Whether it's pro-life philosophy, activism or legislation, whether it's about a current topic or a situation pro-lifers face in their own lives and work, this is the place where we'll talk about it! Please forward any comments to me, Judie Brown. Thank you!
SYNCHRONIZED STEALTH: OBAMA’S ‘DEPARTMENT OF DEATH WITH DIGNITY’! Posted: Tuesday July 28, 2009 at 2:25 pm EST by Judie Brown
The current debate over health care is one of those scenarios that might play well in a science-fiction thriller, but must not be allowed to play out on the backs and over the dead bodies of the uninformed. The intent to create a nationalized health-care system appears more and more like a behind-the-scenes project based on government control over who lives and who dies. I might even suggest that nationalized health care’s real purpose is to keep feeding the vultures who prey off the culture of death, instead of keeping Americans healthy.
The problem is what is not occurring right now in the public debate. In other words, what remains unstated has many of us extremely concerned. Obama’s so-called health-care plan, if implemented, could be the most egregious assault on the dignity of the human person since the Supreme Court’s dreadful Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton decisions of 1973. Here are a few specifics.
Betsy McCaughey, former lieutenant governor of New York, is an adjunct senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. Dr. McCaughey has written extensively on the dangers of the Obama health-care proposal and its many ramifications. What she has found in the draft now circulating in the House of Representatives is alarming, but apparently interests only a few of those who should be warning the public about it. And their target audience should be those who are approaching age 65 and, of course, those who are elderly and needing care. This target audience is going to become the walking target of Obama’s health-care “reform.”
Dr. McCaughey’s detailed research is available on the Defend Your Health Care web site. There you will find explanations of several chilling aspects of the various Obama health-care proposals floating around, including the following excerpt from “Assault on Seniors,” published in the Wall Street Journal:
The House bill shifts resources from specialty medicine to primary care based on the misconception that Americans overuse specialist care and drive up costs in the process (pp. 660-686). In fact, heart-disease patients treated by generalists instead of specialists are often misdiagnosed and treated incorrectly. They are readmitted to the hospital more frequently, and die sooner.
“Study after study shows that cardiologists adhere to guidelines better than primary care doctors,” according to Jeffrey Moses, a heart specialist at New York Presbyterian Hospital. Adds Jeffrey Borer, chairman of medicine at SUNY Downstate Medical Center: “Seldom do generalists have the knowledge to identify the symptoms of aortic valve disease, even though more than 10% of people over 75 have it. After valve surgery, patients who were too short of breath to walk can resume a normal life into their 80s or 90s.”
While the House bill being pushed by the president reduces access to such cures and specialists, it ensures that seniors are counseled on end-of-life options, including refusing nutrition where state law allows it (pp. 425-446). In Oregon, the state is denying some cancer patients care that could extend their lives and is offering them physician-assisted suicide instead.
What is perhaps most interesting about Dr. McCaughey, who earned her doctorate in constitutional history, is that those who favor Obama’s health-care reform are vilifying her right and left. Though we know that this is how advocates of death and disrespect for human dignity operate, it is nevertheless disturbing. She has been called a liar, a spinner of tall tales and other terms of endearment, but the information she is providing is readily available from unbiased sources, such as the text of the health-care “reform” bill itself.
Though many claim Obama's massive bill is needed, few have actually read it. National Review blogger Jack Fowler actually took the time to present a portion of it in a post titled “Doctor Kevorkian, Call Your Office.” In the bill’s “Advance Care Planning Consultation” section, we read the following:
Such consultation shall include the following:
`(A) An explanation by the practitioner of advance care planning, including key questions and considerations, important steps, and suggested people to talk to.
`(B) An explanation by the practitioner of advance directives, including living wills and durable powers of attorney, and their uses.
`(C) An explanation by the practitioner of the role and responsibilities of a health care proxy.
`(D) The provision by the practitioner of a list of national and State-specific resources to assist consumers and their families with advance care planning, including the national toll-free hotline, the advance care planning clearinghouses, and State legal service organizations (including those funded through the Older Americans Act of 1965).
`(E) An explanation by the practitioner of the continuum of end-of-life services and supports available, including palliative care and hospice, and benefits for such services and supports that are available under this title.
I could quote much more of this very lengthy section, but the gist is already quite obvious. Why would the government’s health-“CARE” bill include such detailed guidelines for discussion of end-of-life matters, unless it aims to ensure that the elderly and infirm are ready to bite the bullet, even if God is not ready to call them home? It does not take a rocket scientist to question why a “health-care” plan should include such a strong emphasis on not preserving their lives.
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and the National Committee for a Human Life Amendment, which works closely with the USCCB, have addressed health-care “reform” proposals without noting the gruesome specter of euthanasia that pervades the legislative proposals currently on the table. For example, a recent NCHLA alert makes the following statement:
On July 17, Bishop William Murphy, Chairman of the Bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, sent a letter to Congress saying: “The USCCB looks forward to working with you to reform health care successfully in a manner that offers accessible, affordable and quality health care that protects and respects the life and dignity of all people from conception until natural death.” Abortion must not be included as part of a national health care benefit.
While it is laudable that the U.S. bishops and their collaborators are crying out for an elimination of abortion funding from the so-called health-care reform proposals, why are they not pointing out the potential for euthanasia as well? Is the plan’s emphasis on ending the lives of the elderly not just as abhorrent as its intent to require Americans to pay for an ever increasing number of abortions? If the answer is yes, then why aren’t the bishops educating Catholics nationwide on the threat these bills pose for people of all ages, from creation until death?
The USCCB stated the following in a document entitled “Making Health Care Reform ‘Abortion Neutral’: What is the Legal Status Quo on Abortion?”:
Health care reform whose goal is to advance health coverage, not advance an agenda on abortion, will take care to be abortion neutral. It will preserve current policies that bar use of taxpayer funds, respect conscience rights, and generally encourage childbirth over abortion; it will not mandate abortion as part of any “basic” or minimum benefit package.
This statement alone is mind-boggling! The USCCB sounds complacent about the fact that the nation is going to have abortion on demand, but by golly, it is upset about health-care “reform” requiring us to pay for it!
In addition, we have found that various diocesan “respect life” offices across America are taking their lead from the July 17 letter issued by Bishop William Murphy, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, which advocates four principles for health-care reform:
• a truly universal health policy with respect for human life and dignity;
• access for all with a special concern for the poor and inclusion of legal Immigrants;
• pursuing the common good and preserving pluralism including freedom of conscience and variety of options; and
• restraining costs and applying them equitably across the spectrum of payers.
Once again, there is no mention of the encouragement of euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide that the Obama plan entails.
I find it laudable beyond words that the USCCB, the participants in the recent Stop the Abortion Mandate webcast and commentators such as Star Parker have articulated a huge number of Americans’ absolute disdain for considering the aborting of a child as “health care.” However, there must be equally strong opposition to prevent Obama’s “Department of Death with Dignity” from becoming a reality. Let’s restore respect for human dignity across the full spectrum of a person’s life!
You can encourage the USCCB, NCHLA, similar organizations, national news commentators and media outlets to focus on respect for human dignity at all stages of life, by expressing absolute rejection of all forms of euthanasia—and abortion—in any health-care bills.
News commentators and media outlets are easily located via the internet. The information below is provided to assist you in contacting pro-life organizations.
National Committee for a Human Life Amendment
1500 Massachusetts Ave. NW, Suite 24
Washington, D.C. 20005
202-393-0703 www.nchla.org
God Bless you Judy!
The USCCB fail us AGAIN.
Thank you for this article. I am forwarding to my confused Catholic friends and to the Catholics who know it so they can forward.
Thank you,
Liz
Elizabeth Daly Sato | July 28, 2009
I heard an AARP spokesperson being interviewed on NPR, reassuring the elderly that the proposed every-five-year consult for Medicare recipients was benign, rather than the consult-to-die sessions that we suspect. If AARP does not concern itself with the beginning of life, then they could convince themselves that the folks at the other end of the spectrum are not at risk. This absolute trust in the health care profession and our present administration seems naive, since both include active killing of human beings (abortion) as a part of health care. David Volk | July 30, 2009
David
AARP has been in the hip pocket of the pro-euthanasia movement for years and years. They are publicly deceptive; always have been.
Judie Judie Brown | July 31, 2009
So, what is the motivation for AARP to support euthanasia? It would seem diametrically opposed for an organization representing older people to support killing off those older people. David Volk | August 3, 2009
David
I have been aware of the AARP's role in supporting so-called Death with Dignity or "compassion in dying" since the early 1980s. What is their motivation: it's the "loving" thing to allow people to control how they die! That is their argument, not mine!
‘OBAMACARE’: FAST TRACK TO ECONOMIC SUICIDE Posted: Monday July 27, 2009 at 3:28 pm EST by Judie Brown
By Dennis M. Howard
Economic conservatives are worried about the runaway tax-and-spend potential of President Obama’s health-care initiative. They are worried that “before this thing is through, it could cost us $1.6 trillion and still not solve the health-care problem.”
But that’s not even half of the real story.
What they’re overlooking is the hidden cost of federal funding of abortion as part of an “essential benefits package” that will be imposed on everyone unless it is explicitly excluded from the legislation. Right now, the Democrats are opposed to such an exclusion.
If the health-care bill passes without this exclusion, taxpayers will be forced to pay for other people’s abortions whether they like it or not. And the $1.6 trillion the eco-conservatives are worried about will only be the tip of a very large iceberg.
That’s because abortion has a huge hidden economic cost. It’s the loss in gross domestic product (GDP) represented by all those babies who never had a chance to grow up to become the future workers, consumers, taxpayers and parents the nation needs to sustain future economic growth.
This is something the younger generation better start worrying about. People under 40 will still be paying taxes 30 to 50 years from now, so they will take the biggest hit from this phenomenon. And because their numbers have already been depleted by abortion, that means even fewer shoulders on which to rest a much bigger burden.
We’ve already had more than 51.7 million abortions since 1970. That’s a whopping 30.6 percent of our current under-40 population. If we had a war that took that kind of toll, we would have run up the white flag decades ago. The pro-aborts just don’t give up that easily.
What they don’t want to admit is that people are our country’s most important renewable resource. Ever since Roe v. Wade, we’ve been depleting that resource with abandon.
The hidden cost of those 51.5 million abortions has already reached an estimated $35 trillion in lost GDP. Assuming a 33-percent tax rate, that’s enough to pay off our entire current national debt with enough left over to fund a vibrant economy.
If all those kids had lived, we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in.
Looking forward, the picture isn’t any brighter ... especially if we keep subsidizing abortion. That’s exactly what the Democrats propose to do by sending you the bill for other people’s abortions.
GDP per capita is now about $45,000 per year, and – until the current slump – it was compounding at a rate of four percent per year. It is a measure that includes everyone from the cradle to the grave. But every baby we abort is one less contributor to GDP – not just for today, but for a lifetime.
Every child we abort today will cost us about $23 million in future GDP over a lifetime. And the bonus is that babies don’t compete for jobs with the rest of us for their first 20 years. But they create jobs for everybody else – doctors, nurses, teachers, homebuilders, toymakers, retailers – you name it.
If there ever was a major job killer, it is the baby-killing industry.
Yet all those nuts we send to Congress continue to subsidize Planned Parenthood to the tune of $326 million a year. That’s about $1,000 for every abortion Planned Parenthood performs. Now Congress want to compound that by making you pay again ... and again ... and again.
So, unless abortion is explicitly excluded from Obama’s health-care plan, get ready for even higher taxes. Whether it’s your abortion or someone else’s, you’re going to get the bill.
Planned Parenthood estimates that the number of abortions will rise by 20–35 percent if the Obama health-care bill passes. That will take abortions back to levels not seen since the mid-1980s. And that means even bigger losses in future GDP.
Thanks to the magic of compounding, by 2040 to 2050, we’re already looking at cumulative GDP losses of $335–500 trillion dollars just from abortion. Add another 20–35 percent to that, and we’re talking about really big money.
That’s why I call “Obamacare” a fast track to national suicide. It is far more significant than anything else that threatens us this side of eternal damnation.
In his book Obamanomics, John Talbott lists "25 Greatest Threats to our Prosperity” and their potential costs. (Abortion oddly is not one of them!) High on his list are “World Poverty" ($100 trillion), "Global Warming" ($60 trillion), "Globalization’s Nasty Side Effects" ($60 trillion) ... all the way down to “Terrorism" ($5 trillion).
His terrorism tab is laughable. We’ve already exceeded it. And nearly all of the others are based on numbers conjured up in someone’s imagination.
My estimates, on the other hand, are based on hard-rock numbers. GDP per capita is a measure that is used universally throughout the world. Indeed, my estimates are more conservative than those employed by government agencies in the cost/benefit analyses they use to plan their spending.
But try telling that to some politician who firmly believes that abortion is some kind of free lunch. Sure, it looks “free” to a guy who wants to avoid the responsibility of paying 21 years of child support, but the baby’s only crime is wanting to call him “Daddy” for the rest of his life.
For the rest of us, it adds up to more of what we have been experiencing for the last 35 years: declining personal incomes, a shrinking economy, lost jobs, rising taxes, and less freedom as the Nanny State takes over more and more of our personal lives.
In short, abortion is the biggest fraud ever perpetrated on the American people.
But you have a choice. If you want bigger tax bills, a grimmer future for your children and grandchildren, and more government encroachment on your right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, just go back to sleep and forget you ever read this.
But if you are ready to fight this, come join us at We the People Speak, our new non-partisan educational campaign to restore common sense to American politics. Or join us on Facebook. Contact your representatives by calling the U.S. Capitol switchboard: 202.224.3121. And urge them to explicitly exclude funding for abortion from any health-care bill.
Dennis Howard is president of the Movement for a Better America, an ALL Associate group dedicated to pro-life marketing communications and education. This commentary was originally published on http://www.movementforabetteramerica.org and is reprinted here with his kind permission. Dennis is a veteran journalist and market researcher who began researching abortion's economic impact in 1992. In 1994, based on long-term demographic trends, he began forecasting the current economic crisis. His forecasts have proven correct, starting in 2000 and continuing until 2010 and beyond. Dennis frequently speaks and gives interviews on this topic. Contact information: http://www.movementforabetteramerica.org; mbaforlife@gmail.com; Media calls – 973-895-7367/ 973-796-8338 (cell)
SEX: GOOD, BABIES: BAD Posted: Friday July 24, 2009 at 12:07 pm EST by Judie Brown
By Kortney Blythe
This mindset seems to be common in the pro-death camp.
Take, for instance, this quote by Elisabeth Garber-Paul in an article on the rise in sexual activity during this economic recession: “So join the rest of America in this exciting new trend. Save money, stay in, have sex—just don’t make a baby.”
That’s right, Elisabeth, throw respect for yourself out the window and spit in the face of God by removing one of his intentions for intercourse. More babies will just make the economy worse, right? Wrong. In fact, one of the reasons we are even in this recession is because of the plummeting birthrate. There simply aren’t enough people to replace the retiring population in the workplace and pay for Social Security, or to stimulate the economy.
Not that you’ll hear about that from the anti-human, overpopulation zealots. But do your research. Watch Demographic Winter and Demographic Bomb, two documentaries which debunk the overpopulation myth and ask a very important question: Is it possible we have been failed by the very ideas we thought could save us?
It goes without saying that abortion advocates think saving sex for marriage is ludicrous and archaic. Just check out the title of a book just released by radical feminist Jessica Valenti: The Purity Myth: How America’s Obsession with Virginity is Hurting Young Women.
In an interview on the rabidly pro-abortion RH Reality Check web site, Valenti purports that teaching and honoring purity is just as dangerous as the media’s “pressure on sexuality and the hypersexualization of women.” Oh, really? So, protecting young people from the heartbreak and emptiness of premarital sex, not to mention a load of sexually transmitted diseases, is akin to the objectification of women, the result of which has been a generation of depressed, confused girls with eating disorders?
She goes on to say, “The purity myth is so embedded in our culture and our psyches… You don’t have to be forcing your daughter to take a virginity pledge in order for the fiction of virginity to affect your life.” Really? Then why does every Hollywood film end (or begin) with a couple jumping into bed together? If it’s so “embedded” in our culture, then why are abortion, STD and teen pregnancy rates so high? (I’m not going to even legitimize her term “fiction of virginity” with a response).
As if that isn’t enough, in Greensboro, North Carolina, a new program is paying high school girls to not get pregnant. That’s right. For every day they stay baby-free, $1 is deposited into an account to be used for college. According to a local TV news report, the group was founded by Hazel Brown, “a maternity nurse who thought too many teens were having babies.”
Ms. Brown, how about seeing the root of the problem? Too many teens are having premarital sex. The problem is not the presence of a baby, but the actions of his mother and father, which resulted in his existence.
The three goals of this program, called College Bound Sisters, are for the girls to “avoid pregnancy, graduate from high school and enroll in college,” Brown said. Oh, what lofty goals we have for our young people!
Teenagers rise to the expectations that are set for them. If all we ask is that they avoid pregnancy (and we’ll even pay them for that!), what are we teaching girls about sex, relationships, the value of children or personal responsibility, for that matter?
Instead of urging purity and self-control, and demonstrating the joys of a quiver full of children (Psalm 127:3-5) within marriage, this program bribes young girls. If those same girls were taught basic biblical morality, they wouldn’t be having sex, and thus, there would be no chance of pregnancy.
The message of this program in a nutshell: Go ahead and sin against God by having damaging premarital sex, but just make sure you avoid one of the outcomes: babies.
If only young people knew the joy and blessings they are missing out on when they use sex for purely physical and selfish reasons! Then, and only then, they would cherish chastity as it should be cherished.
To my single friends reading this, please flee from this deadly mentality of me-first, pleasure-seeking sex without consequences. Seek righteousness, pursue holiness and practice chastity.
“But understand this: There will be terrifying times in the last days. People will be self-centered and lovers of money, proud, haughty, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, irreligious, callous, implacable, slanderous, licentious, brutal, hating what is good, traitors, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, as they make a pretense of religion but deny its power. Reject them.” (2 Timothy 3:1-5)
Kortney Blythe is the chapter and street teams coordinator for American Life League’s Rock for Life project, which brings the human personhood message to youth through music, education and human rights activism. This commentary originally appeared in the July 2, 2009 issue of the RFL Report.
I just finished reading what you said about Jessica Valenti and I can't believe what I read! Virginity is bad? Please, who is it hurting by remaining a virgin? Whats wrong with remaining a virgin until marriage? People like that make me sick and are more then harming young people! elisabeth | July 24, 2009
Judie, after 25+ years of blind Christian faith, I have to say and admit from personal study, personal experience and personal loss...is that ANY and ALL religions are outdated, violent and promote hatred. If you don't believe me, just watch your own video on Bill Maher. You could have chosen to speak out against what he said, but for you to want or him to be fired for exercising his free speech right that was given to him in agreement in the Secular Constitution, you need to look in the mirror.
But, I am sure in this world of "Controversy Sells" I seriously doubt that you will see my point.
Religion poisons everything Judie, period.
Craig Fine | July 27, 2009
Thank you for this important information. We desperately need the intervention of God if we are to stop President Obama's stealthcare plan. I think we are missing the root, though, and that is rampant disobedience to natural and divine law regarding human sexuality, especially through our use of contraception, all contraception, and especially abortifacient contraception. Staggering number of children are aborted without proper attention even from pro-life organizations. I am personally passionate because I unwittingly aborted one child by using the IUD and possibly others and also by the Pill. Thanks for what you are doing in that regard, Judie. Juliana Davis | July 28, 2009
Dear Craig,
You take a very negative view of something very positive and good. Freedom of speech should never translate into hateful, deceptive rhetoric about any human being, including the Holy Father. Maher was wrong, and that is it in a nutshell.
Faith in God brightens everything as one's love for God grows; blind religions, such as secular humanism and the like, poison everything. Think about it.
CHURCH TEACHING AND HUMAN REPRODUCTION Posted: Thursday July 23, 2009 at 4:52 pm EST by Judie Brown
By John B. Shea, M.D., FRCP(C)
Contraception:
The Catholic Church teaches that “the direct interruption of the generative process already begun, and, above all, directly willed and procured abortion, even if for therapeutic reasons, are absolutely excluded as licit means of regulating birth. Equally excluded … is direct sterilization, whether perpetual or temporary, whether of the man or the woman.” This teaching prohibits contraception by means of the condom, intrauterine device, vasectomy, tubal ligation and chemical contraception by the use of oral contraceptives, morning-after pills, or the administration of contraceptives by injection or in a skin patch. The reason for this prohibition is that contraception breaks the inseparable connection, willed by God and unable to be broken by man on his own initiative, between the unitive meaning and the procreative meaning of the conjugal act.
Contraception greatly dishonors marriage, the greatness of which is beautifully described by Dietrich von Hildebrand. “No natural human good has been exalted so high in the New Testament. No other good has been chosen to become one of the Seven Sacraments. No other has been endowed with the honor of participating in the establishment of the Kingdom of God. … The wonderful, divinely appointed relationship between the mysterious procreation of a new human being, and this most intimate communion of love … illuminates the grandeur and solemnity of this union … Thus it is that in order to preserve the reverent attitude of the spouses toward the mystery of this union, this general connection between procreation and the communion of love must always be maintained.”
History has clearly demonstrated how prescient Pope Paul VI (1963-1978) was when he predicted that the practice of contraception would cause the man to lose respect for the woman, considering her a mere instrument of selfish enjoyment. The gigantic increase in the incidence of abortion and of sexually transmitted infections bears witness to the promiscuity that followed the legalization and wide availability of chemical contraceptives. The pope also warned of the danger that public authorities which take no heed of moral exigencies would try to solve problems of the community by means illicit for married couples. Witness the worldwide promotion of contraception and abortion fostered by the United Nations today, and also the mandatory one-child policy of the government of China.
Paul VI, in Humanae vitae, stated that “if, then, there are serious motives to space out births, which derive from the physical or psychological conditions of husband and wife, or from external conditions, the Church teaches that it is then licit to take into account the natural rhythms immanent in the generative functions, for the use of marriage in the infecund periods only, and in this way to regulate births without offending the moral principles which have been recalled earlier.” Pius XII taught that unless some serious circumstances arise, spouses are obliged to have children. However, he also teaches that it is moral for the spouses to limit their family size or even to refrain from having children altogether, if they have sufficiently serious reasons. He stated that “there are serious motives, such as those often mentioned in the so-called medical, eugenic, economic, and social ‘indications,’ that can except for a long time, perhaps even during the whole duration of the marriage, from the positive and obligatory carrying out of the act.”
The 1965 Vatican document The Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World (Gaudium et spes) teaches that “among the married couples who thus fulfill their God-given mission, special mention should be made of those who after prudent reflection and common decisions, courageously undertake the proper upbringing of a large number of children.” It also states that it is the duty of the parents, and of them alone, to decide on the number and spacing of children, and that they should take “into consideration their own good and the good of their children already born or yet to come, and ability to read the signs of the times and of their own situation, on the material and spiritual level, and finally, an estimation of the good of the family, of society, and of the Church.”
The morally acceptable way for spacing the birth of children is called “Natural Family Planning.” One of the best methods is the Hilgers system. The effectiveness rates of this method for avoiding pregnancy have been shown to be 99.5 to 98.8 at the twelfth month of use. This compares favorably to the pill, of which Planned Parenthood’s web site states, “Of 100 women who use the Pill, only 8 will become pregnant during the first year of typical use.”
Relevant medical facts
Some chemical “contraceptives” abort all of the time. All of them abort some of the time. They do this by preventing implantation of an embryo in the uterus. Elites in the medical profession try to justify their use of the word “contraceptive” by stating that there is no embryo before implantation. This statement is false. The science of human embryology demonstrated, over 100 years ago, that a new individual human being comes into existence when the single-cell zygote is formed, either by fertilization or by cloning. Using the oral contraceptive pill before the first child is born causes a 40-percent increase in the risk of breast cancer. Taken for four or more years before the first child is born increases that risk to 72 percent. The OCP also increases the risk of cancer of the cervix of the uterus and of the liver.
The condom does not provide complete protection from the risk of acquiring sexually transmitted infection.
Artificial reproductive technologies:
A human being can be brought into existence by the fertilization of an ovum by a sperm. This can be achieved by sexual intercourse or in the laboratory by in vitro fertilization. Reproduction of a human being can also be achieved by cloning. There are many different methods of cloning that include nuclear transfer, embryo splitting, etc.
The Church teaches that IVF and human cloning are morally forbidden. Why? IVF between husband and wife is condemned because it is illicit in itself, and in opposition to the dignity of procreation and the conjugal union. IVF in which the sperm or ovum of a third person is used is also condemned because, in addition, it violates the reciprocal commitment of spouses and shows a grave lack of regard for that essential property of marriage which is unity. It also deprives the child of her or his filial relationship with parental origins, can hinder the maturing of personal identity, can damage personal relationships within the family and has repercussions on civil society.
IVF is neither, in fact, achieved nor positively willed as an expression and fruit of a specific act of conjugal union. The human embryo is treated as a product of technology and not as a gift of God. In its use and in the use of many other techniques of genetic engineering, a human person is objectively deprived of his or her proper perfection. Such fertilization establishes the domination of technology over the origin and destiny of the person. This domination is contrary to the dignity and equality that must be common to parents and children. Therefore, IVF and cloning are morally unacceptable.
Relevant medical facts
• Few children conceived by IVF are ever born. In each cycle, six to eight embryos are conceived. At most, two are implanted. The rest are either disposed of immediately or are frozen, and eventually, most die. Only 25 percent of those conceived are implanted, and of them, only 20 percent are born. Therefore, only five percent of IVF embryos are born alive. The Australian bioethicist Nicholas Tonti-Filippini calculates that the chance of saving a given frozen human embryo by implantation is less than two percent.
• Birth defects associated with assisted reproductive technologies: 4.9–7.2-fold increase in malignant tumor of the retina; five percent incidence of Beckwith–Wiedemann Syndrome (large tongue, predisposition to cancer); in Brazil, incidence of cancer increased 117 times; cerebral palsy increased 1.4–1.7 times; fourfold increase in developmental delay; premature birth increased 5.6 times; low birthrate increased 9.8 times and heart deformity increased four times.
• To achieve IVF, a woman is given hormones to stimulate the development of many ova at the same time. This may cause ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome. Symptoms include nausea, vomiting and breathing difficulty. In rare cases, blood clots, kidney or lung disease may occur and may be life-threatening.
• Dr. Thomas Hilgers’ FertilityCare System: Dr. Hilgers’ Natural Procreative Technology is a method of care that involves precise diagnosis of the hormonal caused of infertility, and its appropriate treatment. It is also morally acceptable as a way to help an infertile woman to conceive, and is two to three times more successful than IVF, at a fraction of the cost. One study on women who had previous failed IVF, showed a success rate of 36.2 percent. The Hilgers system has been shown to be up to 80-percent successful in helping women to have a successful pregnancy after they have suffered repeated miscarriages. It cuts the rate of premature birth in half, thus helping to reduce the incidence of brain damage. For more information, about the Hilgers System for avoiding or achieving pregnancy, contact the Marguerite Bourgeoys Family Centre Fertility Care Program; 688 Coxwell Avenue, Toronto, Ontario M4C 3B7, Canada; phone 416-365-2868; e-mail fertilitycare@sympatico.ca
Dr. John B. Shea is a retired diagnostic radiologist and a fellow of the Royal College of Canada. This article first appeared in the June 2009 issue of Catholic Insight magazine and is reprinted here with its kind permission. For more information on the availability of the FertilityCare System in the U.S. and Canada, visit www.fertilitycare.org; call 402-390-6600; or write to FertilityCare Centers of America, 6901 Mercy Rd., Omaha, NE 68106.
CATHOLIC HEALTH CARE’S DEMISE—IS IT IMMINENT? Posted: Wednesday July 22, 2009 at 3:28 pm EST by Judie Brown
There was a time when institutions bearing a Catholic identity, such as hospitals and clinics, would never have agreed to even the slightest hint of deviating from the Catholic Church’s teachings. That was, I am sad to say, a very long time ago.
Today, there appears to be a slow deterioration in the Catholic identity of Catholic health-care institutions. I started to become aware of this over 10 years ago, when the Peoria Protocol first came to my attention. For those unfamiliar with it, the Peoria Protocol, first developed in 1995, was put in place at Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria, Illinois. The Protocol defines permissible approaches to medical care following a sexual assault. Following are two of its four possible courses of action:
* The woman is determined to be past the early post-ovulatory phase of her cycle if the LH urine test is negative and her progesterone level is greater than or equal to 6 ng/mL. In this situation, the timing of the sexual assault could not have coincided with the presence of an ovum. Hence, it is morally permissible to administer an emergency contraceptive for the victim's psychological benefit.
* Finally, the woman is determined to be in the late post-ovulatory phase if the LH urine test is negative, her progesterone level is less than 6 ng/mL, and she anticipates menstruation in less than seven days. Here, too, it is morally permissible to administer a contraceptive medication.
These two statements, while approved by many Catholic medical ethicists, represent a fundamental moral problem. If the Catholic Church does not condone the use of contraception as medical treatment in any case other than a situation involving a serious medical condition and in which the female abstains from sexual relations during such treatment, how can it be permissible to administer a powerful chemical compound that is known to abort, when there is no serious medical condition and alternative therapies exist? Neither of the above scenarios described in the Peoria Protocol provide a 100-percent guarantee that a child has not been conceived. Moreover, these statements are nuanced and do not provide adequate safeguards to protect the child, should his conception have occurred as a result of the rape.
One has to wonder why a Catholic hospital would even consider this treatment option. Saint Francis Medical Center is also involved in dispensing oral contraceptives. The news media reports that its involvement in the distribution of birth control pills is the direct result of a “middle ground” decision:
[W]hen OSF Saint Francis began hiring primary care physicians in the 1990s as part of OSF Medical Group, many of the physicians wanted to prescribe oral contraceptives. Much anguished discussion ensued, said Joseph Piccione, corporate ethicist for OSF Healthcare System.
Yet a middle ground was found. No contraception of any kind would be distributed within the four walls of the hospital itself, Piccione said.
Regardless of walls, there is no Catholic doctrine that would sanction an arm’s-length agreement that the birth control pill can be dispensed under the aegis of the Church.
Then there’s the California case involving known abortionists serving as staff physicians for Catholic hospitals. When Wynette Sills first brought this to our attention earlier this year, we investigated, only to find—to our dismay—that, in fact, the situation is as she originally described it. As Bud Reeves reports,
We want our readers to know that we are continuing with our investigation as well as with our direct action activities regarding Mercy San Juan Hospital (MSJH) and Catholic Healthcare West’s (CHW) practice of allowing identified abortion doctors to practice at MSJH and even be promoted on their webpage. CHW originally excused their promotion and use of three identified abortion doctors as a matter of an insurance requirement. Following my (Bud) efforts to get clarification from Mr. Gardner, last week he sent me a one sentence email which now claims that federal law requires CHW hospitals to allow the abortion doctors to practice in their hospitals. I wrote back to Mr. Gardner and asking him for a meeting or at least giving us the citations for the laws he refers to. So far nothing but silence from Mr. Gardner. Keep this in prayer.
It is probably no accident that about a year ago, Catholic Healthcare West entered into an alliance with human cloning practitioner Advanced Cell Technology, Inc. While it is reported that Catholic Healthcare West will be conducting clinical trials of adult stem cell treatment for heart disease, this alliance raises serious ethical questions, due to the fact that “ACT has previously promoted research that contradicts Catholic principles regarding respect for the rights of the human embryo.”
The problematic nature of such agreements, arrangements and alliances is not by any means limited to Illinois and California. It is a nationwide epidemic, rooted in the age-old dilemma of choosing between God and money. This becomes very clear when revisiting the complexities of the Boston archdiocese’s Caritas Christi mess. You may recall that American Life League was quick to commend Cardinal Sean O’Malley when the archdiocese made this announcement on June 26:
Caritas Christi Health Care, the financially challenged Catholic hospital system founded by the Archdiocese of Boston, is abruptly ending its joint venture with a Missouri-based health insurer at the insistence of Cardinal Sean P. O'Malley, who has decided that the relationship represented too much of an entanglement between Catholic hospitals and abortion providers.
But, within days, we received a telephone call informing us that the agreement had actually not been cancelled. Carol McKinley reported this on her blog, which has thus far not been refuted: “Nobody (including other bishops and cardinals) is able to get details out of the cardinal about what it is he has approved. I think our Catholic pro-life force deserves to know what the actual arrangement is.”
But we do have an inkling when we consider the statement Cardinal O’Malley made, as quoted in the Boston Globe: “By withdrawing from the joint venture and serving the poor as a provider... upholding Catholic moral teaching at all times, they are able to carry forward the critical mission of Catholic health care.’’ The newspaper’s analysis: “Because Caritas will no longer be a joint owner of the insurance venture, the archdiocese is hoping that there will no longer be any question that Caritas will not financially profit from abortions, sterilizations, or other services provided by non-Catholic hospitals.”
A Caritas spokeswoman told the Globe, “This is the right way to move the distraction of the debate of ownership and allow us to be a provider.’’ Here is noted Catholic commentator Phil Lawler’s response: “A debate over involvement in killing unborn babies is a ‘distraction’ from the business of saving lives. A debate over mutilating people to make them infertile is a ‘distraction’ from the distinctive mission of Catholic health care.”
So we are left to wonder if all this means is that Caritas Christi is no longer a an official business partner of abortion providers, but still connected with them in some way. Does it mean that Catholic hospitals will continue to refer for abortion, use the morning-after pill to treat rape victims and so forth? Nobody knows!
As I write this, similar problems are developing in New Hampshire, where the pressure is on Catholic hospitals to bend to the will of the state. New Hampshire Right to Life has prepared a set of three videos dealing with the challenges they face at this time. As was the case in Massachusetts, the cause of concern is a merger.
Wisconsin’s Catholic hospitals are also under the gun. Just last year, they were forced to dispense emergency contraception and did not sue, or in any other way, act to protect their Catholic identity. So what will happen now?
Well, the answer, which is frightening to say the least, may be contained in a short commentary written by Catholic Health Association’s president and CEO, Sister Carol Keehan, DC, who attended the March 5 Obama White House Health Reform Summit. She tells us,
President Obama also was clear that we will have to spend more money in the immediate future to build the infrastructure to lower health care costs in order to achieve the kind of savings and affordability in the future. He pointed out that this is politically one of the hardest kinds of decisions to make.
It occurs to me that the various pressure tactics already being used by state governments to pressure Catholic hospitals into doing the unthinkable are but one way to tighten the noose as “Obama-care” becomes a reality, if, in fact, it does. What also occurs to me is that our bishops must speak with a unified voice, without any dissent and without any bureaucratic mumbo jumbo. They must set forth authentically Catholic medical ethics as the only medical ethics that will be followed in a Catholic setting—with or without mergers, alliances or “common-ground” shenanigans. Until that happens, Catholic health care, as we once knew it, will continue to deteriorate and, at some point, will crumble.
I honesty cannot belive that a woman would consider rape to be a gift from God. Maybe you, julie, need to get out in the real world for a while. You will be not be winning anyone's heart and mind by acting like a fanitic joell | July 22, 2009
It must be that bishops are unable, or unwilling, to teach Catholic beliefs, and so instead appease the culture.
For example, the Peoria Protocol "administer an emergency contraceptive for the victim's psychological benefit" when no physical purpose exists.
And OSF allowing employee physicians to prescribe oral contraceptives because they the doctors wanted to. Teaching employee physician the truth as set forth in Humanae Vitae would have fulfilled the Bishop's and OSF's responsibility, instead!
If Catholic teachers and institutions are not going to stand up and answer the challenges in the hard cases, then what do they understand Catholicism to mean? When do people get the teaching? When does the light shine? When does the Light shine?
If bishops want to restrict themselves to espousing pious practices - which the secular culture may ridicule but nonetheless tolerate, and avoid teaching us how to address the difficult decisions in our lives, then they lead us towards sentimental religiosity and away from truth and heroic living. David Volk | July 22, 2009
Catholic health care has been sliding down the moral slippery slope ever since it permitted replacement of the demoniacal possession theory of disease with heretical scientific theories of disease. Arium | July 22, 2009
The Massachusetts law requiring that emergency contraception be provided at hospitals to rape victims went into effect in late 2005. There is no exception for Catholic hospitals and none are known to have refused to comply with the law. One of the ways the medication works is by preventing the implantation of a newly conceived human being in its mother's uterus. This is an abortion. Governor Romney vetoed the legislation, and the Catholic hierarchy made no effort to round up the votes (one-third from either house of the legislature) needed to sustain the veto. Never mind that about 70 percent of the members were Catholic! Apparently diocesan leaders decided it would not be worthwhile to risk antagonizing the heavily Democratic legislature by working to sustain a Republican governor's veto. Charles O. Coudert | July 22, 2009
One has to know Peoria's local politics to really understand what is happening at OSF-Saint Francis Medical Center regarding Catholics and contraception. What has happened is quite complex and not transparent.
OSF hired Catholic ethicist Joe Piccione in the early 90s and made him OSF Corporate Ethicist. According to the Peoria Journal Star articles from that time, one of Mr. Piccione's main goals was to work with the Catholic Diocese of Peoria and make ethical loopholes which would allow OSF to be in the contraceptive business. The rationale was to help OSF stay competitive in the Peoria medical marketplace.
OSF's Mr. Piccione and Bishop John Myers along with other leaders of the Catholic Diocese of Peoria were able to contrive a policy which allowed OSF physicians to write for contraceptives ('limited private practice'). At the same time, OSF HealthPlans insurance provided a wide array of oral contraceptives and sterilization methods.
These policies were implemented, as explained to me by Mr. Piccione, using ethical firewalls to separate the evil act (contraception) from OSF. The ???limited private practice??? policy and third party payers supposedly provide the firewalls.
However, when interviewed by the Peoria Journal Star 15 years ago, Mr. Piccione, stated that OSF and the Catholic Diocese of Peoria would have dirty hands with the implementation of this contraceptive policy.
And just recently, OSF purchased Carle Clinic in Bloomington, Illinois. Carle Clinic representatives have told me that their physicians will soon become OSF employees and will write prescriptions for oral contraceptives in this newly purchased OSF facility.
Unfortunately, these Peoria policies and practices continue today and are in opposition to the fundamental teachings of Humanae Vitae. However, as clearly described in Judie's commentary, the Catholic Diocese of Peoria and OSF-Saint Francis Medical Center are not alone in succumbing to the forces of the medical marketplace.
John A. Carroll, MD
Peoria, Illinois John A. Carroll, M.D. | July 23, 2009
Joell,
Nobody suggested that sexual assault is a gift from God, but a child who is conceived in a tragic situation like this is NOT the criminal and should NOT be put to death. It is the father of that child who has perpetrated the crime.
I am not a fanatic, Joell, but I do know that God creates every human being and He never makes a mistake, although human beings like you and I make them all the time.
IS ABORTED FETAL DNA LINKED TO AUTISM? Posted: Tuesday July 21, 2009 at 3:03 pm EST by Judie Brown
By Theresa A. Deisher, Ph.D.
Just when the pharmaceutical industry thought the vaccine-autism controversy had been resolved, the National Vaccine Advisory Committee has recommended further study of vaccine safety. A perceived fear of the safety of the U.S. vaccination schedule has led increasing numbers of parents to opt out of full compliance. The numbers of children who are not fully vaccinated has now reached a point where “herd” immunity may be compromised, compelling the Centers for Disease Control to hold town-hall meetings and convene a Vaccine Safety Working Subgroup. Despite research ruling out mercury (Thimerosal) or the measles portion of one specific vaccine, autism continues to rise to a level of one in every 64 children in the UK.
The NVAC draft report recommends further study of the potential for vaccines to contribute to autism in children who have underlying mitochondrial disease, a worthwhile study given the clinical history of such children developing autism after vaccinations (see Poling case). What the NVAC has overlooked, however, in their recommendations, is that epidemic regressive autism is associated with the switch from using animal cells to produce vaccines to the use of aborted human fetal cells for vaccine production. Now when we vaccinate our children, some vaccines also deliver contaminating aborted human fetal DNA. The safety of this has never been tested.
Autism and autism spectrum disorder are polygenic diseases, meaning that multiple genes have been shown to be associated with these diseases. Studies have also clearly shown that there is an environmental component, a trigger, that is required. Vaccines are an obvious potential environmental trigger for autism because of the almost universal childhood exposure to vaccines in first world countries. The vaccine-autism connection was first hypothesized following the introduction of a new measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine to the U.S. in 1979, with complete U.S. market share by 1983, and to the UK in 1988. Autism rates began to rise in the U.S. after 1979 and rose dramatically after 1983, and likewise rose in the UK after 1988, leading physicians to suspect a link. Initially, the measles component of this vaccine, MMR II, was suspected to be the culprit. Subsequent studies have also focused on the presence of mercury in vaccines, which incidentally, the MMR II vaccine did not contain.
Those studies have largely ruled out the new measles portion of the MMR II or mercury as the environmental trigger for autism. However, the compelling temporal association between this new MMR vaccine and autism cannot be ignored or explained away. What has been ignored is the fact that this new MMR vaccine introduced the use of aborted fetal cells for vaccine production. At one point, as much as 94 percent of children in the U.S. and 98 percent of children in the UK were given this vaccine.
Today, more than 23 vaccines are contaminated by the use of aborted fetal cells. There is no law that requires that consumers be informed that some vaccines are made using aborted fetal cells and contain residual aborted fetal DNA. While newer vaccines produced using aborted fetal cells do inform consumers, in their package inserts, that the vaccines contain contaminating DNA from the cell used to produce the vaccine, they do not identify the cells as being derived from electively aborted human fetuses. (See the Varivax—chicken pox—package insert for the presence of MRC5 residual DNA.)
In other words, they tell you what is in the vaccine, but they don’t fully inform you where it came from. The earliest aborted fetal cell-produced vaccines such as Meruvax (rubella) and MMR II do not even inform consumers that the vaccines contain contaminating DNA from the cell used to produce them. Furthermore, it is unconscionable that the public-health risk of injecting our children with residual contaminating human aborted fetal DNA has been ignored.
How could the contaminating aborted fetal DNA create problems? It creates the potential for autoimmune responses and/or inappropriate insertion into our own genomes through a process called recombination. There are groups researching the potential link between this DNA and autoimmune diseases such as juvenile (type I) diabetes, multiple sclerosis and lupus. Our organization, Sound Choice Pharmaceutical Institute, is focused on studying the quantity, characteristics and genomic recombination of the aborted fetal DNA found in many of our vaccines.
Preliminary bioinformatics research conducted at SCPI indicates that “hot spots” for DNA recombination are found in nine autism-associated genes present on the X chromosome. These nine genes are involved in nerve-cell synapse formation, central nervous system development and mitochondrial function.
Could genomic insertion of the aborted fetal DNA, found in some of our childhood vaccines since 1979, be an environmental trigger for autism? Could the fact that genes critical for nerve synapse formation and nervous system development are found on the X chromosome provide some explanation of why autism is predominantly a disease found in boys? Could the “hot spots” identified in these autism-associated genes be sites for insertion of contaminating aborted fetal DNA?
These questions must be answered, and quickly. Recent literature suggests that autism spectrum disorder may now impact one out of every 100 children. The pharmaceutical industry is also currently moving to replace more animal-produced vaccines with aborted-fetal-cell production and also to produce biologic drugs using aborted fetal cells.
The practice of using aborted fetal cells for vaccine and drug production creates wrenching moral dilemmas for parents and consumers, ignores informed consent rights, and exposes our children and ourselves to contaminants lacking safety evaluations. We cannot ignore this issue in good conscience, and we cannot afford to wait.
Dr. Deisher is president of Sound Choice Pharmaceutical Institute (www.soundchoice.org), as well as a cofounder and the research and development director for Ave Maria Biotechnology Company (www.avmbiotech.com), which promote pro-life biotechnology. This article is an adaptation and update of Sound Choice Pharmaceutical Institute’s June 2009 newsletter and is published with its kind permission. For more information on Dr. Deisher, see "Providing real choice: A conversation with Dr. Theresa Deisher" in American Life League's Celebrate Life magazine (January-February 2009) .
My brother is 71 years old and is living with autism. He never had any of the vaccines against anything. Mom and Dad could not afford to take Richard to the doctor to get that done. This was the end of the Hoover Depression. They could not afford to take him to the doc for the vaccines. Rich was conceived during Ember Week (remember those) of June, 1937. This might play a part in Richard's getting autism. Karen | July 31, 2009
Dear Karen
If I might point something out to you, it would be that the vaccinations that were available in the late thirties were not of the same calibre as those being manufactured today. The history of vaccines, which is posted on line, is quite interesting. http://www.keepkidshealthy.com/welcome/immunizations/immunization_timeline.html
I am not at all certain that anyone in those days actually recognized autism per se or that the vaccines that were available would have affected anyone in the same way that they do today.
CHANGE: BUT IN WHAT DIRECTION? Posted: Monday July 20, 2009 at 1:42 pm EST by Judie Brown
By Ken Connor
There is no doubt that President Obama's most valuable political asset is his remarkable charisma—his ability to send the spirit of the nation soaring on the wings of hope and change. Among the hopeful visions and promises of change articulated by Mr. Obama in his inaugural speech this past January was a vow to "restore science to its rightful place and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality."
Six months into his term, a picture of the president's understanding of science and its "rightful place" is emerging, and it is anything but flattering. President Obama has repeatedly demonstrated a propensity to elevate "science" over ethical considerations in pursuit of utilitarian goals. He has shown himself to be all too willing to sacrifice principle, morality and the most vulnerable among us for the sacred "achievements" of social and scientific progress.
This penchant of the president to disregard the importance of protecting innocent human life should come as no surprise. As a state senator, Mr. Obama opposed legislation mandating emergency medical treatment for infants who survived an attempted abortion because he felt that a live baby would "add one more burden on a woman." Still, one would hope that President Obama, famed "reconciler of opposites," would find a way to strike a balance between his pro-abortion, pro-"science" constituency and his pro-life supporters.
On the issue of life however, Mr. Obama has thus far proven himself to be unwilling or unable to find that mythical "common ground" he so eloquently spoke of in his commencement address at Notre Dame. In his short time in office, the president has disbanded his council on bioethics (apparently they spent too much time talking about ethics), overturned limits on embryonic stem cell research instituted by President Bush, ended federal funding of abstinence-based education in favor of funding for contraception-based education, lobbied for federal funding for abortion in Washington, D.C. and supported the addition of an abortion provision in the behemoth health-care bill currently winding its way through Congress.
Perhaps most revealing is the elimination of the President's Council on Bioethics, a distinguished group of experts who explored the ethical and public policy implications of emerging biomedical developments such as cloning and embryonic stem cell research. The Council provided an important forum for discussing such matters, thereby fostering the development of a reasoned consensus about how to proceed through uncharted territory. One would think that such a role would hold great attraction for President Obama in light of his stated commitment to discussion and debate; yet time and again, Mr. Obama has demonstrated that when it comes to protecting innocent human life, he is unwilling to allow ethical concerns to impede scientific "progress."
Mr. Obama appears to view any "advance" in science as an intrinsic good that is always beneficial to mankind. This is the same mentality that animated the eugenics movement of the early 20th century. In the 21st century, this mentality has given rise to a "disposable man" ethic that dictates that embryonic stem cell research should proceed unencumbered, regardless of its lack of success and regardless of the fact that each tiny embryo dissected in our quest for our improvement or immortality represents the willful destruction of nascent human life.
Obama's disposable man mentality may also be seen in his approach to pregnancy and abortion. His decision to de-fund abstinence education makes it clear that he sees no utility in a principled approach to preventing unplanned pregnancies. Obama apparently believes that the abstinence-only approach is stifling and outdated. Why encourage teens to defer sex until marriage? Their hormones are, after all, raging. We’ll just provide condoms on the front end, and if that doesn’t do the trick, abortion on the back end—all at taxpayer expense, of course. Problem solved; principle be damned.
Taking a cue from President Obama's approach to eliminating "problems" without addressing root causes, Planned Parenthood, the nation's number one abortion provider and recipient of millions in federal taxpayer dollars, has shown itself willing to break the law and bury reports of the abuse of underage girls requesting abortions. Under the organization’s utilitarian view of life, it doesn't matter how a girl got pregnant—even if it was through the commission of a crime. Planned Parenthood is in the business of solving the "problem" of unwanted pregnancy through abortion. Period.
But what about those who, based on principle, refuse to perform—or assist in the performance of—an abortion? If President Obama has his way, the days of conscientious objection will soon be over. Medical practitioners who refuse to train in these procedures or offer these services will be guilty of—you guessed it—an ethics violation!
President Obama has made it crystal clear where he stands on questions of medical ethics and human life. And rest assured, it is nowhere near middle ground.
In his inaugural address, the president invoked a noble vision for America: "The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.... Our founding fathers, faced with perils that we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expediency's sake."
As he advances his agenda, President Obama would do well to remember his own inspiring words and ask himself if his policies will preserve the American tradition of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, or whether they will sacrifice these precious ideals on the altar of utility and scientific expedience.
Ken Connor is chairman of the Center for a Just Society (www.centerforajustsociety.org), an attorney and coauthor of Sinful Silence: When Christians Neglect Their Civic Duty. This article was originally published by the Center for a Just Society on July 10, 2009 and is reprinted here with its kind permission.
I am with you one hundred percent, Ken. Anyone who claims a woman has a right to choose abortion, claims refutal to The Constitution of the United States and the Bible, Olivia B. West | July 20, 2009
Obama's immoral decisions come as no surprise given the fact that he adheres to the philosophy of Saul Alinsky. Any means possible are allowed in order to accomplish their ends. If you want to see what makes Obama tick...study Saul Alinsky....scary stuff! Jacqui Fetsko | July 21, 2009
I had to look up Saul Alinsky, and Wikipedia offers a disturbing example of what Jacqui refers to, "that the most effective means are whatever will achieve the desired ends". His final work, published the year before he died, begins with the following tribute, "From all our legends, mythology, and history (and who is to know where mythology leaves off and history begins ??? or which is which), the first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom ??? Lucifer." Rebellion for rebellion's sake. David Volk | July 22, 2009
Pro-Life Story: Abortion is mean Posted By Elizabeth Nebel on Mar, 17 2007 On the back of my mustang I had a sticker made that reads "ABORTION IS MEAN." It's big and on my back windshield. Anyways I went to the mall one day and I was wearing my ... Read
