Thank God for “Safe” Abortions

ChelseaAbortion, Pro Life, Right to Life, WomenLeave a Comment

A popular mantra among abortion supporters, made popular by former President Bill Clinton, is that it must stay “safe, legal and rare.” The idea is that, as long as abortions are legal and kept out of the “back alley,” they are somehow safer.

I am sure that Rasheedah Dinkins would beg to differ. A month after undergoing a “safe” and “legal” abortion, Ms. Dinkins became seriously ill and was taken into the hospital where she “needed blood transfusions and had her uterus removed. She also suffered a stroke due to the serious blood loss and had one of her lungs collapse.”

“I was laying in my bed and I got the cold shakes,” Dinkins told AP about her ordeal. “My body kept going numb. After that, I don’t remember anything.”

Incidentally, this same clinic was recently shut down by health officials. Dinkins and another woman are suing the clinic which has been the defendant in numerous medical malpractice lawsuits.

Santorum Still in High Demand

ChelseaPolitics, Pro LifeLeave a Comment

ricksantorum.jpgSince losing his bid for re-election last year, former Senator Rick Santorum remains in high demand. He has gotten offers for numerous speaking gigs and to write another book. He became a senior fellow with the Ethics and Public Policy Center and has not refused an offer to sign on as a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer. This Thursday he announced that he has signed a deal with the Fox News Channel to offer regular commentary on politics and public policy. “It’s an opportunity for me to continue to talk about the issues I care about and to speak to the country … outside of government as opposed to inside,” Santorum told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

I was sad to see this man, who is a great defender of the family and human life, lose his seat in the Senate, but I am glad to see that he remains a public voice.

His first book, It Takes a Family, is about the difference between social programs based on misguided intellectual ideals and those based on a moral code.

Hat Tip: The HILL Chronicles

It is “Categorically Impossible” to be Catholic and Pro-Abortion

ChelseaAbortion, Politics, Pro Life, ReligionLeave a Comment

SanFranNanPORTLAND, OR, March 1, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – “It is categorically impossible for the same person to state that he or she believes simultaneously both what the Catholic Church teaches and that abortion is just a choice,” says Bishop Robert Vasa in a column released today by the Catholic Sentinel, the diocesan newspaper of the Archdiocese of Portland and the Diocese of Baker.

Though he did not mention her name, he was speaking specifically about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. In an interview with Newsweek last October she was asked whether being pro-choice conflicted with her Catholic faith and she responded:

“To me it isn’t even a question. God has given us a free will. We’re all responsible for our actions. If you don’t want an abortion, you don’t believe in it, [then] don’t have one. But don’t tell somebody else what they can do in terms of honoring their responsibilities.”

And earlier this year her daughter quipped that according to her Catholic school education, homosexuality and abortion weren’t wrong, “They were just choices,” nothing more.

To these claims, Bishop Vasa answered that there was a difference between a just and an unjust choice.

“An unjust choice would be to choose to terminate the life of another human being. This is not just a choice and it is not a just choice; it is an unjust choice. Furthermore it is an unjust choice which is diametrically opposed to the clear and consistent teaching of the Catholic Church as well as to the clear and consistent teaching of God Himself in the Ten Commandments. The direct, intentional taking of the life of an innocent human being is inhumane and unjust. It is not just a choice!”

True freedom, as a gift from God, does not consist in doing what we want, but in doing what we ought. When one chooses to defend or participate in an action that results in the killing of an innocent human being, such as abortion or embryonic stem cell research, it is a violation of the natural law and goes against the goodness and love of God – which is a truth written in the heart of every man.

Abortion in Italy

ChelseaAbortion, Right to LifeLeave a Comment

Below is part of Jill Stanek’s column in World Net Daily about the abortion crisis in Italy. It’s very sad what is going on over there, but we’re not that far behind.

Legalized abortion has poisoned Italy.

According to several foreign or Christian news reports like this one in SperoNews.com:

A 13-year-old girl is in the psychiatric unit of an Italian hospital after a forced abortion. The girl threatened suicide after her parents and an Italian court submitted her to an abortion, against her will.

According to “La Stampa” [Italian newspaper] young Valentina suffered a mental breakdown after Judge Giuseppe Cocilovo of the Court of Minors ruled that she must undergo the procedure to kill her child.

Valentina had become pregnant by her 15-year-old boyfriend and her parents demanded she have an abortion on the grounds that she was “ruining her life” by becoming a mother. Valentina’s mother said she did not have the money to support the child.

Under Italian law, the parents or guardians of a minor may force a child to undergo an abortion.

Since the abortion, Valentina has been confined to the psychiatric unit of Regina Margherita children’s hospital in Turin for wanting to commit suicide.

“You have made me kill, and now I kill myself,” Valentina reportedly cried. “I am not crazy; I am only evil like a dog” for what her parents and the court have obliged her to do, she said.

Other reports stated the girl “went into a frenzy” after her forced abortion. As of Feb. 21, she was still in the psych ward.

This story creates dilemmas for abortion proponents, not the least of which is abortion can cause a mother to crack up. The other side could use this case to say parental notification laws are bad. The problem is they only fight these laws to free a girl to abort. To argue for her right to remain pregnant would be to take our position.

Which is why I could not find this story covered by any American mainstream news organizations, nor did I read of any Italian feminist groups arising to defend this girl’s “right to choose.”

Meanwhile, Italy is in the throes of a population crisis. The fertility rate is way below replacement levels, one of the lowest of any Western country – 1.33 children per woman.

I wonder why.

Pharmacy Protection Update

ChelseaAbortion, Personal, PoliticsLeave a Comment

The bill, HB 412, to protect pharmacies from liability for refusal to perform, assist, recommend, refer to, or participate in any act or service in connection with any drug or device that causes an abortion, was heard this morning. Testimony went well. There was opposition from the usual suspects, NARAL Pro-Choice Missouri, the ACLU, etc… No decision was made on the bill today, but they should vote in the near future. Rep. Emery is confident that there is enough votes to vote it out of committee. Thank you for your prayers.

Have Your Cake, and Eat it Too!

ChelseaMiscellaneousLeave a Comment

Carrying a little excess weight? Fret not. It may be a blessing in disguise.

Science Daily — Expanding waistlines, unsightly bulges: people will gladly remove excess body fat to improve their looks. But unwanted fat also contains stem cells with the potential to repair defects and heal injuries in the body. A team led by Philippe Collas at the University of Oslo in Norway has identified certain chemical marks that allow him to predict which, among the hundreds of millions of stem cells in liposuctioned fat, are best at regenerating tissue.

Researchers Advance the Survival and Growth of Adult Stem Cells

ChelseaAdult Stem Cell Research, Science, ScientistsLeave a Comment

Science Daily — MIT researchers have developed a technique to encourage the survival and growth of adult stem cells, a step that could help realize the therapeutic potential of such cells.

Here’s a statement you won’t see in any main stream news article: “Those [adult] stem cells hold great promise for treatment of injuries and some diseases.” That is from MIT professor Linda Griffith who is involved with this recent study “showing that when presented in the right physical context, certain growth factors encourage the survival and proliferation of bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells grown outside of the body.”

Griffith is a sight for sore eyes as far as scientific researchers go: she objects to the use of human embryos for stem cell research. She came to this realization after her personal experience with in-vitro fertilization 10 years ago:

“Like some other scientists I know, my personal views about creating human ES cell lines changed when confronted with the reality of doing so from my own embryos. After this experience, I was not comfortable conducting human ES cell research myself, and I have a tbetter understanding of why some scientists object to all work with human ES cells.”

She also promotes the promise of adult stem cells:

“I’m very optimistic about the potential for adult stem cells to be useful clinically for the problems I work on, since there are already some clinical successes based on these cells. Continuing, careful, methodical work will lead to improved therapies based on adult stem cells. We are aiming to expand the range of therapies that work in the clinic.”

The MSM would have you believe that all scientists and researchers believe in advancing the “promising” ESC research, but actually this article, which is from Science Daily, calls Griffith “one among many scientists around the world who have at least some objections to creation of human embryonic stem cells, for a variety of reasons.” Interesting.

Pharmacy Protection

ChelseaAbortion, Politics2 Comments

edemery.jpgPlease say a special prayer today for Rep. Emery, who I work for. His pharmacy protection bill will be heard in a committee hearing tomorrow morning at 8 a.m. I am not sure if they will be voting on it then or not. The bill specifies that pharmacies will be immune from liability for refusal to perform, assist, recommend, refer to, or participate in any act or service in connection with any drug or device that causes an abortion. It is a great piece of legislation and I hope that it passes.

WWJD?

ChelseaEmbryonic Stem Cell Research, Pro Life, Religion, Right to LifeLeave a Comment

Dave Andrusko has a column on the National Right to Life website responding to Michael D. Kerlin’s op-ed for Newsday offering a “spiritual” rationale for embryonic stem cell research (he is specifically talking about the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act to expand federal funding for ESC research). Things like this always make me queasy because they get the teachings and intentions of Christ totally out of whack. This guy uses the predictable reasoning that Jesus loved and healed the sick and the dying, therefore he obviously would be in favor of sacrificing the lives of nascent human beings in order to heal people today.

“America today is full of blind men and Lazaruses who scientists believe could benefit from stem cell research – people suffering and dying from cancer, spinal-cord injuries, heart disease, diabetes, Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis, Lou Gehrig’s disease and other ailments,” Kerlin writes. “Yet we risk turning our backs on them. In the same way that Jesus loved sick and dying strangers, imagine loving strangers with such incurable diseases in the same way that you love your closest friends and family. Then imagine not doing everything in your power to save them.”

His basic rationalization is the same argument we hear over and over again: sure these embryos may be human lives, but they are going to die anyway, so we may as well get some use out of them. After all, aren’t we killing in order to live?

Yes it is good to seek cures relieve suffering, but it must always be kept in line with the dignity and sanctity of human life. All life is sacred. And no human life, no matter how small or insignificant should ever be made into an object or a means to an end.

Man Walks, Courtesy Stem Cell Therapy

ChelseaAdult Stem Cell ResearchLeave a Comment

More good news from adult stem cells. A 23 year old man who was paralyzed below the waist is now walking again, regaining 50% sensation, after being treated with his own stem cells taken from his bone marrow. Nearly 100 ml of his bone marrow was removed, harvested and isolated before the stem cells were injected near the injured spot in his spinal cord. The stem cells emit trophic factors, which enable neurons and vessels to grow; a part of them becomes integral to the region, another component becomes part of the growing nerves.

The hospital is also examining the possibility of using this therapy in treating cardiac problems, liver failure, diabetes, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson’s disease.