Fr. Rocky's New Appointment and Religious Freedom

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

Crystal clear coverage of The Drew Mariani Show is made possible in part by Charity Mobile. charitymobile.com.

The issues that matter most, right here. The Drew Mariani Show on Relevant Radio.

Bishop David Ricken (0:17)

I am very pleased to announce that Father Francis Hoffman has accepted my appointment to serve as president and rector of the National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion.

Fr. Francis Hoffman (0:28)

It is my hope that every baptized Catholic in America and Canada, and any other person of goodwill, make a pilgrimage to this shrine at least once in their life. And experience the life-changing graces of a good confession, as well as the mercy of God, through the powerful intercession of Our Lady of Champion.

This is the only church-approved apparition of the Blessed Mother in the United States, so we all need to make the most of it.

SPEAKER_1 (0:53)

It's The Drew Mariani Show on Relevant Radio.

Ed Morrissey (0:57)

This is Ed Morrissey filling in for Drew Mariani today. That was Bishop David Ricken of Green Bay, announcing that Father Rocky has accepted a position to serve as President and Rector of the Shrine of Our Lady of Champion in Champion, Wisconsin. We're going to talk to Father Rocky a little bit. We're going to first talk a little bit about the news, but Father Rocky will be joining us shortly to talk a little bit more about this appointment and about how he will be working that in with his Relevant Radio stuff. It's going to be such an exciting time for everybody here at the National Shrine and at Relevant Radio. A couple of things. First off, we haven't really had a chance to discuss it much today.

Drew might talk about this later in the week, or it might come back up around on Friday when I'm guest hosting. But there was a death in Russia near a Center for Infectious Disease Research in Siberia, that has been a suspicious death. It's a woman who worked at that facility. And it's an Anti-Plague Scientific Research Institute. That's the name of it, Irkutsk province. She died of a pneumonia of an unknown cause, according to the region's governor. And this was an update today. So they're acknowledging that she died of some form of pneumonia, but they're not specifying what it is. They are locking down the town, apparently. The local hospital is under quarantine. There's travel restrictions.

The nearby factory in Irkutsk is an aluminum factory. They're imposing a mask mandate. I'm not sure if a mask is really that effective against this type of bacterial spread. But Marco Rubio, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, is saying that it's something that they're watching, but they don't think it's a cause for alarm. This is not necessarily as contagious as a coronavirus would have been.

It does raise questions as to what the Russians were doing with this particular infectious agent. I think that there's some concern that there may have been some military ambitions there. Donald Trump was talking about that he's also looking at it very strongly, which is the way Trump would put, we would probably say looking at it closely. He says looking at it strongly.

But they are taking a look at it. It is not necessarily cause for concern yet.

But it is something that we're going to have to keep an eye on. And it raises a question here as to just how much, what kind of risk we are taking with these types of epidemiological experimentation, I guess is the best way to put this. You have diseases that we've mostly controlled or in some cases fully controlled. And we are trying to tinker with these things. And there may be some good reasons for that. But I think we've seen some demonstrations over the last few years, and especially in 2020, 2019 and 2020, that it's simply not something that we are taking seriously enough, the safety and security. And you have to ask yourself, is the benefit of this type of research outweighed by the risks of it breaking out from the labs and spreading? And certainly, that turned out to be not the case with the research into the coronavirus at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in 2019 And we'll have to see on this one, but this is going to be a difficult story, and hopefully, it will be a short story, but of course, at Relevant Radio, we're going to keep an eye on it. I am very happy now to talk to my friend Father Rocky Hoffman about his new job, Father Rocky. Congratulations, first off, on your appointment to be the president rector of the National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion.