A Bad Samaritan?

How many unwed pregnant mothers has Annie Laurie Gaylor helped?

Just a Few of the Many Mothers and Babies Saved by CareNet

.Most recently, Gaylor condemns the good Samaritan Care Net, which does help unwed pregnant mothers– a need Gaylor herself apparently does not realize is important in our society.

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Gaylor and the FFRF (Freedom From Religion Foundation) not only abandon unwed mothers, but want the government to take sides on the abortion question– THEIR side.  And Isthmus is facilitating.

Isthmus just featured Gaylor’s (and FFRF’s) opposition to a Wisconsin government website listing of the Christian pregnancy care center (Care Net) under family resources.

In the article, Isthmus quotes Gaylor extensively, yet fails to cover the opposing view.  Isthmus also facilitates Gaylor’s misportrayal of the faith based Care Net as incompetent and unsafe, without any facts to support this claim.

Bucky Badger leads Hundreds of Care Net Supporters in Walk for Life

Care Net is actually very competent, very safe, and is supported by numerous groups in Madison, including religious ones.  It is one of Madison’s proudest inter-faith endeavors, with a proud history of helping unfortunate women to take charge of rebuilding their lives.  Our family has been involved in fundraising for CareNet over the years, and participating organizations have included numerous area Christian churches (including our Catholic church), the Princeton Club, Oscar Mayer, the Mallards, Relevant Radio Madison, Bucky Badger and Oremus Catholic Rock, to name just a few.

America is split on the issue of abortion– is abortion a fundamental women’s right, or is it the murder of a human being? The truth cannot be both ways. Although Supreme Court Justices may have ruled for abortion, our society is still strongly divided, and the laws are not even consistant.  A murderer who kills a pregnant woman is legally guilty of two murders, yet if that woman were on her way to Planned Parenthood for an abortion, apparently for her, this would not constitute murder at present. continue reading…

Discussing Abortion

From a recent discussion on abortion:

Syte:

You should stop calling abortion a woman’s “right.”

Half of all women disagree with you.  Half of all women are pro-life, and half of all women believe that abortion is morally wrong – Gallup Poll 2011.

www.faithmouse.com

Women have no more “right” to kill an inconvenient child than they have to kill an inconvenient husband, an inconvenient elder parent, or an inconvenient neighbor.

Abortion also hurts women physically, emotionally and psychologically — abortion facts.

As a woman, I have a right not to have my taxes spent on the killing of human beings and the damaging of women’s lives.

There is a new, much improved feminism which is superior to the old outdated feminism which demanded the destruction of what a woman values the most—her family.

Alan (name changed):

And the half that don’t agree with you Syte? Their voices matter less than yours? Abortion is legal whether or not you agree with it. You might want to revise your BS line about it being the same as killing a husband. Or was that “not intended to be a factual statement”? By your logic I have a right not to have my tax dollars go towards illegal foreign wars and gas subsidies. In a democracy you don’t always get what you want.

Syte:

Alan —

If you want democracy, the Gallup poll shows that 51% of Americans consider abortion to be morally wrong, while 39% find it morally acceptable.  Not that public opinion can alter morality, but even on your terms, you lose.

BTW, despite your attempts to call pro-life opinions “BS”, morally, the “wrongness” of the killing of a pre-born child is not less than the killing of a husband.   A human is a human, no matter how small.

Alan:

From the the exact same poll you keep posting 49% are Pro-Choice while a measly 46% are Pro-Life (or anti-choice as I like to call it). A human is a human sure but a fetus is a fetus and a zygote is a zygote and abortion is legal. Tell me again why Republicans did NOTHING while they controlled ALL of the federal government from 2001-2006? Keep fighting the good fight though if it makes you feel morally superior. It’s a fight you’ll never win. As soon as Republicans take action they lose this as a wedge issue. And that’s all this is. Republicans manipulating Christians.

Syte:

Alan –

No need to get so emotional.  Perhaps YOU like to feel morally superior, but you have no grounds for throwing that accusation at me.  It is possible to disagree with people and to debate the facts without feeling morally superior or turning it into a fight.

You might like to call pro-lifers “anti-choice,” but I refrain from calling you guys “pro-murder,” and I also point out that the only reason that you are debating with me today, and the only reason other readers are reading this, is that nobody killed US when we were zygotes, fetuses, pre-borns, or whatever terminology pleases you.

So what about the “choice” of the unborn child?  The Constitution guarantees the right to “life, liberty and property.”  Abortion takes away the first, fundamental right, life, without which there can be no further rights.

Just trying to put the facts out there.  BTW, you misquoted the poll.  You might concede that within the error margin of the Gallup poll, Americans have been pretty much 50/50 on pro-life and pro-choice for the last several years.  Which, incidentally, is quite a change from the 33/56 ratio we had in 1996, fifteen years ago.  Like it or not, Americans are rapidly turning pro-life, as they find out more about abortion and its effects on women, on children and on society.

In addition, on other related questions, pro-life is actually winning today in 2011   :

• 51% say abortion is morally wrong, while 39% say it’s morally permissible.
• 27% say abortion should be legal under any circumstances.
• 37% say abortion should be legal under most circumstances
• 61% say that abortion should be legal under no or few circumstances.

Regarding majorities and abortion and why the Republicans have not reversed abortion, you should know better, unless you have not been following this issue.  There has never been a vote on the legality of abortion in the United States, either by the people, or by the legislature.  Abortion decisions, starting with Roe v. Wade, have been made by APPOINTED judges who were not elected, and who do not represent the will of the American people in any way.   When a liberal president appoints a liberal judge, we are stuck with that liberal judge’s decisions for the tenure, regardless of the will of the people or of the legislature.  Liberals have found a loophole in the Constitution, by which the will of the people can be circumvented.  Glad to have the opportunity to point that out.

Alan:

Yeah that damned Liberal court we have now sure is making decisions based on the will of the people. Is that thier job? Their job is to interpret the law, or in Clarence thomas’ case sleep through the process while others interpret the law. I only pointed out the near 50/50 tie becasue you decided 51% in a poll on morality was enough to support your argument. Stating that a pre-born child is a life is also not a certainty. It’s not according to the US Constituiton or the bible so where do you get the idea that life starts at conception? What I want is for conservatives to stick to thier supposed values. Keep the government out of the uterus.

Syte:

Alan, you wrote:  “Stating that a pre-born child is a life is also not a certainty…..   not according to …..the bible.”

No? Not a certainty, unless you consult moral experts—including most major religions, the Dalai Lama, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Hindus, Islamic leaders, the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod, Oriental Orthodoxy, Orthodox Judaism, Protestant Churches (all Fundamentalist, Pentecostal, Charismatic and other Evangelical denominations), the Southern Baptist Convention, the Roman Catholic Church, and thousands of other moral experts including over 1,000 pro-life groups that are not affiliated with religious denominations, who all oppose abortion on demand.  These moral experts are not in vehement opposition to the surgical removal of a mole, but to the termination of a human life.

Also, your claim that a pre-born child may not be a “life” IS addressed in the Bible:

“And it came to pass, that when Elizabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the INFANT leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost”- Luke 1:41

John the Baptist was a second-trimester baby at the time that he is described in the Bible as an “infant.” Christ, to whom John the Baptist was responding, was an embryo, probably a few weeks old.  Surely, the Bible’s use of the term “infant,” and the ability of persons to recognize and respond to each other, indicates the existence of “life”?

Throughout our society our laws and language acknowledge the “life” of a pre-born child:

• Murderers get charged with TWO counts of murder when they murder pregnant women.
• The Mayo clinic uses the word “baby” throughout their online description of “fetal” development.
• Even YOU used the phrase “pre-born CHILD.”

A child only seems to lose human life status when he or she becomes “inconvenient,” and comes under consideration for abortion.  Then the language of dehumanization kicks in, to whitewash what is really going on, and to make it more palatable.

Steven (name changed):

Out of more than 600 laws of Moses, none comments on abortion. One Mosaic law about miscarriage

specifically contradicts the claim that the bible is antiabortion, clearly stating that miscarriage does not involve the death of a human being. If a woman has a miscarriage as the result of a fight, the man who caused it should be fined. If the woman dies, however, the culprit must be killed:

“If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished according as the woman’s husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.”

—Ex. 21:22-25

The bible orders the death penalty for murder of a human being, but not for the expulsion of a fetus.

Syte:

Steven—

Your quotation actually shows that under Mosaic Law a pregnant woman was acknowledged to be carrying a CHILD, and that causing the loss of that child “will surely be punished.”

HOW do you contort that into claiming that Mosaic Law approved abortion?  Your quotation actually does the opposite of approving abortion.  It acknowledges the human life existing in the woman and specifies punishment for the destruction of that life.

You are really grasping at straws.

Steven:

You fail to investigate the bible’s definition of life (breath) or its deafening silence on abortion. Moreover, the Mosaic law in Exodus 21:22-25, directly following the Ten Commandments, makes it clear that an embryo or fetus is not a human being.

Steven:

If you are an American christian, you may want to check out these groups:
American Baptist Churches-USA, American Ethical Union, American Friends (Quaker) Service Committee, Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Episcopal Church, utheran Women’s Caucus, Moravian Church in America-Northern Province, Presbyterian Church (USA), Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Unitarian Universalist Association, United Church of Christ, United Methodist Church, United Synagogue of America, Women’s Caucus Church of the Brethren, YWCA, Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, Catholics for Free Choice, Evangelicals for Choice

Syte:

Steven –

Of course, the fact that we are having this discussion is because you were not aborted as a child.  This unequivocally proves that the developing fetus is a human being, unless I am now debating with just a huge mass of cells.

It is dangerous to interpret a “deafening silence” in your own favor.  For example, before Sept 11th, there was a “deafening silence” in the U.S. and in our homeland security policies regarding flying airplanes into buildings.  It cannot be inferred from that silence that the U.S. approved of flying airplanes into buildings.  It is more reasonable to infer that such a heinous act was never imagined to be possible before Sept 11th.

So it is equally possible, and even more probable, that the relative silence of the Bible ( don’t dismiss my Luke 1:41 example above, which the vast majority of religions interpret as evidence that a preborn child is as human as the rest of us!), that the relative silence of the Bible on abortion was due to:

• The violent and destructive nature of abortion, which rendered it an unthinkable act previously –something no one in their right mind would consider, akin to flying airplanes into buildings.
• The tremendous medical risks associated with abortion without the assistance of modern technology, which was not available at the time.

Regarding your listing of some Christian Churches which allow abortion– the reason for the historical proliferation of Christian Churches in recent times is the fact that people who wished to justify what was previously considered to be morally wrong split off from the first Church – starting with divorce, now including abortion.  Finding a church which approves your favorite transgression of previously accepted morality is not the best way to go, for anyone interested in what is REALLY right or really wrong.

We don’t usually make our own unprofessional conclusions before seeking a doctor, engineer, lawyer, or home inspection expert who agrees with us.  We call in the experts, and ask THEM for guidance.  So, too, with a church—if you decide for yourself whether abortion is morally right or wrong, then choose  a marginal church according to your own conclusion, then you are wasting your time.  You might as well call yourself Church and be done with it.

You are ignoring the fact that the vast majority of mainstream religions do not approve abortion.  You misquote the policies of some churches – for example, the United Methodist Church does NOT condone abortion – “The United Methodist Church upholds the sanctity of human life and is reluctant to affirm abortion as an acceptable practice” – Wikipedia on Christianity and Abortion .  Similarly, not all Presbyterian Churches allow abortion. Catholics for a Free Choice are not a church, but a miniscule minority group of dissidents within the Catholic Church, who have been excommunicated. Their membership comprises 0.001 of 1% of Catholics.  I have not checked the rest of your list, but you might be wrong on quite a few of them.

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Wisconsin State Journal:

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10,000 protesting budget cuts today (Madison)

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March for Money

10,000 marchers

front page

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400,000 protesting abortion a few weeks ago (Washington, D.C.)

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March for Life

400,000 marchers

no mention

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You are reading this because nobody killed you while you were an embryo.

A pro-life vote in this election is a vote for human rights.  Unborn children have the right to life, and African-American babies have the right NOT to be selectively destroyed.   77%   of  African-American pregnancies are aborted right now, and African-American babies are three times more likely to be aborted than white babies.  Since Roe v. Wade in 1973, the black population in the U.S.has been reduced by over 25 percent( ref).

A nation which cares about 4,295 combat deaths (~430 per year) in the War on Terror , and cares about 40,000 motor vehicle deaths per year, should also care about  1 Million infant deaths by abortion per year.

For those who are hard-hearted enough to advocate     1 million yearly infant deaths for the sake of a promiscuous lifestyle without consequence– consider, too, the financial repercussions.  The tax dollar contributions, as well as social security contributions that would be made by the  45 million Americans who are missing  since Roe v. Wade, would be staggering.

The argument that unaborted babies would be a burden on society (given the racial abortion statistics quoted above) borders on racism.  Generally, the birth of a baby transforms people of any color into more mature, caring and motivated individuals who become an asset to society.

Pro-abortion arguments such as rape or incest are attempts to sensationalize the issue, and to circumvent the real ethical questions.  Rape and incest actually represent only 1% of abortions, and are introduced to distract from the fundamental moral issue.  Planned Parenthood actually often helps molesters and rapists to hide their crimes, by assisting them with abortion and failing to report their crimes.

Many don’t seem to realize that each embryo IS actually a new and unique human person, as important and valuable as we all are.  Size or age does not diminish the value of any human being.

This irreplaceable value of each human life  is at the heart of moral teachings and respect for human life, and is essential for the healthy and balanced survival of human society.

The ethical questions behind pro-life issues cannot be so trivially dismissed as some attempt to do by masquerading murder under the banner of “pro-choice.”

Whose choice?  Certainly not the unborn child’s choice!

Madison, vote Pro-Life!  In this election, that means vote Republican.

Planned Parenthood, the largest abortion corporation in America, will be developing the sex education programs to be used in Wisconsin public schools.  Here is an example of their work, which was distributed by girl scouts at the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in March 2010:

PDF of “Healthy, Happy and Hot”

September is here, and everyone’s getting ready for school. I stumbled across a Badger Herald article entitled “Great Sexpectations,” which flippantly steered new UW student arrivals toward sexual experimentation, and towards facilities such as Planned Parenthood.

So I submitted a comment. (Hope it gets published!)

Motto: Numen Lumen ("God, our Light")

Flippant attitudes toward sex lead to pain and anguish.

The human body carries the ability to create new human life. It’s called sex.

Misuse of this ability, just like misuse of any other human function, can lead to great trouble.

A recent government study has shown that 70% of parents and 54 % of Teens say that sex before marriage is wrong. Release of this study was delayed by the Obama administration for 18months (study dated Feb ’09, released only Aug 23, ’10), presumably because the administration did not like the results of the study.

The fact of the matter is that there are reasons for caution and for the morality that has been respected by our civilization for thousands of years. The reasons include reluctance to kill preborn children, reluctance to deal with psychological problems, depression, STD’s, and reluctance to destroy one’s chances of finding true love in a good marriage in the future.

Bascom Hill

At UW Madison, you will rarely hear this more cautious and conservative attitude that is shared by the vast majority in America. At UW Madison, you will most likely hear a forced, radical liberal agenda, driven by the pursuit of immediate gratification, regardless of future consequences to yourself or to others. UW Madison is often quite intolerant of Christian sexuality.

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Hopefully anybody admitted to a university with the academic caliber of UW Madison will already have learned the benefits of delayed gratification, and will not jump into recreational sex as this article seems to condone. DO your homework (start with the links in this article), find out the consequences of your actions, and take the trouble to locate the 54% of teens in your class who think it’s wrong to have sex before marriage.

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There are lots of groups on campus who can support you in this choice – starting with St. Paul’s Catholic Center — for the numerous students coming from Catholic homes, or for anyone else interested in a Christian perspective on life. Madison’s Cathedral Parish is another great place to look for fellowship and support in a holy and healthy lifestyle.

In defense of the sanctity of human life, the dignity of marriage as a union of husband and wife, and the freedom of conscience and religion–

has created an online campaign to collect signatures.

So far, 247 United States religious leaders , including 55 Roman Catholic Bishops (Bishop Morlino, Bishop Chaput, Archbishop Dolan and others) have signed the Manhattan Declaration.

A total of 467,033 signatures have been collected to date in support of the Manhattan Declaration. Have YOU signed the Manhattan Declaration?

Read the Declaration

Sign the Declaration

The phrase “feminism” is bandied about quite freely by liberals, who feel entitled to define the identity of women and to declare what is best for all of them.

As a New York City girl starting college in 1969 during the development of Gloria Steinem’s social experiments, I have had a lifetime of opportunity to try those ideas on for size. I can assert from experience that the Gloria Steinem “feminism” falls short, and that in 2010, “feminism” is in dire need of an update.

There is no question that the 1970’s “feminism” brought some refreshing and positive changes to our view of women and their potential role in our culture. Acknowledging that women are equally capable of intellectual achievement as men, changing female fashion to be more practical and less punitive than before ( I’m particularly talking about the shoes!), and giving women more choices in life, were all very positive developments.

However, the “feminists,” in their passion to give women “choices,” actually ended up NOT giving women true choice, but railroaded all women into an alternate role, the radical feminist. The new role was different from the previously defined narrow role, but was just as narrow and just as imperative, as the previous role had been.

The critical error made by the old “feminism” was a failure to recognize what is important to most women – the family. In some (LOL) “ideal” world peopled by perfect and affordable servants, and by men who were more feminine than most actually are, perhaps a woman could pursue an exciting career, find love and family life, and be satisfied with the help she received in raising her family.

But the reality that we young women starkly confronted was that the support for raising one’s family simply did not exist, that most shortcuts were designed to be taken out on the children and on the marriage, and that two careers simply could not be optimized simultaneously.

Feminists became more and more radical in confronting these problems – if the time, care and compromise required by family, husband, and children added strain to a woman’s professional life—the solution was to eliminate them. Divorce skyrocketed, children were aborted, and the most successful females became those like Elena Kagan, who dispensed altogether with husband and family. Simultaneously, depression, health problems, and drug addiction escalated among women.

Some of us, noticing the impossibility of the assignment (superwoman at work and at home), made a “choice” to focus on one job, the home. Like most men, who do not undertake two careers simultaneously—say, lawyer and neurosurgeon – we decided to do one job well rather than to do two jobs poorly.

There was no tolerance in the “feminist” culture for this choice, and the social demotion that accompanied it was blatantly obvious at every social event we attended after making that choice. The previous awed gasps I used to receive when introduced as a biochemistry professor evaporated, and were replace with the “flee the leper” response when I was introduced as a Mom at home.

I am by no means the only woman to have figured this out, although most women “at home” are not too vocal about their choices.

Some women are blessed enough to be able to sustain a career without neglecting their family life – those who have the unusual family support group that, say, Sarah Palin has, and are able to have the best of both worlds.

But regardless of our individual choices, “feminism” is in radical need of an update.

• ALL women’s choices should be welcomed and supported, especially the essential and sacrificial choice of staying and serving at home. This choice is in dire need of recognition and respect.
• A woman’s happiness should NOT be contingent on contraception and abortion. Killing a woman’s children does not liberate her in any way, and does not lead to happiness.
• Women should not be expected to work double time, as most working women do. Actually, many of us at home also work double time, so would that make it triple time?
• People should come to the mature realization that the world is not teeming with eager and perfect servants anticipating the honor of caring for our children at low cost. The care of children is loving, rewarding, sacrificial and demanding work that will NOT be performed adequately by a rotating staff of low-paid child-care providers.

In life, we have to make choices. We cannot have it all. We are forced to indicate with our choices what is most important to us. Good things often have to be relinquished for better things.

Most people, when interviewed at the end of their lives, quote family and friends as their biggest source of joy and satisfaction. Faithful lifelong spouses, children who have made good choices, are much more rewarding and satisfying than a successful career. I have personally derived much more joy and satisfaction from family than from biochemistry research at Princeton University. Few people can have both, and our choices indicate which is most important to us.

Feminism is in dire need of an update – at very minimum, ALL women’s choices, including the choice not to neglect one’s family, must be respected. It’s time we educated our young women to realize the errors of the old feminism and to realize that they WILL have to make some choices—real choices, not radical agenda choices like abortion, which only serve to hurt everyone.

“Choice” cannot be so narrowly defined as to include only the killing of one’s child. Judging from women like Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin, and numerous others, the new feminism has arrived, new “choices” are becoming possible, and the old radical feminists are faltering on their way out.

Watch out, here comes November!

An unelected board of retired judges (Governmental Accountability Board, GAB, appointed by Gov. Doyle) has issued a ruling that restricts the dissemination of voter information for 30 days prior to primary elections (starting Aug 15th) and for 60 days prior to general elections (starting Sept 4th).

These rules would make it illegal to disseminate information prior to elections without registration with the government, payment of $100 registration fees, and provision of detailed information about the information to be dispersed. This would apply to individuals and to groups, and would affect information distributed by internet as well.

• The new rules would tax and would slow down pre-election activity by pro-life and pro-family organizations, and might limit the ability of bloggers like myself to post election-related information as I am doing now.
• The new rules would affect the various voter guides which have long been planned by pro-life groups.
• The rules would create a government record of all pro-life activity and of individuals who participate in it. The registration would identify, label and tax all activists participating in one of the most important elections in the history of our country — an election which will determine the future of Obamacare, abortion, and health care rationing.

In my opinion, this step is not dissimilar to the Nazi requirement for Jews to wear armbands identifying them. It is a major unconstitutional violation of freedom of speech. It taxes and creates a governmental record of all pro-life activity and all who participate in it.

Wisconsin Family Action (WFA) has organized:

• Online petition to protest this ruling
• Phone calls to the Governmental Accountability Board protesting this ruling — Call Kevin Kennedy the director of the GAB at 608-266-8005 and politely tell him to use his influence with the GAB board to urge them to revoke the new rules in §1.28 that unconstitutionally restrict both individual and organizational free speech.
• Requesting $10 donations to WFA to help reverse this ruling.

Please participate and spread the word to all Wisconsin residents!