BIG BLUE WAVE: January 2014

Thank you Fr. Benjamin Kneib.

He was only ordained in 2012.

This is his parish.

It appears he's a new parish priest.

I just thought I'd give them some publicity.

What about patients who want doctors who don't prescribe birth control? Do they have any rights in this matter?

H/T: SoCon or Bust.

One of the more peculiar crisis pregnancy stories that I have read.

Not terribly pro-choice, these Maoists, are they?

In an exclusive chat with TOI, a fearless Kamla said that she married Lalsai one and a half years ago and rebels in their Local Operation Squad (LOS) wing of guerilla group had forced them to undergo either vasectomy or sterilization before and after marriage many times. "I escaped every time with excuses of health issues or a busy schedule whenever I was forced. But recently on January 18, when we checked with pregnancy kit-which I managed to get from the health wing-it was positive! It was both ecstatic and scary at the same time to know that they won't let the baby live," a thoughtful Lalsai said.

"On the other hand, consequences of surrendering haunted us. Eventually, with mutual decision we decided to quit Maoism and surrender before Rajnandgaon police. As we were working as sentris for the group during the day, it wasn't tough for us to abscond," he added.Kamla and Lalsai hailing from Kondemanpur and Lohkar were active at Pallemadi region on the Rajnandgaon-Kanker border and were handed 303 rifles by leaders. In their conversation, Kamla said that she wasn't forced to join LOS, but she eloped from her village after getting influenced by the dancing group of Maoists that visits villages to lure youngsters and join them. "I was 13 year old then," she said.

Just read this in a blogpost:

Choosing abortion is not easy for anyone and it is something that will effect them for the rest of their lives.

I hope we can put this myth to rest.

And this is somehow embarrassing?

Call me old-fashioned (I’m fine with this label), but during my week as a housewife, I discovered that there is something comforting and familiar about traditional gender roles.

She is two steps away from dumping the feminist label.

Dear Readers, I beg of you to make this go viral on all social media.

My two beefs about homilies are as follows:

1) Anecdotes seem to be the only strong weapon in the priestly toolbox.

And they get boring real fast if that's the only thing the homily has going for it.

Even when they're good.

So please... enough with the anecdotes. You don't have to tell a cute story or a joke in every single sermon. Please. Save our sanity.

Christina Blizzard:

A recent letter to an ethics columnist in the Toronto Star from an older woman complained she had to share a gym changeroom recently with a man who claimed to be transgendered and was therefore entitled to use the women’s changeroom.

The “woman” had a penis. The penis had an erection and the person it was attached to asked her if she “came here often.”

Don’t get me wrong. I hate to sound insensitive to people who may be having a crisis about their sexuality, but common sense dictates there should be limits to their behaviour.

Imagine you bring your young daughter into this change room.

I rest my case.

But pedophiles would never sink to posing as a woman to get access to naked girls. That's unthinkable, you hater.

This is a positive development.

I'm nervous about this being associated with Putin. Putin is a dictator. Russia is not a free country.

However, this is not enough.

Abortion cannot just be merely restricted.

Fetal rights must be recognized.

Because the moment the government loses interest in increasing the population, abortion restrictions will go out the window.

"I have come to believe the Senate must be non-partisan," Trudeau told reporters. "There are no more Liberal senators ... The only way to be part of the Liberal caucus is to be put there by the people of Canada."

The former Liberal senators are free to organize themselves however they wish, Trudeau said. That means they are no longer accountable to any elected parliamentary leader.

Does anyone really believe this BS?

When I read the headline that the Pope's next encyclical would be about the environment, I thought oh no.

Typical leftish topic that will make all the MSM and dissenters go ga-ga.

Then I actually read the Catholic take on it:

Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi confirmed the news in his Jan. 24 statement, noting that in his text, the Pope intends to give a strong emphasis to the theme of “human ecology” – a phrase that was originally coined by retired pontiff Benedict XVI.

I've seen the phrase "human ecology" among social conservatives in France.

It's new buzzword.

I expect that the next encyclical will have significant portions devoted to prolife themes.

Pope Francis will not disappoint.

That man keeps defying expectations.

And we want to bring this to Canada?

Girls in UK are ordering abortion pills online from India and China so they don't have to face their parents.

The thing is, some feminists think it's okay to encourage this kind of behaviour.

Do you suppose maybe, just maybe, some British girls read these instructions?

Pro-life groups might want to consider warning women of the dangers of such abortions.

From This Magazine:

Everywhere I turn, it seems women are expected to take sides before we’re allowed to feel something. It’s as if our feelings represent something greater than our individuality, a value, a duty. Holding the pamphlet in my hand, I can’t help but think: shouldn’t the focus have always been on women and their experiences—minus the debate?

You know an abortionist is bad when even NAF won't have anything to do with him

Proving what I have said all along:

SteynOnline:

Like Dr Michael Mann, who's currently in court in British Columbia, the District of Columbia and (for all I know) Colombia, Richard Warman is a serial SLAPPer. In fairness to my nemesis, Mann at least sues to inject a little court-ordered Viagra into his ever more flaccid hockey stick. Warman, on the other hand, sues merely for fun and profit, as an extension of his role as Canada's self-appointed Hatefinder-General. As eventually emerged at a Canadian "Human Rights" Tribunal hearing, he adopts Internet disguises and posts as a "hatemonger" on so-called "hate sites", and then sues those sites. Very foolishly, the Canadian courts have rewarded him for playing dress-up Nazi. I met Mark and Connie Fournier in Ottawa at the CHRT "secret trial" that Maclean's QC Julian Porter and I succeeded in getting opened up and revealed to public gaze. They're brave and tenacious fighters of a kind Canada needs more of, but professional SLAPPer Richard Warman has done them in.

While soliciting for funds for his defense against Mann, he was generous enough to ask that his fans donate to Mark and Connie.

He writes:

Whenever I hear abortion spokespeople defend their position — and I mean, whenever I hear them — they seem to me determined to obscure the real issue. They talk about being “pro-choice,” but who among their opponents is anti-choice? They talk about “women’s health,” but what sinister constituency demands that women be unhealthy? They talk about “protecting a woman’s body,” but it’s not the woman’s body under threat, it’s the body of the baby inside her.

Okay, aborting a baby might be liberating, empowering and convenient. It might even dramatically improve the future course of your life. But the same could be said about murdering your wife if she’s a big enough pain in the neck. That doesn’t give you the right to do it, and it doesn’t make it the right thing to do.

The only relevant question about abortion is whether an unborn child is or is not a human being. If she is, I do not see how you have the moral right to kill her except in extreme circumstances.

Yes I've noticed this, too, even about "good" bishops:

They often talk a good game, but we don't see a lot of action.

I wish the clergy and the faithful could sit down and have a discussion about these matters, and ask bishops point blank: why isn't Canon 915 applied? Why do politicians whom we know oppose Catholic teaching continue to receive Communion?

Just about every serious believer has had a debate on God's existence, especially those who are heavily engaged in apologetics.

Now you might say that it's an exercise in futility, as nobody ever changes their minds through such debates.

And it's true that the debates themselves fail to convince people, in the moment.

However, I always try to impart a piece of the puzzle that will help atheists get closer to knowing the truth.

Mark and Connie need help with their legal expenses. They've done a lot of heavy lifting for freedom lovers in Canada. Won't you contribute? Even if it's just five bucks...

I always wanted someone to film an abortion in the womb so we can all know the truth about what happens.

I think this is the closest thing I have so far.

This is an embryoscopy of an instrument severing the cord of an embryo.

The label says that embryoscopy is used to study missed and habitual abortion.

But as I watch, I wondered if the embryo in question was really dead or not.

It would seem far-fetched to imagine someone going through the bother of using embryoscopy for this kind of abortion.

And in the womb, all the tissue is in constant motion, alive or dead, because of the liquid environment.

Plus the music really livened up the footage.

Still you wonder if the embryo's arm movements were reactive as the instrument approached his face.

Whether the embryo is live or dead, I thought it was very educational and moving to see an embryo in his natural environment.

Meanwhile in Canada, feminists fight for the right to kill babies like her who happen not to be born.

From the website:

As of today, January 23, 2014, and after 13 years online, Free Dominion is closing its doors to the public. We have been successfully censored.

Today, Ontario Superior Court Justice Robert Smith issued an order in the Richard Warman vs Mark and Connie Fournier and John Does defamation case heard September, 2013. In addition to ordering that we must pay Warman $127,000, Justice Smith issued an injunction against us ordering we that never publish, or allow to be published, anything negative about Richard Warman. This means we are barred for life from ever operating a public forum or a blog (even about cookie recipes) where the public can comment. If we do so, any one of Warman’s handful of supporters could, and probably would, use a common proxy server to avoid being traced, plant a negative comment about Warman on our site, and we would both be charged with contempt of court. If that happened --unlike in the Ottawa courtroom where we were blocked at every turn from presenting a defense-- we actually would have no defense. We would both go to jail. This life sentence was imposed for our terrible crimes of voicing our honestly held beliefs and allowing others to do the same. Defamation law, in its current state, is entirely inadequate and counterproductive when applied to the internet. Now it is being used as a tool of censorship. Effectively!

We are assessing our options.

In faith,
Mark and Connie Fournier

Move to the States, Mark & Connie. They still value free speech over there.

Quick Update: On FB, Connie writes "Thanks for the support, everyone! We aren't done yet!"

I'm happy to see greater secular involvement in the fight against abortion.

But I'd like to suggest a slight modification of vocabulary.

Bleep.

How does anyone a 35-year-old impregnate a 12-year-old and not get at least a couple of decades in the slammer?

And oh yeah:

With enhanced credit for pre-sentence custody, Long has six more years to serve.

I wonder if this is an outlier. Formatted for easier reading:

To get information in the sexual and contraceptive behaviors in Chinese female college students, a randomized cluster sampling was conducted in colleges and universities in Wuhan Area, China, in terms of types of colleges, subjects (literature, sciences, medicines, art etc), and grades etc.

I think it's about time we put this claim to bed:

On the 41st anniversary of Roe v. Wade, CNN’s senior legal analyst smeared the entire pro-life movement in saying on Wednesday’s AC360 Later, “They want women to have no control over their own bodies.”

What pro-life women doesn't want control over her body?

“Signs For Life are victimizing women who need an abortion for health reasons, women who have been raped, women who want an abortion simply because they are not ready to be a parent,” Murphy wrote.

It's time we tell feminists to stop the victim ploy.

I think it's time we end the feminist emotional extortion.

See here.

I was not really aware of Pope John Paul II. I'm not sure abortion would have been legal in Poland.

I would add:

Andrea Bocelli
Sean Lennon

Why aren't there more Catholics at the March for Life?

In sum: because there's not enough Holy Anger. Even among the clergy.

He hits it out of the park. A highly quotable video.

I hope you post it to your blogs and social media.

Dear Cardinal Ouellet: promote this man!

Okay.

But as in previous stories, names are never named.

Nobody is ever found guilty.

I strongly suspect there is a gay lobby in the Vatican.

But nobody ever seems to confront these people.

If the purpose is to let the public in on the secret to protect them, then why not point to the guilty parties?

There's too many of these accusations without names being named. If this is the case, somebody needs to do the right thing and out the guilty.

If no names are named, I'm going to start thinking this story is non-sense.

Hey, he's bilingual! Who knew? :)

After viewing the video multiple times, Arthurs said that last claim, at least, rings true.

"It wasn't too bad at all," he said of the mayor's attempt at Patois. "Obviously he's got Jamaican friends and he's been around Jamaicans quite a bit, because that's exactly how Jamaicans on the street would describe the situation."

Multiculturalism. It's a beautiful thing. It brings people together. :)

You gotta laugh.

UPDATE: And another video pops up.

I'm not upset that a politician is so watched.

I just wish all politicians were so thoroughly scrutinized.

I am so happy he said it: The SSPX are like Protestants.

Salvation is tied to submission to the Roman Pontiff.

If you want to skip the intro, go to the 3:50 mark.

And why are we hiding this guy?

A priest after my own heart.

Compare:

According to this study, only 6.2 percent of girls that delay sexual intercourse until they are 20 years of age or older will have an abortion in their lifetimes. Contrast this with women who became sexually active at age 14—37.9 percent of these women will have one or more abortions in their lifetimes.

The data is just as compelling when we look at the correlation between the number of male sexual partners a woman has, and her likelihood to have an abortion. According to the study, only 6.4 percent of women who have an abortion have had one male sexual partner for life, meanwhile 89.0 percent of women who reported having one or more abortions had 3 or more sexual partners.

In other words, the closer you come to practicing the Christian ideal of chastity, the less likely you are to get an abortion.

I was curious and decided to see whether the original report studied the issue of contraception.

Indeed it did!

99% of women who have ever had an abortion have used contraception.

10% of women who have never used contraception have gotten one or more abortions.

20% of women who have ever used contraception have gotten one or more abortions.

30% of women who have ever had abortions started using contraception before the age of 15.

This suggests that social conservatives are correct: the sooner you start having sex, the more likely you are to have an abortion and contraception does not solve the problem. It seems to exacerbate it.

Now I don't wish to suggest that it's all a matter of practice, that if everyone just dropped contraception, the problem would be fixed.

It's a question of attitude. The women who wait, who don't use contraception have a different attitude towards sex and procreation.

This different attitude leads to different behaviour.

If you have a Christian mindset when it comes to sexual behaviour and you try to live up to it, your likelihood of having an abortion is far less than if you have an average secular mindset.

The problem is, of course, that women don't date and have sex thinking "my primary goal is to avoid an abortion."

Women date and have sex because they want to love and be loved, and pregnancy and abortion is a secondary issue.

I think Catholics have a tougher time convincing people that contraception is bad because contraception is not the real problem. When pro-aborts push contraception, it's a purely mechanical thing: take the pill, you won't get pregnant (or reduce its likelihood) end of story.

But Catholics have to teach a worldview to get people to understand. So you can't just say "contraception is bad because it doesn't leave couples open to life." They don't understand at all what's behind that phrase. It sounds like non-sense to them.
So Catholics have to go through a lot of steps explaining a lot of points that the culture has forgotten.

But the results are clear: abstinence prevents abortion better than contraception.

Before I get to the main subject of the post, I'd like to say:

I disagree, but I'm not offended.

See how that works?

I think a lot of what she said is stupid, but I'm not upset.

Why?

Because ultimately her opinion doesn't matter.

My opinion of myself matters the most. (And God's).

First I'd like to get to the part I (partially) agree with:

Alone Yet Not Alone ...

had a limited release (nine cities) on Sept. 27, 2013, targeted specifically toward the Christian market. Its production company — Enthuse Entertainment — describes itself as a producer of "God-honoring, faith-based, family-friendly films that inspire the human spirit to seek and know God." The film tells an alleged true-life tale from 1755 of two young sisters kidnapped by Native Americans after a raid on their family farm.

...

The plot of "Alone Yet Not Alone" also deals with the Native Americans (referred to as "savages" in the film's trailer) attempting to "indoctrinate" the kidnapped girls "into native culture," as reported by Film.com. The women, however, retain their faith, turning the film into a tale of Christianity "triumphing" over other religions and practices

I watched part of the video for the song and I thought "meh".

I hate how so much of Christian entertainment is uplifting.

When I hear uplifting I hear: shallow, predictable, sentimental, self-serving, not catchy, safe, saccharine, unnuanced, boring.

This is why most people prefer U2 to 99% of the Christian music out there.

The production values looked pretty good, though, I'll say that.

I just got the email.

No reason was given.

Eric Ames will be the Interim leader until the election of a new leader at the next Annual General Meeting.

Okay. This is a bit of a surprise.

If it doesn't show the fetus being sucked by a vaccuum, then they are not showing the abortion.

Lots of people have discussed their reasons for abortion on the air.

I don't recall ever seeing a fetus dismembered on air.

Did you ever notice that sundry medical operations are shown on tv... but not abortion?

[Psst... is the animated gif working for you? It's my first effort.]

From an abstract:

Decisions and determinants of decisions to prolong or shorten life in the course of fatal diseases like ALS are poorly understood. Decisions and desire for hastened death of N = 93 ALS patients were investigated in a prospective longitudinal approach three times in the course of 1 year. Determinants of decisions were evaluated: quality of life (QoL), depression, feeling of being a burden, physical function, social support and cognitive status. More than half of patients had a positive attitude towards life-sustaining treatments and they had a low desire for hastened death. Of those with undecided or negative attitude, 10 % changed attitudes towards life-sustaining treatments in the course of 1 year. Patients' desire to hasten death was low and decreased significantly within 1 year despite physical function decline. Those with a high desire for hastened death decided against invasive therapeutic treatments. QoL, depression and social support were not predictors for vital decisions and remained stable. Feeling of being a burden was a predictor for decisions against life-supporting treatments. Throughout physical function loss, decisions to prolong life are flexibly adapted while desire to shorten life declines. QoL was stable and not a predictor for vital decisions, even though anticipated low QoL has been reported to be the reason to request euthanasia. In contrast, feeling of being a burden in decision making needs more attention in clinical counselling. Considering a patient's possible adaptation processes in the course of a fatal disease is necessary.

Source:
J Neurol. 2014 Jan 12. [Epub ahead of print]
Live and let die: existential decision processes in a fatal disease.
Lulé D, Nonnenmacher S, Sorg S, Heimrath J, Hautzinger M, Meyer T, Kübler A, Birbaumer N, Ludolph AC.

I love this kind of trivia:

Of 881 Chinese handwritten volumes with medical texts of the 17th through mid-20th century held by Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin and Ethnologisches Museum Berlin-Dahlem, 48 volumes include prescriptions for induced abortion. A comparison shows that these records are significantly different from references to abortion in Chinese printed medical texts of pre-modern times. For example, the percentage of recipes recommended for artificial abortions in handwritten texts is significantly higher than those in printed medical books. Authors of handwritten texts used 25 terms to designate artificial abortion, with the term da tai [see text], lit.: "to strike the fetus", occurring most frequently. Its meaning is well defined, in contrast to other terms used, such as duo tai [see text], lit: "to make a fetus fall", xia tai [see text], lit. "to bring a fetus down", und duan chan [see text], lit., to interrupt birthing", which is mostly used to indicate a temporary or permanent sterilization. Pre-modern Chinese medicine has not generally abstained from inducing abortions; physicians showed a differentiating attitude. While abortions were descibed as "things a [physician with an attitude of] humaneness will not do", in case a pregnancy was seen as too risky for a woman she was offered medication to terminate this pregnancy. The commercial application of abortifacients has been recorded in China since ancient times. A request for such services has continued over time for various reasons, including so-called illegitimate pregnancies, and those by nuns, widows and prostitutes. In general, recipes to induce abortions documented in printed medical literature have mild effects and are to be ingested orally. In comparison, those recommended in handwritten texts are rather toxic. Possibly to minimize the negative side-effects of such medication, practitioners of folk medicine developed mechanical devices to perform "external", i.e., vaginal approaches.

Okay, it's a small study, but obese women get so much bad news, don't they deserve some good news?

This problem is epidemic.

QUOTE from a reader of Fr. Z:

The priest in my parish seems to be a very decent and holy Man; but his homilies are super simplistic and boil down to being good and faithful. He also tells a minimum of two jokes per homily.

Have you folks been anecdoted to death yet?

It seems every homily has an anecdote. And I'm not just talking one or two priests.

Check out these maps that show the reality.

Pro-abortion governors:

Pro- and anti-abortion state governments:

States that enacted pro-life measures in 2013 [in blue]:

Number of cumlative state-wide pro-life measures enacted in 2013:

The one big victory pro-aborts scored was Obamacare.

But big victories are built on a lot of little victories.

Majority resulted in abortion.

I thought this study was fascinating and I hope more is done on this topic.

Objectives

Popular discourse on abortion in film and television assumes that abortions are under- and misrepresented. Research indicates that such representations influence public perception of abortion care and may play a role in the production of social myths around abortion, with consequences for women’s experience of abortion. To date, abortion plotlines in American film and television have not been systematically tracked and analyzed.

Study Design

A comprehensive online search was conducted to identify all representations of pregnancy decision-making and abortion in American film and television through January 2013. Search results were coded for year, pregnancy decision, and mortality outcome.
Results

310 plotlines were identified, with an overall upward trend over time in the number of representations of abortion decision-making. Of these plotlines, 173 (55.8%) resulted in abortion, 80 (25.8%) in parenting, 13 (4.2%) in adoption, 21 (6.7%) in pregnancy loss, and 16 (5.1%) were unresolved. 13.5% (n = 42) of stories ended with the death of the woman who considered an abortion, whether or not she obtained one.

Conclusions

Abortion-related plotlines occur more frequently than popular discourse assumes. Year-to-year variation in frequency suggests an interactive relationship between media representations, cultural attitudes, and policies around abortion regulation, consistent with cultural theory of the relationship between media products and social beliefs. Patterns of outcomes and rates of mortality are not representative of real experience, and may contribute to social myths around abortion. The narrative linking of pregnancy termination with mortality is of particular note, supporting the social myth associating abortion with death.

Implications

This analysis empirically describes the number of abortion-related plotlines in American film and television. It contributes to the systematic evaluation of the portrayal of abortion in popular culture, and provides abortion care professionals and advocates with an initial accurate window into cultural stories being told about abortion.

Source:
Telling stories about abortion: abortion-related plots in American film and television, 1916–2013 ☆ ☆☆ ★
Gretchen Sisson, PhDCorresponding author contact information, E-mail the corresponding author,
Katrina Kimport, PhD
University of California, San Francisco
Contraception
Available online 9 January 2014

I know that prima facie, a lot of pro-lifers will be in favour of this.

But remember that this is experimental.

Unborn children will be involved in this experiment, without their consent.

I really hope this works.

Because if it doesn't, a lot of babies will die.

Women might, too.

I'm from Quebec. We never used ushers-- at least not in the French churches. We all line up haphazardly, we all get Communion, no riots break out.

The first time I saw an usher in an English church in Quebec, it was a math teacher directing traffic during communion when my school went to Mass at the church next door. I just thought he was being a control freak. It never dawned on me this is how it was done in the rest of North America.

I never got the concept of ushers. People greeting parishoners and giving out bulletins, okay, but not ushers.

With the exception of Christmas, when you`re trying to find a spot to squeeze in.

(Psst... it's satire, in case that wasn't obvious).

Any takers?

One advantage of the Pope's approach is that when he does condemn abortion, it hits home:

‘‘It arouses horror at the thought that there are children who will never see the light – victims of abortion – or those children who are used as soldiers, raped or killed in armed conflicts, objects in that tremendous market in the form of modern slavery that is human trafficking, which is a crime against humanity,’‘ Pope Francis said.

Somebody should do a count of the number of times Pope Francis condemned abortion in the first year of his pontificate compared to Pope Benedict and Pope John Paul II.

I sense he would compare favourably.

Apparently Sunday Assembly isn't atheist enough for some:

Last fall, Jones and Evans embarked on a mission to spread their godless assembly to cities around the globe. They traveled throughout the U.K., Ireland, Australia, Canada and the United States, including stops in Los Angeles and New York.

“Our vision: a godless congregation in every town, city and village that wants one,” their website states.

However, according to a CNN report this week, three members of the New York Sunday Assembly decided to break away from Jones and Evans and launch their own “denomination” so to speak, called The Godless Revival.

Founder Lee Moore reportedly accused the founders of Sunday Assembly of having “a real problem with atheism,” asserting that he was advised to refrain from using the word “atheist,” not to feature atheist speakers and to host the meetings in a more family-friendly location other than the local dive bar.

I find the name of the denomination a little ironic.

"Revival" means bringing faith back to life. There's nothing to bring back to life with atheism.

Have you noticed how atheism borrows a lot from religion (particularly Christianity) to legitimize their movement?

If you really hated religion, wouldn't you shun everything associated with it? Why would you call your group a Church, a denomination or a revival? It's like Christianity without God.

Why not a Saturday group? Why not call it a shul?

It suggests that maybe Christianity wasn't as bad or wrong as they make it out to be.

I'm posting this FYI for the pro-life geeks out there who are curious about lesser known methods of killing fetuses.

My interest was piqued by this study investigating the effectiveness and safety of umbilical cord ligation as a method of feticide.

The issue, of course, was safety to the healthy twin, and the mother.

The age of the pregnancies in question were 17-27 weeks.

In the past ten days, six newborn babies were abandoned in Udaipur region. Shockingly, the data reflects that on an average every second day an infant has been deserted by his or her parent. All of these infants were hardly a day or two-day old when recovered by the authorities. Three of them are under safe abandoned categories since they were found in cradles. Three boys and three girls are abandoned on the New Year.

...

Mahesh Ashram administration has been given the guardianship of all the infants. 'It indeed heartbreaking to see the infants in such a plight but if we look at the positive aspect, it is a relief that people are not throwing the babies in sewers and trash bins but are safely discarded on cradles. The babies will survive now," Devendra Agarwal of Mahesh Ashram said

Yes, the babies will survive now. Because they weren't aborted.

Many critics say that such newborns face dire prospects because they have been abandoned.

But the truth is, there are countless couples waiting to adopt such children.

The question is: how to match these babies to the couples who want them.

Jeff Mirus articulates what I have been thinking:

It has become clear over the past few years that the emphasis on “culture wars” has done little or nothing to reverse the flight of Western culture from Christian values, even though the concept was initially perceived as a sort of rubric through which the public morality essential to the common good might be recovered. During this same period, the Church has called repeatedly instead for a “new evangelization”. The apparent clash between the two phrases has come to a head in the insistence of Pope Francis that we must proclaim the whole Gospel rather than concentrating so much on public battles over the Gospel’s most contested moral points.

This conceptual shift has been bewildering to many, who wonder whether their public witness to the faith is unappreciated in Rome or, worse, whether they have somehow been wrong to screw their courage to the sticking point in precisely those controversies where contemporary society is most opposed to the Church. I hope by now that sufficient distinctions have been made to enable everyone to see the larger issue. It is not that working for the public acceptance of Christian and natural morality is wrong, but that the failure to recognize and respond to the need of our contemporaries for the full Gospel is self-defeating. Our moral efforts are often undermined by a kind of tunnel vision.

The public culture is increasingly anti-Christian not primarily because of political manipulation but because the private culture is, on the whole, not significantly Christian at all. People do not support divorce, contraception, abortion, homosexual behavior, same-sex marriage, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research, and, inter alia, the primacy of secularity and the State over religiosity and the Church primarily because they are evil, but primarily because they are wounded and lost. There are reasons enough over the past several hundred years for what we might call our deep civilizational loss of faith. Even for those called to emphasize public battles, it is useless to proceed as if we are just a few votes away from the Age of Faith when, in fact, we live in a period where effective awareness of the Gospel is largely non-existent.

What does that amount to?

In this light, it is paramount to foster the development of more apostolates which serve the needs which people recognize in themselves. Such apostolates serve at once as a concrete manifestation of Christian love and as a means to respond to other needs which people may not yet recognize.

Let's superimpose this on the current situation inside the Church.

We have a doctrinal dissent problem.

While apologetics and debate are good and necessary, we are far more likely to be listened to if we serve the people.

Why are do many people ignore Church teaching?

It is true that a lot of it has to do with not being taught the Faith, and there is a lot of heresy out there that undermines efforts to teach the faith.

The thing is, they don't see orthodoxy in action. They don't see how it's relevant to their lives.

How do you expect a cohabitating couple to adhere to the faith they can't make the link between Church teaching and their concrete existence?

These couples have problems. So what are we doing to help them with their problems?

Now I'm not advocating that we sanction their living arrangement.

But, they are still a couple and they still have legit problems. Take, for instance, raising children. How can faithful Catholics help them raise their kids in a better way?

I've often thought about there are mothers who need affordable baby-sitting, or mentoring, or some place to call when they have an issue that can't be solved in their immediate social network because the people in it are just a basket case. There are a lot of Church ladies who could mentor, babysit, and give advice on how to deal with situations.

Now if you serve the people, they make friends with you.

Friends are far more likely to listen to friends.

Friends are more likely to get people to pray, turn to Jesus-- and the Church. And the wisdom of the Church.

(Wisdom, that's another thing that seems to have been abandoned, but that's a blogpost for another day).

Of course, in saying, I don't think we should stop doing the apologetical work, or the prolife activism.

There is a danger that when we suggest a new approach, we abandon old approaches that have done good. Apologetics has done a heckuva lot of good for the Church, and so has prolife activism. Apologetics is still the order of the day. So is putting forward pro-life ideas. Because when the single mom's heart has turned to Jesus, and she begins considering what the Church says, she will need answers to her questions and that's where apologetics comes in.

I have often sensed that Church life has lost its sense of relationships. How many churches I have been to where I was just a benchwarmer to the priest. I didn't know him and he sure as heck didn't know me. It was like going to the theatre, I was the anonymous audience to his words instead of a child in a spiritual family. He was a sacrament dispenser and I was a recipient. It was like he was a bureaucrat administering a government service in the Kingdom of God.

I remember talking to a Mennonite pastor who did rescue work in Toronto in the 80s. He told me the story of another prolife pastor who was eventually charged with pimping his wife because they needed money for dental work. I can't remember the exact details of the story, but that's not the point. What he said was that he was ashamed and mad that this man could not come to the Church with his problems and ask and expect help. He had to sink to this level of desperation.

Well how true is that? How true is that of Catholics? How true is that of indifferent Catholics, "ex" Catholics, apostate Catholics, lukewarm Catholics? It's even more true than with respect to orthodox Catholics.

I can't say the Church has ever help solved any of my personal problems. Or anybody else I know.

And as I write this, I feel a certain compassion fatigue myself. Everybody asks me to care when I have my own family to take care of.

Notwithstanding my own weariness, the Church needs to do this stuff, regardless of my feelings, which I suspect represent a large swath of the Catholic population. I'm not the only one tired at the end of the day of taking care of the family.

(But then this is why we have religious, isn't it? Because they are free to devote their time).

Orthodoxy still needs to be on the agenda. Just as Pope Francis said, we can't only talk about abortion.

In fact, we can't only talk.

We have to find the means to put our faith into practice in a way that helps lost and wounded souls. A lost and wounded soul needs Jesus. Spiritual cripples can't find solace in high-fallutin' dogmas. We have to be Jesus to them.

I don't pretend to know how this can be put into practice concretely. But it needs to be said.

I completely identify with Faye Sonier.

When I'm pregnant, I cannot debate abortion. I can post about it or read about it, but debating it gives me palpitations that could very well send me to the hospital.

Other pro-lifers have confessed to me that sometimes, to cope, they have to mentally and emotionally move to a 30,000 foot view of the abortion issue. They need to think about the “issue” without thinking about one or every single life destroyed. I fully understand how it would be crippling to function, much less engage, otherwise. I’ve been there too. Some days, as horrible as it sounds, I can’t bear to think about each life lost. On those days, I can handle a statistic, but I can’t handle the Susies, or Ellas, or Matteos, or Jacks who didn’t make it through the day because an abortionist and mother decided that today would be that child’s last.

Yep, that's me. I have to neutralize the issue, otherwise I can't be efficient.

And then sometimes, late at night, I break down and cry. It's overwhelming.

They say abortion hardens women and abortionists. Sometimes I wonder if it doesn't harden pro-lifers as well. Maybe not in their conscience. But somewhere on the emotional level, you can't let things affect you that you otherwise would, because it would distract you from the big picture.

A lot of moral outrage gets stuffed for the greater good.

Many well-intentioned pro-lifers say that when it comes to abortion, they want to apply the laws on murder to the deaths of fetuses.

They mean well because they value the unborn child, and they want to see justice done. So it's normal that they say this.

But the reality of pregnancy and abortion makes that wish practically impossible (which is not to say I oppose an abortion law).

This article underscores my point.

I think this suit is positively laughable.

He spread the supposed "defamation" more widely by going to the media than if he had just shut up about it--which says that he WANTED people to know what others said because it was to his advantage

When people spread embarrassing lies about me that can damage my reputation, I don't tell others about the said lie.

That this lawsuit was allowed to proceed is shocking.

It is utterly baseless.

God bless this boy's soul:

THE father of a Pakistani teenager killed after tackling a suicide bomber has hailed his son for saving "hundreds'' of lives through his bravery.

Aitzaz Hassan, aged around 15, died in hospital after stopping the bomber, who blew himself up, at the gates of his school in the northwestern district of Hangu on Monday.

His father Mujahid Ali Bangash, 55, said he felt not sadness but pride at his son's death.

"Aitzaz has made us proud by valiantly intercepting the bomber and saving the lives of hundreds of his fellow students,'' he said. "I am happy that my son has become a martyr by sacrificing his life for a noble cause.''

...

Police official Shakirullah Bangash said that Aitzaz intercepted the bomber some 150 metres away from the main gate of the school, which has around 1000 students, most of them Shiite.

The schoolchildren were the target of the attack, he added.

Wow. Now that's guts.

Dear Muslim World: this is the example more of you need to follow. To uphold life, not destroy it. To be prepared to suffer for a cause rather than kill someone for it.

Asks Julie at Concerned for Life. She writes:

What constantly surprises me is the negative reaction to a basic biological fact - Luc's life did begin nine months before he was born into the world. The ad does not say Luc was a person nine months ago, it simply states when his life began. Why is it that pro-choicers cannot admit this fact that is written into every medical text? They can say they don't believe Luc was a person; we are not arguing that philosophical point. We are simply stating something that people who support abortion do not want to admit: the fact that this baby is a live organism during its entire time in the womb. It really is quite ignorant to deny such a basic fact. Surely their argument against being pro-life should be based on something more factual than their visceral reaction to this simple statement.

Now some people who support abortion will admit that life begins at conception and that the embryo is a human being, at least in a biological sense.

However, it has been my experience that most will not.

Many know that once you admit that the embryo is a human being, you are ceding the argumentative ground to the pro-life cause.

And so in the name of politics, they deny the embryo is a human being. Even if all the facts show it.

This is why it's important to forward the facts.

Truth always wins.

I am totally disgusted.

He should reject that award.

The Order of Canada was completely discredited when it was award to Henry Morgentaler.

It's only a matter of time before parents can pick the blue-eyed blond babies.

I suspect there may come a time, far in the future, where we will look up to babies such as these who were genetically selected for their superior qualities.

I thought there was no application, so I stopped paying attention.

Now that I know there is an update, it's more important than ever to sign the petition calling on the Minister to reject RU-486.

Have you co-signed MP Cheryl Gallant's letter to stop the ban on the incandescent light bulb?

75- and 100- watt bulbs are now banned for sale in Canada.

The same will happen to 40- and 60- watt bulbs by the end of 2014.

Please sign.

A government should not be telling the people how to light their homes.

And please, post this link to the website on your blogs and social media. Get lots of people to sign. This is a very important campaign.

This is how governments take away liberty: one small measure at a time. If the people don't react, the government will keep doing it.

Want to know how to get involved in the pro-life movement?

Share it around.

Post by Royal Bingham.

UPDATE at 12:31 Pm January 5th.

I thought this video might not be of an abortion. From the comments, again without confirmation:

I love this story:

“What are the nuns doing that they can’t answer the phone?” Francis asked in the message he left, the recording of which was obtained by Spain’s El Mundo newspaper and broadcast on Italian media Saturday.

“This is Pope Francis. I wanted to offer you greetings for the end of the year. Maybe I’ll try to call again later. May God bless you,” he said.

I bet the nuns are kicking themselves.

I am in between the generation that sends everyone to voicemail and those who feel it's rude not to pick up.

I pick up unless I'm really in a bind.

My husband doesn't pick up if he doesn't feel like getting up or talking. Which is not infrequent and which I think is rude to people we suspect may be phoning (we don't have a machine! My voicemail is on my cell phone).

Luckily I have four daughters. Two of them answer the phone, and my five-year-old picked up for the first time when I called from out-of-town the other night. My husband didn't want to pick up (He might have been busy, though).

The Pinchuk Art Cetre in Kiev is holding an art exhibition entitled Where There's a Will, There's a Way. It's dedicated to the theme of AIDS.

Now this piece by Ukranian artist Ilya Chichkan isn't meant to be a fetal rights piece, but it prominently features two stone sculptures of unborn babies, one in a female hand, another in a male hand:

Since the hands holding the sculptures are live, it's considered "performance art".

(I just wonder what those actors do all day, standing in back of a wall!)

The blurb is quite interesting:

This new work consists of two human hands that are each holding a tiny sculpture representing a “deformed” foetus. One is the hand of a woman, a metaphor of motherhood relating to AIDS as a risk for the unborn child, often infected inside the womb. The second hand is that of a man, a metaphor of (failed) protection.

I'm not sure what to make of this piece, but I'm very intrigued, and I'm always keen to underscore the presence of the unborn in contemporary art.

You only see his face between 0:35-1:26 -- the rest is pretty boring.

The video is from Dr. Osama Shawki.

Good.For.Him.

I hope others follow suit.

“I’m the first person to say you can’t disobey the law because you may not like it. I may not like paying my taxes, but I have to pay them,” said constitutional lawyer Julius Grey.

But when a law violates fundamental rights, civil disobedience is “a necessary safety valve,” he said.

“It’s the essence of liberal democracy that when your conscience tells you can’t do something, you cannot do it,” Grey said.

This is rich:

However, Daniel Weinstock, a law professor at McGill University, thinks it’s unlikely the charter will result in civil disobedience since he doubts the government really intends to enforce the charter, should it pass.

“I can’t see the government going into Jewish General Hospital and start arresting nurses in hijabs and doctors in kippahs,” he said.

If the government does not intend to enforce this law, it's an unjust law.

If you do not enforce the law, you make a mockery of the law. You cannot pass a law without the intention of enforcing it. It makes the law into an empty dare.

I don't buy the central thesis:

The prevailing opinion amongst those who talk and write about discernment is that God calls men and women to religious life by placing an innate desire for religious life in their hearts. If you have no such desire, it is unlikely that you are called.

This advice, although it looks harmless on the surface, ends up thwarting religious vocations. Men and women who prayerfully examine their desires almost never find a strong desire for religious life lodged in the depths of their hearts.

This looks pretty good:

Tyler talked with this mother and daughter who were curious about street evangelization. The mother is Catholic but the daughter is fallen away from the faith (she says she is now agnostic and gay). The daughter made some claims that fallen away Catholics often make, specifically expressing the opinion that the Bible and Church’s teachings are outdated. This view is understandable if one does not see morality as based on an objective standard, such as Natural Law. Moral relativism is a problem evangelists encounter often, since it is easy to espouse but ultimately a shallow and dangerous road. When it comes to talking with people who identify as homosexual, they are often afraid that Catholics “hate” them and specifically target them. But the team explained that the Catholic position is not about singling out a specific group, but rather about expressing a consistent moral ethic. The team explained that sins such as cohabitation are also wrong, even if the couple is not gay, because ultimately sexual relations are designed by God for a specific purpose, and any purpose outside that is thus contrary to God’s will. The team said that the daughter seemed to have a lot of spiritual turmoil in her life, which can prevent a person from turning back to God. Let us pray for her, as her mother says she does daily.

We need a LOT more of this.

Trinity Western is a Christian institution in Langley, B.C. It is not a racist institution. But it does require its students to sign a “Community Covenant,” promising not to get drunk, watch porn, or engage in “sexual intimacy that violates the sacredness of marriage between a man and a woman.”

In other words: no gays allowed. (Before you ask: No, you can’t ban gay sex without effectively banning gays.)

If you can't ban gay sex without effectively banning gays, then you can't ban opposition to homosexuality without effectively banning Christians.

Public Health (Folkehelseinstituttet) figures showed between 2001 to 2009, five abortions were performed at weeks 22 or 23. Between 2010 and 2011, 12 abortions were carried out. Some of the aborted fetuses’ hearts continued beating for between 45 and 90 minutes, reported Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK).

If a baby has to die in the name of female empowerment, so what? It's only human life.

... and 1 in 7 abuse marijuana.

I shouldn't be shocked, but I am:

The objectives of the present study were to identify the prevalence of alcohol abuse and marijuana use among First Nations youth living on-reserve, and to identify independent risk indicators associated with these behaviours. Two hundred four students from the Saskatoon Tribal Council (Saskatchewan) who were enrolled in grades 5 through 8 were asked to complete a school health survey. The prevalence of alcohol abuse and marijuana use among First Nations on-reserve youth was 23.5% and 14.7%, respectively. Surprisingly, female First Nations youth were more likely to abuse alcohol and use marijuana than male First Nations youth. The prevalence of alcohol abuse and marijuana use among Saskatoon urban youth of the same age were only 5.4% and 2.7%, respectively. After regression analysis, five independent risk indicators were associated with alcohol abuse and marijuana use among First Nations on-reserve youth. The prevalence of alcohol abuse among First Nations on-reserve youth is higher than that in neighbouring urban youth of the same age.

Source:
Paediatr Child Health. 2013 Jan;18(1):10-4.
Prevalence and risk indicators of alcohol abuse and marijuana use among on-reserve First Nations youth.
Lemstra M, Rogers M, Moraros J, Caldbick S.

I can just see this as a backdoor argument for capital punishment.

"He's going to suffer from the intense guilt of his crime, it's for his own good."

It also shows a certain ageism and ableism.

If the suicidal person is young and reasonably healthy, their suicidal impulses are unhealthy and they need to be given a reason to live.

If the suicidal person is terminally ill, disabled or mentally ill, it's normal that they feel that way, so they don't need to be given a reason to live. Such attempts at persuasion are interference.

H/T: Alex Schadenberg

This is right up there with banning extra-large pop:

Animal-rights activists say the carriage horses are overworked and claim that the city's traffic and pollution create an unsafe environment.

"They constantly breathe exhaust while dodging dangerous traffic," says the website of one anti-carriage group, New Yorkers for Clean, Livable, and Safe Streets (NYCLASS), "confined to the shafts of their carriage and their tiny stable stalls, with no access to green pastures."

Of all the problems that are plaguing New York City, they're worried about horses.

Who cares if people have to breathe that polluted air?

Who cares if ghetto kids don't have access to pasture?

Let's ban horses what they love to do.

That'll perk them right up!

Does anyone see the irony of banning environmentally horses to accommodate polluting cars?

But maybe I should just shut my mouth right now. Don't want to give progressives any ideas...

This is a really good post on what's wrong with radical traditionalists.

My beef with traditionalism is how many proclaim fidelity to the Church while not being faithful to the Church.
Ultimately, you either trust in the Church's Magisterium, or you don't.

Magisterial teaching is what the living Magisterium says. Not what you think dead popes said.

Why would the papal Magisterium have been right for 2000 years, but then suddenly go astray?

You shouldn't have to ask whether you have to decide between the Magisterium and one's personal evaluation of Magisterial teaching.

God established the Magisterium to eliminate all that second guessing.

From an email sent to Mary Meets Dolly:

I was one of three embryos created in the process, but I was the only one who survived. I mourn my siblings every single day. I can't talk about them with my parents, because bringing the subject up inevitably causes fights, and they don't feel the way I in the do. They don't regret what they did, they don't see anything wrong with IVF, and they don't count my siblings as members of the family. They never bring them up in conversation, and when I talk about them, they'll concede that they are my siblings, but it's only to make me feel better. I don't think they really believe it. If they did, they'd regret what they did. When people asked how many children they had, they'd say three. They'd talk about them as members of the family, and say how much they wished they could be there at Christmas and birthdays. My mum would light candles for them at church and have Masses said for them. But it's just me. I'm the only one who seems to care about them.

It hurts me every time I see in the news something about IVF, because the media treats it as if it's okay. There's never any mention that people die during the process.

The closest thing I can come up with is this page.

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