New “First of it’s Kind” Clinical Stem Cell Trial

ChelseaAdult Stem Cell Research2 Comments

The Intermountain Medical Center in Murray has begun a new clinical trial using adult stem cells to prevent or repair kidney damage that can occur after open-heart surgery. For the treatment, bone marrow stem cells are injected into the bloodstream where they are carried into the kidney. Said Christof Westenfelder, chief medical officer of biotech company AlloCure:

“This cell based therapy is superior to all the other therapies because the cells interpret correctly what is going on and fix it, and after they have fixed it they say okay we are done, leaving, we can now destroy ourselves. When you give a drug that is very different. When you give a drug, you know the drug has effects all over the place. These cells only go to sites where you have a problem.”

Meanwhile, embryonic stem cells continue to be plagued with a high probability of rejection and have not been FDA approved for any human clinical trials because of their potential to become cancerous

In other ethical stem cell news, it appears scientists have found another source of pluripotent stem cells. This time from men’s testicles (ht: Jivin J). If I had to make a choice, I’m not sure which would be more appealing to me, stem cells taken from a man’s testicles or from a woman’s menstrual blood…

TOB in Rolla, MO!!

ChelseaTheology of the BodyLeave a Comment

nullI am pleased to announce that a parish in my diocese will be hosting a TOB seminar next month! Christopher West will be at St. Patrick Church in Rolla, MO on Saturday, Nov. 8 to present An Introduction to Theology of the Body. From the flyer:

In the words of Pope John Paul II, “if we live according to the true meaning of our sexuality, we fulfill the very meaning of our being and existence.” Many think they understand what the church teaches about the body and the relationship between man and woman. However, the deeper reasons—the WHY of these teachings—are NOT well understood.

The human body is meant to be a sign of God’s own life and love in the world. Join Christopher West for a thought provoking presentation that will enrich your understanding of human sexuality and the spiritual power it contains.

This is the same seminar that I went to in KC earlier this year. It consists of four parts:

    • What is the Theology of the Body and Why is it so important?
    • The Creation and Redemption of Man and Woman
    • The Resurrection of the Body and the Heavenly Marriage
    • The Sacrament of Marriage and the Language of Sexual Love

The event is from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. They will be offering 8 a.m. Mass for those interested. Pre-registration (by 10/24) is $15, registration (after 10/24) is $20 with a $5 optional box lunch. Register form can be found on this flyer or contact Paul Wood: 573-364-1435, stpatsyouth@ymail.com.

St. Patrick Church
17 St. Patrick Lane
Rolla, MO 65401

I Love These Blogs (and You Should Too)

ChelseaPro Life, Theology of the Body1 Comment

    I Love Your Blog Award

Very humble thanks to Regular Guy Paul (whose blog I love) for tagging me with the “I Love Your Blog Award” last week. Since October is Respect Life Month I thought I’d award some blogs specifically dedicated to life issues and bioethics that have become great resources for me.

Check them out:

Second Hand Smoke – anyone at all interested in bioethics must start here.
Mary Meets Dolly
Life Ethics.org
The Human Future
BioEthics.com
Human Life Matters – a triplegic with advanced multiple sclerosis, Mark Pickup has beautiful reflections on the gift of life and suffering

And because it’s hard to have respect for life without respecting the act intended to create life, check out these blogs dedicated to spreading the word about Theology of the Body:

The New View on Sex
Rise of the TOB
The Great Deception – Jenny writes wonderful reflections that would make anyone fall in love with TOB. Many of them are published on the TOB “Channel” at Catholic Exchange. Some must reads for this Respect Life Month:
Contracepting Reality
Modest is…Hottest?
Sex and the City (of God)
With My Body, I Thee Fool
Seeing is Believing: Depersonalization by Sexualization

Pray for the Supreme Court Today!!

ChelseaPro LifeLeave a Comment

nullThe Supreme Court opened a new term today. Since the Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton 49,640,776 babies have been surgically and medically aborted – millions more have been killed chemically – under the full protection of the law. This is unacceptable in a nation that boasts of being “one Nation under God” and prides itself on “freedom” and “equality” for all.

There could be new appointments to the SC over the next few years. Let’s pray for the future of this court and its willingness to protect the innocent and most vulnerable members of our society! A daily prayer for the Supreme Court: “May the Guardian Angels of the U.S. Supreme Court Justices guide them today.”

Cute Baby Blogging!

ChelseaPro Life1 Comment

I finally got to meet my friends new baby boy, Kale, this weekend:

KaleKale

We were watching the Mizzou Tigers destroy Nebraska.

The STL International Film Festival and “The Stem Cell Divide”

ChelseaCloning, Media, Missouri, Stem Cell ResearchLeave a Comment

I just got word from the filmmakers that the documentary “The Stem Cell Divide,” which I was a part of, will premier at the St. Louis International Film Festival on Sunday Nov. 16th, 2 p.m., at the Tivoli 1 Theatre. The movie documents the great stem cell debate that has been raging in Missouri over the last few years.

Triumph Documentaries has been making this film since 2005 when we were trying to ban human cloning in the MO State Senate. A year after that attempted ban pro-cloning forces launched a deceptive $30 million dollar campaign to enshrine the right to clone human beings for scientific research in our State Constitution. What was supposed to be a slam dunk passed only by the slimmest of margins thanks to an impressive anti-cloning grassroots campaign. Since then pro-lifers have been trying to get a ban on cloning voted on in the state, but have been stopped twice – once when a joint resolution failed to pass the legislature in 2007 and again in Secretary of State Robin Carnahan wrote a disgraceful and intentionally misleading ballot summary for what was to be a state-wide initiative petition (that lead to a lawsuit that we originally won, but then lost on appeal.) And because our Constitution now forbids lawmakers from intentionally restricting funds from researchers and institutions involved in cloning/ESC research, we’ve had many disagreements during the last two legislative sessions between lawmakers and pro-life organizations (MRL in particular) about State funding issues.

The documentary, I believe, will primarily focus just generally on the issue of stem cell research and cloning. It is supposed to be an unbiased look at both sides of the debate so I will be interested to see how balanced it actually turned out. The filmmakers main interest is in keeping the conversation about this vitally important topic alive.

I was originally interviewed at the pro-life rally day at the State Capital in 2005. Wanting to follow up since the passage of Amendment 2, the filmmakers came out to my house earlier this year – while we were still in the middle of the lawsuit against the SOS’s biased ballot language – to tape a longer interview. Here are some pics from that day:

Watching me “work”:
Triumph Documentaries,
Filming me getting in and out of my car:
Triumph Documentaries,

If you’re interested: Advance tickets for programs at Tivoli 1 Theatre are for sale at the Tivoli box office beginning Oct. 20. Box-office hours are 5-10 p.m. Monday-Friday and 2-10 p.m. Saturday-Sunday. No phone sales. For tickets online, visit tickets.landmarktheatres.com.

Here is the film festival schedule. More about the festival

Verastegui’s Gift for Saving Babies

ChelseaAbortion, ActivismLeave a Comment

I wish I had this gift. From 40 Days for Life:

John Anthony is helping lead the 40 Days for Life vigil at Family Planning Associates (last Saturday), the busiest abortion facility in Los Angeles. He knew Saturday would be a difficult day, and was praying as many volunteers as possible would be on hand to stand witness.

Those prayers were answered — and then some — with the arrival of actor Eduardo Verastegui, the star of the movie Bella, and several of his friends.

“Eduardo arrived a little after 8 am and did not stop counseling, praying and encouraging women to choose life for their babies — with love, tenderness, humility and compassion — until a little after noon,” John Anthony said. “God is good — five babies were saved that morning!”

This isn’t the first time Verastegui has helped save a baby from abortion. In this video he explains what happened thee very first time he counseled a woman outside of an abortion clinic:

Eduardo, if you are reading this, a few of us will be at the Planned Parenthood clinic in Columbia Missouri tomorrow morning around 9:30 a.m. Since I’m sure you come to MO all the time…please stop by if you are in the neighborhood. We could use your help. Oh…nevermind. According to LifeSiteNews, you will be going back to the Family Planning Associates in LA. Well, maybe next time…

Watch Eduardo’s video outreach to Hispanic voters about abortion and Barack Obama: Reaching out to Hispanics

Previous post:
Swell Bella Fellas, on a Mission for God

Lessons from a Little Flower

ChelseaLove, Religion, Suffering1 Comment

If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me (Lk. 9:23, Mt. 16:24

nullThis is a call that our greatest saints have heard and taken to task. In understanding the call of suffering and self denial, few saints have had as much of an influence on me as Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face – also known as the Little Flower – whose feast we celebrated yesterday. Throughout her short life on this earth, the little saint suffered greatly the distress of many trials, physically, spiritually, emotionally, always with a peaceful attitude of love and confidence in God.

Upon her entrance into the Carmel, Therese recalled that

“suffering opened wide its arms to me and I threw myself into them with love…Jesus made me understand that it was through suffering that He wanted to give me souls, and my attraction for suffering grew in proportion to its increase…

The little flower transplanted to Mount Carmel was to expand under the shadow of the cross. The tears and blood of Jesus were to be her dew, and her Sun His adorable Face veiled with tears…I understood what real glory was. He whose Kingdom is not of this world (Jn. 18:36) showed me that true wisdom consists in “desiring to be unknown and counted as nothing (The Imitation of Christ I, 2:3),” in “placing one’s joy in the contempt of self (The Imitation of Christ III, 49:7).” Ah! I desired that, like the Face of Jesus, “my face be truly hidden, that no one on earth would know me (Is. 53:3).” I thirsted after suffering and I longed to be forgotten.

How merciful is the way God has guided me. Never has He given me the desire for anything which He has not given me, and even His biter chalice seemed delightful to me.

For this “little flower” each moment of sacrifice and suffering was itself a little flower that she spent nullher life offering to her beloved Spouse and no sacrifice, no flower, was too small or insignificant for the Lord. While she suffered majorly in the loss of her father, the slow and painful death due to TB and a great trial of faith, Therese also offered Christ the little sufferings of everyday, which sometimes included dealing with a…less than agreeable sister in her community (Te-Deum relates that story):

I’ve always remained little, therefore, having no other occupation but to gather flowers, the flowers of love and sacrifice, and of offering them to God in order to please Him.

What she found was that paradox of love that is the Cross. For when endured with great love for Christ and for souls, the act of suffering eventually ceases to be a burden, but instead becomes pure joy to the heart of a saint:

I have suffered very much since I was on earth, but, if in my childhood I suffered with sadness, it is no longer in this way that I suffer. It is with joy and peace. I am truly happy to suffer.

In this day and age, when the world seeks to destroy human life in an effort to overcome human weakness and avoid suffering, let us imitate the example of this little saint who took Christ’s words seriously and, like St. Paul, was content in her weakness and rejoiced in her suffering. For it is when we are weak that we are truly strong (2 Corinthians 12:10) and through our sufferings, united with the Cross, that we are redeemed (1 Peter 1:6-7).

My God, I accept everything out of love for You: if You will it, I really want to suffer even to the point of dying of grief.

See my Path to Holiness posts illustrating St. Therese’s “Little Way”:
It is to Recognize our Nothingness
Unless You Become Like Little Children
The Little Flower on Little Flowers
Darkness Within Faith – mentioning here trial of faith

All quotes here come from her autobiography Story of a Soul and from the book St. Therese of Lisieux, Her Last Conversations. Read my favorite passage from Story of a Soul. I cannot tell you what a gift this little Saint and the Sory of her Soul has been for me. If you have not yet discovered this treasure I highly encourage you to click on the link above and order your copy today.

    “My vocation is love!”

To offer myself as a victim of Divine love is not to offer myself to sweetness, to consolation, but to every anquish, every bitterness; for love lives only by sacrifice, and the more the soul wills to be surrendered to love, the more must she be surrendered to suffering.

Remember the “Hollow Men”

ChelseaAbortion, Fatherhood, MenLeave a Comment

I found this poem in a USCCB pamphlet on men and abortion:

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men…
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless…
Remember us — if at all — not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.

–T.S. Eliot, “The Hollow Men”

Abortion is not merely a “woman’s issue.” It takes two people to get pregnant and both of those people are inevitably impacted by the decision to end the life that both parties helped to create.

The Bishop’s pamphlet cites a 2007 web based study of 135 men who have experienced abortion which found that 48% of those men opposed their partner’s abortion decision and 69% reported moderate to very high stress following the abortion (Rue, Coyle & Coleman, 2007). Another review of how abortion impacts relationships reported that: (1) men tend to exert greater control over the expression of painful emotions, intellectualize grief, and cope alone; (2) men are also inclined to identify their primary role as a supporter for their partners, even after an abortion, and even if they opposed the decision; (3) men were more likely to experience feelings of despair long after the abortion than women; and (4) men are more at risk for experiencing chronic grief. (Coleman, Rue & Spence, 2007a) Read more

These “hollow men” are largely ignored and left out of the abortion debate completely. A tragedy considering how can deeply wound the soul of a man as much as it does a woman.

The Bishop’s pamphlet, which is an article by Dr. Vincent Rue, concludes:

Abortion leaves indelible footprints in the texture of masculinity, in the recesses of a man’s heart, and in his reproductive history. A father is a father forever, even of a dead unborn child. In the aftermath of abortion, the real choice for men is whether to accept this biological reality, grieve the loss and seek forgiveness, or to continue denying what is inwardly known and swell the ranks of the hollowed men. Irrespective of the law, both man and woman co-created the pregnancy, and both will live with the aftermath, regardless of how some may try to celebrate “choice.”

As we mourn the loss of innocent human life to abortion and pray for the women whose lives have been traumatized as a result of their abortion, let’s also keep in mind the men who are hurting and grieving as well.

Read this post at And Sometimes Tea: Abortion and Men

My previous post:
Abortion is Forever for Fathers, too!

Resources for post abortive men:
Men and abortion
Resources for men
Reclaiming Fatherhood

The Intimacy of a Kiss

ChelseaLove, Marriage, Religion, Theology of the Body1 Comment

I meant to post this last week:

nullA kiss is not just a kiss to actor Kirk Cameron of Fireproof, a movie about the importance of preserving marriage and what it must be founded on. During an interview on the Today Show last Tuesday he revealed that the woman he is seen kissing in the movie is not the lead actress who plays his on-screen wife, but Cameron’s own wife in real life, actress Chelsea Noble. The decision for the on screen wife swap was because, he said, “I have a commitment not to kiss any other woman.” Call me crazy, but I’d be willing to bet that keeping your hands and lips off of someone who is not your spouse is at least one good way to preserve a marriage – even if it is only “acting.”

Eduardo VerasteguiCameron is not the only actor who understands the intimacy of a kiss. Bella star Eduardo Verastegui (whom I met very briefly in STL last year, see post) has vowed to do no more on-screen lip-locks. From an interview with Celebrate Life magazine:

“When you kill somebody in the movies, you’re not killing anyone. But when you kiss someone, it’s really a kiss,” Eduardo stressed. “In sex scenes, you’re really half naked. So I would recommend that people be careful, because you are working with fire and you’re gonna get burned. Don’t risk yourself for some role. I know because I did it. And I’m telling you, 12 years of that was nothing but emptiness, pain and suffering.” Eduardo described sex scenes as what they are: “legal adultery.” And because a kiss is sacred, he vows to kiss no woman unless she’s his wife.

See my Path to Holiness post: “Bella” Star Seeks Holiness in Not-So Ordinary Life

The body has a language and we must speak it truthfully. Even “just a kiss” is an extremely intimate act, especially between a man and a woman, meant to express affection, love and devotion.

Fireproof opened in theaters this past weekend and if the estimated calculations are accurate it looks like it was the #4 movie in America over the weekend. A reader who saw it recently commented:

This movie is wonderful it really hit home thank God for this Christian movie I encouraged all married couples to go and check it out.

See my post Fireproof, Marriage and World Peace. Related story: With the help of God, marriage crises can be overcome, says Pope