Catholic Bishop Denies Communion to Pro-Abortion Democrat Sen. Dick Durbin: “Until He Repents of His Sin”

By Steven Ertelt
Life News

Pro-life Catholics who wish Catholic Church leaders would step up and deny communion to leading politicians who support abortion are getting good news today.

One Catholic bishop is denying communion to pro-abortion Democrat Dick Durbin, a top Democrat in the Senate who has long supported and promoted abortion. Durbin joined other Democrats to block a bill banning abortions after 20 weeks.

Bishop Thomas J. Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois says Durbin is “cooperating in evil” and persisting in “manifest grave sin” because of his abortion advocacy and must therefore “not be admitted to Holy Communion until he repents of his sin.”

In a statement on the Diocese of Springfield website, Bishop Paprocki said, 

“Fourteen Catholic senators voted against the bill that would have prohibited abortions starting at 20 weeks after fertilization, including Sen. Richard Durbin, whose residence is in the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois.”

The full statement reads:

I agree completely with His Eminence, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Chairman of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) Committee on Pro-Life Activities, who called the U.S. Senate’s failure to pass the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act “appalling.”

Fourteen Catholic senators voted against the bill that would have prohibited abortions starting at 20 weeks after fertilization, including Sen. Richard Durbin, whose residence is in the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois. 

In April 2004, Sen. Durbin’s pastor, then Msgr. Kevin Vann (now Bishop Kevin Vann of Orange, CA), said that he would be reticent to give Sen. Durbin Holy Communion because his pro-abortion position put him outside of communion or unity with the Church’s teachings on life. My predecessor, now Archbishop George Lucas of Omaha, said that he would support that decision. I have continued that position.

Canon 915 of the Catholic Church’s Code of Canon Law states that those “who obstinately persist in mani­fest grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion.” 

Life News article continues here

Judge Lets Abortion Clinics Throw Aborted Babies in the Trash or Sewer

By Joe Kral
Life News

On January 29, 2018, Federal District Court Judge David Ezra issued a preliminary injunction[i] against the State of Texas from enacting their newly minted fetal disposition law. The law, like several around the country, would mandate that those children killed in an abortion would have to be humanely cremated or buried. However, Judge Ezra believed this law to be unconstitutional on several grounds. His decision is quite problematic from a moral perspective.

Judge Ezra’s decision relies upon the application of the “undue burden” legal standard created by the United States Supreme Court, which determines the constitutionality of pro-life legislation, and is a standard that has no moral basis. The “undue burden” standard rests on the idea that “[A] statute which, while furthering a valid state interest, has the effect of placing a substantial obstacle in the path of a woman’s choice cannot be considered a permissible means of serving its legitimate ends.[ii]” 

The Court continues that an enacted law that has “the purpose or effect of presenting a substantial obstacle to a woman seeking an abortion imposes an undue burden on that right.[iii]” And what is the underpinning of this principle? The Court waxes philosophical by stating that “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.[iv]”

There are two problems with this standard: 1) it is contrary to the virtue of justice, and 2) its adherence to philosophical relativism. First, justice has a strong tradition of being defined as “that which is due to another.[v]” Even if the Court tries to make the argument that the so-called abortion “right” is due to women, it falls radically short in proving this point in any of its cases. For example, the Court readily admits in Roe v. Wade that it cannot define when human personhood begins, but then permits abortion. 

This sort of logic is akin to someone who is hunting in the woods and hears a rustle, but he is not sure if it is a deer or a human being but shoots anyway. It is reckless and common sense would tell a person not to commit that sort of action. In ethics, this is called the principle of the safer course.

The court creates a potential problem if it says that they cannot say if the unborn child is a person, but they allow for abortion anyway since they could be sanctioning legalized murder (which, of course, they did). Furthermore, it is clear that the child is indeed a person. 

As hard as some philosophers may try to argue that the unborn child is not a person, they cannot get away from the fact that the child is an individual member of the homo sapiens species. This reality squares with Boethius’ famous definition of personhood, “an individual substance of a rational nature.[vi]” There is no magical moment when a child becomes a person, rather the child, by his/her nature, is a rational substance at the moment of conception.

Life News article continues here

Blind Mom “Sees” Her Unborn Baby

By Dave Andrusko
National Right to Life

Okay, pretend you didn’t read the headline. It’s more fun that way.

Tatiana Guerra, 30, is from Brazil, and was 20 weeks pregnant when this video was taken. When she was 17, she’d lost her sight.

Courtesy of Huggies Brazil and the digital design firm, The Goodfellas, what you see on YouTube is the unfolding of a minor miracle– at least to we who are sighted and especially to those of us who grapple with understanding 3D printing.

The YouTube is less than 4 minutes long. We are immediately introduced to Tatiana and “Dr. David.” He seems to have a gentle touch and a reassuring voice, the perfect bedside manner.

After the opening “hellos,” the video cuts to Tatiana at home. She caresses her swollen abdomen and talks quietly and persistently to Murilo.

Clearly, Tatiana is passionately in love with her unborn son. “Mommy can’t wait to feel your little body, your little face, your little hands ….So come,” she says. “Mommy is counting the days. …You don’t need to be afraid.”

The video cuts back to Dr. David as he is performing the ultrasound. They chat back and forth.

“What does his face look like?”

“His nose looks like yours,” Dr. David says. “His two little eyes are closed.”

Tatiana smiles and giggles when she is told her son has a “small mouth” and a “chubby hand.”

All the while a 3D printer is transforming ultrasound images of Murilo’s face into something solid.

“And if…if you could touch him, would that let you know what he’s like?”
“Yes,” she responds.

At that juncture Dr. David hands Tatiana the 3-D sculpture of her unborn son’s face wrapped in a white cloth.

“That is your son.”

“What do you mean!?”

“That’s an image of your son. See if he feels the way you think he does.”

And then, the tear-jerking moment. She read a message, written in Braille…

“I am your son.”

National Right to Life continues here 

Voices for Life is an e-publication dedicated to informing and educating the public on pro-life and pro-family issues. To read our Mission Statement, use this link.  Follow us on Facebook, Google, and Pinterest.  Help us spread the pro-life message by sharing our articles on your favorite social networks.

Pregnant, need help or know someone who does? 

National Hotline: Call 1-800-712-HELP or Text 'HELPLINE' to 313131.

In Southeast Penna:  Call the Community Women's Center at  215-826-8090

If you or someone you know is suffering after abortion, confidential non-judgmental help is available.  Call Project Rachel's national toll-free number 888-456-HOPE (4673) or visit hopeafterabortion.org.  

Blessing Abortion Is Foolish, Corrupt and Evil

It is especially tragic that these clergy fail to teach the abortion providers they bless that God hates, and sees as an abomination, "hands that shed innocent blood."

By Kim Ketola
Christian Post

Abortion is now widely accepted and promoted as a basic human right and as reproductive freedom, liberating women from the burden of childbearing and motherhood.

The Washington Post recently covered religious leaders blessing a late-term abortion business based on the "sanctity of the health and free will of women." At the ceremony, a Baptist pastor was quoted as saying that through abortion God affirms a woman's "moral agency."

Despite the cover of the cloth, these clergy are false teachers. Instead of preaching biblical truth and trusting God who delivers us from trouble, they advance the abortion mindset.

This abortion mindset sees pregnancy as a matter of personal choice, and choosing not to be pregnant as the highest degree of empowerment for the average woman. She should trust abortion, not God, to protect her from economic hardship or financial dependency. Abortion, not God, will bring her out of limited opportunity in work and education. Abortion, not God, will save her from having to devote her life to a family member with permanent disabilities.

Abortion, not God, will somehow instantly relieve her from living with a constant reminder of having been sexually violated against her will, perhaps by a family member she must remain in contact with.

Abortion is also their holy panacea for women—the magic cure to the scourge of inequality with men, the stroke that levels the playing field to upend the patriarchy and liberate the female sex from her biologically ordained bondage to men and the demands of motherhood.

Like many young women who choose abortion, I was as ignorant of the abortion mindset and rhetoric as I was of the developmental milestones of my baby at 12 weeks.

But I began to be against abortion immediately after experiencing it, because I knew something was irretrievably lost. I knew I had failed as the last line of defense against the taking of an innocent life.

Facing this reality—that death lies at the center of every abortion—may not break the abortion mindset. Here, the false teachers are complicit, helping women claim their freedom and express relief.

Others' hearts will break to realize their devaluation as women; now they must compulsively prove their equality with men. This is actually a hopeful sign—the seeds of seeing abortion for what it is and not what the false teachers present.

Yet, getting a new mindset is a process for many of us. We're against abortion.

But, there must be exceptions, we're told. But, if the sex was forced, you needn't be burdened with the life you carry. But, if your child is diagnosed as less than perfect, you too can escape the burden such a pregnancy may bring.

The abortion mindset denies that every life is worthy of protection. The abortion mindset in effect, denies God, placing individual women in His place.

The abortion mindset assumes women alone are in control of the creation of new life, and as such, they retain sole ownership of pregnancy. In our hearts, we know it's morally indefensible to grant a group of people ownership over another group, despite the special circumstance of the utter dependency of one group upon the other. 

Christian Post article continues

Pro-Life Evangelist Billy Graham Passes Away, Said “My Heart Aches for America” Because of Abortion

By Steven Ertelt
LIfe News

Respected pro-life evangelist Billy Graham passed away today at his home in North Carolina. His devotion to Christianity and biblical values earned him praise and respect from people around the world.

While Reverend Graham was noted for his evangelical work in calling people to a relationship with Jesus Christ and repentance from sin, he also had a solid devotion to biblical principles. That included opposition to abortion.

Graham once said that his heart aches for America because of the number of children killed in abortions.

Graham previously said abortion has taken America’s morality downhill — so far that the nation is on par with cities in the Old testament that God destroyed because of their lack of sexual morality. In a 2012 open letter titled “My Heart Aches for America” that addressed concerns about moral issues, Graham wrote: 

“My heart aches for America and its deceived people. The wonderful news is that our Lord is a God of mercy, and He responds to repentance.”

Some years ago, my wife, Ruth, was reading the draft of a book I was writing. When she finished a section describing the terrible downward spiral of our nation’s moral standards and the idolatry of worshiping false gods such as technology and sex, she startled me by exclaiming, “If God doesn’t punish America, He’ll have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah.”

She was probably thinking of a passage in Ezekiel where God tells why He brought those cities to ruin. “Now this was the sin of … Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen” (Ezekiel 16:49–50, NIV).

I wonder what Ruth would think of America if she were alive today. In the years since she made that remark, millions of babies have been aborted and our nation seems largely unconcerned. Self-centered indulgence, pride, and a lack of shame over sin are now emblems of the American lifestyle.

Yet the farther we get from God, the more the world spirals out of control.

My heart aches for America and its deceived people. The wonderful news is that our Lord is a God of mercy, and He responds to repentance. In Jonah’s day, Nineveh was the lone world superpower—wealthy, unconcerned, and self-centered. When the Prophet Jonah finally traveled to Nineveh and proclaimed God’s warning, people heard and repented.

Life News article continues here

Testing for Down Syndrome, When Woman Sees Ultrasound, She Realizes She’s Pregnant With “a Little Person”

By Sarah Terzo
National Right to Life

From a woman who was being tested to see if her baby had Down syndrome or another handicap; she had been considering abortion if the baby was discovered to be disabled. She’s describing what she saw on the ultrasound:

“I was on this incredible high, like I saw the head and the little shoulders and then I came home and I suddenly crashed because I thought, there was this little person, I mean, it looked like a little person. And I was more upset than I’d ever been because what would I do? You know, would I have an abortion? Because here I’ve seen it, and it looks like a little person.”

Rayna Rapp, “Testing Women, Testing the Fetus: the Social Impact of Amniocentesis in America” (New York: Routledge, 1999) p. 129

Editor’s note. This appeared at Clinic Quotes and is reposted with permission.

Website: National Right to Life

Voices for Life is an e-publication dedicated to informing and educating the public on pro-life and pro-family issues. To read our Mission Statement, use this link.  Follow us on Facebook, Google, and Pinterest.  Help us spread the pro-life message by sharing our articles on your favorite social networks.

Pregnant, need help or know someone who does?

National Hotline: Call 1-800-712-HELP or Text 'HELPLINE' to 313131.

In Southeast Penna:  Call the Community Women's Center at  215-826-8090

If you or someone you know is suffering after abortion, confidential non-judgmental help is available.  Call Project Rachel's national toll-free number 888-456-HOPE (4673) or visit hopeafterabortion.org.  

The Death Camps of America

   

from Martin Fox, President
National Pro-Life Alliance


History has a way of repeating itself.

And tragically, time and time again the world has witnessed the slaughter of countless innocents.

Perhaps that’s why Eva Edl, a survivor of a concentration camp under a Communist regime in Hungary, calls abortion mills the “death camps of America.”

Having personally experienced the devastating consequences of a failure to respect human life, Eva now fights to end the slaughter of innocent children in this country.

After all, Eva was just a child herself, only nine years old when she was thrown into a cattle car, shipped to a concentration camp housing some 20,000 people, and packed into a bare room with nothing but an inch of straw lining the floor.

The conditions were so severe that Eva estimates some 50 people died every day.

Eva spent six months in that camp, and she might have lost her life if her mother hadn’t escaped and broken her out of the concentration camp.

Because her mother gave her that chance at life, Eva survived to later come to America.

But when she arrived, she was horrified.

She said in an interview, “When a government does not value human life at any stage of development or aging, it only depends on who is in charge that hour that will determine who will be killed next.”

“Right now, it’s the babies.”

So now, Eva works as a committed pro-life activist, fighting to protect the unborn.

And just like Eva, you and I share that same mission.

 

 

The National Pro-Life Alliance occupies a unique and important role in the pro-life movement. The focus of many other pro-life organizations is research, publications or counseling. These are all important and worthy activities, but the National Pro-Life Alliance is singular in its focus on passing pro-life legislation that will protect the unborn from the moment of conception onward. For more information on the National Pro-Life Alliance or to make a donation, please use this link.

South Carolina Committee Passes Bill to Define Unborn Baby as a Person and Ban Abortions

By Micaiah Bilger
Life News

South Carolina lawmakers moved forward Tuesday with a controversial bill to ban all abortions in the state.

The bill, nicknamed the “Personhood Act,” would require the state to recognize and grant legal protections to every human life, beginning at the moment of conception. It includes exceptions for medical emergencies when the mother’s life is in jeopardy, as well as in vitro fertilization.

The State reports the bill passed a state Senate committee Tuesday in a 12-9 vote after a lengthy debate. It now moves to the full state Senate for consideration.

State Lt. Gov. Kevin Bryant sponsored the bill while he was a state senator, and Gov. Henry McMaster said he will sign the legislation if it reaches his desk, according to the report.

Approximately 6,000 unborn babies are aborted in South Carolina every year, the report states.

State Sen. Richard Cash, R-Anderson, said they hope the bill will overturn Roe v. Wade and end legalized abortion in the U.S.

“We are trying to challenge the Supreme Court on their fundamental error that a human being is not a person,” Cash said. “A human being is a person.”

The legislature considered a similar bill in 2017. At the time, a South Carolina Planned Parenthood spokesperson threatened to challenge the legislation in court if it became law.

Abortion groups have succeeded in overturning similar laws in court. In 2012, the Oklahoma Supreme Court struck down a similar personhood bill as unconstitutional because it recognized unborn babies as human beings who deserve the right to life.

Personhood legislation, even if upheld in court, may not make abortions illegal. When considering a Missouri statute in 1989, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist ruled that the personhood statute was nothing more than a statement of position that had no bearing on banning abortions or even limiting them in any way.

The state of Missouri had approved a statute saying, “the life of each human being begins at conception” and “unborn children have protectable interests in life, health, and well-being.” The statute required that all Missouri state laws be interpreted to provide unborn children with rights equal to those enjoyed by other persons.

Life News article continues here

New York Attorney General’s Office Runs Fake Facebook Profile to Spy on Pro-Life Advocates

By Michelle Piccolo
Life News

In startling courtroom admissions during cross examination by Thomas More Law Center attorney, Tyler Brooks, the New York Attorney General’s star witness admitted she created a fake Facebook page pretending she was a pro-life Christian to develop dossiers and entrap pro-life sidewalk counselors who appeared in front of the Choices Women’s Medical Center in New York City’s Jamaica neighborhood. She then passed on the information to the Attorney General’s Office, which was already well aware of her fraudulent activities.

The startling testimony came during a hearing last Thursday (2/15), conducted by U.S. Federal District Court Judge Carol Bagley Amon, to determine whether she should grant Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s request for a preliminary injunction prohibiting pro-life sidewalk counselors from coming within sixteen feet of the Choices premises. The hearing before Judge Amon continues tomorrow (2/21), and is expected to last several more weeks.

During last Thursday’s cross-examination by Brooks, the witness admitted creating the Facebook page under the fake name of Shelly Walker. The witness described her elaborate scheme to entrap the unwary pro-life counselors named in the Attorney General’s lawsuit. 

She went to great lengths to invent an entirely fictitious identity; using someone else’s photo she had found on the internet, listing her occupation as a bank teller and stating she was from Saginaw, Michigan, even posting weather reports from Saginaw, as if she were there.

Moreover, in order to make her Facebook personality of Shelly Walker appear legitimate, she sent out hundreds of friend requests, friending hundreds of pro-lifers throughout the country. 

She purposely searched out pro-life and conservative groups and even claimed to be a supporter of Ted Cruz and Father Frank Pavone, an ardent pro-life Catholic priest. She fabricated an emotional personal story of being talked into an abortion by her husband, who she later divorced (none of it true). In real life, she’s a Choices escort leader who is strongly pro-abortion. She does not share any conservative or pro-life views. Nevertheless, she created this fake persona of Shelley Walker to appear as a concerned pro-life advocate to gather information on and entrap pro-life counselors. 

In fact, she sent a friend request to Angela Braxton, one of TMLC’s clients in this lawsuit. Braxton, not realizing this was really one of the Choices escorts, accepted her friend request, thinking Walker was a pro-life advocate like herself.

She also admitted that she shared the information of the targeted pro-life counselors with the Attorney General’s Office. The Office never told her to stop or to delete the information based on her fraudulent Facebook postings. In fact, the Office outfitted her with a concealed video camera to record pro-life counselors in front of Choices. 

Ironically, just three weeks ago, in an interview on NPR’s All Things Considered, the Attorney General highlighted his crack-down on fake identities, impersonations and fraud on the internet. Read the transcript of the interview here.

Life News article continues here

Brothers and Sisters of Aborted Children Suffer

By Kristi Burton Brown
National Right to Life

Abortion is anything but a simple choice. It affects not just the child who dies in an unimaginable way. It affects not just the mother who suffers through the abortion or the father who could do nothing to stop it. Abortion affects the family at large – grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and brothers and sisters.

It can be a very strange thought to wonder why you were chosen to live while your brother or sister was chosen for death. Why did you survive? What would your sibling have been like, acted like, looked like? Would he or she have resembled you? Become your best friend? Years of memories you should have had were wiped out before you ever knew that your brother or sister should have existed. Indeed, abortion is anything but simple for the brothers and sisters of aborted children.

Barb, who has worked with the AAA Center for Pregnancy Counseling for nearly thirty years, writes this:

“Abortion teaches children that they have worth because they were conceived in the right conditions and at the right time; that they have value because their parents want them. Up to 50% of all American children have lost a brother or a sister to abortion, making it much more likely that they live with a performance view of love: I was born because I was wanted therefore I better perform so they will continue to love me.”

Barb also talks about the reality of survivor’s guilt among siblings of aborted children and about the horrors of selective reduction, in which one or more babies in a multiple pregnancy (twins, triplets, quadruplets) are selected for death and aborted while the rest are allowed to live. Mark I. Evans, a doctor known for doing selective reductions, explains the heartache from his own perspective. Imagine the thoughts of surviving siblings once they discover what happened to their brothers or sisters, right next to them in the womb:

“It’s a very hard procedure, because the baby is moving, and you are chasing it. That is what is very emotional — when the baby is moving and you are chasing it.”

Angie (not her real name) is the sister of two aborted children. She was the oldest child and the only girl allowed to be born. Her only full biological sibling was aborted just a few short years after Angie’s birth. Angie’s mother then went on to have two sons – Angie’s half-brothers. They were five and nine years younger than her. When Angie’s mother got pregnant for the last time, she decided she was too tired to have a fourth child. So she flew to New York, where elective abortion was legal at the time, and aborted Angie’s last sibling.

Angie will always have to wonder why she was allowed to live when her brother or sister was subjected to a crude back-alley death. Would she have ever had a sister? Would her real father have been able to stay in her life if her full brother or sister had lived? What would it have been like to have had a sibling close in age to her; to grow up with as a friend? Would she have been a second mother to her youngest sibling, just like she was to her youngest living brother? What made the difference? Why was she saved, when others died?

National Right to Life stories continue here

Voices for Life is an e-publication dedicated to informing and educating the public on pro-life and pro-family issues. To read our Mission Statement, use this link.  Follow us on Facebook, Google, and Pinterest.  Help us spread the pro-life message by sharing our articles on your favorite social networks.

Pregnant, need help or know someone who does?  

National Hotline: Call 1-800-712-HELP 
or Text 'HELPLINE' to 313131.

In Southeast Penna:  Call the Community Women's Center at  215-826-8090

If you or someone you know is suffering after abortion, confidential non-judgmental help is available.  
Call Project Rachel's national toll-free number 888-456-HOPE (4673) or visit hopeafterabortion.org.