LifeNews.com Pro-Life News Report
Monday, December 19, 2011
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Current Headlines
Top Stories
• Planned Parenthood Closes Four Abortion Referral Clinics
• Obama Makes Ex-Planned Parenthood Board Member Appeals Judge
• Salvation Army Faces New Criticism for Stance on Abortion
• Top Five Most Influential Pro-Life Celebrities of 2011
More Pro-Life News
• NAACP Opposes Congressional Bill to Ban Race-Based Abortions
• Christopher Hitchens: Abortion Survivor, Post-Abortive Father
• From Suicide to Conversion: Recovering From an Abortion
• Pavone: Advent a Time to Reconcile Mother and Unborn Child
• Pro-Abortion Emily s List Unveils More 2012 Endorsements
• NARAL Gives Fox News Hall of Shame Award, Ignores Abortion
• Conscience Clauses Needed Worldwide for Medical Professionals
• Report Shows Ireland s Pro-Life Abortion Laws Benefit Women
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Planned Parenthood Closes Four Abortion Referral Clinics
Citing the economic downturn and a decrease in taxpayer funding, Planned Parenthood officials closed four abortion referral clinics in two states, giving pro-life advocates an early Christmas gift.
The Planned Parenthood center at 137 S. Pugh St in State College, Pennsylvania, home to Penn State University, will close tomorrow after operating for more than a decade. A press release from Planned Parenthood of Northeast and Mid-Penn indicated it came about because of the economic climate.
The decision to close is a difficult one, and one that we regret having to make, said president and CEO Kim Custer. The combination of reduced reimbursements for services and increased costs has made it impossible for Planned Parenthood to sustain the services in this location.
The center did not do abortions but referred students and others in the city for them. One employee at the center took another Planned Parenthood position while a second left the abortion business to find employment elsewhere.
Meanwhile, Kristen Glundberg-Prossor, spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest, says the Washington state-based abortion business will close its center in Silverdale because of less taxpayer funding from the federal government and the recession in the state. Planned Parenthood centers in Oak Harbor and Forks will close as well.
Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest (PPGNW) will be closing its Forks health center located at 231 Lupine Avenue, effective December 31. Also, PPGNW will be downsizing operations in Sitka, Alaska. The Forks closure will impact 71 patients who will be referred to the Planned Parenthood health center in Port Angeles. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/planned-parenthood-closes-four-abortion-referral-clinics/
Obama Makes Ex-Planned Parenthood Board Member Appeals Judge
Last week, the Senate confirmed the nomination of Alaska Supreme Court Justice Morgan Christen to become a member of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals,one of the most left-wing federal appeals courts in the nation.
The confirmation has President Barack Obama adding yet another pro-abortion judge to the nation s judicial system. Although Christen had to wait months to be confirmed, she will now serve on a court that will decide pro-life legislation coming from Pacific Coast states usually declaring it unconstitutional.
In May, the White House announced Obama had named Justice Morgan Christen to the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. She has served as an Anchorage Superior Court Judge for seven years before pro-life former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin named her to the state Supreme Court having to choose between two pro-abortion candidate given to her by a judicial selection panel.
When she submitted her application to become a state Supreme Court justice, Christen made no mention of the fact that she is a former board member of Planned Parenthood and served the pro-abortion group in the mid 1990s. Knowing that information, Jim Minnery, the director of the Alaska Family Council, a pro-life group, opposed her nomination because she would become another activist on the Court. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/obama-makes-ex-planned-parenthood-board-member-appeals-judge/
Salvation Army Faces New Criticism for Stance on Abortion
A weekend article by WorldNetDaily has the Salvation Army facing new criticism for its position on abortion, which supports the pro-life position on most all abortions but allow for rape and incest exceptions.
The Salvation Army is not new to criticism for supporting exceptions to its pro-life position, as Life Decisions International, which compiles frequent lists of corporations to boycott for donating to the Planned Parenthood abortion business, has cited the Salvation Army for criticism. LDI has included the red kettle organization in its list of groups that deserve scrutiny because of less than absolute pro-life positions.
The Salvation Army s abortion position statement starts off with a pro-life theme.
The Salvation Army believes all people are created in the image of God and therefore have unique and intrinsic value. Human life is sacred and all people should be treated with dignity and respect. The Salvation Army accepts the moment of fertilization as the start of human life. We believe that society has a responsibility to care for others, and especially to protect and promote the welfare of vulnerable people, including unborn children, the organization says. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/salvation-army-faces-new-criticism-for-stance-on-abortion/
Top Five Most Influential Pro-Life Celebrities of 2011
These celebrities have greatly impacted the pro-life movement, especially in 2011. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/top-five-most-influential-pro-life-celebrities-of-2011/
NAACP Opposes Congressional Bill to Ban Race-Based Abortions
This is the civil rights struggle that will define our generation, says Rep. Trent Franks.
Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act of 2011 criminalizes abortion on the grounds of race or sex. Doctors could be imprisoned for not determining if the race or sex of the baby influenced the mother s decision to abort. The object of the bill is to protect the rights of the minority and females against this bias. The catch is, if abortionists are innocent of such bias the Act will not affect their business ; but if they are guilty of deliberately performing abortions on the minority, it will stop them from abusing the rights of the abortion victims. This bill ensures that the rights of minority and female babies are the same as those of white male babies.
Yet there are some civil rights groups who have a bone to pick with those who would defend these babies rights. Ironically, it is the minority and women s rights groups especially who are fighting against the bill s name and the bill itself. Opponents of the bill include the NAACP, the National Council of Jewish Women and 45 other U.S. civil rights groups. They say that the two great civil rights leaders have nothing to with discrimination in the womb. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/naacp-opposes-congressional-bill-to-ban-race-based-abortions/
Christopher Hitchens: Abortion Survivor, Post-Abortive Father
I say, RIP, sadly thinking Christopher Hitchens is not. The renowned liberal author and journalist died at the age of 62 following a short battle against esophageal cancer, since summer 2010.
Hitchens spent his latter years evangelizing atheism. So he wanted it known he would not convert to Christianity at the end, and if he did, he really didn t. From Causa Celsum:
Hitchens suspected there would be rumors of a deathbed conversion but even more he feared that he might actually call out to God. Speaking perhaps truer than he knew, he sought to give a preemptive strike against such a possibility, explaining that would not be the real Christopher Hitchens doing such a thing:
Even if my voice goes before I do, I shall continue to write polemics against religious delusions, at least until it s hello darkness my old friend. In which case, why not cancer of the brain? As a terrified, half-aware imbecile, I might even scream for a priest at the close of business, though I hereby state while I am still lucid that the entity thus humiliating itself would not in fact be me. (Bear this in mind, in case of any later rumors or fabrications.). http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/christopher-hitchens-abortion-survivor-post-abortive-father/
From Suicide to Conversion: Recovering From an Abortion
After trying to kill myself to escape the overwhelming guilt after my abortion, I emerged from my month spent in an adolescent psychiatric unit with an incongruous newly-found zeal for abortion rights.
Within weeks of my discharge from the psych unit, I found myself on a bus to Washington, D.C. to march for abortion rights and soon after I began volunteering as an escort for a first-trimester abortion clinic. An advanced degree in psychology isn t necessary to see that I was plainly trying to assuage my guilt (and protect my delicate and damaged psyche) by assuming the precise opposite of what I truly believed. Freud called this reaction formation, one of many coping strategies he dubbed defense mechanisms. I certainly took reaction formation to the extreme by espousing the most diametrically opposed position of my innermost heart when I accepted the offer of a job at an abortion clinic. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/from-suicide-to-conversion-recovering-from-an-abortion/
Pavone: Advent a Time to Reconcile Mother and Unborn Child
The introduction to the lectionary, when speaking of the Sundays of Advent, says, Each gospel reading has a specific theme: the Lord s coming in glory at the end of time (first Sunday), John the Baptist (second and third Sundays), and the events which immediately prepared for the Lord s birth (fourth Sunday) (No.11). http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/pavone-advent-a-time-to-reconcile-mother-and-unborn-child/
Pro-Abortion Emily s List Unveils More 2012 Endorsements
The pro-abortion group EMILY s List, which supports female Democratic candidates who oppose all limitations on abortion, has unveiled new endorsements in four highly-contested 2012 House races. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/pro-abortion-emilys-list-unveils-more-2012-endorsements/
NARAL Gives Fox News Hall of Shame Award, Ignores Abortion
The leading pro-abortion lobbying group NARAL has given out its Hall of Fame and Hall of Shame awards for 2011 and Fox News is the winner of its Hall of Shame award. Ironically, while the organization is all about abortion Fox wins the award because of its coverage of birth control. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/naral-gives-fox-news-hall-of-shame-aware-ignores-abortion/
Conscience Clauses Needed Worldwide for Medical Professionals
The moral conscience of health care providers is under attack. Increasingly they are being forced to provide medical services that go against their moral beliefs. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/conscience-clauses-needed-worldwide-for-medical-professionals/
Report Shows Ireland s Pro-Life Abortion Laws Benefit Women
A new report shows that Irish women have benefitted from our ban on abortion, linking our low abortion rate to low incidences of breast cancer and comparative good mental health among women. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/12/19/report-shows-irelands-pro-life-abortion-laws-benefit-women/
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