Angelus News | May 17, 2019 | Vol. 4 No. 18
A priest waits while sitting in a confessional box in the Cathedral of Barcelona. A new bill making its way through the California legislature would seek to force priests to break divine law in order to follow civil law. But would requiring priests to break the seal of confession in cases of alleged child sexual abuse really prevent abuse? On page 10, editor Pablo Kay weighs both sides of the debate surrounding SB 360 and looks at how similar legislation has fared in other places. On page 13, contributing editor Mike Aquilina recounts the history of confessional secrecy as a key part of the Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation in the Catholic faith. And on page 3, Archbishop José H. Gomez writes why the bill is a “mortal threat to the religious freedom of every Catholic.”
A priest waits while sitting in a confessional box in the Cathedral of Barcelona. A new bill making its way through the California legislature would seek to force priests to break divine law in order to follow civil law. But would requiring priests to break the seal of confession in cases of alleged child sexual abuse really prevent abuse? On page 10, editor Pablo Kay weighs both sides of the debate surrounding SB 360 and looks at how similar legislation has fared in other places. On page 13, contributing editor Mike Aquilina recounts the history of confessional secrecy as a key part of the Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation in the Catholic faith. And on page 3, Archbishop José H. Gomez writes why the bill is a “mortal threat to the religious freedom of every Catholic.”
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Surviving Hollywood<br />
with a grounded faith<br />
Surgery, treatment, and prayer helped Vinny Fasline beat cancer<br />
and pursue his dream of performing as a stand-up comedian<br />
BY CARL KOZLOWSKI / ANGELUS<br />
Growing up in Pittsburgh,<br />
Vinny Fasline was surrounded<br />
by his boisterous<br />
Italian Catholic family.<br />
He had dreams of taking his athletic<br />
abilities to college and beyond, but<br />
his idyllic life was thrown for a loop<br />
when he developed brain cancer at<br />
the age of 13, and wound up fighting<br />
to survive.<br />
Thanks to a combination of surgery,<br />
treatment, and intensive prayer,<br />
Fasline pulled through his ordeal and<br />
found a new path in life, applying his<br />
ample natural wit to stand-up comedy.<br />
He put aside his sports dreams<br />
and moved comedy to the top of his<br />
bucket list after his mom enrolled him<br />
in a stand-up comedy class when he<br />
was 16.<br />
Fasline has never looked back. At 32,<br />
he is a star performer at the Hollywood<br />
Improv Comedy Club and the<br />
Comedy Store, and he has headlined<br />
clubs across the country, touring the<br />
U.S. and Canada with comedy superstar<br />
Dane Cook.<br />
Fasline has also made it a point to<br />
give back with his talents, helping<br />
other cancer patients by performing at<br />
fundraisers for the Pittsburgh branch<br />
of Gilda’s Club, a cancer support organization<br />
started by comedy legend<br />
Steve Martin in honor of the late Saturday<br />
Night Live star Gilda Radner.<br />
“My mom pushed me into a college<br />
comedy class when I was 16, so I owe<br />
a lot of this to my mom,” said Fasline.<br />
“I was really funny as a kid, and did<br />
impressions when I was 3 years old.<br />
Vinny Fasline presents an award to a cancer survivor during the St. Baldrick’s Ever After Ball<br />
fundraiser in 20<strong>17</strong>.<br />
My mom used to think I was hilarious.<br />
[She] was probably my only fan. I<br />
was doing impressions and she always<br />
thought I had potential and I wanted<br />
to do all these daring things after my<br />
surgery. I went up right after I was<br />
cured and I was bad. Last year I went<br />
back home to Pittsburgh and headlined<br />
that same club. That was cool.”<br />
Fasline’s cancer first manifested itself<br />
one morning when he had a seizure<br />
while his father, a doctor, was driving<br />
him to school. Rather than physically<br />
shaking, he “spaced out” and stopped<br />
talking mid-conversation, not even<br />
noticing that his dad was telling him<br />
to get out of the car.<br />
“They call that kind of reaction<br />
‘episodes,’ and my dad figured out<br />
something was really wrong when I<br />
didn’t get out of the car and I said I<br />
had to get dressed for school,” Fasline<br />
IMAGE VIA INSTAGRAM @VINNYFASLINE<br />
26 • ANGELUS • <strong>May</strong> <strong>17</strong>, <strong>2019</strong>
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