Life Issues

• 40 Days for Life: These peaceful prayer vigils are held twice a year. Nothing jumpstarted my spiritual life like my first day on the sidewalk outside an abortion mill. Please join us in prayer and fasting and in peaceful vigil to end abortion and the culture of death and promote the Culture of Life and a Civilization of Love.
• Alabama Citizens for Life: To defend human life through legislation, action and prayer from conception until natural death.
• Americans United for Life
• Bioethics Defense Fund: Learn about HR3200 and what Obamacare really means for you and your loved ones.
• Faithful Citizenship. (Caveat: The USCCB is coming along but they still have associations with groups that are, to put it mildly, rabidly anti-Catholic and many Catholics find that troubling, me among them.)
• Fight FOCA
• Fr. Frank on YouTube
• Fr. Frank Pavone
• Her Choice Women’s Center: Birmingham Abortion Alternative and Information, 205-252-0706. I visited this center and was really impressed with the atmosphere and the welcome I received, and with what they have to offer women: free pregnancy testing, free limited ultrasounds, “earn while you learn” classes, a boutique downstairs where you can use the earned points for things new mothers need, like car seats, strollers, all kinds of stuff. Her Choice runs entirely on donations. Hint hint. Ahem. :)
• Human Life International
• Human Life Review: “In a world of blog posts and hat tips, there is still a pro-life journal that publishes on paper with copious footnotes. The Human Life Review, published by the Human Life Foundation, is a resource that no pro-lifer should be without. …Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom—and humanity. HLR can help in keeping that vigilance well-informed.” —Lydia McGrew. Of special note is the paper written by Ronald Reagan in 1983, Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation.
• Jill Stanek: the nurse who blew the whistle on the live birth abortions going on at the hospital where she worked.
• JPII’s Audiences on the TOB
• LifeNews
• Lila Rose, President of Live Action, “a new-media movement for life!” Live Action Films YouTube Channel. Oct. 5 2010: Links renewed. See below or these posts (here or here) for more details. (Text left here for archival purposes. Links removed after communications with the organization in which they insist on using and recommending Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals and the methods he recommends. I cannot in good conscience continue to support this group until they repudiate Alinsky, his writings and his methods.)
• ND Response
• One More Soul: Fostering God’s Plan for Love, Chastity, Marriage and Children. Janet Smith, Ph. D., and others. One More Soul is “dedicated to spreading the truth about the blessings of children and the harms of contraception. We carry a wide variety of educational resources, including CDs, DVDs, pamphlets, booklets, books, and more.” Online store.
• Option Line: Pregnancy Center, alternatives to abortion. Call 800-712-HELP or 800-395-HELP. See banner and further description above for more on this excellent resource.
• Physicians for Life
• Population Research Int’l
• Priests for Life
• Real Healthcare Respects Life
• Reflections of a Paralytic: All Life Is Sacred: Chelsea Zimmerman, pro-life blogger, devout and faithful Catholic.
• Sanctity of Life Ministries, Jim Pinto, MEV, who is the Nat’l Co-ordinator of Missionaries of the Gospel of Life Lay Associates. His office is here in Birmingham, AL.
• Secondhand Smoke, the blog of Wesley J. Smith at First Things.
• Silent No More
• Susan B. Anthony List and blog: “Advancing, mobilizing and representing pro-life women directly contradicts the claim that abortion is a woman’s right and the premise that abortion somehow liberates women.”
• Theology of the Body Institute
• Unborn Word of the Day
• USCCB: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Please remember to pray for our Bishops. They have a daunting task before them. We need to give them all the support we can.
• Wesley J. Smith, J.D., Senior Fellow in Human Rights and Bioethics at the Discovery Institute, an attorney, a consultant for the Center for Bioethics and Culture, and the associate director of the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide. His blog, Secondhand Smoke, used to be at First Things, the online site for the magazine founded by Fr. Richard John Neuhaus. But now the blog has moved and has a new name: Human Exceptionalism.

“The morality of the 21st Century will depend on how we respond to this simple but profound question: Does every human life have equal moral value simply and merely because it is human? Answer yes, and we have a chance of achieving universal human rights. Answer no, and it means we are merely another animal in the forest” (Wesley J. Smith, quoted from the About page at his blog, Human Exceptionalism).

• Smith is the author of the Consumer’s Guide to a Brave New World. His latest book, A Rat is a Pig is a Dog is a Boy: The Human Cost of the Animal Rights Movement, is due to be published in January and may be pre-ordred at Amazon.com.
  Be sure to check out Wesley’s excellent podcast, Brave New Bioethics: What It Means To Be Human. Download or listen on the web or subscribe through iTunes.

The HHS Mandate: The Obama Administration’s Aggressive Abortion Agenda

On Feb 15 there was a special webcast about the HHS Mandate with Fr. Frank Pavone, Rep Chris Smith, and others. You can still listen to or download it and find other resources on the page.

• Stop the HHS Mandate: Sign the petition and, please, share this with friends and family, everybody you know. We need to stand up and speak out. Together.
• USCCB Issues and Action: Conscience Protection.
• USCCB HHS Mandate Page.
• USCCB Religious Liberty Page.
• Read the statement from the bishops after the Vice President made a false claim during the VP debate about the HHS Mandate and its effect on religious institutions.
• Religious Freedom Initiative: Read, get involved, get yard signs, more at the One More Soul website.
• Coverage on EWTN’s shows: The World Over and EWTN Live.
• EWTN is suing over the HHS Mandate with help from the Becket Fund. Sign the petition. Read more and find updates.
• Fr. Robert Sirico of the Acton Institute commented on the HHS Mandate on a segment of The World Over.
• Peter Breen of the Thomas More Society commented on the mandate and the First Amendment in a conversation with Fr. Mitch on EWTN Live.
• Reading the history of the Thomas More Society just now was an eye-opener for me. I had no idea how the Society had gotten started: “Quit the case or quit the firm!”

Freedom of religion, conscience protection — relics of a bygone era? Learn more about the HHS Mandate and what it means to every person in the U.S.A.. It’s not about Catholics and it’s not about contraception. It’s about freedom. And the vanquishing thereof.

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This is from 2012 but I’m keeping it here for historical archival purposes: Life issues are so important that they deserve a section all their own, so here it is. There are links about the HHS Mandate at the end of this page. Sign the petition to stop it. Visit the USCCB Religious Liberty Page. Read the statement from the bishops after the Vice President made this false claim during the VP debate:

“With regard to the assault on the Catholic Church, let me make it absolutely clear. No religious institution—Catholic or otherwise, including Catholic social services, Georgetown hospital, Mercy hospital, any hospital—none has to either refer contraception, none has to pay for contraception, none has to be a vehicle to get contraception in any insurance policy they provide. That is a fact. That is a fact.”

Um, no, Mr. Vice President, that is not a fact. Read the statement from the USCCB, which they released the day after the debate in what may have been the fastest action ever taken by any group of bishops in the history of the Church. Please check out the links at the end of the page and take action: share information with your friends, family, co-workers. And in the upcoming election, please vote with your formed and informed Catholic conscience!

As always, if you find any broken links, etc., anywhere on the site, please let me know. Thanks. And thanks for reading. God bless!