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anniversary of the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision to raise the profile of "personhood." The term is used by a movement in state legislatures to define unborn babies as persons, affording them the same guaranteed right to life as all other Americans. Probably the first definitive statement on the idea came from Justice Harry Blackmun, who wrote the majority opinion for Roe v. Wade...
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The School of Communication at Loyola University Chicago posted an internship for an e-publicist at Planned Parenthood of Illinois, according to the university's web site. "Planned Parenthood of Illinois' online advocacy program consists of over 20,000 members and annually generates tens of thousands of messages to legislators," the internship posting notes. "Our e-advocacy program plays a critical role in moving pro-choice initiatives and is building a powerful voice for grassroots activism on choice issues throughout the state."
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San Francisco Archbishop George Niederauer has personally counseled House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, about her views on abortion and other moral issues, Pelosi revealed in a recent interview with Newsweek. But the Speaker apparently has no intentions of changing her opinions, regardless of the archbishop's advice. In an interview with Newsweek's Eleanor Clift published on the magazine's website on Dec. 21 and in the print edition dated today, Pelosi said, "I have some concerns about the church's position respecting a woman's right to choose. I have some concerns about the church's position on gay rights. I am a practicing Catholic, although they're probably not too happy about that. But it is my faith. I practically mourn this difference of opinion because I feel what I was raised to believe is consistent with what I profess, and that is that we are all endowed with a free will and a responsibility to answer for our actions. And that women should have that opportunity to exercise their free will."
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As of Dec.8, 31,000 signatures had been collected on a petition for a ballot initiative that would allow Alaska voters to decide whether abortion practitioners should be required to get consent from - or at least notify - parents before performing an abortion on a minor girl. However, at least 11,000 more signatures are still needed in order to ensure that the initiative can be placed on next year's primary election ballot. According to state law, 32,734 signatures are required but to make up for names that may be invalid for various reasons, organizers are seeking an additional 11,000. Alaskans for Parental Rights, the leading organization behind the initiative, said Catholic support for the initiative has made a large impact on the success of the petition drive.
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"Planned Parenthood is the world's largest abortion provider. Your non-profit organization has an annual budget in excess of $1 billion and posted an $85 million profit last year. Planned Parenthood also received $350 million in federal funding in 2007. You would be included in the health care legislation under consideration as a community service provider. A recent Harvard Business School case study revealed that despite these massive public subsidies, Planned Parenthood is still struggling financially. This health care bill is an abortion business bailout. Cecile, the public deserves to know, how much exactly do you stand to gain from this bill?"
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Despite profits of $85 million in 2008, Planned Parenthood is facing serious financial difficulties. According to a recent Harvard Business School case study, Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) is structured as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization with multiple affiliates, each of which is also a 501(c)(3) non-profit. The national entity lobbies on national policy, sets affiliation standards, and leases its "Planned Parenthood" brand to affiliates, each of which has its own independent board and management structure, and so enjoys independence in its day-to-day operations. Internally, Planned Parenthood's difficulties stem from the uneven strength of its affiliates, and President Cecile Richards is worried. According to the Harvard case, her organization faces "tough economic times, a hostile political environment, and limited ability to raise philanthropic dollars in a resource constrained area of the country."
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On the other side of the Atlantic, the news passed almost without notice: the news about a strong public appeal in defense of life, of marriage, of religious freedom and objection of conscience, launched jointly - a rarity - by top-level representatives of the Catholic Church, the Orthodox Churches, the Anglican Communion, and the Evangelical communities of the United States. Among the religious leaders who presented the appeal to the public on Friday, November 20, at the National Press Club in Washington (in the photo), were the archbishop of Philadelphia, Cardinal Justin Rigali, the archbishop of Washington, Donald W. Wuerl, and the bishop of Denver, Charles J. Chaput. And among the 52 first signatories of the appeal were 11 other Catholic archbishops and bishops of the United States...
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With the Patrick Kennedy Communion flap and the recent action of the Bishops of Spain having opened up the issue of denying communion to pro-abortion politicians, it is worthwhile to review the position of the Vatican on the matter. Since the controversy came to a head in 2004, the stance from the Vatican on the matter has been clear and consistent. For the Pope and top Curial Cardinals in charge of the matter there is no question about the responsibility to deny Holy Communion to Catholic politicians who obstinately support abortion. In fact, the issue was closed as early as 2004 with a letter from Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI.
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Chinese researchers Peng Xing and his colleagues conducted a case-control study in Northeast China examining reproductive factors associated with subtypes of breast cancer. They found a statistically significant overall odds ratio of 1.17 (17% increased breast cancer risk for all subtypes combined) among women with induced abortions. Earlier this year, a Turkish study reported a statistically significant 66% increased risk for women with abortions. [2] Both studies show that, when honest research is conducted outside the control of the U.S. National Cancer Institute and other Western governmental agencies or organizations tethered to abortion ideology and politics, the truth emerges that abortion raises risk. Studies reporting no abortion-breast cancer (ABC) link were proven in medical journals to be stupendously flawed (fraudulent).
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Bishop Thomas Tobin had his scheduled meeting with Congressman Patrick Kennedy postponed -- planned after Kennedy claimed the Catholic Church is not pro-life. Kennedy said that in an interview last week and was quickly rebuked by the bishop, who has issued a new scathing letter. Kennedy told CNS News in an interview that the Catholic Church is fanning "the flames of dissent and discord" by taking the position that it opposed the health care bills in Congress because of their abortion funding. You mean to tell me the Catholic Church is going to be denying those people life saving health care? I thought they were pro-life?" he said. Tobin called on Kennedy to issue an apology and said he is a "disappointment" because of his pro-abortion voting record.
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On Saturday's Huckabee show on FNC, host Mike Huckabee interviewed the former executive director of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Bryan Texas, Abby Johnson, who became a pro-life activist after witnessing an ultrasound of an abortion while she assisted in a procedure. She charged that the abortion provider tries to "increase the number of abortions they do" for the purpose of making money, and described the emotional experience of watching an unborn baby at 13 weeks pregnancy "trying to get away" as its life was being ended. Video of the interview can be found here. Johnson: "I saw the probe going into the woman's uterus. And at that moment, I saw the baby moving and trying to get away from the probe. ... And I thought, 'It's fighting for its life.' And I thought, 'It's life, I mean, it's alive.'"
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Abortion advocates are turning on each other in the wake of the House vote on the Stupak amendment that saw massive abortion funding stripped from the health care bill. Abortion advocates are upset with Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her top lieutenants while grassroots abortion activists are companying about the leadership at Planned Parenthood and NARAL. In the House, the feud saw top pro-abortion lawmaker Rosa DeLauro take on Pelosi, according to a Politico report. Before representing Connecticut, DeLauro was the executive director of the pro-abortion group Emily's List and she had that single-minded pursuit of the abortion agenda in mind as she took on the Speaker.
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American Life League president Judie Brown released the following statement on the news that Cardinal Justin Rigali will support Speaker Nancy Pelosi's Affordable Health Care for America Act (H.R. 3962), provided an amendment preserving the status quo for abortion is voted upon. "Our Catholic bishops should be fearlessly leading the way towards a culture of life. Fighting to maintain a status quo credited to the destruction of 51 million preborn children is wrong and confusing to 65 million Catholics united in the defense of life. What Cardinal Rigali has permitted by way of political maneuvering is to allow an amendment to be heard and watch it be defeated. While our Catholic bishops will scramble to define their opposition to abortion in the aftermath, Pelosi will wave Rigali's support for health care reform as evidence that lay Catholics would somehow be wrong in opposing her bill.
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Records involving at least one sex-offender priest were maintained in so-called archives at the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, according to a document released Wednesday as part of a pending lawsuit. That would call into question testimony by retired Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland, who dismissed the notion as "antique" and "Old Testament" in a deposition last year. "I've heard about it, but I've never seen those files, and I don't know if the Archdiocese of Milwaukee has such things," Weakland said in response to a question about "sub secreto or confidential files." That appears to contradict earlier testimony by Weakland in a 1993 deposition in which he acknowledged the existence of such files and newly released archdiocesan documents - including one addressed to Weakland - that reference the archives.
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The House of Representatives will finally cast its first votes on the pro-abortion health care reform bill this weekend. After a fluid process that saw dates repeatedly pushed back, the first chance pro-life advocates will have to stop the abortion funding bill will come Saturday night. That means pro-life advocates need to continue turning out phone calls and emails to lawmakers every day until all of the votes have ben cast. Two steps remain before lawmakers will actually take a vote on the pro-abortion health care bill itself, HR 3962. First, the House must vote on the Manager's Amendment, which is an amendment to make changes to the bill, and it does not include any limits on abortion funding.
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A new report from researchers at a university in New Zealand indicates 85 percent of women who had abortions report negative mental health issues as a result. The report is the latest from professor David Fergusson and his team showing abortions cause problems for women. The University of Otago team examined the medical history of over 500 women and concluded having an abortion generally "leads to significant distress in some" women who have them. It noted women reporting adverse reactions to their abortions were up to 80 percent more likely to have mental health problems and risk of mental illness was "proportional to the degree of distress" associated with the abortion.
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The new health care reform legislation put forward by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi not only includes a new program that funds abortions with government money, but would also hurt doctors and patients. That's the message from a national organization for Christian and pro-life physicians. The 16,000-member Christian Medical Association, the nation's largest faith-based association of physicians, has problems with the 2,000-page healthcare overhaul bill (HR 3962). The group told LifeNews.com today that the measure far exceeds the need for targeted reforms, instead injecting massive government intervention that threatens the patient-physician relationship.
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"This dangerous provision to the Senate health care bill could give Planned Parenthood, already under investigation for tax fraud and concealing child rape, quasi-government status and even more influence over our kids," Diller said. Section 1803 also creates a "Personal Responsibility Education for Adulthood Training" program (i.e. sex education), which grants at least $250,000 to each state to educate adolescents on "both abstinence and contraception for the prevention of pregnancy and STDs." American Life League's Michael Hichborn has a full analysis of this and the many other dangerous provisions included in the health care bill in his upcoming report on America's Healthy Future Act of 2009.
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House Democrats said today that they have almost enough votes to get a pro-abortion health care bill through the chamber. The votes they say they have collected include almost enough for the government option, which would expand abortion funding even further. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi asked her top lieutenants this week to conduct a vote count to determine where members of the party stand on HR 3200, which pro-life groups oppose. Three House committee have approved different versions of the bill, all of which include massive abortion funding and mandates, that Pelosi and top Democrats will meld into one measure.
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Hundreds of thousands of students from thousands of schools around the world refused to speak today to protest abortion. As they silently stood up for the unborn with red tape on their mouths or red armbands they helped prevent at least 22 abortions on their friends and their babies. The Pro-life Day of Silent Solidarity, a project of Stand True ministries, has grown since its inception years ago to find pro-life people from around the world participating. Last year Stand True heard back from participants about 59 girls who canceled their abortions on the day of the event due to the efforts of the students and the number now stands at 22 with the event ongoing and only initial reports in so far.
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Choice, choice, choice -- it's the mantra of the child-killing industry. But it's a lie. They want to shut down choice for women considering alternatives to killing their children. "You have no choice," they tell her as they walk her into the abortuary, dress her in a surgical gown, and position her feet in the stirrups. "You have your education, your future, yourself to think about....Don't look at the picture on the sonogram; it's just a blob of tissue....You have no choice." These "compassionate" killers lie to the woman from the minute they answer the phone to make the appointment to murder her baby. Do they offer alternatives? No! Former abortionists and clinic workers tell of how they use marketing techniques to prey on her fears and pressure her to choose abortion. It's one of the most lucrative industries in the U.S. They sell the abortion, get taxpayer dollars to support it, and some even sell the babies' body parts...
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DC Area Pro-life leaders Randall Terry, Missy Smith, and Dick Retta will be joined by a large group of pro-life advocates outside of St. Matthew's Cathedral to call attention to the 50,000,000 babies who have been murdered by "surgical abortion" in America since 1973. Moreover, these Catholics will focus on Canon 915, which specifically forbids Catholics who are in public scandal - such as Catholic politicians who support child-killing by abortion - from receiving the Holy Eucharist. Randall Terry states: "This Red Mass is a beautiful call to pray for Justice amongst judges and statesmen; but in many ways it is a mockery, because many of those attending help kill innocent babies by the millions. While some attend with great devotion, others scoff at Christ by their actions, and commit sacrilege by receiving the Body and Blood of Christ while they hold a knife to the throat of the unborn.
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A new Pew Research Center poll released today shows support for legal abortions has dropped 11 percent from 2008-2009. The poll joins a handful of others from earlier this year confirming there is a growing shift towards the pro-life perspective, perhaps exacerbated by President Barack Obama's pro-abortion record. The findings by the nonpartisan Pew center show Americans taking a pro-abortion position by a 54-40 percentage point margin in 2007 and 2008. Now, two surveys of 5,500 adults found 47 percent support legal abortions with 44 percent opposed.
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In a late Tuesday vote, members of the Senate Finance Committee narrowly approved an amendment to restore some of the abstinence education funds President Barack Obama and abortion advocates in Congress have removed from budget bills. Sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch, a Utah Republican, the amendment reinstates $50 million a year in abstinence funding through Title V state block grant programs. Traditionally, abstinence education funding was extended along with funding for the Transitional Medical Assistance program, which extends Medicaid to families struggling to leave welfare, but President Obama zeroed it out in his budget proposal to Congress.
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Most viewers can easily pinpoint the pro-abortion bias in news reports by the so-called mainstream media, but former CBS newsman Dan Rather is confirmation what they already know. Rather will headline a fundraising event for a local affiliate of the Planned Parenthood abortion business. Planned Parenthood Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota tapped Rather to be the keynote speaker at its October 13 banquet at the Minneapolis Hilton. "Dan Rather, the voice, heart and soul of American journalism, is one of the most recognized and renowned reporters of our time," the abortion business trumpets in an announcement of the event.
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The Senate Finance Committee today started its debate on the new Baucus health care bill that contains massive abortion subsidies and mandates. During the opening statements, Sen. Chuck Grassley said the bill funds abortions and that it must be amended to make sure that is not the case. "On abortion, despite commitments made by the President and Secretary Sebelius, this bill does not follow the longstanding principle that federal funds should not be provided for elective abortions," he said. "Instead, federal funds would end up subsidizing elective abortions and plans that offer abortion coverage would be subsidized with those same federal funds," he added.
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In a new interview that is certain to upset pro-life Catholics, dissident Catholic professor Douglas Kmiec continues to claim that pro-abortion President Barack Obama takes a pro-life view. He says he was so excited talking about abortion with Obama during the campaign that he said Obama's views made him think his candidacy was "my catechism come to life." Kmiec, a former Pepperdine University law professor whose covering up Obama's pro-abortion views during the election drew a rebuke from Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput, received a reward from Obama by being named as the ambassador to Malta. In an interview with The Times of Malta, Kmiec recounts how he became an Obama supporter.
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Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele has again cast doubt on his professed loyalty to the pro-life movement by saying he "absolutely" believes there is room for a pro-abortion candidate in the GOP. Steele gave the remarks during a brief interview with the Columbus Dispatch in a local restaurant Thursday after leading a Republican rally against President Obama's health care legislation. Steele told the newspaper that a Republican candidate's view on legal protection for unborn children should reflect the views of their local constituencies. The GOP chair was then asked if there is room in the party for a pro-abortion candidate such as Steve Stivers of Ohio's 15th district, who is favored to win the Republican nomination next year.
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The third poll in the last two weeks has found that Americans strongly oppose taxpayer funding of abortions in any health care reform legislation. The new poll, commissioned for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, finds a high percentage of Americans oppose abortion funding. The poll also asks a significant question not found in other polling data on abortion and health care -- whether Americans oppose the use of private funds for abortions, which has been the defense from President Barack Obama and other abortion advocates of the abortion funding provisions. Conducted by International Communications Research from September 16-20, the telephone survey found widespread public opposition to including abortion in health care reform. The poll indicates 67 percent of those surveyed opposed requiring people to pay for abortion coverage through their taxes and 56 percent opposed making them do so through their insurance premiums.
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The profanity, vulgarity and evil resident in the Northern Illinois Woman's Center, an abortion clinic in Rockford, IL, demonstrates the beastly and erratic behavior of people associated with that abortion industry. Rockford pro-lifers have posted a shocking video on YouTube. These pro-aborts are sickos, so make sure your children are NOT in the area as you view this video. Of course, this so-called "women's center" is another example of what we can expect if Obama's death-care bill passes. To view the video at YOUTUBE CLICK HERE
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Your Letter announced your formation of the Task Force on Supporting the Choice for Life. Rather than offer a detailed evaluation of my own, I note my agreement with the personal analysis of William Dempsey, ND '52, President of the Sycamore Trust, calling attention to "the obviously deliberate exclusion from Task Force membership of anyone associated with the ND organizations that have been unashamedly and actively pro-life: the Center for Ethics & Culture and the ND Fund for the Protection of Human Life. Nor was the student representative chosen from the leadership of the student RTL organization or from anyone active in last year's student alliance protesting the honoring of the President, ND Response. It is hard to resist the inference that this is as a move toward marginalizing the Center and the Fund, neither of which receives any University support the way it is.... Finally, it is unsettling but instructive that this announcement comes a day after Fr. Jenkins' annual address to the faculty in which he described his goals for the year, which included increasing female and minority faculty representation but not a word about the most crucial problem facing the university, the loss of Catholic identity through the failure to hire enough Catholics to restore the predominance required by the Mission Statement. This is a striking falling away from [Fr. Jenkins'] wonderful inaugural address. The fact that ND did nothing to serve the pro-life cause until forced by the reaction to the Obama incident testifies to the fact that, without a predominance of committed Catholics on the faculty, any pro-life efforts launched under pressure will in time fade away. The risk, and surely it is real, is that this initiative and the publicity ND is generating about it will deflect attention from the fundamental problem besetting Notre Dame....But I return to where I began: A project that deliberately excludes from participation those who have courageously manned organizations standing against the faculty attitude toward the pro-life cause ought to be regarded with suspicion."
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"For months, the President, his staff, and his congressional allies have misrepresented actual language in their bills that would result in government funding of elective abortions. The latest statements by Mr. Obama and Ms. Sebelius are most likely a continuation of their strategy of denial, evasion, and distortion. We say, watch what they do, not what they say."
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American Life League is heartbroken over the loss of a true pro-life hero, gunned down on the day Americans across the country mourn the violent deaths of 3,017 people. What a terrible irony that his death, on this day of infamy, brings to mind the 50 million innocent lives lost to abortion. Our thoughts and prayers go out to his family, friends and community in the wake of this tragedy, and we renew our call for peace and prayer as the only remedies for the culture of violence.
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ABC is coming under fire for prohibiting a commercial that urges opposition to the pro-abortion government-run health care plan in Congress. The League of American Voters had planned to air the commercial that is already airing on other networks in 12 states. Bob Adams, the director of the group, told LifeNews.com he is "stunned" when he heard the news from his media buyer. "ABC television has banned our TV ad from airing on its network," he said. "With our success, we were planning to go national, so we sent the ad to the major networks." Adams says the ad, crafted by Dick Morris, the Fox News contributor and political strategist, "simply tells the truth about Obamacare."
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Only 13 days separated the passing of Eunice Kennedy Shriver, the founder of the Special Olympics, from the death of her brother Ted last week. But amid the wall-to-wall coverage and the stream of retrospectives for the senior senator from Massachusetts, it was easy to forget that he wasn't the only famous Kennedy sibling to enter eternity this month. Liberalism's most important legislator probably merited a more extended send-off than his sister. But there's a sense in which his life's work and Eunice's deserve to be remembered together - for what their legacies had in common, and for what ultimately separated them. What the siblings shared - in addition to the grace, rare among Kennedys, of a ripe old age and a peaceful death - was a passionate liberalism and an abiding Roman Catholic faith. These two commitments were intertwined: Ted Kennedy's tireless efforts on issues like health care, education and immigration were explicitly rooted in Catholic social teaching, and so was his sister's lifelong labor on behalf of the physically and mentally impaired. What separated them was abortion.
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Time magazine joins the Associated Press and the nonpartisan FactCheck web site in confirming that the health care bills in Congress allow taxpayer-funded abortions. The weekly publication takes Obama to task saying he "does not tell the whole story" on how the bills fund abortions. "The health-care reform proposed by House Democrats, if enacted, would in fact mark a significant change in the Federal Government's role in the financing of abortions," Time explains. Although the health care bills do not overturn the time-honored protections found in the Hyde amendment and federal laws (though they could be easily overturned by a Democratic-controlled Congress, Time explains how the health care bills set up a new scheme that would not be subjected to those provisions against abortion funding.
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State Sen. Matt Murphy (R-Palatine) is running as a strong social conservative for governor of Illinois - but in the company of a few other so-called "pro-lifers" he cast a vote for pro-abort Sen. Christine Radogno (R-Lagrange) as Republican leader heedless of the fact that by doing so he was consigning important life issues to the dustbin since Radogno is a wholly owned subsidiary of Terry Cosgrove's Personal PAC. The pro-life opponent to Radogno was Sen. Kirk Dillard (R-Hinsdale) whose anti-abortion credentials are unquestioned. Joining Murphy in voting for Radogno was State Sen. Bill Brady (R-Bloomington)... although Brady who speaks eloquently about pro-life did a sneak trick by voting for Radogno after it was clear she was winning.
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I imagine most would like to die as Ted Kennedy did, knowing a relatively pain free end was coming - and approximately when - so as to use that gift of time to spend with loved ones as well as search their past and soul to try to make any amends necessary with the world and with God.... Kennedy was given all that, a year knowing he had terminal brain cancer before he died at home last night at the age of 77. Only God knows the condition of Kennedy's heart when he fell asleep here and woke up there. But on earth Kennedy never retracted his pro-abortion stance. We know he was capable of changing his mind because he was once pro-life. Kennedy fully understood the magnitude of the issue before renouncing the sanctity of preborn human life, as demonstrated in an August 3, 1971, letter he wrote to a pro-lifer...
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A measure in President Barack Obama's health care plan could allow for special interest groups like Planned Parenthood, the nation's largest abortion services provider, to operate health care clinics, at taxpayer expense, inside America's public schools. Under Title V ("Other Provisions") of Obama's "America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009" (the official name for the bill, H.R. 3200), Subtitle B (School-Based Health Clinics, or SBHC) outlines a program in which the federal government would fund clinics in or near the nation's schools. The administration of these clinics will not rest with the school nurse or anyone who answers to the school administration or parents. Under Section 399Z, "the SBHC sponsoring facility assumes all responsibility for the SBHC administration, operations, and oversight."
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A Senate committee will drop a controversial provision that detractors have said will set up "death panels" for elderly Americans. Though the committee may remove the controversial language, the House health care bill has wording in its legislation that presents more concerns. The provisions in question concern end-of-life counseling and they have been derided because they provide financial incentives for physicians to promote various options. However, those options, in three states, could include assisted suicide, or they could include promoting withdrawal of lifesaving medical treatment or food and water.
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A new report relying on data from the Centers for Disease Control finds the states that accepted abstinence education funding saw greater reductions in teen abortions compared to states that didn't. The information provides another argument in favor of funding abstinence education programs. The Texas-based pro-life group San Antonio Coalition for Life has put out the new report and it compared CDC abortion figures to the list of states accepting or rejecting the funds. From 2001 through 2005, abortion advocates were successful in getting 17 states to reject the federal grants for abstinence funding. The results show they were worse off for their decisions.
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CCI NOTES": The following email was sent by Keith Mason, a leader in the movement to pass the Personhood Amendment in individual states. The Montana state senate, for example, passed SB 406 this past February, the language of which states: "all persons are born free and have certain inalienable rights ... person means a human being at all stages of human development of life, including the state of fertilization or conception, regardless of age, health, level of functioning,or condition of dependency." A personhood amendment on the Colorado ballot in November, 2008 lost 73-27%.
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Today, the United State Senate confirmed Judge Sonia Sotomayor as the next Justice of the Supreme Court by a vote of 68-31. Concerned Women for America Legislative Action Committee (CWALAC) President Wendy Wright said, "Sonia Sotomayor begins her tenure on the Supreme Court with a daunting challenge to live up to the standard she presented during her nomination hearing. She carries the burden of the public's skepticism that she will follow the Constitution and law, not her ethnic experience or foreign laws, in her rulings. Her lifetime appointment will be a test as to whether she acted with integrity."
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Pro-life and human rights leaders will launch a weeklong "Abortion is Not Healthcare" campaign with Capitol Hill Prayer vigil on Sunday. With the House of Representatives set to vote on a healthcare bill this week, activists will be working to ensure that taxpayer funded abortions and not part of this legislation. The following is a partial list of 'Abortion is Not Healthcare' events: Sunday, July 26, at 6:30 P.M. Outside of the office of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, on 1st and Independence Streets SE, in front of the Cannon Office Building. A prayer vigil to kickoff "Abortion is Not Healthcare" week.
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There is a disquieting reason Ruth Bader Ginsburg's defenders have been denying, however implausibly, the clear meaning of the Supreme Court justice's recent remarks about the history of abortion law, and that reason is this: Historically, eugenics has always been a significant component of the intellectual underpinnings - and political impetus - of the movement to legalize abortion. This legacy is glossed over by the rhetoric of today's "pro-choice" tacticians, who couch their arguments almost exclusively as a question of a woman's inalienable right to control her body and to make her own reproductive decisions. This reasoning carried the day, at least with the U.S. Supreme Court, which rendered it a constitutional right. But, from the early days of the national discourse on this topic, the idea of feminist empowerment was coupled with the less noble rationale of eugenics, that disturbing dogma that seeks to improve the human race through selective mating - and by controlling who has the opportunity to be born.
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Today Reps. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) and Rosa DeLauro (D-Connecticut) announced that they will again sponsor the "Preventing Unintended Pregnancies, Reducing the Need for Abortion and Supporting Parents Act." Though advertised as "common ground," the bill re-hashes approaches that have been tried, funded, and failed to reduce abortions. This time it is packaged as "a unique approach" inspired by "the spirit of President Barack Obama's call to find common ground between the pro-choice and pro-life communities." "The Ryan/DeLauro bill will fund abortion groups and programs such as 'comprehensive sex-ed' -- which has no evidence of reducing abortions. No pro-life group with a proven track record backs this bill. 'Common ground' has become an idiom for 'fund abortionists,'" stated Concerned Women for America President Wendy Wright.
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In what one pro-life leader called an "incredible victory" for parents and children, a federal court has lifted an injunction against an Illinois law which entitles parents to notification before their minor daughters are taken for abortions. The Parental Notice Act, passed in 1995, has been in legal limbo for more than ten years because the Illinois Supreme Court refused to issue the rules necessary to make the Act effective, the Thomas More Society reports. Paul Linton, special counsel for the Chicago-based Thomas More Society (TMS), developed the legal strategy to lift an injunction on the law.
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Kansas Rep. Todd Tiahrt made remarks in opposition to tax-funding of abortion, which would increase abortion especially among the impoverished, predominately Black communities of Washington, D.C. Rep. Tiahrt rightly noted that tax-funded abortion would "encourage women who are single parents, living below the poverty level, to have the opportunity for a free abortion." He then remarked that if tax-funded abortion had been available, perhaps President Obama or Clarence Thomas may have been aborted. "If you take that scenario and apply it to many of the great minds we have today, who would we have been deprived of? Our president grew up in those similar circumstances. If that financial incentive was in place, is it possible that his mother may have taken advantage of it?" Rep. Tiahrt said.
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A White House spokesman appears to have settled confusion on the position of Surgeon General nominee Dr. Regina Benjamin by saying that the doctor, though widely considered a devout Roman Catholic, supports President Obama's agenda on abortion. White House spokesman Reid Cherlin said in a Miami Herald report yesterday that Benjamin "supports the president's position on reproductive health issues." Earlier this year Secretary of State Hillary Clinton explicitly confirmed that for the Obama administration the term "reproductive health" includes abortion. Cherlin added that Benjamin also aligns with Obama's position on seeking "common ground" on abortion "to try and reduce the number of unintended pregnancies."
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A House subcommittee last week further stripped the ability of community abstinence education programs to obtain federal funds for their work. Led by pro-abortion Rep. David Obey, a Wisconsin Democrat, a House appropriations subcommittee stripped even more funding from the federal budget. The House Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor HHS passed the Fiscal Year 2010 appropriations bill but not before it further targeted abstinence education. Although both sides of the abstinence debate say the language in the bill needs more analysis, the first glance makes it appear that abstinence education funding will be eliminated or severely curtailed. Obey included $114.5 million for a new teenage pregnancy prevention initiative that Obama is calling for, but the funds are expected to go to groups like Planned Parenthood that perform and promote abortions.
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Pope Benedict XVI has released a new encyclical Caritas in veritate (Love in Truth), that says the numerous social political issues are all tied to the pro-life ethic. The leader of the Catholic Church made it clear that human life must be protected from conception on and that the pro-life perspective can't be compromised in pursuit of common ground on other political issues. Although the new paper doesn't mention pro-abortion President Barack Obama, some observers are seeing it as an indirect statement in response to his disingenuous pursuit of common ground on the abortion issue.
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A new poll commissioned by the Knights of Columbus supports other reports that say Americans are increasing becoming pro-life. About 49 percent of Americans now describe themselves as pro-life, while 60 percent think abortion should be legal only in a few circumstances or not at all. The poll, undertaken in partnership with the Marist Institute for Public Opinion at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, New York, conducted a telephone survey of 1,223 Americans in May 2009 and claims a margin of error of plus or minus three percent. An October 2008 Knights of Columbus/Marist Institute poll showed 44 percent of Americans considered themselves to be pro-life. This figure increased to 49 percent among the May 2009 respondents. Men and women were about evenly split on abortion but were still slightly more pro-life than those polled in 2008.
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In the wake of George Tiller's killing, many pundits and pro-abortionists have tried to project the shadow of his assassination onto the entire pro-life movement. A June 2 Associated Press (AP) article titled: "Suspect in doctor killing railed against abortion" exemplifies the attempt. Although the AP professes to be an unbiased news source, the only pro-lifers interviewed expressed support for Tiller's slaying and a substantial part of the story outlined the increased security measures abortion mills will now assume. Although every mainstream pro-life organization issued immediate condemnations of the killing, the article lacked a single quote from any of these statements. The only recognition of the pro-life movement's rejection of the killing was a paragraph that stated:
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Donors have given cancer groups billions of dollars to fight breast cancer during the last quarter of a century. Nevertheless, cancer authorities expect more women to be diagnosed with breast cancer - 254,650 cases in 2009. With over a quarter million cases, isn't it time to reconsider our approach? In a June 2009 news release, we charged that the group, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, perpetuates the breast cancer epidemic by withholding the truth that abortion increases breast cancer risk. We issued three challenges to Komen. First, we challenged the group to debate us on the abortion-breast cancer link. Because science is on our side, we expect Komen to duck the challenge, as have four other organizations.
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The firestorm raised by the article by Archbishop Rino Fisichella, president of the pontifical academy for life, published in "L'Osservatore Romano" last March 15, is far from dying out. Especially now, with the involvement of... But let's not get ahead of ourselves. We'll review the matter from where the previous article on www.chiesa left off. Fisichella's article was entitled "On the side of the Brazilian girl," and took a position on the case of a Brazilian girl who was already fertile at the age of nine, was raped repeatedly by her young stepfather, became pregnant with twins, and was given an abortion in the fourth month of gestation.
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In a Thursday afternoon interview with members of various Catholic publications, President Barack Obama defended himself from criticism over his pro-abortion record. He said he supports a conscience clause on abortion but gave a joking response to a question about Notre Dame. According to a National Catholic Register report, Obama talked about his upcoming visit with Pope Benedict XVI and said he looked forward to taking with him about unrelated political issues. Father Owen Kearns, editor in chief and publisher of the Register, said each member of the Catholic press was allowed to ask one question and the most controversial came in regard to Obama's position on conscience clauses. Kearns told Register writer Time Drake that Obama tried to "dispel the worst" about what pro-life advocates say about his attempts to overturn the additional pro-life conscience protections President Bush put in place.
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At United Nations (UN) headquarters this week, the Obama administration continued its push for ever increasing access to legal abortion around the world. The Obama team has introduced language that has thrown a high level negotiation into a roil. The US proposal calls for "universal access" to "sexual and reproductive health services including universal access to family planning." The document under consideration will culminate in the 2009 Annual Ministerial Review, which convenes next week in Geneva. The sticking point for many delegations and what has driven apart the usual solid European bloc is the use of the word "services" in the context of "reproductive health." Way back in 2001 during negotiations related to the ten year review of the Child Convention, a Canadian delegate blurted out "of course everyone knows 'services' means abortion." Ever since, the word "services" has been a topic of hot debate.
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A new undercover video shows what others have when it comes to Planned Parenthood and how it handles potential cases of sexual abuse. New footage shows a staffer at a Birmingham, Alabama abortion center telling a woman who appears to be a victim of statutory rape that "we bend the rules." The video is the latest from Lila Rose, a UCLA student who has become a muckraker for her series of videos exposing the nation's largest abortion business. In this new video, the Birmingham Planned Parenthood counselor tells Rose, who pretends to be a 14-year-old statutory rape victim that it "does sometimes bend the rules a little bit" rather than report sexual abuse to state authorities.
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Bob Pawson of Pro-Life Educators And Students (PLEAS), announces, "Our growing team of pro-life coordinators now includes Jeff White from Survivors of the Abortion Holocaust, Rev. Patrick Mahoney of Christian Defense Coalition, and Troy Newman of Operation Rescue, for the July 2 prayer-and-picket demonstrations during the NEA teacher union convention at the San Diego Convention Center and NEA-State-Affiliate offices across America. "These esteemed pro-life leaders are promoting and recruiting for our peaceful, prayerful demonstrations regarding the NEA leadership's pro-abortion track record. They are speaking at the Rally for Life at New Beginnings Church in Norco, CA, this Tuesday evening alongside Rev. Walter B. Hoye II, president of Issues4Life Foundation."
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Fr. Frank Pavone, National Director of Priests for Life, today reacted to White House press secretary Robert Gibbs' statement that President Obama and Pope Benedict have a "shared belief in the dignity of all people." Fr. Pavone stated, "They do not. President Obama believes in the dignity of most people, but not all. We call on the President to clearly state that children should be protected by law before birth, not just after." Priests for Life is the nation's largest Catholic pro-life organization dedicated to ending abortion and euthanasia. For more information, visit www.priestsforlife.org
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The governor of the Mexican state of Jalisco, Emilio Gonzalez Marquez, has filed an appeal with the country's Supreme Court challenging the new Official Mexican Norm, which was published on April 16 and obliges public hospitals to provide abortions in cases of rape. If the appeal is successful, Jalisco would not be forced to implement the norm. According to the newspaper Reforma, the constitutional challenge was filed on June 15. It must be addressed within 30 days. "If the court decides by a majority of eight votes that the norm is unconstitutional, Jalisco will be exempt from the obligation to implement it," the newspaper reported. It said this was the first time a state has filed a constitutional challenge against the application of a health care norm.
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While pro-life advocates battle the rationing portions of the Kennedy health care restructuring bill in the Senate, the House version presents other problems. House leaders introduced their own measure on Friday that sneaks Planned Parenthood funding into its 852 pages. Several pro-abortion congressmen, including Reps. George Miller and Henry Waxman, both California Democrats, and Democrat Charlie Rangel of New York, are behind the measure. The bill includes almost everything on President Obama's wish list including, for the first time in either chamber of Congress, the "family planning" nightmare the Family Research Council has been warning about.
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"Susan G. Komen for the Cure is no friend of women," said Karen Malec, president of the Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer. "Komen perpetuates the breast cancer epidemic by withholding the truth that abortion increases breast cancer risk. We have three challenges for Komen. "First, we challenge Komen to debate the abortion-breast cancer (ABC) link with us at the next Catholic Health Association (CHA) meeting or another venue. Since science is on our side, we expect Komen will duck the debate, as others have. [1,2,3] "Second, Komen justifies its denial of an ABC link by using studies that were severely criticized in the medical journals, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons and Ethics and Medics, for violating fundamental rules of epidemiology. [4,5,6,7] No experts have ever challenged the conclusions reached in these journals. Komen must follow customary scientific procedure by sending letters to the journals proving that their conclusions are incorrect.
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Informed consent before abortion has been adopted by the Slovak Parliament establishing a mandatory counseling requirement, a 3 days waiting period, and mandatory parental/guardian consent requirements for minors within the current Slovak abortion law. International abortion groups' pressure, coordinated by the US based pro-abortion network "center for reproductive rights", called for rejection of the amendment claiming that it was "in conflict with women's rights to privacy, physical integrity and autonomy, confidentiality, health, and non-discrimination." A letter signed by 19 pro-abortion organizations/networks and 7 individuals was sent to all Slovak policy makers, quoting the World Health Organization: "Parental notification or authorization is considered a requirement that deters women from seeking timely care and may lead them to risk self-induced abortion or clandestine services", and also quoting the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).
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A friend was kind enough to forward pro-abortion President Barack Obama's Father's Day Reflections which ran in Parade magazine over the weekend. I had not seen it until late yesterday, and perhaps you haven't either. It's worth reading and thinking about. The obvious inconsistency [inconsistent, that is, if you are as militantly anti-life as Obama is] is his statement, "That is why we need fathers to step up, to realize that their job does not end at conception; that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child but the courage to raise one." Tacitly, at least, there is the acknowledgement that a father's job begins at the beginning of his child's life which is at conception.
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In an interview with Jon Stewart of the "Daily Show" on Comedy Central last week, former presidential candidate Mike Huckabee blasted the false notion that common ground exists in the abortion debate. The notion that there is common ground on killing children and hurting women has been repeatedly taken to task by pro-life advocates. Huckabee said that abortion advocates don't want to give an inch in the abortion debate by accepting even modest limits on abortion such as parental notification, which would allow parents to know when their daughters are considering the life-altering decision. Stewart talked about how abortion advocates may have the best interests of women in mind, but Huckabee countered that pro-life advocates care for both mother and child.
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Supreme Court nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor's views on abortion law and the unborn were topics in several of her meetings with U.S. Senators. One pro-life senator reports that Sotomayor told him she had never thought about the rights of the unborn, while a pro-abortion senator says that she clearly acknowledged to him "the importance of precedent." On Tuesday Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) discussed his meeting with Sotomayor. "We had a good meeting that covered a wide array of issues and Judge Sotomayor was very personable and engaging. However, I didn't hear anything today that eased my concerns," he said. "When I asked if an unborn child has any rights whatsoever, I was surprised that she said she had never thought about it," Sen. DeMint reported. "This is not just a question about abortion, but about the respect due to human life at all stages, and I hope this is cleared up in her hearings."
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"President Obama has declared his intention to reduce abortion. Now he is seeking support from the American Medical Association for his health care plan, and we're calling on him to remember that commitment," said Eric Scheidler, Communications Director of the Pro-Life Action League. "Our message is simple: Abortion is not health care." Scheidler's group will hold a pro-life rally outside the Hyatt Regency in Chicago starting at 10:30 a.m. Monday, June 15, where Obama will speak on his health care plan to A.M.A. delegates. In his commencement address at Notre Dame, Obama called for "common ground" on the abortion issue, and stated his desire to reduce abortion, which he called a "heart-wrenching decision."
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Of everything I read about the June 6 funeral of late-term abortionist George Tiller, I thought this was the most telling, from the New York Times: But for the most part, Dr. Tiller's funeral focused less on his work than on his life with his family and friends. The word abortion was never uttered. ... Clearly they all knew: Tiller was murdered for his "life's" work, but the reason was unmentionable? Sad. Even in death George Tiller's "vocation" was anathema. Imagine eulogizing anyone else murdered for a cause without extolling that for which they were slain. On the contrary, why they died was a reason to eulogize...
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Pro-Lifers are invited to come picket the National Education Association leadership's pro-abortion policies, actions, and agenda at the San Diego Convention Center on July 2 between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. and at NEA state affiliate headquarters in cities across America from 11 a.m. through 1 p.m. (local times). "By peacefully and prayerfully picketing the NEA's convention and offices across America, pro-life citizens can publicly reaffirm that we express our concern, compassion, and desire for true justice through lawful and constitutional means using reason and rational discourse in the American tradition of the public square," said Bob Pawson of Pro-Life Educators and Students (PLEAS). "We're encouraging pro-life leaders, teachers, parents, students, clergy, and everybody to mobilize their pro-life groups, friends, and family members," said Gingi Edmonds of ProLife Opinion. "President Obama may address NEA's 9,000 delegates to thank them for endorsing and getting him elected."
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The apologetics organization Catholic Answers has filed suit against the Internal Revenue Service claiming the federal tax collection agency has "intimidated" churches and non-profit groups into silence on politically controversial moral issues. In an announcement posted at the organization's web site, Catholic Answers president Karl Keating explained that the IRS fined the group for a 2004 e-letter it wrote saying that Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry should not be allowed to receive Holy Communion. Keating charged that Francis Kissling, then-leader of the pro-abortion front group "Catholics for a Free Choice," had instigated the IRS action with a complaint.
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Prominent voices of the pro-life movement repudiated the murder of the late-term abortion provider George Tiller, who was shot and killed Sunday morning at a Wichita Lutheran church. Tiller was shot and killed by an unidentified assailant shortly after 10 a.m. at Reformation Lutheran Church (ELCA) in Wichita. The 67-year-old was one of the few U.S. physicians who still performed late-term abortions in the country. Troy Newman, President of the Kansas-based Operation Rescue said in a statement that his organization "has worked for years through peaceful, legal means, and through the proper channels to see him brought to justice. We denounce vigilantism and the cowardly act that took place this morning. We pray for Mr. Tiller's family that they will find comfort and healing that can only be found in Jesus Christ."
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George Tiller's clinic in Wichita, Kan., is one of only three in the nation that performs late-term abortions, according to an AP tally. He had already been shot - once in each arm - in 1993, and his clinic was bombed in 1985. He often traveled with a bodyguard, according to several reports. Both abortion rights and anti-abortion activists condemned the killing. But it comes as the debate over abortion has been reemerging on a national level. It was at the center of the backlash to President Obama's address at Notre Dame University on May 17. It has also come up as a potential cause of questioning later this summer during hearings to confirm Sonia Sotomayor, Mr. Obama's Supreme Court nominee.
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President Obama nominated federal Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court Tuesday, citing her "inspiring life story" and "distinguished career" in his decision. Sotomayor, 54, would be the first Hispanic on the high court if confirmed. She would succeed Justice David Souter, who is retiring. The president, in his announcement, said he was looking for a justice with a "common touch and a sense of compassion" as well as experience and depth of knowledge. He said Sotomayor, who grew up in a Bronx housing project and has an extensive judicial background, would come to the Supreme Court bench with more varied experience than anyone currently on the court when they were appointed.
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Towards the middle of his May 17th commencement address at Notre Dame, President Barack Obama asked the following questions: Is it possible for us to join hands in common effort? As citizens of a vibrant and varied democracy, how do we engage in vigorous debate? How does each of us remain firm in our principles, and fight for what we consider right, without demonizing those with just as strongly held convictions on the other side? Essential and vital questions, these, and the concise and straightforward manner with which he proposed them reveals Obama's rhetorical brilliance. But Obama did more than propose thought-provoking questions to his Catholic audience; he provided definite answers to these, at least for those in the audience not entirely spellbound. Obama's answers, along with the philosophical and theological principles they presuppose, were deftly hidden behind his rhetorically honed, magical words; and when they are exposed to the light, they reveal a different incantation than the one that appeared upon the exquisitely polished linguistic surface.
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Two prominent pro-life congressmen are challenging President Barack Obama on his recent comments during his Notre Dame graduation speech that he supports a conscience clause. Obama told students he wanted to find common ground on abortion and used the conscience clause as an example. However, his administration has already proposed overturning a measure President Bush put in place to uphold three conscience laws. "Let's honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded in clear ethics and sound science, as well as respect for the equality of women," Obama said.
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Fr. John Jenkins, President of Notre Dame University, sits on the board of directors of Millennium Promise, an organization dedicated to fighting poverty in Africa that promotes contraceptives and abortion, it has been revealed. The finding comes as the controversy over President Obama's award and speech at the University reaches a fever pitch in the last week before the event. As the president of Notre Dame, Fr. Jenkins has received the majority of the heat for the scandal. However, despite the criticism of over 70 U.S. bishops and over 350,000 petitioners, Jenkins has steadfastly continued to defend the university's honoring of the president. In a letter to graduating students dated this past Monday, Jenkins said that Obama is "a remarkable figure in American history and I look forward to welcoming him to Notre Dame."
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"I distinctly remember hearing him say on the campaign trail that he doesn't know anybody who's pro-abortion," Rev. Bill Stenzel said. "He doesn't view abortion as a positive, good thing. It needs to be addressed in ways that can make a difference. His approach wouldn't be all that different than the approach we might take in any parish: How do we bring people together? I see him as committed to reducing the rate of abortion." (CCI NOTES: Gee Bill, did Obama also tell that there really is a Santa Clause? Cardinal George spoke to Obama directly, saw through his lies and confronted his record of being the most pro-abortion politician Illinois has ever seen, which evidently, Stenzel is unwilling to do.)
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Flag Day marks the next event of Organized for Life's "Taking Things to the Next Level" campaign. Flag Day (June 14) will kick off Pro-Life Party Week, a cutting-edge strategy to co-opt liberal tactics and bring an end to taxpayer funded abortions. The United States government, with our taxes, funds abortion, forcing every born citizen to participate in the abortion industry. Activists will bring people into their homes to participate in a landmark effort to stop taking our hard-earned dollars to pay for the destruction of life. By rescinding the Mexico City policy, the Obama administration requires taxpayers to fund abortions abroad. His administration is also pressuring Congress to fund abortion in Washington, DC and considering repealing the Hyde Amendment, which strictly limits federal funding of abortion. "It's time to say that our flag, the symbol of our nation, will finally stand for LIFE, liberty, and pursuit of happiness."
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Leaders of the Silent No More Awareness Campaign (SNMAC), the world's largest network of individuals harmed by abortion, responded today to Planned Parenthood's new Mother's Day appeal and urged post-abortive women to seek healing. "Just when it seemed Planned Parenthood's Mother's Day fundraising letters couldn't get more hypocritical, this year they've brought in a children's author to say we should honor mothers by donating to the nation's largest abortion business," said Janet Morana, co-founder of SNMAC. "Honoring mothers by giving money to Planned Parenthood, though, is like honoring our troops by sending care packages to al-Qaeda. It makes no sense and it's highly offensive."
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The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) launched a new "Oppose Destructive Stem Cell Research" campaign today, equipping citizens to contact Congress and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to oppose embryonic stem cell research and support ethical cures and treatments "we can all live with." The campaign is facilitated by the USCCB's partner organization, the National Committee for a Human Life Amendment. Following President Obama's March 9 executive order, the NIH proposed guidelines for federally funded research that will require destroying live human embryos for their stem cells. The draft guidelines are open for public comment through May 26. The campaign homepage, www.usccb.org/stemcellcampaign, summarizes why the proposed guidelines are unacceptable, provides links to USCCB resources (including the bishops' statement "On Embryonic Stem Cell Research" and multi-media resources and ads), and encourages web users to "Contact Congress & NIH Now" through an e-mail interface. Several resources are available in both English and Spanish.
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A new poll conducted by Pew Research finds the support for legal abortions has dropped to its lowest level in 15 years. The latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, conducted March 31-April 21 among 1,521 adults, finds President Barack Obama's abortion advocacy could be sparking a shift to the pro-life side of the abortion debate. The Pew poll found 46 percent of Americans say abortion should be legal in most cases (28%) or all cases (18%) and 44 percent of Americans believe that abortion should be illegal in most (28%) or all cases (16%).
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Catholic Charities USA has e-mailed an invitation to many people in leadership roles with their organization from across the nation. The purpose of the invitation is to announce a Washington reception, which is scheduled to be held this coming Tuesday, May 5, 2009. It boggled my mind when I read the following text at the bottom of the invitation: "Catholic Charities USA wishes to thank Senator Richard Durbin and Senator Arlen Specter for cosponsoring this event." Senator Richard Durbin is a Democrat from Illinois who has two claims to fame: He is totally pro-abortion as his personal statement indicates: "Throughout my 20 years as an elected official, I have strived to be a leader in the fight to protect women's rights. In addition to preserving women's reproductive rights, I have fought cuts in family planning funding and supported the coverage of contraceptives in health insurance programs....I've stood for election more than 12 times in the House and Senate, general and primary, stating my position as pro-choice. So the voters of Illinois know that." Second and far more egregious is the fact that Senator Durbin is allegedly a Catholic!
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A pro-life Catholic educational watchdog group today is delivering to University of Notre Dame officials more than 300,000 petitions opposing its invitation to President Barack Obama. The pro-abortion president will deliver the college's commencement address and receive an honorary degree. After news of the invitation reached the public, the response from the pro-life community was immediate and strongly negative. Although hundreds of thousands of people contacted Notre Dame directly, another 300,000 signed the petition sponsored by the Cardinal Newman Society at NotreDameScandal.com.
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The president of the national conference of Catholic bishops recently elaborated further on the meeting he had in March with President Barack Obama. Cardinal George told a recent gathering of Catholic priests that Obama says he is not pro-abortion and will eventually work to reduce abortions. For most pro-life advocates, Obama's extensive pro-abortion record of executive orders and key political appointments proves otherwise. According to a Catholic News Service report, Cardinal Francis George discussed the conversation he had with Obama at a March 18 meeting at the White House.
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The news of topsy turvy world economies has kept the media buzzing across the globe. From the little island republic first discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1492 comes a report that should bolster anyone who believes that all human life is sacred. On April 23, 2009 the Dominican Republic was urged by its President Leonel Fernandez to consider the matter of ending the death penalty for un-born children in that country. In a remarkable vote the lawmakers put down abortion's blood drain by a whopping 167 to 32. Made up of 31 provinces within an area roughly the size of the State of New Hampshire twice over the Dominican Republic is a Caribbean gem nestled between Haiti, the North Atlantic and the Caribbean Sea. With famous cities and resort areas like Puerto Plata, San Cristobal, and Santiago the capital city of Santo Domingo is by far the most attractive to tourist and visitors.
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CCI NOTES: The website www.rhrealitycheck.org is one of several pro-abortion sites. We're linking to an article they recently published describing the full court press that pro-abortion advocates in Illinois are putting in place to pass the Illinois FOCA. This bill recently failed, but as the article referenced indicates, the pro-abortion industry is not going away. On the contrary, they are are work RIGHT NOW planning on how to get the bill through the next sessions. It is critical that Illinois Catholics realize what our opponents are up to...
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The administration's train on government-controlled health care is speeding down the track, and the driving force of that policy--the next Secretary of Health and Human Services--is still very much in question. While the President is itching to fill the final seat in his Cabinet, nominee Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D-Kans.) (A Catholic) did little to help her cause yesterday by vetoing an extraordinarily popular Kansas bill on women's health. By rejecting SB 218, a proposal that passed by wide margins in the House (82-43) and Senate (25-11), Sebelius proved her critics right by showing just how beholden she is to the radical abortion industry.
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A representative of the Faculty union at the Jesuit-run University of San Francisco (USF) has said the union would file an unfair labor practice complaint against the University if it changed the health insurance plan to exclude abortion, reported Our Sunday Visitor (OSV) yesterday. The University stirred controversy in December when it was revealed that the students' default health insurance package, touted as tailored to the school's needs, included abortion coverage. The University administration quickly amended the plan, saying the inclusion had been an oversight.
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The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced late on April 22 that it has expanded over-the-counter access to the morning-after pill, Levonorgestrel or "Plan B," for 17-year-old minors as well as to adults. Deirdre McQuade, Assistant Director for Policy and Communications at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities, objected to the move in the following statement: "The FDA's court-driven decision to make Plan B available without a prescription to 17-year-old minors - as well as to adults - flies in the face of common sense. Levonorgestrel is a powerful drug, taken in two doses over a 12-hour period. It is 40 times more potent than comparable progestin-only birth control pills (Ovrette) for which a prescription is required. Wider access to Plan B could endanger the lives of newly-conceived children, and will put minors at risk for unnecessary side effects, undermine parental rights, and contribute to higher STD rates."
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Were you aware that women who express regret about their abortions don't trust other women to think for themselves? A Planned Parenthood staff member wrote an article critical of a woman holding an "I regret my abortion" sign, complaining "It assumes that women have little to no capacity to think for themselves about their lives and their choices and their bodies." In fact, the women who hold "I regret my abortion" signs know from experience that they were misled about abortion. They are sharing this reality with others against the politically correct tide of affirmation that abortion is just a "simple medical procedure" to remove the "products of conception." And they are making a huge difference with the general public, who now seems to understand that abortion is a negative experience with many risks and difficulties.
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A second financial revelation has cast further doubt on Gov. Kathleen Sebelius' representation to the Senate Finance Committee of the nature of her relationship with late-term abortionist George Tiller. Sebelius is President Obama's nominee for the secretary of the Health and Human Services (HHS). She is currently seeking Senate confirmation. After Sebelius was recently found to have reported only a fraction of Tiller's $38,450 in donations to her insurance commissioner campaign, Operation Rescue yesterday released a copy of a 2002 letter from Tiller stating that he contributed $200,000 to his political action committee (PAC) to assist Sebelius' gubernatorial reelection.
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The White House mail office has confirmed it received a "deluge" of as many as 2.25 million red envelopes symbolizing the empty promise of lives snuffed out in abortion in a massive campaign that was larger than most White House mailing movements in the last 35 years. White House mail worker "Steve" has handled letters for 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. for more than three decades. Every single package and letter destined for the White House goes through his office. Asked if he has seen a flood of red envelopes bound for the White House, Steve chuckled. "Uh, yes," he said emphatically. "Believe me, they made it here."
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The Illinois version of the radical Freedom of Choice Act that Congress may eventually consider has been defeated. Today was the last day for the state House to vote on the bill, known as the Reproductive Health and Access Act, and it failed to do so. House Bill 2354 will not be called for a vote today and, as a result, it will die for the legislative session. Abortion advocates will have to file the bill again next session for it to be considered once more. "All our hard work has paid off," Eric Scheidler of the Pro-Life Action League, one of the pro-life groups working to defeat the bill, told LifeNews.com. "The phone calls, letters, petitions and protests sent a crystal clear message to our state representatives."
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Some of you may have seen the major news story of the private plane that crashed into a Montana cemetery, killing 7 children and 7 adults. But what the news sources fail to mention is that the Catholic Holy Cross Cemetery owned by Resurrection Cemetery Association in Butte - contains a memorial for local residents to pray the rosary, at the 'Tomb of the Unborn'. This memorial, located a short distance west of the church, was erected as a dedication to all babies who have died because of abortion. What else is the mainstream news not telling you? The family who died in the crash near the location of the abortion victim's memorial, is the family of Irving 'Bud' Feldkamp, owner of the largest for-profit abortion chain in the nation.
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A U.S. District Court judge's decision giving 17-year-olds over-the-counter access to the morning-after pill known as Plan B "will put minors' health at greater risk," according to a pro-life official of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Deirdre McQuade, assistant director for policy and communications in the USCCB Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities, told Catholic News Service March 25 that U.S. District Judge Edward Korman's decision the day before was "worrisome in any number of ways." Judge Korman, of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, said the Food and Drug Administration had "repeatedly and unreasonably" delayed a decision on whether Plan B should be available over the counter and had been swayed by politics in ultimately deciding to make the drug available without a prescription only to those 18 or over.
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Pro-life and pro-family organizations from across the country have assembled a coalition to fight HB-2354, or the Illinois Reproductive Health and Access Act. The coalition calls the bill Illinois' version of the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA), and has launched a Web site, www.StopIllinoisFOCA.com, to give citizens who oppose the bill a place to connect with each other and receive updates. "This 'Illinois FOCA' takes away the most basic restrictions on abortion that even a majority of pro-choice advocates support," said Eric Scheidler, communications director of the Pro-Life Action League, one of the organizations leading the grassroots mobilization. "We joined together and developed StopIllinoisFOCA.com because we needed a place where people could get all the facts about this heinous bill, and take action against it."
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Bishop George J. Lucas has joined the bishops of Illinois in urging Catholics to call their state representatives with a simple message: "Vote NO on House Bill 2354." HB 2354, the Reproductive Health and Access Act, passed the House Human Services Committee on March 11. The bill will now head to the Illinois House floor for consideration of the entire body. The bill, according to the Catholic Conference of Illinois is "extreme." "It declares abortion to be a fundamental right and it invalidates a health care professional's right of conscience," said a March 16 alert from the Catholic Conference.
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When President Barack Obama signed his executive order to allow human embryos to be mined for their stem cells in order to help older, more powerful humans, there was much excited applause. The applause came from so many, their eyes bright, lit as if from within. It came from those who believe in scientific progress as the answer to the problems of the modern world, believing as fervently as any monk on the slopes of Mt. Athos believes in the Resurrection of Christ. In signing the order last week, the president said that the Bush administration, which strictly limited such research, had offered a false choice between science and morality. He said his new order "is about ensuring that scientific data is never distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda-and that we make scientific decisions based on facts, not ideology. There it was. Ideology, a pejorative applied to faith, offered up during Lent by our president.
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During his presidential campaign, Obama promised he would pass the "Freedom of Choice Act" (known as FOCA) after he became president. Unfortunately, ths looks like it could be a promise he might keep. FOCA creates a "fundamental right" to abortion throughout the nine months of pregnancy. There would be no governmental body that could "deny or interfere" with this "right" or to discriminate against this "right" in the regulation or provision of benefits, facilities, services or information. For the first time, abortion would become an entitlement that the government would and must condone and promote. This law would go way beyond Roe vs. Wade because it would impose an extreme regimen upon our country. It would eliminate informed consent, parental involvement laws, laws promoting maternal health, abortion clinic regulations, government programs and facilities that promote childbirth and other health care, without also subsidizing abortion.Conscience protections laws and partial birth abortions would be affected also.
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Last week, more than 4,000 Catholic parishioners, employees, volunteers and school children met in Springfield to promote the tenets of Catholic social teaching and express support or disagreement with bills currently being considered by those who represent the citizens of Illinois in the capital. After a rally around schools, we split up to contact various legislators and the new governor. The conversations were mostly pleasant and, I'm told, the day was well received. The state government, like the federal government, is wrestling with huge deficits and with payments for social services that are many months behind. Catholic hospitals now have a harder time borrowing money to pay their bills while waiting for the state to pay its bills for health services guaranteed by government programs. Catholic Charities and other social services have similar problems. Everyone agreed easily that the state has to find ways to pay its bills more quickly, even if ways for the state to find money remain extremely contentious.
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President Obama's proposal to rescind a policy that protects the conscience rights of health care workers has now been formally published in the Federal Register, thus opening the 30-day period available for public comment on the proposal. Pro-life groups in the United States are urging concerned citizens to voice their concerns. The policy, one of the last acts of the Bush Administration, protects health care workers from being forced to perform and provide controversial services that conflict with their personal, moral and religious beliefs. Comments may be submitted by email at proposedrescission@hhs.gov.
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The head of the Roman Catholic Church's highest office overseeing Church law has slammed the nomination of Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius as Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), calling the nomination "the source of greatest embarrassment" to the Catholic Church. In an interview with Thomas J. McKenna, president of Catholic Action for Faith and Family, Archbishop Raymond L. Burke, Prefect of the Apostolic Signatura, strongly supported the means by which the Governor has been disciplined by her bishop because of her public support for abortion. Kansas Archbishop Joseph Naumann has been strongly critical of Sebelius in the past, publicly admonishing her not to receive Communion, and has called Obama's nomination of the governor "offensive."
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Saying it would undercut the Catholic Church's financial hierarchy, the state's bishops on Sunday urged parishioners to fight a proposed state law that would allow them to control their individual parish's financial affairs. The bill, introduced last Thursday by the Legislature's Judiciary Committee -- chaired by Sen. Andrew J. McDonald, D-Stamford, and Rep. Michael Lawlor, D-East Haven -- caught many Catholics by surprise, who first heard about it during weekend Masses. In a statement read at Fairfield County Masses, Bridgeport Bishop William E. Lori delivered a harsh rebuke to the proposal, charging it "directly attacks the Roman Catholic Church and our faith" and was a "thinly-veiled attempt to silence the Catholic Church.
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In Kansas governor Kathleen Sebelius, President Barack Obama has appointed a strong abortion advocate for Health Secretary. While evidence makes that clear, some Sebelius backers claim she's not that radical in backing abortion because she oversaw a decline in abortions in Kansas. Researcher Michael New, a professor of political science at the University of Alabama, put those claims to the test. He finds that abortions may have indeed decreased during Sebelius' tenure as governor, but he finds she had nothing to do with the decline. New also indicated Sebelius could have grown the size of the drop in abortions but failed to do so.
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President Barack Obama's apparent decision to drop the protections the Bush administration put in place to protect doctors means he can no longer say he is pro-choice on abortion. That's the assessment of respected pro-life attorney Matt Bowman of the Alliance Defense Fund. As LifeNews.com has reported, Obama has taken the next step to remove the new protections the Bush administration put in place to protect pro-life medical centers and staff who do not want to do abortions. The protections provided better enforcement for existing conscience laws for medical professionals.
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In the latest move against the pro-life movement and its desire to protect human life before birth, President Barack Obama signed an executive order on Monday forcing taxpayer funding of embryonic stem cell research. "We will lift the ban on federal funding for promising embryonic stem cell research," Obama said. He said his administration would make decisions on embryonic stem cell research "based on facts, not ideology," even though critics have condemned his decision as purely ideological and alternatives have produced better results.
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How does a formerly pro-life Catholic college girl morph into a pro-abortion zealot who identifies the roots of her transformation as including attending the National March for Life? You read that right. As implausible as it might sound, Kate Childs Graham says that this happened to her, and the results are not pretty. In her recent article "I Am a Prochoice Catholic," which appears in that notorious bastion of contumacy, The National Catholic Reporter, Ms. Childs Graham reveals: "I wasn't always a prochoice Catholic. During college I attended the annual March for Life on more than one occasion. The first time my friends and I traveled to the event from Indianapolis, Ind., was with a bus full of high school students - most, seemingly, only going for the trip to Washington, D.C., with their friends, sans parental supervision. Needless to say, it was a noisy bus ride. After I transferred to Catholic University, I volunteered for the Mass for Life two years in a row, helping to herd all of those high school students into every crevice of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception."
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Cardinal Francis George last month wrote a letter to all Catholic priests in Chicago asking them to preach about the issue of abortion and the church's opposition to it, as well as to encourage parishioners to take "pro-active measures" against abortion. The letter said that although the Catholic Church "wants to work with the new president and the Congress," it cannot "cooperate in any plan to remove all restrictions on abortion, to violate personal or institutional conscience clauses or to call abortion a human right." Kurey said the response to the campaign is due in part to the new administration and concern that antiabortion laws would be overturned if FOCA becomes law (Ramirez, Chicago Tribune, 2/13).
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Now is the time to educate your representative, on the dangers of the Freedom Of Choice Act (FOCA) and urge them to vote "NO" on HB 2354. If Illinois should pass this bill, abortion would be enshrined as a right in Illinois... FOCA states every woman has "a fundamental right" to have an abortion, and no Illinois government may deny or "interfere with" this right. Moreover, no government agency may "discriminate against the exercise of this right when regulating or providing "benefits, facilities, services, or information" to the public. In other words abortion may not be treated differently from live birth -- if a public program supports motherhood it must equally support abortion. FOCA endangers a wide range of laws enacted by the people and their elected Representatives over 35 years.
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Reports have surfaced that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a self-avowed "Catholic" adamant abortion supporter, intends to head a delegation to Euope that will meet with Pope Benedict XVI. Today the Drudge Report headlined a report by Rep. John Culberson (R-TX) on Houston's KSEV radio that Pelosi hopes to pass the federal economic stimulus bill in time for her join the group, which reportedly leaves Friday evening. According to Il Tempo, Pelosi will arrive in Rome Sunday afternoon, her first visit to the city since becoming Speaker of the House. It has not been determined when Ms. Pelosi plans to meet the Pope.
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The student-led nonprofit, Live Action, has provided the full, unedited footage from a recent investigation of a Tucson Planned Parenthood clinic to the offices of the Arizona Attorney General and the Pima County Attorney. The tapes show Planned Parenthood covering up a reported case of sexual abuse of a 15-year-old girl, and were made public last week on the Live Action's website, www.liveaction.org. In the footage released last week, a Tucson Planned Parenthood counselor tells a Live Action investigator, posing as a pregnant 15-year-old, how to hide her sexual relationship with a 27-year-old man. The counselor, identified in the video as "Araceli," cautions the girl not to bring her reported 27-year-old "boyfriend" to the judicial hearing required to obtain an abortion without the consent of her parents.
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"If Catholic hospitals were required by federal law to perform abortions, we'd have to close our hospitals," Auxiliary Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Chicago said during an interview just after the November election. Other Catholic spokespeople said they would respond in the same way they responded to previous unjust laws, such as segregation. The spokeswoman did not specify what form that resistance might take.
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President Barack Obama gave a speech at the National Prayer Breakfast Thursday to announced his new office of faith-based advisors that includes abortion advocates. Obama was condemned for not criticizing abortion in the speech despite using language pro-life advocates normally employ. "We have seen faith wielded as a tool to divide us from one another - as an excuse for prejudice and intolerance," the president said. "Wars have been waged. Innocents have been slaughtered," Obama added, saying nothing of the more than 50 million unborn children who had died in abortions or the women injured in the process.
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Concern about the threat to virtually all abortion regulations posed by the so-called Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) have generated online petitions, postcard campaigns, statements from Catholic bishops, letters to Congress, and other opposition throughout the Pro-Life community. Has this risk been overblown? Is there really no risk at all? It seems "abortion rights" proponents are trying to challenge the credibility of their opposition by claiming they were never serious about FOCA in the first place. They might have a bridge to sell you too; in Brooklyn perhaps?
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"It has long been American Life League's contention that canon law applies within the Church in the same way that state, federal or local law applies to the citizens of the United States. At American Life League, our focus has been on Canon 915, which is written for the express purpose of protecting the body and blood of Christ from sacrilege. We have repeatedly called on the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops to enforce this law, abide by this law and deny the Holy Eucharist to any public figure who claims to be Catholic while at the same time supporting abortion. Abortion is an intrinsically evil act, and no Catholic who supports that act in any way should be permitted to receive Christ."
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Fr. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International and an exorcist, spoke at a luncheon hosted by In His Sign Network (IHS). He is an exorcist authorized to perform exorcisms in several states, and highlighted the connection between the abortion industry and demonic influence. "Abortion is a demonic industry," he told The Bulletin. "Abortion is blood sacrifice of innocent blood to the devil. The clinics are like temples, the doctors are like priests, the medical table is like their altar. It's a ritualized sacrifice. They have a dogma called choice, a hierarchy called Planned Parenthood, and guardian angels in the form of police guards that will arrest you if you try to stop them."
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Archbishop Raymond Burke, in an exclusive interview last week, told LifeSiteNews.com that the issue of pro-abortion politicians continuing to receive Holy Communion is still one of major concern and that it is the duty of bishops to ensure that they are refused. He told LifeSiteNews.com, "I don't understand the continual debate that goes on about it. There's not a question that a Catholic who publicly, and after admonition, supports pro-abortion legislation is not to receive Holy Communion and is not to be given Holy Communion." "The Church's law is very clear," said Archbishop Burke, who was appointed last year by Pope Benedict XVI as the head of the Church's highest court, the Apostolic Signatura. "The person who persists publicly in grave sin is to be denied Holy Communion, and it [Canon Law] doesn't say that the bishop shall decide this. It's an absolute."
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The past few days have seen a spate of news reports indicating that the American people are in dire straits these days and that pro-life Americans absolutely must remain focused on what is truly important. This became even more apparent yesterday when an American Life League staff member explained, during a conference call with other pro-life leaders, that many pro-lifers are convinced that with Obama in office, they have to play what is known in football lingo as "defense." In other words, holding the wolves at bay is all that can be expected. But not so fast. This is no time to be satisfied with holding on to the status quo. The struggle between good and evil is already in high gear, so, for me, tolerating prevalent political positions is not an option.
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The national pro-life postcard campaign being conducted in parishes throughout the country is a way for Catholics who supported Barack Obama for president to tell him they did so despite, not because of, the new president's stand on abortion, according to officials of the U.S. bishops' pro-life office. "Many Catholics voted for Obama despite his position on abortion, and they have an obligation to say 'This is not why I voted for you,'" said Richard M. Doerflinger, associate director of the USCCB Office of Pro-Life Activities, at a Jan. 22 briefing with the Catholic press in Washington. Deirdre A. McQuade, assistant director for policy and communications in the pro-life office, said it is important for Catholics to tell Obama, "If I voted for you, this (abortion) is not what I voted for."
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NBC has rejected a pro-life ad that celebrates President Barack Obama's mother's decision not to abort the first black American president for its Super Bowl lineup - even though the video has skyrocketed in popularity with almost 750,000 hits on YouTube. The commercial, sponsored by the pro-life Catholic group Fidelis and its CatholicVote website, begins with an ultrasound image of a baby moving in his mother's womb. "This child's future is a broken home," it says...
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Conventional wisdom says newly-elected presidents have about one hundred days to get their act together before coming under criticism from the mainstream media (MSM). However, most political observers predict Barack Obama will have an even greater grace period with the MSM--who loves the man. But Obama has made some promises which may force members of Congress to put up a fight like few past presidents have seen before him this early in their administrations. Amazingly, Obama did extremely well with Evangelicals who usually vote Republican primarily because of social issues. For example, Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush, scored heavily with social conservatives and African-Americans who were steadfastly opposed to homosexual "marriage" before the run up to the 2004 presidential election. Many blacks simply refused to support John Kerry's liberal policies regarding homosexual "marriage". And, with a stroke of political genius, Karl Rove (Bush's political guru) used the issue to tip the scales just enough to secure a second term for Bush 43.
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Interestingly, when presidential candidate Obama gave his famous "Call to Renewal" speech, he said: "Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific, values. It requires that their proposals be subject to argument, and amenable to reason. I may be opposed to abortion for religious reasons, but if I seek to pass a law banning the practice, I cannot simply point to the teachings of my church or evoke God's will. I have to explain why abortion violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all." Incidentally, this same principle is reiterated under "Faith" on the White House website. Although all morality is essentially based in religion and certainly not devoid of reason, suppose God or religion were left out of the picture. Suppose a completely secular approach to abortion was made only "amenable to reason" -- an approach that seeks to show that abortion "violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all," just as the president insists. Would the argument against abortion be sufficiently strong?
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Millions of death warrants have just been signed, sealed and delivered over to the world's powerful abortion lobby. Please click here to send an emergency contribution that HLI will use to fight the abortion demon and uproot the culture of death around the world. True to his word, President Obama has undone the "Mexico City policy" that kept your tax dollars from funding organizations that promote abortion around the world. This policy has protected the poor and oppressed of the world - especially those living in Third World countries - for the past eight years. Now that protection is gone!
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President Bush today declared Sunday a national pro-life day to foster respect for human life and his declaration may be the last one with pro-abortion incoming president Barack Obama taking over the White House next week. Bush has declared an annual pro-life day every year during his tenure. In one of his final actions as president, Bush declared January 18 to be "National Sanctity of Human Life Day." "All human life is a gift from our Creator that is sacred, unique, and worthy of protection," the presidential proclamation read.
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Cardinal Francis George celebrated a special Mass for Life on Saturday evening at Queen of the Rosary Church in Elk Grove Village. The Mass was tied to the upcoming Jan. 22 anniversary of Roe v. Wade making abortion legal 36 years ago. The thrust of Cardinal George's message to a full church was to have hope and a desire to work together as a church family to continue to fight abortion when Democratic President-elect Barack Obama takes office. "To kill unborn babies is a great sin," he said. During his homily, George, of the Archdiocese of Chicago, dressed in white, first spoke of the feast of the Epiphany that celebrates the journey of the Three Kings who visited Baby Jesus after his birth.
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The contraceptive pill is polluting the environment and is in part responsible for male infertility, a report in the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano said Saturday. The pill "has for some years had devastating effects on the environment by releasing tonnes of hormones into nature" through female urine, said Pedro Jose Maria Simon Castellvi, president of the International Federation of Catholic Medical Associations, in the report. "We have sufficient evidence to state that a non-negligible cause of male infertility in the West is the environmental pollution caused by the pill," he said, without elaborating further.
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For faithful Roman Catholics, the thought of yet another pro-choice Kennedy positioned to campaign for the unlimited right to abortion is discouraging. Yet if Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of Catholics John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, is appointed to fill the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Hillary Clinton, abortion-rights advocates will have just such a champion. Ms. Kennedy was so concerned to assure pro-abortion leaders in New York, Britain's Guardian newspaper reported on Dec. 18, that on the same day Ms. Kennedy telephoned New York Gov. David Patterson to declare interest in the Senate seat, "one of her first calls was to an abortion rights group, indicating she will be strongly pro-choice." Within the first week of her candidacy, Ms. Kennedy promised to work for several causes, including same-sex marriage and abortion rights.
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The 2009 Speak Out Illinois Conference, "Rekindle the Fire", will be held Saturday, January 31, 2009, 8:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., at Westin Lombard Yorktown Center, 70 Yorktown Shopping Center, Lombard, IL. 60148. Parking is free. See Conference web site http://speakoutillinois.org for flyers and registration forms. Conference Registration is $50.00 per person if postmarked by January 19, 2008, $60.00 per person thereafter. Phone the Illinois Right to Life Committee for additional information 312/422-9300.
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THE LONG-AWAITED 'CONSCIENCE RULE' WAS PUBLISHED in Friday's Federal Register and is set to take effect Jan. 20 at 12:01 a.m. - as it happens, the very day of the Presidential inauguration of one who is expected by his abortion industry backers to cancel it. The new President will not have the power on his own, however, to repeal the statutory medical provider conscience provisions the rule is intended to implement. "Federal protection of provider conscience rights dates back to the 1970s," notes a news release from the Dept. of Health & Human Services announcing the new regulation. "The [Church] Amendments protect health care providers and other individuals from discrimination by recipients of HHS funds on the basis, among other things, of their refusal, due to religious belief or moral conviction, to perform or participate in any lawful health service or research activity." Such "service[s]" and activities would certainly include committing abortion or aiding medical experiments in which embryonic boys and girls are sacrificed.
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The invitation extended to all pro-life organizations and individuals by Father Tom Euteneuer (http://www.hli.org/sl_2008-12-19.html) should be a welcome call to action for all of us. Father Euteneuer, President of Human Life International, was focusing his attention on a nonprofit pro-life research company, which as he describes it, "provides a safe-haven for the consciences of parents that find themselves between the rock of government regulations and the hard place of vaccines made from cell lines using aborted fetal tissue." Further, this company and its parent are dedicated to resolving the ethical conflict involved with the use of embryonic children for the purposes of research and development.
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Eugenics: the word conjures up the macabre image of medical experiments in Nazi Germany to bring about a pure and unsullied "master race." But Hitler's ideas were preceded much earlier by activities in the United States. One of the earliest eugenics laws was passed in 1909 in Califoria. It resulted in the sterilization of over 16,000 "hereditarily diseased offspring." The Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery is currently celebrating American women with a federally-funded exhibit including racist eugenicist Margaret Sanger, our own Adolf Hitler. Sanger believed the purpose of birth control was to breed a master race. She defined those she considered unfit as "human weeds" who "clog up the path."
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At the recent fall assembly of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Bishop Robert J. Hermann, the administrator for the Archdiocese of St. Louis, declared that for any bishop it would be a "privilege to die tomorrow to bring about an end to abortion." He has further explained that Catholics' response to abortion in our country should be proportionate to the scale of the tragedy. At the bishops' meeting in Baltimore, Bishop Hermann had said: "We have lost 50 times as many children in the last 35 years as we have lost soldiers in all the wars since the Revolution. I think any bishop here would consider it a privilege to die tomorrow to bring about an end to abortion."
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In a stark warning to President-Elect Barack Obama, Cardinal Francis George of Chicago, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), today warned the Obama Administration, on behalf of all the US bishops, that "aggressive pro-abortion policies, legislation and executive orders will permanently alienate tens of millions of Americans, and would be seen by many as an attack on the free exercise of their religion." The statement, which was "written at the request and direction of all the Bishops," was released today at the end of the an nual fall assembly of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops. While the message begins on a conciliatory note, the vast majority is directed at the issue of the rights of the unborn. "The bishops of the Catholic Church in the United States welcome this moment of historic transition and look forward to working with President-elect Obama and the members of the new Congress for the common good of all," begins the statement. From there, however, it notes that the 1973 Roe v Wade decision was "bad law" and that the Freedom of Choice Act which Obama has promised to sign is even "more radical."
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Pro-life Catholics from Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, and Pennsylvania will "welcome" Catholic Bishops to Baltimore with two days of protests, decrying the USCCB's silence and treachery concerning the unborn during the 2008 Presidential Election. Some protesters will wear "Obama Masks" and hold signs saying: "Bishops: Thank you for Faithful Citizenship!" Other signs to be unveiled. Randall Terry, Protest Organizer states: "A key factor in the election of Barack Obama was the silence of Catholic Bishops. They had a duty to clearly and courageously defend the lives of unborn children; most of them failed miserably. Their silence and cowardice over the last 12 months paved the way for Obama's victory, and will cost millions of innocent babies their lives."
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In a genial but critical exchange reproduced on The Witherspoon Institute's web site Public Discourse, Pepperdine University law professor Doug Kmiec and Archbishop of Denver Charles J. Chaput have exchanged further remarks concerning Kmiec's advocacy for President-elect Barack Obama. The archbishop told the professor he welcomes a civil dialogue but also called on Kmiec to convince Obama to change his position on life issues. Kmiec, a pro-life Republican, wrote in response to the archbishop's Oct. 17 address to an ENDOW dinner, titled "Little Murders," in which the archbishop commented that Kmiec has a "strong record of service to the Church and the nation" but claimed Kmiec and other pro-Obama Catholics "have done a disservice to the Church, confused the natural priorities of Catholic social teaching, undermined the progress pro-lifers have made, and provided an excuse for some Catholics to abandon the abortion issue instead of fighting within their parties and at the ballot box to protect the unborn."
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As Americans devoted to defending the innocent continue to reel from the election results, there are a few things that bear consideration as we move forward. The first is that the course we set must not be based on despair or fear, but rather on hope and confidence. Though it may sound trite, given the sheer magnitude of what Obama might accomplish, it is nonetheless true that nobody beats God, and that should be our rallying point. The second point is that the pro-life movement must get back to the basic reason why there is a pro-life movement, and that is quite simply that we know that every abortion results in the death of an innocent baby. So, our efforts are not about regulating the murder or hedging it in; they are about personhood. And yes, you will hear a lot about that from me. The reason is obvious.
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Biden is not the only Catholic who will be seriously challenged by an Obama administration bent on reversing what its pro-choice allies regard as eight years of defeat; pro-life Catholics will face different, if equally grave, dilemmas. The bishops already find themselves defending the Catholic integrity of Catholic hospitals under pressures from state governments; those pressures, as well as pressures on doctors and other Catholic health-care professionals, will increase in an Obama administration, especially if FOCA succeeds in knocking down state conscience-clause protections for Catholic health-care providers and institutions. And should an Obama administration reintroduce large-scale federal funding of abortion, the bishops will have to confront a grave moral question they have managed to avoid for decades, thanks to the Hyde amendment: does the payment of federal taxes that go to support abortion constitute a form of moral complicity in an "intrinsic evil"? And if so, what should the conscientious Catholic citizen do? About which, it will be very interesting to hear what professors Kmiec, Kaveny and Cafardi have to say.
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Like millions of the faithful, I have been thrilled by the sudden and forceful rise of various Bishops' voices against the errors decimating the hearts of the Faithful in this election cycle. I am speaking of the errors stated by Doug Kmiec (and echoed by others) that go like this: "It is time to set the record straight that it violates no aspect of Catholic teaching for a Catholic Voter to endorse, support, or vote for Barack Obama..." (Doug Kmiec, Catholic Attorney and Author, Can a Catholic Support Him?, pg 36, emphasis added.) Anyone with "an ear to hear" clearly knows that no Catholic can vote for Obama with a clear conscience - no matter what Doug Kmiec, Roman Catholics for Obama, or any other misguided Catholic may declare. As Bishop Martino declared: "This is madness, people."
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Two Catholic groups that have received heavy criticism for making false claims that Barack Obama is pro-life and for receiving funding from pro-abortion billionaire activist George Soros are now trying to deflect attention by saying other Catholic groups get Soros money as well. As LifeNews.com reported, Catholic League president Bill Donohue accused two left-wing Catholic groups of getting money from the activist. Donohue said Catholics in Alliance receives funding from Soros' Open Society Institute (OSI) and that it is integrally linked to Catholics United. Now, Chris Korzen of Catholics United is deflecting the criticism by claiming OSI also funds Catholic Charities, Catholic Relief Services (CRS) and Catholic Legal Immigration Services -- making them supposedly "morally equal."
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In an address delivered to a women's group last week, Archbishop Charles Chaput of the Archdiocese of Denver strongly criticized Obama-supporting Catholic Doug Kmeic, and called it absurd for self-professedly pro-life Catholics to support Obama, "the most committed 'abortion-rights' candidate ... since the Roe v. Wade decision of 1973." "To suggest - as some Catholics do - that Senator Obama is this year's 'real' prolife candidate requires a peculiar kind of self-hypnosis, or moral confusion, or worse," said the archbishop, who emphasized that his address at the ENDOW ('Educating on the Nature and Dignity of Women') dinner expressed his views as a private citizen, and not as a representative of the Church.
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Voting for a pro-abortion candidate when there is an alternative option is to cooperate in evil, and therefore morally impermissible, clarified two Texas bishops. In a message made available to the faithful during this Respect Life month, bishops Kevin Farrell of Dallas and Kevin Vann of Fort Worth seek to "dispel any confusion or misunderstanding that may be present among you concerning the teaching contained in" the U.S. bishops document on faithful citizenship. "'Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship' clearly teaches that not all issues have the same moral equivalence," the bishops explained. "Some issues involve 'intrinsic evils'; that is, they can never under any circumstance or condition be morally justified."
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The Chicago-area nurse who exposed the practice of life-birth abortions that led to the bill Barack Obama repeatedly opposed in the Illinois legislature says Obama lied about his record during the final presidential debate. Jill Stanek says Obama again misrepresented his position and record before the American people. As LifeNews.com reported, John McCain took Obama to task during the debate when the topic turned to abortion. "Sen. Obama, as a member of the Illinois State Senate, voted in the Judiciary Committee against a law that would provide immediate medical attention to a child born of a failed abortion. He voted against that," McCain said.
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Save our children! More than anything else, this election is about saving our children or killing our children. This life issue is the overriding issue facing each of us in this coming election. All other issues, including the economy, have to take second place to the issue of life. Save our children! Many people in Germany supported Hitler for economic reasons even though, as his programs advanced, he put to death millions of Jewish people. He ended up wrecking the economy together with the country of Germany. How are we different if we vote for proabortion candidates for office? How can we help change our political and legal situation to protect innocent children and support a culture of life?
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Sometimes election years produce more policy myths than good ideas. This year one myth is about abortion. It goes like this: The Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision is here to stay, and that's fine because laws against abortion don't reduce abortions much anyway. Rather, "support for women and families" will greatly reduce abortions, without changing the law or continuing a "divisive" abortion debate. Various false claims are used to bolster this myth. It is said that over three-quarters of women having abortions cite expense as the most important factor in their decision. Actually the figure is less than one-fourth, 23%. It is said that abortion rates declined dramatically (30%) during the Clinton years, but the decline stopped under the ostensibly pro-life Bush administration. Actually the abortion rate has dropped 30% from 1981 to 2005; the decline started 12 years before Clinton took office, and has continued fairly steadily to the present day.
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The most telling debate Barack Obama ever had was not with John McCain but Patrick O'Malley, who served with Mr. Obama in the Illinois Senate and engaged him in a colloquy every American should read. The Obama-O'Malley debate was a defining moment for Mr. Obama because it dealt with such a fundamental issue: The state's duty to protect the civil rights of the young and disabled. Some background: Eight years ago, nurse Jill Stanek went public about the "induced-labor abortions" performed at the Illinois hospital where she worked. Often done on Down syndrome babies, the procedure involved medicating the mother to cause premature labor. Babies who survived this, Nurses Stanek testified in the U.S. Congress, were brought to a soiled linen room and left alone to die without care or comforting.
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With debate moderators not asking any questions of the candidates on abortion, pro-life advocates have been hoping John McCain and Sarah Palin would criticize Barack Obama's pro-abortion record. In a national radio interview on Thursday, Palin did just that and called Obama's record "atrocious." During an interview with nationally syndicated radio talk show host Laura Ingraham, Palin described Obama's view that abortions should be legal for any reason throughout pregnancy "absolutely atrocious." Palin heavily criticized Obama's votes in the Illinois legislature against the Born Alive Infant Protection Act, a bill that would require hospital staff to provide medical care for infants who survive failed abortions.
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While some Barack Obama backers are hoping to provide cover for his pro-abortion positions by saying he will advocate better health care, the Obama campaign is coming under criticism for refusing to say whether his governmental health care plan will require Americans to pay for abortions. Obama, who supports unlimited abortions throughout pregnancy for any reason, is promoting a health care plan that would mandate employer-sponsored health care and use targeted taxes to socialize medicine for low-income families. Although the plan is clear in some respects, it is hazy vis-a-vis the abortion question.
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The bishops of New York State have issued a document calling upon Catholics to "exercise our cherished right and our solemn duty as Americans and as Catholics" to vote to support pro-life and pro-family values. "We Catholics are called to look at politics as we are called to look at everything - through the lens of our faith," wrote the bishops on Wednesday. "We should be guided in evaluating the important issues facing our state and nation by the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the teachings of His Church." The bishops highlighted the Catholic obligation to form one's conscience, in order that Catholics may better discern which issues carry a greater moral weight. The most important of these issues, write the bishops, is "the inalienable right to life of every innocent human person," which "outweighs other concerns where Catholics may use prudential judgment."
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No sooner had the video gone up of popular Hispanic actor Eduardo Verástegui denouncing presidential candidate Barack Obama on abortion than YouTube officials took it down. The video sharing site removed the full version of the video, which showed graphic images of abortions. It did, however, leave an edited version in place that contains the Bella actor urging Latinos to vote against Obama without the footage of babies who have died from abortions. The Verástegui video has already caught fire across the Internet with more than 8,000 people viewing it in only two days.
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BornAliveTruth.org is a 527 political organization whose mission is to educate the public on the IL Born Alive Infants Protection Act and Barack Obama's record opposing this act. "Can you imagine not giving babies their basic human rights, no matter how they entered our world? My name is Gianna Jessen, born 31 years ago after a failed abortion. I'm a survivor, as are many others...but if Barack Obama had his way, I wouldn't be here. Unfortunately, Barack Obama voted four times against affording these babies their most basic human right. I have serious concerns about Senator Obama's record and views on this issue, given he voted against these protections four times as a state Senator. Just as abuse victims share their stories to educate the public, fight for the common good and hope that as a result politicians do what's right, I felt it was important to come forward and give these new born babies a voice. I am living proof these babies have a right to live, and I invite you to learn more about Senator Obama's record on this important issue."
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The first principle in voting is that to be pro-abortion disqualifies a candidate from office. He/she is simply unsuited to hold office. Their thinking is awry. Because of this opinion, they get everything important wrong as well. But Catholics have obligations above and beyond other voters. Why? Because they have received the Truth. The following principles apply to them. Catholics who cast a vote for a politician who supports abortion and same-sex 'marriage' "commit moral evil," if a moral candidate is available. Advancing pro-abortion candidates and their aims is incompatible with the Catholic faith.
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Gianna Jessen survived a saline abortion 31 years ago. "I didn't have any burns anywhere on my body -- it was amazing." The saline, however, did leave Jessen with a mild case of cerebral palsy, a slight limp, and a life-long commitment to oppose abortion. Jessen is featured in a television ad presently running in Ohio and New Mexico, criticizing Barack Obama's four votes against the Born Alive Infant Protection Act (BAIPA). I asked her why she teamed with Jill Stanek's organization, Born Alive Truth, to make the ad. "It's very important for the American people to know how [Obama] feels about the most vulnerable among us," she told me. (Stanek is the Chicago nurse who began lobbying to secure legal protections for babies born alive during abortions.) Jessen has been active in the anti-abortion movement for 16 years and testified before Congress in 2002 about the BAIPA. At those hearings she met Stanek, who approached her several months ago about doing the ad. "I was thrilled to do it. It's as if I have been preparing many years for this moment."
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The US Department of Health & Human Services has proposed regulations that will protect pro-life doctors who exercise their conscience against participating in abortions. The regulations are currently posted on the Federal Register for public comment and they need to hear from pro-life health care workers. Please take a minute today to follow the attached links and write your support for these regulations. The deadline to comment is September 25, 2008.
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Barack Obama's campaign has a new advertisement up that accuses John McCain of "lying" about Obama's opposition to the Born Alive Infant Protection Act, a bill to protect babies who survived abortion. The only problems are that McCain never leveled the charge and the charge isn't a lie. According to the ad, John McCain lied about Obama's stance on the bill. "John McCain attacks? The sleaziest ads ever, truly vile," a female narrator says. "Now, votes taking out of context accusing Obama of letting infants die? It's a despicable lie." McCain has never directly hit Obama on BAIPA, but an independent group called BornAliveTruth.org has. BornAliveTruth.org has been organized to educate the public on the Illinois Born Alive Infant Protection Act and Obama's record opposing it. Last month, pro-lifers unearthed evidence from the Illinois state archives that showed Obama had lied about his record on the bill.
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Appearing on C-SPAN last weekend I mentioned that Barack Obama had opposed the Born Alive Infants Protection Act when he was an Illinois state senator - a position he has attempted to deny or obfuscate ever since. The liberal blogger who appeared on the program with me erupted with indignation. She didn't deny that Obama had opposed the bill. She denied, hotly, that babies are ever born alive after an attempted abortion. Since I have actually met Gianna Jessen, who survived an attempted abortion, I invited viewers to contact me directly if they wanted evidence. My inbox has been bursting. The denial goes very deep. Any number of e-mailers expressed their contemptuous certainty that "born alive" infants were an invention of pro-life activists. OK, enter "abortion survivors" into your browser and see what you get. Or, if you prefer a traditional media source, consult the Daily Mail in Britain. The Mail has reported that in just the past year 66 infants had been left to die after abortions in Great Britain.
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A so-called Catholic group that supports Barack Obama is running a new television ad in battleground states claiming Sen. John McCain is not pro-life on abortion. The ad doesn't mention any abortion-related votes but claims McCain voted against supporting pregnant women and supports troops in Iraq. Catholics United is a 527 special interest group that is airing a new television ad in Pennsylvania and Ohio that challenges his pro-life views. The group said its ad will begin Friday and run for seven days on cable television in "highly Catholic areas" of the two states. The ad features a woman who says she is a mother of three children and pro-life. "John McCain, it's not enough to say you're pro-life, actions speak louder than words," the actress says. "You voted against one of the largest support programs for pregnant women."
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While two patron saints are generally invoked for the protection of the unborn, St. Joseph and St. Gerard Majella, neither is specifically assigned by the Church for that cause. St. Gerard is in fact the Patron of Expectant Mothers, and by accommodation becomes a patron for the unborn. St. Joseph has often been proposed as a patron saint of the unborn, because of his role as protector of the Holy Family and patron of the Universal Church. However, St. Padre Pio has a specific claim to this honor, a prerogative that was confirmed by the Blessed Virgin Mary herself. The story begins in 1905, well before he became famous for his stigmata and other spiritual gifts. At that time he was still a seminarian, known as Brother Pio, and was assigned to the humble friary of St. Elia a' Pianisi, in southern Italy. After his involvement in an unusual and striking spiritual encounter, Brother Pio immediately wrote everything down and handed it to his spiritual director, Padre Agostino. The note eventually became part of the documentation presented to the Vatican during the process of his canonization over seventy-five years later.
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Already notorious for its unconditional embrace of abortion, the Democratic Party has now managed to adopt a position on the paramount life issue that is, if anything, even more extreme. The new platform adopted in Denver states that the Party "strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade and a woman's right to choose a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay, and we oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right." Past Democratic Party platforms had managed to at least sound moderate by invoking the formulation, popularized by Bill Clinton, that the party's goal was to make abortion "safe, legal, and rare." The problem arose with the word "rare," which important elements of the party's political base seem to have found offensive. It certainly grated on the sensibilities of feminists, the more radical of whom regard abortion not as something to be avoided but as a positive act of liberation from conventional sex roles, a bloody rite of passage into their own largely barren ranks. Even pro-choice feminists of a more moderate persuasion were unhappy at the moral judgment implicit in the call to make abortion "rare." They may not have regarded abortion as an unmitigated good, but they were certainly unhappy with anyone who suggested that it was in any way unsavory.
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Republican John McCain has picked first-term Alaska governor Sarah Palin as his surprise choice for a running mate, in a move hailed by conservative leaders as "absolutely brilliant" and "electrifying" conservative voters, especially women. Gov. Sarah Palin, known for her traditional and unabashedly pro-life and pro-family views, is the mother of five children, including her youngest boy, Trig, who has Down Syndrome. She is now only the second female vice-presidential candidate in history and the first for the Republican Party. Gov. Palin had been considered a wild-card for a running mate, and the choice further solidifies the appeal of the Republican presidential contender to values voters. The news comes only days after the Republican platform became what has been called the most pro-life and pro-family in Republican party history.
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Catholic public leaders inconvenienced by the abortion debate tend to take a hard line in talking about the "separation of Church and state." But their idea of separation often seems to work one way. In fact, some officials also seem comfortable in the role of theologian. And that warrants some interest, not as a "political" issue, but as a matter of accuracy and justice. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi is a gifted public servant of strong convictions and many professional skills. Regrettably, knowledge of Catholic history and teaching does not seem to be one of them.
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The Barack Obama campaign has issued another response to the criticism levied against him for voting against bills that would have protected babies who survive botched abortions. While pro-life groups have accused Obama of supporting infanticide, his campaign calls such comments "offensive and insulting." The bills specifically would have made sure newborns who are purposefully born premature to be left to die or survive botched abortions will receive appropriate medical care. The Obama campaign sent the statement, with another attack on pro-life groups following Obama's own comments claiming pro-life advocates had lied about him, to CBN News correspondent David Brody.
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Thousands of pro-life advocates are lining the streets of Denver protesting abortion at the Democratic convention, but you'd never know it from the national media coverage of the event. On Monday night, led by Alveda King and Archbishop Charles Chaput, they held a prayer vigil at a Planned Parenthood. As many as 2,500 people lined the streets outside a local abortion center and called on Democratic Party leaders, and their pro-abortion presidential candidate Barack Obama, to stop abortions. Some participants carried rosaries or pro-life signs while teenagers scrawled pro-life messages on the sidewalks with chalk -- including those Democratic convention participants would use to head to the Pepsi Center. King, the niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, told the participants that Obama would be a nightmare as president because he supports abortion throughout pregnancy and without limits.
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Catholicculture.org has reported on August 18, 2008 that the Missionaries of the Gospel of Life, a religious order founded in 2005 by Father Frank Pavone, has been disbanded. According the Catholicculture.org report, they group will continue as a lay association. The article asserts that the disbanding was the decision of the Amarillo (Texas) diocese, but that it was also ratified by the Vatican. "In the long run, the move may presage further troubles for Priests for Life, Father Pavone's more successful venture. The Missionaries were only a small part of the overall operation of Priests for Life." Catholicculture.org suggested several reasons for the abrupt actions of the diocese. There is a question about any religious order that may controlled by a secular corporation that has political motives rather than religious ones.
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The head of the highest court in the Vatican has given an interview with a Roman magazine in which he notes that when dealing with pro-abortion Catholic politicians, "the minister of the Eucharist has the obligation to deny It (Communion) to him." Last month, Pope Benedict XVI appointed Archbishop Raymond Burke, formerly the Archbishop of St. Louis, as the Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, which is the highest judicial authority of the Catholic Church besides the Pope himself. In an interview published in the current edition of the Italian magazine Radici Cristiane, Archbishop Burke addresses the issue which has caused great controversy among the hierarchy in the West.
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Barack Obama said that National Right to Life is lying about his position on the Born Alive Infant Protection Act that he opposed while an Illinois Senator. He opposed this Illinois bill in 2001, 2002, and 2003. Why did Obama oppose the bill? In 2001, he spoke against the bill saying it "would essentially bar abortions." Obama now claims he would have supported the Federal bill that passed 98-0 in the U.S. Senate during 2002. So why did he so vigorously oppose the state bill? In 2004 he responded to an open forum question by claiming there was already a law that applied. When reminded about case of the baby Jill Stanek held until it died, he responded, "Jill Stanek works for Alan Keyes." This attempt to connect Stanek to his opponent for U.S. Senate was incorrect, but he evaded the issue, and refused to discuss it further.
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The prefect of the Apostolic Signature, Archbishop Raymond Burke, said this week that Catholics, especially politicians who publically defend abortion, should not receive Communion, and that ministers of Communion should be responsibly charitable in denying it to them if they ask for it, "until they have reformed their lives." In an interview with the magazine, Radici Christiane, Archbishop Burke pointed out that there is often a lack of reverence at Mass when receiving Communion. "Receiving the Body and Blood of Christ unworthily is a sacrilege," he warned. "If it is done deliberately in mortal sin it is a sacrilege." To illustrate his point, he referred to "public officials who, with knowledge and consent, uphold actions that are against the Divine and Eternal moral law. For example, if they support abortion, which entails the taking of innocent and defenseless human lives.
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CCI NOTES: In a move that reminds us of the "work makes you free" mantra hanging over the gates of concentration camps, the left wing media has rounded up a gang of suckers who proclaim that the Democrats are now pro-life! In a truly Orwellian charade of word play, the party of abortion on demand has decided that including wording that 'less abortions are better' makes them clear for Catholic voters. How stupid do the media think Catholic voters are? Or rather, how desperate are they for an excuse to keep voting for the Obama's, Kennedy's and Clinton's...
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In 1998, Ridge was told by his hometown bishop, Donald Trautman of the Diocese of Erie, that he could not speak on church property. In this year's presidential race, Ridge would be told by bishops around the country not to present himself for Communion. This would become a recurrent nightmare for the McCain campaign week after week after week. Is that a winning message for McCain? Finally, McCain is asking Republicans to accept a man who, if he wins, would likely be the presumptive presidential nominee sometime in the future. This would effectively turn the Republicans away from being the pro-life party and would spell electoral disaster for Republicans for years to come. Pro-lifers certainly would have a very hard time voting for a pro-choicer at the top of the national ticket. Look at what happened to Rudy Giuliani in the primaries. And they certainly would never support a publicly dissenting Catholic. The way of Ridge is the way of both defeat and disaster.
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Just one week before the Summer Olympics kick off in Beijing, the House of Representatives approved legislation calling on the Chinese government stop its brutal campaign of forced abortions. They accompany the coercive one-child family planning policy that has earned the nation worldwide scorn. The House approved the resolution on a 419 to 1 vote. The Congressional-approved measure asks China to "end abuses of human rights of its citizens" in order to ensure that the Olympic games take place "in an atmosphere that honors the Olympic traditions of freedom and openness."
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Anderson said: "Imagine if this year millions of Catholic voters simply say 'no'- no to every candidate of every political party who supports abortion." He added, "It's time we stop accommodating pro-abortion politicians, and it's time we start demanding that they accommodate us. What candidate or political party can withstand the loss of millions of Catholic voters in this election or the next?" He concluded: "Catholic voters have the power to transform our politics. And if faithful citizens can build a new politics-a politics that is not satisfied with the status quo but one that is dedicated to building up a new culture of life. There are more than 150 million Catholics in North America, and if we stand together and demand better from our politicians, we can transform politics. And if we truly hope for a culture of life and a civilization of love, then we must first think, and then act, in new ways."
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) in an interview with C-SPAN's "Q and A" Sunday said that her support for abortion rights has not conflicted with her requests to receive Holy Communion in the Roman Catholic Church, as it has for other lawmakers, The Hill reports. During an interview with "Q & A" host Brian Lamb, she was asked to comment on opposition from Catholic Church officials to allowing lawmakers to receive Communion who support abortion rights -- including Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R), who both ran for president. Pelosi in the interview said, "I think some of it is regional. It depends on the bishop of a certain region and fortunately for me, communion has not been withheld, and I'm a regular communicant so that would be a severe blow to me if that were the case."
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I think Pope Paul VI was trying to prevent the tide of abortion on demand, pornography and divorce that became epidemic. It is true that there could have been more promotion of natural family planning. The success of this birth control is in the 98 percent range and those couples who actively practice it have a 3 percent divorce rate. The fruit of this encyclical is not so bitter as McClory would have us believe as it was celebrated by Pope John Paul II in his encyclical, Evangelium Vitae. I think the bitterness comes out that unfortunately what Pope Paul VI predicted actually came true and millions of lives have been lost since 1968 and families destroyed.
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(CCI NOTES: We received this correspondance from our friend Kenneth M. Fisher, Founder & Chaiman, Concerned Roman Catholics of America, Inc. (www.crcoa.com) regarding the terrible state of 'leadership' in the Knights of Columbus.) The Pope's declaration of Fr. McGivney as Venerable was exploited by Supreme Chaplain Bishop Lori as "a ringing affirmation of the Order he founded" (Columbia, May '08), while the K of C's morally decayed leadership fail to suspend or expel the many Pro-Abortion and Pro-Homosexual politicians and members, and bishops fail to excommunicate them!
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What's the best way to suppress the turnout of pro-life voters on Election Day in a contest that features a strong contrast on abortion issues? Play down abortion as an issue that helps the pro-life candidate and urge him to not mention it when talking with Americans on the campaign trail. That's just what the Christian Science Monitor did in a Monday news article. Written by Dante Chinni, the article claims "the issue may have lost some of its power for the Republicans" and the headline screams that "Obama may have an edge." If so, that would be a sharp departure from every presidential election in recent decades.
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A new book by Columbia University professor Matthew Connelly documents the way the "reproductive rights" leaders at the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) and International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) rose to power by exposing the abuses of the population control movement, but then supported even larger and more coercive programs. In 1973, twenty years after formally establishing global population control, the movement's leaders believed it was spinning beyond their control. In response to bad press about out-of-control sterilization campaigns in India and elsewhere followed by a groundswell of popular backlash, John D. Rockefeller was persuaded to re-brand the movement from a "war" on population to a campaign for women's rights. Likewise, General William Draper's Population Crisis Committee sponsored the "feminist unity" platform at the 1974 World Population Conference in Bucharest.
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A leading psychology professor and a liberal pro-life group are concerned that the American Psychological Association will hide the risks of abortion when it released a new report in August. Last year, the psychological group began a new review of abortion and emotional issues. The APA created a task force to review all the existing research regarding the negative psychological consequences following abortion. Based on their evaluation of the data, they will release a report that will influence their members and the media for years to come.
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Yesterday, African-Americans kicked off the 99th annual conference for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Though Barack Obama was on-hand as the first black presidential candidate, black pro-life advocates there said he doesn't represent them. Several pastors and dozens of black pro-life people, including NAACP members, said the organization shouldn't turn a blind eye to how abortion disproportionately hurts black women. The protestors included Dr. Alveda King, a niece of the Rev. Martin Luther King who told the Wall Street Journal she knows what abortion does to women -- having had two abortions herself.
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A fact sheet from the Guttmacher Institute puts it this way: "Black women are 4.8 times as likely as non-Hispanic white women to have an abortion." The Centers for Disease Control further report what this means: While about one out of every five white pregnancies ends in abortion, it's nearly one out of every two for African-Americans. The debate can get uncomfortable. Pro-lifers point to Planned Parenthood's origins in the eugenics movement. Indeed, these unpleasant associations recently resurfaced after pro-life students at UCLA hired actors to call up Planned Parenthood clinics posing as donors. In one call, the actor expressed his dislike of affirmative action, and said that he just felt that "the less black kids out there, the better." The woman responded, "understandable, understandable" and went on to say she was "excited" about the donation.
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Catholic Citizens of Illinois encourages all members to participate in the 40 Days for Life national campaign, to be held from September 24 to November 2. We need volunteers to sign up for any of the one-hour timeslots on Saturday, October 4. The 24-hour prayer vigil will take place in front of the Abortion Aid clinic, 5228 N. Elston near Foster - not far from the Women's Center in Chicago. Many other organizations and parishes are participating in this important vigil: the Respect Life Office of the Archdiocese of Chicago, the Pro-Life Action League, Couples for Christ, Knights of Columbus, Illinois Right to Life. We very much want to have a strong presence from CCI on October 4. Please send an e-mail to mary_kelly33@hotmail.com with your name, e-mail address, and telephone number and your preferred timeslot.
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The death of Tim Russert commanded the news coverage of virtually all of the networks on the day that it happened. And to the surprise even of his friends, it commanded the channels on the next day... and the next, leading to a wake held, of all places, at St. Albans, by the National Cathedral, a Mass at Trinity Church, and a Memorial Service at the Kennedy Center. It was the kind of death and mourning more associated with Presidents, with high figures of state, than with journalists. One could only imagine the scene when Walter Cronkite is called to that Great Newsroom in the Sky. Will he lie in state at the Capitol? And yet why this out-of-scale display for Tim Russert? One gathers that he was a good guy, down to earth, not pretentious, and far more fair-minded, it was said, than other prominent figures in the media, affecting to be commentators on politics. As H.L. Mencken said of Grover Cleveland, he was a good man in a bad trade.
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The archbishop of Vienna, Christoph Cardinal Schönborn, has again shown his sympathy for politicians who support abortion. On June 25 he decorated the socialistic deputy mayor of Vienna, Renate Brauner, with the Pontifical Order of St. Gregory the Great. The Order of St. Gregory is the fourth highest award for merits regarding the Roman-Catholic Church. It is directly granted by the Pope and is one of the highest decorations that is conferred on lay people. The award was instituted by pope Gregory XVI. in 1831. The inaugural brief states that it is intended for "gentlemen of proven loyalty to the Holy See" who "are deemed worthy to be honoured by a public expression of esteem on the part of the Holy See".
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Mark Linton, director of Catholic Outreach for the Obama Campaign, refused to appear on a Catholic radio show to explain Obama's views regarding abortion and address his accusations of supporting infanticide. The Detroit-based radio show, hosted by Al Kresta, founder of Ave Maria Communications and best-selling Catholic author, wanted to invite both Mark Linton and Deal Hudson, the director of InsideCatholic.com, onto his radio show. Nick Thomm, the producer for Kresta's show, explained to CNA, "[Linton] is the National Catholic outreach guy and he disagrees with Deal Hudson over the facts surrounding Obama's record on abortion. So we figured we'd have them both on the show to hash it out."
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Obama was not a member of the US Senate at the time that the Born Alive Infants Protection Act passed unanimously through both chambers of Congress. But he was a member of the Illinois state legislature, where similar legislation was introduced at the state level. There, Obama twice voted against the legislation, in 2002 and 2003, and as chair of the Health and Human Services Committee blocked another attempt to bring the legislation to the floor of the Illinois Senate. The pro-life community in the state of Illinois was aghast, and pro-life Catholics were horrified. Yet today Catholics around the country are lining up to endorse Barack Obama's candidacy for president of the United States.
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Attendees at the National Right to Life Committee's annual convention may be lukewarm about John McCain's candidacy, but when it comes to Barack Obama, they are positively overheated. From the speakers to the rank and file at the Arlington, Va., event, there was near-unanimity Thursday in their strong opposition to the presumptive Democratic nominee. Audience members vigorously applauded as former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson delivered an extended attack on Obama in his keynote address. Calling the Illinois senator a "last gasp" of 1960s-era radicalism and "George McGovern without the experience," Thompson sternly warned the crowd that Obama would appoint Supreme Court justices unfriendly to their agenda.
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Leading pro-abortion group NARAL is continuing its attacks on John McCain in the latest fundraising email sent to its donors and the attacks focus on abortion and birth control. NARAL, which has already endorsed pro-abortion presidential candidate Barack Obama, says McCain is unfit to be president because he opposes abortion. "Please join NARAL Pro-Choice America immediately and help us ensure that the anti-choice, anti-birth control candidate, John McCain, does not become president," NARAL president Nancy Keenan says in the fundraising missive.
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You are the Democratic candidate for president. You want to reach out to Catholics. So what do you do when the majority of the elected officials on your National Catholic Advisory Council have the seal of approval from NARAL Pro-Choice America? That's the position Barack Obama now finds himself in. A few months ago, his Catholic advisory council was announced with great enthusiasm, and Sen. Bob Casey (D., Pa.) was listed as a national co-chair. His appearance at the top of the council sent a clear message: This campaign is determined to recover some of the lost Democratic sheep who have gravitated to the GOP over abortion.
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The Los Angeles Unified School District doesn't want Karen Kropf talking to its students. District leaders fear that what she says isn't "balanced" and that she's not a certified "expert" in the field. Really, though, they just don't like her message about teenage sexual self- control and the limited protection of condoms. That, and they're worried about what the ACLU might say, especially given California's law against "abstinence- only" education. Investigating Kropf's situation, I was startled to discover an alarming trend that has gone unreported: The ACLU and Planned Parenthood have teamed up in an aggressive campaign over the past several years--a campaign to pressure states to eliminate abstinence education and to reject federal funding for these programs. And though their work hasn't drawn much attention, it has been remarkably successful. A year ago, only four states refused federal abstinence- education funding. Today the number is seventeen. The goal is to get enough states to refuse the federal abstinence-education funding to the point where the ACLU and Planned Parenthood can convince Congress to eliminate such funding entirely.
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Federal authorities are investigating the actions of a Catholic charity in Richmond which helped a 16-year-old Guatemalan girl to receive an abortion in January, in possible violation of Virginia law. Officials have called the matter to the attention of U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) headquarters in Washington, urging it to prevent any repetition of the incident. Four employees of Commonwealth Catholic Charities, Richmond, (CCR) have been fired and one supervisor with the bishops' Migration and Refugee Services agency has been suspended, according to federal sources and a secret April 29 letter written by three bishops to 350 bishops nationwide.
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Pope Paul VI has been called a prophet for his intuitions expressed in the 1968 encyclical, Humanae Vitae, about what would happen to society if contraception ever became widely used. But a "prophecy" is much more than just a prediction: it is really a view of reality and an assessment of what happens when the right order of things is snubbed. All the Old Testament prophets told the people of Israel, in unambiguous terms, that they had turned their backs on the Lord's covenant (God's view of reality) and that the consequences would be dire if they persevered in that apostasy. Succeeding generations of scholars, who saw the fulfillment of the prophets' words, then scrupulously wrote their prophecies down for posterity -- lest anyone forget them!
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Presidential candidate John McCain met with pro-life Catholic leaders in Philadelphia Wednesday, according to Catholic columnist Deal Hudson. The meeting also included a private time McCain had with Priests for Life director, Father Frank Pavone, who said McCain pledge to carry the pro-life mantle. The meeting with Catholic leaders and lay members was held at the venerable Union League. Hudson explains in a new column that the meeting is one McCain will hold with Catholic and pro-life leaders in other parts of the nation as he seeks to build support for his candidacy within the pro-life community.
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The CMA has received a request for prayer for participants at an important meeting on June 16-17 that I thought was worthy of passing on to you. The Surgeon General is convening a meeting June 16-17, with representatives from NIH and DHS, to discuss the increasingly evident association between induced abortion and preterm birth. If the Surgeon General were to officially recognize this association, it could be very important. Two friends of the CMA, John Thorp and Byron Calhoun, will be a part of the meeting, and they are going to really need solid prayer backing, as the "choice" oriented establishment has a strong history of trivializing this association.
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Jim Sedlak, vice president for American Life League, issued the following statement about Habitat for Humanity of Sarasota, FL ending its cooperation with Planned Parenthood: "We received news this morning that the Board of Directors of Habitat For Humanity of Sarasota, Inc. voted last evening to disengage itself from Planned Parenthood and not go through with a planned land deal. We are extremely pleased that the Habitat board saw fit to take this action."
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Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann, whose Roman Catholic archdiocese covers northeast Kansas, on May 9 called on Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius to stop taking communion until she disowns her support for the "serious moral evil" of abortion. That put the church in conflict with a rising star of the Democratic Party, often described as a "moderate" and perhaps the leading prospect to become Barack Obama's vice presidential running mate. Naumann also took Sebelius to task for her veto April 21 of a bill, passed 2-to-1 by both houses of the Kansas Legislature, that would strengthen the state's ban on late-term abortions by authorizing private lawsuits against providers. That followed by a year her veto of a bill requiring explicit medical reasons for a late abortion, which was preceded by vetoing other abortion legislation in 2006, 2005 and 2003.
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Sen. John McCain responded to the news of Sen. Edward Kennedy's brain tumor saying that Ted Kennedy was the "last lion of the Senate." Nice words, but hollow. Clearly Kennedy has been a forty-year force to reckon with in the US Senate, but lionizing him for his headstrong political partisanship over four decades is a little like saying that sticking around for a long time and being opinionated qualifies as a "legacy." That very record of anti-life advocacy is the measure by which his soul will be judged. While I pray for Sen. Kennedy's recovery from a brain tumor, I pray more for his recovery from the cancerous metastasis of abortion ideology in his soul. Ironically, in the same years in which abortion has become less and less acceptable to the American public, it has become more and more of an obsession for Sen. Kennedy. Prior to Roe v. Wade, Sen. Kennedy had actually held a pro-life view of the sanctity of life.
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A priest friend of mine, ordained within the last 12 years or so, told me that during his first parish assignment he dutifully preached on contraception, but immediately afterwards was "spoken to" by the pastor. The pastor ordered him "not to do that again," and muttered, "just watch the collection receipts go down." Huh? If this is what we are about, then we are no better than a overnmental bureaucracy that self-perpetuates after having lost its purpose for existing. I should add that the pastor was not a wild-eyed radical or dissenter, but one of the stalwarts of the diocese, the type to whom bishops like to send the newly ordained to learn the ropes. He was the type that another priest friend of mine referred to as "a company man." In frustration he cried out to me, "John, they're company men!" By the company, he was not referring to the Magisterium, but the local diocesan system. They knew how to play the game, advance their careers, manipulate or get around the bishop when necessary, and keep their own backsides covered.
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A national pro-abortion group has endorsed Illinois Sen. Barack Obama over rival New York Sen. Hillary Clinton in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination. The group, NARAL Pro-Choice America, announced its political action committee's endorsement on May 14 and has posted it on its web site. The group has supported Clinton throughout her career. "Pro-choice Americans have been fortunate to have two strong pro-choice candidates in Senator Obama and Senator Clinton, both of whom have inspired millions of new voters to participate in this historic presidential race," NARAL president Nancy Keenan said in a statement. "Today, we are proud to put our organization's grass-roots and political support behind the pro-choice candidate whom we believe will secure the Democratic nomination and advance to the general election. That candidate is Senator Obama."
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"Since becoming archbishop, I have met with Governor [Kathleen] Sebelius several times over many months to discuss with her the grave spiritual and moral consequences of her public actions by which she has cooperated in the procurement of abortions performed in Kansas. My concern has been, as a pastor, both for the spiritual well-being of the governor but also for those who have been misled (scandalized) by her very public support for legalized abortion. It has been my hope that through this dialogue the governor would come to understand her obligation: 1) to take the difficult political step, but necessary moral step, of repudiating her past actions in support of legalized abortion; and 2) in the future would use her exceptional leadership abilities to develop public policies extending the maximum legal protection possible to the unborn children of Kansas."
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While the pro-life movement continues to flourish around the world, there is plenty of evidence of the diminishing vitality of the pro-choice movement and their tired rhetoric. In fact, last week HLI received a form letter about "reproductive rights" from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts. First of all, it's very hard to take seriously form letters that have a printed "Dear______" followed by a handwritten name. Not only that, but the senders didn't even bother to look up the very well-publicized names of the leaders of our organization to address the letter personally, nor did anyone sign it. The letter arrived in a padded envelope which included a small-sized red hanger. Yes, a red coat hanger, the worn-out symbol of those who mindlessly claim that "women are dying from illegal abortion, and therefore, it should be made legal to make it safe!" More distressing, however, was the reality that some poor college students are already slaves to the distorted thinking of the pro-choice movement, and they actually think that we're going to go along with them. Below is an excerpt from their form letter to HLI. It would get a big "F" from any college professor who wanted his students to put some thought into their term papers. I have added some editorial comments for your information:
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A Rockford abortuary has made the demonic side of the abortion industry readily apparent to the public by decorating its facility with a nun in a coffin, a crucified rubber chicken, and a set of sacred images arranged in a voodoo-style altar. Kevin Rilott, an Illinois pro-life activist who has often prayerfully protested in front of the Rockford Northern Illinois Women's Center (NIWC) abortuary that features the sacrilegious display, hopes that images of the offensive exhibition will expose the evil carried out at the facility. "This clinic affects the lives of thousands of Rockford women and children. The issue here isn't even primarily abortion. What we believe the people of Rockford and the country have a right to see is a medical facility that promotes a bizarre form of racism, bigotry, and hatred," Kevin Rilott told LifeSiteNews.com.
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The Senate voted 95 to 0 to pass the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act on Thursday, which bars employers and health insurers from discriminating against individuals on the basis of their own or their family members' genetic information. Pro-life groups say the bill helps protect the disabled. The House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a nearly identical bill by a vote of 420 to 3 this time last year. Deirdre McQuade, a pro-life spokeswoman for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops told LifeNews.com they're very happy with the passage of the Senate bill.
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The decision by several prominent pro-abortion politicians to publicly receive Holy Communion at papal Masses during the recent visit of Pope Benedict XVI, despite clear Church teaching that says that their reception of Communion would constitute a grave sacrilege, may have backfired. While at first it seemed like it would be business as usual, today Cardinal Edward Egan of New York issued a statement condemning the reception of Holy Communion by former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani. The Archdiocese informed LifeSiteNews.com that the issue is being brought forward publicly at this time "because it has become a public issue and a public question."
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ALL asks the Holy Father to deny the Eucharist to those "Catholic" politicians who will attend Thursday's Mass to be held at the Washington Nationals' new ballpark. One of the pro-abortion Catholics featured in ALL's ad is Illinois' own U.S. Senator Dick Durbin. A Durbin spokesmen told Politico the senator plans to attend a reception for Pope Benedict XVI Wednesday night, but due to scheduling conflicts, will not be at Thursday's Mass. Two Republicans and nine Democrats are pictured among the criticized U.S. Senate members along with ten Democratic members of the U.S. Senate and one Republican governor -- California's Arnold Schwarzeneggar.
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The Bush administration received both attacks and praise for its support of pro-life doctors who don't want to lose their OBGYN accreditation for not referring for abortions. Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt defended their conscience rights in a letter to a national OBGYN group last week. Leavitt opposes the new policy the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists has been working on that says all doctors, including those who are pro-life, should refer women to abortion centers. One of the biggest problems with the policy is that the college's board could adopt it and doing or promoting abortions could become formally linked to obstetrician board certification.
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Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia spoke to students at the University of Central Missouri on Tuesday night and told them that abortion isn't found in the Constitution. He also indicated he would be lucky to get 60 votes in today's political climate where abortion rules how senators vote on judicial confirmations. "The reality is the Constitution doesn't address the subject at all," Scalia said of abortion. "It is one of the many subjects not in the Constitution which is therefore left to democracy. If you want the right to an abortion, persuade your fellow citizens it's a good idea and pass a law. If you feel the other way, repeal the law," he said, according to a Columbia Tribune report.
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We need your help TODAY to defeat the most sweeping pro-abortion bill ever proposed in Illinois: HB-5615, the "Reproductive Justice and Access Act". HB-5615 would: Kill all restrictions on abortion in the state, parental notification and the partial birth abortion ban. Force pro-life health care professionals to cooperate in abortion by making abortion referrals. Mandate "comprehensive" sex-ed programs, which promote promiscuity and undermine the family, for all public schools. Require taxpayers to fund abortions through Medicaid. Keep abortion 100% legal in Illinois if Roe v. Wade is ever overturned in the Supreme Court.
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Over the last few weeks, something rather bizarre has occurred in the pro-life movement and it is difficult for me to get my arms around it. So, I have decided to share the puzzlement I am experiencing in the hopes that others, upon reading this, will join me in a fervent Lenten prayer for healing. This past January 17, as a personhood proposal was being presented as a way to amend Georgia's state constitution, the two bishops in that state made a public statement in opposition to it. They wrote, "As the Catholic bishops of Georgia we, along with our brother bishops throughout the world, have unceasingly advocated for the sanctity of human life and continually supported legislative efforts to increase protection of human life." They claim to agree with the "objectives" of the proposed state constitutional amendment but oppose the approach because it "does not provide a realistic opportunity for ending or reducing abortion in Georgia."
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In his message to new United States Ambassador Mary Ann Glendon on Friday, Pope Benedict praised the pro-life and pro-family work of numerous Americans. In the address marking the Pope's acceptance of Glendon as US ambassador, the Pope celebrated "the efforts of so many of your fellow-citizens and government leaders to ensure legal protection for God's gift of life from conception to natural death, and the safeguarding of the institution of marriage, acknowledged as a stable union between a man and a woman, and that of the family."
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After a series of events with pro-abortion speakers at Catholic colleges, a coalition of pro-life groups have issued a new statement calling on Catholic universities to stop inviting such speakers. They say the speakers violate the Catholic Church's pro-life views and an admonishment by the U.S. bishops not to give pro-abortion politicians a platform. Organized by the Cardinal Newman Society, a Catholic college watchdog group, the statement urges Catholic institutions to "refrain from all activities that provide a public platform to" abortion advocates. It calls on the educational institutions to not "imply support or even neutrality toward, political leaders and candidates who advocate positions on serious moral issues that are clearly contrary to Catholic teaching."
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In fact, the dirty secret of Planned Parenthood is this: Its founder, a one-time nurse named Margaret Sanger, believed that America needed "to cut down on the rapid multiplication of the unfit and undesirable at home" through methods of eugenics. Merriam-Webster defines eugenics this way: "a science that deals with the improvement (as by control of human mating) of hereditary qualities of a race or breed." Much evidence points to Sanger being a racist. To stop the "multiplication" of those she saw as unfit, Sanger sought to halt "medical and nursing facilities to slum mothers," as she wrote in her book, "The Pivot of Civilization." (Of course, we cannot depend on our so-called mainstream media to report on Sanger's shameful writings.)
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In every country where abortion is being promoted, the insistent mantra of the abortion promoters is the lie that "unsafe (i.e., illegal) abortion" is damaging women's lives and should be replaced by "safe and legal" abortion. The transformation of abortion from illegal to legal is supposed to make it - magically - safe for women. That was but one of the many lies about abortion that the US Supreme Court swallowed in 1973 when it legalized this killing procedure. While the abortion industry itself admitted that most of the illegal abortions were done by trained doctors in the comfort of their offices, very few arguments were as persuasive as the one that said women would be served by eliminating "back-alley" abortions and replacing them with abortion on demand. This pernicious lie is still a favorite argument of the abortion industry around the world, and they must marvel at how easily people fall for it.
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Another Catholic Diocese has asked parishes and schools within its jurisdiction to break their ties with the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure because of its involvement with abortion. Komen has come under intense scrutiny over the years for making donations to Planned Parenthood, the nation's largest abortion business. In this case, the Diocese of Little Rock is asking that Catholic groups there no longer support or fundraise for the breast cancer organization. The decision could have significant financial effects for Komen as several Catholic churches and schools have hosted teams for the annual race, according to an Arkansas Catholic report.
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In last night's debate between Senator Barack Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton, MSNBC moderator Tim Russert asked both presidential candidates whether there was "any word or vote that you'd like to take back" in your "careers in public service." Senator Obama cited his role in a unanimous decision by the U.S. Senate regarding the Terry Schiavo case. He said it was "a mistake" for the Congress "to interject itself into that decision-making process of the families" to settle her fate...
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We are just five months away from the 40th anniversary of the papal encyclical on birth control, entitled Humanae Vitae, and I am writing to ask your assistance in a project that I hope will impact thousands of men responsible for this marvelous teaching-our priests and seminarians. The project is simple: to send to as many priests and seminarians as possible a new email newsletter that is dedicated to educating them on the teaching of this encyclical. In a moment, I will tell you how you can help me in this project, but first let me explain why this is important. There are two complaints that I have heard in literally every one of the 50+ countries I have visited. Complaint one is that priests don't preach enough about abortion. That is painfully apparent to all of us. Complaint two is that they are almost totally silent about the issue of birth control as well. Some have described this as a "conspiracy of silence" in the face of one of the most important issues of our day.
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U.S. taxpayers are being forced to fund America's largest and leading abortion non-profit corporation, Planned Parenthood, to the tune of $305.3 million annually. Despite claims that Planned Parenthood provides a wide-range of family-planning services, the organization boasts of being the world's largest abortion provider-performing a record 264,943 abortions in the fiscal year 2005-2006 -- a time period during which they made no adoption referrals (Source: Family Research Council). In the previous year, Planned Parenthood had reported 1,414 adoption referrals, which amounts to one adoption for every 180 abortions.
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A young woman, who was considered a talented artist, loved to paint and had sold a number of paintings, was found dead in her home in Helston, Cornwall, UK. Emma Beck committed suicide on February 1, 2007 after aborting her twin babies in September 2006. She left a suicide note which said, "Living is hell for me. I should never have had an abortion. I see now I would have been a good mum. I told everyone I didn't want to do it, even at the hospital. I was frightened, now it is too late. I died when my babies died. I want to be with my babies - they need me, no one else does."
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Former president Bill Clinton made a campaign stop for Hillary in Steubenville, Ohio on Sunday and found himself greeted by more than 100 pro-life students from nearby Steubenville University. According to eye witnesses accounts, Clinton lost his temper and lashed out at the pro-life students during the speech. Clinton's heated response came after being questioned on his support of abortion-on-demand. "I gave you the answer. We disagree with you," Clinton said about the position he and Hillary Clinton hold on abortion.
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A pro-life nurse is seconding a statement made by Alan Keyes that Jesus Christ would not vote for Barack Obama, pointing to his support for infanticide. Jill Stanek is a nurse who discovered babies were being aborted alive and shelved to die in soiled utility rooms while working at a hospital in Illinois and since has been a strong advocate against partial-birth and live-birth abortions. According to her commentary on WorldNetDaily.com, Stanek explains why Keyes made his statement.
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The battle for life has only just begun in Jamaica, but the best part of it is that the defenders of life have a fighting chance because they are getting organized now. They are working very hard to keep their people faithful to their founding vision of "respecting all" and "cherishing the weak." Please pray the prayer to the Guardian Angel of Jamaica on the side bar of this email and keep their valiant efforts in prayer for at least the near future.
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For 12 years the Roman Catholic Church enjoyed a happy solidarity with the White House on the issue of abortion. It was an emblematic alliance of the politics of the 1980's: Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush, shoulder to shoulder with cardinals and bishops from Democratic redoubts like New York and Boston, standing firm on the issue that has consumed the church hierarchy in recent years. Now the bishops have a new President, one who carried the Catholic vote last fall, who is a graduate of a Catholic university and who has endorsed much of the social welfare agenda that the National Conference of Catholic Bishops has advocated for years. But this President also chose, as one of his first acts, to begin to roll back 12 years of Republican abortion restrictions, and he has promised to do more.
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President Bush declared Sunday to be a national pro-life day for Americans to recognize the sanctity of human life. With elections this year and a new president taking office this time next year, it could be the last of Sanctity of Human Life Day that President Bush can declare during his two terms as president. "On National Sanctity of Human Life Day, we recognize that each life has inherent dignity and matchless value, and we reaffirm our steadfast determination to defend the weakest and most vulnerable members of our society," the president said in a proclamation LifeNews.com obtained.
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The Wisconsin State Assembly has passed legislation mandating that all Wisconsin hospitals, including religiously-affiliated hospitals, must inform any self-described victim of sexual assault of "emergency contraception" and must provide it upon her request. Emergency contraception, as defined by the bill, includes both the morning-after pill and the intrauterine device (IUD). The morning-after pill can alter the lining of the uterus so that a newly conceived embryo cannot implant in the womb, leading to its death. The IUD always blocks implantation, also causing the death of any newly conceived human being. "It is a sad day for Wisconsin," said Peggy Hammil, state director of Pro-life Wisconsin.
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It goes without saying that the annual March for Life is one of the most exciting and unifying events in the international movement to defend life. 100,000+ pro-lifers converged on our nation's capital this week, more than half of whom were under the age of 25, and declared that the slaughter of the innocents is never going to be accepted as a permanent institution in our nation. Abortion-promoters would be hard-pressed to show the world that they could sustain such a massive public movement in their favor for 35 straight years. I can only say, "Bravo!" to all the people - especially the kids - who made great sacrifices to join us in Washington this week.
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While Hillary Clinton was courting votes, Rick Majerus was courting trouble. First, he said he was "not going to go there." Then, he did. The Catholic basketball coach for the Catholic St. Louis University looked into the TV camera at the Clinton rally last weekend and said, "I'm pro-choice, personally." That's when the Roman Catholic coach ran smack into the Roman Catholic archbishop. On Tuesday, St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke said St. Louis University should discipline Majerus for comments he made at the rally. Burke also told the Post-Dispatch that he would deny Majerus holy Communion if the coach did not change his positions on abortion rights and embryonic stem cell research.
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Thirty-five years ago today the United States Supreme Court declared and decided that under the law an unborn child is not considered a person. But we know many things about the unborn. Biology confirms that from the start each unborn child is a separate individual with his or her own genetic code. Babies can now survive outside the mother's womb at younger and younger ages. And the fingers and toes and beating hearts that we can see on an unborn child's ultrasound come with something that we cannot see: a soul. (Applause.)
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A group of 96 prominent Catholics have issued a petition opposing a November 2007 "Call for Civility" that had urged Catholics not to demand excommunication for politicians at odds with Catholic teachings on abortion. The signers of the new statement believe the November statement would have the effect of silencing the pro-life movement and silencing criticism of pro-abortion Catholic politicians. Among the 96 signers are Templeton Prize winner Michael Novak, authors Robert Royal and Peter Kreeft, and columnist Russell Shaw. Austin Ruse, president of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute (C-FAM), and one of the organizers of the new statement said, "Rather than giving pro-abortion Catholic politicians a pass, we should vote them out of office and encourage them to repent."
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Americans United for Life (AUL) has released their fifth annual ranking of the most and least Pro-Life states. AUL works with state legislators across the nation to pass effective Pro-Life laws. This new national ranking of states shows Michigan in the lead, followed by Louisiana, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Kansas. AUL's criteria covers each state's treatment of all Pro-Life issues and the final ranking depends largely on each state's enactment of prudent and well-supported laws limiting abortions as much as the Supreme Court has allowed. Among the laws that AUL looks for are informed consent, parental involvement for minors, abortion facility regulations, and abortion funding limits.
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A state judge in Kansas has confirmed there are "discrepancies" in abortion industry records submitted to the state, casting doubt on whether Planned Parenthood followed state law when it performed late-term abortions on babies that might have been able to live outside the womb. The testimony came from Shawnee County District Judge Richard Anderson in a court hearing on the issue of whether records provided by the industry to the state are accurate, and whether they show a pattern of failing to follow Kansas law.
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American Life League slammed the latest ad campaign of Planned Parenthood Golden Gate, describing their new "safe sex" ad as a promotion tool for new abortions, and took strong exception to the fact that the campaign was paid for with taxpayer dollars. "Planned Parenthood says it promotes sexual health, but in reality, it's just promoting recreational sex," said American Life League vice president Jim Sedlak. Planned Parenthood Golden Gate recently released an ad campaign to be aired on MTV, VH-1, and Comedy Central that associates Planned Parenthood with the so-called Mile High Club.
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The latest news from Catholics for a Free Choice (CFFC) is nothing short of gravely misguided. Their theme is "Prevention not Prohibition" and the subject is, of course, abortion. CFFC claims to speak for Catholics throughout the country who apparently do not accept Church teaching, do not believe that abortion is an act of murder and do not want anything to impede "mainstream" thoughts and positions on the subject of reproductive rights. Or should I say instant sexual satisfaction? CFFC claims that 97 percent of Catholic women have used an artificial method of contraception and Catholic women have abortions at the same rate as others in the nation. Such statistics should not be a cause for celebration but rather a reason to challenge the status quo, challenge the misguided Catholics, beseech the bishops to teach and stick to spreading truth rather than pandering to sexual urges.
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When Mr. Snell tried to counsel the woman, his words were cut short when the man became furious, jumped the fence and, in the words of Mr. McTernan, "leaped on the vehicle with Ed and catapulted him off of the vehicle and onto the ground." Mr. Snell hit his back and head on the pavement and was knocked unconscious. His medical report outlines the extent of his injuries: "multiple trauma, right subarachnoid hemorrhage (bleeding in the area between the brain and the tissues that cover the brain), compression fractures of four vertebrae (T3, T4, T5 and T10), right scapula fracture and fracture of the fourth and fifth ribs." Before doctors were able to stop the bleeding in his head, they even feared Mr. Snell would die.
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14 protesters were arrested outside Rudy Giuliani's headquarters in Manchester. Among them were dedicated anti-Abortion leaders, Randall Terry (founder of Operation Rescue), Joan Andrews-Bell (who has served multiple years in prison and is the Author of "You Reject Them, You Reject Me.") and her son Emiliano (whom suffers from "frozen joint disease" and was adopted after being rescued from a dumpster after being born with no legs.) 11 anti-abortion protestors led by Randall Terry were arrested on Tuesday for blocking the entrance to Guiliani's headquarters and charged for criminal trespassing. On Wednesday other activists followed suit: Joan Andrews Bell, son Emiliano and Willy Lewis.
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As it does every Christmas season, Planned Parenthood e-mails its supporters a Christmas card titled, "Choice on Earth." This year it has an accompanying video on "Moments that inspired us in 2007." One of the highlights of the year is the opening of a new clinic in Aurora, Illinois. Catholic League president Bill Donohue ripped into this today: "Planned Parenthood says it stands for choice. So do serial killers and rapists. Jeffrey Dahmer believed in choice as well. Choice, of course, carries no moral quotient by itself-it must have an object. And the object of choice that Planned Parenthood prizes is killing kids in utero. But to admit this is to admit to a moral monstrosity. Which explains why it prefers to talk about a woman's 'right to choose,' without ever finishing the sentence.
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The sports world recently greeted the news that this year's Heisman Trophy Winner, Tim Tebow from the University of Florida, was almost a casualty of abortion. Twenty-some years ago he was not the strapping 6'3", 235 lb. beloved sports hero that he is today. At that time he was a one-inch-long unborn child whose existence, because of an amoebic infection, was defined as threat to his mother's health. Pam Tebow, his mother, was told by a doctor that it would be in her best interests to abort this baby, and she refused. Her husband backed her up on that generous decision, and seven months later they gave birth to a perfectly healthy boy. Little did they know that twenty years later they would be standing on a national stage with a Heisman Trophy winner giving that magnificent witness to life. The world thanks you, Mr. and Mrs. Tebow! There cannot be a more touching Advent story than this.
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University of Florida quarterback Tim Tebow became the first sophomore in the history of the NCAA to win the coveted Heisman Trophy as the best football player in the nation. However, Tebow's accomplishments may never have been supported had his mother followed a doctor's recommendation to have an abortion. With 29 passing touchdowns and 22 rushing touchdowns, Tebow displayed the kind of versatility that has become more valued at the quarterback position. Pam Tebow and her husband were Christian missionaries in the Philippines in 1985 and they prayed for "Timmy" before she became pregnant. Unfortunately, as the Gainesville Sun reports, Pam entered into a coma after she contracted amoebic dysentery, an infection of the intestine caused by a parasite found in a contaminated food or drink.
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Not wanting to become known as the town quack, I am reluctant to write another politically incorrect column about breast cancer. Four weeks ago, when I reported a study that found a statistical link between abortion and breast cancer, the hate e-mail poured in, denouncing me for being an ignorant, stupid, anti-science, anti-choice and anti-woman lunatic. But it also brought a message alerting me to yet another study, suggesting that premenopausal women (younger than 50) who used oral contraceptives prior to having their first child faced a higher risk of breast cancer. Yes, I know, this debate has been going on for years, if not decades, and judging by the last studies given wide exposure a few years ago by the media, the issue seems settled: Oral contraception does not significantly increase the risk of breast cancer. There's just one problem. According to an analysis in one of the most credible peer-reviewed journals in the country, the Mayo Clinic Proceedings, the risk is real...
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When it comes to the Republican presidential candidates, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee insists in a new interview that he is the strongest. He says that's because none of the other top-tier GOP hopefuls support a human life amendment to the Constitution as he does. While Rudy Giuliani is clearly pro-abortion, the human life amendment has been a sticky subject among the leading pro-life Republican candidates. Huckabee has sought to use it to separate himself from the pack.
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So "stem-cell" is code, a slogan, the fact understood by political consultants and their candidates, by the abortion rights groups and the politicians who seek their votes and by those that oppose abortion rights and seek those other votes. Human embryos don't vote. Many Americans don't believe there is life in them at such an early stage. I do. But others don't. Yet if left alone in a mother's womb, nurtured there, surely they'd be born to run and breathe and think and speak, and perhaps grow old enough to vote. And they'd want to survive and they'd express that desire through public policy debates, like this one.
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A leading Catholic cardinal says Catholic voters who continue to support the Democratic Party despite its pro-abortion stance are doing the Church a disservice. He says the party has been openly hostile to pro-life advocates and Catholic support for pro-abortion Democratic candidates "borders on scandal." Cardinal Sean O'Malley of Boston says he has policy differences with the Republican party but he is more concerned about the Democratic Party because abortion is an overriding issue more important than others. O'Malley, the head of the Boston archdiocese, made the statements to the Boston Globe in an interview published Thursday.
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October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Breast cancer detection, prevention, research and treatment are of the utmost importance due to the devastating impact that this disease has on women and their families. Pro-life citizens who are interested in fighting this deadly disease should be aware that one breast cancer organization, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, has a policy of offering financial support to abortion providing facilities. Here are the Komen-Planned Parenthood facts (followed by a list of alternative organizations)...
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A British actuary magazine has published an article saying the link between abortion and breast cancer will cause an epidemic there. The Actuary, a professional magazine, says England and Wales will likely see a rise in the number of women afflicted with the deadly disease. The article discusses the impact the link will have for the life and health insurance and health care industries through 2029. The article is based on the findings of Patrick Carroll, a statistician and actuary, who recently released a study showing that abortions is the best factor for predicting the incidence of breast cancer among women. Carroll published his forecasts of breast cancer rates last month in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons.
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A leading pro-abortion law firm has released a new report saying thirty states are likely to ban most or all abortions if the Supreme Court reverses the Roe v. Wade decision. The firm also conducted a poll finding many Americans are unaware of pro-life efforts to get abortion bans in place for when the high court overturns the case. The New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights says Roe is under attack like never before with pro-life activists using new strategies at both the state and federal level. It's most recent version of its report "What if Roe Fell?" finds that pro-life groups are advocating both immediate bans on abortion as well as trigger laws that would make abortions illegal if Roe is reversed.
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Colorado Springs Bishop Michael Sheridan spoke with LifeSiteNews.com yesterday about the use of the morning after pill in Catholic hospitals. Despite the fact that Catholic hospitals in many US dioceses have been administering the drug in rape cases, the recent decision of the Bishops of Connecticut to permit the morning after pill Plan B to be administered in Catholic hospitals in cases of rape even without an ovulation test has reignited the debate. With all the debate over Plan B only one thing is certain. That is that no one can be absolutely certain that when administered after sexual intercourse (with or without an ovulation test) Plan B will not cause an abortion.
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Pro-life advocates in the US have asked for the suspension of taxpayer funds to Planned Parenthood, the largest and richest abortionist organisation in the world. Citing a criminal case against the group, pro-life leaders will send a letter to all members of Congress urging suspension of the more than $300 million Planned Parenthood receives as a tax free organisation. A grand jury indictment is pending against Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri on 107 counts, 23 felony and 84 misdemeanour, of unlawful late-term abortions and other abortion-connected crimes. The case is set to go forward since a judge ruled there is "probable cause" to proceed. The allegations were brought by Johnson County District Attorney Phill Kline.
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In what is likely the most significant contribution to date in the debate over the use of the so-called "emergency contraception" pills at Catholic hospitals, renowned theologian Fr. Peter Damian Fehlner has written on the subject. The Doctor of Sacred Theology who has been teaching theology in Franciscan universities and seminaries in the US and Italy for forty years, has questioned the basis on which the whole issue is based - namely whether it is permitted for Catholics to administer Plan B even if it acted as a contraceptive rather than causing abortions. Fr. Fehlner, who was the North American Superior for the Franciscan Friars of the Immaculate in the United States from 1996 to 2002, dismissed outright the use of Plan B at Catholic hospitals where there is any doubt as to it possibility of causing an abortion.
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The rights of pharmacists and other health care professionals to refuse to dispense abortifacient drugs have taken a step forward, according to a statement from the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ). A long running dispute between the state of Illinois, pharmacy owners such as Walgreens and Walmart stores and several pharmacists who refused to dispense abortifacient drugs has resulted in an agreement that pharmacists must be allowed to opt out. In 2005, Walgreens pharmacist Rich Quayle was suspended from his job and said he would look for other work rather than agree to dispense the morning after pill in accord with a recently passed law. In April 2005, Governor Rod Blagojevich said that the "right of conscience does not apply to pharmacists" and issued an edict attempting to force all pharmacists in the state to distribute the drugs.
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A headline in the October 15th Chicago Sun-Times reads, "Planned Parenthood is not the enemy in abortion fight." Such a statement could have come straight out of Planned Parenthood's own marketing plan. Unfortunately, the facts do not support the perception Planned Parenthood wants to create with this marketing message. In 2006, the Guttmacher Institute (research arm of Planned Parenthood) rated the states on the effectiveness of their state-funded birth control distribution programs. States such as New York and California were rated excellent while Nebraska was rated poor. Which of these states do you think have high abortion rates? Remember, Planned Parenthood claims that better access to birth control will reduce abortions. Well, New York and California are among the states with the highest abortion rates while Nebraska has low abortion rates. Thus, Planned Parenthood's own statistics demonstrate the failure to achieve their claimed results....
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Several months ago I heard a provocative description of martyrdom from Fr. Robert Cook, President of the new Wyoming Catholic College. His idea was that martyrdom in the modern age is not necessarily one of bloody (red) martyrs who die violently for the Faith. Neither is it the daily, silent and sacrificial (white) martyrdom of humble believers. He says that modern martyrs will manifest their heroic courage economically; that is, we will be called to pay dearly for our principles, not necessarily at the cost of lives, but at the cost of dollars. This is "green" martyrdom, and it has nothing to do with the environmental movement. The pagan enemies of Christianity today are not honest enough to put a gun to our heads and demand that we renounce Christ, even though they often express their unmitigated contempt for us in various ways. One has only to witness the blasphemy of the recent Fulsom Street homosexual festival in San Francisco to know that vitriolic hatred for Christianity is alive and well in our society. Our enemies know, however, that even though many Catholics would undoubtedly give up their lives for Christ, people find it much harder to give up their jobs for Christ. When faced with a choice between fidelity to a clear teaching of the Faith or compromising on that principle for the sake of "keeping peace at home" or saving one's reputation, etc., the pagans know that it takes a heroic person to choose the abstract principle. Yet, a sacrificial commitment to principle is where the call to martyrdom lies in the modern age, and increasingly so, for Catholics and all men and women of good conscience. Standing on principle costs us dearly.
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In a letter to the Catholic Bishops of Connecticut sent October 4, the national Catholic Media Coalition (CMC) begged the bishops to rescind their recent approval to dispense the abortifacient drug Plan B to rape victims at Catholic hospitals in the state. (See letter at end of email, and at www.catholicmediacoalition.org/pr_ct_cath_conf_10_5_07.htm).. "Rape is a horrible crime," said CMC President Mary Ann Kreitzer speaking on behalf of the group. "Women need help and support at such a time. But the fact that the woman is the victim of a violent act cannot justify her committing a violent act against her innocent unborn child. It is a grave scandal to have Catholic bishops approve the use of this abortion drug. Their capitulation encourages further coercion by the government against the Church. No less than our first amendment freedom of religion is at stake. Additionally, bishops who won't fight for a one-week-old baby are likely to betray older babies and the elderly and vulnerable as well. We demand that the Connecticut bishops rescind this evil decision."
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Members of Catholic Citizens of Illinois learned a little about how to vote during the 2008 election when Father Frank Pavone spoke at the group's annual dinner meeting Sept. 25 at the Wyndham-Drake Hotel in Oak Brook. Catholic Citizens of Illinois was founded in 1996 by a group of Catholics who were concerned by trends in voting behavior and public opinion polls. The group is working to restore traditional Catholic values in the lives of Illinois' public. With her 1-year-old son, Sam, in tow, Sara Burch of Lombard was one of nearly 300 people who attended the dinner. "I am here to support Catholic Citizens of Illinois because I think it is a great pro-life group and to hear Father Pavone, who is a great voice in the pro-life movement," she said.
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The Philadelphia-based National Catholic Bioethics Center(NCBC) has released a statement to help clarify the Connecticut Catholic Bishops' decision on the Connecticut legislation mandating contraceptive treatment for rape victims. Meanwhile, Human Life International has also weighed in on the deicison saying it contains "extremely egregious errors" and has asked the bishops to reverse their resolution. The legislation has been controversial because the state's Catholic bishops have allowed the use of the "Plan B" contraceptive as required by the law. "Plan B" works by preventing ovulation, but may also render a woman's womb hostile to a fertilized egg if she has already ovulated.
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In an interview with the CBS News program "60 Minutes" scheduled for broadcast tonight, pro-life Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas says abortion was behind all of the attacks on him during his confirmation hearings. He called the confirmation process a "high tech lynching." Thomas tells newsman Steve Kroft that the whole issue of alleged sexual harassment was a front for abortion advocates to attack him over the issue of abortion. "That was the elephant in the room... That was the issue," he tells CBS News. "That is the issue that people are apparently so upset about." "[That is the issue] that you determine the composition of your Supreme Court and your entire federal judiciary, it seems now," Justice Thomas adds.
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Planned Parenthood, trying to pressure Aurora, Ill., officials to allow a new superstore abortion clinic to open quickly even though it was deceptive in its permit applications, has launched an attack on area pro-lifers by citing their "violent tendencies," even though the claims at issue were rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court three times, including a rare unanimous decision just last year. The attack came from Steve Trombley, president of Planned Parenthood/Chicago Area, who sent a three-page letter to all 12 Aurora aldermen and Mayor Tom Weisner following accusations the abortion business defrauded city staff about the medical building, which was scheduled to open Sept. 18. However, since the site is zoned for medical offices under a temporary occupancy permit under the name of Gemini Health Center, Weisner said the city will do an investigation on the legality of the permitting process.
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A lawsuit against Planned Parenthood and its Chicago executive will be filed today, seeking $7.5 million for publicly accusing peaceful pro-life activists of having a record of advocating violence. The lawsuit is being prepared by the Thomas More Society of Chicago, whose chief counsel, Tom Brejcha, told WND the action is scheduled to be filed today in Kane County on behalf of pro-life protesters who are opposing the opening of a mega-clinic abortion facility in suburban Aurora. On her blog, WND columnist Jill Stanek reveals that a number of Aurora residents who took part in a 40-day prayer vigil over Planned Parenthood's plans to open the mega-clinic will be listed as plaintiffs.
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A change of policy at Georgetown University Law Center will permit the University - which is the oldest Catholic university in the nation - to give grants to students who lobby for abortion for agencies such as Planned Parenthood. The Hoya, the Georgetown University newspaper, reports on its front page today about the policy change. The policy change was announced September 7 by Law Center Dean T. Alexander Aleinikoff in a letter published in the Law Center's student newspaper. The decision comes after the Law Center got flack from pro-abortion students and faculty for directing student group Equal Justice Foundation, which received University funds, to refuse funding to a student who applied for funding to intern at Planned Parenthood.
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Bishop Samuel Aquila of Fargo is strongly urging his priests to imitate him by praying for one hour in front of an abortion facility during this year's national Forty Days of Life. The Forty Days for Life will begin Sept. 26 and conclude Nov. 4. According to organizers, churches and groups in 89 U.S. cities and 33 states have agreed to participate by conducting vigils in front of abortion clinics, praying, and fasting. Bishop Aquila, who has committed to one hour of prayer at the abortion facility Sept. 28 at 10:30 a.m., wants to encourage participation by all of the faithful through his own example and the example of his priests.
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"Thank you for expressing your concerns about reports that the Bishop's Conference allegedly hired a "pro-choice advocate" as the Director of Domestic Social Development. Please be assured that new Director, Kathy Saile, is a faithful Catholic who is pro-life and fully committed to the Catholic Church and its moral and social teaching, beginning with the right to life. These matters were fully explored and confirmed in the hiring process and in reference checks. These charges apparently originated in blogs suggesting that Kathy Saile is pro-choice because she spoke at a dinner sponsored by a pro-choice women's group. Here are some of the relevant facts..."
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How political should faithful Catholics be? Find out when you attend Catholic Citizens of Illinois' annual awards banquest on September 25, 2007, at the Wyndham Drake Hotel, Oak Brook. The speaker will be Fr. Frank Pavone, founder of Priests for Life and a new order of priests and nuns for life. The subject will be the Role of Catholics in Public Life. Invitations will be sent to our members. The public is welcome. To reserve your seats, please call 708-352-5834. Tickets are $60. Tables of 10 are $500.
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A victory celebration will be underway tonight as citizens in Aurora celebrate the fact that they have at least delayed the opening of the largest abortion center in the United States. Today a federal judge stopped Planned Parenthood of Aurora from opening as scheduled tomorrow. The massive Planned Parenthood facility applied for a building permit under false pretences and outraged the community. Led by the Pro-Life Action League, thousands have protested outside the yet-to-be opened facility for the last month attracting the attention of the international media. "Today's court action demonstrates that truth still matters in America. This is exactly what we've been praying for these past 40 days, that Planned Parenthood would not open on September 18," said Eric Scheidler of the Pro-Life Action League, "We trust that the judge will allow Aurora to fully investigate how Planned Parenthood tried to come into town without disclosing who they were and their plans to perform abortions. Planned Parenthood had 13 appointments scheduled for Tuesday's opening. If God's answer spared 13 innocent lives, then we give the Lord the praise for the delay and the ultimate permanent closing of this abortion mill."
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Planned Parenthood apparently thinks there is a Federal law that prevents communities from discriminating against them. They will argue in Federal Court on 9/17/07 that Aurora "has become corrupted by politics." Planned Parenthood attorneys will demand that the Federal Court force Aurora to allow the September 18th opening of their $7.5 million facility. They will argue that an ongoing investigation by Aurora into whether Planned Parenthood failed to comply with local ordinances cannot be justified, even though Planned Parenthood used deceptive means to obtain permits for building their abortion fortress at 3051 E. New York Street. Documents filed with Aurora were submitted by Gemini Office Development LLC and claimed that the occupant of the facility was "unknown at this time."
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Several hundred parishioners packed a Catholic church in Aurora Wednesday night to pray that a Planned Parenthood women's health center never opens in their backyard. More than 350 parishioners crowded into the sandy-brick-colored church as the pungent scent of incense hung in the air. Diocese of Joliet Bishop J. Peter Sartain served as chief celebrant at the 7:30 p.m. Mass at the Church of Our Lady of Mercy, 701 S. Eola Road, Aurora. "We're here because we're sad about the possibility of an abortion clinic opening up down the street," Sartain said during his homily. "There are so many ways, every day, that we have of creating a culture of life."
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Please join the largest coalition of pro-life organizations ever assembled in Illinois on at 9am on Sat. Sept 15 for the "Jerico Walk" protesting the massive abortion mill in Aurora, IL
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Catholic University of America (CUA) has invited former presidential candidate, Senator John Kerry to speak on environmentalism and the Iraq war this semester despite initial opposition by the office of University Center, Student Programs and Events (UCSPE). The Tower, the campus paper of Catholic University, said the UCSPE had initially objected to Kerry's appearance, saying there is an "unwritten" campus rule banning political candidates during an election year. Kerry, who still receives Communion regularly, has 100 per cent pro-abortion voting record according to NARAL Pro-Choice America. During the 2004 presidential debates, Kerry claimed that he was "personally against abortion", but would not "take what is an article of faith for me and legislate it for someone who doesn't share that article of faith."
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CCI NOTES: Please join Bishop Sartain and Joliet (IL) Diocese Catholics in a day of prayer and penance, September 7, 2007. As many CCI readers are already aware, Planned Parenthood is opening a massive abortion mill in Aurora IL. Bishop Sartain has asked that Catholics everywhere join us in prayer for the promotion of a Culture of Life and an end to abortion. Thanks!
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A second leading Catholic official has resigned his membership with Amnesty International over the human rights group's decision to support abortion. Cardinal Keith O'Brien of Scotland said he could no longer be affiliated with the organization after joining as a student more than 40 years ago. The head of the Catholic Church in Scotland wrote the director of the group and said it gave him "great sadness" to renounce his membership but he can't support a group that opposes a "basic right to human life." "As a matter of conscience and with great sadness I have decided to resign from Amnesty International having first joined as a student and supported it over many decades," Cardinal O'Brien wrote about his decision.
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Making abortion easily available has also made it easy for others to pressure or even force women and girls into unwanted abortions. If given real support, options, and resources to have their children, the vast majority of women having abortions would continue the pregnancy. Instead of receiving support, however, many find that they are pushed, coerced, lied to, or threatened until they undergo an abortion. In some cases, women have been assaulted and even murdered by their partners for refusing to have abortions-homicide is the leading cause of death among pregnant women.3
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September 5, 2007 marks the 10th anniversary of the death of Mother Teresa. Now declared "Blessed," she continues to inspire disciples of Christ worldwide. My own interaction with her came shortly after I took leadership of Priests for Life. I asked if I could visit with her in Calcutta, and spent a week with her in June of 1994 discussing the new ministry I was leading, and the direction of pro-life strategy overall. Two events that had recently occurred shaped our conversations. One was the speech she had given in February at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, DC. She spoke in the presence of President and Mrs. Clinton and Vice-President and Mrs. Gore. It was an unforgettable moment, as this short, humble woman proclaimed to those in power: "...If we accept that a mother can kill even her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another?...Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but to use any violence to get what they want. This is why the greatest destroyer of love and peace is abortion."
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When Planned Parenthood shows up in town, young people are lured into dangerous sexual behavior. As Planned Parenthood's Teen Wire website shows, Planned Parenthood has no respect for family values and encourages teens to engage in risky, unhealthy sexual behavior. Planned Parenthood drives a wedge between parents and their children. Families Against Planned Parenthood is a grassroots coalition of concerned citizens, community groups, churches and neighborhoods determined to defend our families from the dangerous influence of Planned Parenthood. We want to keep Planned Parenthood out of our community (in Aurora IL.) For more information CLICK HERE
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Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton campaigned in New Hampshire over the weekend and told voters that the she won't soften her hard-core pro-abortion views if she's elected president. That could cause her problems as a recent poll showed extreme pro-abortion views are a turnoff to women voters. Clinton promised she would bring change as president but also vowed she would never compromise on her pro-abortion views. "Ultimately, to bring change, you have to know when to stand your ground, and when to find common ground," she said. "You need to know when to stick to principles and fight, and know when to make principled compromises."
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The coalition of pro-life musicians, Rock for Life, which claims some 700 musicians as members, says that Amnesty International's new abortion policy risks alienating some of its pro-life celebrity supporters. Rock for Life has accused Amnesty of "duping" pro-life singers, such as Christina Aguilera and Avril Lavigne, who are among those featured an Amnesty CD to raise awareness and funding for the survivors of Darfur, reports The Sunday Times. The CD was released two months ago and has sold more than 400,000 copies to date. Rock for Life accuses Amnesty of using the CD to promote abortion, without making its intentions clear to the singers because it didn't consult its membership before adopting its new pro-abortion stance.
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In Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov, the Grand Inquisitor spoke of something that should be broadcast to today's Catholic Hierarchy, top to the bottom. The Antichrist will invert the Sermon on the Mount. Instead of seeking first God's Kingdom, it behooves modern mankind to reorder priorities. First comes the wherewithal for modern economic security, next comes Our Lord's command. Here, then, is a mark of the progressivist spirit. When it comes to marriage and babies, look first to what it is going to cost you. If you "increase and multiply," won't your worries likewise increase, while pari passu your saving's account decreases? The progressivist clergy has created mindsets such as, "My confessor told me that: 'The individual decision is the last word,' and mine calls for family `responsibility.'
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If abstinence outside of marriage is the only truly responsible choice, then how can we expect young people who first choose the irresponsible behavior of having premarital sex to somehow become responsible on a lower plane by using birth control consistently and correctly? It is only human nature, as reflected in the desire for instant gratification, to ignore not just the first norm of behavior, but the remaining ones as well. Sex outside of marriage will lead to casual sex, that is, sex without stopping to deal with the inconveniences of birth control, high prices or otherwise. The only responsible choice is abstinence before marriage and fidelity within marriage. Any other choice is irresponsible because it is guaranteed to produce negative consequences sooner or later.
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Amnesty International affiliates have reaffirmed a decision their leading officials made in April to endorse abortion. The vote reconfirms the human rights group's position supporting abortion in cases when women are victims of sexual abuse -- especially in war-torn areas. Amnesty's nine-member executive committee voted to back abortion in those cases or when a pregnancy threatens a woman's life or health and the decision came under fire because it was done without the consent of AI's national chapters. With their official backing, AI will now move ahead with plans to promote abortion in areas like Darfur and to try to get nations in places like Latin America and Africa to overturn their pro-life laws prohibiting abortions.
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A new poll conducted by a leading web site for evangelical Christians finds a significant number of pro-life advocates would support a Democratic presidential candidate who opposes abortion. However, the 2008 elections won't likely give voters that option as all of the leading Democrats strongly back abortion. The Christian web portal ChristiaNet.com conducted a survey of 900 of its members, virtually all of whom are pro-life Christians. Asked "Would you elect a Pro-Life Democrat for president?" the poll showed 43% said they would vote for a Democrat willing to support legal protection for unborn children.
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A massive pro-life press conference and rally was held near the newly-constructed facilities of a mega Planned Parenthood abortion mill on Thursday. The event was part of a full-scale campaign launched by pro-lifers from the Chicago district to prevent the clinic's scheduled opening this fall. About four hundred people attended the pro-life rally that was held at the Prisco Community Center in Aurora. Pro-life flyers, little plastic figures of foetuses and other information and promotional material lined the tables inside the building. Jim Sedlak of STOPP Planned Parenthood, one of the keynote speakers during the day's events, encouraged the pro-life campaign, mentioning another case in which protesters stopped a facility by raising legal challenges. At the rally Sedlack encouraged pro-lifers to continue their fight against Planned Parenthood because it "can" be beaten.
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On August 15 we celebrate the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It was not a coincidence that Pope Pius XII, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, decided to announce in the year 1950, i.e. shortly after the end of World War II, the Dogma that the Mother of God was assumed into Heaven body and soul. This dogma underlines the importance of both the human body and the human soul in this life and the next. It was during the time of the Nazi and Stalinist barbarianism which overshadowed Europe that the lack of respect for the human and his body was seen. One of the methods of this cruelty was euthanasia. It appeared in different forms. One such method was the so-called "merciful death" program which was implemented to destroy the mentally retarded and mentally ill in Germany and occupied countries. Families were told that it did not make any sense for these people to "suffer" in their "useless" or "non-human" state. The "under humans," that is Jews, Poles, and Gypsies, were also killed, and in particular those who were "not useful" for society, such as the elderly and children. Next their bodies were profaned and burned, and the ashes disposed off as garbage.
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Since Hong Kong became a part of China again in 1997, the former British province has become a refuge for women on the mainland who are escaping the Asian nation's brutal one-child family planning policy that involves forced abortions and sterilizations. The China policy, which prevents most people in the country from having more than one child, does not apply to Hong Kong. Leaders of the former city-state frequently encourage residents there to have three children per family in order to sustain its population.
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Mobilizing to do battle against a Planned Parenthood women's health center in Aurora, Naperville area churches hope prayer will be a powerful weapon. They are urging parishioners to join a 40-day anti-abortion prayer vigil under way against a full-service Planned Parenthood center that will include abortions. Catholic parishes in both Naperville and the part of Aurora where the center plans to open are part of the Diocese of Joliet. "The most important thing we can do is pray," said Doug Delaney, executive assistant to Diocese of Joliet Bishop J. Peter Sartain. "Pray for success, and that this clinic never opens."
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The standard Catholic description of a real Sacrament is that it is an "efficacious sign instituted by Christ to give grace." The "sign" is whatever the particular Sacrament is meant to convey: Baptism - cleansing from sin, Eucharist - union with Christ, Penance - forgiveness of sins, etc. "Efficacious" means that it actually produces the effect it signifies, and it "gives grace" as sort of a conduit of divine life into our souls. A Catholic Sacrament is holy in itself and does not need a holy person to administer it, and on the basis of the Sacrament's innate holiness, the children of the Church are sanctified and in turn sanctify the world in which we live. The demonic "sacrament" of abortion has the same characteristics as a real Sacrament except that it reverses any concept of holiness and perverts its meaning.
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A new animated version of the well-known children's book, "Horton Hears a Who," may once again spark debate about the story's pro-life interpretation when it is released next Spring. The 20th Century Fox production of the well-known children's book, "Horton Hears a Who," is a major production that will be in theatres on March 14, 2008. The film features the voice of Jim Carrey as the main character Horton and Steve Carell as the Mayor of Who-ville... Horton... risks his life to guard (a) dust speck, and repeats the phrase that has since become well known: "A person's a person no matter how small."
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An Illinois pharmacist has won the first battle against Wal-Mart over whether he has to be forced to distribute the morning after pill, which can cause an abortion in limited circumstances. Beardstown pharmacist Ethan Vandersand rejected a request to fill a prescription for the drug last year. That refusal led to disciplinary action from Wal-Mart and a civil rights lawsuit from Vandersand. Vandersand was the only pharmacist on duty at the Wal-Mart store when a Planned Parenthood staff member seeking the Plan B drugs presented the script. The staffer eventually went to another pharmacy in town.
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That trustworthiness, however, is called into question by news from California, where for the second time in two months, Planned Parenthood of San Diego and Riverside Counties has been hit with a medical malpractice lawsuit. This time, it's a woman who says Planned Parenthood failed to tell her she had cervical cancer, and then tried to cover its tracks. The earlier suit was filed by survivors of a woman who died following an abortion. All of these events unfolded in a bit more than a week. During an average week, it should be noted, Planned Parenthood performs 5,095 abortions. As mentioned, you paid for much of this; tax dollars account for about one third of Planned Parenthood's total income. You're paying for deception and death. Don't be fooled by smoke and mirrors.
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Neighbors who drive by the bustling construction site in Aurora think they are seeing the completion of the "Gemini Health Center," just as the sign says. So do the painters, carpenters, electricians and other tradesmen who have been working on the project for the last eight months. But in a few weeks the sign will be changed to reflect the true owners of the building: Planned Parenthood. At 22,000 square feet, this is among its larger facilities in the nation, providing a wide range of women's health services -- including abortions.
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The following is an excerpt from my upcoming book on exorcism. One chapter of the book is entitled, "Pro-Life and Exorcism" and is devoted to reflecting on the evil of abortion from a spiritual perspective. As a caution for those who may not be accustomed to the language of spiritual warfare, I would mention that the view of abortion contained in the passage below is derived primarily from Jesus' presentation of the devil as "a murderer from the beginning" (Jn 8:44) and from scriptural passages that identify other demons who collaborate with Satan in his attempt to destroy the very life of God's children. Make sure to pray as you read this passage.
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Is there any reason to believe that legal abortion is safe? Recent closures of large abortion providers in New Jersey reveal the ugly truth. Should we think that similar conditions would not be found in large abortion mills in Chicago, New York, San Diego, or elsewhere around the nation? Why would the only filthy, unsafe abortion providers be located in New Jersey? WDIV in Detroit conducted an undercover investigation of an abortionist who is still licensed in Michigan. They aired a three-part expose. That report revealed "Dr P." commits abortions in more than one abandoned building and openly breaks parental notification and 24-hour waiting period laws. This takes New Jersey off the hook as the only state where legal abortions are obviously not safe. In just the last year other reports on closing down unsafe abortion providers have surfaced from Florida, Alabama, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.
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There is a movement afoot to strip Planned Parenthood of millions of annual taxpayer dollars. One of the leaders in this effort is Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., whom I mentioned last week as being a chief cog in the effort to halt activation of the Fairness Doctrine, which Democrats hope to use to stifle conservative talk radio. Rep. Pence, a rising star in the Republican Party, this week offered an amendment to the House appropriations bill (H.R. 3043) that funds the Departments of Labor and Health and Human Services, to prohibit taxpayer dollars from funding Planned Parenthood's abortion efforts. Sadly, the amendment was defeated, 189-231. I'm praying that down the road, we will be able to stop Planned Parenthood from receiving our tax dollars while performing a quarter of a million abortions annually.
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Hillary Clinton was one of three candidates to appear at a Planned Parenthood conference yesterday where she told the abortion advocates she would promote abortion as president. In addition, Clinton also said that her first action as president would be to reverse President Bush's policy on international abortions. When Bush first took office, he put the Mexico City policy back in place that has been the international policy under Presidents Reagan and Bush and revoked by President Clinton. The Mexico City policy ensures that taxpayer funds are not directed to groups that promote or perform abortions in other countries. Clinton said she would do away with the policy on her first day in office.
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The wife of a jailed activist against forced abortions showed up in the Chinese capital city on Wednesday to beg national officials to let her husband Chen Guangcheng out of prison. Chen was jailed after being convicted of bogus property destruction charges after exposing forced abortions. Chen, a blind attorney, had been preparing a lawsuit on behalf of thousands of women in the eastern city of Linyi who were victims of forced abortion and sterilizations when he was arrested. After two trials, which saw his attorneys and key witnesses prevented from attending, Chen was sent to prison for four years for destroying property in a protest he never attended. Since his imprisonment, Chen has been beaten by fellow prisoners at the urging of guards and had his head completely shaved to humiliate him.
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The Cardinal Newman Society (CNS), a national organization for Catholic renewal in Catholic universities and colleges throughout the United States, has recently urged American schools to cut off their affiliations with Amnesty International (AI) on account of its recently announced policy of pro-abortion advocacy. In a letter to the presidents of U.S. Catholic colleges and universities, CNS Executive Vice President Tom Mead wrote, "If your institution has an AI chapter, CNS urges you to work with your students to reorganize the club and continue its important work promoting human rights without an Amnesty International affiliation."
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At first glance, Rudolph W. Giuliani should be an appealing presidential candidate for observant Roman Catholics. The grandchild of Italian immigrants, Mr. Giuliani went to Catholic schools, considered joining the priesthood, and as mayor of New York battled a museum that exhibited a painting of the Virgin Mary adorned in elephant dung. But church leaders say they are frustrated by prominent Catholic politicians like Mr. Giuliani who argue that while they are personally opposed to abortion, they do not want to impose their beliefs on others. One American bishop, Thomas J. Tobin of Providence, R.I., recently wrote a caustic column for his Catholic newspaper calling Mr. Giuliani's position "pathetic," "confusing" and "hypocritical." Other bishops said that they would not criticize a candidate by name but would not hesitate to declare Mr. Giuliani's stance contrary to Catholic teaching.
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As part of its ongoing effort to focus attention on the scandal of Catholic elected officials who support legal abortion, American Life League is sponsoring a full-page ad in USA Today as the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops begins its semi-annual meeting. The bishops are gathering this week in Albuquerque. The ad focuses on Pope Benedict XVI's recent comment that according to the Catholic Church's canon law, "the killing of an innocent child is incompatible with receiving Communion, which is receiving the body of Christ."
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From the beginning of the abortion debate, those favoring abortion have pointed to the social costs of "unwanted" children who simply won't get the attention of "wanted" ones. But there is a trade-off that has long been neglected. Abortion may eliminate "unwanted" children, but it increases out-of-wedlock births and single parenthood. Unfortunately, the social consequences of illegitimacy dominated. Children born after liberalized abortion rules have suffered a series of problems from problems at school to more crime. The saddest fact is that it is the most vulnerable in society, poor blacks, who have suffered the most from these changes. Liberalized abortion might have made life easier for many, but like sex itself sometimes, it has had many unintended consequences.
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Cardinal Renato Martino, president of the Pontifical Council for justice and Peace, has called on all Catholics to stop funding Amnesty International because of its recent support of abortion. The nearly 50 year-old human rights organization gave its official stamp of approval to abortion in cases of "rape, incest and extreme risk to the health of the mother". However, the new policy, which AI had attempted without success to keep from the public, calls for the universal decriminalization of abortion, thereby making the AI policy effectively advocate for abortion on demand.
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The ability to destroy human embryos to cure diseases is a "gift from God" said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a self-described "devout Catholic", referring to the recent bill passed to fund human embryonic stem-cell research. "Science is a gift of God to all of us and science has taken us to a place that is biblical in its power to cure," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). "And that is the embryonic stem cell research."
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Democrats in Congress have proposed a plan to fine pharmacies up to $500,000 if the pharmacists follow their conscience and decline to dispense abortifacient chemicals. "Pharmacists are professionals, not vending machines," said Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America. "The FDA has been known to make mistakes in approving drugs, and doctors have made mistakes in prescribing. Pharmacists provide a line of defense to ensure that patients' lives and health are protected and can make patients aware of ethical concerns. "Yet this bill would punish pharmacists up to $500,000 for acting on their ethical duty," she said. The new plan, called the "Access to Birth Control Act," is being pushed forward by U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., and Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J.
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A few days ago I joined with several pro-life leaders in signing an ad that focused attention on Dr. James Dobson and other Christian leaders who had celebrated the Supreme Court's decision in the Gonzales v. Carhart case. We did so because it is of specific concern to each of us that the facts contained in the actual Supreme Court decision and its ultimate impact on our struggle to end abortion are not clearly understood by some-and perhaps intentionally distorted or ignored by others. While not surprising, it is of some concern that those who lashed out at the ad's signers are in a state of denial, and in this particular case, that condition could be more costly to the babies than anyone can imagine. Allow me to explain...
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Bishop Thomas Tobin of Providence, Rhode Island received an invitation in the mail recently from none other than Rudy Giuliani. The politician was inviting the bishop come to a fundraising dinner for his presidential campaign, but Bishop Tobin did more than just politely decline. Instead of sending a non-descript RSVP to inform Giuliani that he would not attend, the prelate wrote him a scathing letter to turn down his offer. According to the diocesan newspaper, the Rhode Island Catholic, Bishop Tobin was already greatly "distressed" before he received the invitation to the fundraiser and was planning on writing about the matter already. The bishop also explained, "But then I received an invitation to attend a fundraising luncheon for presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani, and that absolutely confirmed my decision."
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"The truth hurts," said Jim Sedlak, vice president of American Life League. "Planned Parenthood's own statistics show that despite the protests of the organization's president, Planned Parenthood is indeed the most radical pro-abortion group in the country." Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards fired off a news release after learning that a political strategist had so characterized the organization. "While American Life League does not take any positions on any political candidates," said Sedlak, "we must comment when the truth is assailed, which is precisely what Cecile Richards has done." According to Planned Parenthood's own data, it committed 264,943 abortions in its own facilities in 2005. "It did this," said Sedlak, "by operating the nation's largest abortion chain-with 232 medical and surgical abortion facilities across the country-and continually fighting for the supposed 'right' of every woman to kill her child through abortion."
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A new national poll of adults shows that a majority of people disagree that Catholic politicians who support abortion should be denied communion at church. The poll comes after comments from Pope Benedict XVI saying they should and that pro-abortion politicians automatically excommunicated themselves. Reacting to those comments, Rasmussen Reports conducted a telephone poll with 1,000 American adults on May 16 and 17. They asked respondents, "The Pope believes that Catholic politicians who support abortion rights should be denied communion. Do you agree or disagree?"
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WASHINGTON, Abortion advocate Frances Kissling, head of Catholics for a Free Choice, is all but begging the US bishops to excommunicate her in a column this week while claiming that her "right" to support abortion is enshrined in Canon law. She declares, after decades of public repudiation of the basic tenets of Catholicism, that she cannot be excommunicated formally because Canon law itself is equivocal and open to interpretation. Kissling has made her fame by being the "Catholic" voice of abortion claiming for decades that it is possible to repudiate the sanctity of human life and remain a "good Catholic."
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They say that the wording of a poll can lead to any desired result and previous media polls on whether Americans want the Supreme Court to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade decision have been biased. They've said the case allowed abortions only in the first trimester of pregnancy. But when the breadth of the decision is explained -- that it and a companion case led to virtually unlimited abortions -- a new survey shows that Americans are more likely to favor overturning it. The Judicial Confirmation Network and the Ethics and Public Policy Center were curious to find out what the public thinks about Roe if educated about the facts of the case.
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A campaign video released yesterday by the Hillary Clinton for President Campaign includes an image of Mother Teresa with then-First Lady Mrs. Clinton. The national Catholic-based advocacy group Fidelis called on the campaign to remove the image from the video. "It is wholly inappropriate, disrespectful and disturbing that Hillary Clinton is using an image of Blessed Mother Teresa as a political tool, especially given their radically different views on abortion," said Fidelis President Joseph Cella.
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A group of Catholic Democrats in the US Congress recently objected to comments of Pope Benedict XVI about the fact that legislators favoring the legality of abortion should not receive Communion. They said, "Advancing respect for life and for the dignity of every human being is, as our church has taught us, our own life's mission."
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Despite widespread condemnation for performing abortions on underage girls while protecting the statutory rapists involved by not reporting them to authorities, Planned Parenthood is continuing the practice big-time - with many new cases of underage girls - according to an investigation of violations of state criminal reporting laws. Critics of Planned Parenthood characterize the practice as a "pedophile protection racket."
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Recent reports from Connecticut and Wisconsin leave us wondering what in the world is going on in the world of "Catholic" health care. It would seem that the appropriate treatment for a victim of criminal rape has become a question of whether Catholic hospitals can be put in the position of doing the unthinkable. Reports from Connecticut were the first to come to our attention. The Connecticut state senate approved a bill that would require all hospitals-including the four Catholic hospitals in the state-to provide Plan B emergency contraceptive pills to rape victims. What is most startling about this turn of events in Connecticut is that the state's Catholic bishops asserted their opposition to this law by advising the lawmakers that "Catholic hospitals provide emergency contraception to rape victims in the vast majority of cases. In fact, it is an extreme rarity when this medication would not be provided."
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"I'm sorry we have to picket this Mercy Home fundraiser," said Joseph M. Scheidler, National Director of the Chicago-based Pro- Life Action League. "But Hillary Clinton's appearance at their Graduates' Luncheon is just wrong! This is a well-known and much loved Catholic institution, while Senator Clinton is unabashedly hostile to the Catholic Church's teaching on the value of life." The Leader Council of Mercy Home invited Hillary Clinton to address the guests at their annual Graduates' Luncheon today, without consulting Fr. Scott Donahue, director of Mercy Home. The League's Executive Director spoke with Fr. Donahue, who, though he opposes Clinton's appearance, said he could not rescind the invitation.
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When the Supreme Court Wednesday upheld the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act passed by Congress in 2003, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told a press conference: "I would only say that this isn't the only decision that a lot of us wish that [Justice Samuel] Alito weren't there and [former Justice Sandra Day] O'Connor were there." Does that mean Reid was repudiating his Senate vote for the bill restricting abortions? No, he told me Thursday, he was talking about other decisions by Alito. Reid, an effective legislator and canny politician, reflects a dilemma on abortion among Democrats who are flying high against dispirited Republicans.
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Sen. Hillary Clinton has been scheduled to appear as the keynote speaker at the Merch Home luncheon fundraiser on May 7 in Chicago, despite objections from pro-life groups over her vociferous support for abortion and homosexual 'rights.' The Mercy Home Graduates Luncheon is an annual fundraiser to support the Mercy Home Catholic children's charity. Mercy Home for Boys & Girls is a long-term residential home for young people ages 11 to 21, administered by Catholic priests. Fr. Scott Donahue is the current president of the organization. According to the Pro-Life Action League, Fr. Donahue was apparently not aware Sen. Clinton had been asked to speak at the event until he was informed of her scheduled appearance by the League. Join the Pro-Life Action League to protest at 11am. To ask that your name be removed from Mercy Home's mailing list, or to voice your opinions of their utterly boned-headed decision to invite Mizz Clinton to their fundraiser CLICK HERE.
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The Supreme Court's recent decision to uphold restrictions on partial-birth abortion (actually, it's infanticide) in most cases has stirred up the folks who support the act of abortion in ways that boggle my simple mind. Goodness! If we believe their rhetoric, we would have to admit that indeed, the sky is falling and all people of good will should run for the hills. I'm so sorry to have to burst this bubble of fear and hysteria, but it is perhaps time to be realistic rather than emotionally blathering about what five Catholic men on the Supreme Court actually did-and more importantly, what they did not do.
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For decades the World Bank has been pressuring developing nations into implementing population control in order to qualify for receipt of loans. That program accelerated during the Clinton era in the 1990s as the Bank, which is controlled by the United States, more openly insisted countries wishing to receive funding permit abortion, and institute 'family planning' programs. The current Administration has attempted to alter this abortion-pushing stance with the guidance of Juan Jose Daboub, a former El Salvador finance minister, who was last year appointed as a managing director of the bank under President Paul Wolfowitz. The new health strategy sought to relax requirements that recipient countries implement population control 'family planning' policies as a condition of receiving loans.
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After getting national attention last week with comments supporting taxpayer funding abortions and calling the funding a "right," Rudy Giuliani thumbed his nose at the pro-life movement further over the weekend telling them to get over the issue of abortion. Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, has seen his polling numbers decline slightly because of his wide difference with most Republicans on the issue of abortion. He's previously indicated that he will let Republican judge him on his track record and stances and determine on their own whether he's qualified to get the GOP nod for president in 2008.
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A representative of a woman's group that educates people about the link between abortion and breast cancer says that news of a lowering the number of cancer deaths would be better if women had been told about the link. The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer says there would be fewer deaths to report. The organization points to a new report from the American Cancer Society that cancer deaths declined slightly in 2003 and 2004. But Karen Malec, the head of the Coalition, told LifeNews.com "There would be fewer cancer cases and deaths if women had been told the truth in the 1980s when conclusive evidence became available" about the abortion-breast cancer link.
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The epidemic of Premature/Low Birth Rate deliveries, named the "Silent Crisis", which affects one in eight births each year in America, is a risk factor for infant death, cerebral palsy, mental retardation, epilepsy, autism, blindness, deafness, lung infections, gastrointestinal infections, etc. The March of Dimes (MoD) www.MarchofDimes.com sponsors its annual "Walk America" campaign, enlisting 20,000 teams across America, to raise millions of dollars supporting the research and education needed to prevent premature birth and other infant health issues. MoD's web site publicly claims that half of the causes for prematurity are largely unknown. The risk factors they do acknowledge are: maternal or fetal stress, infections, bleeding and over-stretching of the uterus.
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The Supreme Court has reversed a decision it handed down in 2000 and upheld a Congressional ban on the gruesome partial-birth abortion procedure. The ruling indicated that the federal ban on the abortion procedure did not violate the so-called right to abortion established under Roe v. Wade. Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the majority opinion for the Supreme Court and indicated that the abortion advocates who sued to overturn the ban "have not demonstrated that the Act would be unconstitutional in a large fraction of relevant cases."
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The Supreme Court's decision to uphold the federal ban on partial-birth abortions could pave the way to a ruling reversing the high court's 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade that toppled pro-life laws across the country. That's something pro-life advocates relish and pro-abortion activists fear. The thought is that if the high court could reverse its 2000 decision on partial-birth abortion that it could change its mind on abortion itself as well. Wednesday's ruling is the first major abortion case in which new Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justice Samuel Alito have ruled, perhaps giving a clue as to their views on Roe itself.
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A group of hard-left Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) have sent a letter to a top-ranking member of the US State Department demanding that she not attend the upcoming World Congress of Families IV set for Poland this May. In the letter recently released to the Baltimore Sun by Catholics for a Free Choice (CFFC), several MEPs claim that by speaking at the WCF, Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees and Migration Ellen Sauerbrey would be providing an "official US government stamp of approval to extremist and intolerant views."
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Rudy Giuliani has worked overtime to try to back off of his position in favor of abortion and persuade pro-life voters that he won't be so bad. While he talks about appointing judges who don't legislate from the bench and flip-flopped to oppose partial-birth abortion, he still supports taxpayer funded abortions. In an interview with CNN, the former New York City mayor told White House Correspondent Dana Bash that his prior position in favor of abortions paid for with public funds wouldn't change if he's elected president.
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A second Mexican bishop has issued an explicit warning to Mexico City's legislatures cautioning them that, should they vote in favor of proposed legislation that would legalize abortion, they would be automatically excommunicated upon the death of the first baby under the new law. Mexico City is governed by an assembly which can pass legislation independent of the laws of the rest of the country. Although the country as a whole is considered predominantly Catholic, the liberal Party of the Democrats runs the Mexico City Hall and holds a 34 seat majority in the 66 seat legislative body. It is not known how many of the city legislators are practicing Catholics.
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American Life League has launched a year-long petition campaign asking President Bush to officially declare March 25 as the Day of the Preborn, beginning with March 25, 2008. "Every human being's life begins at fertilization and the United States Constitution guarantees the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," said Judie Brown, president of American Life League. "We are simply asking President Bush to do his part to help secure these rights that have been recklessly disregarded for the preborn."
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The Rev. Thomas J. Euteneuer STL, president of Human Life International, (HLI) said March 26, "Catholic parents should shudder at the thought of Dan Maguire teaching theology to their children at a Catholic university. I call upon Marquette to stop hiding behind false ideas of tenure and 'academic freedom' in the face of theological malfeasance and dismiss Dan Maguire. A Catholic university should be Catholic and not tolerate false teachers like Maguire." Father Euteneuer applauded the Doctrine Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops for their clear and ringing rebuke of dissident Professor Daniel Maguire of the theology department of Marquette University in Milwaukee.
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The nation's Catholic bishops have repudiated a document written by a professor at Marquette University, a Catholic school, saying that abortion and contraception are morally permissible. The call the pro-abortion views int he pamphlet "false teaching" and point to the church's long-standing pro-life views. Daniel Maguire, a professor of religious ethics at Marquette, authored the document and mailed it last summer to the nation's 270 Catholic bishops.
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The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Pace received heavy criticism from the media and homosexual activist groups, as well as some members of Congress, for his comments last week against homosexuality. In an interview with the Chicago Tribune, Gen. Pace said, "I believe that homosexual acts between individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts. I do not believe the United States is well-served by a policy that says it is OK to be immoral in any way." The chairman's statement was a simple declaration of traditional morality, Archbishop Chaput said, and one held by a majority of Americans. (CCI NOTES: The cranks at the Chicago Tribune have never let the facts get in the way of their left wing agenda.)
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The representative of the Holy See to the United Nations told a panel meeting to discuss the status of women that abortion does not liberate women or advance their rights. The UN is Commission on the Status of Women is meeting to follow up on the Fourth World Conference on Women. Archbishop Celestino Migliore said that the mistreatment of women and the relegation of women to a second class status in some parts of the world is only exacerbated by abortion. He said abortion "is ironically employed by women against women" and said abortion is wrongly "often considered a tool of liberation."
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As women around the world observe International Women's Day the women of the Silent No More Awareness Campaign are urging the United Nations and cultures worldwide to celebrate the one thing that makes women unique - the ability to nurture life and give birth. The organization of women who publicly regret their abortions states, "It is time for people to re-consider the archaic acceptance that for women to be equal to men we must deny our reproductive gifts. The last 50 years of feminism has undermined what it really means to be a woman. Organizations such as the National Organization for Women (NOW) have tried to achieve equality by neutering women. Specifically through the promotion of abortion, yesterday's feminists have done more harm to their sisters than any previous patriarchal system have."
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"It is categorically impossible for the same person to state that he or she believes simultaneously both what the Catholic Church teaches and that abortion is just a choice," says Bishop Robert Vasa in a column released today by the Catholic Sentinel, the diocesan newspaper of the Archdiocese of Portland and the Diocese of Baker. Although Vasa, the Bishop of Baker, did not mention her by name, he was referring in his column to Democrat Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi specifically, and to all politicians of a similar ilk in general.
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CCI NOTES: Only a propaganda rag like NYT would have the gaul to run a title "Backing Abortion Rights While Keeping the Faith." Kissling is a fraud. A heretic of the worst order, Hell bent on spreading the outrageous lie that you can butcher babies and remain a "faithful Catholic." Now that she has "retired" from Catholics for Free Choice, we hope she will reflect on her public heresy and repent before she goes on to her eternal "reward."
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A Portuguese pro-life group says it's ready to join Catholic church leaders to lobby the nation's parliament to reject a bill the government plans to sponsor that would legalize abortion. Portugal officials said they would introduce the measure after voters rejected a ballot effort to make abortions legal within the first 10 weeks of pregnancy. The Accao Familia organization said that pro-life advocates must continue to "stop those who are trying to impose a new morality on society." Portuguese voters backed the abortion referendum on a 59 to 41 percent margin but it didn't take effect because only 44 percent of the country turned out to vote. More than half had to participate for the vote to count.
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Abortion supporters like Cindy Richards (two Chicago Sun-Times articles in the last three weeks - 1/24/07 and 2/14/07) are appalled that the government of Illinois might actually require parents to be notified before their teenage daughters can get abortions. Such a requirement might interfere with a young girl's right to get an abortion without telling her parents. The hidden implication is that such a girl has adequate judgment, even at a young age, to make her own decision whether or not to inform her parents. Of course, she will make this decision under the advisement of her doctor, and the government cannot interfere with that doctor / patient relationship. Just ignore the fact that she will see the doctor for the first time when he begins the abortion procedure.
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Portugal has some of the strictest abortion laws in the EU Prime Minister Jose Socrates has said abortion will be legalised in Portugal despite the turnout for a referendum being too low to be legally binding. Turnout was about 40%, far less than the 50% required, but of those who did vote, 59.3% backed a proposed change to the current law. The proposal allows all women abortion until the 10th week of pregnancy. Currently abortions are only allowed in cases of rape, a health threat to the mother or serious foetal abnormality.
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American Life League has launched a public petition campaign asking the U.S. Catholic bishops to uphold the Church's stance on the sanctity of human life by enforcing Canon Law 915. "The Church's teachings on the incompatibility of supporting abortion and receiving Holy Communion are clear and concise," said Judie Brown, president of American Life League. "Denial of Communion is not a sanction or a punishment; it is in fact a form of pastoral correction designed to show that an individual is out of communion with the Body of Christ."
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The Knights of Malta have officially notified LifeSiteNews that Terry McAuliffe will never be admitted to the Order of Malta on account of his pro-abortion stand and public repudiation of the Catholic Church's teachings on the sanctity of life. On Monday, McAuliffe made a brazen boast on the Hugh Hewitt show that not only could he be "pro-choice" and "Catholic", but said he was also invited to join the famous Knights of Malta. The Knights initially disbelieved reports that pro-abortion McAuliffe was joining their Order, but after examining the facts re-informed LifeSiteNews that the Order has no choice but to reject McAuliffe as an unworthy candidate.
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Why this rush to destroy our disabled children? Isn't it morally worse to kill a disabled preborn baby as compared to a normal one? Isn't this the worse violation of social justice? Too many American Catholics demonstrate for the rights of illegal immigrants but keep silent about this genocide. Too many Catholics are stridently vocal against the death penalty but say nothing about the genetic cleansing of Down syndrome babies. Are these Catholics unaware that eugenics has a history in America advocated by the likes of Oliver Wendell Holmes, a eugenics enthusiast and social Darwinist ("three generations of imbeciles are enough")? Don't they know that at one time eugenics was offered as a solution to the illegal immigration problem in the U.S.? Are they ignorant of the fact that the Nazi Third Reich awarded the American eugenicist Charles Davenport an honorary degree for his American work in "racial hygiene"? Read about it in Harry Bruinius's book Better for All the World: The Secret History of Forced Sterilization and America's Quest for Racial Purity (Knopf, 2005). How have we developed this moral blind spot that allows us to place people into a caste system of "fit" and "unfit"?
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Cardinal Sean O'MalleyWashington DC, Jan 30, 2007 / 04:40 pm (CNA).- "We need to raise the volumn in announcing the Gospel of Life," with these words Cardinal Sean O'Malley strongly urged Americans to join in building a civilization of life and love. The Cardinal-Archbishop of Boston told a packed house of Pro-life demonstrators, gathered at a Mass in the Crypt of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington last week that while Gospel of Life must be announced with conviction, it must also be proclaimed with love.
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On January 29th, the Chicago Tribune carried a letter in Voice of the People from Kelly Culwell, MD. Culwell claimed that the Parental Notice of Abortion Act of 1995 would endanger teenagers if it is finally allowed to become effective. However, Culwell is not just some practicing physician who is relaying wisdom from years of experience. Culwell is a 2006-2007 Fellow selected by Physicians for Reproductive Choice and Health to join their Leadership Training Initiative (LTI). The purpose of LTI is to develop the skills to be active and visible on reproductive healthcare issues. In layman's terms, that means Culwell's letter provides propaganda from the perspective of an organization pushing "reproductive choice."
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The fallout from the decision of new Washington Archbishop Donald W. Wuerl to remain silent in the face of Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's flagrant abuse of the Catholic Church continues. On January 22, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette picked up on the LifeSiteNews.com story about statements by Human Life International Leader Fr. Tom Euteneuer and American Life League President Judie Brown criticizing Archbishop Wuerl for silence and inaction...
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In the political hot seat of Washington, D.C., Archbishop Donald Wuerl has stuck to the stand he took as bishop of Pittsburgh, refusing to withhold communion from Catholic legislators who support legal abortion. Asked if he planned to refuse communion to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, he responded: "You're talking about a whole different style of pastoral ministry. No." A response he made recently to questions about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have infuriated the far-right edge of the Catholic blogosphere, and drawn ire from some of the most conservative Catholic leaders of the anti-abortion movement.
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A breakthrough in medical science is getting support from the Roman Catholic Church. The Vatican is welcoming the advancements made with embryonic stem cell research that allow stem cells to be extracted from amniotic fluids without hurting the unborn embryo. The issue continues to fuel heated debate in the United States regarding federal funding of such projects. Bishop J. George Lucas of the Springfield Diocese, which includes Decatur, is following the Vatican's lead on the sanctity of life by writing a letter in the Catholic Times that will be released this weekend.
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A truly Catholic criticism of pro-homosexualist policies in the state (and, sadly, Catholic dioceses) arises from a worldview opposed to reducing everything to personal preference. Catholics -- at least, if they follow the Church -- do not hate the persons who happen to be homosexual but they condemn homosexuality as they condemn every other perversion or sin. Opposing the ideas and policies that promote the normalizing of homosexuality is, at its deepest level, a fight for the souls of homosexuals themselves and a defense of society in general from false ideas and destructive practices. It is a struggle to preserve the integrity of the human person. As such, it is not any kind of "phobia" but an act of love.
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In light of the new Democratic majority in Congress, pro-life advocates believe it is imperative that they demonstrate commitment by participating in the annual March for Life later this month. Mitch Striedl, coordinator of youth outreach for the Archdiocese of Chicago Respect Life Office, acknowledged that the 110th Congress poses a formidable force for pro-lifers to reckon with. Generally speaking, Democrats tend to fall on the opposite side of pro-life legislation. Already, the party has pledged to pass legislation that provides federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research in the first 100 hours of Congress' new session. Striedl concluded, "This is an important year."
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A pro-life organization that monitors corporations that donate money to Planned Parenthood has released a new list of companies that give money to the nation's largest abortion business. New corporations on the boycott list include jeweler Tiffany & Company and Blackjack Pizza restaurants. Life Decisions International has been monitoring companies for over 15 years and says that at least 137 corporations have stopped funding Planned Parenthood as a result of the pro-life boycotts. That's cost Planned Parenthood an estimated $35 million.
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A new report by the United States governments' Domestic Policy Council admits that embryos are human beings; the only differences between embryos and other human beings, says the report, are accidental differences in levels of development. "Embryos are humans in their earliest developmental stage," writes the Council. "We do no have to think that human embryos are exactly the same in all ways as older humans to believe that they are entitled to respect and protection. Each of us originated as a single-celled embryo, and from that moment have developed along a continuous biological trajectory throughout our existence. To speak of 'an embryo' is to designate a human being at a particular stage."
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U.S. Representative Nancy Pelosi, radical liberal Democrat from San Francisco, has not only succeeded in crashing through the "marble ceiling" as the nation's first female House Speaker, but she also seems to take extreme pleasure in breaking many "marble statues" as a scandalous and defiantly unresponsive member of the Catholic Church. Year after year her Congressional voting record proves that there isn't an abortion she doesn't love, and holds a 100% grade with NARAL (National Abortion Rights Action League) and other pro-abortion groups.
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"The Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007 is a dreadful piece of legislation that, if approved, will further the unconscionable destruction of preborn persons," said Judie Brown, president of American Life League. "The continual misinformation about human embryonic stem cell research offered by those who wish to encourage such 'science' does not change the fact that terminating the lives of innocent human embryos for research is ethically and morally corrupt."
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Planned Parenthood is an evil organization," said Judie Brown, president of American Life League, "and we are going to do everything in our power to oppose Planned Parenthood and its agenda in 2007." Mrs. Brown said Planned Parenthood is set to move forward aggressively in 2007, "and we must be ready to move forward just as aggressively to stop its plans. We at American Life League are rededicating ourselves to an all-out effort to expose the truth about Planned Parenthood, creating such discontent that people turn away from this organization, its products, its services and its ideals."
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You may be asking why the physicians' crusade against abortion was not acknowledged for its huge life-saving efforts earlier. The answer is that abortion, prevalent at all levels of society and at least implicitly recognized as the killing of one's own children, was an incredibly taboo subject. Abortion no longer is such a taboo subject, and it is high time that we recognize Horatio Robinson Storer and the hundreds of physicians who joined his crusade for their immense contribution to the current makeup of our population. May 3 of each year would be a logical celebration date, given that it marks the official beginning of the national physicians' crusade against abortion. Storer was born on February 27, 1830; February 27 would be another appropriate holiday, given Storer's key role in founding the physicians' crusade and in spearheading both goals of the crusade for more than a decade. Although those who view the restrictive abortion laws overturned by Roe as abominations would be reluctant to admit it, Storer may be the most important person in the U.S. in the 19th century.
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The Phoenix diocesan newspaper, with endorsement from the bishop, is urging area Catholics to petition for an end to abortion clinic funding by the local branch of one of the largest breast cancer foundations in the country. The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation donated $25,000 to Planned Parenthood of Central and Northern Arizona, after the fundraiser Race for the Cure raised $1.8 million last month. The money was designated for programs providing "breast health education and early cancer detection in Coconino, Gila, Maricopa and Yavapai Counties."
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The heterodoxy at the USCCB in the past several decades has reached Biblical proportions. Just last week, a group of Catholics contact Msgr. Malloy (head of the USCCB) to ask that the announcement for the annual Call to Action (see the Call to Action pulldown on the CCI menu for articles about this heterodox organization) meeting be removed from the USCCB website! That is just one example in a long line of scandalous activities. The latest debacle is the outrageous decision by the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, who announced this week that is had accepted the largest abortion provider in the nation, Planned Parenthood, as a member organization. The LCCR is an umbrella group that includes several of the largest Catholic organizations in the US, who are now "partners" with Planned Parenthood in protecting "Civil Rights." Read it and weap...
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Bishop Paul Swain came out swinging Thursday. Within an hour of being ordained a Roman Catholic bishop and installed as the eighth leader of the Catholic Diocese of Sioux Falls, he had spoken out on two issues on the Nov. 7 ballot. "I'm proud to say that the first vote I will cast as a South Dakotan will be yes for Referred Law 6," Swain said, to applause and a standing ovation. Referred Law 6 is the abortion ban, which was passed by the state Legislature earlier this year and will be decided by voters. It outlaws all abortions except those done to save a pregnant woman's life.
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Georgette Forney, president of NOEL and co-founder of Silent No More Awareness, is calling on post-abortive women to sign their names to a pro-life advertisement that will hopefully appear in several U.S. newspapers. Forney hopes to gather at least 1,700 signatures for the advertisement, which will give a voice to women who regret their abortions. Caron Strong, national director of Operation Outcry, and Karen Reynoso, a founder of Renewed Hope Ministry, are also supporting the campaign.
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"We expect that Catholics should take seriously the teachings of the church regarding our responsibilities for society - that we be good citizens, we vote, that we expect Catholics who run for office would do all they can to protect the dignity of every individual and make decisions for the common good," Chaput said. Chaput has gained a national reputation for stating Catholic politicians should "act Catholic," and that Catholics should vote their faith at the ballot box.
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In his October 15th column in the diocesan newspaper, the Catholic New World, Francis Cardinal George, the archbishop of Chicago, has bluntly told Catholic politicians there should be no separation between their faith, their conscience and their votes. In the lead up to the mid-term elections, George writes, "Conscience is not an excuse for doing something irrational." The Cardinal went on to note that "We are to form our consciences according to the social teaching of the Church and use that formation to make political choices . . . The first and most essential principle of Catholic social teaching is the dignity of every human person and one's basic right to life from conception to natural death. Respect for human dignity is the basis for the fundamental right to life. This is a non-negotiable principle."
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Yvonne Florczak-Seeman, creator of A Time to Heal and author of "A Time to Speak," explained the 12-week Bible study group for women who have had abortions is designed to "use the evils of our past toward the hope for the future." The program is set to be launched in February in every diocese in Illinois. In the Joliet Diocese, the programs are slated to begin at the crisis pregnancy centers known as Woman's Choice Services in Lombard and Downers Grove. The first training session for the 38 facilitators has just been completed, but another training session for more interested individuals is scheduled to begin in a few weeks.
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Major Pro-Life and Pro-Family organizations in Illinois criticize State Representative John Fritchey's bill, HB 5840, regarding minors and abortion as an explicit attempt to stop the Parental Notification Act of 1995 from going into effect. The 'Adolescent Health Care Safety Act' is nothing more than a cruel joke on Illinois parents and their minor daughters. The purpose of this Act is to avoid parental involvement. The proponents of this legislation oppose parental notification and their bill is an attempt to deceive the families of Illinois," said Dawn Behnke, legislative spokeswoman with the Illinois Federation for Right to Life.
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In the fight to preserve the toughest abortion ban in the nation, the talk is not of a fetus' right to life. It's of a woman's right to motherhood. Antiabortion activists here deliberately avoid the familiar slogans of their movement. They don't talk about the "murder of innocent babies" or quote the Bible on the sanctity of life. Instead, campaign manager Leslee Unruh has taken what she calls a feminist approach, arguing that legalized abortion exploits women and - for their sake - must be stopped.
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A Respect Life Program package is assembled annually by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Secretariat for Pro-Life activities to call attention to numerous human life issues. Each contains information on current issues, program suggestions, liturgy resources, clip art, prayers for daily recitation and parish bulletin briefs.
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A leading Vatican spokesman gave a speech Monday reminding members of the United Nations the reproductive health for women should not include promoting abortion. The speech comes after pro-life advocates were able to keep abortion out of a key UN document that is still under consideration. Archbishop Celestino Migliore, the Catholic Church's UN representative addressed the UN General Assembly and told it that it should not consider "access to reproductive health" as a tool to promote abortions.
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Rev. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International, opened Saturday's session with a clear tactical agenda for the budding movement: "It's time to get serious about denying Planned Parenthood funding for birth control or sex education and abortion. We need to hold them accountable for this contraceptive welfare. We have to work very carefully to keep that sword away from Planned Parenthood."
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The Illinois Supreme Court has announced it has agreed - after 11 years of delays - to develop rules for parental notification of abortions on girls under the age of 18, and pro-life groups say that may "rescue Illinois from its notorious position as the abortion dumping ground of the Midwest." That comment comes from Joseph M. Scheidler, national direction of the Pro-Life Action League, who said until now, Illinois was the only state in the region without a parental notification requirement.
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Arrangements are in progress for the launch of a crisis pregnancy complex in the heart of a shopping center on 75th Street in suburban Downers Grove. The 1,360-square-foot space has been rented, but necessary renovations cannot commence until city officials stamp all appropriate permits. The new center would be the second facility in DuPage County staffed by volunteers of Woman's Choice Services, a Catholic-based pregnancy assistance association.
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This year's packet of materials for Respect Life Sunday includes a CD-ROM with all the kit materials for the first time. The annual Respect Life program begins Oct. 1 this year. It is observed in virtually all U.S. Catholic dioceses with a combination of education, prayer, service and advocacy activities. This year's theme is "Created, loved, redeemed by God. Priceless!" Packets provided to each diocese include advertising materials, a poster, a liturgy guide, clip art, suggestions for activities for adults and children and a set of educational pamphlets. The CD includes all the materials in both Microsoft Word and PDF formats, as well as longer versions of the pamphlets. All content is provided in English and Spanish. The information also may be downloaded at the Web site of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (read more for links.)
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In 1995, the Illinois legislature passed a law that a parent or guardian (or grandparent or step parent residing in the same household) must be notified 48 hours before a child under 18 has an abortion. However, the Illinois Supreme Court has refused to write rules that the law requires for an appeals process. Therefore, the law cannot go into effect. The Illinois Supreme Court is the only state Supreme Court in the country that has refused to issue such appeal rules.
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TORONTO, August 22, 2006 - Every year the University of Toronto's Student Administrative Council (SAC) hands out a "frosh kit" to new incoming students. This year, some 6,500 first-time students at the University of Toronto will receive such a kit, but the kit will not include pro-life materials from the official pro-life club even though club promotional materials are normally permitted in the kits.
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BISMARCK, N.D. - Federal approval of the so-called morning-after pill is tragic and reflects a "culture of death" in the United States, North Dakota's Roman Catholic bishops say. The head of an abortion clinic in Fargo says over-the-counter sales of Plan B morning-after birth control pills will prevent more unwanted pregnancies.
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Today President Bush threw his support behind Dr. Andrew von Eschenbach's plan to approve Plan B for over-the-counter (OTC) sale to women 18 and older, while keeping it prescription (Rx) for teen girls. The FDA lacks the legal authority to approve "dual status" marketing of the same dosage of a drug, and they lack the authority to enforce an age-restriction. How will the FDA ensure that Barr Laboratories confines OTC sale of Plan B to women 18 and older?
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WASHINGTON, August 21, 2006 - For his pro-life supporter base, President George W. Bush stepped into one of the biggest political landmines of his Presidential career today with his approval of over the counter status for the abortion-causing morning after pill Plan B.
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Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- A pro-life law firm has filed a brief with the Supreme Court in the case concerning the Congressional-approved ban on partial-birth abortions. The American Center for Law and Justice told the court to reject the argument made by abortion advocates that abortion is safer than childbirth. After President Bush signed the partial-birth abortion ban, pro-abortion groups launched three lawsuits against it and federal appeals courts in Nebraska, New York and California declared the ban unconstitutional.
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Adams, MA - A pro-life advocate has purchased the historic home that was the birthplace of suffragist organizer Susan B. Anthony. In a move that fits in with her consistent opposition to abortion, Feminists for Life of America (FFL), a leading pro-life women's group will manage the home. Carol Crossed, of Rochester, New York, purchased the two-story, 1,566-square foot home at auction on Saturday for $164,500. Crossed is a vice-president for Democrats for Life and a longtime supporter of FFL. She indicated an FFL member will live in the home and she hopes to eventually open it up to the public.
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ABERDEEN, North Dakota, August 3, 2006 - The Dakota Voice yesterday told the story of South Dakotan mother Megan Barnett of Aberdeen whose son was conceived when she was raped at 19. Megan, a believing Catholic, says that after the attack she was offered "emergency contraception," an abortifacient drug, by emergency room attendants. She refused the drug saying that it would be wrong to kill her child even at the embryonic stage.
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BONN, July 11, 2006 - This week, six years after being ordered to cease and years of interventions from the Vatican, the German Catholic bishops' conference has prohibited Catholics from using a pregnancy service that was issuing certificates for government funded abortions. "As a private association, Donum Vitae is an organization outside the Catholic Church - its information centres are not acknowledged by the bishops' conference or by individual bishops," the bishops said in a statement. "Persons acting in the Church's service are prohibited from cooperating with Donum Vitae. Nor is it permitted to exchange personnel."
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JERUSALEM, June 29, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Knesset, the Israeli Parliament, has voted overwhelmingly to reject a proposal to expand abortion availability. The vote was 39 to 9 against a proposal to abolish the committees - made up of doctors, rabbis and social workers - that currently judge whether a woman may have an abortion. These committees are criticized by pro-abortion feminists in the Knesset who say they are an obstacle to abortion.
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Norfolk, England (LifeNews.com) -- A British hospital that refuses to provide medical treatment to a pro-life advocate who got in trouble for repeatedly mailing pictures of abortions to staff there is coming under fire from pro-life people around the world. Lynn's Queen Elizabeth Hospital has been deluged with mail since news broke that it would not treat 74 year-old Edward Atkinson.
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ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN - Even as pro-life and pro-family advocates across the world are focusing their energies and resources in the fight against so-called abortion "rights" on the national level, a powerful international effort to circumvent the law-codes of independent, sovereign nations is ongoing. This effort, spearheaded by the worldwide legal academia is seeking with increasing success, in particular, to create international laws enforcing universal access to abortion, and to make the refusal to provide abortion an international crime, punishable by the International Criminal Court (ICC). At least, such is the opinion of Richard Wilkins, professor of law at Brigham Young University.
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In his book, Aborting America, reformed abortionist Dr. Bernard Nathanson made reference to what he told his medical students years ago. "There's a fortune in abortion," he wrote. Planned Parenthood's annual report shows this is still true. This evil enterprise last year reported an income of $882 million and a "profit" of $63 million.
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NEW YORK - The World Bank and other international institutions are promoting "reproductive health" as a part of the UN's Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) even though "reproductive health" was completely absent from the MDGs which were negotiated in 2000 by the largest gathering of heads of state in history. "Reproductive health" was also rejected as part of the Millennium Declaration, a five year review of the MDGs, negotiated last summer in New York even though the international community came under severe pressure by UN agencies and powerful NGOs to include it.
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Our cousins in Great Britain, from whom we inherited a language, a political culture and, most specifically, the principle of freedom of speech, are going off the deep end, to judge from the jailing of Edward Atkinson.Here's the background. Last year, the U.K. was rocked by a high-profile abortion case. This was because the demise of "Baby A," as she became known, was photographed and videotaped. This evidence of her brutal end was widely distributed in the U.K.
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MORE than 20 babies have been aborted in advanced pregnancy because scans showed that they had club feet, a deformity readily corrected by surgery or physiotherapy. According to figures from the Office for National Statistics covering the years from 1996 to 2004, a further four babies were aborted because they had webbed fingers or extra digits, which are also corrected by simple surgery. All the terminations took place late in pregnancy, after 20 weeks. Last year, according to campaigners, a healthy baby was aborted in the sixth month at a hospital in southeast England after ultrasound images indicated part of its foot was missing.
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A typical headline that summarized yesterday's subcommittee hearing on the deaths linked to the abortifacient RU486 could have gone something like this: "Experts split on abortion pill's role in 4 deaths - Scientific panel disagrees on whether RU486 triggered deadly infections."As it happens that is an actual headline. However, it does not refer to yesterday's discussion before the House Government Reform subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and Human Resources, chaired by Rep. Mark Souder (R-In.). Instead, it dealt with a joint scientific workshop put on last week by the Centers for Disease Control and the FDA. But in either case the headline would be completely accurate and totally misleading. Explaining this is a bit complicated because there are various elements to the latest, very cunning pro-abortion ploy.
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I awakened to sad news. Tammy Skinner, the Suffolk, Virginia mother who killed her own child, was set free. I decided I had to write. I want to tell the world what has occurred. Baby Girl Skinner must not have died in vain. I will let the facts speak for themselves.
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Catholic and Evangelical leaders are speaking out against proposals within the famous human rights organization Amnesty International to enter into abortion advocacy. Outspoken human rights advocate and Calgary Bishop Fred Henry told LifeSiteNews.com, "The proposal of Amnesty International to enter into abortion advocacy is an ill-conceived and gross betrayal of their mission to campaign for human rights."
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TRENTON, N.J., April 7, 2006 - In a stunning reversal for abortion providers, a New Jersey Appellate Court has issued a unanimous opinion that the factual contention that a first trimester abortion terminates the life of a human being is a question to be decided by a jury. In the sixteen page opinion in Rosa Acuna v. Dr. Sheldon Turkish (Appellate Docket # A-4022-03T5), the the Court remanded the case for trial, ruling that whether a first trimester abortion terminates the life of a complete, unique human being presents a fact question for a jury to decide.
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Nashville, TN - In an abortion debate long considered a "women's issue," the pain that men feel about a past abortion is often lost in the shuffle. But millions of men who may have prompted or agreed with their partner's decision to have an abortion often face regret years later. Longtime country music singer Kenny Rogers, known for his romantic touch and everyman approach, highlights a father's abortion pain in the title track from his latest album, Water and Bridges.
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I cannot tell you how much e-mail I have received complaining about the clergy not helping Pro-Life people. Why so little encouragement from the pulpit to support the Pro-Life cause? Are the clergy self-centered cowards; or, are they just being prudent? Are they afraid of losing the tax-exempt status for their Church, if they speak out? Are they afraid of hurting the feelings of certain parishioners whose families have had abortions and fear that they may be pointing a finger of accusation against them, making them most uncomfortable? Would their remarks be interpreted as supporting a political party that is Pro-Life rejecting their Pro-death opponents?
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The Oglala Sioux Tribe in South Dakota plans to blow smoke at the abortion ban signed into law earlier this month that would outlaw all abortions in South Dakota except to save a mother's life. Should the ban survive court challenges, Oglala president Cecilia Fire Thunder has vowed to "personally establish a Planned Parenthood clinic on my own land which is within the boundaries of the Pine Ridge Reservation where the state of South Dakota has absolutely no jurisdiction," according to NativeTimes.com.
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In a meeting today with representatives of the Vatican to international organizations, Pope Benedict XVI stressed that respect for the truth is the bases of justice. "Relations between States and within States are just in so far as they respect the truth," he said. "When, however, the truth is offended, peace is threatened and rule of law is compromised, then, as a logical consequence, injustices arise."
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CONNETICUT, United States, March 15, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A series of simple posters by Harvard Right to Life, showing the early stages of fetal development, accompanied by cheerful text and line drawings, have so outraged pro-abortion students they are ripping the posters down.
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Students arriving at Hamilton's McMaster University on a snowy Tuesday morning for their regular classes had no idea they were in for a sobering dose of the reality of abortion. Early in the morning, LifeLine, the McMaster pro-life group, had set up displays of photos depicting the grisly truth of abortion all around campus. The project was entitled simply "Unmasking Choice."
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Late last month, 55 Catholic Democrats from the House of Representatives released what they termed a "historic" Catholic Statement of Principles. In substance the statement seeks to reconcile the support for abortion embraced by the Democratic Party with Catholic social teaching and a "consistent moral framework for life."
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CHICAGO, February 28, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Longtime Chicago pro-life activist, Joseph Scheidler, has again won in the Supreme Court in a twenty-year-old case brought against him by the National Organization for Women, the leading US radical feminist activist organization. The Supreme Court ruled 8-0 that the charge of extortion could not be applied to pro-life demonstrations outside abortion facilities.
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A 90-minute panel discussion at Boston College on "Catholic Politicians in the U.S.: Their Faith and Public Policy," on the evening of February 27, was attended by nearly 6000 people. Five Catholic journalists and prominent political commentators, sponsored by the college's Church in the 21st Century Center, spoke on a wide range of subjects including unions, media bias, economic policy, the just war theory, federal funding of stem cell research and Terri Schiavo. But at the centre of the discussion, and the crux of all the other issues was the right to life.
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The legality of partial-birth abortion will come under the scrutiny of the U.S. Supreme Court, the court announced today. An analysis by National Right to Life notes that the federal law now stands a good chance of being approved and the decision will rest on Justice Anthony Kennedy. Among currently sitting Supreme Court justices, five have voted in favor of Roe v. Wade -- that is, in support of the doctrine that abortion must be allowed for any reason until "viability" (about five and one-half months), and for "health" reasons (broadly defined) even during the final three months of pregnancy. Two justices (Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas) have voted to overturn Roe, and two (John Roberts and Samuel Alito) have not voted on the matter. Justice Kennedy, although a supporter of Roe, voted in the 2000 Stenberg case to allow Nebraska to ban the partial-birth abortion method.
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The American Psychological Association is coming under fire for continuing its long-standing position in favor of abortion despite new studies showing abortion causes a host of psychological and emotional problems for women. The APA adopted a pro-abortion position in 1969, but it was not based on any research showing abortion to be psychologically beneficial for women.
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NEW YORK, February 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Silvia Pimentel, has distinguished herself as one of the leading promoters of abortion on the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). Elected to sit on the committee in January 2005 and currently serving as Vice Chair, Pimentel is one of the 23 'experts' on the UN body which monitors compliance with the UN convention of the same name.
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Supporters of the abortion movement have deceived mankind with bumfuzzling statements that Partial Birth Abortion is a rare occurrence, being performed "less than 500 times a year on only fetuses that are severely deformed." However, as early as November 1995, Ron Fitzsimmons, then executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, admitted on ABC's 'Nightline' that he lied when he asserted the procedure was used rarely and only on fetuses and women whose lives were in danger. At that time, Fitzsimmons estimated 5,000 Partial Birth Abortions were performed annually and "primarily done on healthy women of healthy fetuses."
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WASHINGTON, February 3, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - New Republican House Leader, John Boehner, declared his intention to uphold the right to life of the unborn before his election.
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When pro-life activists gather in Washington, D.C. on January 23, 2006 for the 33rd Annual March for Life, there will be a new face on stage -- the face of a Hollywood filmmaker. Jonathan Flora, an award-winning producer with Disney's Buena Vista Home Entertainment has been invited by March for Life founder Nellie Gray to share the stage with, among others, Bob and Mary Schindler (the parents of the late Terri Schiavo) and Father Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life.
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In this season of politicized and contentious confirmation hearings to fill vacancies on the U.S. Supreme Court, some of the sharpest debate and disagreement concerns a so-called "right of privacy" in the U.S. Constitution. The advocates of a constitutional right of privacy speak as though that right were expressly stated and enumerated in the Constitution. But the text of the Constitution does not contain the word "privacy" or the phrase "right of privacy."
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It was during the second day of questioning that Sam Alito's wife broke down, wept and left the room after hearing Sen. Kennedy imply that her husband was a bigot. What was Kennedy's evidence? In 1985, Sam Alito belonged to Concerned Alumni of Princeton. He had joined to protest the ouster of ROTC from campus. Alito was neither an officer nor active, but like future Sen. Bill Bradley, he joined. What were CAP's sins? Headed by National Review publisher William Rusher, CAP had a magazine called Prospect that carried an essay opposing affirmative action and regretting that Princeton had ever gone co-ed.
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Samuel Alito Jr. wrote a memo in 1985 arguing there is no constitutional right to abortion, and pro-choice groups are alarmed by that document. They say it proves he's a right-wing extremist with a "long history of hostility to reproductive freedom," in the words of the National Abortion Federation.
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NEW YORK, January 12, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A high school principal's decision prohibiting a student from wearing his pro-life shirt in school has been overturned by a federal district court. Judge Elfvin of the Western District of New York signed a permanent injunction ordering Fillmore Central High School located in Fillmore, New York to allow the student to wear his pro-life shirt to school.
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London, England (LifeNews.com) -- A new study appearing in Britain's premier medical journal The Lancet says as many as 10 million sex-selection abortions may have occurred in India since ultrasounds were able to detect the gender of an unborn child approximately 20 years ago. The Lancet article said researchers examined data from an Indian study of 6 million people living in 11 million households nationwide.
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A conservative, pro-life college professor and bioethicist has won a national award that some say is the equivalent of the Nobel Prize. Former Goodwin College Science Department chairman Lawrence Roberge was recently named the "2005 Connecticut Professor of the Year" by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education.
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Every year one in three pregnancies worldwide ends in an abortion. A total of 40 million abortions are performed each year, which means that since 1980 one billion children have not been allowed to be born. Contemplating Baby Jesus in the crib one may wonder whether the fact that there are 6.5 billion of us today instead of 7.5 billion is a human achievement or not. Some think it is, some think it is not. But why do those who consider universal legalised abortion to be a sign of progress want to force those who regard abortion as a crime to be a part of it?
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In a letter to the editor of the Chicago Sun-Times, Bill Beckman, Executive Director of Illinois Right to Life Committee, responds to a column by the Rev. Jesse Jackson. In the height of hypocrisy, the formerly pro-life Jackson takes this opportunity to lecture us on the real meaning of Christmas and the call to treasure every child and protect babies in the dawn of life.
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Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- A Catholic pro-life group has launched an advertising campaign to defend Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito from attacks. The group Fidelis says it's worried that abortion advocates, other groups and the media are questioning whether Alito is fit for the court because of his Catholic faith. "This season is a special time when many Americans commemorate our Judeo-Christian roots," Fidelis President Joseph Cella said.
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PRINCETON, December 2, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Infamous advocate of infanticide and the man often credited as the founder of the modern radical animal rights movement, Dr. Peter Singer, was featured in the National Post this week predicting that the traditional ethics of western civilization would shortly be abolished. Singer's comments appeared first in the September/October edition of the journal Foreign Policy as a speculation on what cherished social institutions would still exist in 35 years.
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A UN researcher says the prevalence of abortion and infanticide targeting girls ahas caused a gender imbalance that has resulted in 200 million fewer women than there should be worldwide. The researcher says the girls are "missing" because of a practice he calls "gendercide." Theodor Winkler, head of a research center that directed the project, says the number of missing girls is based on the normal birthrate of males and females and the expected gender balance in the worldwide population.
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"In the know" readers are likely aware of the American Girl doll company boycott called for by the Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League "in response to the company's refusal to sever ties with the pro-abortion group Girls Incorporated." Other pro-life groups supporting the League's boycott are Priests for Life, Operation Rescue, Stand True Ministries, Aid for Women and Illinois Right to Life
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Imagine giving men the same "reproductive rights" as women: the freedom to terminate fatherhood at any time during a partner's pregnancy, and corresponding with baby abandonment laws, up to one year after delivery.
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Sacramento, CA (LifeNews.com) -- Earlier this month, a Catholic school in California won praise from pro-life advocates for firing a teacher who volunteered at a Planned Parenthood abortion business. Now, the student whose mother exposed the teacher's activities has been expelled from the school.
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The Pro-Life Action League is alerting parents that a seemingly innocent self-esteem campaign launched by the popular American Girl doll company is helping to support the pro-abortion, pro-lesbian agenda of Girls Incorporated.
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Chicago commuters were greeted by Joe and Ann Scheidlers Pro Life Action League on Wednsday October 19, as over 30 pro-life activists stretched along the outer drive, Daley Plaza, and Wacker Drive. For several years, the Pro Life Action League has drawn sharp focus on the face of abortion by displaying oversized photographic eproductions at roadsides during peak commuting hours. The signs, each several feet wide and over six feet tall, have drawn harsh criticism from pro-abortionists, who prefer to keep the gruesome reality of abortion out of sight and out of mind.
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CCI NOTES: Chicagoans shouldn't be surprised when Liberal Catholics like Carol Marin demonstrate their fashionable acceptance of "gay" rights and abortion. After all, any whiff of opposition to these social scourges would certainly find them bumped from the invite lists on the cocktail calendar. Like most Liberal Catholics, Marin enjoys tossing in Christ's parables where they can prop up her liberal arguements (Communist dictator Stalin is known to have done this too.) As authentic and practicing Catholics know (and people like Durbin don't), it is a Catholic's duty and obligation to correct sinners for the sake of the eternal salvation of souls. To fail to do so invites a millstone being placed around a sinner's neck, and drowning them in the sea, lest anyone be scandalized into believing sinfulness is acceptable. And no Carol, that isn't a splinter in your eye. It's an aborted fetus...
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Last week, the National Catholic Register (NCR) published a front-page article discussing Professor Joel Brind's landmark report in the National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly last month. Brind accused governmental agencies (most notably, the U.S. National Cancer Institute) and other scientists and organizations of using fraudulent research to cover up a link between abortion and increased breast cancer risk. NCR reporter Patrick Novecosky contacted officials at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and the American Cancer Society (ACS) for their comments, but they aren't talking. They directed him to statements about the abortion-breast cancer link on their websites.
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A group providing information about the link between abortion and breast cancer were asked to leave an international conference on Breast Cancer in Halifax last week. Ellen Chesal of the group, Positive Options for Women, told LifeSite News.com that their table at the conference was very well received by most of the conference attendees. "We ran out of material and had to go out to run off more," she said. On the second day of the conference, however, the group was approached by one conference organizer and accused of misleading women. Chesal said, "A board member from the Breast Cancer Foundation approached us, enraged, and spitting out accusations about us having a hidden agenda and that we were presenting a lie to frightenwomen from having abortions."
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It's funny how the media loves to misuse the word "right" when it comes to advancing their agenda such as killing unborn children or adoption of children by homosexuals (i.e. "Gay" "rights" and abortion "rights") but never use the word right, when it comes to life itself, the most fundamental human right of all. They have it very backwards. The callousness and cold-heartedness of people in journalism is hard to comprehend let alone describe. Shameful isn't strong enough. Depraved would be more correct. Rather than true journalists they amount to no more than the Democrat Party's advertising branch and they need to change.
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State Senator Peter Roskam will be the special guest at a Tribute to Fathers on Saturday, June 18, as part of the annual Hike for Life to benefit CareNet Pregnancy Services of DuPage. Roskam, a Glen Ellyn native who now resides in Wheaton, has been serving the western suburbs in the State Capitol since 1993. He is currently in a bid to replace the retiring Henry Hyde as Illinois' Sixth District Representative for the United States Congress.
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A pro-life group that was one of the leading critics of a study claiming abortions increased during President Bush's first term in office is applauding the results of a new Planned Parenthood report showing the opposite is true. Shortly before the 2004 presidential election, researcher Harold Stassen released an op-ed in which he claimed abortions had increased during Bush's administration, based on the findings from roughly a dozen states.
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There is a legal obligation of informed consent for any medical procedure. With the majority of studies showing that abortion increases breast cancer risk, and even the minority studies reinforcing the well-established principle that childbirth is protective against breast cancer, patients seeking abortion have an obvious right to this information. The patient who had an abortion and later develops breast cancer may have a valid claim against the provider. Already there have been at least two settlements in the United States in lawsuits brought for such failure to disclose.
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Planned Parenthood of Indiana has to show state investigators the medical records of some of its youngest patients, a judge ruled on Tuesday. The judge rejected the organization's contention that disclosing such records could have a chilling effect on patients across the state.
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Having an abortion almost doubles a woman's risk of giving birth dangerously early in a later pregnancy, according to research that will provoke fresh debate over the most controversial of all medical procedures. A French study of 2,837 births - the first to investigate the link between terminations and extremely premature births - found that mothers who had previously had an abortion were 1.7 times more likely to give birth to a baby at less than 28 weeks' gestation. Many babies born this early die soon after birth, and a large number who survive suffer serious disability.
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At his installation in the Basilica of St. John Lateran on Saturday, May 7, Benedict XVI delivered his first homily from the episcopal see of the bishop of Rome. He applied to himself the definition of the pope that had been coined by St. Gregory the Great: "servant of the servants of God." He affirmed that the task of the bishop of Rome is that of "presiding in doctrine and presiding in love": this latter expression is taken from St. Ignatius of Antioch. This love, he explained, is that of Christ, who makes himself really present in the Eucharist, from which the Church "is continually born anew."
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A report last week in the Kaiser Daily Reproductive Health Report revealed that a panel of five obstetrician/gynecologists - whose job is to determine what information to include on Alaska's informed consent website - will include information about fetal pain and a "possible" abortion-breast cancer link. Two doctors are professed abortion-supporters. At least one of them performs abortions and, therefore, stands to profit from a watered-down statement concerning the risk.
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A study funded by the radically pro-abortion organizations, the John Merck foundation and Catholics for a Free Choice, surveyed staff at all 597 Catholic hospitals in the United States and found that only 55% of them refused to dispense the abortifacient morning after pill. Despite the deceptive name, "emergency contraceptive" works in many cases by stopping an already formed unborn child from attaching to the uterine wall. This effect is disputed by no reputable scientists. Catholic medical ethics is clear that abortion is, in all cases, and at all stages of development, the moral equivalent to murder and can never be condoned.
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Last month, Gov. Rod Blagojevich issued an "emergency rule" that would force pharmacists across the state to fill prescriptions for contraceptives, including abortion-inducing drugs, regardless of any moral objections they may have. This issue will come before the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (JCAR) on Tuesday May 17th in Springfield. With a two-thirds vote, this committee could rule to suspend the emergency rule. Listed below are the members of JCAR.
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A leading Catholic says Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich should rescind his order requiring state pharmacists to fill all prescriptions. The order has been criticized because it would make pharmacists dispense drugs that can cause abortions and violate their moral and religious views. Cadinal Francis George called on Blagojevich to back off the rule, which has sparked a national firestorm of controversy. Several pharmacists are participating in two lawsuits against the governor's actions.
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"What have cancer fundraising businesses done to reduce breast cancer rates during the last three decades?" asked Karen Malec, a 15-year cancer survivor and spokesperson for the Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer. "Every year, sneakered women raise billions for cancer businesses that are more interested in research than disease prevention," said Malec. "Breast cancer rates haven't declined. They've increased." More than 211,000 cases of invasive breast cancer and 59,000 cases of in situ breast cancer are expected this year. One in 7.5 American women develops the disease in her lifetime. In 1970, one in 12 women developed the disease.
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President Bush has announced his intention to nominate Julie Finley, a strong pro-abortion advocate, as U.S. Ambassador to The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). The OSCE is engaged in setting standards in fields including human rights and humanitarian concerns as well as military security, and economic and environmental cooperation. In addition, the OSCE undertakes a variety of preventive diplomacy initiatives designed to prevent, manage and resolve conflicts within and among the participating states.
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Pro-abortion forces won a victory in the Illinois House Wednesday as State Rep. Rosemary Mulligan (R-Park Ridge) successfully passed HB 2492 which would make it a criminal offense for an ultrasound to be administered without a doctor's order. Mulligan said that Planned Parenthood and the Illinois State Medical Society encouraged her to sponsor the legislation because there was a concern about long exposure of fetuses to ultrasound waves.
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The House passed a bill on Wednesday making it a federal crime for any adult to transport an under-age girl across state lines to have an abortion without the consent of her parents. A vote on a similar bill is expected in the Senate later this spring or early this summer, and backers says its chances are good. The measure, the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act, passed 270 to 157 and was a victory for abortion opponents, who have been pushing an ambitious agenda now that Congress is under greater Republican control.
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A pro-life activist who was present said that as she was being arrested, the girl's mother was begging police to help retrieve her daughter. Angela Michaels, of Small Victories Ministry, said "Exactly one hour later at 10:35 am, the 14-year-old emerged from the clinic looking disheveled. The 14-year-old told us that employees kept her in a quiet room until the procedure was performed and she was told that her mother had left."
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From 4-D Ultrasound Imagery to Revolutionary In Utero Surgery, Advanced Technology Takes You Into the Womb WASHINGTON, Jan. 12 /PRNewswire/ -- From the moment of conception, every human embryo embarks on an incredible nine-month odyssey of development fraught with uncertainty. Now, cutting-edge technology makes it possible to open a window into the hidden world of the fetus and explore each trimester in amazing new detail. On Sunday, March 6, 2005, at 8 p.m. ET/ 9 p.m. PT, the National Geographic Channel (NGC) presents "In the Womb"
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We live in times when pro-abortionists and homosexual activists cleverly claim that abortion and "gay marriage" are "rights" instead of wrongs and "anti-choice" and "homophobia" are the true evils. "Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!" Isaiah 5:20 Amen! Father Walter J. Quinn, OSA preached at all of the Masses at St. Francis Church in Greenlawn, New York on the weekend of February 12-13, 2005...
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A Cook County Circuit Court Judge has ruled that the parents of unimplanted embryos can sue their fertility clinic under the Wrongful Death Act after the clinic accidentally destroyed the embryos. In an 11-page opinion, Judge Jeffrey Lawrence ruled Friday that "a pre-embryo (a fertilized egg that hasn't yet been implanted) is a 'human being' within the ... Wrongful Death Act and that a claim lies for its wrongful destruction whether or not it is implanted in its mother's womb." Lawrence made his ruling, he said, based on Illinois abortion law and the state's Wrongful Death Act.
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As the end of the march made its way up the hill leading to the Supreme Court building, the mercury dropped and a light snow began to fall. This created an epic scene as thousands pushed their way through adverse weather to stand up for the moral values so lacking in our society. At election time, Americans made their commitment to these moral values clear. At this year's March for Life, those present showed a dogged persistence to continue marching as long as it takes to overturn Roe v. Wade and renew a sense of decency to America.
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Hillary Clinton's idea of an overture to pro-life groups is to blame those who oppose abortion for its spread. This line of reasoning is comically convoluted, but Hillary Clinton has been trying it out anyway, saying President Bush is responsible for the rise in abortion in some states because he won't fund her favorite prophylactic programs.
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On Friday, January 21st, 2005, the day after the Inauguration, God providentially gave us the opportunity to show President Bush, Vice -president Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Condaleeza Rice, and former president George Bush Sr. & his wife Barbara (the President's parents) the bloody photographs of the murdered preborn! (see photo below) Here's how it happened...
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American Life League is today unveiling a two-page ad identifying the 72 pro-abortion Catholics in the U.S. House and Senate. The ad is scheduled to run in the Washington Times. "This is the first time American Life League has publicly identified all pro-abortion Catholic Republicans and Democrats in both houses of Congress," said Joseph Starrs, Director of American Life League's Crusade for the Defense of Our Catholic Church. htm
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A Catholic church plans to bury the ashes of as many as 1,000 aborted fetuses Sunday, raising a storm of protest from those who accuse it of exploiting the pain and grief of women for political purposes. The Sacred Heart of Mary Church obtained the ashes from a mortuary that had a contract to cremate remains from the Boulder Abortion Clinic. But the clinic said it didn't know the ashes were being given to the church.
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Last week, during a conversation about embryonic stem-cell experimentation, a state senator speculated to me, "What if God has ordained some human embryos for research in order to discover cures and treatments for the greater good?" At first I thought the man's question was too rhetorical, too deep for me, like, "If God is so great, can He create a rock He can't move?" The initial response that came to mind seemed too obvious.
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Coming just two days after George W. Bush's inauguration, Saturday's anniversary of the 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion is dominated by the hopes of one side - and fears of the other - that the president will try to overturn Roe v. Wade through appointments to fill expected high court vacancies. Anti-abortion activists were among the legions of Bush supporters converging on Washington in the past few days, and most will remain for Monday's annual March for Life. Though Bush is widely admired within the movement, some of its militants still question his commitment to reversing the 32-year-old decision.
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Archbishop Raymond Burke, after spending a busy 2004 setting the pace for episcopal pro-life leadership, appears set to continue his strong efforts on behalf of the sacredness of life in this new year. This past Saturday, Burke personally led a congregation of 400 Catholics to the sidewalks in front of the Planned Parenthood abortion mill in downtown St. Louis. In his homily at the cathedral Mass, Archbishop Burke described the pro-life fight as "a battle against Satan and his cohorts." He said, "We pray for the parents who are contemplating the betrayal of their parenthood through abortion."
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A former advisor for the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation who resigned because the group makes donations to Planned Parenthood and refused to acknowledge the abortion-breast cancer link, will be a featured speaker at an Illinois event for teenagers. Eve Sanchez Silver, a research analyst for Komen, quit her position in September when she learned cash-strapped Komen affiliates were sending contributions to the nation's largest abortion business.
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A lot of people are asking how a loving God could have allowed the tragedy that killed over 150,000 innocent people in Southeast Asia. Aside from the fact that nobody can read the mind of God or understand His motives which are all born out of a foolish love for we wayward mortals, we ought to be asking another question closer to home: how can tens of millions of Americans allow the grisly murder of 4 million innocent human beings every year?
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Last November, the United States government permitted its employees in 27 Illinois counties to choose a Catholic health plan run by the Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis. Planned Parenthood was aghast. How dare the government let a federal employeee choose a Catholic health plan! So, Planned Parenthood protested, permitting William Donohue, President of the Catholic League, to expose Planned Parenthood as hypocrital and anti-religious.
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First came the sex scandal. Then there were lawsuits. Now there are bankruptcies. And some economic analysts believe this could be just the beginning of the financial fallout from widespread charges of clerical sexual abuse within the U.S. Catholic Church. Nearly 11,000 people have accused priests of child sexual abuse from 1950 through 2002, according to a church-commissioned study released this year. There could be thousands more who have not yet come forward.
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The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer deplores two Associated Press (AP) articles in less than seven weeks attacking legislative efforts that require doctors to inform women about the abortion-breast cancer (ABC) link. The AP censored facts that every woman has a right to know. Both AP stories said the U.S. National Cancer Institute denies a link. However, neither story reported that several medical groups disagree with the government's opinion and do recognize a cause-effect relationship.
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Have you ever been so close to a miracle that you could feel the presence of God? On December 18th, the Pro-Life Action League began their 2nd annual "Empty Manger" Abortion Mill Caroling Day in front of Planned Parenthood's headquarters and concluded three mills later at one of the busiest abortuaries in the City of Chicago, Albany Medical Surgical Center. What happened that day was a miracle...
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The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer denounces two flawed studies on the risks of oral contraceptives (OC's) and cites them as one more example of ideology trumping science. The authors, whose research is a part of the Women's Health Initiative, erroneously claimed their findings showed that OC's reduce the risk of heart disease and do not raise breast cancer risk. Federal officials announced this week that a statistical reanalysis shows the heart findings to be flawed and the breast cancer findings suspect.
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"Increases in abortions, more money from taxpayers' pockets, and bigger profit margins -- all while clinics are closing down and donations are dwindling. That is the state of Planned Parenthood," said Jim Sedlak, executive director of American Life League's STOPP International, in response to the release of Planned Parenthood Federation of America's 2003-2004 Annual Report. STOPP International, which has monitored Planned Parenthood's operations for 20 years, provided its exclusive analysis of the latest report and put it in historical perspective. Sedlak pointed out the following facts and trends about Planned Parenthood in the last year...
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A 16-year-old New Jersey high school student wants Planned Parenthood kicked off her campus. Claire Moore is a junior at Manasquan High School. The pro-life student wants the school to dump a required freshman sexual education course that includes two days of presentations by Planned Parenthood on contraceptives and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). She says when she took the class, she was appalled to hear the group encourage teenagers to seek an abortion if contraception failed.
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Pro-choice activists need to rethink "the value of the fetus" to reach middle-of-the-road voters, says Frances Kissling of Catholics for a Free Choice in the winter issue of her group's magazine. Her 7,400-word essay "Is There Life After Roe?" admits the legitimacy of parental-notification laws -- "Surely we agree that young women aged 13, 14, 15 (and even older) need their parents at this time?" -- and criticizes support by liberals for partial-birth abortion. "We failed miserably to touch on the broader unrest about abortion itself that the procedure raised in the minds of many," says Mrs. Kissling, the nation's most prominent pro-choice advocate among Catholics.
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Last week, California Democrat Congressman Henry Waxman issued a report claiming that most federally funded abstinence-only programs teach "false, misleading, or distorted information about reproductive health." Generally speaking, if any of Waxman's charges are true, the misinformation should stop. There are more than enough factual reasons to avoid promiscuous sex without resorting to embellishment or distortion. But Waxman's specific allegation that "abstinence-only curricula contain false and misleading information about the risks of abortion" stinks from a mile away.
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When is a breast-cancer group offensive to women? When it supports abortion, says one breast-cancer advocate. Eve Sanchez Silver, a two-time breast cancer survivor and Hispanic outreach director for the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, found out in September that the organization provided funding to Planned Parenthood, the nation's largest abortion provider. She was stunned and disappointed to the point of resignation - from her job, that is.
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The Clinton Administration's rush-to-approval made a mockery of the FDA's stringent review process, with evidently lethal results. The President should do something about this, soon. FDA approval of RU-486 should be withdrawn and a new review process mandated. Let Danco and Planned Parenthood sue, if they like; their defense of the indefensible will itself advance the pro-life cause.
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U.S. District Court Judge David Coar has denied a motion by Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan to dismiss a lawsuit filed against Secretary of State Jesse White by the nonprofit group, Choose Life Illinois, Inc. Today, in denying Madigan's motion, Judge Coar set a trial date of January 2006, "engraved in stone," and rejected Madigan's argument that the lawsuit was baseless. Judge Coar warned there would be no trial postponements.
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For the third straight year, Planned Parenthood, the nation's No. 1 abortion provider, is selling greeting cards with the holiday message "Choice on Earth." This year's offering, which includes bright pink snow flakes and the now-infamous phrase, is available at the organization's online store. Two years ago, outcry about the cards in the media, Planned Parenthood claimed, actually spiked sales of the items, as well as "Choice on Earth" T-shirts.
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...At the same time, Archbishop Burke said he expects the coming year to bring clarity and renewed attention to the question of refusing Communion to pro-abortion politicians. "It's funny because some people now characterize me as a fundamentalist, or an extremist," Archbishop Burke said in an interview Nov. 26. "But these are questions that are at the very foundation of the life of our country. We just simply have to continue to address them," he said.
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Are there any other circumstances, other than when CBS is discussing the abortion-breast cancer link, that its journalists invite an expert to its studio for an interview, but do not identify that person as an expert? In the wake of the scandal involving Dan Rather's use of forged documents, one might have expected CBS to be up to higher standards of professionalism and integrity.
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Faced with an honest Protestant president who reads their books, quotes their pope and has done more than any modern U.S. president to rebuild respect for God and human life, many of those who work at the Vatican are . . . disgusted. About 60 percent of them hope that Kerry wins the election, reports the (left-leaning) National Catholic Reporter. The Vatican is the headquarters of the Universal Church, but its culture is deeply European. And Old Europe has been dying for 50 years, becoming a continent of slackers - with declining economies, shrinking native populations and entire countries refusing to join the war against the Islamic terrorists on their doorstep for fear that, if the West wins, America will somehow benefit.
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...I want to reiterate what I have said: abortion is the greatest moral evil of our age. In light of that truth, a Catholic who deliberately votes for a candidate precisely because of the candidate's permissive stand on abortion is guilty of formal cooperation in grave evil. When a Catholic does not share a candidate's stand in favor of abortion, but votes for that candidate for other reasons, such an action can only be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons. I cannot think of a value to put on innocent human life and the right to life; others, in conscience, may be able to. However, I ask each of you to give serious consideration to the Truth that is Gospel of Life as you prepare to vote and I ask each of you to remember that we are, all of us, our brothers' keepers.
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On the eve of a national election marked by controversy over the Catholic hierarchy's response to pro-abortion Catholic politicians, Loyola University of Chicago Law School is honoring one of Illinois' most notorious pro-abortion politicians. Lisa Madigan ran for State's Attorney with the backing of pro-bortion groups like Planned Parenthood, NOW and Personal PAC. During her campaign she vowed to shut down pregnancy resource centers. Now Loyola isconferring the St. Robert Bellarmine Award on Madigan in a ceremony this Saturday.
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The Cardinal Archbishop of Chicago was driving past an abortion facility one day, and saw a group of young people praying. He has sent a letter thanking the group of young adult pro-life activists from St. Mary of the Angels Young Adult Group who for years have done sidewalk counseling and prayer vigils outside Chicago's Planned Parenthood abortion facilities.
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An ad by the Pittsburgh group appeared in the diocesan newspaper, the Pittsburgh Catholic. "A candidate for office must understand that the Church stands against any policy or course of action which diminishes life, dignity or the rights of the human person: abortion, capital punishment, war, scandalous poverty, denial of health care, mistreatment of immigrants and racism to name but a few," the group claims, according to a Pittsburgh Post Gazette report." All are essential issues to a 'pro-life' voter."
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Colorado Springs Bishop Michael J. Sheridan was the homilist at the Mass concluding the International Week of Prayer and Fasting October 11. The Mass and concluding prayer vigil were held at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington. The International Week of Prayer and Fasting's three goals of the conversion of nations, an end to abortion, and world peace "are all intimately connected and related to the others", pointed out Bishop Sheridan.
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An organization of priests in the Milwaukee Archdiocese has urged that the U.S. bishops not refuse Communion to Catholic politicians who support abortion legislation that is contrary to Catholic teaching. The priests made the comments in a letter to Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick of Washington as head of the U.S. bishops' Task Force on Catholic Bishops and Catholic Politicians formed by the bishops' conference last fall.
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According to documents obtained by Culture & Cosmos, officials of the Dioceses of San Bernardino and La Crosse have instructed pastors and parish administrators not to allow the distribution of "Voter's Guide for Serious Catholics," published by Catholic Answers. With two weeks remaining before election day, the dioceses' actions are another episode in the political drama surrounding the question of the Catholic vote.
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It is not hard to imagine that the lawyers of the medieval Ius commune would have been horrified at some of the present day exercises of ecclesiastical power and would support the efforts of those who are trying to set things right.. It appears that a significant elements of the Church's canonical tradition have been set aside. Some have suggested that a solution could be found in making the Church over in the image of our secular governmental systems in the West. To the contrary, I believe that history shows that the Church need not and should not rely on such things as Anglo-American legal traditions, the Scottish Enlightenment, the views of personalities such as John Locke or Thomas Jefferson or the Constitution of the United States. She would better protect children, more effectively deal with the sandal of pro-abortion Catholic politicians and further the salvation of souls by recovering her own noble legal traditions.
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Halloween is just around the corner, and once again UN Children's Fund is recruiting millions of little children to fundraise on its behalf. But if a cute little ballerina (or superman) comes to your door bearing a little orange box marked UNICEF, give them candy instead of coins. The UN Children's Fund, which promotes abortion, sterilization and contraception, does not deserve to have its coffers fattened.
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A leading pro-abortion law firm says abortion could quickly be illegal in some 30 states should the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision be overturned. The new report highlights the high stakes both sides in the abortion debate see in the upcoming presidential election. According to the New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights, some states still have pre-Roe laws prohibiting abortions on the books that could be enforced should the landmark decision fall.
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A member of the Pontifical Academy for Life contends that bioethical topics need to be explained better and suggests that bioethicists study communications. Monsignor Ángel Rodr'guez Lu'o, professor at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross and consultor for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, expounded on his idea in this interview with ZENIT.
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The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer condemns a statement from the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (RCOG) saying, "Induced abortion is not associated with an increased breast cancer risk." This represents a reversal from its position in 2000 when the RCOG's guidelines said the research was methodologically sound and "could not be disregarded." There are recognized and contested breast cancer risks of abortion.
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Loyola Hospital is trying to color the stark black-and-white news that it commits late term, live birth abortions. Following revelations it is one of at least two Catholic health systems involved in the "early labor induction" procedure, as it calls it, Loyola attempted to justify its position in a statement September 23. Eleven months ago, the National Catholic Register reported that Chicago's Loyola and the west coast and Alaska's Providence Health System "stated they perform this procedure at or after 24 weeks of pregnancy, the time when a baby is usually considered to be viable."
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The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer applauds Eve Sanchez Silver's courageous decision to resign her position as a charter member of The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation's National Hispanic/Latina Advisory Council (SGK) during the group's Dallas meeting last week. Silver is the director of Cinta Latina Research. She's a popular speaker and a medical research analyst working as a breast cancer research advocate with premier U.S. cancer research facilities. Silver, a two-time breast cancer survivor, was motivated to resign after reading a coalition press release revealing that Komen's affiliates have helped fund Planned Parenthood.
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The issue of early inducement of labour for children with 'anomalies incompatible with life' has created a stir in the world of online pro-life reporting. On September 15th, LifeSiteNews.com ran a story, based on an editorial by Jill Stanek, about the labour inducement practice followed by at least two Catholic hospital systems in the United States. Stanek quoted Fr. John O'Callaghan, a member of the Loyola hospital ethics committee, saying that the procedure was done "to ward off the physical complications of bringing to term a child who is not going to live anyway."
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Two people who have been touched by the tragedy of breast cancer took information about the link between abortion and the deadly disease to participants in the Chicago-area "Race for the Cure," sponsored by the Susan G. Komen Foundation. They received mixed reactions from those involved. Jeanette Joyce and a friend, Tom Morrison, know how breast cancer can affect people's lives.
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The news was a real bummer. A reporter named Tom Szyszkiewicz, who writes for the Catholic publications Our Sunday Visitor and the National Catholic Register, was calling to tell me he had discovered two Catholic hospital systems were committing the induced labor abortion procedure - live birth abortion - on handicapped babies. The bad news warped to bizarre when Szyszkiewicz said these hospitals were waiting until babies were 23 to 26 weeks gestation before aborting them, i.e., until they were of viable age, so they could say these weren't abortions at all but simply labor inductions and, thus, sanctioned by the Catholic Church.
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Illinois Department of Public Health has released their compiled Illinois abortion statistics for 2003. Last year 42,228 abortions were committed in Illinois. Of these abortions, 3,497 were committed on women from other states. The good news is that 4,717 fewer abortions were committed in Illinois last year compared to 2002. This decline in abortions is almost exactly a 10% decline in just one year.
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PRWEB: "Set and performed in a Catholic church, this spiritual musical in one act explores the dilemma of a Catholic Democrat under fire for supporting pro-choice legislation. A month before Election Day, a reporter reveals the fact that the senator's own daughter had an abortion when she was in college, an abortion her father knew nothing about. "THE ANSWER" will be performed October 1-3, Friday and Saturday 8PM, Sunday at 5PM at St. Gertrude's Catholic Parish in Edgewater, 1420 W. Granville Avenue, Chicago."
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The Immaculate Heart of Mary sisters of Michigan have donated $200 to a pro-abortion-rights political action committee that works to get like-minded women elected to office. The donation to Emily's List, says the nuns' vice president, was simply meant to help women in the political process. "We weren't making a political statement in terms" of abortion, Sister Mary Katherine Hamilton told the Detroit Free Press.
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"Archbishop Raymond Burke is giving St. Louis Catholics a way to vote for politicians who support abortion rights without commiting a grave sin or having to go to confession. In his latest clarification of controversial comments he made earlier this summer, Burke said Thursday he believes Catholics could vote for a politician who supports abortion rights as long as that's not the reason they are voting for the candidate, and they believe the politician's stance on other moral issues outweighs the abortion-rights stance." (See commentary below CCI)
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Ms. Hackett, "THE ANSWER" is not pro-abortion. Quite the contrary. Not only does the playwright embrace the Church's teaching on abortion wholeheartedly, the play's lead character does likewise in a painful confrontation with his wife who is pro-choice. What's more, this senator who has been denied Communion because of his support of pro-choice legislation not only defends his bishop for "manning the wall," he is forced to examine the consequences of living out his political life split off from his deepest religious beliefs.
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Portugal has refused permission for a Dutch "abortion ship" to enter its territorial waters. The government said the group operating the trip planned to hand out pills to end early unwanted pregnancies - a procedure prohibited in Portugal.
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The 10th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade is a good time for us to pause and reflect. Our nationwide policy of abortion-on-demand through all nine months of pregnancy was neither voted for by our people nor enacted by our legislators- not a single state had such unrestricted abortion before the Supreme Court decreed it to be national policy in 1973. But the consequences of this judicial decision are now obvious: since 1973, more than 15 million unborn children have had their lives snuffed out by legalized abortions. That is over ten times the number of Americans lost in all our nation's wars.
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Fr. Frank Pavone, director of the international pro-life organization, Priests for Life, will be coming into the Sioux Falls area to give several powerful talks to the clergy and the general public on August 18th and 19th. In what is being hailed as a "whistle-stop" tour of Sioux Falls, Fr. Pavone will be speaking to thousands of area residents about the November election.
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The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer deplores the fact that two medical journals have resorted to censorship for the purpose of suppressing scientific debate and academic criticism of flawed research on the abortion-breast cancer (ABC) link. [1,2] The journals, Lancet and Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers and Prevention, refused to publish letters critical of research showing little or no relationship between abortion and increased breast cancer risk.
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As the American Catholic Church hierarchy contends with notorious pro-abortion Catholic politicians - who publicly defy Church teaching in their political lives while flaunting their Catholicism by receiving Communion - state delegates of the Knights of Columbus are contending with a proposal to expel member Knights in politics who support abortion rights.
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Perhaps it is time for Catholics and others of good faith to stand back for a moment, take a deep breath, and just consider for a moment the question as to whether or not the horrific "confusion" over whether or not the earliest human embryos - regardless if they are sexually or asexually reproduced - are human "persons" is really so relevant to these abortion, cloning, and stem cell debates after all. Is the hotly debated "distinction" between a "human being" and a "human person" simply just another one of the many false distinctions that have permeated these bioethics debates on abortion, cloning and stem cell research - like the false distinction between "therapeutic" and "reproductive" cloning?
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"A spokesman said Obama voted against the abortion legislation because it included provisions that "would have taken away from doctors their professional judgment when a fetus is viable." The legislation, which was defeated, would have made it illegal for doctors to let a fetus die if it happened to be delivered alive during an abortion. Quite simply, Barack Obama is a liar..."
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Undeterred by the Archdiocese of Philadelphia's refusal to permit them to speak at area Masses, American Life League's Summer Crusade for Life walkers will arrive in Philadelphia this week. During their stay they will pray at local abortion mills, meet with Catholic public figures and speak to gatherings of faithful Catholics in their homes and other venues.
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You probably think the mission of Planned Parenthood is to help people plan their families. In a letter printed in the July 13th Sun-Times, Steve Trombley of Chicago area Planned Parenthood stated their mission as "providing women with access to comprehensive health care and helping them make lifelong responsible choices." This mission is not what you think, especially once you understand the true meaning of the terms used by Planned Parenthood. "Comprehensive health care" means access to contraception and abortion...
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Denver's Catholic Archbishop Charles Chaput was interviewed on Colorado Public Radio about his position in the debate over giving communion for Catholic public officials who support abortion. He wrote a column, one of a continuing series, in which he said that Catholics' who support abortion are not really Catholics, but "a very different kind of creature."
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When I look back on my early days as a Catholic, when I briefly attended the new rite, I recall a great many things that told me something was wrong. High on the list was the way the vast bulk of the congregation was dressed. Many of them may as well have been sitting in the stands at the Indianapolis 500. These were people who would have been mortified to show up at a friend's wedding in jeans and a T-shirt, yet they thought nothing of donning such apparel for Sunday Mass - where the Sacrifice of Calvary, the greatest act of love the world has ever known, was made present for them on the altar. This phenomenon is by no means confined to the Catholic Church; a revenge of the casual has insinuated its way into just about every nook and cranny of American society.
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Sen. John Kerry's newly expressed position that as a Roman Catholic he personally opposes abortion but favors keeping it legal was explicitly rejected by a bishop 10 years ago. In his 1994 "Pastoral Letter on Morality and Conscience," the late Bishop John Keating of Arlington, Va., addressed the argument of some Catholic politicians who seek "to justify a 'pro-choice' position" by stating: "I am personally opposed to abortion, but I cannot impose my religious beliefs on others." Keating wrote: "The fallacy in this reasoning is simply that the morality of abortion is not a religious belief, any more than the morality of slavery, apartheid, rape, larceny, murder or arson is a religious belief. These are norms of the natural law of mankind and can be legislated even in a completely religionless society.
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"I oppose abortion, personally. I don't like abortion. I believe life does begin at conception," said Kerry. "But I can't take my Catholic belief, my article of faith, and legislate it on a Protestant or a Jew or an atheist... who doesn't share it. We have separation of church and state in the United States of America." Wait, John. If you believe life begins at conception, there can be no "but." If your first statement is true, killing innocent human life after conception can only be called murder.
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Did you hear the news? Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry actually believes that life does indeed begin at conception. At least, that's what he told the Dubuque Telegraph Herald. Say what? "I oppose abortion, personally. I don't like abortion. I believe life does begin at conception," said Kerry. "But I can't take my Catholic belief, my article of faith, and legislate it on a Protestant or a Jew or an atheist... who doesn't share it. We have separation of church and state in the United States of America." (Here comes my sad and heavy sigh...)
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Frustrated that the Illinois General Assembly has successfully blocked legislation for the past two years authorizing the sale and production of a specialty license plate that would help to fund adoption agencies, a group of adoption advocates filed suit in federal court Monday. The federal suit #04C-4316, filed by Choose Life Illinois, Inc., attempts to halt the distribution of specialty car license plates in Illinois until the standards for the plates' issuance are "non-discriminatory and content-neutral."
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One of the most dramatic medical advances of recent years has been the use of surgery to correct birth defects--before birth. Surgeons can operate on fetuses in the womb for a variety of conditions, from life-threatening tumors to spina bifida. When they operate, it may surprise you to learn, they provide anesthesia not only to the mother but also to the fetus. Or maybe it doesn't surprise you. Maybe it seems obvious that fetuses can feel pain long before they emerge into the world. But some people wish you wouldn't think about that fact.
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The archdiocese of Boston actually called the church where Sen. John Kerry was going to Mass on Easter and reassured the pastor it was OK to give Kerry Communion because Archbishop Seán Patrick O'Malley has not yet taken a stand. Thus Kerry received the Eucharist. Help Archbishop O'Malley decide to take a stand! Sign a petition urging him to instruct his priests and teach the faithful the truth, by refusing further Communion to Kerry!
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"Will Catholics vote against Gov. Carter, Mr. Mayor, because of his abortion stand?'' The mayor of Chicago stared at the reporter with the bemused frown he reserved for silly questions. "They don't vote that way.'' Twenty-eight years later, they still don't vote that way. Nevertheless, in the run-up to the last seven presidential elections, experts on both sides have predicted that the ``Catholic anti-abortion'' vote would cause trouble for the Democrats, especially given the drift of Catholics from Democratic alignment. Both these "theories'' - a Catholic anti-abortion vote and a Catholic realignment - are urban folk tales that float around in the collective consciousness of the media with very little basis in fact.
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Every Saturday, dedicated pro-lifers - women and men - pray and sidewalk counsel at Chicago area abortion clinic, hoping to persuade the abortion-bound women not to go through with the procedure. At a Planned Parenthood abortion clinic in downtown Chicago, a group of young adults provides the weekly pro-life witness. And at the same time, individuals working or volunteering for Planned Parenthood act as "escorts" for the clinic's patrons. Sad stories are not uncommon in this endeavor, including one told by Kelly (last name withheld per request), a regular pro-life witness at the clinic.
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Perhaps the San Francisco judge who banned the ban on partial-birth abortions last week was right. After, all what is the difference between a baby, more than halfway born, having his brains sucked out, and a baby, entirely within the womb, having his skull crushed and his body torn apart? Certainly, it makes no difference to the child, who becomes certainly dead. By a brutal procedure that would be condemned under anyone's conception of human rights. Not the most ardent death-penalty advocates are for head crushing or brain sucking as an acceptable form of capital punishment, even for the most ghoulish of crimes.
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Scott Ferrier is a tireless promoter of the faith, and like most Catholic activists, he has managed to blend his vocation as a pilot with apologetics through The Sower of Catholic Airline Professionals, a newsletter targeted to the aviation industry, and specifically, to Catholic pilots. For more information about this organization, contact Scott at scottferrier@earthlink.net.
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If teaching what it believes is a threat to Dick Durbin, then maybe he needs to reconsider what he is doing with his life. Maybe it is time for him to repent and defend life instead of supporting death (abortion, euthanasis, embryonic stem cell research, human cloning) as a solution to a variety of human problems.
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During a recent interview, I mentioned that I believe one of Planned Parenthood's objectives is for girls and women to engage in illicit sex as often as possible, so as to increase the odds they'll get pregnant and have to abort. The show host was flabbergasted. I was flabbergasted that he was flabbergasted. I reminded him that Planned Parenthood makes the bulk of its deadlihood - hundreds of millions of dollars every year - from abortion. My theory was obviously over the top in this guy's opinion. The interview ended abruptly.
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Employers in Illinois may get the right to opt out of insurance plans that pay for birth control, the Chicago Sun-Times reported Friday. The measure, which Thursday was approved by a narrow margin in the Illinois House of Representatives, addressed a state regulation requiring HMO's to cover family planning services that, supporters of the change said, forced religious organizations that don't believe in birth control into higher-priced insurance plans.
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This summer, the Chicago area will once again be the focus of a national traveling display exposing the public to graphic visual depictions of aborted babies. In June, the California-based Center for Bio-Ethical Reform (CBR), headed by pro-life activist Gregg Cunningham, will bring its Key States Initiative to the greater Chicagoland area. In this CBR campaign, a large fleet of trucks and even some aircraft will be used to display billboards depicting photos of aborted babies.
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The Roman Catholic bishop of Colorado Springs has issued a pastoral letter saying Catholic Americans should not receive Communion if they vote for politicians who defy church teaching by supporting abortion rights, same-sex marriage, euthanasia or stem cell research. Several bishops in the United States have warned that they will deny Communion to Catholic politicians who fail to stand with the church, but Bishop Michael Sheridan of Colorado Springs is thought to be the first to announce that he would extend the ban to Catholic voters.
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"...it is obviously true that not all Democrats are evil, the sad fact is a vast majority do fully support the pro-death, libertine platform of their party. It's fair to say, then, that there are many more pro-life Republicans than pro-life Democrats. Does that mean we give all Republicans a pass in that regard? Hardly. We must hold their feet to the fire. We must point out the utter foolishness of "pro-life" Republicans endorsing pro-abortion Republicans, simply for the sake of political expediency and "party unity." And we must point out the danger of the "big tent" philosophy."
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A pro-life display featuring crosses has generated controversy on a university campus in Illinois. Students at Bradley University's Newman Catholic Center recently put up 4,400 crosses to raise awareness about the number of abortions performed daily. A student group called Voices for Choice protested the display, claiming it misrepresented the religious diversity on the Peoria campus, was offensive to non-Christians, and needed to be removed.
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..."March for Women's Lives" made maximum usage of euphemism, invoking "choice" whenever marchers meant killing. They, for example, used placards to convey the lament that Barbara Bush hadn't killed her son in the womb. "If Only Barbara Bush Had Choice," read one sign. "Barbara Chose Poorly," read another. Marchers were also disappointed that the Pope's mother hadn't killed him in the womb. "The Pope's Mother Had No Choice," said a sign.
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Well, thanks be to God, the satanic 'March for Women's Lives' is history. Or should I say "herstory"? The best way I can explain what I witnessed at today's so-called March for Women's Lives is to reference the movie, The Exorcist. When the possessed child, Regan, is confronted by priests who have come to expel the evil spirit from her, she reacts in shockingly vulgar, profane ways.
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"'I fully intend to receive Communion, one way or another. That's very important to me,' Pelosi told reporters during her weekly press conference. "'I believe that my position on choice is one that is consistent with my Catholic upbringing, which said that every person has a free will and has the responsibility to live their lives in a way that they would have to account for in the end.'"
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Just four days before she was scheduled to give the commencement address at the University of Saint Francis, Dr. Nancy Snyderman received notice she is no longer welcome at the podium.A statement provided late Tuesday by the university cited Snyderman's comments about abortion, specifically fetal reduction, on ABC's "Good Morning America" on Oct. 30, 1997, as the reason for rescinding the invitation. Information about those comments was provided to the university by Bishop John M. D'Arcy, head of the Fort Wayne-South Bend Roman Catholic Diocese, the university's statement said.
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Moves by the Church to deny Holy Communion to staunchly pro-abortion Catholic politicians are growing. At a Vatican press conference last Friday, Cardinal Francis Arinze said that politicians who unambiguously support abortion must not go to Communion and priests must deny them the sacrament. Last January, then Bishop Raymond Burke of La Crosse, Wisconsin, issued a decree forbidding Catholic legislators who support abortion or euthanasia from receiving Communion. To learn more about the canonical and pastoral implications of these declarations, ZENIT interviewed American theologian Father Thomas Williams, dean of the School of Theology of the Regina Apostolorum Pontifical Athenaeum.
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Despite Sunday's high-profile pro-abortion rally in the nation's capital, opinion polls indicate that most Americans reject abortion-on-demand, says a U.S. bishops' conference aide. "Abortion activists were marching out of step with the American people last weekend," said Cathy Cleaver Ruse, spokeswoman for the bishops' Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities.
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McBrien said, in short, that the Roman Catholic Church had better learn to live in a pluralistic society where there are some evils that simply have to be lived with - sanctioned even by Catholic politicians - because that's the way things are down here. In other words, if you are elected to a position in government, leave your Christian morality at the door, especially the US Congressional door. If you are holding a political title of any sort and run into ethical situations that are not in keeping with Christian faith, forget the faith and go for the politically opportunistic...
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The American abortion lobby is poised to hold its death march in Washington, D.C., [Sunday, April 25th] to renew their commitment to the slaughter of premature babies. Of course, they will cynically disguise their agenda as concern for the lives of women who might be killed if abortion is again made illegal. As always, these people are lying through their teeth and as proof I predict the following...
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On Sunday, April 25, several pro-abortion groups will have their much ballyhooed "March for Women's Lives." Thousands of abortion enthusiasts will gather in the nation's capital to make our country aware of their determination to keep abortion-murder legal. And - surprise, surprise - they don't particularly care for pro-lifers.
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Dr. Bernard Nathanson, co-founder of NARAL (National Abortion Rights Action League), but now a defender of life, has debunked the statistics cited about deaths from illegal abortion. While the actual number of such deaths was 39 in 1972, NARAL was claiming that over 5000 women died each year from illegal abortions. Nathanson admitted that NARAL fabricated this statistic for political gain.
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WASHINGTON (AP) - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry delivered an unabashed defense of abortion rights on Friday just hours after a top Vatican cardinal said that priests must deny Communion to Catholic politicians who support abortion rights. Several other Catholic politicians said they, too, had no intention of altering the way they practice their religion or their politics. With hundreds of Catholic politicians in the United States supporting abortion rights, the trans-Atlantic counterpoint was only the latest sign that the issue promises to be a recurrent one on the U.S. campaign trail this year.
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When pressed on such "unambigiously pro-abortion" Catholic politicians, Arinze said such a politician "is not fit" to receive communion. "If they should not receive, then they should not be given," he said. The statement from the highest authority in the Catholic Church on the subject, next to the Pope, was a shock to many since many bishops have publicly backed away from refusing Communion to pro-abortion politicians. In fact, the Catholic news service yesterday published the results of a survey of several European Bishops who opposed denying Communion to pro-abortion politicians.
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In remarks that could influence the U.S. presidential race, a leading Vatican cardinal said on Friday that a politician who is unambiguously in favor of abortion should be denied communion at Mass. The issue has sparked debate in the United States over Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, a Roman Catholic who supports abortion rights. Cardinal Francis Arinze, the top Vatican cardinal in charge of the sacraments, was asked at a news conference whether priests should refuse communion to a politician who is unambiguously pro-abortion.
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"No pro-abortion series of events would be complete without a rally bashing the Catholic Church. Now the bigots are back again, enlisting the support of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Rights. But it isn't much of a coalition: Jewish organizations comprise 54 percent of the co-sponsors; Unitarian Universalist groups constitute another 16 percent. On the other hand, support has come from the Episcopal Church, USA; the United Church of Christ; Presbyterian Church USA; and the United Methodist Church. We hope all Catholics take note of who their friends are."
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Thursday, April 22, American Life League's STOPP International will hold a press conference at the National Press Club at 10:00 a.m. April 22 is the first day of Planned Parenthood Federation of America's (PPFA) annual convention. The event is being held in Washington, D.C., this year in conjunction with this weekend's so-called "March for Women's Lives," which PPFA is co-sponsoring. This press conference will expose how PPFA uses its pro-abortion, pro-contraception, pro-sex education agenda to destroy the moral fabric of our society.
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Prenatal diagnosis (also known as prenatal genetic testing) - procedures such as amniocentesis, chorionic villus sampling (CVS), maternal serum alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) and ultrasonography - in and of itself, is not evil. But it can be evil if the intention of undergoing such testing is to procure an abortion if the unborn child is determined to be "defective."
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It isn't the first time the National Education Association has backed abortion and it likely won't be the last. But, for pro-life teachers, that their national union is co-sponsoring this month's march for abortion is another example of the organization destroying the lives of students teachers otherwise would have taught.
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John Kerry yesterday met with Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, archbishop of Washington, D.C. Contrary to the drift of media reports, it was Kerry, not the cardinal, who initiated the meeting. "The senator had asked to meet with the cardinal," explained archdiocesan spokeswoman Susan Gibbs to TAS. Kerry, sizing up McCarrick as a genial liberal bishop willing to accommodate his renegade Catholicism, originally invited the cardinal over to his house. But Kerry ended up meeting the cardinal at the archdiocesan pastoral center, as that proved more convenient for Kerry after a speech he had given at nearby Howard University.
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Where do abortion championing "Catholics" get the idea that they are indeed in good standing with the Vatican? How do they conclude they can daily defy the Holy See? Who are they to put themselves above the scriptural data regarding God's reverence for life, beginning at conception? Of course, these "Catholics" are surely encouraged daily by the snobbery shown by United States Senator John F. Kerry when it comes to his desecrating the Blessed Sacrament. As he receives the sacred elements in Communion while championing killing babies in the womb, he repeatedly commits a grave sin. His wife joins him in that grave sin.
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Of course, all of us remember the many good and holy Priests, Nuns, and parents, who taught us that it is a great sin against the Holy Spirit to receive the true presence of the Lord in Holy Communion, while in the state of mortal sin. It is one thing to have these clear laws of the Catholic Church, and another to have the moral convictions to state and enforce them. We pray that more and more Priests and Bishops will do just this for the salvation of many immortal souls under their guidance and "shepherding."
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"To say that the Beral study is seriously flawed and that its conclusions do not stand up to close scrutiny is to understate seriously the magnitude of what is really going on here. For starters, the claim that this is a "full analysis" is flatly false. Let's just do the simple math. We start with 41 studies which showed data on induced abortion and breast cancer, dating as far back as 1957. Then how do we get to 53 studies? (Actually, the total is 52 studies.) We add 11 studies worth of unpublished data, right? That might be okay, but it wasn't what was done..."
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The National Organization for Women, which has stated an intent to crush groups opposing abortion, could collect $1.2 million in damages and legal fees from pro-life activists despite losing a case before the U.S. Supreme Court one year ago. As WorldNetDaily reported, the feminist group charged protests organized by Joseph Scheidler's Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League amounted to extortion under RICO, the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.
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In a statement released after last week's passage of the Unborn Victims of Violence Act by the U.S. Senate, National Organization for Women President Kim Gandy warned, "Giving a fetus at any stage of development [emphasis hers] the same legal rights as the pregnant woman will undermine the right to abortion as guaranteed under Roe v. Wade." Ah, Kim, out of the mouths of babe killers. You're so right. After President Bush signed UVVA today, it became a criminal offense to harm a preborn baby during the commission of a federal crime.
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Research being published in the British journal The Lancet on Friday purportedly examined 53 studies in 16 countries on the abortion-breast cancer link. Studies using women's self-reports of abortion histories (retrospective studies) were said to be corrupted. Why? Scientists declared that healthy women lie about their abortions more often than do breast cancer patients. This is a theoretical problem called "report bias" which several teams have shown does not exist. It just so happens that there are 28 retrospective studies, all of which report risk elevations among women who choose abortions.
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"Would you believe that 36 Democratic senators voted against the "Unborn Victims of Violence Act." When you compare this with just 2 Republicans voting against the act, it confirms my charges that the Democratic Party has lost ts moral compass and has earned the title, "The Party of Death."... Of these 36, 10 are Catholics -- John Kerry, Ted Kennedy Joe Biden, Chris Dodd, Richard Durbin, Tom Harkin, Pat Leahy, Barbara Mikulski, Jack Reed and Patty Murray."
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Take action: Call your senators, 202-225-3121, in support of S. 1019. The first U.S. Senate vote on the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, critical legislation first introduced in 1999, is expected as early as Wednesday of this week. The Act has passed in the House of Representatives three times, but the pro-abortion forces have succeeded in keeping it from a Senate vote until now. Buoyed by the Senate's Republican majority and the President's support of the bill, it now has a good chance of becoming law.
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A professor of ethics and theology at the Catholic Marquette University is under fire for his pro-abortion activism and recently was the keynote speaker at an event for a Florida affiliate of the nation's largest abortion business.
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Recently, Girl Scouts of the U.S.A. CEO Kathy Cloninger told NBC News, "We have relationships ... with Planned Parenthood organizations across the country, to bring information-based sex education programs to girls." In response to this admission, American Life League's STOPP International has announced a new initiative that will compile a definitive list of Girl Scout councils along with their positions and intent to partner with Planned Parenthood.
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Cardinal William Keeler, Chairman of the Committee for Pro-Life Activities, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, urged the Senate to pass S. 1019, the Unborn Victims of Violence Act. The bill would recognize unborn children as second victims when their mothers are victims of federal crimes of violence. The Senate is expected to vote on the legislation as early as next week.
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Two venerable abortion advocacy groups are reuniting for the 2004 election cycle with a common goal: remove pro-life President George W. Bush from office and replace him with pro-abortion Sen. John Kerry (D-MA). Voters for Choice and the Planned Parenthood Action Fund have doled out millions on behalf of pro-abortion candidates and they announced at a press conference last week that they plan to unite their efforts this election cycle.
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Beginning today, two pro-life ads sponsored by Concerned Women for America of Illinois will air over 350 times on major cable television channels in Chicago, the collar counties, and Northwest Indiana throughout the next three weeks. A poll conducted in October 2002 by Baselice & Associates of Austin, Texas, for the Vitae Caring Foundation showed 31 percent of Chicago adults consider themselves "consistent pro-life," while only 26 percent are "consistent pro-abortion."
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The evidence is mounting that an increasing number of individuals and organizations do not believe the National Cancer Institute's propaganda that abortion is unrelated to breast cancer risk. A weekly news magazine for radiologists, administrators, educators and radiologic science professionals featured a cover story entitled, "Breast Cancer: The Deadly Effect of Abortion?," in its February 9, 2004 issue. The magazine, RT Image, awarded the author, Glenda Martinez, first place for her article in the student category of the 2003 RT Image Writing Competition.
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In response to the concerns of the US government, the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has promised to make substantial internal reforms to ensure that its publishing offices around the globe no longer produce documents endorsing abortion rights. At the same time, UNESCO's efforts to distance itself from one particular document that recommends abortion on demand for girls, by highlighting the UN Population Fund's participation in the production of the document, may create further problems for UNFPA as it embarks on a public relations campaign aimed at restoring its US funding.
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"Those words, given by Father Frank Pavone during a speech before the recent March for Life, rekindled anger I have long felt because I have witnessed what he asserted. There is a staggering amount of pro-life complicity with abortion when one thinks about it. Father Pavone was speaking about the business community. "It is time for construction workers, plumbers, electricians, computer technicians, and any other professionals called upon to service killing centers to say, 'I will not cooperate.'"
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What exactly do abortion supporters mean by "safe" abortion? A woman suffered a perforated uterus and a lacerated colon in a botched abortion in Florida. After the botched abortion, local Pro-Life advocates helped the injured woman file suit with the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA). The AHCA found no violations and an attorney for the agency wrote, "Egherman (referring to abortionist William Egherman) did not breach the standard of care. Perforation of the uterus is a known and common complication of an abortion. Egherman acted timely and properly when he realized that the perforation might have occurred."
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Human cloning's slippery slope toward complete dehumanization of human beings will not stop until the U.S. Senate passes Senator Brownback's complete ban on human cloning. In the meantime, surely almost everyone can agree that proposals like those in New Jersey and Delaware demean the humanity of women and children alike.
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The Caring Outreach has launched a television campaign this month in the Chicago area to help women considering abortion. The television ads will run for at least eight weeks on all network television stations in the Chicago media market, and target women 18 to 49 years of age by airing on Days of our Lives, Dr. Phil, Oprah, The Early Show, the Today Show, and a number of news programs.
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Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- A media watchdog group is accusing ABC News of biased coverage about abortion and the March for Life, where more than 100,000 people gathered to mourn the Roe v. Wade decision allowing abortion. While ABC on Thursday night gave a few seconds of air time to Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark's clarification of his position in favor of abortion, it blacked out any coverage of the March for Life.
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In an interview with LifeSiteNews.com following the Vigil for Life Mass in Washington Wednesday, Boston Archbishop Sean O'Malley expressed his great desire for a renewal of faith among Catholics. Asked about the problem of Catholic politicians promoting abortion, the Archbishop noted that the problem "is not only politicians but those (Catholics) who vote for them." He stressed repeatedly the "great need for adult catechesis among our people."
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LifeSiteNews.com reports today from Washington DC where we were blessed to take in the Mass at the National Basilica of the Immaculate Conception. In addition to an immense overflow crowd of some 8000, 70 seminarians, 80 deacons, 300 priests and 40 bishops joined four cardinals to celebrate the Mass. The homily was given by the main celebrant of the Mass, Baltimore Cardinal William Keeler, the current Chair of the US Conference of Bishops Pro-Life Committee. The Cardinal urged the youth who made up the vast majority of the crowd to "be not afraid" even though it may seem we are like David up against many Goliaths. He advised the youth to take up the 'five smooth stones' of conviction, courage, compassion, charity and constancy.
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"When organizations such as Planned Parenthood, NARAL, NAF, NOW and other pro-abortion organizations tell you they are just concerned about women's health -- don't you believe them. They do NOT speak the truth. They have conned the American people. There is MUCH more suffering and deaths due to abortions on demand now, then before the infamous Roe Vs Wade in 1973."
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A pro-life victory was realized in the last few weeks of the year when Washington Cardinal Theodore McCarrick wrote a pro-life group December 15 to assure them that a "problem" at a Catholic University "has been resolved." Children of God for Life Director Debra Vinnedge told LifeSiteNews.com that last fall she wrote the Cardinal asking him to stop Georgetown University - a Catholic institution - from using aborted fetal cell lines.
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"As Americans, we are led by the power of our conscience and the history of our country to defend and promote the dignity and rights of all people. Each person, however frail or defenseless, has a place and a purpose in this world. On National Sanctity of Human Life Day, we celebrate the gift of life and our commitment to building a society of compassion and humanity..."
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CCI joins Judie Brown of the American Life League, and faithful Catholics all over the United States in supporting Bishop Raymond Burke, who made public today (Jan 8, 2004) a decree that so-called "pro-abortion Catholics" are no longer allowed to receive Communion (PDF Link) in his diocese. While it is a tragedy that anyone be denied the Body and Blood of Christ, it is clear that in the last 40 years, unrepentent pro-abortion Catholic polticians have made a mockery of the Catholic Church, and caused immeasurable scandal by their behavior. We hope that Bishop Burke's bravery and fidelity to the Church inspires other US Bishops to take action.
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CCI NOTES: Having participated in two Vote Life America protests this year (see Catholics protest pro-abort former Gov. Edgar speach at Saint Xavier University and also see Catholics protest "pro-choice" Dem Dan Hynes exploitation of St. Ignatius Prep alumni and staff) CCI recommends to all our readers a quick visit to VLA's revamped web site at www.votelifeamerica.com. "Vote Life America" believes that every American is granted the Constitutional "INALIENABLE" right to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness and hopes that someday America will return to upholding that sacred right to all human beings...especially to the most vulnerable and innocent child in the womb."
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"In (Belloc's) view, the 'Free Press,' however, born in rebellion to the 'Official Press' which usually serves the interests of the governing classes, was growing in credibility for exposing the 'incapacity and falsehood' of many large newspapers." Belloc further opined, "The Capitalist Press has come at last to warp all judgment. The tiny oligarchy which controls it is irresponsible and feels itself immune. It has come to believe that it can suppress any truth and suggest any falsehood. It governs, and it governs abominably: and it is governing thus in the midst of a war for life."
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I was recently discussing abortion with Debbi, who is "pro-choice." At one point she asked me, "Are you against the death penalty?" Now usually, a let's-change-the-subject tactic like this should be handled by gently returning to the current subject of the conversation. But in this case I took a different approach. "Oh yes," I said, "I am very much opposed to the death penalty, as is our Priests for Life organization. I preach against it frequently."
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A sign of how worried the pro-abortion lobby is was demonstrated in a recent newspaper article. The local left wing weekly, the San Francisco Bay Guardian, ran a story in their November 5 issue titled, "The New Choice." In it, writer Tali Woodward expressed some of the fears the left is having: "But while bumper-sticker slogans about keeping laws off a woman's body are as common now as they were decades back, the pro-choice message is not resonating anymore. National polls show that the number of people who identify themselves as pro-choice has been declining since the 1980s."
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Pro-life activists outraged by Planned Parenthood's promotion of its "Choice on Earth" greeting cards are planning protests at several of the organization's facilities across the nation Sunday. According to a statement from the Christian Communication Network, large picket signs will be displayed with the phrases: "Planned Herod-hood," "The perfect gift: an aborted baby," "Merry Christmas - abort your baby," "Planned Parenthood kills children," and "Planned Parenthood: Satan's little helpers." Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the U.S.
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As of December 2003 the Texas Department of Health became the first U.S. state to inform women that elective abortions boost their risk of delivering a future newborn with the brain damage condition known as CEREBRAL PALSY. [see www.tdh.state.tx.us, "A Woman's Right to Know" (page 17)] "Some large studies have reported a doubling of the risk of premature birth in later pregnancy if a woman has had two induced abortions...."
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The "benefit" to women from over-the-counter sales of Plan B will be new uncharted health risks, again making women the victims of dangerous drug side effects to support men's sexual adventures. FDA approval of over-the-counter sales of Plan B would be a grossly irresponsible action that places higher priority on casual sex ideology and profit for Barr Laboratories at the expense of women's health.
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Today, December 16, 2003, great leaders in pro life movement gave factual testimony to the many reasons why the evil abortifacient "Morning After Pill" should not be allowed to be sold over the counter. Yet, within minutes, the FDA's advisory panel proclaims that they've OK'd the Pill to be sold over the counter. Were these government people not listening to the profound medical and scientific warnings and admonitions just minutes before? "If we continue to promote contraceptives, civilization will revert to barbarism," said John Paul II. "The sin of the century," Pius XII told a catechetical congress meeting in the United States in 1946, "is the loss of the sense of sin."
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"On behalf of the 350,000 American families supporting our work, I come to make the simple request that the Food and Drug Administration not approve over-the-counter status for any combination of chemicals defined as morning after pills (emergency contraception). This request is made based on the following facts: (a) these high doses of artificial hormones can and do terminate the lives of human beings after their lives have begun at conception/fertilization; (b) these pills are dangerous for women, particularly adolescent women, and (c) the damage to family life would be severe."
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Sen. Paul Simon was a solid pro-abortion vote throughout his career. With the exception of one vote during his freshman congressional term, he consistently voted to fund abortions, both at home and overseas, with our tax money. He consistently defended his pro-abortion stand, was endorsed by the radically pro-abortion National Organization for Women (who sued me for being pro-life), and the National Abortion Rights Action League (now NARAL Pro-Choice America). He co-sponsored the Freedom of Choice Act of 1990.
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The hypocritical nature of Planned Parenthood should become obvious to everyone after reading its latest annual report," said Jim Sedlak, executive director of American Life League's STOPP International project. "Planned Parenthood claims it seeks to reduce abortion, but its abortion numbers are skyrocketing - over 3 million in its own facilities since 1970. When it opened an abortion facility in Bryan Texas, the health department reports there show abortions jumped a whopping 153%. The evidence is clear. More Planned Parenthood facilities means more abortions."
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Illinois Right to Life Committee has issued their annual report on pro-life progress in Illinois. They report that the responses from Christian pro-lifers in Illinois to state senators on anti-life bills and to the Chicago Tribune on anti-life reporting bias have made an impact.
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Now both abortion counselors and those considering an abortion can find the true story in a well-researched book accessible to all. It is Women's Health after Abortion: the Medical and Psychological Evidence, by Elizabeth Ring-Cassidy and Ian Gentiles published by the deVeber Institute of Toronto, 2002, 333 pages. Call NRL at (202) 626 8829, e-mail bioethics@deveber.org or log onto http://www.deveber.org/publications2.html. It is based on over 500 articles that have appeared in medical journals and other sources. -
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What do you call a Catholic who says that he is "personally opposed" to some form of immoral behavior, but refuses to take action against it? Under some circumstances, you call him Your Eminence. For years I have been bewildered by the public statements of Catholic politicians who claim to be "personally opposed" to legal abortion, or physician-assisted suicide, or same-sex marriage, but nevertheless vote in favor of these policies. From a strictly logical perspective, their position is incoherent.
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Arizona's most prominent abortion doctor was convicted yesterday on 22 counts of sexually abusing patients over the past 17 years. over the past 17 years. Dr. Brian Finkel, 54, who has said he performed 20 percent of the state's abortions annually, was found not guilty on 34 counts, including six of the more serious charges of sexual assault, the Arizona Republic reported.
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"A Republican state central committeeman, Dr. William Dam, recently argued in the Illinois Leader that only the most recent popes have spoken out against abortion. I would beg to differ with Dr. Dam. Pope Sitxtus V, who served the Church in the 16th Century, also spoke out against it. Is Dr. Dam intellectually dishonest or just uninformed?"
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An attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union argued that siding with the Catholics would, in essence, impose the church's doctrine on thousands of non-Catholic women who work at the church's hospitals or social-service agencies. "Catholic Charities' noncompliance with California law would injure three fundamental rights of the people who work for the social services agency: gender equality, reproductive autonomy and religious freedom," attorney Margaret Crosby told California's high court in briefs.
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Many pro-lifers lead beautiful apostolates that help women, educate the public and change hearts. This column isn't for them. We want to take a moment to look at the legislative side of the pro-life movement, and ask, now that the partial-birth abortion ban is law in the United States, what should we do next? For starters, we should learn the lessons that other activists teach us.
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Frustrated that so many Catholic politicians support abortion rights, the bishops of the United States said Monday they will begin evaluating whether they can impose sanctions against elected officials who vote contrary to church teachings. In a freewheeling discussion reflecting years of concern, some bishops suggested that the church should consider punishments ranging from denying honorary degrees to elected officials, refusing to allow them to speak at Catholic institutions, or even excommunicating them.
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At a time in her life when most people would be satisfied to relax and spend time with their grandchildren, Irene Napier is just getting started. She has announced a road trip to Washington DC and chartered a beautiful Van Gelder coach that will shuttle as many as 55 people to the March for Life.
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The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer welcomes news that the Catholic Medical Association (CMA) passed a resolution endorsing state legislation, which would require abortion doctors to inform patients about the increased risk of breast cancer associated with having an induced abortion.
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"How can a Catholic university invite a pro-abortion politician to explain how he came to adopt such a scandalous position," said Karl Maurer, vice president of Catholic Citizens of Illinois. "Gov. Edgar, who is firmly pro-abortion, did more to obstruct the pro-life efforts of the Catholic Church within Illinois than any other politician."
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"America stands for liberty, for the pursuit of happiness and for the unalienable right of life. And the most basic duty of government is to defend the life of the innocent. Every person, however frail or vulnerable, has a place and a purpose in this world. Every person has a special dignity. This right to life cannot be granted or denied by government, because it does not come from government, it comes from the Creator of life." President George W. Bush
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"A few pro-lifers have complained in recent months that the partial birth abortion (pba) ban won't stop one abortion... But there the pro-aborts are, screaming, trying to rally troops that are dwindling only because they killed off their replacements, screaming that the pba ban is but the first step toward outlawing abortion. "There was panic among the army in the field and all the troops in the military post. The raiding party also trembled in fear. The earth shook, and there was a panic sent from God" (I Samuel 14:15). Read what they are saying on their websites. They are not crying Chicken Little this time. The pro-abortion sky is falling."
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Before an emotional audience, President Bush Wednesday signed a law outlawing partial-birth abortions - and promised to defend it in court. The ceremony took place at 1:45 p.m. in the Ronald Reagan Building. "Today at last, the American people and our government have confronted the violence" of partial-birth abortion "and come to the defense of the innocent child," Bush said during the ceremony.
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On Monday, Nov. 10, American Life League's Crusade for the Defense of Our Catholic Church will unveil its latest ad, "A Catholic Bishop's Guide to Washington." The two-page ad will run on the first day of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' semi-annual general meeting in Washington. The ad, in clear, unequivocal language, challenges the bishops to use their proximity to Capitol Hill to their advantage by engaging wayward members of the flock who consistently vote pro-abortion while publicly claiming to be Catholic.
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"On Wednesday night, October 29th, Governor Jim Edgar's introduction was preceded by an announcement that there were protesters outside, but that Saint Xavier Univ. was acting in the true sense of John Paul's Encyclical "Ex Corde Ecclesiae" The former Governor is pro-abortion and was invited by the University's Center for Religion and Public Discourse to present his talk entitled, "Centering Yourself in the Public Life." (for more information, see "Pro-abort Former IL Gov Invited to Sisters of Mercy Run St. Xavier Univ. to Discuss His "Moral Compass": Protest Planned") We would like to know how promoting a former pro-abortion Governor's talk to students in a Catholic University apply to the teachings of this Encyclical or follow it's guidelines for dedication to the search for wisdom and upholding Catholic and universal truths?"
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"Women have the right to expect that a publication, which goes by the name, "Health Magazine," would offer a reliable discussion of scientific research, which would be a few cuts above that of other popular women's magazines, such as Glamour or Cosmopolitan. A higher bar should be set for a magazine dedicated to the improvement of health. Women deserve answers when the "Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer" published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute (JNCI) reveals that breast cancer rates jumped more than 40% between 1987 and 1998 for exclusively the youngest of three generations - the Roe v. Wade generation."
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Two Catholic men praying the Rosary were attacked with pepper spray as they knelt in prayer outside the Albany Center abortion clinic on north Elston Ave. in Chicago on Saturday. Police reports were filed, but the assailant disappeared. It is suspected that he fled into the abortion clinic, and was hidden from police, even as they searched premises. Sidewalk counselor Robert Rudny was temporarily blinded, treated at a nearby hospital and later released. His assailant escaped.
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"In 1996, the Vatican withdrew it symbolic contribution to UNICEF, stating as the reason its promotion of abortion and contraception. It has not been reinstated. Unfortunately, with its new direction, UNICEF has abandoned its original mandate to provide basic health care and education services to the poorest children of the world. UNICEF has moved far beyond its original purpose of protecting and defending children to actively assisting in the destruction of millions of tiny lives. It is a cynical program, indeed, that uses children to prevent the birth of other children."
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"Because some partners of Church World Service support the provision of contraceptives which is contrary to the teachings of the Catholic Church, it is important to Catholic Relief Services that Catholic participants in CROP WALK are well-educated on the designation process. Unfortunately, this is not possible given the decentralized nature of this country-wide event. Consequently, Catholic Relief Services has decided to withdraw as a designee agency."
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Though college students mightbe conceived as bleeding heart liberals, not all Northwestern students fit the mold. Take, for example, the 20 students who showed up last Wednesday to the first meeting of Northwestern Students for Life, a new student group at NU that opposes abortions. "This (group) is trying to fill the void for the pro-life position (on campus)," said Katie Althen, a Weinberg senior and acting president of the group.
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Saint Xavier University, an independent Catholic college in Chicago, has drawn criticism from several leading pro-life and Catholic lay groups for inviting former Governor Jim Edgar to give a lecture to the student body on October 29th. During his eight years as governor of Illinois, from 1990 to 1998, Gov. Edgar, who is pro-abortion, consistently blocked pro-life legislation, which resulted in forty to fifty thousand abortions per year during that period. Vote Life America has announced a protest will be held outside the school (3700 West 103rd St. east of Pulaski) that evening, beginning at 5:30 pm. The Chicago Police will be on hand to ensure that your rights to protest this event are not violated, and that you will not be harmed or harrassed by pro-abortion goon squads.
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"The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer announced today that the first U.S. abortion-breast cancer (ABC) lawsuit settled for an undisclosed amount on October 17, 2003. The case was filed in Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas. The plaintiff was a 17-year-old Pennsylvania resident when a second-trimester abortion was performed in New Jersey without parental knowledge or consent. Although she hasn't developed breast cancer, she sued her abortion provider, Charles Benjamin, for neglecting to warn her about the physical and emotional risks of abortion."
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"The Senate on Tuesday voted to ban the practice that critics call partial birth abortion, sending President Bush a measure that supporters and foes alike said could alter the future of U.S. abortion rights. A court challenge is certain. "This is an enormous day. It's been a long seven-year fight about the issue of partial birth abortion," said Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kansas. He was a leader of the drive to end abortions, generally carried out in the second or third trimester, in which a fetus is partially delivered before being killed."
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"To put it bluntly, I have a few reservations about canon 1398. "A person who actually procures an abortion incurs a latae sententiae excommunication," the canon states. Please do not mistake my reservations as support for abortion. In no way do I condone this intrinsically evil act, which the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches "is gravely contrary to the moral law" as well as an "abominable crime" (2271)."
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"When a newspaper calls its letters section "Voice of the People," can you expect to read what readers really think? Or do editors reserve the right to interpret readers' words to comply with their own preconceptions? The answer depends on which newspaper you're reading-and the subject of the letter. If your letter presents abortion in an unsympathetic light, your letter may well be aborted or distorted."
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WASHINGTON (AP) - The House voted Thursday to ban a type of abortion that for years has been at the center of the debate over a woman's reproductive rights. President Bush has promised to sign the bill into law and opponents say they will immediately challenge it in court. The bill, passed 281-142, could be taken up by the Senate as early as Friday. Bush's signature would make it the first federal law since Roe v. Wade in 1973 to restrict a specific abortion procedure.
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"Pardon this religion columnist, a Protestant, for being puzzled by two political frontrunners, who are Catholics. One is retired Gen. Wesley Clark, a man who converted to Catholicism during the Vietnam War. Now he is leading the pack of Democrats wishing to be nominated presidential candidate. And what are his opening remarks when asked by doubtful interviewers about his party credentials? "I am pro-choice!" he keeps insisting in a manner that strikes some of us a trifle too forceful."
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"During a speech before the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons on September 19, 2003, I identified several lies about the abortion-breast cancer (ABC) research, which have been posted on the National Cancer Institute's (NCI) Web site since 1999. One of the most egregious fabrications concocted by this political agency was this statement: "The scientific rationale for an association between abortion and breast cancer is based on limited experimental data in rats and is not consistent with human data." On the contrary, 26 out of 32 studies in the worldwide medical literature reported risk elevations. The agency provided some of the funding for most of the American studies - at that time, 12 out of 13 reported risk elevations."
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The picture of Baby Samuel became a global sensation, for obvious reasons. Still a fetus, Samuel grabs his surgeon's hand during an operation to repair his spine. His father, Alex Armas testified before the US Senate yesterda |
