Trading on the Female Body

The Silent Scream

Stop Abortifacients

http://www.myspace.com/stopabortifacients

Can Communion Be Denied to Those Who Dissent?

The Myth of Overpopulation

NFP is NOT Catholic Birth Control

Does Contraception Really Prevent Abortion?

NFP Video Found on YouTube!

By a happy accident, I came across "Responsible Fatherhood" on YouTube:

"Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007"

Cardinal Rigali chairs the Committee for Pro-Life Activities of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. In an April 4th letter to every member of the United States Senate, he urged rejection of S. 5 (i.e., the "Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007"). He noted that S. 5 would "force taxpayers to encourage deliberate attacks on innocent human life in the name of medical progress." On April 11th, 46 Democrat and 16 Republican senators subsequently ignored Cardinal Rigali's plea and voted in favor of the so-called "Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007."

When presented with this possible vote during his campaign, Robert Casey was not clear about his position. On April 11th, however, Senator Casey was one of only two Democratics to vote against the so-called "Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007" (Pennsylvania's other senator voted in favor of this heinous legislation.).

Messages thanking Senator Casey for his principled position may be left at <http://casey.senate.gov/contact.cfm>.

re: "Prenatal Test Puts Down Syndrome in Hard Focus"

There certainly appears to be a growing disregard for the sanctity of the lives of persons with Down Syndome. As per "Prenatal Test Puts Down Syndrome in Hard Focus" (5/9/07 NY Times), some parents are trying to counteract this:

"About 90 percent of pregnant women who are given a Down syndrome diagnosis have chosen to have an abortion. Convinced that more couples would choose to continue their pregnancies if they better appreciated what it meant to raise a child with Down syndrome, a growing group of parents is seeking to insert their own positive perspectives....The parent evangelists are driven by a deep-seated fear for their children’s well-being in a world where there are fewer people like them....

"The focus on the unborn is new for most parent advocates, who have traditionally directed their energy toward support for the born. But after broader testing was recommended in January, the subject began to hijack agendas at local support group meetings. A dwindling Down syndrome population, which now stands at about 350,000, could mean less institutional support and reduced funds for medical research. It could also mean a lonelier world for those who remain....

"The 5,500 children born with Down syndrome each year in the United States suffer from mild to moderate mental retardation, are at high risk for congenital heart defects and a variety of other medical problems, and have an average life expectancy of 49....But the richness of their children’s lives, parent advocates say, is poorly understood. Early medical intervention and new expertise in infant heart surgery stave off many health problems; legally mandated inclusion in public schools has created opportunities for friendship and fostered broader social awareness of the condition....

[Some parents] "see themselves as society’s first line of defense against a use of genetic technology that can border on eugenics. 'For me, it’s just faces disappearing,' said Nancy Iannone, of Turnersville, N.J., mother to four daughters, including one with Down syndrome. 'It isn’t about abortion politics or religion, it’s a pure ethical
question'....

"many parents see expanded [prenatal] testing as a step toward a society where children like theirs would be unwelcome. The Newsweek columnist George F. Will labeled it a 'search and destroy mission' for a category of citizens that includes his adult son, Jon Will."

The Need to Combat Moral Numbness with Compassion & Clear Moral Argument

In a 5/10/07 NY Times piece, Nicholas Kristoff offers some disturbing thoughts on the moral decision processes of vast numbers of people:

"Time and again, we’ve seen that the human conscience just isn’t pricked by mass suffering, while an individual child (or puppy) in distress causes our hearts to flutter....Evidence is overwhelming that humans respond to the suffering of individuals rather than groups ....Even the right animal evokes a similar sympathy....after I began visiting Darfur in 2004, I was flummoxed by the public’s passion to save a red-tailed hawk, Pale Male, that had been evicted from his nest on Fifth Avenue in New York City. A single homeless hawk aroused more indignation than two million homeless Sudanese. Advocates for the poor often note that 30,000 children die daily of the consequences of poverty — presuming that this number will shock people into action. But the opposite is true: the more victims, the less compassion."

Kristoff calls our attention to a journal article by Paul Slovic of the University of Oregon. "'If I Look at the Mass I Will Never Act': Psychic Numbing and Genocide." The title of this journal article paraphrases an insight offered by Mother Teresa of Calcutta:

"Most people are caring and will exert great effort to rescue individual victims whose needy plight comes to their attention. These same good people, however, often become numbly indifferent to the plight of individuals who are 'one of many' in a much greater problem....

"In a deeply disturbing book titled A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide, journalist Samantha Power documents in meticulous detail many of the numerous genocides that occurred during the past century, beginning with the slaughter of two million Armenians by the Turks in 1915....In every instance, American response was inadequate....media news coverage is similarly inadequate....the intense coverage of recent natural disasters stands in sharp contrast to the lack of reporting on the ongoing genocides in Darfur and other regions in Africa, in which hundreds of thousands of people have been murdered and millions forced to flee their burning villages and relocate in refugee camps....

"Images seem to be the key to conveying affect and meaning, though some imagery is more powerful than others....When it comes to eliciting compassion, the identified individual victim, with a face and a name, has no peer....Going beyond faces, names, and other simple images, writers and artists have long recognized the power of narrative to bring feelings and meaning to tragedy....nonfiction narrative can be just as effective....

"we need to create laws and institutions that will compel appropriate action when information about genocide becomes known....we cannot depend only upon our moral feelings to motivate us to take proper actions against genocide. That places the burden of response squarely upon the shoulders of moral argument and international law"

If You Love Me...

...Keep My Commandments.

"Making Moral Decisions" - Start By NOT Buying This Book (8/12/06)

Click to see this review on Amazon.com.

In a second hand book store on the Jersey Shore, I came across Edward Stevens' "Making Moral Decisions" (Paulist Press, 1981). I was intrigued to see that it had received an imprimataur from the late Archbishop Peter Gerety of Newark. Yet right in the preface, Stevens advised us that "Religion doesn't have the answer to moral questions" (p. 2). After reading the entire book, my own assessment is that Stevens' understandings of the natural law and Catholic moral teaching were gravely deficient.

Reportedly at the Vatican's urging, Archbishop Gerety removed his imprimataur, in 1984, from another Paulist Press product - "Christ Among Us."



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