PERSONAL UPDATE No. 79. July 2007: 24th Jul 07
Is This Decision the New Dawn for Pro-Lifers?
Will Hillary Rodham Clinton Win in 2008?
Bishop Slams Giuliani as a Pontius Pilate
Gay’ Dogmas are Ideology, Not Science
Blowing the Whistle and Risking her Career
The HSE and a Tale of Mixed Messages
The Euro Constitution: Trick or Treaty?
The Pope Meets a Pro-Abortion Politician
Secret Policy-Makers and the ‘Right to Abortion’
A Timely Book from Fr Benedict Groeschel
Is This Decision the New Dawn for Pro-Lifers?
On April 18, 2007, five years after President George Bush signed it into law, the United States Supreme Court in Washington upheld the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 against a constitutional challenge mounted by the abortion industry in Gonzales v. Carhart. The above decision is now known as Carhart II to distinguish it from Stenberg v. Carhart, known as Carhart I, when the Supreme Court struck down a similar law banning partial-birth abortion passed by the state of Nebraska in 2000.
Judging from the furore of the pro-abortion NARAL, Planned Parenthood and the ACLU, you would think that Roe v. Wade had been reversed altogether, and abortion was now banned throughout the country. In fact, the new law may not prevent even one abortion. Carhart II upheld the federal law banning a specific method of abortion, that is, only one specific method. Sadly, abortion in America remains legal throughout the whole of pregnancy, and abortionists can still abort a nine-month unborn child, using court-approved methods and justifications.
So, are there any benefits from this decision of the Supreme Court, and, if so, what are they? In five different ways the 2007 judgment breaks away from the clear pro-abortion bias of previous judgments, as in Carhart I, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, Doe v. Bolton, Roe. v. Wade, etc.
1. The Court called abortion ‘killing’.
In Carhart II, the Supreme Court has drawn a clear line between abortion and infanticide, unlike its previous ruling in Carhart I. Prior Supreme Court judgments were not honest about abortion. For example, they refused to concede that abortion kills a living human being. Unwilling to state when life begins, they referred to children before birth as “potential life”, and called abortion “termination of pregnancy”. Carhart I used obscure Latin words to sanitise the deed —calvarium for skull and disarticulation for tearing off limbs.
In Carhart II, the court lifts the veil, repeatedly acknowledging the humanity of the unborn child. The ruling refers to the prenatal human as a “child”, an “infant”, and calls abortion “killing”.
2. The Court reiterated the state’s interest in protecting the unborn.
Some judges in Carhart I refused to give much or any weight to Nebraska’s stated interest in preserving unborn life. In their view, banning partial-birth abortion (they called it “PBA”) would not prevent other equally gruesome abortion methods (of which they approved). They claimed Nebraska’s real motive was based on moral revulsion and was therefore an improper one in law.
While it does not overrule Roe v. Wade, Carhart II emphatically re-affirms the state’s interests in showing “its profound respect for the life within the woman” and in protecting the life of the unborn child “from the inception of the pregnancy”. Carhart II also re-affirms the state’s interest in “protecting the integrity and ethics of the medical profession”, implying correctly that partial-birth abortion erodes both.
3. The Court ended the unlimited ‘health exception’ of abortion doctors.
Roe v. Wade invalidated all prohibitions of abortion before viability and mandated that any prohibition of abortion after viability must include a “health exception”. This, in effect, blocked any regulating law, because every abortion-minded woman arguably presents some “health” factor, broadly described by the Court to include “all factors—physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age—relevant to the well-being of the patient” (Doe v. Bolton). Later decisions expanded the use of the health exception by demanding its inclusion in statutes that merely regulated some external aspect of abortion, such as laws requiring parental notice. Carhart I even claimed that, if a few doctors believed a particular method of abortion might have a marginal health benefit over other methods, then it cannot be prohibited. Carhart I concluded that when medical authorities are divided on the alleged health benefits of partial-birth abortion, the court should favour the “substantial medical authority”, whatever that might have meant.
In 2007 Carhart II reverses this presumption that favoured abortion operators, allowing lawmakers greater leeway to enact laws according to what they reasonably conclude is based on the best available evidence. The Court accepted that most obstetricians hold that there is no medical benefit from partial-birth abortion, and it is totally unnecessary in today’s medical practice.
4. The Court stopped the use of hypothetical cases to block entire abortion laws.
New laws can be challenged “on their face” only when evidence shows that the statutes are always unconstitutional and therefore void. However, the Supreme Court has up to now permitted challenges to entire abortion regulations “on their face” on nothing more than possible problems for future patients. In the past abortion providers usually challenged a new law the day before the law would have taken effect by devising a merely possible case where a woman might be put at serious risk by the new laws. Pro-abortion plaintiffs argued that, if the law were in force, a hypothetical patient could be irreparably harmed while waiting for a court to find the law unconstitutional as applied to her own situation. Challengers have successfully blocked laws for years, merely by presenting a court with the hypothetical and sometimes far-fetched case of an imaginary plaintiff. This was how Carhart I struck down the Nebraska law banning partial birth abortion.
Carhart II states that, even if medical uncertainty is claimed, such challenges should not be entertained. Instead, a doctor should appeal to the courts only to prevent the law’s application to an actual woman whose health he can prove would be in danger from the ban. Abortionists are well aware that partial-birth abortion offers no medical benefits and is unnecessary.
5. The Court read the statute to mean what it says.
Courts reviewing abortion laws have also favoured abortionists in the contorted way they interpreted the language of new laws. In other legal contexts, language in a statute is understood according to its common meaning. If the law would be constitutional under a plausible interpretation of the act’s language, the court gives lawmakers the benefit of the doubt and assumes they intended to convey a constitutional meaning.
With abortion laws, however, plain phrases have often been twisted to create vagueness and confusion. Carhart I, for example, twisted Nebraska’s definition of partial-birth abortion to claim it was “vague and overbroad”, and would ban other “popular” methods of abortion.
Thankfully, Carhart II examined the federal ban in a common-sense way, interpreting it as banning only what it clearly describes—a totally barbaric procedure.
What does all this mean for the future? In the negative column, Carhart II has left Roe and Casey untouched. But if the Court means what it says in Carhart II, we can expect it to uphold more state and federal laws regulating and limiting abortion. For example, the Court may now uphold new laws on parental involvement without phony health exceptions, or on informed consent—giving truthful information about foetal pain, the abortion-breast cancer link, the risk of subsequent premature births or the child’s characteristics as shown by an ultrasound image before the abortion.
The Court’s new-found honesty about unborn life and abortion and its apparent increased willingness to uphold reasonable regulations may open up many opportunities to foster greater respect for life and discourage abortion, even while Roe and Casey stand.
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Will Hillary Rodham Clinton Win in 2008?
The spectre of the abortion fanatic and radical feminist Hillary Rodham Clinton winning the presidential election in November 2008 looms over US politics. Were she to win, and were her fellow Democrats to solidify their present hold on both houses of Congress, they could ram through so many new pro-abortion federal judges and pro-abortion laws that abortion on demand would be entrenched for decades.
Mrs Clinton is indeed fanatical. Among her more extreme pronouncements just in the first half of this year were that sodomy—she did not use that word, of course—is not immoral and that the US Supreme Court should not have upheld the federal law against slaying infants who are mostly born (partial-birth abortion).
Veteran political observers, including pro-lifers, note that, although Mrs Clinton appears to be the front-runner right now, she does have negatives. A new Gallup poll puts her “unfavourable” rating at 50%. Bill Clinton remains her husband, a fact that the conservative site NewsMax.com emphasizes by calling her “The Next Clinton”.
Also, few people see her as personally likable; many think her ruthless in her political ambition; and her reputation for honesty is so dismal that author Thomas Kuiper last year compiled an entire book of contradictory and fantasised statements of hers.
Author Kuiper’s tome, I’ve Always Been a Yankees Fan, takes its title from a claim about Mrs Clinton’s baseball team loyalties that she made when she moved to New York to run for the US Senate. The book’s cover photo shows her wearing a baseball cap not of the New York Yankees but of the Chicago Cubs, her actual lifelong favourite.
Mrs Clinton Pursuing the Hispanic Vote
The threat of Hillary Rodham Clinton winning the presidency is made all the more real by an apparent shift in the loyalties of many Hispanic Americans, who now number one in eight Americans. USA Today notes that more than 40% of Hispanics voted for George W Bush for president in 2004, but that a USA Today/Gallup poll last month suggests the honeymoon is over.
Analysts concede that no one political party “owns” the Hispanic vote. Twice as many Hispanics as other Americans call themselves “independent’ voters. But Mrs Clinton is making a concentrated push for that vote. Her presidential campaign’s chief, Patti Solis Doyle, is Hispanic, as are two of her national directors, and she has a Hispanic pollster, a liaison to Spanish-language media and a director of Hispanic outreach.
Hispanics voted 62% for Bill Clinton in 1992 and 72% in 1996, and many still like him, says USA Today. US Catholic bishops did little to discourage that at the time, and pro-lifers see little hope of that changing this time around.
Pro-lifers have found that many Hispanic voters assume that Democrat politicians are pro-life. That hurdle must be overcome.
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Bishop Slams Giuliani as a Pontius Pilate
Pro-abortion Rudolph Giuliani remains the leading Republican candidate, but his hold is tenuous and his presidential bid has taken some blows lately. For example, Bishop Thomas J Tobin of Providence, Rhode Island, slammed him in his weekly column in the May 31 issue of his diocesan newspaper, The Rhode Island Catholic.
Bishop Tobin wrote, “Rudy’s public proclamations on abortion are pathetic and confusing. Even worse, they’re hypocritical.” He likened Giuliani’s position—calling aborting infants “morally wrong” but giving “respect” to pro-aborts’ “viewpoint” about the baby-slayings—to Pontius Pilate’s stance toward Jesus.
The bishop posed this question:
… would we let any politician get away with the same pathetic cop-out on other issues: “I’m personally opposed to… racial discrimination, sexual abuse, polygamy, incest… but don’t want to impose my beliefs on others”?
Bishop Tobin also noted that Catholics have a special obligation to defend human lives, and that Pope John Paul II wrote in Evangelium Vitae, “This task is the particular responsibility of civil leaders… No one can ever renounce this responsibility…”
The bishop named US Senators Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden and Jack Reed, and Representative Patrick Kennedy, as having “followed a similar path in abandoning the Faith [emphasis added] for the sake of political expediency”, and he ended with this comment: “How these intelligent men and women will someday stand before the judgment seat of God and explain why they legitimised the death[s] of countless innocent children in the sin of abortion is beyond me.”
No one has remarked about the stark and unprecedented choice of words—“abandoning the Faith”—that Bishop Tobin applied to the pro-abortion politicians.
Lightning Bolts for Giuliani
Rudolph Giuliani got a shock, almost literally, during a televised debate in New Hampshire the week after Bishop Tobin’s column against him appeared. Asked about the bishop’s column, Giuliani began to brush it off —when suddenly a loud crack was heard and his microphone and the entire sound system gave out.
The moderator said a lightning bolt had struck the building. The audience laughed, his opponents shrank back in jest and a chuckling Giuliani remarked, “For someone who went to parochial schools all his life, this is a very frightening thing.” He was about to answer the original question when another lightning bolt hit. Then two more lightning bolts struck as Giuliani said abortions are wrong but should be legal.
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Gay’ Dogmas are Ideology, Not Science
According to the American Psychiatric Association, there are no replicated scientific studies supporting any identified biological cause for homosexuality. But now the Montgomery County Board of Education, in the state of Maryland, has done what science and medicine could not do by declaring in its newly approved curriculum that homosexuality is “innate”, that is to say, that homosexuals are born, not made. The board could not produce any evidence to support this claim, but is merely following the example of numerous government agencies in Canada, USA, Britain and Ireland, not to mention the EU Parliament.
Let’s put the facts as clearly as we can:
a) There is no scientific research or study that has established the existence of a “gay gene”. Numerous studies suggest the opposite. Calling Same Sex Attraction (SSA) “innate”, “biologically determined” or, worse still, “created by God” is as unscientific as talking about the “flat earth”. For example, Dean Hamer’s much touted study of the “gay gene”, published in Science in 1993, was subsequently discredited, and he has since retired from research to dedicate himself to “gay” activism.
b) Closely connected to the theory of the “gay gene” is the concept of “sexual orientation”. If “orientation” is anything, it is a persistent, deep-rooted, and maybe lifelong, existence of SSA, whether or not this attraction leads to homosexual actions. The theory that there are several sexual orientations among humans is just that—theory with very little evidence. Unfortunately, much human rights and equality legislation have accepted the concept of sexual orientation as proven.
c) Numerous studies have found that SSA is a transient condition during adolescence and the years that immediately follow. Many young teenagers who experience SSA find that the problem disappears by the time they reach the age of 25.
d) The claim that trying to change a person’s “sexual orientation” is impossible, medically dangerous and therefore should be opposed is contradicted by numerous cases where therapy has succeeded. For some, this is not a realistic option. They have to learn to live chastely as a person with SSA, as Fr John Harvey of Courage holds.
e) The claim that “coming out” will solve the problems of a person with SSA is highly doubtful. The “gay scene” puts men at grave risk of contracting HIV and other STIs as well as developing grave mental health problems. “Safe sex” via condoms has not worked to prevent the spread of these diseases.
f) The homosexual lifestyle generally leads to much higher level of serious mental disorders, substance abuse and self-harm. Homosexual activists have always blamed “homophobic” society for the psychological problems of homosexuals and their reduced life expectancy but a recent study has shown that the mental disorders of homosexuals are no different in countries where there is high level of tolerance and acceptance, e.g. Holland and New Zealand.
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Blowing the Whistle and Risking her Career
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The HSE and a Tale of Mixed Messages
Are Ireland’s health promoters any better than those of the United States? We do not have to look far to find evidence that our health authorities think in terms of pills and condoms when faced with the consequences of sexual promiscuity. We know about the solutions of the Irish FPA, Marie Stopes, and the Crisis Pregnancy Agency, but what about the Health Service Executive (HSE), the umbrella group between the Department of Health and Children and the area health boards?
The HSE is currently promoting a “Carry a Condom” campaign, mainly directed at young people in the name of “sexual health”. There is little doubt that sexual promiscuity in Ireland is producing its deadly consequences in the form of sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Data compiled by the HSE’s Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) indicates that the number of STIs reported in 2005 fell by 5.1 per cent on the previous year, with a significant decline in two of the big three infections, ano-genital warts and non-specific urethritis, which were down 17.2 and 23.3 per cent respectively.
This slight decline from the seriously high numbers of 2005 should give little joy since the incidence of other infections rose sharply. “This suggests that the observed decline may be masking an underlying trend that continues to rise. We are concerned at a big increase in chlamydia in 2005 compared to the previous year (up 19.6 per cent to 3,353). Chlamydia now accounts for one-third of all reported STIs in Ireland”, said Dr Aidan O’Hora, specialist in public health medicine at the HPSC.
There was also a definite rise in syphilis notifications, which doubled from 144 cases in 2004 to 282 last year, though this still only accounts for about three per cent of reported STIs.
More than 10,000 STI cases were reported last year but the real figure could be much higher because some infections show no symptoms, according to Brian Neeson, the HSE’s health promotion manager. “The figures around a disease like chlamydia can be misleading because many cases go undetected—about 70 per cent of women and 50 per cent of men will show no symptoms of chlamydia—and the same is true of gonorrhoea. Up to 86 per cent of women and 55 per cent of men are asymptomatic”, he said.
Response of HSE —‘Carry a Condom’
The HSE released these sobering statistics to coincide with its launch of a national campaign to educate people about the risks of contracting STIs and how to counter them. What is the response of the HSE to this near epidemic? According to HSE’s Catherine Murphy, assistant national director for “population health”, “Using a condom significantly reduces your chances of catching a sexually transmitted infection.”
So, we were assailed daily with television commercials, billboard/posters instructing Irish girls not be embarrassed to carry condoms—“It would be more embarrassing to catch chlamydia!” This is the HSE’s stark message and solution in its nationwide campaign.
“There is nothing romantic about an STI”, said the same Catherine Murphy. “If left untreated, complications from chlamydia, for example, can include pelvic inflammatory disease, ectopic pregnancy and infertility. Condoms are the most effective defence against conditions such as chlamydia, genital warts or HIV”, she said. “We encourage people to carry condoms, particularly as sex is often unplanned.”
Carrying a Condom is ‘Doing Something Responsible’
The caption on the HSE’s posters showed a couple in an embrace with the woman thinking to herself: “I am too embarrassed to suggest a condom.” Followed by, “ I would be embarrassed however if I got chlamydia.” Mr Neeson said some people would feel embarrassment if others knew they were carrying condoms; instead, he continued, they should feel they were doing something responsible. Just to make sure they are well prepared, he added, they should “always use a quality condom with a BSI kite mark”. Now there’s a careful man.
Meanwhile, the IFPA and the Irish Pharmaceutical Union (IPU) are lobbying the Government to reduce VAT on condoms to encourage their use. The Crisis Pregnancy Agency said that condoms “need to be made more affordable, so that young people and people with low incomes can protect themselves from unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections.”
Doctors Speak out About Condom Failures
Telling young people that condoms provide major protection against STIs ignores the statistics of condom failure. STIs are frequently passed by “skin to skin” contact even when condoms are used. This can happen because the bacterial or viral germs that cause STIs (such as human papillomavirus, chlamydia, herpes, and syphilis) can enter your body wherever the skin is broken.
So, even if the virus or bacteria isn’t passed through tears or holes in the condom itself, you can still get diseases because condoms don’t cover or protect all areas. That means condoms don’t prevent many of the STI infections that take place during sexual contact.
What the HSE fails to take on board is that many leading health experts have warned against depending on condoms for protection against HIV and other STIs. Here’s a sampling of their comments: “You just can’t tell people it’s all right to do whatever you want as long as you wear a condom. It (AIDS) is just too dangerous a disease to say that”, said Dr Harold Jaffee, chief of epidemiology, National Centers for Disease Control, USA. “Simply put, condoms fail. And condoms fail at a rate unacceptable for me as a physician to endorse them as a strategy to be promoted as meaningful AIDS protection”, pointed out Dr Robert Renfield, chief of retro-viral research, Walter Reed Army Institute. “Relying on condoms for ‘protection’ can mean lifelong disease, suffering, and even death for you or for someone you love”, advised Dr Andre Lafrance, Canadian physician and researcher. “Saying that the use of condoms is ‘safe sex’ is in fact playing Russian roulette. A lot of people will die in this dangerous game”, added Dr Teresa Crenshaw, member of the US Presidential AIDS Commission and past president of the American Association of Sex Educators.
Dr John Lalor added his say in The Irish Times in March (29/3/07): “For 30 years I have worked as a GP in a society (England) where the number of teenage pregnancies, the number of sexually transmitted diseases and the number of single mothers have increased exponentially. Free contraception, early sexual education, and free health care have been available. My view, extraordinarily, is that the British model is an absolute failure.”
A Not so Embarrassed Young Lady
If the public acclaim and positive reaction of so many young people (and not so young) to the Irish-made film “Once” is anything to go by, there is indeed a new hope abroad. A film reviewer in the Chicago Tribune was moved to comment that it was ‘‘the best musical of a generation’’. The two leading actors in the story of love and commitment are the “Commitments” actor Glen Hansard and the Czech actress Marketa Irglova. Dubliner Glen Hansard is also famous in Ireland for more than a decade as the lead singer of The Frames.
“Once” is a film about relationships, values, family, children and above all commitment. It’s the story of an unnamed busker played by Glen Hansard, who teams up with a young Czech woman (Marketa Irglova). The two record an album together, wander around Dublin, and sing their way through eight songs, during which they talk about past relationships and learn from each other’s experience.
Although the film leans heavily—perhaps a little too heavily—on Hansard’s and Irglova’s songs, the joys of the film are many. It is funny, endearingly and intimately shot, warm, subtle and imbued with a wonderful sense of reality and place. Any Dubliner watching the film will relish spotting the locations, including Simon’s Place, a coffee shop, Walton’s music shop, Grogan’s pub and Bogart Menswear.
The pivotal moment and the critical turning point in the film comes when Marketa gives a categorical and crystal clear “NO” to the sexual advances of Hansard. For her, sexual relationships are part of a commitment—in particular that of marriage. There can be nothing casual about them. Hansard is very quick to get the message, and his love and respect for her deepens.
This is not the usual way that today’s films conclude, something that makes this very moral story all the more valuable. Another thing. The film was made on a budget a fraction of that of the HSE’s Carry-a-Condom campaign. Both the makers of “Once” and the HSE condom campaigners are talking about protecting people and their relationships. Whereas the HSE fails miserably, “Once” succeeds brilliantly. Why can’t the HSE mandarins tap into something like this?
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The Euro Constitution: Trick or Treaty?
It is hard not to excuse the Euro-sceptics for throwing an angry fit over the most recent EU agreement. Under Madame Merkel’s leadership, the EU constitution has been raised from the dead, given a makeover as a “reform treaty”, and is to be presented to the 500 million citizens of the Union as another giant step forward.
No one should have any doubt that this “technical amending treaty”, as its advocates call it, brings the European superstate that much nearer. That is the intention of its backers, including France and Germany. While there will be a Euro “president” of the Council of Ministers with a two and a half year appointment, renewable for a second term, there is no mention of the word, “constitution”, no Euro national anthem or flag, and its foreign minister will be known as the “High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy”. How very typical of Euro jargon!
While Ireland’s foreign policy dovetails seamlessly with Brussels, the Irish government may well find the ambitious “security” plans of the EU at odds with the country’s much-vaunted neutrality. Spin in Brussels will require spin in Dublin.
The new treaty strengthens the Brussels executive—the Council of Ministers and the Commission—yet only adds marginal powers to the European Parliament. As for the peoples of the 27 nations, they are not to be trusted to approve after the disastrous referenda in France and Holland. The leaders of those two countries now assert that, since this is only an amending treaty, a referendum is unnecessary. The UK’s new Prime Minister will use this excuse to dodge his own government’s promise to consult the people. As one commentator put it, “The emerging super-Europe, following the political traditions of Napoleon and Bismarck, is bureaucratic by nature, rather than liberal.”
The Charter Versus the Constitution
The Charter of Fundamental Rights, part two of the draft constitution, remains unchanged, and will be binding on all member states, as interpreted by the European Court of Justice, and will override national law including written constitutions. This vaguely worded and trendy document will be a minefield for legislators and the national courts, and a gold mine for the legal profession and fashionable lobby groups. What kind of opt-out did Ireland obtain with Poland and the UK? It better be good because the European Court of Justice is no slouch when it comes to overriding national law.
The Charter has an aggressively secular character that refuses to acknowledge Europe’s Christian heritage, still less the necessary Christian basis for human dignity and rights. While capital punishment is expressly forbidden (art. 2 §2), the unborn do not merit a mention.
“Therapeutic cloning” is permitted but “reproductive cloning” is forbidden (art. 3, § 2 d). On other sensitive matters, the Charter gives with one hand and takes with the other. For example on the right of parents to educate their children:
14(3) The freedom to found educational establishments with due respect for democratic principles and the right of parents to ensure the education and teaching of their children in conformity with their religious, philosophical and pedagogical convictions shall be respected, in accordance with the national laws governing the exercise of such freedom and right.
Compare this with the Irish Constitution, art. 42:
1. The State acknowledges that the primary and natural educator of the child is the Family and guarantees to respect the inalienable right and duty of parents to provide, according to their means, for the religious and moral, intellectual, physical and social education of their children.
2. Parents shall be free to provide this education in their homes or in private schools or in schools recognised or established by the State.
On the rights of children, the Charter is equally vague, as in art. 24, § 2.
In all actions relating to children, whether taken by public authorities or private institutions, the child’s best interests must be a primary consideration.
The three paragraphs of this article set the child’s welfare and rights almost outside the family and parents while his “best interests” remain undefined.
There is a radical difference between the Charter and the Irish Constitution. For the Charter, society is composed of individual citizens and the all-powerful state that is the source of their rights. It does not define the family or the role of marriage, and omits any mention of the family as the “fundamental group of society”.
The state grants various rights to individuals, and like a referee mediates in disputes and decrees the limits of rights, for example, the right of parents to educate their children. According to the Charter, the individual has a right to what it calls “private and family life” (art. 7), and the “right to marry and found a family” (art. 9), but these like other rights are always seen through the prism of individual choice.
In Irish law, the state not only recognises pre-existing rights of individuals, but also the existence and rights of the family based-on-marriage, a reality distinct from the individual and the state. The family has a right to exist prior to and independent of the state. Irish law is based on Natural Law where basic rights are recognised; the Charter is based on positive law where rights are given.
As mentioned in Personal Update, no. 75, already up to 70% of our new laws come from Brussels—without debate and usually without the knowledge of the citizens.
The Irish people will be offered a referendum sometime in 2008—after they have been softened up and judged to be willing to accept direction from the country’s political class and a sycophantic media.
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The Pope Meets a Pro-Abortion Politician
Will Tony Blair, Britain’s retired Prime Minister, become a Catholic, now that he has relinquished the top job? Egged on by broad hints from Fr Michael Seed—who reportedly rubs shoulders with Britain’s great and good—this Romeward move was almost taken as a sure thing by eager commentators. Well, that is, up to now.
Even before Blair paid a last visit to Pope Benedict XVI at the end of June, he confessed that “things aren’t always as resolved as they might be”. The reports of the meeting of the two leaders spoke of a “frank exchange of views” on “delicate subjects”, presumably leaving things even less resolved than before.
Maybe His Holiness is showing his brother bishops how to tackle political leaders who proclaim their Catholic beliefs while supporting deeply immoral laws. Apart from waging war in Iraq, Blair has supported “gay marriage” and adoption, “therapeutic cloning”, embryo destroying research and did nothing to reduce Britain’s appalling abortion triage during his ten years in office. In Europe he failed to support the Vatican’s bid to have any Christian reference in the draft EU constitution. Seems that he was due a “null points” award in his end-of-term report.
I am still puzzled how a farewell encounter turned out to be such a bumpy ride, almost as bumpy as the Blair-Putin encounter at the G8 Summit in May. I suspect that the Vatican stopover was not a mere courtesy call for Blair. Since he intends to launch an initiative to bring about harmony between the three Abrahamic faiths, Christianity, Judaism and Islam, he may have asked the Pope for the official backing of the Catholic Church. Did the Pope rub his chin at this request, and air his doubts with his customary forthrightness? Did he question if Tony was “fit for the purpose”?
Tony Blair’s Anglicanism and his wife Cherie’s Catholicism have always been a puzzle. While she is a Mass-going Catholic and her children go to Catholic schools, she is known as a prominent supporter of Planned Parenthood and homosexual rights as well as a New Age votary.
Blair himself was more than just unwilling to challenge the homosexual lobby. After the SORs bill was passed in 2007, he attended a celebration dinner arranged by Stonewall, Britain’s militant homosexual-rights group, to celebrate the passing of the new laws. Blair said that he was “thrilled” by the new laws, which would have the effect of “enabling people to stand proud as they are”. He then congratulated the group, saying “We couldn’t have done it without you.” Referring to earlier legislation introducing official civil unions for homosexual couples, he described the delight he experienced when watching Britain’s first “gay wedding” on the television news, and said he gave “a little skip of joy”. Ho hum!
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Secret Policy-Makers and the ‘Right to Abortion’
One of the most powerful and insidious threats to unborn human life around the world today is the campaign being waged by an alliance of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) within the United Nations. These NGOs work together to establish new, legally enforceable “rights”, including the supposed right to abortion.
One of the most popular tactics in this campaign is to hijack the Compliance Committees of the UN treaty-monitoring system, and it is by these committees that many countries, including Ireland, have been chastised for restricting abortion. The members of these treaty-monitoring bodies are not representatives of governments but unaccountable functionaries. Their aim is to create the impression that the various UN human rights treaties recognise a right to abortion (they do not), and that signatory nations which have laws restricting abortion must change their laws to gain international acceptance. This, of course, involves the deliberate misinterpretation of existing, uncontroversial human rights. According to them, the right to life (of mothers) implies the right to abortion. A bit of dishonesty is a small price for the great prize of an internationally recognised right to abortion.
Another stratagem of the pro-abortion NGOs is to have ambiguous language included in new documents on human rights (conventions or treaties) which could later be interpreted to support a right to abortion. Their preferred phraseology is talk about “reproductive and sexual health rights”. Their most recent attempt to include this was over the wording of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
The European Union pushed for the inclusion of language about “sexual and reproductive health services” being a human right. The EU also supported the “right” of disabled people “to experience their sexuality”, whatever that might mean. While many of the worst proposals were eventually dropped, references to sexual and reproductive health remained in the final document. This was only agreed after all sides accepted that the term does not include abortion, a rare concession by the pro-abortion side, but we can be confident that pro-abortion campaigners will seize upon this phrase to further their cause.
In the debates on the same Convention, Finland, representing the EU, was the only country to oppose efforts to guarantee that disabled people would not be denied life-saving treatment, and would be protected from involuntary euthanasia. The EU representative also contested a reference to the family as the “fundamental group of society”.
This year at the annual assembly of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Ireland’s delegation declined to join the group of countries who supported a United States intervention rejecting any attempt to interpret the WHO’s five year strategy as “suggesting the existence of a new human right to sexual and reproductive health” or “encouraging or compelling Member States to expand the availability of legal abortion”. Ireland’s silence can be very eloquent.
So labyrinthine and arcane are the structures and processes of the UN and the whole international human rights system that it is easy for radical pro-abortion individuals and groups to plug away with their campaign without receiving too much notice or scrutiny—until it is too late. The branches which they have infiltrated most successfully are the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) and the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights. They have also colonised key sections of the structures of the EU.
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A Timely Book from Fr Benedict Groeschel
PS Quick, now—name the seven virtues. What? You can’t? Then how can you possibly practice them and grow in them?
Sure, you knew their names in your school days… years ago. But the virtues are essential to your life today. In fact, it’s impossible for you to advance spiritually unless you’re making a constant, conscious effort to practice and grow in these seven crucial areas of Christian morality—seven steps that lead to Heaven.
Good news! Now you can do that FAR more easily. Just read The Virtue-Driven Life by Fr Benedict Groeschel, CFR. This warm, witty and wise new book from the popular spiritual master will show you…
…how virtue has become a forgotten word; how worldly people use virtuous as a derogatory term; how our morally relativistic news media “oddly set themselves up as the moral judges of the world”; how today’s theologians often hinder our efforts to understand virtue and belittle its importance; how philosophers and psychologists are often more helpful than they; and why it’s wrong to call mere good behaviours virtues.
The Virtues—So Crucial, Yet so Misunderstood
You’ll also discover the famous, well-meaning philosopher who did “all kinds of damage” with his writings on virtues; why a hugely influential psychologist feigned atheism throughout his career; the “destructive,” de-humanising ideas he spread; why viewing people as animals is so dangerous; key Old Testament verses about virtue and vice; and the crucial difference between modern man’s morals and those of the Sermon on the Mount.
Fr Groeschel likewise explores the havoc that “positivism” has wrought in society; how the ancient pagan philosophers were wiser than many modern thinkers; psychologists who are restoring belief in free will, human dignity and virtues; how they define virtue; Christian definitions of virtue; how a virtue is present in you even when you’re not acting on it; and the mysterious “aspect of virtue that rises from the depths of the soul”.
Plus, you’ll learn how some people are “naturally virtuous”; how they can be more decent than “supernaturally decent” folks; how genetics might play a role in virtue; why St Augustine praised the ancient Romans—and why he said their society declined; parallels between modern society and theirs; what the Catechism teaches us about the virtues; one defect in its treatment of them; the two vital differences between natural and supernatural virtues; and what “the mysterious reality called grace” does for you.
The Seven Virtues and How to Live Them
This fascinating book also discusses pre-Christian lists of virtues; the great difference between the “cardinal” and “theological” virtues; the various sub-virtues that flow from the seven virtues; a mistake that a best-selling book on virtues makes; a universal virtue that Communist tyrants tried to stamp out; how “religion buries its undertakers”; whether Beckett really was an atheist; amusing examples of atheists revealing hidden belief; and the surprising number of Irish atheists who believe in Christ’s divinity.
You’ll ponder, too, what St Paul tells us about the theological virtues; how the Catechism and Aquinas define prudence; our false ideas of what’ll make us happy; heroic (and horrific) examples of how natural prudence sometimes conflicts with supernatural prudence; how Pope Pius XII showed prudence in his approach to Nazi tyranny; and how St Edith Stein did as well.
In addition, Fr Groeschel explains why bishops and priests “are remiss in fulfilling their apostolic mandate” if they don’t teach that “you place your eternal salvation in jeopardy if you support [candidates] who take human life”; ugly things that happen to you if you protest against abortion, blasphemy, etc.; how persecution “does marvels for your soul”; Our Lord’s teachings about prudence; and three secrets of acting prudently in these “dangerous times”.
You’ll also read what justice really is; how even “very unjust” people believe in it; why public life is rife with injustice; economic injustices we’re all part of; injustices in the Church, and who will answer for them; what Christ’s death teaches us about justice and injustice; why He did not have to die to redeem us; rules for living justly in today’s world; how “natural religion” differs from faith; and how to give God what we owe Him.
God Will Ask You About Your Virtues
You’ll likewise learn what’s the foundation of all justice; the “incredible irreverence” of some Christian scholars; modern man’s lack of wonder; why he scoffs at shrines such as Lourdes and Fatima; how God will reward you for your virtues; 13 questions about your personal justice, or lack of it; the “incredible injustice done to unborn children and to poor unwed mothers forced into abortion”; and a prayer for justice.
The author goes on to tell what fortitude is; the one word that our late Pope once greeted a group of bishops with; how “Judases” have betrayed the Church since Vatican II; Christian courage versus natural courage; why modern society doesn’t stress courage much; how this corrodes the Church; the brave priest who gave retreats in Soviet slave-labour camps; Jesus’ words about courage; and why it takes courage to picket abortion centres.
Plus, you’ll discover how to bring fallen-away Catholic sons and daughters back; how God supplies great gifts if you’re open to them; amazing examples of martyrs’ bravery; how too many Christians lack courage, and what the remedy is; how it often takes more courage to face daily trials than martyrdom; a prayer for fortitude; what the Bible and the Catechism teach about temperance; how temperance has never been popular; and how Father Matthew’s temperance crusade paid huge dividends for Ireland politically.
This unique book explains, too, why many Christians are less temperate than non-believers; Belloc’s amusing take on food and drink; what temperance dictates about chastity, both within marriage and without; how to practice temperance in your work, chores, spending, possessions, etc.; what your intemperate side reveals about you; how to beat addictions; what you must do if you’re wealthy; Cardinal Newman’s wise words about living as a true Christian; and your serious obligation to the poor.
Secrets of Overcoming Obstacles to Virtue
There’s still more! You’ll learn the true definition of faith; how we cannot attain the “theological” virtues without a certain thing; the awesome truths that faith teaches us; the Catholic Action leader who lost her faith, and became a priest-murderer; examples of human versus supernatural faith; and why agnostics should pray—and how.
In addition, you’ll see why so many Catholics (including priests and religious) have lost their faith, or have a “half-baked” faith; four bedrock doctrines they reject; what The Da Vinci Code tells us about today’s Catholics; five signs that you really believe; the crucial dogma that sets Christianity apart form all other faiths; wisdom from Newman, Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI about faith; the essence of our faith in 44 words; whether non-believers can be saved; what experiences of yours are most like Jesus’ agony in the Garden; and how a priest’s faith got him through 30 years in Red China’s prisons.
Fr Groeschel also explains the beautiful virtue of hope; what is its one and only object; the wonders hope does for you; why total optimists and total pessimists are both wrong; a Catholic poet’s beautiful word-picture of hope; why the poor are happier than the rich; why “no one is more dangerous than those who set out to make a perfect world” (e.g., Lenin and Hitler); why many U.S. Catholics have lost hope; why a Christian shouldn’t count on human hopes; the role of hope during suffering; how the Cross gives us hope; moving lessons in hope from dying souls; and Newman’s beautiful prayer of hope.
You’ll also learn what charity (love) really is; how you can’t produce it on your own; why (and how) you should read our new Pope’s encyclical, Deus Caritas Est; what charity demands of you; C S Lewis’s four kinds of love, and how they differ; how we English-speakers mis-define eros; how to put it into your prayer life; three principles of “selfism” that are pandemic today; the highest form of love, and how to live it; a great example from Christian literature; and how charity needs constant nurturing.
This special book likewise relates why even anti-Catholics admired Blessed Mother Teresa; revolutionaries who love mankind but hate people; the “most important element” of charity/love; how a nun’s heroic charity led to the author’s call to the priesthood; five how-to tips for growing in virtue; virtues that pro-life activists possess; the new approach to pastoral counselling we need; the Kremlin’s conspiracy theory about the election of John Paul II; St Augustine’s prayers for virtue; and much more.
The Virtue-Driven Life will be a Godsend if you have any questions about right and wrong, if you think you’re not advancing fast enough spiritually; if you’re discouraged about your spiritual battle, if you’ve forgotten parts of your religious education, if what you learned was watered-down, if you’re a parent, a teacher or a clergyman—in fact, just about everyone needs this book!
Get it, read it, make notes, resolve to follow its advice, ask the Holy Spirit to help you, and you’ll make sure and steady progress in attaining holiness. You (and God) can’t help but succeed!
The Virtue-Driven Life usually sells for €9.50 (£6.40), excluding postage, handling and packaging, but IT’S YOURS FREE AS OUR THANK-YOU GIFT for your generous gift of €40 or more (or £30 or more) to enable Family & Life to help young people practice the virtues of temperance (i.e., chastity) and justice, thus saving the lives of countless babies endangered by the “planned barrenhooders”.
PPS SAVE TIME! To receive your FREE GIFT more speedily, simply phone through your donation to our office at (353) 1 855 2145, or fax it to (353) 1 855 2474, or e-mail your credit card details to me at fandl@iol.ie Remember, you can also donate quickly and easily through our online service at www.familyandlife.org
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