A Special Kind of Evil

ChelseaAbortionLeave a Comment

Most of the time I’m on here trying to get pro-lifers to think outside the abortion box. However, I do understand that, as life issues go, abortion is a special kind of evil.

The intentional killing of an innocent human life in what should be the safest place in the entire world — it’s mother’s womb.

Instead of a sacred, life-giving vessel, the mother’s womb has become a hostile environment, allowed to be penetrated and injected with toxic chemicals and instruments that assault the baby’s body to the point of death.

“If we accept that a mother can kill her own child,” Mother Teresa said, “how can we tell other people not to kill each other?” Indeed.

Not only that, but by blessing the killing of the obvious child in the womb, we have no moral grounds upon which to object to killing or manipulating human embryos in a test tube, no way to object to the use of aborted fetal tissue in research.

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Every child deserves a chance.

On this 43rd anniversary of Roe v. Wade, a s/o to my baby sister for giving both my nephews a chance (neither of whom were conceived under the most ideal circumstances) and the rest of us a chance to fall in love twice.

Bioethics 2015: Winners and Losers

ChelseaGenetic Engineering1 Comment

The Center for Bioethics and Culture has released their annual list of winners and losers for the previous year. Most have to do with surrogacy and assisted suicide. All are good candidates, but I noticed one glaring omission.

designer-baby2.jpg2015 was a tipping-point year for the genetic altering human embryos and, consequently, the genetic future of humanity.

The losers in this category would be:

  1. the UK, which became the first in the world to offer controversial ‘three-parent’ fertility treatments.
  2. China, where scientists confirmed that they have been editing the genomes of several non-viable human embryos from IVF clinics using a new promising gene-editing technique called CRISPR.

These are major developments, heralded by many science/tech magazines as some of the greatest scientific “advancements” of the past year. And because of them 2016 could very well be the year of the first GM humans.

If there are any winners to be awarded here I would give it to Congress for passing a modest, but meaningful protection from human embryo genetic manipulation. According to my friend Dr. David Prentice, a provision originally placed in the Agricultural Appropriations bill in the House, and kept in the Omnibus funding bill that passed last month, effectively blocks genetic manipulation of human embryos for the time being to allow further discussion on the subject.

I hope this provision really is as effective as Dr. Prentice says it is. Since the UK approved three-parent IVF last spring, the FDA has been reconsidering some of their restrictions on genetic engineering.

Though the response from scientific community has been overwhelmingly positive about going forward with these techniques, a good portion of scientists have cautioned against three-parent IVF, and agree we should have a voluntary moratorium on the editing of DNA in human embryos. There are just too many unknown risks.

The long-term consequences and social implications of this science can’t be ignored.

See more: Human Beings Are Not Science Experiments

“Mother”

ChelseaPro Life1 Comment

Happy New Year and, more importantly, a blessed solemnity of Mary the Mother of God!

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Andrea Solario, Madonna With the Green Cushion

The body is noble because the Son of God, in assuming flesh, did not do so by appearing in the full bloom and blossom of manhood. He thought so much of it that He took His Body from the body of a woman: “He took birth from woman” (Gal. 4:4). Like every body that He made, His, too, drew nourishment from her body and blood; like all children of men, was nursed at her breasts and remained with her for thirty years in obedience. It is thanks to a body that the world could see God in the form of a man; it is thanks to a body that this God-man could utter the sweetest word that has rung down the corridors of history: “Mother.” (Ven. Fulton Sheen, Three to Get Married)

“Blessed is the womb that carried you and the breasts at which you nursed” (Lk. 11:27) Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of death. Amen.

The Feminist Case Against Surrogacy

ChelseaReproductive Technology, SurrogacyLeave a Comment

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Robert Oscar Lopez, PhD interviews Kathleen Sloan, board member for the National Organization for Women and a regular consultant for the CBC:

Human biotechnology creates strange bedfellows. Although Sloan is a committed abortion rights advocate, she has also lent her voice to campaigns opposing human cloning and, most recently, surrogacy and third party reproduction.

Even pro-choice feminists agree that we should stop using women as human incubators.

Holy Innocents: Yesterday and Today

ChelseaPro LifeLeave a Comment

A voice is heard in Ramah, lamenting and weeping bitterly: it is Rachel weeping for her children, refusing to be comforted for her children, because they are no more. -Jeremiah 31:15

Today, December 28, the Church remembers the “Holy Innocents” who lost their lives in Bethlehem shortly after Christ’s birth.

Then it was all boys age two and under who were put to death at the hands of King Herod and his soldiers because of Herod’s fear of the prophecy of the Messiah. Now over 4,000 innocent children of both genders lose their lives every day in this country because of abortion. And let’s not forget the unknown number of innocent lives sacrificed on the altars of science and reproductive “rights”.

Much like the Holy Innocents of yesterday, the murder of today’s innocents is also blessed by our Government.

As we remember the Holy innocents of yesterday, perhaps we should also request their intercession and appeal to God’s mercy on behalf of the millions of innocents being slaughtered here and around the world today.

We rejoice in the glory of Jesus Christ, who conquered the enemy not by force of arms but with a white-robed army of children! -Lauds 12/28

**image of ‘Slaughter of the Innocents’, Duccio di Buoninsegna

Bioethics and the Birth of Christ

ChelseaPro LifeLeave a Comment

baby-jesus.jpgThis is a classic post, from Msgr. Charles Pope on “Bioethics and the Birth of Christ”:

As we approach Christmas we ought to ponder the magnificence of human conception, gestation, birth and life. Even as we extoll the birth of Jesus, we also do well to acknowledge the awesome and mysterious truth that every human person emerges not merely from a biological process, but from the very mind and heart of God, from his will and as an act of his love. None of us are here by accident.

He goes on to discuss the many ways that God’s sovereignty over human conception and life are usurped or ignored in modern times via In Vitro Fertilization, irreverence for sexuality, abortion, and rejection of the disabled and the imperfect. Read the whole thing.

In recent decades the creation of new human life has become nothing more than a biological formula — a science experiment, rather than the mysterious fruit of a loving act between husband and wife.

“When life is merely a technology to do with as we please,” Msgr Pope writes, “it is not long before we end up in some pretty dark places.”

Since the creation of human life has been taken out of the womb and into the science lab we’ve seen some pretty dark stuff: women exploited and abused, babies bought and sold on the black market…

And now we are moving closer and closer to genetically-engineering our children and, consequently, altering the genetic future of humanity.

Let us remember

visitationicon.pngIn Gaudium et Spes we read: “[O]nly in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light” (22)

By His Incarnation, Christ intimately united Himself to the entire human race and showed us the incomparable value of every human person from the very beginning and reminded us that God alone is the author of all human life.

While we are called to cooperate with Him in the mystery of creation, the initiative, says Msgr. Pope, is always God’s. We do not have the authority to take matters of — either the beginning or the end of — human life into our own hands.

EU Condemns Surrogacy

ChelseaSurrogacyLeave a Comment

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Woke up to some good news on Facebook this morning (for a change). Via the Center for Bioethics and Culture:

We’ve just gotten word that the European Parliament has clearly condemned surrogacy, approving the following statement:

“Condemns the practice of surrogacy, which undermines the human dignity of the woman since her body and its reproductive functions are used as a commodity; considers that the practice of gestational surrogacy which involves reproductive exploitation and use of the human body for financial or other gain, in particular in the case of vulnerable women in developing countries, shall be prohibited and treated as a matter of urgency in human rights instruments;”

Read more.
Meanwhile, in America:

1. Gov. Andrew Cuomo and state lawmakers are weighing whether New York should lift its ban on commercial surrogacy, which was enacted in 1993.

2. An Idaho woman, who served as a surrogate three times, and died in October carrying twins. Three people dead and no one’s talking about it.

3. Melissa Cook, who is now 20 weeks pregnant with healthy triplets, is being pressured under legal contract to abort one of the babies she’s carrying for a man in Georgia.

4. A second California surrogate, has come forward after reading Cook’s story and realizing that she was not alone in her situation. She is 17 weeks pregnant with triplets and seeking legal help to fight the abortion coercion.

Repeat after me: Women are not breeders — and children are not commodities. Let’s join the EU and stop this once and for all. Add your name to the petition to stop surrogacy now. Signing is easy.

The Immaculate Conception

ChelseaPro LifeLeave a Comment

nullI’m always amazed when people try to come up with a religious argument for supporting the destruction of nascent human life. I’ve heard the “abortion isn’t mentioned in the bible” line and, of course, the excuse that some fathers of the Church thought ensoulment was delayed till a few weeks after conception.

That’s why I love today’s feast commemorating the Immaculate Conception, a doctrine that was verified by the Immaculate Virgin herself.

God did not choose to purify the womb that would carry His son at some random point in her development outside the womb like, say, her presentation and dedication in the temple or at the Annunciation, both of of which would have seemed appropriate or reasonable. Rather, he chose to preserve the sinlessness of the Mother of God from the very moment of her conception inside the womb of St. Anne.

This, like the Incarnation itself and the scene at the Visitation when the unborn John the Baptist leaped for joy in the womb of St. Elizabeth, illustrates the significance and the sacredness of all life before birth from its very beginning.

Let us pray on this day that such innocent life may once again be preserved and protected in our Nation through the intercession of this Immaculate Mother, Patroness of our Land.

O, Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!

Img: St. Anne Conceiving the Virgin Mary, Jean Bellegambe.

Thank God for Eternal Life!

ChelseaDeath, Eternal Life, Faith, Hope, Prayer, Religion2 Comments

Those of us who fight for the right to life of every human being on this earth must also remember to be joyfully aware that this life, as beautiful as it may be, is not our ultimate end.

Though we fight for truth and freedom in our beloved country, it remains but an earthly dwelling place, a temporary homeland where we must prepare ourselves for the greater Home that awaits us:

I know the country I am living in is not really my true fatherland, and there is another I must long for without ceasing. This is not simply a story invented by someone living in the sad country where I am, but it is a reality, for the King of the Fatherland of the bright sun actually came and lived for thirty-three years in the land of darkness.(Story of a Soul, Manuscript C).

Heaven. Resurrection. Eternal Life. What we believe, what we hope for, is not merely some lofty philosophical ideal or the fantasy of uneducated simpletons. It is truth, Divinely revealed and able to be known through human reason (CCC 156-59).

I love this little dialogue at the end of Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov:

“Karamazov!” cried Kolya, “can it really be true as religion says, that we shall all rise from the dead, and come to life, and see one another again, and everyone, and Ilyushecka?”

“Certainly we shall rise, certainly we shall see and gladly, joyfully tell one another all that has been,” Alyosha relied, half laughing, half in ecstasy.

“Ah, how good that will be!” burst from Kolya.

How good that will be, indeed!

As this month for All Souls comes to an end let us pray for all the nullfaithful departed: Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen

And now we begin that great season of hope where we prepare ourselves for the coming of the Lord when truth and justice will finally reign for all eternity.

If we make death our starting point, we will have no illusions about life.

Happy Thanksgiving!

ChelseaCute Baby Blogging1 Comment

Recent events in Paris and Beirut, with threats of more attacks on the way are enough for anyone to question the wisdom of bringing children into such a cruel world.

But new life is new hope for a better and brighter future. And there has never been a better time to create a brighter future.

New life to be thankful for this year: my new nephew and godson, of course (born 3/17/15)!!

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I need more baby naps in my life.
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My TWO adorable nephews!
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Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus. (1 Thes. 5:16-18)

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving. God is good; let him know you appreciate him and all he does for love of you — even when it’s painful.