It has been two months since my last post, not that there has been nothing to update. It is just that my life has been very eventful with travel, speaking engagements, and pro-life activities related to the other hats I wear.

However, at this time I first call to your attention an important upcoming event of which you should be aware. It is noted on the web site under “Upcoming Pro-Life Activities” on June 24…check it out. https://buildingacultureoflife.org/?page_id=46 . Please note the calendar and see what you can participate in. I will update the info as it becomes available. There will also be many church-based pro-life activities. I hope these will be enriching experiences to encourage also your friends and associates.

The battle for hearts and minds is now fully engaged, and the most powerful people in federal government have declared their allegiance to the “culture of death.” We must not slow down or pull back from our demands that there be respect for the sanctity of life and recognition of the personhood of people developing in the womb.

The current issue of National Catholic Register carries the inspiring story of fraternal twins thriving a year after being born at 21 weeks and 5 days of development in the womb. A picture shows the baby boy and baby girl looking very healthy and wearing t-shirts saying (on the girl) “born together” with an arrow pointing to her brother whose shirt says “friends forever” with an arrow pointing to his sister.

Those who have read my book “Building a Culture of Life” will recall that there is a 50% chance of survival for a child born at 24 weeks, and that pro-life pediatricians recommend resuscitation and ICU. At 23 weeks or less, there is “no chance” of survival, so hospice is recommended to provide dignity to the child and to allow parents to grieve. At 22 and a half weeks, these parents were told that the babies, only weighing 12 and 15 ounces, respectively, would not be resuscitated and would be placed on the mother’s chest to die.

“Born the weight of a can of soda with skin so thin their organs were visible, the babies fit in the palm of their parents’ hands.” There was no chance for survival…….except for God. The parents are Christians “with a fierce faith and belief in the power of prayer.” They “stormed Heaven” with fervent prayers, soon joined by “prayer warriors on social media all over the world.” https://www.sinaihealth.ca/news/born-at-mount-sinai-hospital-the-worlds-most-premature-twins/ The twins are now thriving.

So, what do you think about second trimester abortions? Is it just a piece of tissue, an inconvenience to a woman who has educational or career plans, a disaster for a woman who is without support from the father, a child that will be a burden on society…??? The abortionists will take care of this little problem. The relevant chapter in my book describes how these children would be killed and dismembered and their parts removed from the womb (think of the “products of conception” being put back together in the movie “Unplanned” to be sure all the parts were removed from the mother).

All of us developed from the tiniest beginnings and passed through this stage on the way to becoming a new full-term baby, but we were a person in development at every stage of that process. This is what is asserted by abortion survivors, those people who survived an attempt to end their lives in the womb. They say that they were persons then, just as they are persons now, and that their lives matter. Their testimony is perhaps that most feared by those who support abortion. https://abortionsurvivors.org/

Let us be mindful that we are now “setting the stage for our next major battle together…ensuring Human Rights for All in America,” asserting and protecting the personhood of every preborn American in the womb.

Let us not be tired, complacent, or satisfied with our success. Our success has indeed been limited, and the abortion protagonists are well funded and relentless in pursuit of their goals of protecting political power and vast sources of financial gain.

Chapter 9 in my book also addresses some of the things we can do to make a difference, and I reaffirm these as often as I can get someone to listen (or read). However, there is much more for us to discuss, and I will bring those to your attention in due course. For now, do not miss any opportunity to get out and be seen and heard. Be sure that we provide support to those on the front lines providing direct care to women in need every day. Be sure that they have the financial means and material items they need.

And remember, if you are not out there being seen and actually doing something, government leadership will think that pro-life advocates are few, weak, and uncommitted. They will listen instead to those who are committed and have the money to back up their demands. Let us not be found coming up short.

Let us begin with HOPE…. I hope everyone has a meaningful Valentine’s Day; I hope everyone enjoyed the super bowl football game; I hope everyone missed the half-time show (all I will say about that); and, I hope everyone saw the ad showing a grandfather holding up a (rendition in art of a) sonogram of a baby in the womb with his hand stuck in a can of Pringles potato chips, saying “even your little brother Timmy” gets his hand stuck. Importantly, and I hope it was not wasted on you, the ad reinforces the humanity of the unborn child, showing a developing human baby and giving the child a name.

It was for fun and for profit, but this is the way we win the hearts and minds. There are both women and men who will see ultrasound images in future, and it will trigger this memory. Perhaps they will realize that what they see on ultrasound is a baby, not unformed tissue. Perhaps they will even form the questions in their minds, if not on their lips…is it a boy or a girl; what will be the baby’s name?

In other happy news, at the Texas Rally for Life, Governor Abbott reaffirmed his pro-life commitment and discussed the State of Texas $100 million abortion alternatives program and the Choose Life Grant Program. Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee has also announced plans to increase State support for crisis pregnancy centers to $100 million.

But the news is not all good, and we do not expect it to be. We struggle with ideologues, misguided persons, and those who are confused and under-educated. Such is the situation with the AP, which has advised reporters not to use the terms “crisis pregnancy center” or “pregnancy resource/help center.” The AP stated that such terms confuse the public, because the real goal of such facilities is to prevent abortions, so they should be called “anti-abortion” centers. This is so pathetic that it is almost laughable.

However, the lust for the blood of the unborn is also supported by pure evil. “The Satanic Temple” plans to open a free abortion clinic in New Mexico where killing a developing baby is legal up until the point of birth. They plan to dispense the abortion pills, but assert that “this is just the beginning.”

Minnesota has also just passed a law that grants lawful right to kill a baby up until the moment of birth for any reason, and, if a child is born alive after an attempted abortion, it is now lawful to kill it my neglect. So, now we have gone from killing a developing human being in the womb, to killing it if it is somehow born alive. Why stop there? Why not kill a baby after it is born full term? Why not kill a child at any age? Why not kill anyone you do not like for any reason?

Those who have read my book know that history is being turned back to the time prior to the advent of Christianity when pagan communities let unwanted babies (mostly females) die from neglect. Christianity ended that practice. It should be obvious that the current return to paganism in this respect is part of the modern day attack on Christianity and the nuclear family in general. Do we not “get it” yet ? It is not “reproductive rights” and “a woman’s right to choose.” It is part of a plan to end family, religion, morality, and respect for life and human dignity. These must be erased in order to create a loyalty to the state and a society controlled by an oligarchy.

My readers are already engaged in opposition to this outrage against humanity, but we must do more. Let us be educated and committed. Let us advocate from a position of fierce determination that life is precious in all its stages and conditions. The battle for hearts and minds is now fully engaged, and we dare not be slow to do our part.

January has certainly been a very busy month…the National March for Life in Washington, DC, the National Day of Prayer for the Legal Protection of the Unborn, a Catholic Novena for Respect of Life, and (here in Texas) the Texas Rally for Life.

In the trenches, our pregnancy help centers are busier than ever. In the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, the call center for help from the Gabrielle Project has reached fifty daily, but direct help is only available to the ten most in need. Others are referred to their local PHC, but many of those are also experiencing unprecedented requests for help. Here in Texas, much of the sudden increased need is driven by Spanish-speaking immigrants. There are not enough Spanish-speaking volunteers to meet this unanticipated circumstance. Nevertheless, our resourceful and dedicated volunteers are digging in, and their faithful donors are responding to the need with generosity.

Nevertheless, hostility toward those advocating respect for life and human dignity goes all the way to the most powerful elected positions in United States government. Mark Houck and his 12-year-old son were demonstrating in a 40 Days for Life campaign outside a Planned Parenthood clinic in Pennsylvania on October 13, 2021, when a man escorting a woman from the clinic shouted obscenities at the group. He then approached Houck and his son and continued with vulgar and insulting language. His son retreated behind his father, and Houck ordered the man to leave his son alone. However, the man again approached his son and shouted obscenities into his face from only one foot away. Houck stepped in and shoved the man away from his son.

The Planned Parenthood individual filed a lawsuit against Houck, but it was dismissed for lack of evidence of any illegal activity. However, Planned Parenthood has a lot of friends in high places, and a SWAT team of 20 FBI agents was ordered to raid Houck’s home, forcing their way inside and pointing their weapons at him and his wife and seven children, a tactic blatantly designed to intimidate the family and send a message to the pro-life community.

He was charged with assaulting the PP agent while trying to keep women from accessing the PP property. He faced a $350,000 fine and 11 years in jail. He was defended by 40 Days for Life, and it took a jury only one hour to find him not guilty of any offense at all. It was fairly obvious that PP instigated the situation and hoped to frighten away pro-life demonstrators, and in particular, the 40 Days for Life campaign. 40 DFL has cost PP vast amounts of money as women choose not to have an abortion.

In other pathetic news, on January 3 the FDA lifted the requirement for in-person dispensing of abortion pills so that they can be obtained by mail order and dispensed directly by pharmacies (in states where abortion is legal).

The National Council of Jewish Women has raised $1 million “to help thousands of women get abortions.” Evidently little has been learned from the holocaust of WW2.

On January 26, Democrats in the House introduced a bill that would require insurance companies to cover abortions. It would also repeal the Hyde amendment and require Medicaid to pay for abortions. Read my book for background on all this.

An attorney from the American Center of Law and Justice says 12 Our Lady of the Rosary School students and chaperones were kicked out of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum for wearing pro-life hats.

A number of pro-abortion stories appear on a web sites such as prochoice.org and prochoiceamerica.org . They pay to get their web sites to come up on top, but when scrolling down, one sees many more pro-life web sites. The new battleground is fully engaged, and the hearts and minds of the public is the prize !

Feministsforlife.org is an interesting web site. So is foreverywoman.org . The Heartbeat International resource link for abortion pill reversal is very impressive, and the LifeFirst campaign youranswermatters.org challenges people to take the survey…when does life begin? Those with an open mind are gently persuaded by the science that life begins at the moment of conception an is accompanied by a spark of light which has been photographed.

Jesus taught us to love our enemies and do good to those who persecute us. Love and truth will win… but… we must do our part to assert the truth in a loving and compassionate way, offering help, and giving women a real choice, then helping those who choose poorly.

Along the way, every one of us must care about the ripple effect on our society when life is not respected. If we do not respect life at all stages and conditions, then we do not respect life at any stage or condition. If our society promotes the deaths of innocent babies, why are we surprised and distressed by the violent deaths of our other children and the senseless deaths in violence on our streets?

We must all volunteer, donate, stand to be counted, and march for life…whatever we are called to do, whenever we can. Let us also vote for those who will respect life and dignity. Let us have no regrets that we did not try to make a difference.

Herein, I provide you with a variety of topics to illustrate the emotions that we all must feel as 2022 comes to a close. The year has brought us the overturning of Roe v. Wade and the right to debate in our communities how incipient human life shall be protected –or destroyed–and to elect those people who will make the laws that govern our society. However, that success for democracy and constitutional law leaves us challenged by powerful adversaries that lust for the blood of the innocent because of the money and political power that has become associated with the business of abortion.

Therefore, when we advocate to help mothers with everything they need to choose life for their baby, we threaten the wealth and power derived from making mothers feel like abortion is their only responsible choice. We should not be surprised, therefore, if those people lash out with hate speech, threats, and violence. They have also used their very considerable resources to denigrate those who want to help mothers and babies with whatever they need, to isolate mothers from such resources, and to provide innovative ways for mothers to abort their babies.

I discussed the latter in my last post. I now focus for a moment on more objective information. (Thank you Pregnancy Help News and others cited below.)

“Pregnancy help work is an Advent-style life, with expectation, hope, faith, joy, and peace”: https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/pregnancy-help-work-is-an-advent-style-life-with-expectation-hope-faith-joy-and-peace

“Motherhood isn’t fatal: According to the pro-abortion mantra, women must sacrifice the lives of their unborn children to succeed in life. Evidence shows they couldn’t be more wrong”. https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/motherhood-isn-t-fatal

“DOJ official admits targeting pro-lifers as response to overturn of Roe“: https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/doj-official-admits-targeting-pro-lifers-as-response-to-overturn-of-roe

“Feminism 2022: Silencing women with politically incorrect (pro-life) views”: https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/feminism-2022-silencing-women-with-politically-incorrect-pro-life-views

From Shawn Carney: “Last month, National Public Radio aired an audio recording of a woman aborting her twins. Why would anyone want to listen to not one, but two human beings get torn apart by a vacuum machine? It’s the clearest sign yet that our culture has lost even the most basic sense of reverence for God’s precious gift of human life.” “Someone cares: Child killed in on-air NPR abortion segment mourned”: https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/someone-cares-child-killed-in-on-air-npr-abortion-segment-mourned

The following news article demonstrates how fixed delusions and the dangerous idealizations that some of our adversaries exhibit control their behavior. It is baffling how those whose hearts are in the right place, loving and caring for women and babies and wanting to offer every help needed, while not condemning, but offering healing to those who choose abortion, are denigrated viciously in the misguided beliefs of many who support abortion as a form of birth control: “Pro-abortion protesters disrupt D.C. pregnancy center’s annual banquet with vulgar rants” https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/pro-abortion-protesters-disrupt-d-c-pregnancy-center-s-annual-banquet-with-vulgar-rants I invite you to read that portion of my book that explains how people come to believe with passion things that are blatantly untrue, and why their beliefs cannot be shaken.

And, in UK: “A Bill that criminalizes offers of help and alternatives to abortion outside abortion clinics in Northern Ireland does not ‘disproportionately interfere’ with the rights of protesters, the Supreme Court has ruled”. https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/uk-supreme-court-ignores-testimony-of-women-helped-by-pro-life-support-outside-abortion-clinics

And, in Mexico: “it’s time for Mexico to determine a clear and firm course in defense of life, pregnant women, and their children.” “at this time, the widespread demand of Mexican society is the prevention of any form of violence against women, and for those who are pregnant, protection must be extended to their children in the womb.” https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/pro-lifers-in-mexico-demand-government-put-an-end-to-killings-of-pregnant-women

Now for some observations from Christian Voices for Life that we must know (#7 and #8 will be in a future email; I invite you to subscribe to their emails):

“Eight Blatant Lies of the Abortion Industry: # 1 – 3” https://files.ecatholic.com/6894/documents/2022/12/8-Blatant-Lies-1-3.pdf?t=1671467665000

“Eight Blatant Lies of the Abortion Industry: # 4 – 6” https://files.ecatholic.com/6894/documents/2022/12/8-Blatant-Lies-4-6.pdf?t=1671467740000

From Heartbeat International: “Statistics show more than 4,000 babies’ lives have been saved from the abortion pill [since the overturn of Roe v. Wade] … and counting!” More women are using the abortion pills, so the number of women with remorse (sometimes after being under pressure from another person and forced to take the pills) is also increasing, as are the number of facilities that are offering abortion pill reversal.

From Melissa Ohden, founder of Abortion Survivors Network: “While I have met 618 survivors personally, our research shows there are likely over 1,734 babies born alive each year after their mother’s failed abortion! The Abortion Survivors Network is the only organization worldwide that serves those who survive failed abortions. Our mission is to reach, heal, empower and equip abortion survivors and their biological and adoptive families.” Their work includes advocating to legislative bodies from the perspective of a person that survived an abortion attempt that they were a person in the womb and that their lives matter. https://abortionsurvivors.org/

In Malta: “20,000 take to streets of Malta to demand Government not introduce abortion” Malta is a nation state that does not legally permit abortion on demand. https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/20-000-take-to-streets-of-malta-to-demand-government-not-introduce-abortion

Please refer to the “Upcoming Pro-Life Activities” page on this web site for events that you can attend and have your voice heard. Now more than ever, we must participate, we must be informed, and we must be sure the truth is told.

Whenever we can, we must also financially support those pregnancy help centers that provide direct care to women, those institutions that educate our youth and fight for the hearts and minds of the people, and those who advocate that they were a person in the womb, just as they are a person now, and that the lives of every developing person has value, from conception to natural death.

We are now approaching the six month mark since the Supreme Court overturned the 1973 decision in Roe, and delivered to the people the obligation to debate the issue of abortion and to elect their leaders to make the laws under which they will live. It is well to examine what the impact has been. Indeed, experiences are different around the various states. Some states are restricting or outlawing abortion while others are developing an abortion tourism business. Some legislators are even advocating neonaticide.

At the same time that pregnancy help centers have geared up to meet increased requests for help, especially in states where abortion is illegal, pro-abortion advocates have attacked such entities as deceiving, dangerous, and harmful to women, pointing out that they “severely limit the choices of women” by not offering abortions. On that front, it has become a battle, on the one hand, to get women into these pregnancy help centers so their needs can be determined and met, and on the other hand, to get women to refuse help and seek ways to have an abortion. Ironically, pro-abortion advocates offer only that one choice.

It is worth noting that one small study demonstrated that 76% of women who had an abortion said they would have kept their baby “if circumstances were different.” The mission of pregnancy help centers is to do just that– help each mother obtain all the resources she needs so that circumstances prevail to help her choose life for her baby. In those cases where the mother just cannot keep the baby after birth, there are about 36 couples wanting to adopt for every one baby that is available for adoption.

Whereas, in areas where abortion is illegal, women have flocked to pregnancy centers in increased numbers, in many areas, the increase was modest, if any. In communities where households have lower income and less education, nearly 75% know nothing about pregnancy help centers. Desperate women began to buy abortion pills off the streets (sometimes counterfeits). Others obtained pills mailed from out of state after a Skype visit at a Planned Parenthood office, and even from overseas resources by internet sales…often taking the pills without an ultrasound exam or the advice of a doctor, thus often harming themselves and requiring emergency visits to a hospital.

Some women with more advanced stages of pregnancy are leaving states where abortion is prohibited to get a surgical abortion, and Planned Parenthood has established RV’s as mobile abortion clinics across the border from such states. Boats are also taking women off-shore and performing abortions up to 20 weeks without recording the names of the women or any other details.  Such women have no recourse except the emergency department of a hospital when they suffer complications.

There are also a number of new web sites promoting “Plan C”… advising women of different ways they can get access to abortion pills. The use of abortion pills has been on the rise for quite some time. Earlier detection of pregnancy has made those substances very popular. More educated and affluent women are now choosing more often the “morning after pill,” such as the substance called Plan B, to prevent pregnancy after spontaneous sex with no contraceptive plan or if their method seems to have failed.

With increased use of abortion pills, there has been a parallel increase in regrets at having done so. This has given rise to an increasingly larger cadre of abortion pill reversal doctors. Whereas that treatment is not always successful, depending on a variety of factors, but especially dependent on how long since the first pill was taken, it is reported that over 4,000 pregnancies have been saved in the last six months.

It is hard to know whether the overall number of abortions in the United States has decreased in the last six months. There is no standard requirement for reporting, and many abortions are now “self-managed” by use of abortion pills. It is felt that there has been a modest decrease, but it has also been observed that every life has value and that every life saved is important.

Those who support abortion seemingly want women to have an abortion as a matter of exercising a “right,” such as to vote, rather than to explore alternatives in the context of difficult life situations. In their view, those who offer alternatives to abortion and help women to overcome real and imagined reasons why they cannot have a baby are threatening women’s rights in all areas of life. Such short-sighted assessment neglects the overall impact of abortion on mothers and fathers, grandparents and extended families that never were because the baby was killed in the womb.

The only thing that every person in the respect life movement is certain about is that there is much work to be done in the battle to win the hearts and minds of the public. Part of that effort must be placed on educating women about pregnancy help centers and all of the resources available to them.

The other way we can reduce the number of abortions in the United States is to eliminate the ills in our society that lead to the dire circumstances women encounter which cause them to contemplate abortion. It is without dispute that this will be a long, difficult, and controversial task. However, only by doing so will abortion someday become almost unthinkable.

First… let us honor our veterans on this Veterans Day, without whom we would have nothing else to talk about here. Thank you to all my fellow veterans who served with me, and before and after me, in our common cause, so that our freedoms and liberties will not vanish from the earth.

At this writing, some of the 2022 mid-term election results are still not known days after voting was supposed to have ceased. However, it is now reported that some states had same day results while others are still looking for more votes to count. This has led to much concern about why there is a delay in counting votes, especially in states where key races are close and the rules for counting are controlled by the political party in power. Conversations circle around improprieties, election fraud, and ballot stuffing to get the desired results for the party controlling the election process in those venues. Since those in power control what we can know, it seems unlikely that we can ever be sure if we are having fair elections. We veterans, who served our country in order to preserve our freedoms as a beacon to the rest of the world, have a justifiable complaint, if anyone will hear it.

If those concerns are not enough, the shameless and deliberate use of false information and fear mongering once again characterized our election process. This was used somewhat successfully to confuse voters and distract them from important issues of immediate concern. Obscene amounts of money have been poured into such efforts instead of supporting debates to determine which ideas are best for the future of the country. Accordingly, we can also expect this to shape our future.

Returning to our theme of protecting life and human dignity, those who favor abortion enjoyed success in these recent elections based upon the proposition that (1) if women cannot get abortions on demand, then they will lose the right to vote and to have equal wages (for example), and (2) that women who experience a miscarriage can go to jail (as another example of a ludicrous tale that was sold to the public).

We have a serious problem in this country with lack of an education that would prepare the public to discern factual information and provide the ability to engage in critical thinking and decision making. Accordingly, we are quite confused and easily manipulated.

A good example is provided by people who voted for candidates in the same political party that promotes the policies that they totally reject. Another example, back on our main subject, is the confusion among Catholics over abortion. Catholics have led the way in objecting to abortion as a means for birth control, and have spear-headed the formation of pregnancy help centers across the country in the aftermath of Roe in 1973.

To demonstrate how even Catholics have become confused, a survey by Catholic network EWTN that was published in the National Catholic Register reports that 13% of Catholics said abortion should be permitted at any time during pregnancy, while 8% said abortion should never be permitted. Catholic teaching, of course, is that human life must be respected and nourished with preservation of dignity from its tiniest beginnings, throughout all its stages and conditions, until natural death.

The survey further reported that 46.2% agreed with Roe being overturned while 47.8% did not. At the same time, 86.5% favored some limits on abortion, with that number divided such that 26.8% said abortion should only be allowed in cases of rape, incest, and if the mother’s life is in danger, 19.8% objecting to abortion after 15 weeks, 13.1% saying abortion should be legal until week 24, and 9.9% would restrict abortion after detection of the heart beat (about 8 weeks on abdominal ultrasound and 6 weeks on vaginal ultrasound).

While demonstrating that Catholics poorly understand what abortion is, it also indicates clearly that they have no idea what the decision in Roe was. It is no wonder people are confused. The decision in Roe, of course, made abortion a legal procedure throughout all the states so that the people could no longer debate the issues and decide how to regulate abortion in their own communities according to their own values and beliefs.

In overturning Roe, SCOTUS stated that the 10th amendment to the constitution declared in simple and unequivocal terms that any issues not specifically allocated to congress should be debated by the people in the individual states who should elect the representatives who will make the laws to govern their communities. They wrote in detail that the “right to an abortion” that the court in1973 “found” in a clause declaring “the right to privacy” was at no time during debates over that amendment said or implied to have anything to do with abortion. No matter how one feels about abortion, the ruling in 1973 by judges appointed by liberal presidents who supported abortion was clearly “a decision looking for a justification.”

However, it is also clear that most people who have opinions on Roe at the same time have no clue at all about the actual rulings in Roe or Dobbs or what is actually written in the constitution.

It is anguishing to talk about a child conceived by rape or incest. These crimes are infuriating and the implications for the victims is heartbreaking. The perpetrator of these crimes should go to jail, but many people assert that the innocent child developing in the womb should get the death penalty. That is just another reason that those crimes are considered so heinous; one tragedy is compounded by another. It is a horrible situation to contemplate, but abortion is not a healing act for the victim. If anything, it just deepens the pain. Moreover, as I discuss in my book, those who have raised such children have a wholly different opinion on the worth of that child’s life.

It is also worth noting that the cases in which aborting a pregnancy is necessary to save the mother’s life are extremely rare. However, I did experience such a case. The mother had lupus and lapsed into a coma as a consequence of an extreme condition. She was in imminent peril of dying. Scanty data in such cases caused the rheumatologist to opine that the only chance she had for survival would be to abort the pregnancy. Then she could be given medicines that might save her but which would have killed the baby anyway; and, if she died, the baby would die also.

Most people also do not know that babies have survived at gestational age 15 weeks to grow into healthy children. Whereas, this is extremely uncommon (at this time), it should be clear that this is a growing human being whose life should be protected. Why would one want to kill the child at 6 or 12 or 13 or 14 weeks, but let it live at 15 weeks? Is this child not just as much a human being like ourselves, no matter how small? Therefore, we protect pregnant women from injury and restrict them from certain types of work and recreational activities to protect the life of the baby. Yet, we also make it legal for the mother to have the baby killed in the womb.

At age 24 weeks, the baby has more than a 50% chance of living outside the womb. Every possible measure will be taken to save the baby’s life. Yet, in some places the baby will be killed at this age as a matter of convenience for the mother. In some venues, it is now proposed to let an unwanted baby born at full term (40 weeks) be set aside to die from neglect, that is to starve to death or to allow to die from dehydration or infection.

Interestingly, there is a direct correlation between how often Catholics go to mass (from daily to weekly to monthly to yearly) and how they feel about abortion being completely illegal or simply a choice for the woman to make, sometimes with certain restrictions. However, Catholic priests typically do not actually address the subject of abortion during services and seem to care little about the importance of teaching about the precious gift of life and our duty to protect human life and preserve human dignity. Perhaps people listen to the message from their hearts and the teachings in the Bible.

For those who do believe in the sanctity of human life and the worthiness of the smallest and weakest of us, there is grave concern for what is proposed by some of our leaders in the highest positions of government. They want to codify the precepts of Roe by legislation, thus making the option for abortion on demand up to birth, and infanticide after giving birth, the law of the land, which the Supreme Court is pledged to uphold. Thus, there would be no more debate and no more voting on the issue.

The Supreme Court has ruled that we must debate the issues and elect our leaders. The battle over the issue of respect for life in all its stages and conditions in now in our communities. It is a battle to change the hearts and minds of the people. Education and science has brought us to this point after 50 years. Now, we must convince the people that the tiniest growing baby is a person, like us, small and developing, but a real human baby… a person entitled to life.

1. “Women are not stupid…Women have always known that there was a life there.” –Former PP President Faye Wattleton (Source: https://www.lifesitenews.com/pulse/5-quotes-that-show-pro-abortion-leaders-know-exactly-what-abortion-is/)
    
2. “Abortion is life and death, and I think for me it’s about…saying, ‘Yes, we end lives here,’ and being ok with that…I had a woman…say ‘I just killed my baby.’ And I said to her, ‘You did, and that’s ok.'” (Source: https://www.liveaction.org/news/abortionists-end-lives-okay-that/) 
    
3. “[A]cknowledging the violence of abortion risks admitting that the stereotypes that anti-abortion forces hold of us are true—that we are butchers…In general, feminism is a peaceful movement…but abortion is a version of violence. What do we do with that contradiction?” –Abortionist Lisa Harris (Source: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1016/S0968-8080%2808%2931396-2)
    
4. “Life begins at conception and what I do is murder…Clinic workers may say they support a woman’s right to choose, but they will also say that they do not want to see tiny hands and tiny feet. There is a great difference between the intellectual support of a woman’s right to choose and the actual participation in the carnage of abortion. Because seeing body parts bothers the workers.” –Judith Fetrow (Source: https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/dont-panic-the-sidewalk-counselors-guidebook-12174)
    
5. “I have angry feelings at myself for feeling good about grasping the calvaria [head], for feeling good about doing a technically good procedure that destroys a fetus, kills a baby.” –Dr. Diane M. Gianelli (Source: https://www.liveaction.org/news/abortionists-agree-abortion-is-killing/)
    
6. “I performed abortions, I have had an abortion, and I am in favor of women having abortions when we choose to do so. But we should never disregard the fact that being pregnant means there is a baby growing inside of a woman, a baby whose life is ended. We ought not to pretend this is not happening.” 
   –Dr. Judith Arcana (Source: https://www.liveaction.org/news/abortionists-agree-abortion-is-killing/)
    
7. “I’ve done a couple thousand [abortions], and it turned into a significant financial boon…the only way I can do an abortion is to consider only the woman as my patient and block out the baby.” –Dr. John Pekkanen (Source: https://clinicquotes.com/category/quotes/abortion-is-killing/page/7/)

This phrase has been used to mean “adjusting to the increased demands of the task at hand.” At this time, pro-life people would surely embrace that phrase as they describe themselves and colleagues who are finding themselves busier than ever with both activism and direct care to women in need of help. Indeed, my sources universally inform me that there are increased requests for help by women in all kinds of circumstances. Being prescient of this need even before the Dobbs decision was released, the Supreme leadership of the Knights of Columbus asked councils across the country to be cognizant of the increased needs of pregnancy help centers and that they should endeavor to do more than in the past to try to meet those needs.

One of the most urgent challenges is to reach women in those communities where their babies are targeted for death. These are communities where people are under educated and underemployed and often under stress from several social factors. While we work to meet the needs of such women, we must examine public policies which fail to relief those conditions that drive women to the choice of abortion. This is being discussed more broadly as the upcoming elections provide hope that new people will examine failed policies and do new things with more promise. However, a weak economy with high inflation and persistent shortages of many products coupled with the looming specter of a wider military conflict in eastern Europe will likely limit options for quite a while, thus making it essential for pro-life people in their communities to expand help to women and babies and do more than in the past.

In the immediate aftermath of the Dobbs decision, we also saw a vast array of pro-life organizations roll out plans to extend even more help to more women, emphasizing love and compassion, and solutions for every need. Not to disappoint, our adversaries in the pro-abortion faction, rose to the occasion with hate speech and violence. One prominent legislator in Washington, DC, has called for elimination of centers that offer help to women because they actually abuse women (by not referring them for abortion), or that they should be forced to be renamed because pregnancy help center do not really “help” women (because they do not “help” them get abortions). If that kind of rhetoric is supposed to make people turn away from pregnancy resource centers and support abortion, I fail totally to see how.

In other developments, there is more talk about when does life begin and the issue of person-hood. In the former, there is the assertion that what is growing in the woman is a piece of amorphous tissue, that it is not anything human, not a “baby” (shudder-shudder). Therefore, for the sake of the woman with an unplanned and unwanted pregnancy, it only makes sense that the “it-thing” inside her should be “taken care of.”

I recently heard remarks in which this issue was addressed in an amusing way. It was asserted that one can argue at length about tissues and what is inside the woman, but one thing that cannot be disputed is this: what comes out of a woman’s body is a human baby. There is no point after conception when the growing entity was a lizard or dog…it was always a baby, not a piece of something else. Oh, sure…it was small and not completely formed, but still a developing baby. News flash ! When a baby is born, it still continues to develop…and when 20 years old it is still developing… and even at 80 years old the body is still changing and developing (albeit not in the direction we would choose). So, development of humans begins at conception and continues until death.

There is no stage at which the growing entity is not a human in development. So, let us cut the “crap” and just acknowledge that the argument is over who has the right to kill a developing person, and at what age… just a few weeks of development ? What about killing that person after 1 year, or 20 years? That is the debate, and make no mistake about it… learn from history when people gained power and decided who they would kill based on age, sex, religion, medical illness, heritage, language…. If we do not tenaciously demand respect for life in all its stages and conditions from conception to natural death, then we are vulnerable to all the exceptions.

In the Dobbs decision, the Supreme Court ruled that the 10th amendment gave to the people in the individual states the right to debate and vote on how abortion can be regulated in their own communities. The pro-abortion factions have now doubled-down on their rhetoric condemning their pro-life political adversaries as hating women and wanting to take away more and more of the rights women have struggled for over eons. This has grown out of a failure of other arguments for why voters should select incumbent pro-abortion politicians for re-election. The policies of incumbent pro-abortion politicians have been hugely unpopular and have resulted in economic hardships for vast segments of the population, and it is always the poorest and less well educated people and the newest immigrants who suffer most. Since they cannot run for re-election based on successful policies and popular achievements, they have decided to make access to abortion the primary campaign issue. This is mixed with the usual hate rhetoric and fear mongering that we have become used to… to the point that I think many people no longer hear it.

However, the US Catholic Bishops have responded to the misinformation with a “white paper” on the subject titled “The Truth About Abortion & Women’s Health.” In this document, it is well pointed out that abortion is never medically necessary. The point is made, which I also address in my book, that it may be necessary to deliver the child well preterm to save the mother’s life. In some cases, the child should be in ICU with hope of survival. In other cases, the child should be offered hospice in a dignified manner.

In an abortion, the procedure is carried out on a living child with the intention of ending that life. The document goes on to expose the bogus arguments that women denied an abortion will not be able to be treated for a miscarriage or an ectopic pregnancy. In these tragic cases, the developing baby has died and the mother’s life is in danger. There is no issue of trying to save the baby or of deliberately killing the baby. All, of these arguments are foisted on the uneducated and those already indoctrinated into an illogical and unscientific belief system for the purpose of distracting them from the reality of current events while gaining their votes for the purpose of hanging on to power… and power is money.. and some people will say and do anything for more money.

However, the National Catholic Register just carried an article “Previewing the Midterms” in which a recent poll by the Pew Research Center indicates that the economy is the top concern for 77% of voters. However, among Democrats, 71% now say that abortion is very important, whereas only 46% of democrats felt that way in March. That suggests that the Democrat echo chamber is working pretty well, but that the vast majority of people are concerned about the economy and what they have to pay for the things they must purchase in their every day lives. Data on other issues similarly shows that people have many important concerns but that abortion is far down the list. Nevertheless, expect to hear much deliberate misinformation and hate speech as the election nears.

For pro-life people, it is more important than ever to be informed and to disseminate the truth as widely as possible. As the Supreme Court ruled, the debates belong in front of the people, and the people must choose those leaders who will make the laws that govern their communities. Let us be wise, and let us educate our fellow citizens and especially our youth, and let us pray for the wisdom of our newly elected leaders.

I know that the title is uninspiring, but sometimes there is little to work with. In my last post, I elaborated on the (then) current situation in the Post-Roe environment. The developing situation as we approach mid-term elections is now best illustrated by the headlines:

Pelosi calls restricting abortion ‘sinful’; Gutfeld calls out Biden’s ‘soul of a nation speech,’ saying he ‘sold his soul to pro-abortion lobby’; New Mexico governor pledges $10 million for new abortion clinic; Beto O’Rourke won’t say whether he supports any limit on abortion; Vulnerable House Democrats mostly refuse to say whether there should be any limits on abortion; Michigan Board of Canvassers deadlocks on abortion rights initiative vote; Michigan Board of State Canvassers punts abortion ban to state Supreme Court; Abortion most important issue to Democratic voters despite recession risks, poll shows; Catholic Virginia nurse practitioner says CVS fired her for not providing abortion drugs: lawsuit; Legally recognizing ‘personhood’ of unborn babies will ‘harm’ ‘health’ of pregnant women: NY Times guest essay.

So… is the New Mexico governor “insane” and is Pelosi herself “sinful” and are pregnant women “in danger” if a baby is recognized as a person in development, as the rest of the above stories relate.

In other news…. Planned Parenthood, ACLU sue to block Indiana abortion ban; Democrats made abortion the centerpiece of midterms message, but many won’t explain their own position; US government can’t force Christian groups to perform abortions, gender reassignment surgery, court rules; Republican Senate candidates hit back on abortion attack ads from Democrats; Bill Maher defends pro-lifers, rejects Dem attack that those opposing abortion ‘hate women’; Biden says abortion restrictions ‘beyond the pale’ in latest midterms pitch…

And…. Baseball team shuts out pro-life organizations, cancels family night hours before first pitch; North Dakota judge blocks abortion ban trigger law while legal challenges continue; Oregon sees surge in out-of-state visitors seeking abortions; MSNBC host Alex Wagner: We need ‘Underground Railroad’ for women seeking abortion ‘freedom’; Tim Scott rejects claims Roe overturn will hurt GOP, cites ‘infanticide’ discussion by Northam; Texas judge blocks enforcement of President Joe Biden’s abortion guidance….

That is more than enough for me. Democrats want to make abortion the big issue in the mid-tern elections, but are not willing to take a specific position; Republicans want to make the election about the economy and unpopular Democrat policies. Everybody is fighting for the hearts and minds… and the votes…of the people. And, like all politics, it is getting uglier.

All of that being as it may, we should be stepping back to ask if we are going to approve or reject hate and violence and discriminatory and punitive actions against people for their beliefs. Does that not sound wrong when tested against our constitution, the laws of the nation, and our own sense of morality? It would seem so, and the wrongful nature of such a proposition is widely repeated by legal scholars, law enforcement officials, and media pundits.

However, those who advocate for respect of life and preservation of the dignity of every person are demonized by some for their beliefs. How can it be so? At the same time, those who want a voice in decision-making and want the people to vote on issues are denigrated as a “threat to democracy” (??? what???… for wanting to debate issues and vote on them???… isn’t that the very essence of democracy???)

It is quoted again and again about those who deceive as a way of life that, when one tells a lie often enough and stifles opposing opinions, pretty soon the people believe the lie. It is for that reason that the success of such people who lust for totalitarianism depends upon a distortion of history and control of the education of our children.

This election and the outcome of lawsuits and decisions by the US Supreme Court threatens the process by which a one-party rule can be established. That explains pretty well the hate speech, threats of violence against Supreme Court justices, fear mongering over regulation of abortion, calls for closing of facilities that support mothers in crisis who might otherwise choose abortion, and the persecution of people whom oppose the demands of those holding political power.

Let us all examine our values and look at what our leaders have done and what they propose to do. Let us examine the outcome from their previous policies. Let us evaluate whether our leaders respect opposing opinions, whether they are willing to debate in the light of day, and whether they value personal freedom. Even if not encouraged to do so, we must discern the truth from all the noise. The armor of knowledge and truth is empowering, the battle is engaged, and the battleground is in our communities.

After 50 years of prayers and battling for the hearts and minds of the public, the efforts by millions of people to educate, inform through science, and persuade through faith have finally resulted in overturning that unjust decision in Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court in 1973.

The battlefield for the hearts and minds now shifts to our communities.  We must fight harder than ever to win the hearts and minds of our fellow citizens, convincing them that life in its tiniest condition must be respected and protected. It is abundantly clear from every point of view that the human life growing in the womb is a developing person. Nobody has dared to claim a point at which the developing baby suddenly is transformed from a “thing” into a “person.” As an ancient philosopher has said, “What will be human, is human.”

However, the pro-abortion people are smart, determined, and well funded.  They will be relentless in pursuit of the goal to have abortion on demand at any stage of pregnancy as well as the right to allow a child born alive to die from neglect if it is not wanted.  Their weapons are fear, deceit, intimidation, violence…and they use these to keep pro-life people from running for office at all levels, from school boards to US presidency. It is not an exaggeration and not an inflammatory statement;  it is in our news stories daily. It is all about power and money.

The SCOTUS opinion in the Dobbs case was released on June 24, but the judgement was released on June 26 (a technicality related to the timeline for so-called “trigger” laws in various states). Such laws will take effect at a time after the date of the judgement. Thirteen states had laws in place on June 26, 2022 that were “triggered” to take effect and regulate abortion at an interval after the decision in Roe v. Wade was overturned. Texas had such a “trigger” law, and it will be discussed below.

However, Texas had a law on the books from 1925 that banned abortion without exception that, while unenforceable since the Roe decision in January 1973, was never repealed. Immediately upon the release of the judgement on June 26, the law became enforceable as it was written, and long before the “trigger” law was scheduled to take effect. Although this was challenged, the Texas Supreme Court ruled on July 2 that Texas could enforce the law because it was passed by the state legislature. However, no attempt has been made to do so.

In Texas, the Human Life Protection Act was passed in 2011 and finally took effect August 25. New human life is now protected from abortion beginning at the moment of conception. Abortion is a first degree felony punishable by up to 99 years in prison and a fine of at least $100,000 and the Medical Board “must” revoke the license of an offender. There are exceptions for medical emergencies, ectopic pregnancies, and treatment of miscarriage. There is no liability for women.

Abortion clinics in Texas have closed. Some have declared that they will move to a state where they can do abortions. That has obvious monetary implications for selling property, breaking leases, and incurring the expense associated with moving to a new location out of state. Some clinics say they will stay in Texas and focus on health care for women, including birth control and sterilization. However, converting from the low overhead, high income business of abortion to a high overhead, (comparatively) low income practice of OB-GYN in competition with numerous established doctors having good reputations, being board certified, and having hospital privileges does not sound like a good business plan (even if a doctor could be found to start such a practice). It is felt that most such practices would not produce sufficient income to pay the bills.

At the same time that prior abortion clinics are facing financial hardship, Texas appropriated $100,000,000 in the current 2-year budget for the highly successful existing Alternative to Abortion program. This helps women bring the baby to term and keep the baby or place for adoption. Support is available for at least three years after birth from nearly 200 pregnancy centers, maternity homes, and adoption centers. About 150,000 women are served every year.

The Texas Medicaid program already pays for over half of all prenatal care, births, and follow-up care for mothers and babies. The Healthy Texas Women program for low-income women also provides all manner of gynecological services as well as general medical care. https://www.healthytexaswomen.org/

In other news, the defeat of the proposed Value Them Both amendment to the Kansas constitution was disappointing, gaining only 41% of the vote. It would have clarified that the state constitution does not “create or secure a right to abortion” and “does not require government funding of abortion.” In 2019, the Kansas Supreme Court found a right to abortion in the state constitution that nobody knew was there, similar to the way in which the SCOTUS decided the Roe case in 1973, with the bizarre finding that a right to privacy meant a right to abortion.

Although this result in Kansas was much celebrated by those favoring unregulated abortion, a similar amendment in Louisiana passed by 62% in 2020. Similar amendments were also passed in Tennessee in 2014 and then in Alabama and West Virginia in 2018. Lawmakers in Iowa and Pennsylvania are pushing for similar measures.

An article by Michael New https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/the-new-york-times-misleads-on-kansas-pro-life-defeat/ explains a number of factors which likely caused the amendment in Kansas to fail, not the least of which was the huge amount of outside money poured into negative advertising by pro-abortion supporters that would stand to lose a lot of money and the associated political power.

However, the same amendment as that defeated in Kansas is on the November ballet in Kentucky, and a Montana proposition would make all infants born alive at any stage of development a legal person entitled to medical care, a point especially relevant to abortion survivors who are often left to die. At the same time, California and Vermont will try to make the right to an abortion part of their state constitutions.

Michigan had a “trigger” law from 1931 that banned abortion except to save the life of the mother. However, a judge has issued a temporary restraining order against enforcement following a lawsuit by (unsurprisingly) Planned Parenthood. A campaign to place on the ballet in November an initiative to amend the Michigan state constitution to affirm the right of women to make their own decisions about abortion and birth control without state regulation has received a huge number of signatures and is expected to be on the ballet. However, pro-life activists are very strong in the state. Furthermore, the upcoming re-election of the democrat governor, attorney general, and members of the US House are hotly contested, and these elections may well lead to push back against their pro-abortion policies as well.

Finally, to close out this update, Indiana became the first state after the Dobbs decision to pass a new law banning abortion, and by huge margins. The law will take effect September 12, and has exceptions for rape and incest (up to 10 weeks gestation), to protect the life and health of the mother, and if there is a lethal fetal abnormality. Abortions may also be performed only in hospital owned facilities, so all abortion clinics will lose their licenses, and any doctor performing an abortion “shall” lose their medical license.

This action followed the scandalous story of a pregnant 9-year-old rape victim (as unlikely as it would be for a girl that young to be ovulating) who traveled from Ohio to Indiana to get a legal abortion (which occurred just after she reached age 10). In Ohio, the fetal heartbeat law prohibits abortion after a fetal heartbeat is heard (typically by 6-8 weeks) and makes no exception for rape. The rapist was a 27-year-old man from Guatemala living in the US illegally. DNA studies on the aborted fetus confirmed he was the father.

Returning to where we started, the battle for the hearts and minds of the people is now fully joined in our communities, and it is likely to be long and arduous. However, I have no doubt that the vast majority of people will ultimately accept that the tiniest growing human is a person, and that women should be offered everything she needs to have a healthy baby. That is our hope. Let us be proud that we have joined the battle.

It is now four weeks post release of the Dobbs decision by SCOTUS on June 24. Incidentally, that day was a Catholic Holy Day for the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and it was the same day that my book “Building a Culture of Life” was first available in print. What an interesting and exceptionally busy four weeks this has been!

The decision by SCOTUS was explained in lengthy, detailed, and erudite fashion, basing the findings upon solid legal grounds and precedents, citing also the original meanings of the amendments to the constitution, observing that the findings of SCOTUS in 1973 were not based upon the same considerations and therefore were in error, and noting that the court in 1973 totally ignored without explanation why the 10th amendment (giving authority to the states) did not apply in Roe v. Wade.

Some people have attributed to the court in 1973 a “decision looking for a justification.” In present day, leadership in the highest positions in US government, as well as activists with a vested interest in preserving liberalized access to abortion, complain that this court is “off the rails,” as well as offering a plethora of other disparaging remarks, with some also advocating violence against the justices. Hate speech has been plentiful and has stimulated attacks against churches, pregnancy resource centers, cemeteries, and even religious bookstores, with spray painting, broken glass, additional vandalism inside churches, theft and damage to religious objects, and setting fires. Some PRC workers have been assaulted, and at least one person was slightly injured by a gunshot wound.

What has not happened is also important to those with reason. No legal scholar has found a flaw in any of the citations and conclusions by the justices in the Dobbs decision, unlike the decision in Roe which puzzled legal scholars immediately and has been a topic of discussion for decades.

Let us look at what Pope Francis has said in an interview about the Dobbs decision. On July 4, he compared seeking an abortion to “hiring a hit man.” Mother Teresa once commented to someone (I am paraphrasing) that if it is legal for you to kill a baby, then what is there to keep me from killing you. To that I add my personal observation that we have a society that denigrates life and promotes at the highest levels of government support for taking the life of an unborn child, so why should we be surprised when people kill each other on the streets, and why should we be concerned when someone kills children in a school. Is it not because we do not respect life in all its stages and conditions that we do not respect life in any of its stages and conditions.

Whereas we now celebrate the SCOTUS decision that returns the regulation of abortion to be debated by the people in their communities and enforced by their elected representatives through a democratic process, the pro-abortion faction howls at having their cherished income streams (and political power bases) reduced. At the same time, the war is not won; indeed, the next battle is just being joined. The prize we now fight for is in the hearts and minds of the people. It is a matter of hate and violence versus love, mercy, and peace.

The ultimate pro-life goal is for most people to realize that the tiniest human life is a person in development. We all start very, very tiny and develop bigger and bigger, becoming more complex in our abilities until we can live without the protection of the womb. But, even then we are not ready for prime time. We continue to develop, becoming an infant, a toddler, a child, an adult, then middle-aged, and ultimately elderly. Life is a continuum of changes in our body. We might look the same from one day to another, but over a few years, the changes are quite evident. So, it it is a biological truth proclaimed by medical science that the smallest human entity is a person in development from the moment of conception, a process that continues through all of the stages of life. However, that does not make that entity legally a “person” under law.

Since being a person under law provides entitlement to protection of life under the US constitution, some argue the question concerning at what point does the growing human entity become a person entitled to protection of life, thus the point at which abortion would be illegal. Some assert that it is at such times in development that a baby can live outside the mother, but that is different in every pregnancy. Many people do not want to even consider the question because its answer could mean that abortion at any stage is killing a person. So, the growing baby is declared not be a person, basically just “because I say so.” [For a more in-depth discussion of the process by which philosophers have tried to link personhood with ensoulment, please see the relevant chapter in my book.]

If a baby is a person at the time of natural birth, how about a few hours before birth when a baby is delivered by C-section…surely the baby is a person then. Well, how about a week earlier? Then, how about at 20 weeks? Some babies have survived as early as age 15 weeks, so they must have been a person then.

They were helpless and dependent on their mothers at age 14 weeks, and 12 weeks, and 6 weeks, and at 4 weeks…. but they grew until they reached an age when they could live outside the mother and be a person, so they must have been a person during the entire growth period. People may not like it, they may not want to think about it or discuss it, but it is logically true and the culmination of two thousand years of philosophy and medical science. Some things are just true whether one believes it or not. The battle is to convince more and more people that incipient human life in its tiniest condition is a person, thus entitled to having its life nourished and protected.

When I look at the work before us, I find myself inspired by a quotation from Pope St. John Paul II, “Never tire of firmly speaking out in defense of life from its conception and do not be deterred from the commitment to defend the dignity of every human person with courageous determination.” That is my plan.

I will not spend much space here discussing the SCOTUS decision in Dobbs that was announced June 24. However, the implications are huge and will affect every person in the US in ways they will either embrace, reject, or not even understand. My purpose herein is to acquaint subscribers with a cross-section of what is going on in just the last one week. After all, the purpose of this part of the web site is to provide subscribers information from many sources about happenings that they may not know about, and yet be interested in. However, we all have limited time and cannot seek out all relevant information or even read all that we get in emails. I hope you will find this update a useful overview.

First, the Dobbs decision essentially is that SCOTUS has no authority under the constitution to make any decision in the case; the 10th amendment plainly states that any matter not explicitly relegated in the constitution to the US Congress, is relegated to the individual states and to the people to regulate through their elected representatives. The court also ruled that the decisions in Roe and Casey are overturned because the court had no authority to rule in those cases either, for the same reason it has no authority in the Dobbs case. The decision is 237 pages in length and (to the extent that I have read it so far) clearly and systematically explains US cultural history on abortion, legal history, and the meaning of various constitutional amendments (specifically explaining in detail why this court rejected attempts to invoke certain phrases in the amendments as having “hidden meanings” providing women a “right” to abortion).

For the Pro-Life movement, the battleground now shifts to the states where the hearts and minds of the electorate are the prize. People elected to state and federal offices will determine laws that either protect or denigrate life. Pregnancy Resource Centers (PRC) have already been preparing to meet women’s increasing requests for help “Post-Roe.” Leaders across the country are calling for increased donations to fund an expanded outreach to women so they will know that help is available to meet their every need. In a poll of 120,000 households, 73% did not know about the services of PRC. There is much work to do.

On that point, we must observe the sobering fact that those we send to Congress have the power to pass a law permitting abortion throughout the country at any stage, even permitting unwanted newborns to die. The integrity of elections and those we vote for at every local and state level, for Congress, and for president matters now and in future more than ever before, with the lives of countless babies at stake.

These circumstances have been thrust rapidly upon PRC and pro-life activist groups in the context that 13 states (including Texas) have “trigger” laws in place that will take effect and regulate abortion in various restrictive ways now that Roe is overturned. There are many other laws passed by various state legislatures in years past that proposed to regulate abortion in those states but which have been under temporary restraining orders preventing enforcement. Now, these will also be released to become effective.

In Texas, the legality of abortion has become confused during the last week by a plethora of hastily written and poorly researched news articles, as well as by some inaccurate information deliberately distributed. Herein, I present below the facts as of July 1. However, the reader must realize that there is a great deal of legal action taking place that can alter the short term environment and add more confusion. Please check here for new posts as these issues evolve, which I pledge to be accurately resourced.

In 1925, Texas passed a law totally banning abortion: “If any person shall designedly administer to a pregnant woman or knowingly procure to be administered with her consent any drug or medicine, or shall use towards her any violence or means whatever externally or internally applied, and thereby procure an abortion, he shall be confined in the penitentiary not less than two nor more than five years.” That law is still part if the statutes in the State of Texas. In the aftermath of Roe in 1973, this law could not be enforced, but was not removed from the statutes, and Texas began to issue licenses for abortion clinics. In 2004, the Fifth Circuit court ruled that the the law had been “repealed by implication.” However, while a court can block enforcement of a law, no court can remove any law from the statutes of a state. This must be done by a state legislature. When the Dobbs decision was published June 24, the Texas 1925 law immediately became enforceable.

In 2021, Texas passed The Texas Heartbeat Act banning abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, and the US Supreme Court refused to overturn it. Typically, this fetal activity can be detected by 8 weeks on abdominal ultrasound and by 6 weeks on a vaginal ultrasound. Of course, in routine exams, it is an abdominal ultrasound that is performed. Even if a heartbeat is present, the quality of the ultrasound machine and the skill of the technician will determine if the heartbeat is detected earlier or later in gestation.

In 2021, Texas also passed The Human Life Protection Act of 2021 “trigger law” that bans abortion 30 days after the overturn of Roe (e.g., on July 24, 2022), except when “the pregnant female on whom the abortion is performed, induced, or attempted has a life-threatening physical condition aggravated by, caused by, or arising from a pregnancy that places the female at risk of death or poses a serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function unless the abortion is performed or induced.”

On June 28, a Harris County Judge issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) against enforcement of the Texas 1925 law totally banning abortion. The TRO expires July 12, and will be subject to a hearing on that date. Interval legal appeals of the TRO may alter the timeline and even set aside the TRO. However, the Texas Fetal Heartbeat Law remains in effect. That has given rise to comments that abortions can proceed “up to 6 weeks gestation,” which we have seen is an inaccurate statement. And the “trigger” law is set to take effect July 24. At this writing, the 1925 law totally banning abortion without exception for the life of the mother, although antiquated, is still enforceable (when the TRO expires), and it takes precedence over the heartbeat law and the “trigger” law. It seems highly improbable that the 1925 law will ever be enforced by prosecution (although it is likely that it will not be removed from the books), whereas the “trigger” law is legal under the Dobbs decision and will be enforced beginning July 24, regardless of whether the TRO survives that long.

With abortion clinics unable to do abortions in Texas, there are reports that some are referring women out of state, and some states (notably California) are attempting to become an “abortion-tourist” destination. Some organizations are raising money (and pledging tax-payer money) to pay air fare, food, lodging, expenses, and lost wages, to get women to California for an abortion. Legal action attempting to delay or mitigate the impact of the Dobbs decision is in process in all states, creating much confusion. Consult this web page for information as these events play out.

At the same time, some in the pro-abortion factions have reacted with hate speech, intimidating protests, and a call to violence against churches and PRC. There are about 300,000 churches and 3,000 PRC in the US. There has been some vandalism (relatively little so far), but churches, synagogues, mosques, schools, and businesses have all been hardening their perimeters with security. These are unplanned expenses that have a bottom line impact on churches and PRC that are dependent on donations and only exist to help people and were never intended to need a defensive profile. Perhaps unsurprisingly, donations have been pouring in to meet these needs as the mass of silent majority pro-life people want their voice to be heard and now feel encouraged. However, that additional need for financial support will be ongoing because there is an increasing need to reach and educate women about all the resources available to them. And, these must be expanded rapidly since the need is increasing rapidly.

Immediately after the SCOTUS announcement, a coalition of pro-life organizations (including Texas Right to Life and Houston Coalition for Life) organized a rally at the huge Planned Parenthood abortion factory on the Gulf Freeway in Houston the next morning. Then, astonishingly, over just 2-3 days, over 57 national organizations were drawn together in a webinar in which 43 leaders spoke before an on-line audience of 23,500 to discuss the many facets of the post-Roe challenges and how they will work together to meet them. Impressive knowledge, talent, organization, and commitment was demonstrated over the 2 hours and 40 mins event! One speaker had prayed at the Supreme Court location for an overturn of Roe every day for 6,500 days. Watch a replay of the webinar:

https://lifebeyondroe.com/event/?inf_contact_key=e39a4a019b131119ac9031248e664162680f8914173f9191b1c0223e68310bb1

If it is a bit too big to consume at one sitting, try 30 mins a day for 5 days. Make notes to help yourself when discussing and planning with others…and share the link.

Many local, state, and national organizations have provided podcasts and webinars to reach their constituencies in the last few days. The 40 Days for Life organization is hosting a Post-Roe Symposium August 5/6 in Houston. https://www.40daysforlife.com/en/

[[Before you finish this post and leave the web site, please click on the “Upcoming Pro-Life Activities” tab on the Home page and review the entries to see what you might be interested in.]]

Changing to a more sobering topic, my latest Community Impact Newsletter just carried a story “Maternal Mortality Rates on the Rise in Harris County.” Hillary Clinton also said on TV this past week that “Women are going to die” because of the SCOTUS decision in Dobbs. So, what is the truth. The topic is quite complicated and does not lend itself well to discussion in this format. I spend time on this subject in my book Building a Culture of Life, which is now being rolled out everywhere and available to be ordered from Amazon and Barnes and Noble. We must be ready to meet the needs of women on every level, because she must also be able to survive a pregnancy, or the baby will die with her. This often involves health care long after delivery.

The bottom line is that more women have been entering higher risk groups over recent decades. There is a rise in obesity that is associated with high blood pressure and diabetes, and these lead to cardiovascular disease. One might think that CV disease would not be a major complication in young women, and you would be partially right. However, with more women entering these high risk groups, more women will have serious complications, including death. This is what is happening in Texas and across the country. The risk is greatest in women over age 35, and in Black women. The latter (as a group) have more morbidity (diseases), and thus higher risks and, consequentially, a mortality rate nearly twice the national average.

The blame has been placed on a complex of factors including failure to control risks before pregnancy, late visits to doctor when pregnant, variations in the perception of need for such healthcare, lack of healthcare resources, and variable quality of resources for high risk pregnancies…the discussion goes on. I must finish this brief narrative by saying that the problem is systemic and must be addressed at multiple levels concurrently… if our politicians would only do so.

On another front, the National Catholic Register (NCR) is reporting that the four Catholic bishops of Colorado have pronounced that Catholic lawmakers who voted for an abortion law stripping the unborn of any human rights and permitting abortion up to the moment of birth should not take Holy Communion. Colorado was the first state to legalize abortion, in1967. Every year nearly 300 babies are killed after 21 weeks gestation in Colorado, many because they are unwanted girls or because they have Down Syndrome. Perhaps they will compete with California for the title “Best Culture of Death.”

It is also a Catholic scandal that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, an ardent advocate of unregulated abortion at any stage of development, was prohibited by the bishop from taking Holy Communion in the archdiocese of San Francisco. So, she made a point of going to a church in Washington DC and calling media attention to her defiant behavior while taking communion there. Then, this week she visited the pope at the Vatican and was offered Holy Communion there.

For religious Catholics, taking Holy Communion is a sacrament, an act of affirming the teaches of the Catholic church (in a broad way) and bonding oneself with the “body of Christ” (which is the Church), and to Christ himself. To do so, one must be in a state of grace, that is, acknowledging one’s sins, asking forgiveness, and asking for the grace to be worthy of the same. The message many Catholics are getting from the pope is that one does not have to be in state of grace to receive Holy Communion, and that the sacraments are therefore meaningless. Come back here for follow-up on the stink produced by these events.

I normally post an update in pro-life news roughly every 2 weeks. However, I may publish follow-up posts more often in near future, if events dictate, since the situation is so dynamic and volatile. Take time to watch the webinar referenced above. Your whole perspective on life will be changed, and you will be greatly encouraged. Amid consternation over so many serious concerns that we face going forward, there are such magnificent people of impressive talent, faith, and dedication to uplift us, give us hope, and make us feel an important part of something great, which we are !

Most of the recent news has centered around the Supreme Court leak of a draft of the majority decision in the Dobbs case and public responses to that revelation. I will not spend much time on that subject here. I am sure that we are all aware of the vitriolic and hateful rhetoric by the pro-abortion faction and the manner in which the Justices are being threatened. However, those who embrace the culture of death hate foremost those of us who care about women in distress with an unplanned pregnancy, women desperate, confused, and worried.

They hate us because we want to help those women. I invite the reader to come up with a self-consistent set of beliefs about the rights of women that excludes providing help at the time of an unplanned and unwanted pregnancy. Those who believe that every woman who finds herself in such a situation should have an abortion, and should not be helped with other choices, are a strange set of personalities indeed.

In their delusional mental condition motivated by hate and lust for blood, they have assaulted pro-life advocates and carried out acts of vandalism and arson on pregnancy resource centers, stolen religious objects and desecrated churches. At the same time that pregnancy resource centers are preparing to reach out to women in need and provide even more help to more women, many of those organizations and many churches are improving security and hardening access to bad actors….not without good reason, since the hate-mongers are calling for a summer of violence against them.

With the reasonable expectation now that SCOTUS will invoke the 10th Amendment to the Constitution and rule that the individual states have the right to regulate abortion according to the will of the people through their elected officials in those states, the National Catholic Register, in the May 22, 2022 edition, presented an analysis by the Catholic News Agency of the situation at the present time in the various states. The article revealed which states have “trigger” laws that will restrict abortion in such a case. Some states have the right to an abortion enshrined in state law. Some states are more pro-life, and other states are rather mixed. It is an excellent source of information to use in researching these issues, but is obviously too much information to comment on here.

The new battleground over abortion is expected to be at the state level. However, a pro-abortion political party in Congress will continue to try to pass laws providing unrestricted access to abortion at any stage of pregnancy, with some even advocating that unwanted babies should be allowed to die of neglect after birth. Now more than ever, we must fight for the hearts and minds of the people.

NCR also carried an article with reactions in Central and South American countries to the leaked version of their hoped for ruling in Dobbs. Comments by leaders of pro-life movements in Mexico, Columbia, Ecuador, Peru, and Argentina inform us of how far-reaching the decisions of SCOTUS are, how the US acceptance of abortion in Roe v Wade influenced the acceptance of abortion in their countries and around the world. A new ruling by SCOTUS that the US Constitution does not provide a nation-wide right to an abortion, but that it delegates to the individual states in the 10th Amendment the responsibility to make laws regulating abortion, is hoped to have a ripple effect on the attitudes of people and the development of laws in many other countries. This was reiterated in the NCR edition on June 5, 2022 in which it is noted that national newspapers all across Europe carried the story as front page news. It is this realization by the powerful abortion industry, and by politicians supported by the huge wealth they control, that has pro-abortion leaders acting like a dangerous wounded animal fighting for its life.

Finally, for now, I offer a few messages for Catholics. You may wish to catch EWTN Pro-Life Weekly on Thursdays at 9:00 pm (central). You can also download meditations for a pro-life rosary at https://ewtn.com/proliferosary . Some people may be able to attend the EWTN Family Celebration in Phoenix on October 1, 2022 https://ewtn.com/familycelebration

Let us pray for the SCOTUS Justices and for the unborn and for those who embrace death that they may have their eyes opened to the sanctity of new life and the importance of preserving the dignity of every individual.

Well friends, if you thought it could not get any crazier…. or more despicable…

Time magazine published an article on May 21, 2022 that attempts to link the tragedy perpetrated by the Buffalo shooter to the pro-life movement (which they call the anti-abortion movement). The authors try to portray pro-life people as racists who want to stop the abortion of white babies so that more white people can keep the black and brown people subjugated to their dominance.

In making this assertion, they declare that the abortion movement was born in the 19th century due to “white fears of a declining white birth rate.” They try to place this in the context of white Protestants fearing the immigration of white Catholics and Jews, which does not make any sense. In fact, there was such a concern by Protestants “in the 19th century” about the immigration of Catholics (not Jews) as part of the prevailing anti-Catholic sentiment of the time. It had nothing to do with abortion. I have discussed the history of abortion in my book, and it only became a public issue when the women’s rights movement gained a lot of attention. There ensued a major split between the leadership and a minority faction that wanted to bring abortion into the mix.

Another untruth that the authors perpetrate is that pro-life people want to prevent the abortion of white babies. The truth is that 40% of current surgical abortions are black babies. A minority of abortions are in white women. That is why Planned Parenthood has placed 86% of their abortion clinics in predominately Black and Hispanic neighborhoods. This fact has been decried for years by Alveta King (niece of Martin Luther King, Jr.), and especially in the movie “Blood Money: the Business of Abortion.”

More recently, US House Rep Rep. Burgess Owens delivered an impassioned speech against abortion, arguing that it discriminates against Black women in the United States. He declared that abortion has taken the lives of 20 million Black babies, and that 40% of his race has been exterminated. At the same time, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said that restricting abortion would be bad for the economy. Many have expressed outrage at the implication that aborting Black babies is good for the economy.

In fact, the selective elimination of “unfit” black babies (by birth control measures and sterilization of women) was the stated purpose of Margaret Sanger from the beginning. This scandalous racist history actually led to the change of the name of the parent organization to “Planned Parenthood.” However, Sanger was solidly against abortion, which was not practiced by PP until after her death. This assertion by the authors that pro-life people are racists is the practice of racism itself, disguised in a distorted history of which most people are unaware in a blatant attempt to deceive the uneducated. This whole story is accurately told in my book. Here is the link, although it is so goofy and full of distorted quotes and half-truths that I do not recommend you spend any time on it. https://time.com/6178135/buffalo-shooting-abortion-replacement-theory/

In other news… the Archbishop of the Archdiocese of San Francisco has declared that Nancy Pelosi, who labels herself as a devout Catholic and supports unrestricted abortion at any stage of development (an oxymoron, to say the least), is barred from receiving Holy Communion (in the Archdiocese of San Francisco). The issue of people in high offices in the United States who call themselves Catholics and yet support abortion in defiance of the church’s position on the sanctity of life, has produced a schism within lay Catholics who support one political party or another on other issues as well.

Two days later, Pope Francis addressed participants in the “Let’s Choose Life” march in Rome, applauding their “commitment in favor of life and in defense of conscientious objection, the exercise of which is often attempted to be restricted.” “Unfortunately, in recent years there has been a shift in the common mentality, and today we are increasingly inclined to think that life is an asset at our total disposal, which we can choose to manipulate, give birth to or let die as we please, as the exclusive outcome of an individual choice.” “Let us remember that life is a gift from God,” he said. “It is always sacred and inviolable, and we cannot silence the voice of conscience.” These statements will, no doubt, be welcomed by Bishops who have tried to give guidance to lay people on the issue of why political leaders can call themselves Catholic and take communion while aggressively supporting abortion, but other Catholics are called upon the respect the sanctity of life. However, the issue is far from settled.

On May 19, while the House Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the topic of “Abortion Access and Care,” pro-abortion activist Aimee Arrambide affirmed her belief that everyone can decide for themselves what a woman is and that men can get pregnant and have abortions. Twitter reportedly lit up with people mocking her. One person observed that Arramide has admitted her belief that men have a right to an opinion on abortion because they can get pregnant and have an abortion. The pro-abortion faction has tried to discredit opinions by men by saying it is exclusively a female issue since only women get pregnant. It keeps getting crazier…

Vice President Harris has opined that a SCOTUS decision that the people in the individual states have the constitutional right to regulate abortion under the 10th amendment would keep women from exercising a “right” to an abortion (which is, in fact, not a “right” under the constitution or any US statute). She also attempted to cause concern that “rights” like “gay marriage” and “use of contraceptives” could likewise be regulated by the states. Well, Ms. Harris, they are already. Critics are unsure if she is ignorant of how state laws work and what is/is not federal law and what is protected constitutionally, or whether she is just trying to inflame the ignorant.

On the other hand, the New York Times, despite publishing chilling pro-abortion articles, published this guest essay “When Abortion is Pro-Life” by Dr. Matthew Loftus on May 20, 2022. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/20/opinion/abortion-doctor-pro-life.html Dr. Loftus is pro-life and was greatly conflicted when he had to perform a late term abortion… to save the life of the mother who was bleeding to death.

An Oklahoma bill has been sent to the governor for signature, which is expected. The bill bans any procedures that “cause the death of an unborn child,” which is defined as a “human fetus or embryo in any stage of gestation from fertilization until birth.” Exceptions are provided for rape, incest, or if the mother’s life is in danger. As one might expect, there is much acrimony among pro-abortion people.

The Supreme Court is expected to rule in the Dobbs case by the end of June, before going into recess. Due to the now famous “leak” of a draft of the ruling, it is widely believed that the majority of the court will rule that the 10th amendment to the constitution is unambiguous in giving to the individual states the right to regulate issues not expressively retained to the “United States” (that is, the federal government, or Congress). Therefore, the issue of abortion, which was not at any time a topic of conversation in drafting the constitution or any of its amendments, must be regulated in the individual states by the elected representatives of the people in those states.

It has been largely assumed that this draft was leaked by a clerk (typically a very bright attorney who was able to get a plumb of a job working for the court), and it has been reported that the Justices are very unhappy with the betrayal of confidence. Much comment has also been rendered on the long term impact on the court. However, experts also say that the perpetrator should have been quickly uncovered. Someone on the inside contacted pro-abortion activists and coordinated the leak with demonstrations planned to take place immediately after the release.

What if the source was not a lower level clerk but one of the dissenting, very liberal female Justices who supports unrestricted abortion… maybe somebody appointed by President Obama. If the source of the leak is not discovered among the lower clerks, then one has no choice but to suspect an activist Justice. That would make the Supreme Court a political activist organization that, in future, could shape public opinion through leaked information and demonstrations targeted at intimidating dissenting Justices and potentially carrying out violence against their families. The importance of a resolution to this issue and a removal of the guilty party cannot be overstated.

On April 7, the US Senate confirmed Ketanji Brown Jackson as the latest new Supreme Court Justice. Jackson is highly qualified, but many of her prior rulings have been so controversial as to make her nomination appear to be related to an extreme left wing world view. However, Biden made it clear that he picked her based on race and gender, she being black and a woman. Sadly, that obscures her stellar career, albeit that some of her rulings have been said to be “outrageously radical.”

Nevertheless, in her opening statement before the senate Judiciary Committee, she thanked Biden and Congress and then went on to “reaffirm my thanks to God, for it is faith that sustains me…” This gives us hope that she will not support the attacks on religious freedom that we have seen under the Biden administration. But, her record is not encouraging. See my post March 25, 2022.

The Spring 2022 edition of Day 41, a publication of 40 Days for Life, carries an especially noteworthy story about Sue Thayer (1959–2021). Ms. Thayer died 12-24-21 after a brief battle with a rare and very aggressive form of kidney cancer. She worked at a Planned Parenthood location in Storm Lake, Iowa for 17 years from 1991, rising to a management position before she converted to the Pro-Life movement.

Her Planned Parenthood location did not perform abortions, but PP began “an outrageous webcam abortion scheme” in which a doctor would see a woman on a webcam and prescribe abortion pills without a physical exam or even verifying pregnancy. Sue was very troubled because she knew about women who had been injured and even killed by the abortion pills. However, her job paid very well and had exceptional benefits, and her family needed the income, so she “buried her head in the sand” for a while.

Ultimately, she was required to do shifts at an abortion clinic and then to go watch a day of surgical abortions. That left her even more troubled as she thought of “all those babies in the sewer system.” Then, although not trained and licensed to do so, she was required to perform ultrasounds before abortions with a machine that clearly showed the features of a developing baby. She was fired after she declared, “I’m not going to do this!”

It was not long afterwards that she joined 40 Days for Life campaigns and began to lead others. She exposed the PP webcam scheme, accused PP of Medicaid fraud, and testified before Congress. Whereas there is not enough space here to give justice to her efforts, it will have to suffice to say that she also opened Cornerstone for Life Pregnancy Resource Center https://cornerstoneforlifeprc.com/about-us/ which continues to serve the community. She later joined the staff of 40 Days for Life and was tireless in both national and international work, often with a grueling schedule. Ironically, just a week before her death, the Biden administration approved mail-order abortion pills for do-it-yourself chemical abortions. In a previous post, I cited a 500% increase in ER visits due to chemical abortions. https://erlc.com/resource-library/articles/new-study-finds-chemical-abortion-leads-to-higher-rate-of-er-visits/

In Washington, DC, anti-abortion activists known as Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU) obtained a box from the driver of a medical waste disposal company outside an abortion clinic. Within the box were the remains of 115 babies. Of these, 110 were given a funeral mass and were buried. However, 5 of the bodies appear to be late term abortions. On April 8, nearly 70 lawmakers lead by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) have requested the Dept of Justice and the FBI to investigate the deaths to determine whether they occurred in violation of the “Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003.” PAAU and other pro-life groups are maintaining a vigil and demanding “Justice for the Five!”

In 2013, the pro-life group Live Action released a video in which the abortionist at this clinic said, regarding any baby that survived an abortion attempt and was born alive, that he would allow the baby to die. This is what happened to Melissa Ohden who was born alive at 30 weeks gestation after an attempted abortion and put aside to die. She was rescued by a nurse and lived. Read her story in “You Carried Me” (available everywhere). https://abortionsurvivors.org/

The Vermont legislature has passed Proposal 5 to amend the Vermont Constitution to add: “That an individual’s right to personal reproductive autonomy is central to the liberty and dignity to determine one’s own life course and shall not be denied or infringed unless justified by a compelling State interest achieved by the least restrictive means.” If that has you saying “What???,” then you are in good company with many people in Vermont. The people of Vermont will vote on this in November 2022.

As people wonder what that means, it is being discussed that it would appear to permit a minor child to obtain an abortion, puberty-blocking hormones, and gender-changing surgery without parental consent or even notification. The state already allows minor girls to consent for an abortion without parental approval. Vermont is the most abortion-friendly state in the country. In 2019, the state enacted an “all -nine-months” bill which declared a fundamental right to have an abortion and stated that an unborn baby “shall not have independent rights under Vermont law.”

One of the issues which I have discussed in prior posts concerning Roe and Dobbs is that of the 10th Amendment to the US Constitution, which leaves to the individual states all matters not explicitly given in the Constitution to Congress. Obviously, that includes abortion. Some legal scholars say that the Supreme Court should never have taken the Roe case because of the 10th Amendment. Many comments made in the case of Dobbs concern themselves with the prospects of returning decisions regarding all manner of reproductive health to the individual states pursuant to the 10th Amendment. Indeed, the central issue in Dobbs is whether the people of Mississippi have the right to enact laws regulating abortion according to the values of the people of Mississippi.

As we await the Supreme Court decision in Dobbs, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops has organized an ecumenical initiative called the “Pray for Dobbs” campaign. Pro-Life organizations around the country have been discussing the “what-if’s” and preparing for various contingencies. https://www.prayfordobbs.com/ Indeed, we should continue to “Pray for Dobbs.”

On of the most talked about topics at present is President Biden’s nominee to the Supreme Court. It was certain that Biden would pick a candidate who has an acknowledged ideology with a legal track record to match when he made his decision. He also stated that he would choose a black woman. Albeit that Biden makes so many gaffs that he has been subjected to much ridicule at home and abroad, it is particularly sad that his thought processes work with an overlay of sexism and racism. How sad it is for the black woman nominated to know that, out of all the qualified persons with ideologies favored by the President, she was selected over others, not by her accomplishments, but only because of her gender and skin color, the essence of the motivations so many people work to erase.

Now that she has been before the Senate (the hearing concluded yesterday), the public is learning more about Judge Katanji Brown Jackson. Unsurprisingly, she ducked questions about her previous rulings and her views on the Constitution. However, we learned that she has been shockingly soft on child sex abusers, and she was unable to offer any explanation for repeatedly giving the absolute shortest and weakest punishments possible.

Furthermore, she stated that she does not know when life begins. In 1973, Justice Blackmun, in the Roe v Wade decision, wrote the same thing on behalf of the Court, saying that the Court did not know when life begins. However, in the 1960’s every medical book in the world contained the information that the Supreme Court claimed not to know: life begins at the moment of conception and cells divide over and over while the tiny growing human person is shaped into a baby ready to be born and live outside the mother’s body.

It is amply demonstrated by abortion survivors that the tiny growing new life is a person, and abortion survivors declare that they had a right to live when their lives were almost taken by abortion. It is proving impossible to dispute that the unborn are real people. The assertion is powerful that their lives are just as worthy as the lives of anyone else. So, what about all the babies who are killed…that is what the Senate committee wanted to know from Ms. Jackson. In fact, everyone knows when life begins, and abortionists know that they are killing a developing baby, a real person. They just do it anyway. It is increasingly the case that those who support abortion, like Jackson, know it is the deliberate taking of a human life. So, if our leaders in the highest positions and our Supreme Court Justices do not value the lives of the weakest and most defenseless among us, then what kind of people are we?

Jackson also stated that the legal cases of Roe and Casey, which established a woman’s “right” to an abortion, were “settled law.” While not surprising that she would support abortion, legal scholars have commented since 1973 that the reasoning used in the Roe decision were baffling, summoning fragments of assertions in various amendments and then drawing conclusions that were clearly not the intent of the amendments when they were originally debated and supported.

Likewise, the Roe decision was based on such faulty assertions about when life begins, the trimester system, and fetal viability that use of such arguments to justify abortion is just plain scientifically dishonest. The Court also failed to explain why the very simple and plain language of the 10th amendment does not give the individual states the right to regulate abortion according to the values of the people living in those communities. While Jackson stated to believe that future Courts must follow the precedence set by prior decisions, these issues were far from “settled” in Roe or Casey or any of the other related cases since.

A very good example of how the Court can make very bad decisions that must be corrected is the Dred Scott decision in 1857. Jackson claims she does not know what the issues were in that case. That is a very disappointing statement, because it means either that she lacks enough legal knowledge to even qualify as a lawyer, or she is blatantly lying.

Dred Scott sued to obtain his freedom from slavery because his owner had taken him to reside in a slave free state and a slave free territory for a while (too much more detail to relate here). The Court said that Scott did not have a right to sue because a “Negro” could never be a US citizen, amid other racist comments, and that the US did not have the authority to say anything for or against slavery in the new territories (an important issue of the day and a major issue in the lead up to the Civil War). At least some of the Justices were slave owners, and no Justice recused himself for conflict of interest.

Should this remain the law of the land? Or, is Jackson simply saying something she knows not to be true in an effort to protect any revision of Roe and other Court decisions based on Roe? The Dred Scott decision is often said to be the most egregious example of the Court’s bad decisions. In my mind, the decision in Roe is an equally egregious example of convoluted and illogical reasoning, and it has influenced the lives of hundreds of millions more people than the issue of slavery leading to the Civil War, and it has cost the lives of sixty million more people than died in the Civil War.

Jackson declared that “all Supreme Court cases are precedential” and “their rulings have to be followed” (all must include Dred Scott and Roe). Once again, there are no surprises here, but it does point out once again that elections to the highest positions in government do matter. One can only hope that Biden will be forced to select another candidate and that confirmation of any dishonest ideologue can be delayed and eventually declined.

In this edition, there is much about which to be informed. As previously mentioned, as if one needs to be reminded, there is “wailing and gnashing of teeth” among those pro-abortion factions who fear that their ability to dispatch the unborn in the US will be restricted by regulations enacted by the people in their own states….God forbid that people should have a choice!? Pro-life is the real pro-choice !

Whereas one can hope that some day women will cease to choose abortion, it is our duty to ensure that they have a choice, are well-informed, and have easy access to everything they need, every kind of help, and every alternative so they can choose life and have a healthy baby. Therefore, even while we hope the Supreme Court will rule (at least in part) that the individual states have the right under the 10th amendment to the constitution to regulate abortion according to the will of the people, there is much to do by way of education and improving a smooth pathway to meet all of a woman’s needs when feeling anxious, abandoned, and hopeless with an unplanned and unwanted pregnancy.

Now for the news.

Citibank has announced a new policy in a regulatory filing with the US Security and Exchange Commission on March 15. The bank stated: “In response to changes in reproductive health care laws in certain states in the U.S., beginning in 2022 we provide travel benefits to facilitate access to adequate resources.” They do not have any plans to provide help to women. I am forever mystified at the blood thirsty positions people take. This is, of course, nothing new with the abortion industry…that is how they make their money. But, with war in Ukraine, we hear people calling for a more widespread war…. for killing the Russian soldiers, and sending our young men and women to their deaths. Where were they in the first 6 months of 2020 when a peaceful solution could have been negotiated…if people wanted peace.

Idaho has become the first state to model a law after that of Texas, banning abortion after 6 weeks and allowing family members to sue anyone performing an abortion. Those who would have been fathers, grandparents, siblings, aunts and uncles have 4 years to bring the lawsuit, which provides for minimum damages of $20,000.

On Ash Wednesday, March 2, while President Biden appeared before reporters wearing ashes on his forehead, a reported asked how he could claim to be Catholic while supporting abortion in defiance of church teachings. The president’s wife pulled him away to prevent him from attempting to give a response. Biden has said that Pope Francis told him he approved of his taking communion. At the same time, the Pope has said that abortion is murder. If Biden is a murderer, be must be truly sorry and repentant before he can receive absolution and communion. The dichotomy of teachings from the Pope has fragmented the Catholic Church, reminding us once again that it is up to us to provide what women need. The solution does not lie with the Church or any government.

Readers of previous posts know about H.R. 3755, the Women’s Health Protection Act, which aims “to protect a person’s ability to determine whether to continue or end a pregnancy, and to protect a health care provider’s ability to provide abortion services.” This is an attempt to codify the “ability” to have an abortion as the federal law of the land before the Supreme Court rules on the Dobbs case in June. The bill passed the Democrat-controlled House 218-211 and was presented before the Senate. On May 1, the Senate voted 48-46 NOT to bring the bill up for debate in the Senate. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) joined Republicans in opposing the bill. Six senators did not vote. Do they not have the character to stand and be counted for what they believe is right? How about each of us….

A new report shows that the use of abortion pills is up from 44% of all abortions in 2019 to 54% in 2020, largely due to the pandemic and increasing public awareness of the option. Planned Parenthood began to use telemedicine and overnight delivery of the pills. Let us be reminded that our mission includes changing the hearts and minds of the public as well as providing all the physical help and emotional support a woman needs to choose life. When a woman can abort in private, it is only her conscience which is offended. It is virtually certain that the pills will never be illegal. Such a law would be impossible to enforce; witness the use of currently illegal drugs.

The Constitutional Court of Columbia has voted to legalize abortion up to gestational age 24 weeks. Previously, abortion was illegal unless the pregnancy resulted from rape, there were fetal malformations, or if the mother’s life was in danger. While all of these prior exceptions can be met with objections (discussed in earlier posts and some of my other writings), abortion up to 24 weeks means that the most hideous procedure of killing a well-developed person in the womb, sucking out the brain and dismembering the body is now cheered in Columbia as an “historic step”…indeed it is, with great sadness. Beyond 24 weeks, there remain restrictions on abortion, while the pro-abortion faction is still calling for complete decriminalization of abortion at any gestational age for any reason.

A group of Republicans in the House Pro-Life Caucus have decried a recent report investigating allegations of illegal and unethical activities practiced by the University of Pittsburgh surrounding its fetal tissue research, calling it a whitewash. “A truly transparent and comprehensive assessment would not have evaded the questions raised by public records, especially and including whether the University of Pittsburgh used the body parts of babies who were born alive and died from having their organs harvested, as well as if individuals procuring the baby body parts for the university altered abortion procedures to suit their gruesome research.” I have reported on this previously also. It is truly sickening. But, the fact is, there are those who feel that laws are inconvenient, so they just ignore them. We see it frequently in so many areas of concern these days, and in the highest political offices in the land.

The question of when life begins…really? Justice Blackmun did not know in 1973, but every doctor in the world and every medical library in the word in the 1960’s knew the answer…life begins at the moment of conception. That is medical science and not simply a pro-life message arguing that abortion is taking a human life. President Biden has said often since at least 2008 that he believes life begins at conception. In 2015, he said that he was able to accept that premise, but he was not ready to say that to others who have a different view (whatever that means). Now, he has moved even further away from supporting life, saying he respects people who believe life begins at conception, but he disagrees. Will the next step be to decide whose life has value? Should some people be euthanized? Let us know history and understand how that journey began with small steps. Let us not be deceived. Many people already advocate shocking ideas. Let us not be confused. See Https:lifefirst.org under “When does life begin?” (your answer matters).

There is much more news of which we should be aware and as a result of which we should form opinions and incorporate our opinions into activism and voting. Watch for new posts in a few days until I get caught up. As I have mentioned, we can expect the most hateful and vitriolic rhetoric from those who support abortion. The name-calling has started, and I fear that the worst is yet to come. We are dealing with an underlying evil, not that all misguided persons supporting “women’s rights” are evil…many have no idea what they think they are supporting, and they have not seen what options are available to women who want alternatives. But, there is pure evil at work for profit and to rid the world of those least fit to live. Watch as they call us what they are…. the oldest of tactics… demonize your adversary if you have no logically persuasive argument. That is why we must be prepared by the weapons of knowledge and prayer.

As noted in the title, in this post I draw upon articles in recent editions of the National Catholic Register. The contributors and editors report in every issue on some facet of the struggle to protect the sanctity of life and the dignity of those whose lives are diminished… many of those destroyed by abortion. However, those who attack life and human dignity are also assaulting our freedoms to assemble, speak freely, and educate our children, to name a few of the current serious cultural conflicts.

The National Right to Life sponsored a full page ad with a picture of a tiny developing baby. The caption reads: “Her heart is beating. For Now. An unborn baby’s heart is beating until she dies from abortion. Her brain waves could be recorded as early as six weeks. She, along with 800,000 potential playmates, will die from abortion this year. And powerful political forces believe there should be more abortions, even late in pregnancy, and paid for with your tax dollars.”

An organization named Students for Life investigated 784 Christian institutions, of which 237 (30%) were Catholic schools. They found that 81 of the 547 non-Catholic Christian schools (14.8%) and 22 of the 237 Catholic schools (9.3%) had ties to Planned Parenthood.

The investigation was conducted from viewing the school web sites where such relationships were found as: promoting PP as an internship opportunity for credit; promoting PP as a student resource; advertising or partnering with PP for an event; promoting PP as a career or volunteer opportunity.

When the schools with ties to PP were contacted concerning the issue, the number of non-Catholic schools continuing the relationship dropped to 61 (down from 14.8% to 11.2%) and the Catholic schools dropped to 8 (down from 9.3% to 3.4%). PP performed 354,871 abortions in 2021. None of the schools continuing to work with PP returned calls of inquiry. Some of those schools continued to have the same (or modified) links on their web sites, while at least one school hid the links behind a log in screen.

NCR also recently carried a story on surrogate motherhood. Surrogacy involves an arrangement whereby a woman agrees to bear someone else’s biological child and to surrender the child at birth, typically for monetary compensation. Surrogacy is most often arranged by wealthy couples for the convenience of not having to conceive in a natural way or just because the woman does not want to deal with a pregnancy.

The Catholic Church teaches against the practice, and some feminists express revulsion and cite negative implications for women. Comments include references to the perils of pregnancy and cite that the industry is unregulated. In another comment, there is the issue of the bond between the mother and child and the impact on the child when it is learned that he/she was conceived and carried to term in a rent-a-womb.

The article also cites the Church position that a child is a “gift” and that there is no”right” to a child. A child is not a piece of property. And, by bearing children, man and woman uniquely cooperate with Creator God. Pope John Paul II’s “Letter to Women” speaks to the beauty of being a woman and especially a mother. Other angles on this issue include human trafficking with the intention of reproductive exploitation of both the woman and the child. Other statements point out that poor women are at the financial and emotional mercy of the wealthy; women have to use their bodies or sell their eggs to meet their economic needs.

In another article, there are comments by a man who attended the March for Life in Washington, DC, his first time. He describes himself as an “old culture warrior” who has been in the battle since Roe v Wade in1973. He cites his astonishment at how young the crowd was…average age about 30-35, and he observed buses unloading men and women no older than their 20’s from all over the country. Many, if not most, seemed to be from colleges; he counted over 150 different college logos. He was greatly encouraged that the future of the pro-life movement is in good hands.

At the same time, Catholics at the March for Life Prayer Vigil at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception were praying for a renewed reverence for human life. Outside, a demonstration by “Catholics for Choice” supported abortion on demand for any reason. One has to wonder why they would bother to call themselves “Catholic” while showing such disrespect for the wanton destruction of human life and supporting the denigration of women. Calling oneself a unicorn does not make one a unicorn. Neither are they Catholic who lack compassion and deny women alternatives and support when there is an unwanted pregnancy in a very bad situation.

Let us be mindful of all these things. Whereas abortion is the biggest destroyer of human life and has a serious impact on women and lost fatherhood, and a ripple effect on extended families, it is by no means to only way in which “the culture of death” plagues our society. Let us not become weary, but redouble our commitment to “building a culture of life.”

I will make my post a bit more succinct this time, just to inform of a few interesting developments.

Gallup has recently released numbers on the issue of how the American public feel about abortion: should it be totally illegal 20%, totally legal 32%, legal under some conditions (usually cited as rape, incest, mother’s life in danger) 48%; Identify as pro-choice 49%, pro-life 47%…error bars not cited…so basically 48/48… (note that the numbers were 46/46 in 2002, and that pro-choice and pro-life have both varied up and down 41-51% over the last 20 years, only to wind up with identification unchanged at present…although the definitions and issues over 20 years have surely changed). Also note that from 4-8 people out of 100 just don’t know how they identify…. what if we could bring many of them to the pro-life side….? (Can I here “activism, outreach, and education”??)

Pennsylvania Court of Appeals has refused an appeal by 12 states to prevent Biden from expanding abortion at home and abroad by executive order. Ohio University is sponsoring a “sex week” during which students are asked to “thank abortion providers.”

Fox news is reporting that the NIH is planning to spend $88 million in 2022 (in just this one year) on research using aborted fetal tissues. Approximately $21 million has already been provided by the NIAID which is run by Anthony Fauci. I have written some on this topic in past posts. Federal law prohibits the sale or trafficking in fetal tissues, but illegal activities are known (and Planned Parenthood has been a big player). Huge political contributions and a pro-abortion attitude at high levels of government have insured that there has been no prosecution. I do not have space here to document those statements, but I have written on them in previous posts and in my book. As horrifying as this is to many, it is the tip of the iceberg and the stuff of science fiction. The Democrat majority US Senate has refused to ban human-animal hybrid experiments. For those wishing to read on I supply the links below: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/fauci-nih-funding-fetal-tissue-studies and https://www.foxnews.com/politics/pittsburgh-fetal-tissue-project and https://www.foxnews.com/us/planned-parenthood-tissue-procurer-abortion-clinic-testimony and https://www.foxnews.com/politics/unsealed-invoices-planned-parenthood-daleiden-25k Do you want to read about a heart harvested from an aborted baby transplanted into a rat…want to see it beating?

An organization called NARAL has a web site worth visiting. https://www.prochoiceamerica.org/ It advocates unrestricted and unregulated access to abortion, shamelessly advocating abortion as family planning and birth control and a woman’s right to choose…. choose between abortion and no other option. What choice is that ?! However, it is so wrapped up in sugar and love as to make the uninformed person want to sign up right away. The pro-abortion faction is very well funded with the best of advertising and graphic artists that money can buy.

So, I ask the reader, where do you stand… will you be as committed as they are, with the meager financial resources we in the pro-life movement have? Can you spare some of your time for activism, to stand and be counted, to donate a few dollars from time to time to support your local pregnancy resource centers, to support https://LifeFirst.org and https://abortionsurvivors.org and other such organizations which stand on the front line?

One can see that the issues are grave, and we are all needed to be in the fray “with both feet.” Legalisms are one thing, but we have seen in the above links that laws are not enforced by the highest authorities in government if they support a position contrary to the law (and I have written much on how this is wrapped up in political power and self-enrichment). It is up to us to change the hearts and minds of the public through activism and education, and by providing women in need with everything they need to choose life for their baby. And, every last one of us is important to that cause.

Having caught you up to date on some of the most important recent events, I now present a few that are easier to digest.

The current National Catholic Register carries a front page story on the March for Life in Washington, D.C. with comments that hopes are running high for a Supreme Court “reversal” of Roe v. Wade. While I have commented on this issue quite a bit, let us be reminded that the Roe decision involved a cluster of findings and depended upon sentence fragments in various constitutional amendments to discern a new “right” for women to have an abortion. In their findings, they ignored the 10th Amendment, which leaves every matter not explicitly addressed in the constitution to the states.

Furthermore, those discussions in the decision that deal with medical aspects of pregnancy and abortion are antiquated and not relevant to any current review. As if not bad enough, the statement that the court did not know when human life begins and that nobody else did either, was blatantly and knowingly false at the time. Long prior to 1973, the medical community was in total agreement on the issue, and medical books worldwide reaffirmed that human life begins at the moment of conception.

Therefore, a more studious court without a political agenda must look at the Mississippi case and devise an entirely new set of findings, which must, of their nature, contradict the Roe findings. The most simple decision would be to find that the 10th Amendment leaves the matter to the individual states. Thus, the decisions in Roe, Doe, and Casey, as well as other cases which predicated their decisions on the above, would be entirely voided.

However, it is far from clear what the majority court will do. One thing that drove the court in 1973 (other than a desire to find some way to support abortion), was the issue that every state had its own laws and regulations, most of which were somewhat different or very different. The court wanted to get everyone on the same page.

However, the decisions arising out of that desire has led to a legal morass and has divided society along political and moral/ethical positions in a way that is unprecedented, and I dare say, even more divisive, with more far-reaching consequences for women and society in general, than slavery or prohibition of alcohol. We must note that nearly 70 million babies have died. The socioeconomic impact of the loss of such lives that were never born has been very damaging to our society. The topic is a bit hard to discuss, so I will not pursue it here, but I encourage the reader to study the issue. It is rarely discussed, but one needs to know about how it has affected the broader aspects of what we experience every day.

The NCR also carries the story of Aaron Oliver, the Democratic municipal chairman in his New Jersey hometown. Oliver is an openly homosexual episcopal priest and a New Jersey National Guard chaplain. Oliver declares himself to be a lifetime loyal Democrat. He also declares himself to be pro-life. That has put him on a collision course with Democratic leadership.

Publicly, some prominent Democrat leaders have voiced tolerance for pro-life democrats, but at the same time he is being pressured through back door channels to resign. He is an active participant with Democrats for Life of America, an organization led by women and dedicated to electing pro-life Democrats to office. Interestingly, Oliver observes that the pro-life movement is growing with more diversity across many metrics, and with topics under discussion other than abortion and including euthanasia and capital punishment, for example. He says that he has no intention of resigning and will continue to advocate that Democrats work on acceptance of the sanctity of human life in all its conditions and circumstances.

NCR also carries a story about Philip Nitschke, the Australian proponent of euthanasia, who is inventing new ways to kill oneself, cutting out issues of medicines, laws, doctors and family. One device is a “pod” that one gets into. Oxygen is pumped out and nitrogen is pumped in. The machine even films the death. I suppose that is for those who cannot get someone to press a pillow over the face until 5 minutes after all struggling has stopped. A second device that he is working on would be implantable and would trigger death at some time in the future. It is still “on the drawing board.”

The pro-euthanasia group Life Cycle (which openly describes Catholics as their enemy) objects to his methods as lacking “warmth.” You cannot make this stuff up.

In other news, an article points out some interesting events in 2021. A baby born at just 20 weeks gestation had his 1 year old birthday last June. Another born at 21 weeks also celebrated his 1 year birthday in 2021.

One of the amicus briefs to the Supreme Court in the Mississippi Dobbs case was submitted by the Catholic Association. It provided a “window into the womb,” detailed 3-D ultrasound imaging and photographs sucking their thumbs and moving about.

Responding to an alarming rate of false positive tests for Down syndrome in which mothers aborted a healthy baby, the state of Ohio banned abortion for that diagnosis. Iceland, on the other hand, has a policy of “Down syndrome eradication.”

In 2021, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Catholic Social Services who sued because they were excluded from foster care contracts with the City of Philadelphia when they would not agree to certify same-sex couples as foster parents. The Supreme Court unanimously cited the First Amendment in ruling in favor of CSS. This is haled as a victory for freedom of speech and freedom of religion, which have been increasingly under attack by the current administration and the same ruling political party in various states during 2021.

The 2021 Super Bowl featured a pro-life commercial by Toyota (which I regret I did not see) featuring Paralympic swimmer Jessica Long, a 13-time gold medalist. She was adopted at age 13 months but had to have both of her legs amputated at age 18 months. She fell in love with swimming and the rest is history. Does anyone dare to suggest that her life does not matter. Yet, many people would have euthanized her at age 18 months. Such a proposition is still hugely unpopular, so politicians know not to discuss it, but that does not mean that they would not support it if they get a big enough political majority.

On December 6, President Alejandro Giammattei of Guatemala said in an on line event that Guatemala “is a country of faith” and that government has a clear purpose “in respecting life from conception and the protection of family as the central axis of society.” A new public policy to that effect was passed by the country’s legislators last July. He went on to announce that Guatemala will be declared the “Ibero-American Pro-Life Capital” on March 9, 2022.

The Family Matters Association of Guatemala welcomed the announcement and commented “this is a reflection of the values of the Guatemalan society. Being pro-life is in our DNA as Guatemalans!”

In 2017, Planned Parenthood attempted to perform abortions on Guatemalan women by picking them up on shore and taking them to ships, but they were expelled from the country. It warms my heart to think that PP may have been listening. But, how sad it is that our country has not promoted life and family…. yet. The “yet” is up to us to remedy. In Guatemala, it took decades of consolidating the values into public policy. Perhaps one day…..