October 2025
Articles from Mercy:
Critical Considerations
Is it time to reform the Insurrection Act?
Karen Donahue, RSM
Donald Trump’s threat to invoke the Insurrection Act to justify sending National Guard troops to Portland, Oregon and Chicago has focused attention on legislation that dates back to 1807 when Thomas Jefferson signed the bill into law. However, what we refer to as the Insurrection Act today is really a compilation of measures passed between 1792 and 1871 that delineate the role of U.S. military forces in civilian law enforcement.
Because of their experience with the British military prior to independence, the founders were wary of military influence over civilian life. In drafting the Constitution, they placed the military under strict civilian control, making the president, not someone within the military hierarchy, commander-in-chief.
While the Posse Comitatus Act prohibits military involvement in domestic law enforcement, the Insurrection Act provides for exceptions. However, in 230 years, the Insurrection Act has only been invoked thirty times. Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson invoked the Act to protect civil rights workers and African American students attempting to integrate schools in the South. The most recent use of the Act came in 1992, when President George H.W. Bush sent federal troops to Los Angeles following the acquittal of white police officers who beat Black motorist Rodney King.
Donald Trump threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act in 2020, following the murder of George Floyd by a white police officer. However, Mark Esper, his Secretary of Defense at the time, publicly opposed the move and the president backed down.
One of the biggest problems with the Insurrection Act is that it is not clear about what constitutes an emergency that justifies its invocation. In our current reality, “Is it to protect federal law enforcement personnel? To enforce immigration laws? To police crime? To stop nonexistent riots?” Also, the sole authority to decide what constitutes such an emergency rests with the president.
In a recent article, Michael Waldman, president and CEO of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law said, “This coming year, we celebrate the 250th anniversary of American independence. At the time, Thomas Paine wrote, ‘In America, the law is king.’ In this surreal season of presidential overreach, we will find out if that is still true.”
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COP 30 in the Amazon & Raising Hope in Rome
Marianne Comfort; Institute Justice Team
Next month people concerned about international efforts to curb climate change will be keeping their eyes and ears tuned to negotiations going on in Belem, Brazil, in the Amazon rainforest. COP 30, the 30th convening of the Convention of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, will be held Nov. 10–21.
The most well-known international conference on climate change to date was in Paris, France in 2015. There, the nations of the world agreed to hold “the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels” and pursue efforts “to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.” But their commitments to date fall far short of reaching that goal.
In Belem, nations are supposed to bring new, more ambitious commitments for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and addressing gaps in funding for countries most harmed by climate change.
Mercy Sister Rosita Sidasmed of Argentina was part of a writing team that drafted A Call to Climate Justice and the Common Home, a message from the Church in the Global South ahead of COP 30. Franciscan Rodrigo Peret of Brazil shared the urgency of this moment in this 10-minute video.
Pope Leo issued his own call for climate justice in his address to the Raising Hope conference outside Rome last month that celebrated the 10th anniversary of the encyclical Laudato Si’. “What must be done now to ensure that caring for our common home and listening to the cry of the earth and the poor do not appear as mere passing trends or, worse still, that they be seen and felt as division issues?” he asked. He later suggested that “we must shift from collecting data to caring; and from environmental discourse to an ecological conversion that transforms both personal and communal lifestyles.”
At the end of the Raising Hope conference, participants made their own commitments to address climate change, in what will be collected together as People’s Determined Contributions to be delivered to COP 30 in Belem. Countries’ commitments are called National Determined Contributions.
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The dangers of falsely linking Tylenol to autism
Ryan W Roberts, OLF
Last month, Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and President Trump declared that Tylenol’s active ingredient, acetaminophen (or paracetamol outside the U.S.), was responsible for causing autism. They have subsequently claimed that penile circumcision (and the resultant use of Tylenol) results in higher rates of autism. They claimed to draw these conclusions from scientific studies. Considering the medical community’s ubiquitous recommendation in favor of the use of this medicine, it’s critically important that the facts be understood. Mercy’s Critical Concern for Women calls us to be accurately informed so that pregnant people and all parents can make healthy choices.
Acetaminophen has been widely available over the counter in the United States since the 1950s and has been broadly studied. It does have risks – particularly for liver damage – when not taken according to directions, but it is known to have almost no risks when taken in recommended doses. On the other hand, untreated pain and fever can have significant risk for both parent and child, including organ damage and even death. The fabricated fear of autism could have the effect of creating a mindset where the parent and/or child’s death is preferable to life with an autistic child.
A critical tool in understanding scientific studies is the difference between correlation and causation. A study noticing that two things occur in the same population is correlative; such a noticing makes no claim that either one causes the other. A causative relationship is much more difficult to prove and requires exhaustive elimination of other potential sources of a correlation. Studies also need to consider confounding factors, those that could contribute to outcomes that were not evaluated in the study.
While a few studies do exist that may indicate a weak relationship between Tylenol use and autism diagnosis, they are known to be observational rather than experimental. Further, these studies used small subject populations and had a number of possible confounding factors. The strongest evidence comes from a Swedish study finished in 2021 that evaluated whether a parent’s use of Tylenol during pregnancy affected the autism rate in children. This study included nearly 2.5 million children and examined siblings who were not exposed to Tylenol during the pregnancy, eliminating a possible confounding factor. The study concludes that there is no causative link between acetaminophen use and autism, a finding reasserted in this obstetrician’s editorial from just a few weeks ago.
There have been only two studies appearing to indicate a link between penile circumcision and autism, and neither studied what analgesics (i.e., pain relievers) might have been used in the subjects. Both are over 10 years old, and both have been thoroughly debunked. Further, common sense would indicate that in places where circumcision is more common and treated with Tylenol should have higher rates of autism diagnosis. Canada’s circumcision rate (32%) is significantly lower than the United States (71%), while their autism diagnosis rate is nearly identical, differing by only 0.02%.
As an autist (i.e., autistic person) myself and parent of an autistic child, this is a conversation that rests very close to home. The causes of autism are not completely understood, but the scientific consensus is that the primary factor is genetic. Autism is heritable. It is not a disease; it is neither acquired nor does it have or need a cure. The autism spectrum is not linear (i.e., “more” or “less” autistic), but rather a huge variance in the way this neurodivergence is expressed in different people. Autism is always a disability – albeit an invisible one – because of our social norms, but autists are a natural variation in the way humanity has always existed. And Tylenol does not cause autism; parents should not hesitate to use it or give it to their children. Tylenol can save lives. Please follow your physicians’ recommendations and directions on your medications’ packaging.
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