Pro-Life News Bytes September 27, 2007

Reports are coming out of Massachusetts that a 22-year old woman died on September 13, 2007, from hemorrhaging caused by an abortion obtained at Women Health Center in the Cape Cod town of Hyannis. The abortionist responsible for the death is reportedly Rapin Osathanondh, who made headlines in 2001 for threatening to murder five hospital nurses in a fit of rage over misplaced paperwork.

Abortion Death Reported in Massachusetts

"After 34 years of abortion on demand through all nine months of pregnancy, it is time to rethink pro-life strategy," said Law Center attorney Robert Muise, who has criticized the pro-life movement's "lethargy."

Pro-Life Movement Urged to Agree on a Unified Strategy
Vote Life, Canada! says Amen to the Thomas More Law Center’s analysis and advocates that Canada also break out of its apathy.

John Pacheco, candidate for Ottawa West Nepean, posts on his election site a link to a YouTube video. It tells one parent’s heartbreaking story of her 14-year-old daughter’s serious side effects to Gardasil, which are now threatening her physical and mental health.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnTvAneWBZs

Vote Life, Canada! looked into the controversy surrounding the Gardasil vaccine and issued this report and a follow-up post.

Scott Klusendorf of Life Training Institute continues his series of posts on Francis Beckwith’s new pro-life apologetic “Defending Life.”

Beckwith #7: Problems with Thomson's 'Equal Reasonableness' [SK]

He also notes that National Review has just published its own take on “Defending Life.”

An "election guide" by Toronto Catholic Charities published on the website of the Archdiocese of Toronto directs Catholic voters in the upcoming October 10 election to see as their "primary concerns" government funding of programs, affordable housing, and poverty. Conspicuously absent from list are abortion and euthanasia.

Top Election Concerns for Toronto Catholic Charities: Gov't Funding, Affordable Housing, Poverty

Whatever happened to the hope that Archbishop Collins was supposed to bring to the Archdiocese of Toronto? Catholic Bishops are letting Canada down at every turn and seem content to let the Unborn perish.

After a bill to legalize assisted suicide in California failed again in the state legislature, euthanasia advocates are creating a new assisted suicide counseling service. Their goal is to provide help and information for people who want to commit suicide in a less direct manner that gets around state law.

California Group Will Do Assisted Suicide Counseling After Bill Failed

Father Frank Pavone and the National Pro-Life Religious Council respond.

Propaganda from pro-euthanasia study: "Those who received physician-assisted dying … appeared to enjoy comparative social, economic, educational, professional and other privileges."

Euthanasia Critics Challenge Pro-Euthanasia Study Research Methods

National Black Pro-Life Union is joining all pro-life groups in celebration at the announced closure of Alternatives, an abortion clinic in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The facility was closed by the Health Department in June after an inspection revealed filthy conditions that included blood-stained carpets and rusty surgical instruments.

Former Miss Atlantic City Comments on Closing of Filthy New Jersey Abortion Mill

The latest evidence of UNFPA's involvement in the promotion of abortion comes in the annual report of the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR), a non-profit pro-abortion law firm located in New York which is active in trying to change abortion laws around the world. According to the Center's most recent annual report, UNFPA was one of their largest financial contributors last year, donating as much as $50,000.

UN Population Fund Still Denies but in Fact Very Much Does Fund Abortion Advocacy

More on the UNFPA from Vote Life, Canada! here.

A Republican presidential candidate is promoting legislation designed to deter women from choosing to have their unborn child killed in the womb.

Brownback's ultrasound bill seeks to better inform women seeking abortion

Mark Crutcher of Life Dynamics has a new posting on his blog.

The Scam of Moral Irrelevance

Yesterday’s NewsBytes reported that one of Alveda King’s talks was cancelled. Today we discover the reason was that it was too moral—and we all know morals are something the public schools are not allowed to teach, right?

Alveda King Canceled by Des Moines Principal -- Talk Was Too "Moral"

School officials respond.

Cellular phone company Verizon Wireless and top pro-abortion group NARAL have been feuding over the ability of the organization to use its system to send out text messages to its membership with alerts and updates. Verizon initially refused to allow NARAL to use its network but higher officials reversed the decision.

VERIZON WIRELESS WILL ALLOW PRO-ABORTION GROUP'S TEXT MSGS AFTER FEUD

Idaho Chooses Life is after the Bishop to stop a scandal involving a high profile nun.

Christian Newswire/ -- "We issue a public call for Idaho's Catholic Bishop, Mike Driscoll, to intervene quickly and forcefully in the brewing scandal involving Sister Helen Prejean," Sister Prejean is scheduled to be the keynote speaker at an event to raise money for the Idaho ACLU on Friday, September 28th.

ICL Urges Bishop Driscoll to Intervene

The Arizona Supreme Court let stand a state appeals court ruling making Maricopa County officials take pregnant inmates for abortions.

Arizona Supreme Court Rules County Must Take Inmates for Abortions

The leading Northern Ireland pro-life group Precious Life has taken out newspaper ads across the region asking pro-life people to contact the members of the Legislative Assembly and urge them to oppose abortion. The campaign urges pro-life advocates to sign petitions and distribute more.

Northern Ireland Pro-Life Group Lobbies MLAs to Oppose Abortion

A new poll finds that black pro-life voters are more likely to support Republican candidates than African-American voters overall, but that they still tend to vote for Democrats. The survey also found that blacks and Hispanics are more likely to oppose abortion and embryonic stem cell research than white Americans.

Poll Shows Black Pro-Life Voters Still Largely Support Pro-Abortion Candidates

President Bush Defunds UN Agency Involved in Forced Abortions

Thank you Mr. Bush, for the sixth year in a row, protecting the lives of unborn children and the true health and welfare of other women throughout the world.

Press Release From Concerned Women of America:

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President Bush Defunds UN Agency Involved in Forced Abortions

Reallocates money from UN agency that supports China’s one-child policy to Child Survival program

9/14/2007 Washington, D.C. — President Bush has transferred $34 million that Congress allocated for the notorious United Nations Population Fund to instead help children through the “Child Survival and Health Programs Fund.” The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) supports the coercive one-child policy in China that fines, jails, forcibly aborts and punishes the families of women who attempt to choose the number and spacing of their children.

Wendy Wright, President of Concerned Women for America (CWA) stated, “We thank President Bush for his commitment to upholding the law which protects vulnerable women in foreign countries from forced abortions and sterilizations. Chinese women and families have suffered forced late-term abortions, destruction of their homes, massive fines, and threats. The abuses have been so extreme that recently villagers in China rioted against family planning officials. UNFPA blatantly continues its involvement and support of China’s family planning agency and its one-child policy and should not receive U.S. tax dollars.

“It is appalling that congressmen insist on funding this wretched agency that abuses women. U.S. lawmakers should respect the rights of women in foreign nations to have children and not use our tax dollars to perpetrate violence and forced abortion. We are grateful to President Bush and his staff for confronting and correcting this error in allocating money to the anti-woman and anti-child UNFPA.”

This is the sixth year President Bush has followed the Kemp-Kasten provision requiring the president to ensure that no U.S. tax funding goes to organizations involved in forced abortions or sterilizations. The provision was enacted in 1985 because of UNFPA’s support of China’s horrific one-child policy. Kemp-Kasten states, “none of the funds made available in this Act…may be made available to any organization or program which …supports or participates in the management of a program of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization.”

UN Population Fund Plans New Campaign For "Reproductive Health"

In recent postings and articles, the UNFPA has been a party in the discussion.

Last Friday C-FAM.org reported on the release of UNFPA’s four year strategy aimed at supporting and raising “awareness of reproductive rights.”

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) has assessed the various regions of the world and despite differences in local circumstances, proposes that the solution is the spread of "reproductive health services," a phrase that is used by UN agencies and committees as synonymous with abortion. UNFPA recently released a proposal for a comprehensive four-year, $224 million advocacy strategy aimed at supporting and raising “awareness of reproductive rights.” Claiming “the right to reproductive health applies to all people at all times,” the UNFPA program aims to “increase demand for sexual and reproductive health services and reproductive rights” across the globe by working with all sectors of society from governments and community leaders to NGOs and the media.

UNFPA asserts their new program takes into account the culture and socioeconomic climate of particular regions; for instance, they know promoting abortion in Arab states is problematic. Outlining its proposed actions in Africa, UNFPA targets the region’s relatively high fertility rates, arguing that population growth is “outpacing the capacity of economies to generate jobs” and aims “to address the unmet need for contraception” in the region. UNFPA does not seem to take into account the fact that fertility rates are falling in most African countries and that longevity in some African countries has dropped into the 40's. The UNFPA program also proposes increased condom usage among adolescents.

….snip

UNFPA critics take note of the agency’s interchangeable use of the terms “reproductive health services,” “reproductive rights” and “reproductive health.” Both “reproductive health services” and “reproductive rights” remain highly contentious in UN social policy discussions because they continue to be misinterpreted by powerful NGOs and UN agencies to include abortion.

Full report here.

Further background on UN efforts and the UNFPA to "leave no abortion behind." How much is worldwide access to abortion worth?