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!
CATHOLICS, HEALTH CARE 'REFORM' AND THE HOUSE OF JELL-O OBAMA BUILT Posted: Thursday August 6, 2009 at 4:09 pm EST by Judie Brown
In the past week, we have seen multiple negative responses to our views on supposedly Catholic institutions’ involvement with the Obama administration’s health care “reform” plan. We have also seen attacks by leftist “Catholic” entities on our friends at Family Research Council.
Apparently, criticism of the Obama proposals have engendered a bit of ire on the part of some, including Chris Korzen, executive director of Catholics United, who wrote in his blog, “Catholics United will be working in key states throughout the August Congressional recess to correct inaccuracies about health care reform proposals and to build support for health care reform within faith communities.”
Korzen also continued his verbal attack on FRC: “The Family Research Council's continued effort to distort the facts leads one to wonder whether the group's true intent is to derail health care reform. Instead of issuing misleading attacks and inciting fear, the Family Research Council would do better to support efforts aimed at implementing abortion-neutral policies in health care reform legislation.”
Please note that Korzen accuses FRC of making statements that “distort the facts” and are “misleading.” He then goes on to suggest that everyone should agree that as long as health care reform legislation is “abortion neutral,” we should be pleased.
In essence, his argument is that regardless of whether the federal government even belongs in the business of dictating health care policy, Catholics United is sticking with the program. This seems to be the consensus among some similar entities as well, including Catholic Charities USA, the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul and the Catholic Health Association.
In fact, just recently CCUSA not only disputed our report, calling it “inaccurate,” but its president, Father Larry Snyder, also claimed, “These attacks appear to be politically motivated by opponents of health care reform. They are distortions of the truth and disingenuous. Catholic Charities USA will continue to work to reform health care in a way that is consistent with the teachings of our faith.”
The problem with such statements, particularly from Father Snyder, is enormous. First of all, Father Snyder is intimately involved with the Obama administration, having accepted an appointment to the President’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.
Father Snyder sits on the President’s Advisory Council with none other than Harry Knox, a militant homosexual activist who has described the Knights of Columbus as the “foot soldiers of a discredited army of oppression.”
Furthermore, just a few days ago, on behalf of CCUSA, Father Snyder publicly expressed his gratitude for receiving a five-year, one hundred million-dollar contract from the federal government. Reportedly, the funds are earmarked for disaster relief.
All of this leads one to wonder what exactly Obama has been stirring up. His administration has been persuading various so-called Catholic leaders that—regardless of Catholic magisterial teaching—there is a seat at the table for Catholics who will set aside the tragedy of abortion for the supposedly greater cause of “reforming” health care, via Obama’s virtual fiat.
InsideCatholic.com’s director, Deal Hudson, who addressed the same problems in his commentary “Why Catholics will not get abortion out of the Obama health care bill,” asked,
So why should either Congress or the White House be afraid of Catholic criticism of the health care bills as they now stand? Yes, the USCCB has made its official statements, but there's no great roar of opposition to the prospect of federally funded abortion services as a part of universal health care.
As far as the public's perception is concerned, the "Catholic" imprimatur on health care reform has come from Catholic Charities USA, the Catholic Health Association, and the St. Vincent de Paul Society. (God help us if L'Osservatore Romano weighs in on this!)
The good news is the two-month delay in voting on the bill. Richard Doerflinger, associate director of the bishops' Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities, told the National Catholic Register, "Right now, these bills are a moving target.… But we will stay on top of it and continue to educate the public."
Whether or not abortion services remain in the health care bill will be a definitive test of the bishops' ability to educate and to put the "fear of God" in the Congress and the White House. It is a test, I fear, they will fail.
Amen, Deal!
We also have the prominent Catholic commentator and author Philip Lawler, explaining to those with ears to hear and eyes to see, that the health care “reform” problem has been created by the same administration that has done all within its power to ensure that abortion is freely available to anyone and everyone. Lawler’s compilation of the facts is irrefutable. He points out, in introductory comments, “The following information-- which is not my own work, but the work of astute friends in Washington, DC-- provides all you need to know about the Obama White House plans regarding abortion and health-care reform.”
Yet the “Catholic” panderers continue to add the powder and water to Obama’s Jell-O!
What America is facing is potentially cataclysmic, but for Catholics, the situation is even worse. Most Catholic leaders are not listening to the voices of reason and are not leading the flock along the road to Calvary. Instead, they apparently prefer the road to slavery under the Obama regime. They are also largely overlooking the question of subsidiarity, recently addressed by noted Catholic scholar and commentator Jeffrey Mirus, Ph.D. in “The Problem(s) with Federal Health Care”:
With respect to life issues, the United States Federal government has demonstrated a fairly consistent immoral ideological bent over the past fifty years, an ideology more or less continuously evident in court decisions and frequently manifested in both Congress and the White House. Therefore, we must ask ourselves why any fundamentally moral person would wish to place medical care in the hands of the Federal government at all?
Perhaps Americans have become so supinely dependent on government over the past few generations that they cannot conceive of any other solution to widespread social concerns than to shift more power to the highest possible governmental level. This knee-jerk reaction, unfortunately often exhibited even by Catholic bishops, amounts to a sort of instinctive violation of the principle of subsidiarity—one of the cornerstones of Catholic social teaching. The principle of subsidiarity, which holds that authority over human affairs should always be vested at the lowest feasible organizational level, is essential to human dignity because it is the only way to preserve the immense good of deep personal involvement in arranging one’s own affairs. As subsidiarity crumbles, tyranny and—in well-organized modern nation states—totalitarianism are the inevitable result. One would think the history of the twentieth century had already made this abundantly clear.
It is time for each Catholic—whether lay, ordained or consecrated—to rethink the path the American Church is following at this moment. The problem underlying this entire situation and the one that has troubled me the most is this:
Forty years ago, when I first became involved in fighting against abortion, I heard from my pastor (an incredible Catholic priest who never hesitated to preach about sin, hell and the need to confess one’s sins) that abortion was an act of murder. In fact, Father Willenberg, God rest his soul, was the first person to point out that even one abortion is a scourge upon our nation.
At that moment in time (1969), unbeknownst to me, the federal government, in conjunction with Planned Parenthood and its allies, was setting the wheels in motion for a program known as Title X of the Public Health Service Act. This was and is a federal funnel for pouring tax dollars into the coffers of pro-abortion organizations.
Since that time, the federal government has gotten deeper and deeper into the contraception and abortion funding business. The government has turned a blind eye to science, to rational thought and to God. So why are the USCCB, the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul, Catholic Charities and the Catholic Health Association leadership now apparently willing to trust the very same federal government with taking over health care in America? Or even to simply “reform” it?
When a government condones wholesale murder and calls it “reproductive choice,” what could these supposedly Catholic leaders be thinking?
Now is the time for sincere prayer, for recommitting ourselves to stopping this juggernaut some call health care “reform” and, especially, for humble reassessment of government’s proper role concerning respect for the dignity of the human person.
Now is not the time for Jell-O, which is another name for lack of fortitude.
Hi Judy,
Here's humble suggestion that would take the health care for the poor to a new level. Lt's do it ourselves.
Gob bless you,'Dave
Many years ago I spent considerable time and effort calculating the number of poor families in the US and how we might respond to their needs. I wrote a letter to the Denver Catholic Register with my conclusion. Briefly, I suggested that, if each parish adopted 2 poor families, poverty in the US would vanish. I suggested that the size of the parish (or church, as I would invite our Protestant friends to participate) determine how many families they would support. The average was two/parish. The support would include all that was necessary for them to be a part of the community: food, job opportunities from those in the parish, education, and health care. Each parish would voluntarily provide all the essentials. And poverty vanishes and the Good Samaritans (as we are called to be) provide all to them.(isn???t this the object lesson the parable?) The response was less than favorable from readers of the DCR. I do not wish to go there now but just to say that I believe this approach is more relevant and appropriate today then ever.
The current ???crises??? in health care is a perfect example of the need for action on the part of our church. I am of the belief that the poor are not the responsibility of government, that Caesar???s involvement can only mean destruction of the dignity and sanctity of human life. I cannot help but wonder why the Bishops, who I admire greatly on many issues and in their depth of faith, support Caesar???s approach to health care if certain conditions are met. I continue to be amazed that the pressure they (rightly) promoted to resist FOCA is not being brought to the forefront in the current climate where Caesar is attempting to confiscate 10% of the Nation???s wealth. Is the sanctity of life less important for the unborn and the vulnerable if there is the promise of an underlying desirable (in their view) reward, in this case health care for everyone? And what convinces that there is really basic health care for everyone? I have certainly not been convinced.
Let me just say: The right to life is a fundamental right. Nothing precedes it, nothing is more profoundly important than this. This said, the extension of this fundamental right to other areas that support this fundamental principle is not so simple, nor might it be correct. In my humble opinion, a ???fundamental right??? is one which you or I can enjoy without the imposition on others to make it happen. No other needs to be made to provide the umbra to my right to life. It is, without imposition on others. Any extension of this, for example, to the provision of food, shelter, or health care, as a basic extension to my right to life, requires either the virtue of charity or compulsion to provide these life necessities. I submit that compulsion is outside the proper avenue of nurture, unless we see Caesar as a morally necessary player.
If Caesar is a necessary and invited participant, then how do we reconcile the compulsion that follows with the Parable of the Good Samaritan? Remember those who expect rewards from Caesar must pay the price, and it will no doubt cost the innocent their lives.
The Catholic Church provides wonderful health care for about 10% of the population of the US. Is it not possible for the Church to also provide health insurance for those in need? Remember the two families per parish description at the beginning of this little essay. Can not we provide the needed help or even form a national health insurance company that provides insurance on one???s ability to pay? Can this be the more appropriate answer than the current interesting but, to me, not understandable, approach to helping the uninsured? Surely we can do better than Caesar.
David W. Rusch, Ph.D. | August 6, 2009
Excellent Judie! The confusion caused by the above named RC groups is certainly not of God. What 'I don't understand' (perhaps that could be a title of an article that's been simmering in my brain) is how "professionals" at the USCCB can ask for "Universal Health Care Reform" when that term is already 'loaded' and co-opted by forces that are aligned with the culture of death and possibly even against our Constitutional Republic?!!!
It's to late to "baptize it" that term!
The USCCB may, by virtue of having Bishops as members, rightly set out moral principals to help guide voters and legislators: but, from viewing the material they've published (even weighing the good statements pointing out some of the intrinsic evils which are not to be contained in any law) - it is EASY to get the impression that they are telling Catholics that this particular bill is good except for this or that article/paragraph.
In effect, it seems they are stepping WAY beyond their competence to teach regarding faith and morals - stepping in to the realm of high stakes political gamesmanship, Constitutional principals, economics, etc.
In other words: yes, there needs to be reform...but THIS present reform?
Wonder what Bishop Sheen would say? Fr. William J Kuchinsky | August 6, 2009
Hi Judie,
I applaud you for your forthright article. I have become increasingly aware of the battle within the church. When Pope John Paul II wrote Veritatis Splendor, The Splendor of Truth it was challenged by Charles Curran, a Catholic Theologian and known dissident. I truly believe that in the end, the truth will set all of us free. Keep up the good work. Gerry Anderson | August 6, 2009
I was very shocked that two prominant catholic programs that serve the poor would be fooled by government lies that are between the lines of the Obama Health Care Plan. Have they forgoten about praying to our Father for the needs of the poor or have they become dependant like you said to all the current services available from the government but they are not free they have paid for them with the cost of thier souls and conciience . Dolores M Rufenacht | August 7, 2009
Wait a minute, according to you the government has no business in health care. Yet you are fighting for the govenment to rule that abortion is a crime.
Are you not asking to have it both ways? Ignatius | August 7, 2009
Your position is absolutely correct Judie. Your voice is one of the few voices of sanity these days.
You are absolutely correct about the pandering of the USCCB and others. The CU group is also a fringe of heretics.
Making deals with the devil is never a good game to play. Better to suffer the division and turmoil here by standing up for the truth as our Lord promised we would, than be separated from Him later.
Charlie Charlie | August 7, 2009
Hello Judy,
I have been a Roman Catholic since the day I was baptized 58 years ago.
I love my Holy Mother Church. However, I sincerely wish that ALL members of the USCCB would crack down on the clergy,politicans, and all Catholics, as well as follow Church teachings themselves. Abortion and Euthanasia are both miurder of a living human being. Ratioing health care is a grievous human rights violation that will result in suffering of the patient as well as his or her family. It too will result in death. Sins against the Ten Commandments as well as Church teachings. Any Catholic- priest, nun, politician, lay person who supports or embraces Obama's Health Reform is violating the aforementioned and should be dealt with by the shepherds of the Church accordingly. Additionally it should be noted that this plan will not insure the uninsured until 2013 - after many who were rationed will be dead and many uninsured will be dead. Leaving the social security payments of those who have died to the government coffers. Thus all paid in all these years becomes the property of the state. Sounds like we are rapidly tumbling in to socialism at the hands of Barack Obama and his cronies. robin lutz | August 7, 2009
Dear Ignatius
#1: health care is not the proper role of government which was founded by our founding fathers to defend and protect us, not medicate or provide health insurance for us on their terms.
#2 the government, by protecting us, should not permit murder of an entire class of innocent people which is exactly what abortion is. Murder is a crime.
Judie Brown Judie Brown | August 7, 2009
Thank you for compiling such an excellent explanation of why we Catholics cannot support Obama's reform plans.
Even my husband who has supported my sidewalk counseling for six years and who sits on the board of a Maternity Home, didn't see the problem with healthcare reform until I pointed it out. We really need you to continue to educate us young and old, so we can be out there doing God's work not Obama's work. Maria Rugg | August 7, 2009
ONE STEP FOR DEATH, TWO STEPS FOR LIES Posted: Wednesday August 5, 2009 at 4:27 pm EST by Judie Brown
My, oh my, how evil can you get? Now we have a chemical abortion pill approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that is available—thanks to the powers that be—by prescription to young girls under age 17, and over the counter to girls 17 and older. The new pill is designed to make it easier—or so they say—to solve the problem of “unprotected sex.”
The pill, known as Plan B One-Step, was hailed by Planned Parenthood, which commented,
We all like to be prepared. That is why it's a great idea to keep some Plan B in your medicine cabinet or bedside table in case of an accident. Having the morning after pill on hand will let you take it as soon as possible after unprotected intercourse, when it is most effective. If you are younger than 17, you can ask your health care provider for a prescription that you can fill ahead of time.
Obviously, Planned Parenthood is always elated when a new deadly chemical is added to its arsenal. But, as usual, it denies the facts by making specious claims, such as its comment that Plan B One-Step will work to prevent pregnancy. Not once has it admitted that such chemicals can end the life of a preborn child, whose life begins at fertilization, not implantation!
The Plan B One-Step web site further complicates the matter by telling the visitor, “Plan B One-Step is not an abortion pill. It won’t work if you’re already pregnant. If you take Plan B One-Step and are already pregnant, it will not affect your existing pregnancy.“
Note the clever use of the word “existing,” which is supposed to convince the unsuspecting female that if a baby is going to be procreated, this pill will not affect that baby. Scientific evidence, however, is not in agreement. Neither is the Plan B One-Step web site, if you read between the lines.
Simply by going to the “prescribers” section of the same web site, we found this:
HOW PLAN B ONE-STEP WORKS
There are many misconceptions about emergency contraception, so it’s important for your patients to know that Plan B One-Step works similar to regular birth control pills; it simply contains a larger dose of the hormone levonorgestrel. Plan B One-Step works primarily by:
Preventing ovulation
Possibly preventing fertilization by altering tubal transport of sperm and/or egg
Altering the endometrium, which may inhibit implantation
Plan B One-Step is not effective once the process of implantation has begun. It will not affect an existing pregnancy or harm a developing fetus.
Plan B One-Step should be taken as soon as possible. When taken as directed, approximately seven out of eight women who would have gotten pregnant will not become pregnant after taking Plan B One-Step.
For those who have not studied the role that the endometrium plays in the ability of the preborn child to implant in his mother’s womb and continue receiving the nourishment he requires, it should be noted that if the endometrium is altered, that baby may not be able to implant at all and he will subsequently die. This fact, based on science rather than sinister sidestepping, is not addressed anywhere on the web site.
textbook, The Developing Human: Clinically Oriented Embryology, 6th Edition, by Moore and Persaud (page 532),
Postcoital birth control pills? Ovarian hormones (estrogen) taken in large doses within 72 hours after sexual intercourse usually prevent implantation of the blastocyst, probably by altering tubal motility, interfering with corpus luteum function, or causing abnormal changes in the endometrium. These hormones prevent implantation, not fertilization. Consequently, they should not be called contraceptive pills. Conception occurs but the blastocyst does not implant. It would be more appropriate to call them "contra-implantation pills." Because the term abortion refers to a premature stoppage of a pregnancy, the term abortion could be applied to such an early termination of pregnancy.
This statement is not a quote from a pro-life manual, but rather a textbook written by human embryology experts. And yet the folks advocating the use of this pill apparently believe they are better prepared to inform the public, based on a perspective that denies scientific facts for the sake of eliminating babies.
Further, when the Plan B One-Step web site advises the prescriber that the pill does not affect the “process of implantation,” this is disingenuous.The preborn will have already died because he or she could not implant!
Not only that, but the idea pregnancy does not even begin until implantation, which is entrenched among culture-of-death proponents, is once again presumed to be true when it is clearly, unequivocally and patently untrue.
Stop Planned Parenthood International has been on top of this subject since day one and, in a recent media release, presented the truth in plain English:
Planned Parenthood and the birth control industry would have you believe Plan B One-Step cannot cause an abortion. That is a lie.
In 1965, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists issued a Terminology Bulletin that “officially” changed the definition of “conception” from the union of sperm and egg to implantation. As a result, the medical establishment does not call the killing of a human being prior to implantation an abortion. But that is just semantics.
Unfortunately, the birth control industry and Planned Parenthood—the nation’s largest abortion chain—have tricked many women into aborting their tiny children. Plan B One-Step, Plan B, the birth control pill, the IUD and other hormonal birth control products can all cause abortions. Period.
So, the next time you hear that Plan B or Plan B One-Step cannot cause an abortion, you will know the truth. Plan B products kill [babies].
To be informed is to be forewarned. It has always troubled me that so many young women are misled into believing that the solution for an “unwanted” or “unplanned” pregnancy is to ingest chemicals that could kill a baby and will cause other physical damage now or later in life. These facts are, again, denied or otherwise dismissed by culture-of-death gurus as nothing more than the ranting of fanatics.
But facts don’t stand or fall because of someone’s opinion; they can be documented. For example, John Wilks, noted educator and learned pharmacist, wrote Why This Pharmacy Does Not Dispense the Pill for Birth Regulation Reasons,in which he includes a long list of physical problems directly linked to the pill, including (but not limited to) the following:
Cervical cancer
At least 15 scientific papers since 1988 have reported on the increased incidence of cervical cancer in pill-users. The main results from these studies are:
Long-term use of more than 5 years was linked to a 100% increased risk of cervical cancer.
Duration of pill-use beyond 12 years had the highest increased risk of 340%. (Lancet, 1994)
Women starting the pill at an earlier age were at an increased risk compared to those starting later.
The pill may be a risk factor for all the early pre-cancerous stages, as well as invasive cancer.
For every 100,000 women aged 20-54 who had used the pill for 8 years, there were an additional 125 cases of cervical cancer. (Schlesselman, J.J. Obstet Gynecol 1995).
To my mind, there is only one reason why the pharmaceutical industry, the medical establishment and the Planned Parenthood types concur in an ongoing indoctrination campaign: money!
Money talks, preborn people die, women suffer and the beat goes on…
what do you think about this dear?
"I've heard the critics complain about the costs of change. I'm confident that at the end of the process, the change will be paid for-fairly, responsibly, and without adding to the federal deficit ... What I haven't heard the critics discuss is the cost of inaction. If we don't reform the system, if we leave things as they are, health-care inflation will cost far more over the next decade than health-care reform. We will pay far more for far less-with millions more Americans uninsured or underinsured." -Sen. Edward Kennedy, "The Cause of My Life," Newsweek, July 27, 2009
NETWORK August 2009 Media Action
Write a letter-to-the-editor to urge action on healthcare reform that works for everyone
As members of Congress head to their home states and districts for the August congressional recess, we must elevate the urgent need and moral imperative for healthcare reform.
Submit Letters-to-the-Editor to push for healthcare reform that guarantees access to quality, affordable healthcare for all people, especially those who are most vulnerable.
Here are some tips and talking points to help you take action:
1. Refer to a recent article published in the newspaper about healthcare reform.
2. Express the values that frame your vision of a just healthcare system.
Example: As a person of faith, I am called to treat everyone with dignity and compassion and respond to the needs of the most vulnerable.
3. State the problem with the status quo in healthcare.
Example: Our country's broken healthcare system miserably fails this moral standard-it excludes too many, delivers care inequitably and offers compassion only to those who can afford it. Without action by Congress to pass healthcare reform this year, the current situation will only worsen. We'll be paying more for less and the ranks of people without realistic access to care will swell.
4. Describe how healthcare reform is the solution.
Example: We need healthcare reform that guarantees everyone access to quality, affordable healthcare. To fulfill this vision, I urge our representatives and senators to support legislation that makes a public plan option available to individuals and small businesses to ensure that life circumstances or a small payroll doesn't put adequate health insurance out of reach. The security of our families, businesses and nation as a whole depends on building a stable system of healthcare that includes everyone and eliminates all barriers to necessary care.
5. Call to action your fellow citizens and elected leaders in Congress.
Example: The moment is now for engaged citizens, members of Congress and President Obama to put political differences aside and work together to pass healthcare reform legislation. We can't wait any longer to begin building a healthcare future that affirms our sacred bonds of community, extends care and compassion to all and promotes a healthy, whole society.
6. Check your letter for spelling, grammar, clarity and length. Be sure you know the newspaper's submission requirements. Most require letters to be under 250 words.
7. Send a copy of your published letter to NETWORK at networkupdate@networklobby.org and to the offices of your Representative and Senator in Congress.
Note: you can find information about contacts for your local and national media on our website. Go to http://capwiz.com/networklobby/dbq/media/ and enter your zip code.
If you no longer wish to receive e-mail from us, please click here.
ignatius | August 5, 2009
Wednesday, August 05, 2009
Mr Ambassador
As widely expected, the US officially has its new envoy to the Vatican: the Senate confirmed Miguel Diaz as ambassador to the Holy See last night.
Nominated for the post by President Obama in late May, the 45 year-old theologian said he'd relocate to the ambassador's residence at Villa Richardson "as soon as possible"; in keeping with Vatican custom, on his arrival Diaz will present his credentials to Pope Benedict, who'll then offer a public address on the Holy See's assessment of things American, highlights and lowlights both.
Born in Havana and raised in Miami, Diaz is the first Hispanic to hold the post and the ninth Vatican ambassador since full diplomatic relations were established between Rome and Washington in January 1984.
Ignatius | August 5, 2009
Many years ago I spent considerable time and effort calculating the number of poor families in the US and how we might respond to their needs. I wrote a letter to the Denver Catholic Register with my conclusion. Briefly, I suggested that, if each parish adopted 2 poor families, poverty in the US would vanish. I suggested that the size of the parish (or church, as I would invite our Protestant friends to participate) determine how many families they would support. The average was two/parish. The support would include all that was necessary for them to be a part of the community: food, job opportunities from those in the parish, education, and health care. Each parish would voluntarily provide all the essentials. And poverty vanishes and the Good Samaritans (as we are called to be) provide all to them.(isn???t this the object lesson the parable?) The response was less than favorable from readers of the DCR. I do not wish to go there now but just to say that I believe this approach is more relevant and appropriate today then ever.
The current ???crises??? in health care is a perfect example of the need for action on the part of our church. I am of the belief that the poor are not the responsibility of government, that Caesar???s involvement can only mean destruction of the dignity and sanctity of human life. I cannot help but wonder why the Bishops, who I admire greatly on many issues and in their depth of faith, support Caesar???s approach to health care if certain conditions are met. I continue to be amazed that the pressure they (rightly) promoted to resist FOCA is not being brought to the forefront in the current climate where Caesar is attempting to confiscate 10% of the Nation???s wealth. Is the sanctity of life less important for the unborn and the vulnerable if there is the promise of an underlying desirable (in their view) reward, in this case health care for everyone? And what convinces that there is really basic health care for everyone? I have certainly not been convinced.
Let me just say: The right to life is a fundamental right. Nothing precedes it, nothing is more profoundly important than this. This said, the extension of this fundamental right to other areas that support this fundamental principle is not so simple, nor might it be correct. In my humble opinion, a ???fundamental right??? is one which you or I can enjoy without the imposition on others to make it happen. No other needs are necessary to provide the umbra to my right to life. It is, without imposition on others. Any extension of this, for example, to the provision of food, shelter, or health care, as a basic extension to my right to life, requires either the virtue of charity or compulsion to provide these life necessities. I submit that compulsion is outside the proper avenue of nurture, unless we see Caesar as a morally necessary player.
If Caesar is a necessary and invited participant, then how do we reconcile the compulsion that follows with the Parable of the Good Samaritan? Remember those who expect rewards from Caesar must pay the price, and it will no doubt cost the innocent their lives.
The Catholic Church provides wonderful health care for about 10% of the population of the US. Is it not possible for the Church to also provide health insurance for those in need? Remember the two families per parish description at the beginning of this little essay. Can not we provide the needed help or even form a national health insurance company that provides insurance on one???s ability to pay? Can this be the more appropriate answer than the current interesting but, to me, not understandable, approach to helping the uninsured? Surely we can do better than Caesar.
David W. Rusch | August 5, 2009
Will there be PAYBACK for the murder of Dr. Tiller?
Will there be COUNTERTERROR against right-to-lifers?
If a right-to-lifer gets counterterrorized TO DEATH, will that be murder, or JUSTIFIABLE HOMICIDE?
WHO would be the most effective TARGETS for anti-right-to-lifist counterterror?
WHERE do they LIVE?
"Remember, NEVER do anything dramatic to a protester at an abortion clinic. That would be bad publicity for the clinic. All together, children: 'Pick one protester and follow him home!' That way you can include his family in your counterprotest."
operationcounterstrike.blogspot.com OperationCounterstrike | August 5, 2009
It would be good to remind readers that Plan B is given out in Massachusetts Catholic hospitals, apparently with the approval of the Cardinal/Archbishop, to women who ask for it and say they have been raped. Charles O. Coudert | August 5, 2009
IMPOSING DEATH IN A GOVERNMENT-RUN HOSPICE? Posted: Tuesday August 4, 2009 at 1:15 pm EST by Judie Brown
A very dear friend of mine recently lost her husband to cancer. He and his wife had very little time to actually prepare for this event. He was diagnosed on May 18 and died only two months later. The sadness is overwhelming for his family, of course. The reality of how he was treated, however, is beyond shameful. I want to tell you this story because America is standing at the crossroads right now.
My friend’s wife explained to me, just yesterday, that a famous poem came to mind as she was reflecting on the abuse her husband suffered from nurses in a hospice run by the Veterans Health Administration. “The Hollow Men,” by T. S. Eliot is the subject of ongoing analysis, but it is the final two lines of that poem, “This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper,” that stuck in her mind. And as she related her experiences to me, it became a stark reminder that we do indeed live in a culture of death.
Can you imagine a nurse asking a man—in the final throes of cancer—what level of pain he is suffering, and then when he told her, hearing her tell him that what he described as his pain was “impossible”? Had his wife not been there, only God knows what this nurse might have done. She had obviously set herself up as an expert judge of whether someone else was actually experiencing excruciating pain.
And then there was the problem with his lungs, which kept filling up with fluid. While he was in the hospital, a tube inserted into his body to drain the lungs of fluid was cleaned frequently. But once he arrived at the hospice, the nurses explained to his wife that they do not clean those tubes and would not do so, because the doctor’s orders specified that the tube was not to be cleaned.
Again, had his wife not been at his side to intercede for him and demand that they clean that tube, he would have died earlier, suffocating due to the negligence of others.
It is always heartbreaking to be with a loved one as death approaches. But in this case, in addition to her sorrow over the death of her husband of 41 years, what she witnessed in that hospice will be indelibly imprinted on her memory as well.
My husband and I frequently spoke with her during those last heart-wrenching weeks of her husband’s life. Each time she explained that she could not leave his side and had to sleep in his room, my husband would suggest that she needed her own rest and should not sacrifice her own health. She always replied the same way: “He needs me. I must be there with him.”
Thank God she was! Having now heard her reasons, my husband clearly understands that when it comes to medical care for the elderly and those facing death, a new low has been reached on the scale of “cruel compassion.” And while it is not a unique experience, it could become a federally mandated one, if “Obamacare” becomes law. It’s all about cost cutting, after all!
This real-life account very poignantly illustrates why we at American Life League are doing all we can to sound the alarm, in cooperation with many other concerned Americans. The vultures are hovering, and we have little time to rally opposition to this assault on the vulnerable, the weak and the dying. Some may say that my words are alarmist and that no such threat exists. To them I would say, “Tell that to my friend who witnessed the preview first-hand, in a government-run facility!”
President Obama has an agenda, and sadly, it is not the one he publicly proclaims. You may recall hearing in the news, just a few days after our friend passed on, how the president discussed his grandmother’s death. He did not go into details, of course, but his words were unsettling, nonetheless. According to the Washington Post,
Polls show that senior citizens are more skeptical about health-care reform than any other age group.
One woman asked Obama about "rumors" that under the proposed legislation, every American over age 65 would be visited by a government worker and "told to decide how they wish to die."
First, Obama joked that there aren't enough government workers to undertake such a task. Then he got serious and personal, mentioning that his grandmother, who died shortly before Election Day last year, had a medical directive.
"It gave her some control ahead of time so that she could say, for example, if she had a terminal illness, did she want extraordinary measures even if, for example, her brainwaves were no longer functioning? Or did she want just to be left alone?" he said. "You know, that gives her some decision-making power over the process."
Obama’s reference to a “medical directive” and the “control” his grandmother allegedly had are not a simple aside. They represent his convictions, as evidenced when he
suggested at a town hall event Wednesday night that one way to shave medical costs is to stop expensive and ultimately futile procedures performed on people who are about to die and don't stand to gain from the extra care… He added: “Maybe you're better off not having the surgery, but taking the painkiller.”
Palliative care or painkillers, as he suggested, can be used for evil, as I have already pointed out in a previous column. Not a single one of us can control the fact that he or she will die, but it is important to remember that unprincipled “compassion” in the hands of those caring for someone at risk can cause premature death. Fiscal concerns about freeing up beds for younger patients, or saving a few dollars on medications or surgeries can have deadly results.
This is not just a problem that we might face in an Orwellian future. If you do not agree, visit the Life Tree web site and read the timeline entitled “Two Decades to an American Culture of Death.” It is all there, it is all documented and it is not a comedy. The people who espouse killing are deadly serious.
As the timeline preface states, you will learn
how a handful of progressive foundations and quasi-government agencies set out to provide equitable distribution of health care, and in the process, created a duty to die and a culture of death. And how they hope to secure their legacy . . .
Featuring the collaboration of: the Hastings Center, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), George Soros' Project on Death in America (PDIA), Institute of Medicine (IOM), AARP, Choice in Dying, and a number of prestigious universities, to name only a few.
This is but one more reason why this fundamental question must be asked about the Obama healthcare reform initiative:
Does anyone think that a government as committed to abortion, contraception and sex instruction as this one is should be trusted to apply ethical principles to healthcare reform?
Imposed death may save money, in the view of some, but when I think about my friend’s husband, I realize even more clearly that the hollow men are in charge and, to paraphrase T. S. Eliot, many a person’s life will end not with a bang, but with a whimper.
Judie, you are SO right about the silence of the Catholic Church regarding the atrocities of the proposed health "care" plan. We are encouraged to deluge our politicians - please tell me HOW CAN WE MOTIVATE OUR CATHOLIC OFFICIALS!!! WHAT A DISGRACE!!! Marie Ferretti | August 4, 2009
Marie,
I have to disagree with you about the Church remaining silent about the Health Care Plan. The Pope didn't remain silent. Judie Brown didn't remain silent. So why accuse the Church of remaining silent? There were people who did speak out. Not everyone remained silent. Nick | August 5, 2009
CATHOLICS AND HEALTHCARE REFORM Posted: Monday August 3, 2009 at 2:46 pm EST by Judie Brown
Our office’s recent media release has created quite a stir about the folks at the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul (SSVDP), Catholic Charities (CCUSA) and the Catholic Health Association (CHA). It seems that our accusation regarding their support for Obama’s healthcare proposal did not sit well. So I think it is appropriate to review the facts as we know them.
First, there is the SSVDP’s e-mailed action alert titled “Let Congress know that Health Care Reform Can’t Wait!” It states in part,
As a reminder to help in your calls and messages, the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul supports the Catholic Health Association's Vision for U.S. Health Care which lays out principles for reforming the health care system. We call for health care reform that is:
• Available and accessible to everyone, paying special attention to the poor and vulnerable;
• Health and prevention oriented, with the goal of enhancing the health status of communities;
• Sufficiently and fairly financed;
• Transparent and consensus-driven, in allocation of resources, and organized for cost-effective care and administration;
• Patient centered, and designed to address and protect health needs at all stages of life, from conception to natural death; and
• Safe, effective and designed to deliver the greatest possible quality.
You will note that there is no reference in this excerpt, nor anywhere else in the alert, to the fundamental truth that principled healthcare programs begin with a respect for the dignity and innate right to life of every human being, from his beginning until his natural end. No, that message is not there.
What is there is best described as political doublespeak. For example, what does it mean to say that caring for others should be based on a “consensus-driven” allocation of costs? What if the consensus is that paying for abortion is acceptable? What if the consensus is that it is most cost-effective to deny treatment to the elderly when they are diagnosed with a life-threatening condition?
Perhaps the answer to such questions is that what is most important to these organizations is not ensuring that Catholic healthcare principles are upheld in a program like this, but simply rushing to pass “something.” If that is so, then one can readily understand the statement the SSVDP issued this past Friday, in which we learned the following:
Again, the Society of St. Vincent de Paul has not supported any particular or specific legislation; it has expressed its concern for the need for the U.S. Congress to deal with this most urgent need now.
“The Society of St. Vincent de Paul does not support nor will it support any legislation, provision or amendment that fails to uphold the sanctity and dignity of human life,” said Joe Flannigan, the National President of the U.S. Society. “Further, we will continue to work with the Catholic Health Association and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and Catholic Charities USA to ensure that any legislation will continue to support the conscience clause protection to health care workers and that the Hyde exception continues to ensure no abortion can be funded with federal funds.”
While this statement might make some happy, it does nothing to allay the concerns we expressed last week. In fact, it raises more questions than it answers, by referencing the Hyde Amendment, which is mistakenly referred to as an “exception.” The Hyde Amendment has two problems:
• It permits abortion in cases of rape, incest and the life of the mother.
• It was stricken from the healthcare reform bill that passed the U. S. House of Representatives.
In fact, all abortion restrictions were gutted at the last minute, which prompted American Life League to issue the following statement:
"At least now we know the real agenda motivating the pro-aborts behind this bill. You want to talk about healthcare as a basic human right, you want to talk about justice in the healthcare system—where is justice for the child in the womb, where is their right to healthcare? It’s denied because an even more important human right is denied—their basic, fundamental, inalienable right to human personhood.”
Furthermore, the SSVDP appears to embrace the position of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops,which has requested that any healthcare reform measure be “abortion-neutral." The reasoning behind such a request is explained in a USCCB fact sheet and is, to put it bluntly, an egregiously misguided position.
I am not criticizing the statement because the USCCB opposes payment for abortion in a healthcare proposal; rather, I am criticizing it because it is yet another politically motivated statement that, without explicitly saying so, affirms that abortion is an accepted practice in the United States and the bishops don’t want tax dollars to pay for it! Or, to put it another way, pay for your own, which is really not a position consistent with the Catholic teaching that each human being has intrinsic value and should be respected as a child of God. Yes, we live in a world of political realities, but Catholic bishops are the modern-day apostles of Christ, Who warned us not to become part of the problem and called us instead to be His voice, regardless of political realities.
The CHA's six “core values” for moral healthcare reform, which are supported by the SSVDP, CCUSA and, apparently, USCCB, include the following, under the heading of “Justice”: “Health care is a basic human right alongside food and shelter, all of which are necessary for individuals to participate fully in society.” This is a laudable goal; however, according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, health care is not defined as a basic human right, but rather is addressed in a much broader context:
The political community has a duty to honor the family, to assist it, and to ensure especially…
- in keeping with the country's institutions, the right to medical care, assistance for the aged, and family benefits;
- the protection of security and health, especially with respect to dangers like drugs, pornography, alcoholism, etc.;
- the freedom to form associations with other families and so to have representation before civil authority. (Section 2211)
Nowhere is there mention of a “basic human right” that must be subsidized by the state. Nor should such a position be supported, since Catholic organizations such as the Catholic Medical Association and American Life League find it problematic, if not draconian. For example, the Catholic Medical Association makes it clear not only that heavy-handed government control of medical practice could result in the American people losing their freedom to make important decisions about their life and health, but also that
it is critical for Congress to take the time necessary to address the complex economic and ethical issues involved, and to give the American people an opportunity to review any proposed legislation. Health-care reform encompasses both individual rights and the common good, ethical issues surrounding life and death, and economic issues ranging from taxes and property to economic competitiveness. It is essential that Congress first “do [no] harm” and then enact measures that can respect all of these complex goods.
Just as we were finishing up this commentary, we noted that CCUSA issued a statement in which it accuses those of us who have exposed this rush to approve federally mandated healthcare “reform” of being dishonest. Father Larry Snyder, president of CCUSA, said, “These attacks appear to be politically motivated by opponents of health care reform. They are distortions of the truth and disingenuous. Catholic Charities USA will continue to work to reform health care in a way that is consistent with the teachings of our faith.”
First and foremost, it is neither disingenuous nor a distortion of the truth to expose the lack of consistent principle we have seen in public statements made by certain Catholic entities. It is our responsibility to point out what the Church teaches. We understand that Catholic healthcare principles should never give way to political opportunism.
Moreover, there should be no rush to approve any program that surrenders control over one’s destiny to a government agency. A government that approves of killing the preborn is certainly not a government one can trust with health care.
Contact information for the Catholic organizations noted in this commentary follows, in case you have questions or comments for them:
Catholic Charities USA
66 Canal Center Plaza, Suite 600
Alexandria, VA 22314
Phone: (703) 549-1390
Fax: (703) 549-1656 info@catholiccharitiesusa.org
Sister Carol Keehan
President and CEO
The Catholic Health Association
1875 Eye St. NW, Suite 1000
Washington, DC 20006-5440
Phone: (202) 296-3993 ckeehan@chausa.org
Society of Saint Vincent de Paul
58 Progress Pkwy.
St. Louis, MO 63043-3706
Phone: 314-576-3993
Fax: 314-576-6755 usacouncil@svdpusa.org
Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
3211 Fourth St. NE
Washington, D.C. 20017-1194
Phone: 202-541-3000 prolife@usccb.org
Dear Judie:
Thank you so very much for all the Catholic group info regarding socialist medicine.
I pray the USA wakes up and turns away from sin and turns back to God!
Look forward to seeing you in October at Pro-Life Wisconsin banquet!
Thank you for all you do!
God bless you!
Love and prayers,
Jeanne Breunig Jeanne Breunig | August 3, 2009
Judie...
Thanks for your commentary today on so-called health care bills. I am so tired of hearing ambiguous and confusing statements from usccb, st v de p, catholic health care, etc. Keep up the great work and clarity on this and related issues. God bless. Charles OConnell | August 3, 2009
I want to get my pro life group and others to respond to these groups who seem to be wolves in sheep's clothing, again leading the sheep further from true Catholic teaching. What do you suggest? Beverly Deville | August 4, 2009
I add my voice to supporting your efforts. "A government that approves of killing the preborn is certainly not a government one can trust with health care." Indeed, until protection is provided to the unborn, all government initiatives are suspect. David Volk | August 4, 2009
The landing of a $100 million federal contract by Catholic Charities may present a conflict of interest. They may be finding that playing along with the federal government pays a lot better than standing up for God and Catholic principles. David Volk | August 4, 2009
On the subject of abortions should read what would Jesus say/do.
George krafcik | August 4, 2009
Thank you for the thorough explanation. After your initial post, I contacted SSVDP and received a quick, though apparently incomplete, response. This context is VERY helpful, and will help guide where my donation dollars go. Ray | August 4, 2009
Judie,
Thank you for your commnets on these so called Catholic organizations. I have been involved locally with my SVdP conference here in Pa. The president of the conference is still in denial and can't understand what we are saying. Her only excuse is that SVdP never said it support this Health care Reform. They basically did! I content that they never said they opposed it as well! As A catholic organization they should have. The sheeple don't want to think out of the box! They have very little moral courage in saying these organizations are wrong. I salute you for your stand and leadership!
" CONSENSUS NEGATES LEADERSHIP!"
The beat just goes on and one.
Leo | August 4, 2009
Dear Beverly
I recommend bombarding these groups with letters and statements designed to advise them that further donations will be withheld until they get the message: a government that condones the direct murder of millions of innocent preborn babies cannot under any circumstance be trusted to address health care! It is an oxymoron and totally at odds with Catholic teaching.
BREAKING UP IS HARD TO DO Posted: Friday July 31, 2009 at 9:04 pm EST by Judie Brown
Back in the days when I was a teen, one of the greatest Neil Sedaka songs, “Breaking Up is Hard to Do,” was a favorite of mine. Perhaps it was the atmosphere during my senior year of high school—or maybe just the pressures of being senior class president and a gal without a beau—but I liked the song. It seemed to fit the mood in 1962, and it is again on my mind. There are all kinds of breakups, and to my mind, it is the pro-death movement that is beginning to show signs of disarray, dysfunction and even discouragement.
I was just perusing the ramblings and ranting of abortion supporters, and was struck by how troubled these women are by various pro-life efforts nowadays. Their one hope, as distant as it is, would be that in the Obama era, pro-life organizations and activists, as well as the faithful, would throw up their hands and toss in the towel. But quite the opposite has occurred, and they are rather upset about it.
As a matter of fact, their comments run the full gamut of testiness. We’ve got the Alan Guttmacher Institute’s Rachel Gold and Elizabeth Nash telling readers that
abortion opponents are already looking beyond 2009. In Colorado and Montana, they have announced plans for a ballot initiative in 2010. In Mississippi and Oregon, they have been given the green light by the secretary of state to begin collecting signatures for a 2010 ballot initiative. All four of these proposals are similar to the Colorado 2008 initiative and would establish personhood at the moment of conception in the state constitution.
Actually, it is probably disheartening for them to realize that after their dire predictions following the Colorado initiative’s failure, we didn’t all move on and just forget about personhood. But as obvious as it is to me that now is the time and this is the hour for personhood, apparently they don’t agree. Moreover, they cannot even get their facts right about where personhood is being pursued and why.
If they could, Gold and Nash would recognize the obvious: All four of the initiatives they mention, plus at least 15 more, contain language that makes it clear that each human being’s life is to be recognized and protected legally from the instant their life begins. The word “conception” is not used in these initiatives, because it has been so inaccurately redefined and misused by the pro-deathers. Instead, the initiatives in a number of states contain the far more accurate phrase “from the beginning of their biological development,” which means that even babies created through in vitro fertilization will be protected by law and not a single one will ever face death or a freezer again. Gold and Nash need to get with the times.
Cristina Page, a well-known abortion advocate and commentator/blogger, chooses to describe the pro-life movement as “splintering” because she is silly enough to think that there are genuine pro-life organizations that support the dreadful Ryan-DeLauro bill that I discussed earlier this week. She opines with her usual bravado, “The vast majority of pro-life Americans, 80%, support contraception. Even among Catholics, followers of the only religion to oppose artificial contraception, 90% support contraception.”
What Page cannot admit is that while polls tell one sort of tale based upon the wording of the question that is asked, we have found that many of those who describe themselves as pro-life not only favor birth control, but favor some—if not all but a few—abortions as well. On the other hand, the solidly pro-personhood, pro-life Americans are gaining in number, and are rarely polled or written about with total honesty. A good reporter has to be specific about polling to get at the root of why the personhood movement is growing, but such investigation does not serve the agenda of those who place their faith in death rather than life.
Page goes on:
The anti-contraception minority, which represents just 20% of pro-lifers, has disproportionate influence and, with it, hopes to derail common ground efforts the public has longed for. It's time for the disagreement over contraception to be addressed by the pro-life community at large. We will have no chance of making a real impact on unintended pregnancy and abortion rates without dramatic informed strategies on prevention. The pro-life public must demand accountability and representation for their pro-contraception values. Considering that 80% of pro-life Americans support contraception, isn't it time to establish at least one pro-life organization in support of it too?
Once again, we read that the American public is supposedly longing for “common ground,” even though, among my own personal group of friends and neighbors, most have no clue what the term means. I am not suggesting, of course, that this includes the media, which is constantly attempting to drive the “common ground” wedge deep into pro-life efforts, but polling them is about the same as polling Eskimos to find out who likes cold weather.
The “dramatic strategies on prevention” to which Page refers have been failing for more than 40 years. It’s time to use a new formula, one that will actually curtail the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, cancers and heart problems caused by birth control pills and promiscuous behavior. Birth control will not resolve the deep-seated moral problems underlying such behavior; only confidence in self-esteem, respect for the dignity of the human person and love for God will do that for this nation.
Finally, I saw where the Dutch abortion boat was, at long last, grounded, which, of course, according to the death peddlers, has a silver lining. What is it, you might ask? Well, according to abortionist Rebecca Gomperts, “The single-most important achievement has been the founding of Women on Web, a pro-choice website which describes itself as ‘supported by a loose growing network of independent organizations and individuals that have no legal affiliation.’”
The web site reveals that visitors can acquire chemical abortion pills online, if a consulting physician approves. We haven’t investigated this thoroughly as of this writing, but it gives new meaning to “murder online.”
Gomperts also bows to the pro-life movement in Europe and the United States:
Gomperts does feel that the anti-abortion lobby is becoming stronger in Holland. "They copy tactics from the US, they do things like distributing little fetus dolls. They're always putting up posters and they're very active in schools," she noted. "They have more money to influence public opinion than we do. That's worrying. The other day I was giving a lecture at a school in the Bijlmer (a heavily immigrant part of Amsterdam) and I was shocked by the anti-abortion sentiment among the young immigrant girls there. And the youth activities of the Evangelical broadcasting corporation draw tens of thousands of visitors. These are signs that lots of things are changing in our society. Opposition to abortion is growing.
Well, Ms. Gomperts, please continue to behold the rejuvenation in respect for life that is sweeping the world. Gather ‘round a campfire with your American counterparts, sit back and shiver as you observe the public gradually becoming disillusioned with your philosophy, your tactics and your deadly solutions for every human problem.
The new, vibrant, young and enthusiastic pro-life leadership of today, of which I am very proud to be at least partially instrumental in training, is slowly eroding your confreres’ stranglehold on the way average people view abortion, contraception and, I might add, euthanasia.
While we’re not ready to break out the champagne, we’ve already got it on ice. Just watch those personhood campaigns grow, for the truth will, at the end of the day, be victorious!
There’s one more thing we’d like to add. As the pro-death movement slowly begins to fray at the seams, we pro-lifers—young and old—will all join hands, celebrate your movement’s downward trend and sing a tribute to your future:
Down dooby doo down down,
Down dooby doo down down,
Down dooby doo down down, Breaking up is hard to do!
PALLIATIVE CARE’S MERCILESS TWIST Posted: Thursday July 30, 2009 at 4:59 pm EST by Judie Brown
There’s never been an idea that couldn’t become a millstone around someone’s neck. That’s just the way it works due to man’s condition as a mere mortal who has, admitted or not, many flaws in his character. We all have the condition; some simply use it in inhumane ways.
Such is the case with the push to incorporate palliative care into national healthcare reform. What is palliative care? To get a correct response, given the current anti-life climate, we visited the Life Tree web site for an accurate explanation:
Originally billed as "symptom management at the end of life," palliative care is now aggressively marketed as everything from pain relief for the public, to a cost-saving tool for hospitals, nursing homes and insurance companies.
Many pro-life advocates had hoped that palliative care would prove to be the ultimate antidote to the assisted suicide movement. The theory was sound: if patients are offered adequate pain and symptom relief, they will not request assisted suicide as a means to alleviate discomfort. Traditional palliative care—symptom relief when death is imminent—might have accomplished that mission.
However, over the past ten years, palliative care training and certification has been gradually co-opted by the very same right-to-die advocates that palliative care was meant to counter.
A good example would be Diane Meier, M.D., director of the Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC), who was invited to the Obama White House on June 18 for a healthcare reform stakeholder meeting. The meeting was focused on healthcare reform in the context of prevention and costs. According to the CAPC, “Meier told the panel that preventing the wrong care can help save the health system money that can be used to pay for wellness and prevention.”
The CAPC sent out an action alert out yesterday, telling its constituents,
What is important for health care reform and for the ninety million Americans living with serious illness is that care is focused on quality of life, management of the symptoms that accompany serious and chronic disease and facilitation of care that reflects patient goals and values.
The problem with the terms in this single paragraph, taken from a much longer e-mail alert, is that elasticity and subjectivity set the parameters for phrases such as “quality of life,” “patient goals and values” and the ever-evolving meaning of “management of the symptoms.” Such terms can mean one thing if money is not a problem for the healthcare provider and another if value judgments defining who lives and who dies are in play.
As a matter of fact, in the CAPC-supported Senate Bill 1150, entitled Advance Planning and Compassionate CareActof 2009, we find this definition of palliative care:
The term ‘palliative care' means interdisciplinary care for individuals with a life-threatening illness or injury relating to pain and symptom management and psychological, social, and spiritual needs and that seeks to improve the quality of life for the individual and the individual's family.
A government that condones killing preborn children really should not be using a word like “compassion” in the first place. Moving on past the fluffy, feel-good terms, it is important to have a clear understanding of the goals of people in government and in the death industry. Such knowledge is of great urgency as this nation faces the possibility of dramatic changes in the way health care is addressed, particularly for those who are ill, disabled or dying. As we have come to learn recently, far too many in policy-making positions are increasingly committed to saving money by shortening lives. One of their favorite mantras is their supposed concern for a patient’s “quality of life.”
Quality of life is a term representing a utilitarian evaluation of who should live and who should die. It’s a sliding scale of values based on opinions and personal value judgments. When decisions about one’s QOL are being made by the wrong people, comparing the estimated life expectancy of someone who is ill with the cost involved in caring for that person can become the final arbiter. This can have the same effect as directly killing a patient through an overt act of euthanasia.
But ethicist Louise Mitchell exposes this brand of specious thinking:
Some people are too old, some are handicapped. Where do we draw the line? How do we decide that you should be euthanized but not your neighbor? Who is to decide that a person seventy-five years old is too old but someone sixty-five years old is not? That Down's syndrome is okay but cerebral palsy is not? Every human being has imperfections of varying degrees and severities. That is why we have doctors and dentists and even medical insurance. These imperfections are overcome every day. We naturally expect them: we naturally believe we can overcome them: and we do overcome them. The choice we make here is not between death and a handicap or old age. Yet, euthanasia makes a choice in quality of life, saying this quality deserves continuance and this does not.
There is deception in this choice. Death does not improve life or the quality of life: it ends life completely and irrevocably. Euthanasia is not making a choice between suffering, handicaps, and age, or death. The choice is between life and death, between a lower quality of life and the killing of an innocent person, between a good that is always good no matter the circumstances and an evil that is evil no matter what the circumstances.
The CAPC’s use of the term “patient goals and values” is another example of the application of subjective opinions that could be employed to hasten death, rather than relieve the patient who is suffering but certainly not dying. At the end of the day, such terms are easily twisted when the wrong decision makers are empowered. This is what has become so troubling about the healthcare discussions on Capitol Hill.
Who should be making these decisions? Does it really make sense to rely on the United States Congress to tell us, through legislative fiat, what type of treatment can be provided and/or who can be treated and at what age treatment should be denied?
Margaret Sommerville, director of the Centre for Medicine, Ethics and Law at McGill University, makes a salient point in this regard:
The proper goal of medicine and physicians is to kill the pain. It is explicitly not their role to kill the patient with the pain—to become society's executioners—which is what euthanasia entails, no matter how merciful or compassionate our reasons.
While Sommerville is absolutely correct, the problem with state or federal mandates regulating such treatment is that physicians will not be making the final judgment; federal guidelines will.
When Dame Cicely Saunders founded the hospice movement in 1959, it is safe to assume she had no idea how her vision to aid the dying would encounter so many twists and deadly turns. In her early years, she once wrote,
You matter because you are you.
You matter to the last moment of your life,
and we will do all we can,
not only to help you die peacefully,
but also to live until you die.
Hopefully, many Americans will wrestle with the idea of government programs determining who will live or die. Hopefully, each American will let his or her elected officials know that it is never the proper role of government to sanction killing at any time during a human being’s life. No matter how the words are parsed, nuanced or twisted,
[a] man, even if seriously sick or prevented in the exercise of its higher functions, is and will be always a man ... [he] will never become a "vegetable" or an "animal." The intrinsic value and personal dignity of every human being does not change depending on their circumstances.
Help me be a better person. I try to express, in as gentle terms as possible, that I want my Dad's 'Cremains' to be treated with dignity by simply following the Church's guidlines on burial, and my Mom and siblings would proffit spiritually by allowing this to happen?
. The first response I get, whether from the faithful Catholic Funeral Director, or from my kind Pastor, is fear and caution; meaning, while they agree nominally with the guidelines, it is more important to not be 'Dogmatic' or, in the funeral director's advice, "people do what they want and I can't force them". How can I possibly be kinder so they don't fear solidarity with the one who wants to do the right thing rather than the criticism of the world? It's not that I anticipate a strong opposition from family, I just want some minimal, kindly support. Timothy Brophy | July 31, 2009
Hi Judy,
Help me be a better person. I try to express, in as gentle terms as possible, that I want my Dad's 'Cremains' to be treated with dignity by simply following the Church's guidlines on burial, and my Mom and siblings would proffit spiritually by allowing this to happen?
. The first response I get, whether from the faithful Catholic Funeral Director, or from my kind Pastor, is fear and caution; meaning, while they agree nominally with the guidelines, it is more important to not be 'Dogmatic' or, in the funeral director's advice, "people do what they want and I can't force them". How can I possibly be kinder so they don't fear solidarity with the one who wants to do the right thing rather than the criticism of the world? It's not that I anticipate a strong opposition from family, I just want some minimal, kindly support. Timothy Brophy | July 31, 2009
Hi Judy,
My mother, thankfully, asked me to help her get a "living Will", since I have been promoting the Loving Will for several years now. My object is to protect her, and others from the death Culture, while hers is to protect her from unnecessary and extroardinary means to prolong her life. Bottom line, I could perhaps more easily 'sell' this to her if I could insert a phrase or two to reassure her. Can you either suggest a phrase or help to emphasis an existing one to accomplish this?
Public or Private answer is Okay Timothy Brophy | July 31, 2009
I am appalled at the Catholic Health Assoc. & St. Vincent de Paul for taking part in trying to pass the "Obama health care." They, along w/the college of Notre Dame should be stripped from the official Catholic Directory since they do not believe in the commandments of God that govern our Roman Catholic faith! espe marie villasenor | July 31, 2009
Thank you for reminding us of the dignity of life which is a gift from our Creator. We must honor and care for each other with the deepest love, understanding the wonder of life, seeing in each other's eyes, the life that mirrors our own.
Our daily work is to love, and to keep on loving, and never to stop caring for each other, till a natural death occurs in its own timing.
The imposition of death, the intending of death, is the complete opposite of caring. It entails assuming that the patient's life is no longer worth living, that there is no value at all in it. What an arrogant coldness this is! contrasted with what an overriding, all-embracing love.
Can one doubt which way our Lord would guide us to act? Hospice was intended to be a mission of that love, never to hasten death. Now, in many cases, it is hastening death for a majority of patients who come in.
What I know is that to love is to care, and to care impels one to act with care. Acting with care, means to do the things that the arrogant and cold would never do: to feed, to quench the thirst, to bathe, to convey to the patient that he or she is wanted, appreciated, loved.
The push for so-called reform is really a push to ration care and to make a quantum leap downward into the depths of the culture of death, where patients are told they are not going to be treated and therefore, that they are going to die because it is too expensive to care.
However, these same elite decision-makers have no problem with the massive amounts of Medicare fraud bilking the US treasury every year. They have no problem with huge sums of money disappearing into unknown hands.
The role of physicians, nurses and other health care workers must always be to care, never to kill. Forcing health care workers to kill, and that is what this is about, is the same as poisoning a tree, the fruit will never bring health, only illness and death. When patients can not trust their own health care providers, they have no one at all who can save them. Ron Panzer, President Hospice Patients Alliance | July 31, 2009
Dear Timothy
I am not certain why you are experiencing resistance to your request that the simple Catholic guidelines for respecting the remains of a loved one be abided by but it is perhaps the case that these people have never reallly read what the Church teaches. Sometimes when people are unfamiliar with something as basic as what you are asking, they resist be of service.
I suggest you sit down with them and have a conversation about how THEY would wish to be respected at the time when the Lord calls them home, and then suggest that you want nothing less for your Dad.
Judie Brown Judie Brown | August 1, 2009
Dear Timothy
It is at times like these that we have to smile, stand our ground and remind those with whom we are dealing that our first obligation is to God. Following Christ, with love and charity, is not always easy as He told us in the scriptures, but at the end of the day, He will be the judge, not the funeral director.
Judie Brown Judie Brown | August 5, 2009
Timothy
The phrase you are looking for is right out of Catholic teaching:
Nothing need be done if it is causing the patient undue discomfort or if the body is rejecting the recommended treatment.
For a reference in Catholic documents, I suggest the Vatican Declaration on Euthanasia which is on line at http://www.wf-f.org/declarationoneuthanasia.html
Please read SECTION IV, and share it with your mother.
BLOOD-DRENCHED ‘COMMON GROUND’ Posted: Wednesday July 29, 2009 at 4:43 pm EST by Judie Brown
Common ground: a basis of mutual interest or agreement
The current talk about “common ground” continues to concern me. These days, it pertains to several events that are separate and yet quite similar. The first is a piece of Capitol Hill legislation known as the Ryan-DeLauro bill, titled Preventing Unintended Pregnancies, Reducing the Need for Abortion, and Supporting Parents Act (HR 3312). What first caught my eye about this piece of legislation is that it is being celebrated by abortion supporters as a milestone, with commentator Sarah Posner reporting,
These two legislators [Ryan and DeLauro], who disagree on the question of whether abortion should be legal, worked with the centrist think tank Third Way’s culture program to find common ground among supporters of reproductive rights and opponents of legal abortion. The result, though, is pretty much what NARAL Pro-Choice America, Planned Parenthood, and other reproductive health advocates have been arguing for years: prevent unintended pregnancies through comprehensive sex education and birth control, and support economically struggling women and their families.
It is clear that this legislative proposal is somewhat appealing to those who might claim they are pro-life for political purposes, but are not truly dedicated to protecting preborn children as persons. I suggest that this is so because Third Way is an organization that describes itself as “the leading think tank of the moderate wing of the progressive movement” and says, “We work with elected officials, candidates, and advocates to develop and advance the next generation of moderate policy ideas.”
While I am not sure exactly what it means to be in the “moderate wing of the progressive movement,” my gut reaction is not favorable. The good news about Ryan-DeLauro is that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops is opposing it. In a well-articulated statement, the USCCB pro-life office’s Susan Wills aptly labeled Ryan-DeLauro as “the Planned Parenthood Economic Stimulus Package of 2009.” At least on this bit of “common ground,” the bishops have chosen to remove their shovels.
But on other “common-ground” fronts, the news about the Catholic response is not as pleasing. For example, the USCCB is supporting the Pregnant Women Support Act (HR 2035). This bill, which some say could be supported by the White House, is described as a measure that would “reduce the abortion rate.” Cardinal Justin Rigali, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Pro-Life Activities, has appealed to Congress to support the bill, which he claims “will provide many kinds of life-affirming support for pregnant women and their unborn children.” In a letter sent to every member of Congress, Cardinal Rigali states,
First, the fact that over a million abortions take place every year in this country is a tragedy, and we should at least take steps to reduce abortions. Second, no woman should ever have to undergo an abortion because she feels she has no other choice, or because alternatives were unavailable or not made known to her. An abortion performed under such social and economic duress meets no one's standard for “freedom of choice."
In his letter, Cardinal Rigali said that the bill “provides an authentic common ground, an approach that people can embrace regardless of their position on other issues.” While this sounds reasonable, we decided to see what the actual legislation states in relation to abortion, its availability and its identity as a surgical option for expectant mothers. What we found was not exactly compatible with Catholic teaching.
Among other things, the Pregnant Women Support Act sets out to make sure that any woman who is seeking an abortion is first provided with adequate information about her pregnancy. If she proceeds to abort her child, that is her choice.
Section 501 (“Disclosure of information on abortion services”) stipulates that “health facilities that perform abortions… shall obtain informed consent from the pregnant woman seeking to have the abortion. Informed consent shall exist only after a woman has voluntarily completed or opted not to complete pre-abortion counseling sessions.”
This legislation accepts as a fait accompli the Supreme Court decisions on abortion. It implicitly tolerates the idea of aborting a child because this action is protected by law. This is what common ground has always been about when applied to a thorny matter such as murdering a child prior to birth. So why is the USCCB applauding and supporting such a measure?
Bear in mind that the very same USCCB will not endorse political initiatives for protecting the personhood of the preborn child. Many bishops have done little or nothing to educate their flocks on the Catholic Church’s bedrock teaching on the humanity of the preborn and the fact that abortion is an act of murder. Perhaps it is more comfortable to be publicly accepted as reasonable than it is to demand an end to the slaughter.
The Catholic common-ground game appears to reach all the way to the Vatican. Robert Moynihan, founder and editor of Inside the Vaticanmagazine, recently wrote an opinion piece in which he made a few troubling statements. For example, in writing about his good friend Gian Maria Vian, the controversial editor of the Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, Moynihan tells us,
A month before President Obama's scheduled visit to see the Pope on July 10, Vian published an editorial that took a positive view of Obama's first 100 days.
Conservative Catholics in the United States and elsewhere were appalled that, despite Obama's moves to provide greater access to abortion and stem-cell research, the paper was not denouncing Obama. There were calls for Vian to resign.
When I spoke with Vian a few days ago, I asked him about this controversy. He told me that he still has the "full support" of the Vatican's Secretariat of State. (In fact, Vian is a personal friend of Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Pope's secretary of state.)
What can explain Vian's position -- and, by implication, the position of the Secretariat of State, and, perhaps, of the Pope himself?
Vian told me that the "big picture" needs to be kept in mind, that the Holy See's agenda, while always and unswervingly pro-life, nevertheless includes many other issues, such as social justice, disarmament, the Middle East and Cuba.
Vian's position illustrates the considerable differences between the European and American viewpoints on many critical issues of our time. The Europeans (like Vian) focus on points of agreement, and the Americans (like Vian's critics) focus on points of disagreement.
I do think Vian -- and even the Secretariat of State -- may be "naïve" about Obama and his intentions.
But I also believe that Americans can become so intent on one grave moral injustice (abortion and the manipulation of human embryos, both of which are always profoundly wrong) that they can ignore other areas of possible agreement.
What in the world is this man thinking? The “big picture” has a fundamental principle, and that is that each human being has innate dignity bestowed on him by God Himself. Therefore, putting an end to abortion is the “big picture”!
Moynihan discusses the meeting between Pope Benedict XVI and President Obama, opining that because the Holy Father handed Obama a copy of Dignitas Personae, there is that one hopeful “possibility of reaching Obama with a reasoned argument in defense of life.”
When one can relegate the act of abortion to being “one grave moral injustice” among other matters where agreement is possible, the Machiavellian nature of any common-ground proposal becomes obvious. The very idea of seeking "common ground" on which the forces of evil can agree with the forces of good is counterfeit to the core. The pro-life movement does not exist to be all-inclusive on many “issues” and “points of agreement.” It exists to end the murder.
Moynihan knows as well as I do that Obama is not backing down on abortion. Regardless of the global issues on which two heads of state can agree, the pope is the Vicar of Christ on earth. His teaching authority comes from Christ, not from political strategists and certainly not from accommodating evil. The same can be said for each of those men ordained into the priesthood of the Catholic Church, including every single Catholic bishop.
Abortion is not merely one among many so-called issues; it is a human tragedy that is being ignored, accepted and otherwise minimized for the sake of political opportunism. In my many years as a Catholic, I have never heard a sermon on my obligation to placate the world and appease elected officials. What I have heard is that crimes against humanity, such as the horror of abortion, are atrocities before God that can never, ever be condoned, accepted or otherwise embraced.
Perhaps it is time for Catholics, including the bureaucrats at the USCCB, to individually reflect on what is going on and stop hoeing so-called common ground—a ground that is seeping with the blood of dead preborn babies.
And so, what does it buy the bishops to "be publicly accepted as reasonable than it is to demand an end to the slaughter.", with the Culture of Death defining 'reasonable'? It would seem imperative of the bishops to convert the status quo to it being reasonable to allow human beings to live. David Volk | July 30, 2009
Video Story: Erik Whittington @ PLMD 2008
Erik Whittington, Director of Rock For Life, begins the Pro-Life Memorial Day vigil in front of the U.S. Supreme Court October 6.
Pro-Life Story: My Life Forever Changed Posted By Melissa on Nov, 28 2006 When I was about twenty-two years old I was living in San Francisco with a boyfriend. It was the first time I had lived away from my family. When I found out that I was ... Read
