“Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person -- among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life. “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you” (Jer 1:5; cf Job 10:8-12; Ps 22:10-11). “My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth” (Ps. 139:15). Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable.”
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2270-2271
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“For me, life is the most beautiful gift of God to mankind, therefore people and nations who destroy life by abortion and euthanasia are the poorest. I do not say legal or illegal ,but I think that no human hand should be raised to kill life, since life is God’s life in us, even in an unborn child.”
Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
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“While it is true that the taking of life not yet born or in its final stages is sometimes marked by a mistaken sense of altruism and human compassion, it cannot be denied that such a culture of death, taken as a whole, betrays a completely individualistic concept of freedom, which ends up by becoming the freedom of "the strong" against the weak who have no choice but to submit.”
Pope John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life), 1995, no. 19
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“The fact that human life begins at conception is a scientific conclusion, not simply a religious one. The moral norm, which prompts our constant opposition to abortion is the fact that each and every human life has inherent dignity, and thus must be treated with the respect due to a human person. The claim that some human lives do not deserve respect or should not be treated as “persons” is to deny the very idea of inherent human rights.”
Archbishop John G. Vlazny, Speech delivered on Jan 18, 2009, Roe V. Wade Memorial Rally
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“Every child … brings us God’s smiles and invites us to recognize that life is His gift, a gift to be welcomed with love and preserved with care always and at every moment.”
Pope Benedict XVI
* * *
“While many today really acknowledge the dignity and value of human life after birth, they seem to think that ascribing dignity and value to lives before birth is a throwback to outmoded religious beliefs, having no place in our modern scientific world. Yet it is science itself that is proving them wrong. Science shows us the humanity and personhood of children in the womb who, far from being inert and passive tissue, actively direct their own development.”
Every Child Brings Us God’s Smile, USCCB Respect Life Sunday Flyer2009
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“As today’s pro-life community often is, Paul was regularly ridiculed: indeed, he suffered far worse than ridicule, for the truth about God, God’s law, and the natural law makes many uncomfortable. Those who resist God’s law don’t want to be reminded of its demands. This is no less true in our time than in Paul’s. And so we pray for the conversion of those whose hearts have been made hard by the sin of abortion and the sin of its propagation. We pray for the courage and persistence of St. Paul, as we endeavor to spread the Gospel of Life. We pray for the triumph of life”
Cardinal William Keeler, 2006
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“Pope Benedict asks us to turn our love for abused children into prayer... In December we remember the birth of Jesus. God showed his love for us by becoming flesh to save us. As a little child, Jesus invites our love and so dignifies children everywhere… In praying for the exploited children of the world, we truly enter into the Heart of Christ. The will of his Heart is that not one of these little ones be lost.”
“The International Labor Organization estimates that about 1,800,000 minors between 8 and 18 are exploited as soldiers, forced laborers, and sex slaves throughout the world. This number does not take into account the millions who are victims of abortion. Nor does it take into account the millions who are secretly abused by those who should be protecting them.”
Source: apostleshipofprayer.org Apostleship of Prayer is a Catholic organization that receives monthly prayer intentions from Pope Benedict XVI and urges Christians throughout the world to unite in prayer for those intentions.
* * *
"The Gospel of life is at the heart of Jesus' message. Lovingly received day after day by the Church, it is to be preached with dauntless fidelity as "good news" to the people of every age and culture. At the dawn of salvation, it is the Birth of a Child which is proclaimed as joyful news: "I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people; for to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord" (Lk 2:10-11). The source of this "great joy" is the Birth of the Saviour; but Christmas also reveals the full meaning of every human birth, and the joy which accompanies the Birth of the Messiah is thus seen to be the foundation and fulfillment of joy at every child born into the world (cf. Jn 16:21)."
- Pope John Paul II, "The Gospel of Life (Evangelium Vitae)"
Health Care Reform
"We need genuine health care reform - reform that help save lives, not destroy them."
USCCB
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We Shall Not Weary, We Shall Not Rest
“We shall not weary, we shall not rest, until every unborn child is protected in law and welcomed in life. We shall not weary, we shall not rest, until all the elderly who have run life’s course are protected against despair and abandonment, protected by the rule of law and the bonds of love. We shall not weary, we shall not rest, until every young woman is given the help she needs to recognize the problem of pregnancy as the gift of life. We shall not weary, we shall not rest, as we stand guard at the entrance gates and the exit gates of life, and at every step along the way of life, bearing witness in word and deed to the dignity of the human person—of every human person”.
Fr. Richard John Neuhaus (1936-2009)
Father Richard John Nehaus founded the Institute on Religion and Public Life, and its journal First Things, an ecumenical journal whose purpose is to advance a religiously informed public philosophy for the ordering of society. He was active in the civil rights movement, helped form alliance between evangelical Protestants and Catholics and was a prominent pro-life voice. Fore more info, go to http://www.firstthings.com/richard-john-neuhaus
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Unborn Jesus Our Hope
“What about honoring Jesus in the very first stages of His earthly life-as an unborn baby developing in the Blessed Virgin Mary’s womb? We can do this because Jesus shared our existence from conception to death; He sanctified every moment of human existence, including nine months in the womb…. Jesus, by becoming an unborn human person, united Himself to every unborn person. When the unborn are rejected, caused to suffer, and killed, Jesus too is rejected, suffers, and is killed. “Whatever you did for the least of my brothers and sisters you did for me.” Devotion to Unborn Jesus is a call to honor Jesus in all the unborn people of our world. It is a way that we can grow in an appreciation of the gift of life in its initial stages. And it’s a powerful way that we can pray for the unborn.”
- Father James M. Kubicki, S.J., Commentary on George Peate’s book “Unborn Jesus Our Hope”
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Mothers – Source of Life and Joy
“Once I picked up a child and took him to our Children’s Home, gave him a bath, clean clothes, everything. After a day the child ran away. He was found by somebody else but again he ran away. Then I said to the Sisters: Please follow the child and see where he goes when he runs away. And the child ran away the third time. There under a tree was the mother. She had put a small earthenware vessel on two stones and was cooking something she had picked out of the dustbin. The Sisters asked the child: ‘Why did you run away from the Home?’ And the child said: ‘This is my home because this is where my mother is.’ Mother was there. That was home.” -
Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
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Q&A with Fr. Peter Siamoo
Q: Is the Church position on abortion anti-woman?
A: Fr. Peter: "Absolutely no! Scripture specifies the prohibition contained in the fifth commandment: "Do not slay the innocent and the righteous" [Exodus 23:7]. The deliberate murder of an innocent person is gravely contrary to the dignity of the human being, to the golden rule, and to the holiness of the Creator. The law forbidding it is universally valid: it obliges each and everyone, always and everywhere (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2261). So, woman is not a target of this law, every person is bound by it. That being said, I would say that the church position on abortion is not at all anti-women. In fact it is the opposite of it. It is empirically evident that abortion has serious side effects on the woman regardless of the reasons that led to it. Spiritually because it is a grave sin; physically because it is done on/in woman’s body; emotionally because of going against the natural law by brutally terminating the natural mother-child relationship; economically because someone should pay for the procedures involved and the aftermath therapy and so on. By saying no to abortion, the church wants to set women free from the miseries associated by that act."
~ Fr. Peter Siamoo, Priest in Residence, St. Pius X Parish, Portland OR {used 7/11/2010}
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Dear brothers and sisters, our coming together this evening to begin the Advent journey is enriched by another important reason: with the entire Church, we want to solemnly celebrate a prayer vigil for unborn life. I wish to express my thanks to all who have taken up this invitation and those who are specifically dedicated to welcoming and safeguarding human life in different situations of fragility, especially in its early days and in its early stages. The beginning of the liturgical year helps us to relive the expectation of God made flesh in the womb of the Virgin Mary, God who makes himself small, He becomes a child, it speaks to us of the coming of a God who is near, who wanted to experience the life of man, from the very beginning, to save it completely, fully. And so the mystery of the Incarnation of the Lord and the beginning of human life are intimately connected and in harmony with each other within the one saving plan of God, the Lord of life of each and every one of us. The Incarnation reveals to us, with intense light and in an amazing way, that every human life has an incomparable, a most elevated dignity.
~ Pope Benedict: Mass for Nascent Life, Nov 28, 2010
* * *
"My story is not a comfortable one to read. I think it’s only fair to warn you of that up front. Not comfortable, but honest and true. As you are about to discover, I’ve spent years on the front lines of the face-off between pro-choice and pro-life advocates. Which side? Both sides. You are about to enter my journey from naive college girl to director of a Planned Parenthood clinic to advocate for families in crisis, including the unborn members of those families.
I reveal my story not because I am proud of it. I am not. But my thinking and choices are not unlike those of so many people I have encountered. And until we each set aside our own preferences for how we wish others would think and behave, or how we assume others think and behave, we won’t be able to understand those with whom we differ in order to engage in real dialogue and discover truth….
My story is not neat and tidy, and it doesn’t come wrapped in easy answers. Oh, how we love to vilify our opponents—from both sides. How easy to assume that those on “our” side are right and wise and good; how those on “their” side are treacherous and foolish and deceptive. I have found right and good and wisdom on both sides. I have found foolishness and treachery and deception on both sides as well. I have experienced how good intentions can be warped into poor choices no matter what the side.
To this day I have friends on both sides of this polarizing debate. We all long for a story that shows that “our” side is right and good, and “their” side is wrong and bad, don’t we? But I testify that there is good and right and wrong on both sides of the fence. And even more shocking—we have far more in common with the “other” side than we might imagine.
But don’t slam this book shut because of what I’ve just said. Read it for that very reason. Read it to understand the surprising hopes and motivations on the “other” side. I was loved from one side onto the other. My hope is that many more thousands will be loved into truth as well. Maybe you will be the one loving someone on the other side of the fence.”
Read more about Abby’s journey: http://www.ignatius.com/promotions/unplanned/
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The DC March for Life, the West Coast Walk for Life, and Cardinal DiNardo
“You have been, have become and remain the genuine leaders and pioneers of this March for Life and this vigil Liturgy….. To the astonishment of nature, of the chattering classes and of disinterested and jaded media, you have continuously come forward here and throughout the places where you live to be unflagging witnesses to the inestimable worth of each human person.”
http://www.marchforlife.org/
http://walkforlifewc.blogspot.com/
Consider the following:
- A crowd of over 200,000 came to the 38th annual March for Life in Washington DC.
- Following the vigil Mass the night before the march, confessions were heard for more than two hours, a National Rosary for Life was prayed and seminarians from around the country led Holy Hours of Eucharistic adoration in the crypt church from midnight until morning.
- More than 27,000 youth attended the opening Youth Rally and Mass for Life in DC, and it had to be expanded to other nearby overflow locations.
- A record crowd of over 50,000 participated in the 7th annual West Coast Walk for Life, which began only in 2005.
* * *
Fr. John Kerns of St. Juan Diego parish is visiting Vietnam with Fr. Peter Binh Hoang of St. Stephen Parish. They recently visited the Motherhouse of the Sisters Adorers of the Holy Cross of Da Lat, who have a community of Sisters here in Portland. The Sister’s gave them a tour of some of their charities, one of which was a home for unwed Mothers. Fr. John reflects on this visit on his trip blog:
“We visited their school for the blind. Then their home for unwed mothers and orphan children. They have a unique way of finding the young mothers who need their help. Lay people who support the sisters’ ministry, go to abortion clinics incognito. They will sit in the waiting room and strike up a conversation with the pregnant women: “When did you find out you were pregnant?” “Did you think about other options?” Then, in a non-judgmental way they will tell the pregnant women that the sisters will house and feed them through their entire pregnancy and delivery, AND raise their child. Very often, then, the pregnant mother will go with this person to the sisters’ charity to learn more about it. This scenario was repeated in the other orphanages we visited. For those expectant mothers who go through with an abortion, the sisters ask the doctors if they could be given the aborted fetuses to give them a proper burial. Amazingly, the doctors comply. In two years the sisters have buried 2000 babies on land that was donated by a local coffee farmer. The sisters had asked if they could buy the land, but when the seller heard what it was for, he gave it to them. We prayed at that little cemetery. It was very emotional for me. Especially after holding a 3-month-old baby at the orphanage just minutes earlier. Another story. At the orphanage we met a little girl, Thao, who looked about 12, whose mother was convinced to bring Thao to full-term in the orphanage. Thao, was born there, is being raised by the sisters, helps the sisters care for the babies, and she, herself wants to be a sister now. To think that her life was almost taken by abortion, but her mother chose another option and now the lives of these other babies are loving touched by Thao as she cares for them. This young girl who already knows that her life is a gift and is sharing that gift with others.” http://frjohninvietnam.blogspot.com/2011/02/bao-loc-february-3-2011.html
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USCCB President, Archbishop Timothy Dolan Reflecting on Roe v Wade
"The comparison of abortion to slavery is an apt one. The right of a citizen to "own" another human being as property—to control him/her, use him/her, sell him or decide her fate—was, prior to 1865, constitutional, sad to say. That 'right' to own a slave was even upheld by a decision of the U.S. Supreme Court (whose Chief Justice at the time, Roger Brooke Taney, was a Catholic, 'personally opposed' to slavery!) in the infamous 1857 Dred Scott Decision, declaring that a slave who had escaped and claimed freedom had to be returned to his 'master,' because he had no rights at all. Tragically, in 1973, in Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court also strangely found in the constitution the right to abortion, thus declaring an entire class of human beings - now not African-Americans, but pre-born infants - to be slaves, whose futures, whose destinies, whose very right to life - can be decided by another 'master.' These fragile, frail babies have no civil rights at all. Our faces blush with shame as we Catholics admit we did so little to end slavery, but we can smile and thank God that the Church has indeed been prophetic, courageous and counter cultural in the right to life movement"
http://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/2009/10/452-word-of-week-lchaim.html
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Dr. Bernard N. Nathanson died at his home in New York on Feb 11, 2011. Dr. Nathanson was an abortion provider who oversaw more that 60,000 abortions, and early on was a strong supporter of abortion rights. He helped to found the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws (NARAL). With the development of ultrasound in the 1970s, Dr. Nathanson could observe real-time abortions and this led him to change his views and he embraced life and fought tirelessly to defend it. Dr. Nathanson confessed that the figures he once cited for NARAL concerning the number of deaths linked to illegal abortions were "false figures”. (
http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/abortion/ab0005.html)
Dr. Nathanson grew up Jewish. In 1996 he converted to Catholicism and was baptized, confirmed, and received first Communion from Cardinal John O'Connor. When asked why he converted to Catholicism, he stated that "no religion matches the special role for forgiveness that is afforded by the Catholic Church".
* * *
Be it done unto me according to thy word
"In taking on human flesh in the virginal womb of Mary of Nazareth, the Word of God made flesh has restored humanity to friendship with God and through his paschal mystery, has given the gift of human life an inestimable value that no one, no government, no legislature, no judicial court can rightfully and justly take away."
Most Rev. Robert McManus, Bishop of Worcester, homily, Vespers Vigil for All Unborn Human Life, Nov. 28, 2010
* * *
Bryan Kemper
Bryan Kemper, Presbyterian and self described former punk rocker, drug addict, and founder of pro-life “Stand True Ministries” is in RCIA preparing to enter the Catholic Church. Excerpts from Bryan:
“After many, many years of resisting a calling that I tried to suppress I have finally felt the peace of God with my decision to join the Catholic Church… There is only one church that has been consistent from the time of Christ to today on the teaching of pro-life and contraception. Before 1930 there was never a single Christian church in history to accept any form of contraception and today there is only one that absolutely has kept this Christian teaching and truth... I have always believed that communion was more than just a symbol and in looking back at early church teaching it is crystal clear that this was taught from day one… I will be starting RCIA classes and working towards confirmation.… I am asking my friends to pray for my family’s journey and me as I truly seek to be closer to Christ.” More from Msgr. Charles Pope at:
http://tinyurl.com/bryan-kemper
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The Great Human Capacity
In his
recent book length interview with Pope Benedict, Author Peter Seewald asks our Holy Father:
"....Life, Pope Paul (VI) said, is too great, too sacred, for us to meddle in, It is as if to say: If we do not respect the lives of our children, our own lives and the live of society, our world will be lost....."
In his response, Pope Benedict says:
"Paul VI has been prophetically right. He was convinced that society robs itself of its greatest hopes when it kills human beings through abortion. How many children are killed who might one day have been geniuses, who could have given humanity something new, who could have given us a new Mozart or some new technical discovery? We need to stop and think about the great human capacity that is being destroyed here -- even quite apart from the fact that unborn children are human persons whose dignity and right to life we have to respect." http://www.ignatius.com/promotions/light-of-the-world/
I came across this speech by the late Father Richard John Neuhaus while browsing the online forum at the American Lutheran Publishing Board. I won't go into the full details here, but before I get to the 'life article', let me say that Father Neuhaus is possibly THE reason I am Catholic today. I happened to hear an short interview with him on C-SPAN in 2005 at a very critical time in my faith life life as a Lutheran. In the course of that interview I was overwhelmingly convicted that I must look into the Catholic Church. To make a long story short, I did, and my family and I went through RCIA, and entered into full communion at the Easter Vigil in 2007. I thank God daily for leading me to what Fr. Neuhaus described as, and I truly believe to be, "the Church of Jesus Christ most fully and rightly ordered through time". Like Fr. Neuhaus, I remain thankful for my upbringing in the Lutheran Church, where I was taught the Creeds and the faith and received grace. Fr. Neuhaus did not know me, but he changed my life. I finished reading his wonderful book 'Catholic Matters' just days before his passing in Jan 2009.
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