Last Updated on 06/26/08
The example of William Wilberforce.
Informed consent and abortion.
Reasons why the pro-life movement will win! (Part I)
Reasons why the pro-life movement will win! (Part II)
It's time for a Spiritual Audit!
Abortion is better than children living in poverty or with disabilities.
The fetus may be human, but it is not "viable" without the mother.
Abortion is necessary because there are already thousands of children waiting to be adopted.
Women cannot be free unless they have the right to control their own reproductive lives.
How can you make a fetus more important than a grown woman?
If abortion is outlawed, women would be forced to unsafe back-alley abortions.
You cannot legislate morality or force our religious views on others!
1) The example of William Wilberforce.
When it comes to eradicating evils and atrocities in our society, we must never give up. The lesson was taught to us more than 200 years ago by the British Parliamentarian William Wilberforce, a man who fought another great social evil, slavery.
Wilberforce faced a seemingly impossible task, as the British Empire depended heavily on the slave trade. So he educated himself and others on every aspect of the evil, particularly the awful conditions and treatment of fellow human beings. And he and his allies repeatedly organized government inquiries into the horrors of slavery, exposing them to the public.
The first victory was a small one, but Wilberforce doggedly persisted. Year after year, his opponents found ways to defeat the bills he introduced, often with dirty tactics. But after two decades of hard work, in 1807, Parliament abolished the slave trade. It took another quarter century to abolish slavery outright.
By far the greatest evil in our society today is abortion. Like Wilberforce, pro-lifers must never give up and must continue to achieve incremental victories: parental notice, informed consent, appointing pro-life judges etc. Like Wilberforce, who confronted opponents who benefited financially from slavery, pro-lifers are taking on a huge abortion industry, motivated by profit.
Knowing that nearly 4,000 babies lose their life each and every day in our nation must move us not only to prayer, but also to action; to persist and to expose the reality of what abortion is.
We must always remember what we are fighting for nothing less than the lives of thousands of innocent babies.
We must also never despair. Despair would deny the sovereignty of God.
In recent bulletin inserts, we have highlighted reasons why the pro-life movement is winning.
However, more than three decades after Roe v. Wade, pro-abortionists still dominate the very vocabulary that we use to discuss the issue of abortion.
Language is a very powerful tool and the pro-abortion movement has generally shown much more "terminological savvy" than pro-lifers Indeed, they have been very effective in using terminology which either misleads, deceives or confuses the issues.
The words used by pro-abortionists often seem be assistance of the media, the terms they use drastically misrepresent the facts and turn every unborn baby (or "fetus") into a non-entity and give the impression that women are being robbed of "choice".
If the vocabulary is confusing, that is the point. If we do not say what it really is, we can pretend what it is not. Therefore, "a woman's reproductive healthcare" is a euphemism for abortion. "Disarticulating a fetus", which might sound like suspending an unborn's in the calvarium "which might sound like lancing a boil, is too gruesome to describe in this bulletin.
Similarly, when laws are passed to reduce the number of abortions (such as informing the parents of pregnant minors) this is invariably described as "restrictive" in our media, rather than protective. Yet, protection for a victim is only viewed as "restrictive" by those who would victimize.
If you have to dress something up and disguise the truth, you can always assume that it is wrong. When a man murders his wife, we do not say, "Mr. X rendered his wife una live by evacuating her cranial cavity ... " Instead, we say, "He bashed her brains ou!..." Yet, we apparently have no stomach for similarly description when it comes to the unborn child.
So, let them talk about "choice"; we will talk about children. Let them talk about "empowerment"; we will talk about love and respect. Let them talk about "quality of life"; we will speak of human dignity.
3) "Informed" consent and abortion.When you go to the hospital for any medical procedure, you are invariable informed about the procedure, its possible complications, etc. Only then does the patient give "informed" consent.
Abortion is the most frequently performed surgery on adults in America. Yet it is unique in that, while it is surgery that is potentially dangerous to the mother and destroys the human being within her, the mother is not given proper factual information on the surgery, not to mention any details about "what she carries". Indeed,this is one of the most tragic abuses associated with theabortion industry particularly as the abortion clinic has a vested, financial interest to carry out the abortion.
Very little (if any) factual information is given at all, and what is given is often false. The complications are ignored, glossed over, or mentioned on a paper in fine print. The mother's baby is referred to as "pregnancy tissue", "not alive yet", "not a baby yet", "just a bunch of cells", "only a glob". These descriptions are given at a stage of development when thebaby already sucks his or her thumb and feels pain, and when we can listen to his/her tiny heartbeat on an office ultrasonic stethoscope.
Such deception of the mother and railroading her into an abortion is never more evident than when the so-called "counselor" asks her, "Do you want your menstrual period re-established? If so,just sign up for this procedure". Abortion is not mentioned, nor is anything said about the baby.
Abortion is a huge industry,providing enormous profits to providers such as Planned Parenthood. There is no better example of the exploitation of women than this continuing, commercialized, and almost universal deception.
4) Reasons why the pro-life movement will win! (Part I).One day, there will be an end of abortion in America.
There are around 69 million Catholics in the U.S. and if more of us would be prepared to commit ourselves to assist and get involved, that day will be sooner rather than later. If so, fewer innocent, unborn babies will be victims and have to lose their lives.
The New Year is a time for optimism and confidence. This week and next we will outline the reasons why we are winning and why there is reason to be optimistic:-
(1). The most sure sign of our ultimate victory is the strong and ever-growing involvement of young people who are pro-life and fighting for an end to abortion. Today's generation have the benefit of being more scientific and so they know that life begins at conception and cannot be deceived that the child in the mother's womb is anything other than that----a child!
(2). The flow of conversions is virtually all in one direction ... that is, from death to life. Have you ever heard of a pro-life advocate become pro-abortion (other than possibly a few politicians who are notorious for abandoning principles in exchange for votes)? Yet there are thousands of doctors, nurses, technicians, security guards etc who have worked at abortion clinics and who have repented and who are now staunchly pro-life.
(3). Another clear sign of progress is the wave of women who are speaking out about how they regret having had an abortion. The "Silent No More Awareness Campaign" provides an opportunity to share the testimonies of these brave women and they reveal that instead of "solving" a problem, abortion creates more problems of its own. Moreover, these testimonies put the pro-abortion lobby in a huge dilemma because for years, they have been saying, "Listen to the voices of women!" Now, those women's voices increasingly repudiate the lie of abortion.
(4). Over half of America's freestanding abortion clinics have closed since 1993 ..from over 2,000 at that time to roughly 740 today. That is because no matter how much money and media access the abortion movement has built up, they cannot remove the stigma that is attached to abortion. In fact, the abortion industry's greatest fear is not that Roe v. Wade will be reversed,rather, it is that abortion will remain legal but there will not be any medical personnel to do abortions. The simple truth is fewer and fewer doctors---even if they consider
5) Reasons why the pro-life movement will win! (Part II)Last week, we gave a number of reasons to be optimistic. Here are several more reasons why the pro-life movement will win:
(1). In Constitutional history, the rights of oppressed groups, such as women and blacks, have eventually been vindicated. As more evidence was presented to the Courts, they reversed prior decisions. In recent cases, more evidence is being admitted showing not only the unborn child's humanity, but also the harm abortion does to women and the pain the child suffers during an abortion.
(2). There is a growing mountain of medical, psychological and sociological evidence that abortion harms women and families. There is also more research linking abortion to higher incidences of breast cancer, mental illnesses, infant mortality in subsequent pregnancies etc.
(3). Another sign of victory is that the other side has run out of arguments. In the years prior to Roe v Wade, abortion advocates assured everyone that legalized abortion would reduce child abuse, reduce teen and strengthen families. After three decades, it is clear that abortion has significantly compounded these problems.
(4). The last several years have seen unprecedented legislation for the unborn child. On the Federal level, for the first time, an abortion procedure (so-called partial-birth-abortion) has been declared illegal. Legislation has also been passed to protect the unborn after a botched abortion and to protect the unborn from acts of violence other than abortion.On the state level, laws have also been passed to try to reduce the staggering number of abortions.
(5). The evil inner workings of abortion are being highlighted. Abortion advocates have said for years that they want abortion to be "safe and legal", but this is a lie. Crimes of abortion clinics are increasingly being exposed and include medical malpractice, sexual abuse, falsifying medical records etc. What's more, the the abortion industry creates asafe haven for sexual predators and statutory rape. For more details, see www.childpredator.com.
(6) When pregnant women get out of their cars and walk nervously toward the abortion clinic, they increasingly encounter a"sidewalk counselor"---a regular person, armed with only love andwith information the abortion clinic does not want them to know. Frequently,after a short conversation, the counselor will take them to a crisis pregnancy center, where the mother will see a crystal-clear, ultrasound image of her baby. Once expectant mothers see their babies, they invariably choose LIFE.
Finally, the reason why we will win is that by His Resurrection, Jesus conquered death. Thus, we do not cower before the culture of death; rather, we stand before it with victorious confidence!
6) It's time for a Spiritual Audit!In virtually every aspect of Iife--corporate, athletic, education etc., there is a constant evaluation process to measure growth and improvement as we look forward to the New Year, it is a good time to assess our spiritual progress. Have we made a difference in2007? If God were to tally our "faith in action" would He be pleasedwith what we have done (or failed to do)?
Evils plague our society, such as abortion, pornography "comprehensive sex" education, tax funding of Planned Parenthood, and other anti-God, anti-life and anti-family issues.
As Christians, we know that the Bible commands us to be active in serving God. Service is an action word, so we know that we cannot serve God by sitting on the sidelines, or being a "fence sitter". Are we as Catholics influencing our world, or is today's relativism and secularism influencing us much more?
Are we setting an example to the next generation to protect marriage and to defend life, from conception until natural death, or are we just "passively" pro-life? Do we speak up when in a position to defend innocent life? Do we hold our elected representatives accountable?
Obviously, we cannot do it all, but we can certainly do something! Literally, thousands of lives are at stake each and every day. If we do nothing we collude with the pro-aborts, the purveyors of pornography and those that wish to remove God from society. By doing nothing, we reap what they sow!
''Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins" James 4:17
8) A woman's right to "choose"?The word "choice" (as used onthe subject of abortion) is probably the most misleading and deceptive term inthe English language.
While it might sound good to say that government should allow people to make all their own choices, that is neither practical nor desirable. Some choices are crimes. All crimes are choices.
Once a woman is pregnant, barring a miscarriage or an induced abortion, she will have a baby. Therefore, her only "choice" is, "How is the baby going to come out? "Will he or she come out alive and crying, or dead and in pieces? Truly, her choice is between life and death---a live baby, or a dead one.
Consider this hypothetical situation. A group of young men have just started a "Right to Rape" organization. They argue that they have the right to choose to rape women. The real question, they tell us, is, ''Who decides, us or the government? We believe that the government should stay out of this very private matter."Furthermore, they want the state to set up tax-funded centers where they can rape women in a safe, legal fashion.
Clearly, our response would be,"Absolutely not; rape is wrong!"
Note carefully that the real and overriding question is not, "who decides" but a question about the action itself. We must first ask ourselves, "Is rape right or wrong? "Only then can we answer the question of who has the right to choose to do it.
And so it is with abortion. No one should have the "right to choose" abortion because it involves taking the life of a separate, innocent human being and is therefore an atrocity.
9) "Every child a wanted child".
Prior to the legalization of abortion 35 years ago, advocates for abortion held out the panacea of the elimination of "unwanted children" if only abortion was legal. In fact, it was Planned Parenthood, which led this charge, coining the familiar slogan,"Every child a wanted child". Despite the fact that some 47 million "unwanted" babies have died in the intervening period, the pro-choice lobby still uses this argument to justify abortion.
In the 1960's and 70's the pro-choice position was that legalizing abortion would drastically reduce child abuse. America legalized abortion and during the next 30 years, child abuse has skyrocketed (from 167,000 cases in 1973 to 1,694,756 cases in 2002). Yet, despite this staggering increase in child abuse, the pro-choice lobby continues to tie itself in knots by now arguing that making abortion illegal would cause an increase in child abuse!!! How many more millions of children do we have to kill before their scheme starts to work?
We all agree that every child should be wanted. This is an idealistic goal, but sadly we do not live in an idyllic world. Wouldn't it also be a wonderful world if there were no unwanted wives, no aging unwanted parents, no unwanted Jews, blacks or Catholics oranyone else who is devalued or persecuted?
Moreover, since when does anyone's right to live depend upon someone else wanting them? Women rightfully resent that the value of a woman is sometimes determined by whether a man wants her. How can anyone possibly insist that the value of an unborn baby is to be determined by whether a mother wants him or her at any given time? To use being wanted by someone as a measure of whether a human life is allowed to live is a truly frightening concept. Its converse logically awaits us--- that the unwanted can be eliminated. Don't forget that Hitler's Germany was ideal for wanted Aryans.
To make sense, the slogan: "Every child a wanted child" has to be completed "and if not wanted, aborted." To complete the sentence removes the mask from this misleading slogan and reveals it for the evil that it is!
10) "Abortion is better than children living in poverty or with disabilities".
If we are going to say "perfect" human life has value, but imperfect life does not, why does that discrimination have to end at birth? If it is compassionate to take the life of an unborn child who might conceivably live a "terriblelife" someday in the future, surely it is even more compassionate to take the lives of those children actually living a terrible life now!
There are many children growing up in poverty today inAmerica, but has anyone ever heard an argument that their mothers have the right to take their lives, since they cannot afford to raise them? No one makes such an absurd and heartless argument because no amount of financial hardship can justify taking the life of another human being particularly an innocent child.
Abortion advocates support abortion on demand. They insist that women have the right to abort their children for any reason, or no reason at all. Therefore appealing to the hard cases of financial instability is just a smoke-screen designed to mask their incredibly broad agenda.
The solution to poverty is not found in aborting the children of the poor. We have been doing that since 1973 and it most definitely has not worked. The real issue is not poverty, but the humanity of the unborn child.
Similarly, the suggestion that we should abort children who might grow up with a disability is barbaric and inhumane and has no place in a just society. Again, our disabilities should no more disqualify us from life before birth than they do after birth. If someone is born "normal", but later becomes handicapped, is he/she less entitled to the protection of the law? Furthermore, the argument is built on conjecture----on the mere "likelihood" that a child will have some kind of disability. Often, the tests prove wrong and even more often, these children, if allowed to live, end up with lives of joy and happiness that far exceeds those of their "more healthy" peers.
Anyone who tries to eliminate suffering by terminating the lives of the "sufferers" is establishing an extremely dangerous precedent! Who gets to design the "perfectness" scale?
11) "I am opposed to abortion. but I don't believe I have the right to impose my personal beliefs on others".
You will sometimes hear this stated by members of the general public, but it is more commonly said by politicians who are trying to "finesse" the abortion issue. The trick is to appear philosophically pro-life so they do not have to defend the realityof abortion, and functionally, pro-abortion so they do not upset the abortion lobby. They think that this is a shrewd view, when in fact it is just a cowardly one. Unfortunately, for political expediency, many of our "Catholic" politicians take this hypocritical and shameful position!
Understand that the only logical basis for someone to be "personally opposed to abortion" is because they realize that abortion terminates the life of an innocent human being. While claiming to believe that, however, they say it should be legal. So what they are really saying is, "Abortion is the intentional killing of a helplesschild, but I wouldn't do anything to stop it. I am willing to look the other way while someone else takes the life of a child".
That is a smoke screen. Only a coward and/or a hypocrite would concede that unborn children are living human beings but that it is none of his (or her) business if someone wants to abort them.
It is no different than saying that they are opposed to rape but it is none of their business if men want to rape women, or that rape is not an area in which the government should be involved.
We live in a nation where over 3,000 innocent children lose their lives each and every day to the intentional act of abortion. If this is not an area of legitimate governmental interest,then the government has no legitimate interest at all!
12) "The fetus may be human, but it is not "viable" without the mother"
Pro-abortion advocates increasingly have to admit that the unborn child is a human being (because they otherwise deny science) but they argue that the so-called "fetus" has no right to life because he/she is not "viable" and is dependent upon the mother. For the reasons outlined below, this argument has no merit, but if they were sincere in this view, they would at least support a limit being placed on abortions after the twenty second week of gestation, when the child can survive outside the mother's womb. Of course, they do not support such a restriction.
If the issue is that the unborn are not viable because they are dependent upon another individual in order to survive, that does not end at birth. By this standard, a two-year-old baby is no more viable than an unborn baby. In fact, if the guiding principle to the right to life is the ability to survive without others, many people in society would not be "viable" such as the handicapped and the aged. So why would this cruel and illogical "viability" standard only apply to the unborn.
Moreover, science has now produced proof that human beings are actually viable from the moment of conception. Because of invitro-fertilization (IVF), we now know that even at its earliest stages, human life is capable of surviving outside the womb, if given the proper environment. With IVF, the fertilized egg (or child) spends the first few days in a petri dish and is only placed inside the mother because medical science has not yet developed a substitute for the womb.
In other words, the viability issue is yet another smoke-screen because it is a function of medical technology and is wholly unrelated to the humanity of the child. That is further proven by the fact that premature babies are now routinely surviving at gestational ages that would have been unthinkable even 20 years ago (although children are biologically the same as ever).
13) "Abortion is necessary because there are already thousands of children waiting to be adopted".
The truth is the chances of a newborn baby not being adopted are extremely small, regardless of race or circumstances. The problem in adoption is not babies, but older children (many of whom are not legally adoptable) who come into the adoption system long after their birth.
When the abortion industry tries to justify aborting children by saying there are children who are not getting adopted, they are talking about two separate and unrelated groups of children. The interesting thing is that the children they want to abort are the ones who are the easiest to place for adoption and therefore, not part of the problem.
The pro-choice position is, ''We have a group of children over here (older and already born children) who are difficult to place for adoption, so let's deny the right of life of this other group over here (unborn babies) who are extremely easy to place." This argument is plainly absurd and indefensible!
How is a 14 year old girl who needs a loving home helped by taking the life of an unborn baby? Aborting a totally unrelated group of children who are not hard to place will not help her a bit. Pro-aborts often counter that if the people who want to adopt babies could not do so, they might adopt these older children already in the system.
It would be hard to imagine a more repugnant form of extortion than this argument. What they are really saying is, "In order to make adoptive parents take the older children we think they should adopt, we will slaughter the babies they want to adopt". Few statements speak better to their moral bankruptcy than that one.
14) "Women cannot be free unless they have the right to control their own reproductive lives".
There are still many pro-choice advocates who believe that a woman's right to abortion is part of an ongoing feminist struggle for equality and freedom and any restriction on abortion is threatening to women.
This sad and regressive mindset is epitomized by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. When the Supreme Court recently upheld the ban on the gruesome partial birth abortion procedure, Justice Ginsburg wrote quite an astonishing dissenting opinion.
According to Ginsburg, the right to life of the unborn baby is completely ignored and subordinated to the interest of women having complete autonomy over their "reproductive decisions". In her view, if women do not have this autonomy, they are relegated to "when women were regarded as the center of home and family life with attendant special responsibilities that precluded full and independent legal status under the Constitution." In other words, a woman's right to abort her baby in the womb is central to her life and essential to her being a complete woman.
It is indeed hard to understand the depraved concept that a woman cannot be a real woman unless she has complete autonomy to direct a doctor to abort her own baby, even in the case of a partial birth abortion, when that baby is partially delivered for the purpose of taking the child's life.
The truth, of course, is that abortion is not about controlling reproduction. When a woman is pregnant, it is a biological reality that reproduction has already taken place. Abortion is about taking the life of the child that has been produced and is alive.
What kind of perverted mind sees the right to abort one's own offspring as a symbol of freedom? As pro-life feminist, Frederica Mathewes-Green once wrote, women have abortions for the same reason an animal will gnaw off its own leg to get out of a trap. She pointed out that abortion is not a sign that women are free, but proof that they are desperate.
" ... women will never climb to equality overthe dead bodies of their children ... "When the abortion lobby was originally selling the idea of making abortion legal, they ridiculed those who said it would one day be used as birth control. They said abortion would only be used in extreme and rare cases.
Today, even statistics submitted by pro-choice organizations prove this to be a lie. The data shows, (a) only a tiny percentage of abortions (less than 2%) are done for the so-called "hard cases" such as rape (b) approximately half of all abortions are repeat abortions and (c) over 35% of all U.S. women will have at least one abortion by age 45.
When over 3,000 babies lose their life to abortion each and every day, that can hardly be described as a "rare" occurrence! Given this fact, abortion apologists have switched gears and are now selling the idea that even if abortion is used as birth control, it's a private matter and no one else's business.
Of course, it most definitely is our business, because legalized abortion has proven to be not only morally indefensible, but also a financial disaster. Our tax dollars indirectly pay for abortions and since abortion has been legal, we have been forced to bear the financial burden of skyrocketing pregnancy rates of unmarried mothers.
Most importantly, before anyone can participate in any activity derived from his or her right to privacy, we must first ask, "The privacy to do what?" In the case of abortion, we are talking about the privacy to take the life of an innocent child. Thus, the only decent view is that when one individual's "choice" or "right to privacy" will cost another human being his or her life,that choice cannot be considered a matter of privacy.
16) "How can you make a fetus more important than a grown woman"
Abortion is a human rights issue, but politically speaking, it does involve competing rights. On the one hand, you have the mother's "right" not to be pregnant. On the other hand, you have the baby's right not to have his or her life terminated. The question that must therefore be answered is which right is more fundamental?
Abortion advocates argue that outlawing abortion would, in essence, elevate the rights of the unborn over and above those of the mother. However, in reality, outlawing abortion would not be giving unborn children more rights; it would simply re-establish for them the most fundamental right that no one can live without, namely the right to life.
If a baby is not to be aborted, then the pregnant mother must remain pregnant. This will also require of her sickness, fatigue, reduced mobility, an enlarged body and some new clothes. Fortunately, it is not a permanent condition. On the flip side, for a pregnant woman not to be pregnant, her child must be aborted (unless she is past 22 weeks of pregnancy, in which case the baby may well survive outside the womb). Abortion costs the unborn child his or her very life and it is a thoroughly permanent condition. That is what's at stake, both for the child and for the mother. It is not an issue of who is more important, but rather who has more onthe line.
Any time there are competing rights, the government must protect the more fundamental right. For example,the law requires the driver of a car to slow down and stop so a pedestrian may cross the road in front of him. This is not because the pedestrian is more valuable or important than the driver, but rather because, if the driver does not stop, it might cost the pedestrian his life.
Obviously, for a woman to remain pregnant, she gives up far more than a few minutes of drive time, but she givesup far less than her baby who would otherwise be denied the right to life. This is what it comes down to. Since the child has far more at stake, the more fundamental right to life must be upheld.
17) "If abortion is outlawed, women would be forced to unsafe back-alley abortions"
For years, the abortion industry has concocted statistics to frighten people into supporting their agenda. The fact is that every study ever conducted (including figures released by the pro-choice Alan Guttmacher Institute) proves that so-called "back-alley abortions" were extremely rare, prior to abortion being legalized in 1973.
Moreover, the idea that women would be forced to unsafe "back-alley abortions" if abortion was again illegal, has now been discredited by an actual "test market",so to speak.
For 44 years under Nazi and then Communist rule, abortions were legal in Poland. In 1993, the new freely elected Parliament passed a law forbidding abortion. The media screamed: "You will not stop abortions; they will just go underground and women will be injured and die and there will be a flood of miscarriages"
However, the law was passed and not only did abortions drop precipitously (from around 138,000 to 99 per annum), but none of the ominous predictions of the pro-choice lobby materialized. In fact, quite the reverse is true. Miscarriages dropped from around 59,076 in 1990 to 41,568 in1999. Deaths due to pregnancy and birth dropped from 70 to 24 and neonatal deaths per 1,000 live births dropped from 19 to 9. Not only did none of the dire predictions materialize, but instead, Polish women are healthier and have fewer gynecological problems than when abortion was legal and common. So here we have a modern, western nation of 40 million people that decided to forbid abortion by law. The result shatters and completelydestroys the long-standing pro-abortion argument about "back-alley"abortions.18) "You cannot legislate morality or force our religious views on others!"
To say that laws cannot make an immoral person moral is correct. To say that we do not legislate morality is nonsense. Virtually every law is based on an idea of what is right or wrong.
Laws are not passed to control thought, but to control behavior. For example, we impose our morality on rapists. We do not care so much why rapists rape, or what their moral and religious views are, or the reason why rapists disrespect women. Rape is evil and when people want to do evil, it is clearly correct for the government to impose its morality on them. Similarly, pro-lifers do not care so much what people think about babies, as long as they do not kill them.
Indeed, if laws should not be based on morality, what on earth should they be based on? The reality is that laws are based on our collective moral values and is the way society decides which activities it will and will not tolerate .
If we are going to reject a law simply because it is supported by religion, then we would have to abolish most laws. A person does not have to be especially religious to say that it is wrong to abort a child, any more than they would say it is wrong to steal money. Certain activities are unacceptable to civilized people regardless of religious beliefs. Abortion is one of those issues. In reality, abortion is a civil rights and a human rights issue .
Let us not forget that the black civil rights movement was dominated by pastors and was often headquartered in churches. That did not make civil rights simply a religious issue!
19) "There are other issues just as important as abortion, such as homelessness, health care, poverty and the economy. "
This philosophy is generally advanced by two groups of people. The first group is closet pro-abortionists who fully realize that abortion is terribly wrong and want to avoid revealing their position on abortion. The other group is lukewarm pro-lifers who are looking for some way to justify their own inaction on abortion, or more often, to justify voting for a pro-abortion politician.
By equating abortion with other social ills, they are both attempting to neutralize the abortion issue and silence pro-lifers.
To expose what a scam this really is, just ask one of these people if they would ever vote for a white supremacist on the basis that race is just "one of many issues".
Obviously, there is no denying that America faces many societal problems. However, if abortion is the taking of human life----which most definitely it is and even the most die-hard advocates of abortion have to admit (albeit most reluctantly) then our country is engaged in the largest holocaust in history.
To suggest that the wholesale slaughter of 47 million children (since 1973) ----a number which increases by more than 3,000 each day----is even in the same universe as tax policy, or homelessness, or poverty, or any other issue is both heartless and indefensible.
Indeed, for someone who claims to be a Christian to make such a statement is pornographic.
20) The"fetus"-----human life or not?
For many years, their mostsignificant and basic argument has been that the so-called fetus is not a human life; it's just a simple mass of tissue or part of the pregnant woman'sbody. They also claim that the question of when human life begins is uncertain and a religious issue.
However, medical textbooks and scientific reference works consistently agree that life begins at conception, when a genetically distinct individual is brought into existence. Some of the world's most prominent scientists and physicians testified to a U.S. Senate committee that human life begins at conception. At these same hearings, pro-abortionists, though invited to do so, failed to produce even a single expert witness who would testify that life begins at any point other than conception.
From the moment of conception, the unborn fetus is not simple, but very complex. The newly fertilized egg contains a staggering amount of genetic information, sufficient to control the individual's growth and development for an entire lifetime. The key word is development. Like a toddler or adolescent, the term fetus does not refer to "non-humans", but to humans at a particular stage of development. It is scientifically inaccurate and untrue to say a fetus is not a human being simply because he or she is at an earlier stage of development than an infant.
Being inside something is not the same as being part of something. The mother and the unborn child are twos eparate individuals and half the time, they are not even the same sex! The child has its own DNA, fingerprints and blood type, distinct from the mother's.The unborn child even takes an active role in his or her own development, even controlling the course of the pregnancy and the time of birth.
21) Magnitude and scope of abortion
The US. has lost about 1.2 million soldiers in alI of its wars since the Declaration of Independence in 1776. In a much shorter time since 1973, we have killed about 40 times as many pre-born babies. Also, abortion has cost the US about 120 times as much as all American wars have.
Who could have predicted this wide scale slaughter of innocent life that goes on, day in day out? Who would have guessed that abortion would be de-crimlnalized, protected by governments and proudly promoted and funded by governments and corporations?
Who would have guessed that some schools and colleges would promote this, imagined that churches would remain silent and that school officials can and do send minors for abortions without parental consent? Who would have guessed that the media moguls would despise and oppose all who valiantly come to the defense of innocent life?
How did we get to this position? How did we become so callous and how can "civilized" people consider their God given children as disposable? There is nothing in human history to equal this massive slaughter.
Why do we not do more to prevent abortion? Lord, have mercy on us.
22) Mother Teresa's Words of wisdom
The father is likely to place other women in the same trouble. So abortion leads to abortion. Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its
people to love, but to use violence to get what they want. This is why the greatest destroyer of love and peace is abortion.
"It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so hat you may live as you wish, How can there be too many children? That is like saying there are too many flowers,"
The first person in the world to welcome Jesus, to recognize Him in the womb of His mother was a child: John the Baptist. How wonderful, God chooses an unborn child to announce the coming of His redeeming Son. - Mother Teresa
23) The example of three women in the Bible.
The pregnancies of three women many centuries ago changed world history profoundly. These women were Hannah, Elizabeth and Mary
Hannah was unable to conceive until God intervened (Samuel 1: 1-3). Elizabeth was also unable to conceive and was too old to bear a child until God intervened (Luke 15-25) Mary was a virgin, betrothed for marriage to Joseph (Matthew 11823).
These three seemingly ordinary jewish women listened to God and accepted their unexpected pregnancies and their obedience changed the course of history and the lives of hundreds of millions of people
Consider for a moment if any of these women had been capable of and had submitted to an abortion. Certainly, all of them had a reasonable excuse not to want a child. Hannah and Elizabeth were too old to become first-time mothers_ Mary was only a very young girl; she was unmarried and a virgin, living at a time when pregnancy before marriage and adultery could have been punished by death.
God had a plan for their respective children--Samuel, John the Baptist and Jesus, even before they were born. God has a plan for every unborn child today We should not interfere and tamper with His plan, which happens every time a child is aborted.
24) Pro-abortion?
When people believe In something, you do not see them desperately trying to avoid being linked to the activity with which their movement is identified.
For example, those who support the death penalty do not mind being called pro-death penalty. People who work for animal rights, do not mind being called pro-animal rights. People who support the Second Amendment do not mind being called progun, and the 'List goes on and on.
The one exception is people who support legal abortion. Although they vigorously defend abortion's legality, they do everything possible to avoid being called pro-abortion. Clearly, they are advocating the legality of an activity which is not only repugnant, but which even they know is indefensible. If that were not the case, they would not become so outraged at being called pro-abortion.
25) "Right to Choose"-----Choose What?
Abortion advocates often say, "It's a woman's right to choose". However, once a woman is pregnant, she already has a child; the choice is what to do with him or her. Although the word "choice" sounds so positive and harmless, the actual choice is whether to have a live child or a dead child
Abortion advocates also argue that, "You cannot legislate morality". Interestingly, this is exactly the same argument that the civil rights' movement faced. The response of Martin Luther King Jr. was: "We hear the familiar cry that morals cannot be legislated. This may be true, but behavior can be regulated. The law may not be able to make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me".
Similarly, pro-life advocates are trying to regulate behavior, not legislate morality. We cannot force some people to love all children, but we can and should use our infiuence to stop abortionists destroying innocent babies.
26) Which is an accurate description: "Pro-life" or "Pro-Choice"?
"Pro-life" is an accurate description because proponents of this position wish to preserve all life, including the life of the most defenseless in our society-----the unborn baby.
"Pro-choice" is misleading because proponents of this position never offer a choice to the unborn baby and frequently never consult the baby's father. It may be the "choice" of the mother who in many instances is feeling desperate and not properly informed. It may also be the business "choice" of the for-profit abortion clinic and the fee-for-service abortionist However, "pro-death" would be a more accurate description for the "pro-choice" position because an abortion always results in the death of an unborn baby.
In an attempt to make abortion more palatable and acceptable, abortion proponents speak of and defend what they refer to as "reproductive rights". Again, such terminology is deliberately misleading because an abortion has nothing to do with reproduction. In fact an abortion is the exact opposite of reproduction. Furthermore, the unborn baby is stripped of all "rights", so again. the description is blatantly inappropriate.
27) Abortion and putting our faith into action.
In a culture and world that is hungry for the Truth, we are often challenged to put our faith into action. For example, many of our politicians profess their Catholic faith, but try to divorce the faith which they proclaim from their policies, particularly as this relates to LIFE issues.
However, as Christ's followers and as Catholics, we are called to integrate our faith into all aspects of our lives. In fact, we are called to make our faith evident in all our actions and decisions. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells us not to hide our light under a bushel basket, but let our light shine before others (Mt 5:15-16).
Defense of the unborn---the most vulnerable and defenseless human beings in our society, is undoubtedly the most important aspect of integrating our faith and actions. After all, LIFE is the most important gift that God gives us!
28) Pope Benedict speaks on Life issues.
Pope John Paul II left behind an incredible pro-life legacy, as he was always unwavering about the sanctity of LIFE.
Pope Benedict XVI is proving himself to be equally resolute in continuing to raise the pro-life standard for the Catholic Church and humanity generally. The Pope is taking a strong stand against practices like abortion, euthanasia and embryonic stem cell research. The Pope is repeatedly emphasizing, "the inviolability of human beings, the inviolability of human life from conception to natural death".
In the Pope's book, "The Europe of Benedict in the Crisis of Cultures", the Pope took to task nations which have legalized abortion and condemned the culture which, "becomes virtually insensitive to abortion".
The Pope said, "Maybe because in abortion you don't see the face of who will be condemned and never see the light... .. Every human life as such deserves to be always defended and promoted".
29) Stem cell research
The new Congress recently voted in favor oflegislation to divert taxpayer dollars towards embryonic stem cell research. As Catholics, it is very important that we understand the issues regarding stem cells, as there is a great deal of distortion and political maneuvering surrounding the debate.
The position of the Catholic Church
It is important to realize that the Church supports most stem cell research, hecause the medical profession has been mainly using adult stem cells, harvested from bone marrow, umbilical cords etc.
Why is the Church opposed to embryonic stem cell research?
Harvesting embryonic stem cells kills the living human embryo. The Church opposes the direct destruction of innocent human life for any purpose, including research. Creating new life for the purpose of experimentation is morally repugnant and scientifically wrong.
Won't embryonic stem research lead to the cure of many diseases?
This is speculative, to say the least. Many will remember the words of Senator John Edwards before the last election, "If we do the work that we can do in this country, the work that we will do when John Kerry is President, people like Christopher Reeve are going to walk, get up and out of that wheelchair and walk again". Statements like this one have undoubtedly created false, hope and even Reeve's own researchers have now admitted that the promise of embryonic stem cells have been grossly exaggerated and conclude that" ... stem cells from adult bone marrow has significant advantages in treatment of a variety of neurological diseases".
The media has disingenuously portrayed the debate on stem cells as one between progressive science and backward ethics. This has distorted the feebleness and sometimes deceit of the scientific claims made on behalf of embryonic stem cells and thereby lnisled the public.
The fact is that adult stem cells is proven, immensely effective and embraces life. Adult stem cells have been used to successfully treat more than 70 diseases so far and there are many more cures in the pipeline. Conversely, the success rate of embryonic stem cell research is zero----not a single. disease treated or cured, not even for a mouse!
Trials using embryonic stem cells have shown them to be unstable and too likely to form lethal tumors. To make matters worse, twenty years ago we were told that being able to grow any tissue type desired from embryonic stem cells was "an essential first step", Despite tens of millions of dollars and .....
30) Stem cell research
With the current debate in the U.S Senate on federal funding of embrvonic stem cell research and with many States attempting to provide State level funding, it is important that we are informed about the subject.
There are four categories of stem cells and the Church opposes only one type, namely, embryonic stem research (ESC's). The Church opposes this type of research because ESC's are obtained by harvesting living embryos which are generally 5 to 7 days old (young human beings) resulting in the destruction of the embryo. Also, it is worth pointing out that to date, no improvements or cures have been attributed to embryonic stem cells.
In contrast, the Church supports the other types of stem cell research, including adult stem research. Many medical successes ( 90 + diseases showing improvement or cures) have been achieved with stem cells from adults, umbilical cords, placentas, amniotic fluid and even cadavers (as late as twenty hours after death).
Research using adult cells is about 25 years ahead of embryonic stem cell research and many believe adult stem cells hold greater promise.
Please encourage our Senators to oppose HR 810/S.471 and the destroying of embryonic stem cells for research purposes.
31) Slavery and abortion
These are the words of Stephen Douglas trying to defend his "prochoice" position on slavery many years ago:
"I am now speaking of rights under the Constitution, and not of moral or religious rights. I do not discuss the morals of the people favoring slavery, but let them settle that matter for themselves. I hold that the people who favor slavery are civilized, that they bear consciences ..... It is for them to decide therefore the moral and religious right of the slavery question for themselves ... "
Just substitute the word "abortion" every place the word "slavery" appears and this statement perfectly defines the pro-abortion position in America today. Apparently, those who defend evil always rely upon the same rhetoric, regardless of the evil they are trying to defend. The tactic is clear: attempt to focus public attention on "choice" and "who decides" because they cannot afford for the public to consider what is being decided.
32) Contraception and abstinence.
Some argue that the best way to prevent abortion is by promoting contraception. At first sight, this appears logical. However, it is now widely known that the availability of contraception increases sexual activity (especially among teenagers) at a far greater rate than it increases the use of contraception. That guarantees higher pregnancy rates.
This explains why America's dramatic increase in contraception use starting in the 60's was accompanied by an equally dramatic increase in unplanned pregnancies, abortion and sexually transmitted diseases.
Interestingly, this trend continued without interruption until very recently when the government began diverting funds from programs that promoted contraception to those that promote abstinence. Now, government statistics are showing that the rates of unplanned pregnancies, abortion and sexually transmitted diseases are declining for the first time in over 35 years.
33) Embryonic stem cells: Does a bad means justify a good end?
Although the Church approves most stem cell research, it opposes embryonic stem cell research because this involves the destruction of human life.
Unlike other stem cells, embryonic stem cells have to date made no cures, but some argue that the good to be accomplished by the possible healing of such diseases as Parkinson's or Alzheimer's justifies the evil of destroying some human embryos.
This argument reduces people to their usefulness and assumes that there are no moral absolutes. After all, many evil acts could be justified for some good that might come of them, such as a very poor man killing a rich man for his money.
"History has shown that it is always the dispossessed, those whose lives are easily overlooked, who are subjected to the worst abuses of scientific research. So-called "spare" human embryos are particularly vulnerable to this kind of moral blindness, because so many people seem to have difficulty identifying with their humanity" - Cardinal Francis George
"Recent scientific developments have demonstrated that the destruction of embryos may be completely unnecessary to achieve the benefits that stem cell research provides" -Bishop John J. Nevins
34) The wonderful work of Crisis Pregnancy Centers
There are about 3,000 crisis pregnancy centers in' the United States funded and staffed almost entirely by pro-life t Life people, many being unpaid volunteers.
Each provides some or all of the following: counseling about abortion alternatives, information about what government help is available, pre-natal care, sonograms so that expectant mothers can see their babies, room and board during and after pregnancy clothing, baby items, medical services, assistance for other children, assistance with adoption, post-natal instruction, help for moms to continue their education, post-abortion counsel and many other service --all of which are provided free of charge to women with unplanned pregnancies.
These centers prevent thousands of abortions each year, assist and care for mothers who are feeling desperate and promote a culture of LIFE, instead of the culture of death. The centers and the people which work in them are truly a great blessing!
35) The disabled and abortion: "What is the use of access ramps to buildings, if I don't have access to Life?".
These are the words of a disability activist, pointing out a paradox in how disabled people are viewed in our society.
Welcome efforts are made to provide ramps, hearing loops or other aids which help disabled people participate in everyday activities. At the same time, many go to great lengths to stop disabled people being born. Pregnant women are urged to have their unborn babies tested and, if found to be disabled in any way, aborted. Refusal by mothers of such eugenic tests are often met with disapproval, rather than support.
In most countries, a baby which is believed to be disabled can be aborted legally right up to birth. The Church takes a radically different stance:
• Supporting interventions to improve the lives of disabled people
• Calling for those lives to be fully respected and valued
• Insisting that every person, irrespective of age, ability, health, sex or race, has a unique dignity and a right to life.
• Our society desperately needs a new vision in which the gift of human life is always cherished, those who suffer are treated and cared for, and each person is enabled to play his or her role in God's plan for humanity.
36) Facts on Planned Parenthood
(1). Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion chain in America and has
been responsible for the death of more than 3 million innocenl children at its facilities. It aborts about 623 unborn babies each and every day.
(2). From 1995 to 2002. the number of annual abortions performed by Planned Parenthood has risen over 62% despite the fact that abortions nationwide Ilave declined.
(3). Despite the "choice" rhetoric. Planned Parenthood's most recent annual report shows lIlat it set a new low for the number of women it referred for adoption compared to the number of abortions performed. It carries out about 180 abortions for everyone woman it sends to an adoption agency.
(4). Planned Parenthood made nearly $900 million last year, yet it remains a significant beneficiary of our tax dollars through federal funding.
(5). Planned Parenthood puts minors on birth control and carries out abortions without parents' knowledge or involvement.
(6). Planned Parenthood operates a provocative website aimed at adolescents, which through the use of coarse and vulgar language "educates" on, among other things masturbation, oral sex, contraception and abortion.
37) Partial-birth abortion
The Supreme Court is tackling one of the most important cases involving the protection of human life. For the second time in six years, the Court is considering the issue of partial-birth abortion, which should put all the issues surrounding this gruesome practice front and center.
The media often refers to the barbaric procedure as "late-term abortion" and despite their much proclaimed "public's right to know" rhetoric, have been loathe to describe what actually is done.
What happens is that a baby who is in the process of being born, with part of his/her body outside his/her mother's body and part still inside, is deliberately killed. As far as the law is concerned, the only thing that prevents this from being murder is that part of the baby's body is still inside the mother, so that this "procedure" can be classified as an abortion.
The partial-birth abortion issue is one which major parts of the media filter out facts that might lead you to take a position different from the one journalists have. The public has a right to know, but that right is too often aborted.
38) Are we observers or "doers" in the abortion debate?
Florida ranks third in total abortions in the US, but based on population, Florida ranks first in total abortions per capita! And we live here!
Are we doing enough? The answer is an emphatic "no" as it is so easy to simply tune out and put this horror out of our minds and sight.
Yet, nearly all violence done against human beings involves three types of people: the Perpetrator, the Victim and the Observer. This is sometimes called the "Tragic Triangle" With abortion, the abortionist, in collusion with the parent(s) is the perpetrator, the child is the victim, and the observers are all the rest of us. Some believe that we as observers have an equal or greater responsibility than the perpetrators because we can be more objective and if we were really motivated, we could stop this daily slaughter of the innocents.
We can start by making sure we vote for LIFE in the forthcoming elections.
39) Abortion and Women's Health.
Abortion is obviously a traumatic experience from which women can suffer great emotional and psychological stress.
Post abortion research conducted by the Elliot Institute reported its survey of women eight weeks after they had undergone an abortion. Forty four percent complained of nervous disorders, thirty six percent said they experienced sleep disorders, thirty one percent said they regretted their decision and eleven percent admitted they had been prescribed psychotropic drugs by their doctor.
Research also shows that abortion can lead to infertility, by increasing the risk of miscarriages and etopic pregnancy.
There also appears to be a correlation between abortion and later development of breast cancer, the incidence of which has increased dramatically. In 1960, one out of every fourteen women developed breast cancer. Today, approximately one out of eight women develop this cancer. A 1996 report published by the British Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health looked at 23 previous studies and found that abortion increases the breast cancer risk by thirty percent. You might ask whether there is any biological rationale for increased breast cancer after an abortion. The answer appears to be yes; a woman who has an abortion is unprotected internally from exposure to high levels of estrogen when a pregnancy is abruptly terminated.
It seems evident that a woman's biological body was not made by God to withstand the abortion procedure.
40) The science of babies.
At the moment of conception, a new human being is formed which has the exact number of chromosomes that any human being has in each cell: forty-six. Encoded on these chromosomes is all the genetic information for the new individuaL There has never been a person with exactly the same code. before, and there never will be one again; that person is unique from the very first instant.
When was it decided that you would be male or female? When was the color of your skin or eyes decided? All at the moment of conception! This is not religious dogma; these are not quotes from the Bible or the Catholic Church. These are scientific facts that can be found in any biology book in the world!
Yet when we stand up and say that these babies should be protected from abortion, we are told it is just opinion and that we are imposing our religion on others!
Since when is common biology a religious doctrine? Since when is it a matter of "opinion" to say that you may not kill a baby? Since when and why should we ignore the rights of others in the name of "freedom of choice?" Since when is killing a respectable or acceptable choice?
41) Mothers rarely make "informed" choice on abortion.
More than 93% of all induced abortions are done out of "choice" and not for medical reasons (such as the health of the nother),
Abortion clinics, such as Planned Parenthood, have a vested financial interest in the decision made by the mother. Those at these clinics who 'counsel" women on their "options" often act as if abortion is the only alternative. As a result, mothers rarely make an informed choice,
In fact, it is no doubt true to say that no other nedical procedure is performed with the same degree of patient ignorance than an abortion, This is plainly wrong. There is no good reason why any woman should go through surgery of any kind, particularly induced abortion, or even take powerul drugs to induce an abortion and not be informed about potentially serious side effects,
Thus, mothers are rarely told the potential physical and mental health problems and other complications associated with abortion. They also are, variably ignorant about their child in the womb md most importantly, are hardly ever afforded the opportunity to see their child on ultrasound.
Surgical abortions are usually not performed before seven weeks, or 49 days LMP. At 25 days, the child has regular heart beats. By 28 days, the whole embryo is formed: head, eyes, ears, mouth and a blood stream separate from the mother's. At 9 days, the child has complete fingers, toes and unique prints. At 12 weeks, the baby kicks, frowns, swallows, reacts to being touched and tarts to suck.
Expectant mothers rarely receive this and other important information before making a decision on abortion!
42) The Same Mistake
March 6, 1857 was a very dark day in American history. By a 7-2 vote, the US Supreme Court declared Blacks were not legal persons.
Slavery was upheld. Fortunately, in 1868 the 14th Amendment to the Constitution overturned this awful ruling and equality of all people before the law was upheld. Notice, the law did not GIVE blacks this equality. They always had it! God made them equal. What happened with the 14th Amendment was that the law recognized the rights the slaves had from God; human law was brought into line with God's law.
Another very dark day came on January 22, 1973, By another 7-2 vote, the US Supreme Court said that this 14th Amendment DOES NOT APPLY to children in the first nine month of life in their mothers' wombs. The Roe v Wade decision was never requested or approved by the American people.
Seven men simply declared that the pre-born baby is not entitled to have his/her life protected by law, 'A whole category of human beings was once again denied protection, just as in the previous century another category of human beings, the slaves were denied protection.
Modern biology and genetics, common sense and decency all tell us that this is terribly wrong. The fact is babies in the womb have just as much right to live as the rest of us and are just as much "persons" as the rest of us. When will human law once again be brought into line with God's law?
43) Respect Life Sunday.
Each year, the first Sunday of October is designated: "Respect Life Sunday", when we are asked to re-commit ourselves to promoting the culture of LIFE.
It is a good time to ask ourselves whether we are good witnesses to the respect we are called to have for all human life, from conception to natural death. This is challenging because we are members of a society in which there is tremendous pressure to limit our love and ignore the sacredness of human life.
We live in a violent society that sees violence and death by abortion, euthanasia, suicide and capital punishment as a solution to many of our personal and societal "problems" And many of these attitudes are enshrined in our law and culture, leading to more violence, manifested in spousal and child abuse, the gang culture and so on.
On this Respect Life Sunday, we should pray hard for our legislators, for those mothers who feel forced to choose abortion and for those who provide and promote abortion. But we must also look at ourselves. Do we speak up for the innocent abortion victims? Do we promote pro-life values? Do we vote for pro-life politicians? Do we do anything tangible to protect the unborn?
We can definitely help change our society to become a culture of LIFE, but we must be active, informed and faithful witnesses.
44) Our Tax Dollars fund abortions.
Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the U.S. and advocates and benefits from taxpayer-funded abortion-on demand.
PP opposes any limitations on access to abortion, including partial-birth abortion and also opposes mandatory parental notification for minors to undergo the procedure. Approximately one third of its clients are girls younger than 18 who live with one or both parents. Some 97 percent of these girls qualify for federal assistance to reimburse a provider of social services. This is because PP teaches its affiliates how to exploit federal "family planning" programs by qualifying as many clients as possible for federal subsidies of pregnancy tests, contraceptives, and abortions covered by Medicaid.
PP receives a large portion of its funding from the U.S. government. There are at least 18 federal statutes and hundreds of state and local programs that authorize tax dollars to be spent for "family planning" programs and procedures. Under the Hyde Amendment. however, tax dollars are not supposed to pay specifically for abortions. But PP capitalizes on the fact that when federal funds for family planning are administered by state agencies, county health departments, and local school districts, compliance with the law is nearly impossible to enforce.
Please sign the www.StopPlannedParenthoodTaxFunding.com petition as a first step toward ending PP's reign of death in America.
45) Teenage Pregnancy and sexual activity
Florida has the sixth highest teenage pregnancy rate of any state.
• A major study on contraceptive failure reported that in single women under 18 years of age using the birth control pill to prevent pregnancy, the first year failure rate was 11 percent.
• An article in the Family Planning Perspectives journal quotes an annual practical failure rate of 18.4 % in teenage girls under 18 years of age who are using condoms to prevent pregnancy.
• A report in the prominent medical Journal Pediatrics points out that the available evidence indicates that there is little or no effect from sex education classes (such as that promoted by Planned Parenthood) on rates of teen contraceptive use, rates of unintended teenage pregnancies or sexual behavior.
* Research from a variety of sources indicates a correlation between teen sexual activity and the likelihood of engaging in other high-risk behaviors, such as tobacco, alcohol and illicit drug use.
These and other reasons underline the importance of teaching our children that only abstinence works!