in this issue:
hot button issue: RED MASS
abortion: OHIO / PRO-WOMAN FACTOIDS / SELECTIVE REDUCTION
brave new world: FETAL OVARY HARVESTING
catholic bishops: MAINE
culture of death: TEXAS
eugenics: HUMAN GENETIC ENGINEERING
euthanasia: CANADA / PRO-LIFE PERSPECTIVES
health care: CATHOLIC PLAN
human embryonic stem cells: CALIFORNIA / EYE REPAIR / PIG HEART REPAIR
politics: MICHIGAN
web news: BLACK CATHOLICS FOR LIFE
zinger: GLORIA, GET A GRIP!
reflection for prayer: BISHOP THOMAS DORAN
hot button issue
RED MASS: American Life League ran a full-page ad in the Washington Times, alerting Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and Archbishop Sean O’Malley that pro-abortion Catholic political figures may attempt to receive Holy Communion at Sunday’s annual Red Mass in Washington.
(Reading: “Will pro-aborts dare receive Communion at Red Mass?” American Life League news release, 9/30/04)
abortion
OHIO: A federal judge has ruled that the state may not restrict access to the abortion pill mifepristone (RU-486).
(Reading: “Federal judge halts Ohio abortion pill law,” Associated Press, 9/22/04)
PRO-WOMAN FACTOIDS: The Elliot Institute has produced excellent materials with which to arm your pro-life elected officials so that they properly and eloquently defend the rights of both the preborn and the mother.
(Reading: “Political Resource Kit,” Elliot Institute)
SELECTIVE REDUCTION: Dr. Wallace Nunley opines that “high-order multiple pregnancies are not viewed as a success story by Ob/Gyn physicians because of concerns for fetal and maternal morbidity and death. Selective reduction of excess embryos was developed as an attempt to achieve essentially a twin gestation with less attendant morbidity, death and financial burden on the resultant pregnancy outcome.”
COMMENT: We can presume Dr. Nunley is a compassionate and fiscally responsible advocate of killing the innocent. We also see that his arbitrary definition of pregnancy is fixed AFTER the baby’s life has begun.
(Reading: “The slippery slopes of advanced reproductive technologies,” American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, (2004) 191, 588-92)
brave new world
FETAL OVARY HARVESTING: “Imagine this scenario: A new couple is out on a date, sitting down together, getting to know each other over dinner. The woman leans across the table and says, ‘Tell me about your mother.’ The man looks at her and says, ‘Well, actually, my mother was never born.'” Researcher Gulam Bahadur painted that picture, then noted, “It’s extremely frightening, it’s bizarre, but in some years’ time, with no regulation, we could be creating a child from mothers who were never born. Using fetal ovaries … Can you imagine? A genetic mother who was not born?”
(Reading: “My mother was a fetal ovary,” National Post, 9/29/04)
catholic bishops
MAINE: Bishop Richard Malone of Portland said he would not refuse Communion to pro-abortion public figures, noting, “When a politician is receiving the Eucharist is not ordinarily the time to make judgments about a person’s worthiness … Denial of the Eucharist is not necessarily the most prudent way to oppose the assault on the unborn.”
(Reading: “Maine bishop refuses to deny Communion,” Bangor Daily News, 7/9/04)
culture of death
TEXAS: A rancher driving the back roads near San Antonio discovered the body of an infant girl near a fence. The child’s umbilical cord was still attached. The sheriff’s office is looking for the mother, but thus far the search has been unsuccessful.
(Reading: “Medina County rancher finds newborn baby’s body,” KSAT-TV, 9/21/04)
eugenics
HUMAN GENETIC ENGINEERING: Quoting from an article by G. P. Smith: “So long as procreation continues to remain a central driving force in a marital relationship, and the family the very core of progressive society, efforts will be undertaken to expand the period of fecundity and combat infertility. Genetic planning and eugenic programming are more rational and humane alternatives to population regulation than death by famine and war. Genetic enhancement technologies and the scientific research undertaken to advance them should be viewed as not only aiding (or, sometimes resolving) the tragedy of infertility in family planning, but as a tool for enhancing the health of a nation’s citizens by engineering man’s genetic weaknesses out of the line of inheritance. Put simply, healthier and genetically sound individuals have a much better opportunity for pursuing and achieving the ‘good life’ and making a significant contribution to society’s greater well being.”
(Reading: “Analysis: Stearns’ Congressional human cloning fairy tale ‘ban,'” LifeIssues.Net, 9/8/04)
euthanasia
CANADA: A British Columbia supreme court justice has issued a publication ban relative to the trial of Evelyn Martens, a woman accused of providing help in two assisted suicide cases. “The ban serves as a legal warning not to publish, broadcast or distribute information about the accused, Evelyn Martens, until a jury has reached a verdict in her case.”
(Reading: “Publication ban on assisted suicide case,” Cnews, 9/20/04)
PRO-LIFE PERSPECTIVES: Julie Grimstad, founder of Life is Worth Living, has a special e-mail news update that covers the territory involved in defending the vulnerable. To get on her list, e-mail .
health care
CATHOLIC PLAN: For the first time in history, a Catholic health care plan is being offered to federal workers. The plan excludes payment for contraceptives, abortion, sterilization and artificial insemination.
(Reading: “US health plans include one with Catholic tenets,” New York Times, 9/25/04)
human embryonic stem cells
CALIFORNIA: Proposition 71 continues to be the center of heated debate. A new web site created by Doctors, Patients and Taxpayers for Fiscal Responsibility contains language that makes it clear that the endorsers support the ghoulish research but view Proposition 71 as a request by corporate entities to have taxpayers fund their research and development costs.
EYE REPAIR: Researchers at Advanced Cell Technology, working outside the federal restraints, claim they have engineered human embryonic stem cells that could repair eyes.
COMMENT: This is precisely why all human embryonic stem cell research must be banned!
(Reading: “Human stem cells show potential for eye repair,” Reuters, 9/23/04)
PIG HEART REPAIR: Israeli researchers are claiming that by transferring human embryonic stem cells into pig hearts, a damaged heart will be repaired.
COMMENT: It is never justifiable to kill one innocent human being for the purported good of another.
(Reading: “Stem cell treatment of disease takes two leaps forward,” Miami Herald, 9/27/04)
politics
MICHIGAN: Catholics for the Common Good, a group of local priests and lay people, is calling on voters to overlook abortion and “broaden their moral conscience” (i.e., vote for pro-abortion candidates).
(Reading: “Catholics rethink politics,” Detroit News, 9/15/04)
(Background: working against this group is the Church and Truth Project)
web news
BLACK CATHOLICS FOR LIFE: Excellent web site.
zinger
GLORIA, GET A GRIP! Planned Parenthood Federation of America president Gloria Feldt told the press that pro-life legislative activities across the nation are “part of the anti-choice arrogance in which they believe they have the right to impose their ideology on everyone else.”
COMMENT: Oh? Gloria, basic Biology 101 is not ideology, it is factual and provable whereas convincing our children that sex outside of marriage is “normal” is not only ideological but totally erroneous.
(Reading: “Anti-abortion activists broaden efforts,” Associated Press, 9/25/04)
reflection for prayer
BISHOP THOMAS DORAN: “As Americans we have somehow gotten the idea of God as a sort of heavenly sheriff who patrols over us every moment of every hour of every waking day, watching and watching and watching to see if we sin, and then when we do, He says, ‘Ah ha, gotcha.’ That would be a kind of a puerile God, kind of a childish divinity. God tells us to not sin because sin can become a habit and with it comes a habitual weakening of intellect and will that move us further and further away from Him. That is something we have to lay hold of as Catholics. We have to appreciate more and more the continuing effect of sin on our ability to do good and avoid evil.”
(Reading: “Whatever happened to sin?” Catholic Citizens of Illinois, 9/6/04)