Voices for Life

January 29, 2012

I Won't Say "I Told You So"

At the time of the last presidential election, some may have thought that I overstated things in finding parallels with the dystopian world described in Robert Hugh Benson’s Lord of the World, in which Julian Felsenburgh makes eugenics “a sacred duty.”

Since our Lord did not humiliate the frightened apostles by saying “I told you so” when he rose from the dead, I shall not say “I told you so” to any who underestimated the plottings of social engineers whose audacity is only an audacity of despair.

Blessed John Henry Newman, in Discussions and Arguments on Various Subjects, cited the prediction of an eighteenth-century Protestant bishop and scientist, Samuel Horsley:

“The Church of God on earth will be greatly reduced, as we may well imagine, in its apparent numbers, in the times of Antichrist, by the open desertion of the powers of the world. This desertion will begin in a professed indifference to any particular form of Christianity, under the pretense of universal toleration; which toleration will proceed from no true spirit of charity and forbearance, but from a design to undermine Christianity, by multiplying and encouraging sectaries… For governments will pretend an indifference to all, and will give a protection in preference to none.”

-- Fr. George Rutler

Killing Babies is a "private family matter"

"As we mark the 39th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, we must remember that this Supreme Court decision not only protects a woman’s health and reproductive freedom, but also affirms a broader principle: that government should not intrude on private family matters. I remain committed to protecting a woman’s right to choose and this fundamental constitutional right."

-- President Barack Hussein Obama

January 28, 2012

By The Time You Finish Reading This ...

"There are two abortions every minute in the United States. Maybe slightly more, maybe slightly less: The gathering of medical statistics has been corrupted by the politics of abortion, in the same way that everything abortion touches gets clouded by falsity. But call it two abortions a minute. Two abortions a minute. Two abortions a minute . . .

An unborn child has been killed, probably, while you were reading this. Another will die, almost certainly, before you’re done. We are slaughtering by the seconds, and the relentless motion of that murderous clock — tick, tock, tick, tock — can drive you mad, if you start listening to it."

-- Joseph Bottum, Editor of http://www.firstthings.com/

January 27, 2012

Obama Administration to Catholics: 'To Hell With You!'

By Bishop David A. Zubik

It is really hard to believe that it happened. It comes like a slap in the face. The Obama administration has just told the Catholics of the United States, “To Hell with you!” There is no other way to put it.

In early August, the Department for Health and Human Services in the Obama administration released guidelines as part of the implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The guidelines mandated that by Summer 2012 all individual and group health insurance plans, including self-insured plans, cover all FDA-approved contraception, sterilization procedures and pharmaceuticals that even result in abortion.

A million things are wrong with this: equating pregnancy with disease; mandating that every employer pay for contraception procedures including alleged contraceptives that are actually abortion-inducing drugs; forcing American citizens to chose between violating their consciences or providing health care services; mandating such coverage on every individual woman without allowing her to even choose not to have it; forcing every person to pay for that coverage no matter the dictates of their conscience.

Let’s be blunt. This whole process of mandating these guidelines undermines the democratic process itself. In this instance, the mandate declares pregnancy a disease, forces a culture of contraception and abortion on society, all while completely bypassing the legislative process.

This is government by fiat that attacks the rights of everyone – not only Catholics; not only people of all religion. At no other time in memory or history has there been such a governmental intrusion on freedom not only with regard to religion, but even across-the-board with all citizens. It forces every employer to subsidize an ideology or pay a penalty while searching for alternatives to health care coverage. It undermines the whole concept and hope for health care reform by inextricably linking it to the zealotry of pro-abortion bureaucrats.

For our Church this mandate would apply in virtually every instance where the Catholic Church serves as an employer. The mandate would require the Catholic Church as an employer to violate its fundamental beliefs concerning human life and human dignity by forcing Catholic entities to provide contraceptive, sterilization coverage and even pharmaceuticals that result in abortion.

There was a so-called “religious exemption” to the mandate, but it was so narrowly drawn that, as critics charged, Jesus Christ and his Apostles would not fit the exemption. The so-called exemption would only apply to the vast array of Catholic institutions where the following applied:

Only Catholics are employed;

The primary purpose of the institution or service provided is the direct instruction in Catholic belief;

The only persons served by the institution are those that share Catholic religious tenets. (Try to fit this in with our local Catholic Charities that serve 80,000 every year without discrimination according to faith. It would be impossible!)

Practically speaking under the proposed mandate there would be no “religious exemption” for Catholic hospitals universities, colleges, nursing homes and numerous Catholic social service agencies such as Catholic Charities. It could easily be determined that the “religious exemption” would not apply as well to Catholic high schools, elementary schools and Catholic parishes since many employ non-Catholics and serve both students and, through social outreach, many who do not share Catholic religious beliefs. Such a narrow “religious exemption” is simply unprecedented in federal law.

Last September I asked you to protest those guidelines to Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the U.S. Department for Health and Human Services, and contact your political leadership in the federal government. I asked that you request that this flawed mandate be withdrawn because of its unprecedented interference in the religious liberty and freedom of conscience of the Catholic community, and our basic democratic process.

You did. And you were joined by Catholics throughout the country (and many others as well) who raised their voices against the mandate, raised their voices against a meaningless religious exemption.

On January 20, 2012, the Obama administration answered you and me. The response was very simple: “To Hell with You.”

Kathleen Sebelius announced that the mandate would not be withdrawn and the religious exemption would not be expanded. Instead, she stated that nonprofit groups – which include the Catholic Church – will get a year “to adapt to this new rule.” She simply dismissed Catholic concerns as standing in the way of allegedly respecting the health concerns and choices of women.

Could Catholics be insulted any more, suggesting that we have no concern for women’s health issues? The Catholic Church and the Catholic people have erected health care facilities that are recognized worldwide for their compassionate care for everyone regardless of their creed, their economic circumstances and, most certainly, their gender. In so many parts of the globe – the United States included – the Church is health care.

Kathleen Sebelius and through her, the Obama administration, have said “To Hell with You” to the Catholic faithful of the United States.

To Hell with your religious beliefs,

To Hell with your religious liberty,

To Hell with your freedom of conscience.

We’ll give you a year, they are saying, and then you have to knuckle under. As Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York and president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops responded, “in effect, the president is saying that we have a year to figure out how to violate our consciences.”

As I wrote to you last September, with this mandate the democratic process is being ignored while we are being ordered to ignore our religious beliefs. And we are being told not only to violate our beliefs, but to pay directly for that violation; to subsidize the imposition of a contraceptive and abortion culture on every person in the United States.

It is time to go back to work. They have given us a year to adapt to this rule. We can’t! We simply cannot!

Write to the president.

Write to Secretary Sebelius.

Write to our Senators.

Write to those in Congress.

Here’s what you can write:

"Dear (Representative):

“In early August, the Department for Health and Human Services released guidelines that would force Catholic institutions to subsidize through their health care plans contraception, sterilization procedures and pharmaceuticals that even result in abortion.

“It was announced on January 20thby Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the U.S. Department for Health and Human Services, that this mandate is affirmed and that non-profit institutions, including the Catholic Church, have one year to adapt to the mandate.

“This is a direct threat to the religious liberty of Catholics, freedom of conscience and the social service ministry of the Catholic Church. The so-called ‘religious exemption’ in the mandate is no exemption at all as it would require any Catholic institution (that serves non-Catholics or employs non-Catholics) to violate Catholic belief, discontinue to provide health care, or close its doors.

“I ask that you do all possible to rescind the ‘Preventive Service Mandate’ as an unprecedented federal interference in the right of Catholics to serve their community without violating their fundamental moral beliefs.”

This mandate can be changed by Congressional pressure. The only way that action will happen is if you and I take action.

Let them know that you and I will not allow ourselves to be pushed around (or worse yet) be dismissed because of our Catholic faith.

Let them know that you and I will not allow our religious freedom to be compromised.

Let them know that you and I will not allow our religious liberty to be rescinded.

Nobody, not even the president of the United States or anyone who represents him, has the right to say to you and to me as U.S. citizens, as Catholics, or as both: “To Hell with You.”

The president and our elected leaders need to hear from you and me and to listen to us NOW.

http://www.diopitt.org/hhs-delays-rule-contraceptive-coverage

Abortion Safer Than Childbirth? Study's Results Do Not Support Claim!

A new study claims to demonstrate that abortion is safer than childbirth.

The study obviously concentrates solely on the medical risks for the mother, since an abortion always destroys the unborn child. So the study is based on a faulty premise, comparing two medical procedures that have different goals. In an abortion, one life is deliberately sacrificed. In childbirth, medical personnel do their utmost to preserve two healthy lives. It is not surprising that the latter operation is more challenging.

Since time immemorial, it has been generally understood that pregnancy and childbirth place serious strains on the mother. Most abortions are performed early in pregnancy, when those strains are not yet severe. So again, the comparison between abortion and childbirth is inappropriate from the outset. A Reuters news report on the study, however, stretches the application of the new study even further beyond what the facts actually bear. The Reuters story (which does not identify the source of the study until the 10th paragraph) acknowledges the strains of a full-term pregnancy with the remarkably awkward admission that “women are pregnant for a lot longer when they decide to have a baby and so have more time to develop complications.” That is true, certainly. But women who “decide to have a baby”—that is, decide not to destroy their unborn child—also have a better chance of giving birth to a healthy son or daughter.

In citing the results of the study, however, Reuters claims to find meaning that the data do not, and cannot, show. The story cites unnamed “experts” who “say the findings, though not unexpected, contradict some state laws that suggest abortions are high-risk procedures.” And later the Reuters report refers to one researcher who “said previous studies have also shown the safety of legal abortions.” Both statements are inaccurate.

The claim that abortion is safer than childbirth (for the mother) does not mean that abortion is a safe procedure. We know that childbirth entails some medical risks. Even if the risks of abortion are lesser, they are not negligible. Some state laws, designed to protect pregnant women, have required abortionists to provide accurate information about the health risks involved in the procedure. Those risks remain, even if other medical options involve their own risks. The study, published in Obstetrics & Gynecology, compared only the deaths from complications of childbirths and abortions. It apparently did not look into the lingering effects of abortion. Studies have shown that women who procure abortions suffer higher rates of breast cancer, depression, drug abuse, and suicide. Also, women who procure abortions may encounter complications when they eventually seek to bear children--and thus contribute to the elevated rates of death in childbirth.

http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=13084

It Steals Hope

"Abortion kills a child; it wounds a precious part of a woman’s own dignity and identity; and it steals hope.
That’s why it’s wrong.
That’s why it needs to end."
...
-- Archbishop Charles J. Chaput

Photo Credit: Matt K. Cassens, author of http://stblogustine.blogspot.com/2012/01/2012-march-for-life-in-washington.html

January 26, 2012

This Foot Was Not a Part of Her Body

In 1973, when the Supreme Court legalized abortion with its Roe vs. Wade decision, I was a young nurse working in an operating room in Boston. There were no abortion clinics in Massachusetts at that time, since abortion had not previously been legal in that state, so the procedure known as a “D and E” — for dilatation and evacuation — would soon be performed at my hospital in the O.R. When this was announced to the nursing staff, I was horrified at the thought that I would be required to participate in abortions. I considered myself to be liberal and supportive of the women's movement, but abortion gave me pause.

This news was largely met with approval by my co-workers, who considered Roe vs. Wade to be a monumental victory for women's rights. The feminist movement was in full force in those days, and I knew I was in a minority of people who would object to abortion. I really did not want to be the one to have to say anything. Fortunately, there was a one nursing supervisor who was a Catholic who spoke up and took a stand for the rest of us. Catholic nurses would not be required to be involved in any abortions. This came as a huge relief to me because I loved my job and would have hated to leave it. And although I was not exactly the poster child for the good Catholic life at that time, I was glad to be able to hide behind my religion and not have to confront militant feminists.

One night, though, I was called into work for an emergency “D and C” (dilatation and curettage) on a woman who had had an abortion and was now hemorrhaging. This case presented no moral dilemma for me as there was no longer a living fetus and the woman could have bled to death. As the scrub nurse, I was collecting the bits of tissue that were being scraped out of the uterus to be sent to the pathology lab, as was required with any surgical procedure. I was not expecting to see anything recognizable on the surgical sponges and instruments when I suddenly came upon something solid; a bit of firm, white, waxy -looking substance. Upon closer inspection I was shocked to see that it was a tiny, perfectly formed right foot. So much for an unrecognizable clump of cells! I stared in amazement at the sight of such a tiny foot. It was like an exquisite, miniature sculpture with delicate curves, detailed bone structure, translucent skin, tiny toes, minuscule toenails. Its perfection, delicacy and beauty were so grotesquely incongruous with its position on a bloody surgical sponge lying in the palm of my hand. It broke my heart.

There are those who claim a fetus is not a person, but there is only one creature with a foot that looks just like that, just like my foot: It's called a human being. I started to wonder about the person who owned this foot. It certainly did not belong to the woman on the O.R. table; she already had two. This foot was not a part of her body, that she had a right to control, as abortion proponents would say. It must belong to someone else; to a separate and unique individual who had been denied the most basic of human rights, the right to life; to an infant who would never be held; to a little boy or little girl who would never kick a ball; to a baby who was dead now, who now belonged to God.

Thirty nine years ago I had the choice, as a Catholic nurse, not to participate in abortions where I worked. I don't know if I would have that option in today's frightening political climate of health care mandates. Thirty-nine years ago I was glad I didn't have to say anything about my position on abortion and I have been mostly silent ever since. Today I am speaking for the child whose foot I held in my hand. Abortion has killed too many of our most innocent, most vulnerable and most precious human beings. There are alternatives. Let's stop this!

-- Rita Sandberg Silverthorne
http://www.summitdaily.com/article/20120126/LETTER/120129876/1078&ParentProfile=1055