to Medicaid means fewer economic struggles, the report said. It estimates 27,400 fewer Louisiana residents would have trouble paying bills because the burden of health costs would be removed.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2015/06/expanding_medicaid_would_add_1.html">MORE&gt;&gt;</a></p>