To sustain a single life is to sustain an entire world

From Salt + Light Blog:

The sudden decision of the Order of Canada Advisory Council to award the its highest distinction to Dr. Henry Morgentaler has put the spotlight once again on Canada’s abortion architect and activist and raised serious questions about the significance and integrity of the “the centerpiece of Canada’s honours system” which “recognizes a lifetime of outstanding achievement, dedication to the community and service to the nation”.

Henry Morgentaler began his crusade for the legalization of abortion in the 1960s. The 1988 Supreme Court decision that bears his name removed all legal barriers to abortion at any stage of pregnancy – since then, nearly two million future citizens have lost their lives to abortion.

Morgentaler, himself a survivor of the Dachau and Auschwitz concentration camps where he fought for his own survival, said that he has performed more than 100,000 abortions. One may wonder if he ever took to heart the teaching of his own Jewish faith that says: “to destroy a single life is to destroy an entire world and to sustain a single life is to sustain an entire world.”

When Canada honors someone who took the Hippocratic oath and has wreaked such hurt, havoc, sorrow and grief, something is wrong with the Canadian government commission that grants medals and a Governor General who, claiming Catholic roots when convenient, shows herself to be spineless, politically correct and without respect for human life. The recent controversy has also shed light on another dark area of Canadian society: that of the membership of government commissions that consist of patronage appointments who advance personal agendas, reward friends, lurk in shadows of “confidentiality” and hide behind structures and institutions. They pass themselves off as “government officials” when in reality they are not elected and do not represent the public.

During my six years as pastor of the Newman Centre Catholic Mission at the University of Toronto, I felt that I was on the front lines of a war zone against life. One of the most difficult aspects of my pastoral ministry at Canada’s largest university was dealing with many young women (and men) who had abortions. The poor and erroneous advice given to young, pregnant women at university-sponsored sex education centres directed them to clinics for “therapeutic abortions” for unplanned pregnancies.

An initial sense of “liberation” from termination of the unwanted pregnancy was almost always accompanied by deep guilt, trauma, anguish, nightmares for months, an inability to be around children, prevailing feelings of unworthiness, failed relationships, and sometimes a later inability to conceive. While much of the attention surrounding abortion is on the woman, I also saw first hand the devastating effects that it has on young men who fathered the children.

Those who experienced abortions and came to us at the Newman Centre were not fanatical Catholics but human beings who made bad choices, and had been deceived, crushed and terribly diminished. The Governor General was not there to console them.

Dr. Morgentaler and his agents and disciples did not have to deal with these individuals. They merely duped them. Our pastoral staff at the Catholic Chaplaincy was and is still there to help pick up the pieces, extend mercy, compassion and forgiveness, and help heal a broken society that suffers each time life is blotted out.

Henry Morgentaler clearly does not deserve to receive the Order of Canada. He debases the medal and those who have received it for heroism and the building up of Canadian society. Over twenty years of successive Canadian governments have been gutless and without courage to repeal the abortion law that bears Morgentaler’s name.

Perhaps the day has come when Canadians of good will who love life will rise up and say: “enough is enough.” The Canadian killing fields that are now found at the gateways of human life in our country must be transformed into sacred and safe places of life, liberty and security of every person.

Fr. Thomas Rosica, C.S.B.,
C.E.O., Salt and Light Catholic Television Network

Obama's "Biggest Mistake"

From LifeSite News:

Obama: "Biggest Mistake" Was Vote to Help Terri Schiavo

By Peter J. Smith
LifeSiteNews.com

WASHINGTON, D.C., February 28, 2008 - Barack Obama, the young, dynamic contender for the US Democratic presidential nomination, is continuing to send strong signals to members of his party that he is the strongest anti-life candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.

At the last Democratic debate before the March 4 primary showdown in Texas and Ohio that could effectively decide the Democratic nominee, both Sen. Hillary Clinton - a fierce abortion supporter who is aspiring to be the first female president of the United States - and Sen. Obama - who is vying to be the first black US President - were asked which votes they would take back in their senatorial careers. Clinton cited her vote for the Iraq war; Obama said his vote for Terri Schiavo.

"It wasn't something I was comfortable with, but it was not something that I stood on the floor and stopped. And I think that was a mistake," Obama said at the debate. "And as a constitutional law professor, I knew better ... and I think that's an example of inaction, and sometimes that can be as costly as action."

Obama was referring to his vote in March 2005, when the Senate passed a bill by unanimous consent that permitted Schiavo's parents and brother to make their case before federal courts to keep their brain-injured daughter alive via feeding tube...

'Nuff said.

Makes one want to weep...

LifeSiteNews - Ominous Connections

From LifeSiteNews:

LifeSiteNews Message for February 13

Dear LifeSiteNews readers,

Many new readers of LifeSiteNews have difficulty making a connection between abortion, euthanasia, contraception, feminism, explicit sex education, promotion of homosexuality, de-population programs, eugenics, environmental extremism, suppression of religious freedom and globalism. We always hope that after a few months of reading LifeSiteNews they begin to see the connection. Many, including most of the world's religious leaders, haven't been exposed to this information, or if they have, still don't get it or, in very many cases, don't have the courage or trust in God to face the disturbing truth.

The development in Brazil, reported in today's top story by our Latin American correspondent Matthew Hoffman, is exciting news. The Brazilian [Roman Catholic] bishops appear to have suddenly come much farther than all others in realizing and accepting the reality of the "big picture", the above mentioned, "connection", that we at LifeSiteNews have been aware of for years. Even more exciting is that they are taking bold actions to hold accountable those responsible for this massive manipulation and abuse of power - even at the highest international levels.

We hope the Brazilian Bishops' example will be emulated by many more leaders throughout the world. The world is in great danger from the de-population totalitarians who have already caused great harm. Theirs is indeed a very dangerous movement of people and organizations who have very little, if any regard for the inherent dignity of every human life and for freedom. What they wish to achieve far exceeds anything accomplished by Nazism or Communism - and so far they have made huge advances. The producers of the film "Demographic Winter" attest to that.

Bravo for the Brazilian bishops who are responding as bishops should, with great courage and boldness for the benefit of those who are being exploited and oppressed.

We suggest that you continue to read LifeSiteNews reports in the context of the above paragraphs. To further your understanding, if you have not already done so, we strongly suggest you take the time to read the most popular document on LifeSiteNews, The Inherent Racism of Population Control, by Paul Jalsevac.

More than any other report on LifeSiteNews, that document reveals the enormous, deadly influence of International Planned Parenthood and other elements of the depopulation/eugenics movement. It explains the connection between all those items in the first paragraph of this message. Please read the document and tell others about it.

Steve Jalsevac LifeSiteNews.com

Life unworthy of life?

From The hermeneutic of continuity - speaking here of the UK specifically ... but coming soon (?) to a theatre near you & me, too:

John Smeaton has an shocking example of the depths to which debate is sinking on pro-life matters in the UK. (See Do we live in a civilised country? Draw your own conclusions) Baroness Meacher spoke in Parliament the other day to suggest that for two children she knew with cerebral palsy "It would be in their best interests to have been aborted." Baroness Tonge, clearly aware that it is not politically acceptable to call for the killing of disabled people, attempted to redefine the terms in a way that is eerily familiar:

"... we were not talking here about disabled human beings, but about some grossly abnormal human beings; many of those whom I have seen bear little resemblance to human beings."

I think it is apposite to quote in this context a sermon of Cardinal Clemens von Galen given in August 1941. The Cardinal speaks of the mentally ill but we know that those with cerebral palsy were also included in the programme which he condemned:

If it is once accepted that people have the right to kill 'unproductive' fellow humans--and even if initially it only affects the poor defenseless mentally ill - then as a matter of principle murder is permitted for all unproductive people, in other words for the incurably sick, the people who have become invalids through labor and war, for us all when we become old, frail and therefore unproductive.

Then, it is only necessary for some secret edict to order that the method developed for the mentally ill should be extended to other 'unproductive' people, that it should be applied to those suffering from incurable lung disease, to the elderly who are frail or invalids, to the severely disabled soldiers. Then none of our lives will be safe any more. Some commission can put us on the list of the 'unproductive,' who in their opinion have become worthless life. And no police force will protect us and no court will investigate our murder and give the murderer the punishment he deserves.

Who will be able to trust his doctor any more?

In those days, the RAF dropped copies of Von Galen's sermon among German troops. Perhaps they might drop some over the Palace of Westminster now?

[Murderous] Silence of a Shepherd

Terri Schiavo's Brother Denounces St. Petersburg Bishop Lynch "...As my letter states, 'I beg the Lord to spare us another successor of the apostles who would exhibit the same scandalous inaction and silence by which you remain complicit in my sister's murder via euthanasia'."

Michael J. Fox

Kathy Shaidle - aka "relapsed catholic" writes about Fox' U.S. election ads on behalf of embryonic stem cell research in hopes of a Parkinson's cure:

I'm sorry a movie star has a disease, but that doesn't give him the right to sacrifice others in a quest for a cure. What if there was a chance that experimenting on, say, Parkinson's patients might lead to a cure of something else...? (Paging Dr. Mengele...)

Hmm. Well, first of all, yes, embryonic stem cell research is wrong. Always. Period. Full stop. However, the Dr Mengele reference? Groan.

"Ethical" Stem Cell Research?

The story seemed a mite suspicious when I first heard about it - scientists developing a method of extracting stem cells for research from "embryos" without having to kill them ... now, it seems evident that this isn't exactly the wonderful panacaea that we'd been promised. Ryan T. Anderson writing in FIRST THINGS:

"Recent reports of scientists creating “ethical” embryonic stem cells are false or misleading. And there is reason to be very concerned ... "... In essence, the new report says that a single cell can be removed from an embryo at the 8-cell stage, and the remaining 7-celled embryo will continue to develop unaffected. The single cell removed would then be cultured to produce embryonic stem cells. Everyone is a winner ... "... As the original report in Nature and their accompanying news coverage make clear, the researchers did, in fact, destroy many human embryos in the process of creating these stem-cell lines. This, of course, belies the content of the headlines and also calls into question the ethical reliability of those involved in this research project ... "... In the end, the scientific community must affirm its commitment to search for cures while also respecting the innate dignity not only of the people they seek to help but also of all human beings, at whatever stage of their development. Only stem-cell research (and all other research) proposals that treat the embryonic human being as a subject of full moral worth can succeed."