Saturday, February 5, 2011

Lifeissues Newsletter #511

Lifeissues.net: clear thinking about crucial issues

(Due to volume of spam received, we're asking you not to reply to this message but instead send all correspondence tojerry@shirt.ocn.ne.jp. Thank you! Editor")

For clear thinking about crucial issues, visit LifeIssues.net

Dear Friends for Life,

The "Culture of Life" is alive and beginning to make inroads. We see that the Scottish Euthanasia Bill was rejected. A legislative committee in Scotland rejected a proposed bill that would have legalized euthanasia. The vote was 5 to 1 against it.

The birthrate in South Korea shows a tiny increase. The average number of babies born during a woman's lifetime in South Korea has increased from 1.13 two years ago, to 1.26 last year. This is still traumatically under the 2.1, needed to merely replace the present population; however, it is a start in the right direction.

On the other hand, the suffering for many women continues. Abortions are causing Mental Health Problems. A leading group of psychologists and mental health professionals in England published a group letter in the London Times stating, "Research published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry in January has shown that even women without past mental health problems are at risk of psychological ill effects after abortion. Women who have had abortions had twice the level of mental health problems and three times the risk of major depressive illness as those who had given birth or had never been pregnant." 

Informative article: New Study Affirms Link Between Abortion and Subsequent Mental Health Problems

God Bless, 
Jerry Novotny, OMI

(A Thought) "Family values and social justice aren't separate issues. The health of the community depends on the health of the family and the health of the family depends on the justice of the community."  John M. Perkins and Charles Marshity

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Lifeissues.net Newsletter #511
February 6, 2011

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(TABLE OF CONTENTS):

1. Hospital ethics boards out of touch with Church
2. Death by medical breakthrough
3. Produced stem cells 'hold on' to genetic past
4. Divorced People Top Table in Psychiatric Care
5. 'The Splendor of a Catholic Education'
6. 'We'll strive to erase AIDS stigma'
7. 66 execution in Iran's death penalty in January
8. No 'moral certainty' brain death is really death
9. Singapore archbishop to Cath schools on sex-ed
10. The Insidious Blip of Abortion
11. The Miracle of Life
12. Gestational carrier is an ugly term


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(Focus on Asia): "Pakistan has 110 N-weapons, edges ahead of India: US Report" - Pakistan has doubled its nuclear arms stockpile to 110 warheads, developing new weapons to deliver them and significantly accelerating production of uranium and plutonium for bombs to edge ahead of India.

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ITEM #1: Many hospital ethics boards out of touch with Church

Comment: All or almost all Catholic hospitals belong to CHA (Catholic Health Association). CHA's positions on various issues like abortion funding in Obamacare and the Bishop Olmsted case has put CHA at odds with the national bishops. CHA also uses some ethicists like Fr. Kevin O'Rouke and Ron Hamel who have written in CHA's publications supporting "futility" guidelines, withdrawal of tube feedings for the so-called "vegetative", etc. This may be a large part of the problem with the Catholic ethics committees described in this important article.

Every bishop needs to know about the problems described here and too few are even aware that there are problems like these. Bishops like Bishop Olmsted especially must have the support of the Catholic public in overseeing Catholic health care institutions. Catholic and non-Catholics alike use these Catholic institutions and they must have confidence in them. -Nancy Valko, RN

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ITEM #2: Death by medical breakthrough

Seventy-five years ago the Nazis targeted the disabled and the weak for extermination. Most of us now recognize as evil the idea that some people are less worthy of life than others. But, tragically, eugenics never seems to go away completely. It keeps coming back with a new name - such as "medical breakthrough."

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ITEM #3: Artificially produced stem cells may 'hold on' to genetic past

Researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California say they have found that induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells may retain the genetic memory of their previous life, which could restrict the possible uses of such cells in therapy. The study found significant differences between the reprogrammed iPS cells and true pluripotent embryonic stem cells.

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ITEM #4: Divorced People Top Table in Psychiatric Care

Divorced people had the highest rate of hospitalisation in Irish psychiatric units last year, new figures reveal. A census is carried out in March each year by the Health Research Board of people resident in psychiatric units across the country. It found that 2,812 people were resident on the census night and nearly half of the long-stay group were over the age of 65 years.

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ITEM #5: 'The Splendor of a Catholic Education'

The witness and work of Catholic education is all the more important when we recognize the diabolical power and persuasion of the culture of death - aptly described by Blessed John Paul II - which suffocates the souls and suffuses the lives of so many, leaving in its wake a great spiritual, moral, psychological and personal poverty. The idea that fuels the hateful, anti-human and atheistic worldview is that of secularism.

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ITEM #6: 'We'll strive to erase AIDS stigma'

"Villagers should treat those suffering from HIV/ AIDS equally. The patients should not be held responsible for the infection. The villagers shall have the right to intervene in case anyone in the village is found discriminating against the patients," the resolution said. It added that the victimsshould not be denied their right over ancestral property.

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ITEM #7 At least 66 execution in Iran's death penalty in January - UN says

The majority of executions were reportedly carried out in relation to drug offenses, but at least three political prisoners were among those hanged, according to a news release issued by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).

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ITEM #8: No 'moral certainty' that brain death is really death: prominent Catholic ethics professor Brugger

A prominent American professor of Catholic medical ethics has said that in "brain death" criteria there is no "moral certitude" that a patient is really dead, a condition laid out by Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI as necessary for removing organs. The available evidence, he said, "raises a reasonable doubt that excludes 'moral certitude' that ventilator-sustained brain dead bodies are corpses."

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ITEM #9: Singapore archbishop issues message to Catholic schools on sex-ed programs


Archbishop Nicholas Chia has issued a message to Catholic schools in Singapore stressing that any sex-ed program given to students must be faithful to Catholic Church teaching on sexuality. "As we begin a new school year I pray that all our Catholic schools remember that we have a duty and a right to nurture our Catholic identity for the benefit of all our students," Archbishop Chia wrote.

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ITEM #10: The Insidious Blip of Abortion

Over the years I have had several friends confide in me that they have had an abortion, and the one question they have all asked was, "Will God forgive me?"

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ITEM #11: The Miracle of Life

An amazing video presentation from the moment of *conception to birth.

*Clarification: Recently in Ohio, the state legislature passed a bill that  outlaws human-animal hybrids, but permits human cloning! Human cloning is a process of scientifically creating human beings asexually. This is why the word *conceptioncannot stand alone any longer. Those of us who defend the integrity of the human person, regardless of how he comes into being, have understood for a very long time that if our language is imprecise, people could pay for our errors with their very lives.

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ITEM #12: Gestational carrier is an ugly term

We can't keep our Eyes Wide Shut about the exploitation of women in countries such as India where a booming surrogacy industry, described as womb slavery, attracts rich foreigners. And questions need to be asked more broadly about the global trade in the use of gametes in a range of reproductive procedures.


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YOU CAN CHANGE SOCIETY:

1. BE INFORMED: "My people are destroyed from lack of knowledge." Hosea 4:6. Visit Lifeissues.net Website for insights into current Life Issues www.lifeissues.net. Access to all prior Newsletters is located in the Archives on main page.

2. PRAY DAILY: for the courage to be God's presence in society and to strongly support those who are deemed "unworthy of life". "If My people who are called by My Name, will humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land." 2 Chronicles 7:14

3. BECOME INVOLVED: Several years ago Fr. Jerry created a project entitled, "Journey for Life into the Heart of Asia". The project appeals for donations to help finance plane travel for lectures and seminars to developing countries in Asia. Strong focus is centered on reaching Asian Catholic Major Seminaries, Universities, Parishes, Hospitals and Family/Pro Life related groups. The lectures place emphasis on "The Asian Family at Crossroads: Life Issues, Trends and Challenges".

For information about no-cost Pro Life Talks to your group in Asia: contact Fr. Jerry at jerry@shirt.ocn.ne.jp

To become a supportive Missionary participant for this Asian project, kindly send your donations to:

** Fr. Jerry Novotny, OMI 

** LifeIssues.net, Editor

** Akebono-cho 1-15-9

** Kochi City, Japan, 780-8072

(or transfer donation directly to ProLife bank account: Jerome Novotny, Shikoku Bank, Asakura Branch, No. 102-1-0080824)

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Contact EDITOR:

Jerry Novotny, OMI

Akebono-cho 1-15-9

Kochi City, Japan, 780-8072 

[tel/fax: 088-843-0406] 

[email: jerry@shirt.ocn.ne.jp]

["Due to volume of spam received, we're asking you not to reply to this message but instead send all correspondence to jerry@shirt.ocn.ne.jp. Thank you! Editor"]

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Websites by Editor:

English LifeIssues Site: http://www.lifeissues.net,

Japanese LifeIssues Site: http://www.japan-lifeissues.net,

OMI Site: http://www.omijapankorea.net/index.html