Insight Scoop | The Ignatius Press Blog

New: "The Porn Myth: Exposing the Reality Behind the Fantasy of Pornography"

New: The Porn Myth: Exposing the Reality Behind the Fantasy of Pornography

by Matthew Fradd

The Porn Myth is a non-religious response to the commonly held belief that pornography is a harmless or even beneficial pastime. Author Matt Fradd draws on the experience of porn performers and users, and the expertise of neurologists, sociologists, and psychologists to demonstrate that pornography is destructive to individuals, relationships, and society. He provides insightful arguments, supported by the latest scientific research, to discredit the fanciful claims used to defend and promote pornography.

This book explains the neurological reasons porn is addictive, helps individuals learn how to be free of porn, and offers real help to the parents and the spouses of porn users. Because recent research on pornography's harmful effects on the brain validates the experiences of countless porn users, there is a growing wave of passionate individuals trying to change the pro-porn cultural norm-by inspiring others to pursue real love and to avoid its hollow counterfeit.

Matt Fradd and this book are part of that movement, which is aiding the many men and women who are seeking a love untainted by warped perceptions of intimacy and rejecting the influence of porn in their lives.

Matt Fradd is the founder and executive director of The Porn Effect, a website dedicated to exposing the reality behind the fantasy of porn and offering help. He speaks to about 50,000 people every year on the harmful effects of pornography and how to free from it. He is the author of several books, including Delivered: True Stories of Men and Women Who Turned From Porn to Purity.

"I love how Matt has put the decision of whether porn is empowering to women squarely in the readers' hands, by providing an unbiased view of relevant information from multiple sources."
— Crissy Moran, Former Porn Performer

"More than a book, The Porn Myth is an invitation—a timely and clear invitation to love more purely, connect with others more authentically, and experience joy more fully."
— Jill Manning, PhD, LMFT, Author, What's the Big Deal about Pornography: A Guide for the Internet Generation

"One of the most compelling ways to engage the culture on pornography is to meet it on the field of scientific research with level-headed arguments. Matt Fradd does this, laying out a framework for exposing the negative impact of pornography and rethinking our passive consumption of digital sexuality."
— William Struthers, PhD, Author, Wired for Intimacy

"Matt Fradd provides insightful arguments, with the latest research, on nearly every subject relevant to porn—from the dangers of the porn industry to the negative effects porn has on the brain. He equips you to discuss the real harm of pornography and to dispel its myths."
— Dawn Hawkins, Vice President and Executive Director, National Center on Sexual Exploitation

"You will want to obtain at least three copies of The Porn Myth—one for you, one for your favorite minister or counselor, and one to keep on hand to give others."
— Ron DeHaas, Founder and CEO, Covenant Eyes

"The Porn Myth can help you to separate the myths from the facts about porn and to reclaim real love. It counters the falsehoods that have helped to spread porn addiction and sexual dysfunction, and inspires us to take action against them."
— Clay Olsen, CEO and Cofounder, Fight the New Drug

"Matt Fradd does a great job of debunking the myth that porn is harmless and even healthy. For winning a debate—or more importantly, a heart—over the problem of porn, this book is indispensable."
— Jason Evert, Author, Pure Manhood

"The Porn Myth is an important book that brings clarity to one of the most important issues of our time."
— Jennifer Fulwiler, Radio Host, The Jennifer Fulwiler Show

Dr. Janet Smith: Positive response to pro-Humanae Vitae "Affirmation" has "been stunning"

Left: Dr. Janet Smith, who holds the Father Michael J. McGivney Chair of Life Ethics at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit; right: John Grabowski, Catholic University associate professor of moral theology and ethics, discusses a scholars' statement reaffirming Blessed Paul VI's 1968 "Humanae Vitae" encyclical on human sexuality at The Catholic University of America in Washington Sept. 20. (CNS photo/Tyler Orsburn)

Dr. Janet Smith: Positive response to pro-Humanae Vitae "Affirmation" has "been stunning" | Carl E. Olson | CWR's The Dispatch

"The dissenters still run some places," says the well-known speaker and author, "and some of the major professional organizations and journals but they are losing ground fast. They are no longer getting disciples."

Yesterday, the Catholic University of America hosted a press conference for the release of the document "Affirmation of the Catholic Church’s Teaching on the Gift of Sexuality", which was signed by over 500 Catholic scholars with doctoral degrees in theology, medicine, law and other fields. The document opens by stating: "We, the undersigned scholars, affirm that the Catholic Church’s teachings on the gift of sexuality, on marriage, and on contraception are true and defensible on many grounds, among them the truths of reason and revelation concerning the dignity of the human person." As the CNA/EWTN report explained:

Signatories of the document included Fr. Wojciech Giertych O.P., the theologian of the papal household; John H. Garvey, president of Catholic University of America; Tracey Rowland, Dean of the John Paul II Institute for Marriage & Family in Melbourne, Australia; Sister Prudence Allen, philosophy professor at St. John Vianney Seminary in Denver; Fr. Thomas Petri, O.P., academic dean of the Pontifical Faculty of the Immaculate Conception at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C.; and Helen M. Alvaré, law professor at George Mason University.

The scholars charged that a new U.K.-based statement opposing Church teaching “offers nothing new to discussions about the morality of contraception and, in fact, repeats the arguments that the Church has rejected and that numerous scholars have engaged and refuted since 1968.”

The statement in question, organized by the U.K.-based Wijngaards Institute, claims there are “no grounds” for Catholic teaching against contraception. It questioned the idea that openness to procreation is inherent to the significance of sexual intercourse, and said that “the choice to use contraceptives for either family planning or prophylactic purposes can be a responsible and ethical decision and even, at times, an ethical imperative.”

Yesterday's press conference at CUA included panelists John Grabowski, Catholic University associate professor of moral theology and ethics who served as an expert at the 2015 Synod of Bishops on the Family; Janet Smith, who holds the Father Michael J. McGivney Chair of Life Ethics at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit; and Mary Hasson, director of the Catholic Women’s Forum at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. 
Late yesterday I e-mailed with Dr. Smith, who has also edited and authored several books, including Why Humanae Vitae Was Right: A Reader for Ignatius Press. Here is our written communication:

Continue reading on the CWR site.

Cardinal Raymond Burke on Life, Truth, Mother Teresa, Islam, and Cardinal Sarah

U.S. Cardinal Raymond L. Burke, patron of the Knights and Dames of Malta, and Auxiliary Bishop Athanasius Schneider of Astana, Kazakhstan, walk in the 6th annual March for Life in Rome May 8, 2016. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

by Carl E. Olson | Catholic World Report

Speaking to reporters from Rome about his new book, the American prelate goes on record about Christians and Muslims (they don't worship the same God) and Cardinal Sarah (“I agree with him completely...").

In a wide-ranging international teleconference call on Monday with media members, Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke spoke in detail about many timely topics, including the priority of standing up for life in addressing poverty and other social ills, the witness and message of Mother Teresa, essential differences between Christianity and Islam, and the recent controversy over remarks by Cardinal Robert Sarah about liturgical orientation. The occasion of the call was Cardinal Burke's recent book Hope For the World: To Unite All Things in Christ (Ignatius Press), an interview given to French author Guillaume d'Alançon in 2015, and translated by Michael J. Miller for Ignatius Press.

 

Since being named a bishop by Pope John Paul II in 1994, Cardinal Burke has become one of more well-known prelates in the English-speaking world, known for his willingness to address controversial topics forthrightly, despite often being criticized. Noted as a canon lawyer, Cardinal Burke was made a cardinal by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010, and then called to Rome to become Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura. During the two recent Synods on the Family, Cardinal Burke spoke out often about his concerns, telling CWR during the October 2014 gathering that he thought the Synod's mid-term report "lacks a solid foundation in the Sacred Scriptures and the Magisterium", a remark made a month after he was removed from his position as Prefect and named chaplain to the Order of Malta by Pope Francis.

Cardinal Burke, conversing from Rome, told reporters that his new book was motivated by a desire to reflect on his upbringing and how he discerned his vocation as priest, and also "to reflect as a pastor, as a bishop, on certain on certain critical issues of the day". As such, he noted, the book is a "kind of testimony of faith on my part", and the hope is that the book, in keeping with its title, will "give hope" to readers.

Asked about an apparent shifting of priorities among American bishops since the beginning of Francis' pontificate, Cardinal Burke pointed out that while the issues of abortion, poverty, immigration, and global warming all have "moral importance", the Church's tradition and philosophical reason both indicate that "the fundamental question has to be the question of human life itself, the respect for the inviolable dignity of human life and of its Creator, of its Source, and the union of a man and a woman in marriage, which according to God's plan is the place where new human life is welcomed and nurtured."

He expressed concern that the matter of human life and the issues of abortion, artificial insemination, contraception, and euthanasia be placed somehow on the same level as "questions regarding immigration and poverty." The first priority, he emphasized, must be given to proper respect for human life and for the family in order to have "the right orientations in addressing all of the other questions" and challenges faced by people in daily life. It makes no sense, he pointed out, to be concerned with immigration or poverty "if human life itself is not protected in society ... The first justice accorded to any human being is to respect life itself, which is received from God..." Cardinal Burke observed there are some who advocate an elimination of certain parts of the population in order to fight poverty, or who adhere to a "contraceptive mentality" in order to pursue a sort of "social engineering" harmful to society and to individuals.

The former Archbishop of St. Louis emphasized that bishops have a responsibility to proclaim the truth of Christ in love within the Church, following the example of Christ himself, knowing that the love that will "best serve society is the truth, a truth that respects God's plan for us from the moment of creation..." When he travels, the cardinal said, he finds that people want to hear "the truth of the faith" from priests, bishops, and cardinals—"they aren't interested in my personal opinions about things, which won't save their souls, and I am as aware of that as they are; they look to me to reflect very deeply on the truths of the Faith and their application on society today, and to speak to that truth with love and care for society." The fundamental mission of Catholics in the world is to be united to Christ and to "give witness to the truth", a witness that is "very much needed in our time".

Asked how it was that he, as a young seminarian in the Sixties, avoided falling into the "craziness" of that era, Cardinal Burke credited his parents and his upbringing. He acknowledged he was not unaffected by the "tumultuous" times, especially after going to Catholic University of America in Washington, DC, in 1968 to study philosophy. He credits the "stable and good" discipline, prayer life, and formation he experienced in minor seminary, which he entered at the age of fourteen. He lamented that so many seminarians, seminary professors, and priests at CUA abandoned their vocations and ministry during that time. But he "simply couldn't be convinced that this so-called 'new way', this 'new Church'" was a good and right path, as if what he had been taught growing up was now "wrong and needed to be abandoned". He expressed, however, "great sympathy" for many of those who lost their way, saying that it was a "very tumultuous time and we were young".

Reflecting on the upcoming canonization of Mother Teresa by Pope Francis on Sunday, September 4th, Cardinal Burke expressed his happiness that the famous nun will be named a saint, saying "she has been an inspiration to me from my years in the seminary when I first came to know her".

Continue reading at www.CatholicWorldReport.com.

Pope Francis vs. Gender Ideology

Pope Francis sits next Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki, president of the Polish bishops conference, during a meeting with Poland's bishops at the cathedral in Krakow, Poland, July 27. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

Pope Francis vs. Gender Ideology | Robert R. Reilly | Catholic World Report

In the end, reality always wins. An old saying has it that: God always forgives; man sometimes; Nature never.

In Krakow with the Polish bishops two weeks ago, Pope Francis declared that, “We are experiencing a moment of the annihilation of man as the image of God.” He specifically included within this defacement “[the ideology of] ‘gender’”. He was clearly outraged that, “Today children – children! – are taught in school that everyone can choose his or her sex…And this terrible!”

Then he quoted Benedict XVI, who had said to him recently: “Holiness, this is the age of sin against God the Creator.” Francis’ response was that, “He is very perceptive. God created man and woman; God created the world in a certain way… and we are doing the exact opposite.”

Pope Francis is right to use the word “ideology” to define this “exact opposite.” The whole point of ideology is the transformation of reality. It seeks not to understand things, but to change them. A second or false reality is set up parallel to reality, which it then attempts to extinguish. At a certain stage, the destruction becomes literal, as was seen in the Gnostic Nazi and Communist enterprises of the 20^thcentury. Scores of millions were killed in order to institute the faux realities of a race-based theory of history or a class-based theory of history.

The entire LGBT movement is similarly ideological as a gender-based theory of history, if evidently less destructive—though its denial of reality has cost the lives of scores of thousands of homosexuals and others due to HIV-AIDS and other physical ailments attendant to homosexual behavior. Aside from disease and death, how does the “gay” movement express the unreality of the “exact opposite”?

Consider what happens in an actively sexual homosexual relationship, in which sodomy is generally typical. In it, one man behaves toward another man as if that other man were a woman. The other man willingly pretends that he is a woman.

Continue reading on the CWR site.

"A Revolutionary Attraction": On Pope Francis and the wounded warriors of the Sexual Revolution

"A Revolutionary Attraction | Stephen Adubato | Homiletic & Pastoral Review

On Pope Francis’ vision of the field hospital for the wounded warriors of the Sexual Revolution

Americans have been living in an historical moment during which their existential awareness of what it means to be human has been drastically altered. Many of these changes are the consequence of a more extensive series of shifts in approaches to questions of morality, society, and work which began at the dawn of the Modern Era. A significant road marker in the trajectory of the Modern Era’s legacy was the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s and 1970s. This watershed moment in history has left such an indelible mark on the collective psyche of our society that it has made its way into the American legal system; this has been most recently attested to by the Supreme Court’s decision to adjust the legal definition of marriage so that this institution would be extended to couples of the same sex.

The Sexual Revolution stands in a truly provoking position beside the Catholic Church—it provokes all people in contemporary society to ask what is at stake in their lives, and what will most adequately satisfy their needs and desires. The fundamental vocation of all members of the Body of Christ is to respond to the true needs of all people of the world. This has been re-emphasized through the brilliance of a new light which has been cast by the Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy. Our Holy Father Pope Francis asks us to continue our work of evangelization with a heightened awareness of our Lord’s tender embrace of sinners, with a renewed remembrance of his gaze of mercy. Francis calls the Church to be “a field hospital after the battle.”¹ What does it mean for the baptized to be doctors, nurses, and caretakers in the aftermath of the battle that has been waged by the Sexual Revolution? To propose a worldview that is often characterized as being archaic and even hateful in our modern milieu would require us to approach this task with great attention and nuance. Our anxiety in front of a seemingly Herculean task ought to find consolation in the witnesses of numerous faithful Christians in the Middle East who are facing persecution at the hands of the Islamic State. Their willingness to die for the sake of the Faith is not born of a devotion to a political or moral ideology, but rather of an awareness of the true nature of reality and of humanity; which are contingent upon, and thus meaningless without, the Incarnation of God through his Son, Jesus Christ. It is here that we must begin to respond to the invitation that is the Jubilee Year of Mercy that we respond to the needs of a world so severely impacted by the aftermath of the Sexual Revolution: a witness by an exceptionally fulfilled humanity, born of a life lived for the sake of “Another.”

In order to better understand the essential foundations of the Sexual Revolution, it emerged, in part, as a reaction to a mode of expressing human sexuality that was increasingly accused of being “repressive” and “meaningless.” A largely “puritanical” moral worldview was accused of having reduced the human person’s horizon of freedom and fulfillment. The sexual revolutionaries wanted a way out of this restrictiveness. Supported by scientific and psychological evidence that aimed to prove that sexual repression caused damage to the human person, they defended a “free” expression of sexuality that rejected any moral implications: “sexuality is a pleasurable experience and nothing but that… The therapeutic task consisted in changing the neurotic character into a genital character, and in replacing moral regulation by self-regulation.”² The Sexual Revolution was preparing to ring in a new era of utopia. The hearts of these revolutionaries longed for this moment after what they perceived to be a period of drought brought on by puritanical legalism, and a reductive definition of the human person. These revolutionaries responded to their thirsty hearts’ fundamental need for liberation by devising a moral worldview (or lack thereof) which corresponded to the need generated by a puritanical proposal of an incomplete, and ultimately repressive, moral worldview.

What does the proposal of the revolutionaries have in common with the proposal of the Church?

Continue reading on the HPR website.

Regensburg Revisited: Ten Years Later, A West Still in Denial

Pope Benedict XVI waves to pilgrims after a 2006 Mass on Islinger Field near Regensburg, Germany. (CNS photo/Kai Pfaffenbach, Reuters)

Regensburg Revisited: Ten Years Later, A West Still in Denial | Dr. Samuel Gregg | CWR

Irrationality not only manifests itself in violence but also in an inability to apply authentic reason to the many pressing challenges of our age.

A decade ago, a 79 year-old soft-spoken, white-haired German theologian returned to visit a university at which he had spent much of his academic career. On such occasions, it’s not unusual for a distinguished professor-emeritus to offer some formal remarks. Such reflections rarely receive much attention, and are often seen as exercises in reminiscing by scholars whose most substantial achievements are behind them.

In this instance, however, the speech delivered at the University of Regensburg on 12 September 2006 by the theologian Joseph Ratzinger, better known as Pope Benedict XVI, had immediate global impact. For weeks, even months afterwards, newspapers, magazines, scholarly journals, and even entire books attacked, defended, and analyzed the almost 4,000 words which came to be known as the Regensburg Address. Copies of the text and effigies of its author, however, were also ripped up, trampled on, and publicly burnt throughout the Islamic world. Television screens were dominated by images of enraged Muslim mobs and passionate denunciations by Muslim leaders, most of whom had clearly not read the text.

Also noticeable, however, was the frosty reception accorded to Pope Benedict’s remarks in much of the West. Descriptions such as “provocative,” “ill-timed,” “insensitive,” “un-feeling,” and “undiplomatic” appeared in religious and secular media outlets. Certainly the Pope had plenty of vocal defenders in North America and Europe. Among other things, they suggested that some Muslims’ frenzied reaction to the Regensburg Address proved that Benedict’s gentle query about the place of reason in Islamic belief and practice was dead on-target.

Yet there’s no doubt that Benedict’s words at Regensburg touched a nerve—perhaps even several nerves—in the Western world. For while the Regensburg Address received so much attention because of nine paragraphs in which Benedict analyzed a fourteenth-century exchange between a Byzantine Emperor and his Persian Muslim interlocutor, the text’s primary focus concerned deep problems of faith and reason that characterize the West and Christianity today. And many of these pathologies quickly surface whenever and wherever Islamist terrorism rears its head. They continue to enfeeble the West’s response to people whose acts in locations ranging from Brussels to Paris, Beirut to Jakarta, Jerusalem to San Bernardino, Abuja to London, and Lahore to New York reflect many things, including a particular understanding of the nature of the Divine.

The West contra Logos

One of the basic theses presented by Benedict at Regensburg was that how we understand God’s nature has implications for whether we can judge particular human choices and actions to be unreasonable. Thus, if reason is simply not part of Islam’s conception of the Divinity’s nature, then Allah can command his followers to make unreasonable choices, and all his followers can do is submit to a Divine Will that operates beyond the categories of reason.

Most commentators on the Regensburg Address did not, however, observe that the Pope declined to proceed to engage in a detailed analysis of why and how such a conception of God may have affected Islamic theology and Islamic practice. Nor did he explore the mindset of those Muslims who invoke Allah to justify jihadist violence. Instead, Benedict immediately pivoted to discussing the place of reason in Christianity and Western culture more generally. In fact, in the speech’s very last paragraph, Benedict called upon his audience “to rediscover” the “great logos”: “this breadth of reason” which, he maintained, orthodox Christianity has always regarded as a prominent feature of God’s nature. The pope’s use of the word “rediscover” indicated that something had been lost and that much of the West and the Christian world had themselves fallen into the grip of other forms of un-reason. Irrationality can, after all, manifest itself in expressions other than mindless violence.

That irrationality is loose and ravaging much of the West—especially in those institutions which are supposed to be temples of reason, i.e., universities—is hard to deny.

Continue reading at www.CatholicWorldReport.com.

New: "The Walls Are Talking: Former Abortion Clinic Workers Tell Their Stories" by Abby Johnson

Now available from Ignatius Press:

The Walls Are Talking: Former Abortion Clinic Workers Tell Their Stories

by Abby Johnson, with Kristin Detrow

This book narrates the harrowing and life-changing experiences of former abortion clinic workers, including those of the author, who once directed abortion services at a large Planned Parenthood clinic in Texas. These individuals, whose names have been changed to protect their identities, left their jobs in the abortion industry after experiencing a change of heart. They have come forward with their stories, not for fame or notoriety, but to shed light on the reality of abortion. They want their stories to change the lives of others for the better.

These stories are difficult to read, because an abortion is an act of violence, harming not only the obvious victim—the unborn child-- but also the mother, the father, the doctor, and everyone else involved. But these stories also offer hope, for they show that anyone, no matter what part the person has played in an abortion, can start anew, can make amends for past mistakes. They demonstrate that the first step on that journey is telling the truth, as these courageous individuals do in these pages.

"Those of us that have worked in the abortion industry all live with a constant burden. We can't let our burden slide off of our shoulders; it is what keeps us on fire. It reminds us of why we fight so hard. We have seen death and evil in a way that most haven't—and we participated. But we are forgiven. He who has been forgiven much, loves much. And we love a lot. I am eagerly awaiting the day when we can call all abortionists and clinic workers former and repentant abortion providers."
— Abby Johnson, author

Abby Johnson holds a B.S. in psychology from Texas A&M University and an M.A. in counseling from Sam Houston State University. She was hired by Planned Parenthood in 2005 and progressed to the position of community services director and health educator, where she served as liason between the community and Planned Parenthood as media correspondent. Later promoted to heath center director, Johnson ran both the family planning and abortion programs. In 2009 she left Planned Parenthood and joined the local Coalition for Life as a volunteer. She continues her volunteer activities and now works on projects with the national 40 Days for Life campaign. She and her husband, Doug, have a young daughter and live in Texas.

Praise for The Walls Are Talking: Former Abortion Clinic Workers Tell Their Stories:

"Abby Johnson has done a phenomenal job of gathering the experiences of those who have worked in the abortion industry. The movement of grace that brings them out of the industry is profound. The wounds that they carry remind us that the abortion debate is not a moral and philosophical discussion, but a heart issue! The walking wounded are everywhere and, as Abby concludes, it is love and respect that heals the heart."
— Vicki Thorn, Founder, Project Rachel

"In this riveting, compelling book, Abby Johnson tenderly holds out a loving hand of compassion to those millions of Americans who've participated in an abortion and takes a giant step toward healing our abortion-wounded nation."
— Sue Ellen Browder, Author, Subverted: How I Helped the Sexual Revolution Hijack the Women's Movement

"I've seen Abby's transformational story inspire people around the world, and I've witnessed the experiences of many other workers who are also now abandoning the abortion industry. Read and share the testimonies in this important book. It's time to let the world know what really goes on behind the closed doors of the abortion industry."
— David Bereit, Founder, 40 Days for Life

"This is such an important book right now. At a time when Planned Parenthood is under so much scrutiny and pressure, these stories of former abortion clinic workers could make a huge difference when it comes to shutting down abortion providers and ending abortion all together. "
— Teresa Tomeo, Radio Host, Author, Extreme Makeover

"It is not a trivial thing to heed the call of one's conscience, especially when the cost is one's livelihood. I know. Years ago, I walked away from a Stanford Ph.D. and an academic position when I told the truth about forced abortions in China. The women in this book did the same thing. They walked away from the security of their jobs in the abortion industry when they realized the murderous truth about what actually goes on there. Read their stories, and pray that hundreds more abortion clinic workers will follow them out the door, with the last one turning out the lights as she leaves."
— Steven Mosher, President, Population Research Institute

"The Walls Are Talking, and they're urging us to listen. The voices of Abby Johnson and other former abortion workers are loud and clear. Their real life accounts describing the inner workings of the abortion industry can no longer be ignored. And despite the stark madness of this gruesome environment, these stories of grace remind us that no one is beyond the reach of Christ."
— Ramona Trevino, Author, Redeemed by Grace: A Catholic Woman's Journey to Planned Parenthood and Back

"Abby Johnson is one of the bravest women I know. Once she realized the truth about abortion, Abby had the courage to leave the abortion industry and become a powerful voice for the defenseless. She challenges us to face the truth about the abortion industry and its many victims."
— Lila Rose, President, Live Action

"My friend, Abby Johnson, has been teaching us for several years what it means to leave the abortion industry and feel free of the murder, the heartache and the misery that accompany abortion.

Abby's latest book, The Walls Are Talking, is another remarkable journey down the path that she, and so many others, have travelled on their way out the torment of the abortion industry and into the light of truth.

I encourage everyone to read The Walls Are Talking and share it with family and friends. Heroic women like Abby inspire all of us."
— Judie Brown, President, American Life League

Human Liberty and “The Obsolete Man”

A still from the 1961 Twilight Zone episode "The Obsolete Man".

Human Liberty and “The Obsolete Man” | Thomas M. Doran | CWR's The Dispatch

Have we finally arrived at the real—and inhuman—Twilight Zone?

Is there a common thread between Christians and other “enemies of the faith” murdered by the scores in the Middle East, Africa, and elsewhere; “enemies of the state” beaten or disappearing in Russia, China, and North Korea; and many other states where a failure to conform to the orthodoxy of the day gets one publicly vilified, shunted to the side, or worse?

At first glance, an avowedly atheistic Kim Jong-un of North Korea, materialists Vladimir Putin of Russia and Xi Jinping of China, and the leaders of ISIS and Al-Qaeda don’t seem to have much in common, though all of them share a foundational belief in the obsolete man.

Rod Serling captures this truth in the 1961 Twilight Zone episode, “The Obsolete Man”, which he himself wrote, where Romney Wordsworth (Burgess Meredith), a librarian in a state without books, is judged to be obsolete and sentenced to death. There’s not much room for subtlety in a half-hour show, and Serling gives it to us with both barrels, a parable rather than a fleshed-out story. The warehouse-like courtroom has no human ornamentation, a spartan beehive with buzzing drone-like people, while Wordsworth’s small room is cluttered with books but feels homey and comfortable, in spite of the menace outside his door.

Serling introduces this dystopian state as a place where “Logic is an enemy and truth is a menace…a future that might be”. As the story progresses, we learn the “State has proven there is no God”, to which Wordsworth replies, “You can’t erase God with an edict.” When he’s judged obsolete, Wordsworth responds, “No man is obsolete. I am a human being. I exist”, to which the Chancellor of the state responds, “Delusions that you inject into your printer’s veins with printer’s ink…the state has no use for your kind…no more books means no more librarians”. How this state executes Wordsworth, giving him a choice of how to die and broadcasting his death for its “Educative effect on the population” is where Serling displays his characteristic ironical twist, when the Chancellor poses this question: “How does a man react to the knowledge that he is going to be blown to bits?”

Continue reading on the CWR site.

The Doritos Commercial and the Revival of Voluntarism

Bishop Robert Barron | The Dispatch at CWR

Though the commercial is, of course, playful, it exaggerates something quite real—but NARAL insists the child in the womb should not be "humanized".

I'm sure by now you've heard about the absurd reaction of the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) to the lighthearted Super Bowl commercial produced to advertise Doritos. In the thirty-second clip, a pregnant mother, undergoing an ultra-sound, is annoyed by her husband who is absent-mindedly munching Doritos while their baby's image is displayed on the screen. But as the father moves the corn chip, the baby in the womb moves with it; and when the mother throws the bag across the room, the child reacts so keenly and purposively that he decides this is the moment to be born.

Cute, funny, harmless, right? Oh not according to NARAL, who complained (and one is compelled here to stifle laughter) that the commercial dangerously "humanized" the fetus. We are tempted to ask, "What do you think was gestating in the womb? A monkey? A rabbit?"

It has, of course, long been established scientifically that even a conceptus (a fertilized ovum) is already in full possession of human DNA distinct from that of his parents. Moreover, the developing embryo has a heartbeat and her own circulatory system 22 days after conception; at 20 weeks, the baby in the womb is capable of hearing his mother's voice, and responding to light, music, and other external stimuli. So though the Doritos commercial is, of course, playful, it exaggerates something quite real.
Yet according to NARAL, the child in the womb should not be "humanized," lest the absolute right to murder that child at any stage of its pre-natal development should be denied. And mind you, that right, in our country, extends even to the moment when the baby is emerging from the womb (partial birth abortion), indeed to the time after his birth, since many states place no restrictions on the killing of a newborn who has miraculously survived the abortion procedure (cf. born alive legislation). For many people, the bottom line is this: all objective evidence to the contrary, the unborn are not human because defenders of abortion don't want them to be.

And here, philosophically speaking, is the rub.

Continue reading at www.CatholicWorldReport.com.

Tens of thousands rally at Walk for Life West Coast in San Francisco

David Daleiden speaking at the Walk for Life West Coast at the Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco on Saturday, January 23rd. (Photo: Credit: Darwin Sayo, Walk for Life West Coast Media Team; www.walkforlifewc.com)

Speakers at the event included David Daleiden, the citizen journalist whose undercover videos recorded Planned Parenthood officials trafficking in the parts of aborted babies

SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 25, 2016 – A Nigerian pro-life activist and the man whose undercover videos of Planned Parenthood have roiled Congress and redefined the abortion battleground rallied tens of thousands of people at the 12th annual Walk for Life West Coast Jan. 23.
 
“They tell us the lie that women—in order to have opportunities and in order  for us be successful—we must have abortion rights,” said Obianuju Ekeocha, founder and president of Culture of Life Africa which rejects international aid tied to anti-life initiatives. “I stand here before you not just as a black person or an African person. I stand here before you as a woman to say we should never have to buy success with the blood of our babies.”
 
David Daleiden, the citizen journalist whose undercover videos recorded Planned Parenthood officials trafficking in the parts of aborted babies, was the first speaker at the one-hour rally at Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco. The videos led Congress to vote to defund Planned Parenthood in January.
 
“The videos raise the biggest question that Planned Parenthood and their allies cannot answer,” Daleiden said. “That is how on the one hand in our country the humanity of the baby fetus is not considered to be equal enough to our own in order to be totally protected by law. But at the same time it is precisely their equal and identical humanity to our own that makes them so valuable for sale.”
 
At the Walk for Life Mass earlier at St. Mary’s Cathedral, San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone, referred to the videos and to California’s new assisted suicide law saying, “The big question is, what does this say about us as a society. How can we do this to ourselves?”  The archbishop called upon pro-life supporters to be Jesus’ “light shining in the darkness.”
 
Intermittent rain and a wholesale shutdown of traffic in the financial district for construction of Super Bowl City did not daunt supporters, who filled the plaza, which shortly before the rally was a sea of umbrellas. The sun came out for most of the rally.
 
Other speakers included Rev. Clenard Childress who has spoken at almost every Walk, beginning with the first in 2005. The New Jersey Baptist minister is a national African American voice for the unborn, marriage and family. The rally concluded with testimony by Emmanuel-- Jesús Emmanuel Arturo Acha Martínez--a musical icon in the Latin world. “We are here in defense of life. We have to do it. We all have to do it,” Emmanuel said before speaking in Spanish to those gathered.
 
Walk for Life was founded in 2005 by a group of Bay Area residents with the mission of changing the perception that abortion is the answer.

The hijacking of the women’s movement, and the resurgence of pro-life feminism

Young people hold signs outside the U.S. Supreme Court building during the March for Life in Washington Jan. 22, 2015. (CNS photo/Leslie Kossoff)

The hijacking of the women’s movement, and the resurgence of pro-life feminism | CWR

Sue Ellen Browder was there when the women’s movement bound itself to pro-abortion politics. Today she sees hope in a new generation of pro-life feminists.

Sue Ellen Browder has worked as a journalist for more than 40 years, writing for several decades for Cosmopolitan and other women’s magazines. Her articles from that period were calculated to “soft sell” the Cosmo lifestyle and all that it entailed—including casual sex, contraception, and abortion. Her new book Subverted (Ignatius Press) tells the story of how the women’s movement—which in the beginning was primarily concerned about equal rights and opportunities for women, and mothers in particular—was hijacked by the sexual revolution and how abortion became enshrined as the movement’s primary political issue.

Browder will be on the stage at the rally kicking off the 2016 March for Life in Washington, DC on January 22, speaking on “Why the Pro-Life Movement is the Authentic Women’s Movement of the 21st Century.”

She recently corresponded with CWR about her book, her perspective on pro-abortion politics as someone who witnessed firsthand their fusing with the women’s movement, and the hope she sees for a pro-life future in the United States.

CWR: Why did you write Subverted?

Sue Ellen Browder: We can’t correct the errors of the past until we know the errors of the past. This book tells for the first time how two men used some very crafty propaganda to convince women’s movement founder Betty Friedan to insert abortion and contraception into the women’s movement “Bill of Rights.” They convinced her she wouldn’t be able to achieve equity—not equality, equity—for women in education and the workplace if she didn’t include abortion in her package of political demands. 

The women’s movement in the beginning was very united around issues of equal access to education and opportunities in the work force. Abortion split the women’s movement in two. The pro-life movement has not declared a “war on women.” The pro-life movement represents an authentic branch of feminism that walked out the door the very night abortion was inserted into the women’s movement by a mere 57 people under some very diabolic influences.

CWR: Why has this story been buried for nearly 50 years?  

Browder: It’s been reported here and there in bits and pieces. But it’s never been pulled together in one place before. This book, Subverted, is the first time anyone has told the whole story. 

Early suffragists like Susan B. Anthony, Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton were adamantly prolife. Alice Paul, mother of the 19th Amendment, which guaranteed women the right to vote, called abortion “the ultimate exploitation of women.” Although Betty Friedan eventually did succumb to abortion’s siren song, she didn’t even mention abortion in 1963 when she launched second wave feminism with The Feminine Mystique.  

Having once been fired for being pregnant, Friedan wrote in 2000, “Ideologically, I was never for abortion.  Motherhood is a value to me, and even today abortion is not. … For me, the matter of choice has never been primarily the choice of abortion, but that you can choose to be a mother. That’s as important as any right written into the Constitution.” 

CWR: What was the bedrock motivation for the promotion of abortion in the 1960s? And to what degree was it pushed by men who saw it as a means of liberation for themselves rather than by women? 

Continue reading on the Catholic World Report site...

"Born to Win": Students for Life of America at Walk for Life West Coast

"Born to Win": Students for Life of America at Walk for Life West Coast | Gibbons J. Cooney | Catholic World Report

“We want to make abortion unthinkable and this is the pro-life generation that is going to make that happen.”

Each year, San Francisco’s Walk for Life West Coast, which began in 2005, has attracted more attendees. The Walk has been defined since its inception by the participation of young people, not only at the Walk itself, but at the ancillary events that have grown up around the Walk. It has become the largest weekend of Catholic and pro-life activism on the West Coast, with special Masses, prayer services, eucharistic adoration, youth rallies and conferences.

One major activist presence at the Walk is the Students for Life of America. On January 23, following the Walk, Students for Life will host a Youth Rally and movie screening of Voiceless at 5:00 pm at San Francisco’s St. Mary’s Cathedral. On Sunday, January 24, beginning at 9:30 am, Students for Life will host their Third Annual Students for Life of America West Coast National Conference “Born to Win”, also at St. Mary’s Cathedral.

Catholic World Report spoke with Tina Whittington, Executive Vice President of Students for Life of America.

CWR: One of the most important things that has happened in the pro-life movement over the last year has been the series of videos by the Center for Medical Progress exposing the trafficking in the body parts of aborted babies by Planned Parenthood and other abortion businesses. David Daleiden, the founder of the Center for Medical Progress, will be one of the speakers at this year’s Walk. Can you tell us what you think these videos have meant to the pro-life movement?

Tina Whittington: The Center for Medical Progress videos were a game-changer because while many pro-lifers suspected the abortion industry of selling baby body parts, David proved it and proved it dramatically. This time, it wasn’t a pro-lifer saying that Planned Parenthood betrays women – it was the abortionists themselves by admitting they don’t always get full consent from the mother and change up the abortion procedure to get the best organs, which can cause complications for the mother.

This time it wasn’t a pro-lifer holding up graphic images of aborted babies – it was Planned Parenthood themselves holding the tiny, identifiable parts of aborted babies. This time it wasn’t  pro-lifers telling the world that the abortion industry finds any way to make a profit – it was Planned Parenthood high-level executives themselves negotiating the best price for the body parts of aborted babies.

CWR: Students for Life have become a regular presence at the Walk. Two years ago you had the first annual Students for Life of America West Coast Conference. This year will be the third annual confcerence—and a pro-life Youth Rally as well. What results do you hope to see from the Rally and Conference?

Continue reading on the CWR site.

What is Family?

(us.fotolia.com | Roman Sigaev)

 

What is Family? | Russell Shaw | Catholic World Report

While many say we are witnessing a new and emerging "definition of family", we are actually seeing stark evidence of chaos and collapse

A few houses down the block from mine there’s a house with two women in their late 30s or early 40s and two boys ages 12 or 13 living in it. Just about the only man I’ve ever seen there is the pizza delivery guy, and he doesn’t get beyond the front door.

I suppose each of the women is mother of one of the boys. Now and then I think about those kids and ask myself a question: No doubt they’re members of a family—but what family?

When one of them thinks about his family, does he think about his mother and himself? About himself and his mother and his invisible father? About the four people living in that house down the street—himself, the other boy, the two women? And whatever the answer may be now, how will he think of family ten years from now? How will he picture the family he may have started by then or at least begun thinking about?

If that boy is confused, he’s not the only one. What does family mean to Americans today? As a country, as a society, isn’t America suffering from massive confusion about that?

Looking for something that might shed light on these matters, I came across a statement that President Jimmy Carter issued—January 30, 1978 was the date—formally announcing the White House Conference on Families scheduled later that year. That now forgotten White House Conference talk fest was a controversial minor landmark in the evolution of family policy in the United States. Carter’s statement is very short, but it makes three important points appropriate to the occasion.

First: “Families are both the foundation of American society and its most important institution.”

Second: “The American family is basically sound.”

Continue reading on the CWR site.

Cdl. Sarah: “Without God, there is nothing but wars, division, and bewilderment”

Cardinal Robert Sarah

Cdl. Sarah: “Without God, there is nothing but wars, division, and bewilderment”

“The real crisis that our world is going through now is not essentially economic or political, but a ‘crisis of God,’” says prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments.

The following remarks were delivered by Cardinal Robert Sarah at the November 20 presentation in Rome of his book God or Nothing, published in English by Ignatius Press and translated by Michael J. Miller. Miller also translated Cardinal Sarah’s speech for CWR.

***

Allow me first of all to express my most sincere gratitude to Cardinal George Pell, to His Excellency Abp. Georg Gänswein, and to His Excellency Abp. Rino Fisichella for having accepted the invitation to present my book. In particular I thank you for your kind words of praise in my regard, and especially for what you said about my book, God or Nothing. Moreover I wish to thank those who promoted and organized this fine presentation ceremony: Dr. Paul Badde and Dr. Davide Cantagalli. Finally I wish to thank each one of you for your presence. His Excellency Abp. Georg Gänswein reminded us that today we celebrate the memory of Pope Saint Gelasius. This is a sheer coincidence, because today is my fifth anniversary as a cardinal.

How did the book God or Nothing come about? 

To tell the truth, I had never thought of writing a book, until now. One day Dr. Nicolas Diat came to see me for an exchange of ideas about various questions and, at the end of a second meeting, proposed that I write a book about my life. I replied that it was not at all interesting, that there were so many lives finer and richer than mine, but—I added—by means of an interview we might possibly touch on some current ecclesial and social questions about our increasingly globalized and confused world. Even in the Catholic Church we no longer have a safe doctrinal and moral path. Everyone proclaims his own opinions and value with absolute freedom. I too would like to proclaim my faith and my fidelity to Jesus, to the centuries-old Magisterium of the Church. We began therefore with the first two chapters that relate my personal experience, lived out in a particularly difficult socio-political context—that of the revolution in Guinea with Sékou Touré, with extremely tense relations between the Church and the State of Guinea, difficulties and tensions that resulted in the expulsion of the first archbishop of Conakry, Msgr. Gérard de Milleville, the arrest and incarceration of the second archbishop of Conakry, Msgr. Raymond Marie Tchidimbo, the expulsion of all the missionaries in May of 1967, and 26 years of dictatorship and persecution. I, myself, in April 1984, was put on a list of persons to be eliminated, but was spared death thanks to Divine Providence. When I think back on my life, on my “nomadic” vocational journey—Guinea, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea again, France, Senegal—I clearly discern in it concrete proof of divine predilection toward me. 

After these first two chapters, there are some reflections on the popes, the Church, Rome, the modern world, Africa, the profound crises in anthropology and faith in the Western world, morality, truth, evil, prayer, etc. But God is truly the heart of God or Nothing. Why this title? Because today we observe an eclipse, an absence of God from the political, economic, and cultural world. The real crisis that our world is going through now is not essentially economic or political, but a “crisis of God.” Of course, people talk today only about the economic one: in the development of the economic power of Europe—although its original orientations were more ethical and religious—the economic interest has become more and more exclusively decisive. The man of yesterday, like today’s man, without distinction as to race, skin color, culture, country, or continent, is oriented almost exclusively toward the possession and use of material goods. And in the more specific cultural context of Western society, it is no exaggeration to say that man works, organizes, and manages human, political, economic, and commercial relations, starts wars, produces weapons of mass destruction, invades and conquers countries solely or almost exclusively to exploit and accumulate their material riches, in support of his own authority and hegemony. Under the pretext of bringing democracy, peace, and freedom, the West has created chaos in many countries, especially in the Middle East. My judgment may be inaccurate or exaggerated, but we cannot deny the present reality. Above all, Western culture has progressively organized itself as though God did not exist: many today have decided to do without God. As Nietzsche declares, for many in the West, God is dead. And we are the ones who killed Him, we are His assassins, and our Churches are the crypts and tombs of God. A lot of believers no longer attend them so as to avoid smelling the putrefaction of God; but in doing so, man no longer knows either who he is or where he is going: there is a sort of return to paganism and idolatry; science, technology, money, power, unbridled freedom, and endless pleasures are our gods.

I maintain that what we are experiencing today, especially but not only in the West, results from the fact that we have abandoned God in order to assign importance to “nothing.” Of course, the economy, politics, science, technology, and major advances in the fields of health care and social communications are not “nothing,” but in comparison to God they truly are “nothings.” 

In God “we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). In him, all things continue to exist. He is the Beginning, the seat of all Fullness, Saint Paul tells us; apart from him, nothing reigns: everything finds in God its own being and its own truth; otherwise it is “God or nothing.” Certainly, there are enormous problems, often painful situations—human life can be difficult and distressing; and yet we must recognize that God is the one who gives meaning to everything. Our worries, our problems, our sufferings exist and preoccupy us, but we know that everything is resolved in him, we know that it is God or nothing, and we perceive this as a self-evident truth that impresses us not from outside, but from within the soul, because Love is not imposed with violence, but by seducing the heart with an interior light. 

With God or Nothing I would like to manage to put God back at the center of our thoughts, at the center of our action, at the center of our lives, in the one place that he should occupy, so that our journey as Christians might revolve around this Rock who is God, around this solid certitude of our faith. 

Without praise, without prayer, without adoration and therefore without God, there is nothing but wars, division, and bewilderment. Without God in the heart of man, there is only hatred, strife, and conflicts, as we see today. I would like to illustrate this assertion of mine with this story taken from the hagiographic legend of the Muslim “saints.” We know from experience that having an unfriendly or bad neighbor can make life unpleasant. But this difficulty can last 20, or at most 50 years, and then death separates us. But living with a bad neighbor for eternity is much more unpleasant, and so it is better to know him first. Abdalwânid Ibn Zeid wanted to know who would be his neighbor in paradise. He was told: “O Abdalwânid Ibn Zeid, you will have as your neighbor Maïmouna la Nera.” “And where is this Maïmouna?” he asked. “She is from Banou un-Tel, in Koûfa.” Abdalwânid Ibn Zeid arrived in Koûfa and inquired about Maïmouna. They answered that she was a madwoman who pastured her sheep near the cemetery. Abdalwânid Ibn Zeid went to the cemetery and found Maïmouna in prayer. Maïmouna’s sheep were grazing by themselves, but what was even more astonishing and marvelous was that the sheep were mingled with wolves, and the wolves were not devouring the sheep and the sheep were not afraid of the wolves. When Maïmouna had finished praying, Abdalwânid Ibn Zeid asked Maïmouna: “How is it possible that the wolves get along so well with the sheep?” And Maïmouna replied: “I improved my relations with God and He improved the relations between my sheep and the wolves.” 

Human efforts, political or diplomatic negotiations alone, will not succeed in attaining unity and reestablishing peace among men, because there is a virus of division, of disunity that is harbored in the hearts of men since original sin. The unity of the sons of God is a work that only Jesus can accomplish through the Holy Spirit, but without prayer the Spirit runs into a closed door in our souls. Let us therefore make more room for prayer and adoration in our lives, and then each one of us will be able to say: “I improved my relationship with God and He improved and pacified the relations among men and among peoples.”  

New: "Subverted: How I Helped the Sexual Revolution Hijack the Women's Movement"

Now available from Ignatius Press:

Subverted: How I Helped the Sexual Revolution Hijack the Women's Movement

by Sue Ellen Browder

Contraception and abortion were not originally part of the 1960s women’s movement. How did the women’s movement, which fought for equal opportunity for women in education and the workplace, and the sexual revolution, which reduced women to ambitious sex objects, become so united?

In Subverted, Sue Ellen Browder documents for the first time how it all happened, in her own life and in the life of an entire country. Trained at the University of Missouri School of Journalism to be an investigative journalist, Browder unwittingly betrayed her true calling and became a propagandist for sexual liberation. As a long-time freelance writer for Cosmopolitan magazine, she wrote pieces meant to soft-sell unmarried sex, contraception, and abortion as the single woman’s path to personal fulfillment. She did not realize until much later that propagandists higher and cleverer than herself were influencing her thinking and her personal choices as they subverted the women’s movement.

The thirst for truth, integrity, and justice for women that led Browder into journalism in the first place eventually led her to find forgiveness and freedom in the place she least expected to find them. Her in-depth research, her probing analysis, and her honest self-reflection set the record straight and illumine a way forward for others who have suffered from the unholy alliance between the women’s movement and the sexual revolution.

Sue Ellen Browder is a freelance writer who has appeared on Oprah, the Today Show, and hundreds of radio talk shows. Her work forCosmopolitan, New Woman, Woman’s Day, and other magazines has given her a lifetime of experience with the women’s movement as it unfolded in the media, both on the public stage and behind the scenes.

"Subverted offers a window into our uniquely disturbed historical era. Generations of readers will turn to Subverted when they want to know what turned the tide." 
— Jennifer Roback Morse, Ph.D., Founder and President, the Ruth Institute

"Browder combines a compelling personal narrative with piercing observations from her work in women’s media, resulting in a book you can’t put down."
— Jennifer Fulwiler, Author, Something Other Than God

"Subverted is a game changer for our culture, and in particular, for women."
— Abby Johnson, Author, Unplanned

"What a romp—through the offices, the backrooms, and even the personal lives that brought you the sexual revolution!"
— Helen Alvaré, Professor of Family Law, George Mason University

"Here are two books, two stories in one. The first opens your heart, the second opens your eyes."
— Peter Kreeft, Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy, Boston College

"Here is the eye-opening account of how the feminist movement got hopelessly off track, and how a one-time Cosmo writer managed to find her way back to God’s reality."
— Steven Mosher, President, Population Research Institute

"This is a courageous book!"
— Vicki Thorn, Founder, Project Rachel

"A gripping story that uncovers the dirty secrets behind the women’s movement. A must-read for Millennials." 
— Kristan Hawkins, President, Students for Life of America 

"Browder’s understanding of the human person, the intrinsic need for relationship, is beautiful and deep." 
— Jeanne Mancini, Director, March for Life

"Sue Ellen Browder is silent no more about her role in promoting a distorted feminism; you will be refreshed by her courage." 
— Fr. Frank Pavone, National Director, Priests for Life

Interview with Sue Ellen Browder:

Here's why Planned Parenthood's "only 3%" claim is so diabolical

by Carl E. Olson | CWR blog

I rarely watch "The O'Reilly Factor" (which too often comes off as an hour-long infomercial for books titled Killing So-and-So), but I just caught a few minutes of a segment on the Planned Parenthood videos. And, once again, some morally-challenged hack—pretty, tough, and wearing a red power dress—trotted out the tired "97% of what Planned Parenthood does has nothing to do with abortion", which is the more positive way of claiming that abortions make up only 3% of what that vile cabal does behind closed doors.

Those numbers, of course, have been challenged. Rich Lowry of National Review recently wrote, in a New York Post opinion piece:

Practically every defender of the organization, fighting to preserve its federal funding, reverts to the 3 percent figure. How could you possibly, they ask, defund a group that devotes itself overwhelmingly to uncontroversial procedures and services for women?

The 3 percent figure is an artifice and a dodge, but even taking it on its own terms, it’s not much of a defense. Only Planned Parenthood would think saying that they only kill babies 3 percent of the time is something to brag about.

The group performs about 330,000 abortions a year, or roughly 30 percent of all the abortions in the country. By its own accounting in its 2013-2014 annual report, it provides about as many abortions as Pap tests (380,000). The group does more breast exams and provides more breast-care services (490,000), but not by that much. The 3 percent figure is derived by counting abortion as just another service like much less consequential services. So abortion is considered a service no different than a pregnancy test (1.1 million), even though a box with two pregnancy tests can be procured from the local drugstore for less than $10.

Lowry likens this to Major League Baseball teams saying "that they sell about 20 million hot dogs and play 2,430 games in a season, so baseball is only .012 percent of what they do." But in doing so, he pushes aside the key issue at hand: the morality of the action involved.

What if Jared Bogle, who recently plummeted from Subway sandwich fame to child porn infamy, were to make the argument, "I only photographed and touched 3% of the children I was around"? How would that fly? Do you think it might sway people to think he really isn't that bad of a guy?

Or, what if sadistic serial killer, kidnapper, rapist, and necrophile Ted Bundy had made the statement:

Continue reading on the CWR blog.

What Kind of Evil?

(us.fotolia.com | fresnel6)

What Kind of Evil? | Thomas S. Hibbs | CWR

Planned Parenthood supporters are progressive, instrumentalist rationalists, intent on implementing enlightenment policies of science and freedom

"The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid 'dens of crime' that Dickens loved to paint. It is not done even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered… in clean, carpeted, warmed and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voices. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the office of a thoroughly nasty business concern.” — C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

Theologian Stanley Hauerwas once posed the following question concerning fetal tissue to a medical researcher: If it were a delicacy, could you eat it? Beyond the horrifying “medical” practices described in the Planned Parenthood videos, their most disgusting feature is not the nonchalant tone, for which Planned Parenthood issued an apology, but the fact that at least some conversations took place over a meal. Aside from calling to mind Hannibal Lecter’s predilection for liver, fava beans and a nice chianti, the setting of the videos makes clear that however refined may have been the upbringing of the Planned Parenthood employees, they apparently did not have parents who said of this or that topic, “Not at the dinner table!”

Disgusting? Disturbing? How about barbaric and evil? Even some who reject the pro-life cause describe the content of these videos in dark terms indeed. But what kind of barbarism?

A number of commentators have made analogies to the Nazis. Some of it is darkly humorous twitter commentary. Riffing on Molly Ivans’ comment about a Pat Buchanan speech, National Review’s Kevin Williamson tweeted: “I thought Planned Parenthood's explanation sounded a lot more convincing in the original German”. Some have noted the connection between Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger’s support of eugenics and that of the Nazis. Others have cited interesting historical facts such as Mengele's post-Holocaust employment as an abortionist. Perhaps the most telling similarity is a shared philosophy of what the Nazis called "life and unworthy of life."

And yet, I’m not sure the Nazis analogy is entirely apt. There are broadly two dominant strains to modernity. There is the original myth of modernity, which is that of an enlightenment liberation from the evils of tradition; this strain is progressive, universalist, technocratic, and rationalist. The Nazis come from the other side of modernity, the romantic-nationalist reaction against progressive, universalist enlightenment.

Whatever might have been the historical roots of the organization, contemporary Planned Parenthood supporters are not nationalists; they are not reacting against modernity; they are not asserting the superiority of one race over another.  They are implementing enlightenment goals. They are progressive, instrumentalist rationalists, intent on implementing enlightenment policies of science and freedom.

Continue reading at www.CatholicWorldReport.com.

The Divinization of the Earth: A “Religion” Without a “God”

(us.fotolia.com | Elena Ray)

The Divinization of the Earth: A “Religion” Without a “God” | Fr. James V. Schall, SJ | CWR

The direct connection between theories of earth primacy and brutal control of human beings through abortion, sterilization, and euthanasia simply cannot be avoided

"With cries that pierce me to the heart, / my enemies revile me, / saying to me all the day long: / ‘Where is your God?’” — Psalm 42.

"In paganism, the Divine is that to which sacrifices must be offered. This is almost a definition. In this recent movement, Man is something that should be sacrificed on behalf of the Earth. The divinization of the Earth is an extremely consequential move, since it is supposed to be higher than Man.” — Rêmi Brague, “Are There as Many Gods as Religions?” (Modern Age, Summer 2015)

I.

With so much current discussion in panic mode of “earth warming” and “environmental” issues, along with the selling of fetal parts and massive abortions, we need to ask ourselves: “What is going on here?” The popular view is that man, by his very presence on it, is “abusing” the earth. Earth is said to be “greater” than man. In the context of so many billion human beings, each life is insignificant and can be replaced. Thus, morality starts, not with man, but with the earth. Man is second, not first. This human “earth-exploitation” thesis seems to be in conflict with the biblical view that man has “dominion” over the goods of the earth. Those goods are there for man’s use to achieve his purposes, which are not primarily “earth” centered, even though they take place on this planet.

The earth itself, however, has no inner consciousness of itself. It does not behold itself. Unlike man, it has no possibility of being other than it is. There are those who want to hold both sides of this issue. That is, they do not want to “abuse” the earth, whatever that means, but they also want to use the goods available for human needs. This usage seems to be what they are for (that same approach seems also to be Aristotle’s position). But this view brings up the controverted issue: “Just what cohort of mankind are these given resources designed to support?” The current one? All those of past and future? The future but not the present? The entire human race is constantly replicating itself; this steady reproducing of itself is how mankind stays in existence on this planet. One way, no doubt unpopular, to stop human “pollution” would simply be to stop reproducing—a kind of universal vow of chastity. This is not a widely heard view!

The human race has already lived on this planet for thousands upon thousands of years. Man himself appears on the earth as a late-comer but still as both properly belonging to it and yet, because of his intelligence, transcendent to it. If we assume that some ninety to a hundred billion human beings have already lived on the earth, we see that they have been “sustained” more or less well by the earth’s abundance. Contrary to expectations, individual members of the species are generally much better off the later they appear on the planet, at least as far as their physical conditions. Few past eons realized how richly the earth was endowed from its beginning by whatever caused it to be rather than not be. And even today this abundance cannot be understood and used except by insightful human intelligence.

Thus, it is increasingly realized that what is available to man is itself a function of man’s knowledge and craft. When we piously talk of “preserving” resources for “future” generations, we encounter something of an enigma.

Continue reading on the Catholic World Report site.

Extremists execute the unborn, Christians seek truth and justice

(us.fotolia.com | @ivan kmit)

CWR Editorial | Carl E. Olson

The White House says David Daleiden and the CMP are "extremists on the right"; Daleiden, a 26-year-old Catholic, says he's inspired by Pope Francis

Yesterday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest, when asked about President Obama's reaction to the series of undercover videos released by the Center for Medical Progress in which Planned Parenthood officials discuss selling fetal organs for profit, "said the videos were released in a 'fraudulent way' with 'not a lot of evidence' behind them." (The entire press conference can be viewed on the C-SPAN site.) Earnest stated:

There is ample reason to think that this is merely the tried and true tactic that we’ve seen from extremists on the right to edit this video and selectively release this edited version of the video that grossly distorts the position of the person that’s actually speaking...

Earnest clearly indicated that his talking points were coming from Planned Parenthood, admitting, "I’m merely repeating what I’ve seen that they [Planned Parenthood] have said..." He then offered the defense that "any review of the policy that Planned Parenthood says they implement indicates that the views expressed in the videos is—or at least the way they are depicted on the videos—is entirely inaccurate. ... But for those policies and for the way that Planned Parenthood implements them, I'd encourage you to contact Planned Parenthood." In other words, there's nothing to see here—move along!

"The President," he added in a defiant shout out to pro-abortion supporters, "certainly will not support another effort by Republicans to try to defund an organization that offers important and needed healthcare services to women across the country." I wonder: is there any institution in the U.S., at this very moment, that enjoys greater support and cover from the President of the United States than does Planned Parenthood? While Obama has wavered and flopped on many issues during his time office, he has held fast to the pro-abortion faith, even if he has long insisted that no one is really pro-abortion.

If you do a search for "Obama" and "extremists" you'll find that the POTUS often uses the term "extremists" to identify terrorists who have apparently "twisted" and distorted the teachings of true Islam. For example, in a February 17, 2015 op-ed in the LA Times, Obama wrote:

Groups like al Qaeda and ISIL promote a twisted interpretation of religion that is rejected by the overwhelming majority of the world's Muslims. The world must continue to lift up the voices of Muslim clerics and scholars who teach the true peaceful nature of Islam. We can echo the testimonies of former extremists who know how terrorists betray Islam. We can help Muslim entrepreneurs and youths work with the private sector to develop social media tools to counter extremist narratives on the Internet.

He even stated that such "violent extremists"—who, again, have nothing to do, he says, with "the true peaceful nature of Islam"—have authentic, legitimate gripes:

Continue reading on the CWR site.

Planned Parenthood, Cecil the Lion, and the Wisdom of Serpents

(us.fotolia.com | crazycolors)

Planned Parenthood, Cecil the Lion, and the Wisdom of Serpents | Mary Jo Anderson | CWR

The juxtaposition of these shocking videos and the disgust over the killing of Cecil should provide a public relations coup for the pro-life message. Instead, it appears we are about to sabotage ourselves.

The just released fourth video of a Planned Parenthood official haggling over aborted baby organs could be cataclysmic for the abortion crowd. The revelation of what Planned Parenthood is really about should be the golden opportunity for pro-life movement.

But will it be? Will we pro-life advocates squander this perfect storm?

Immediately after viewing Savita Ginde, M.D., Vice President and medical director of Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood, negotiate pricing strategies for infant organs, I had a conversation with one of my sisters regarding the controversy surrounding the killing of the "beloved lion" known as Cecil.  She remarked with dismay that pro-life voices were blundering badly with their sneering tone toward those who were enraged by the death of Cecil, but who seemed unmoved by the callous slaughter of babies in utero. "Their tone is critical of all who love animals, who see the beauty and worth in that lion. Don't they realize that you can care for innocent babies and for animals?"

I was quick to defend the pro-life comments; they were meant to indict the culture—not individuals—that spares few tears for babies but weeps publicly for lion. But as she expanded on her own reaction to recent negative pro-life comments I realized there is a very real disconnect. The juxtaposition of these shocking videos and the disgust over the killing of Cecil should provide a public relations coup for the pro-life message.  Instead, it appears we are about to sabotage ourselves.

The message that adversely compares the public reactions to Cecil's death ("Cat lives matter!") and the grizzly butchery (yawn) of Planned Parenthood may be true, but it is not effective. Worse, it may be squandering a rare opportunity.

Continue reading on the CWR blog.