This is one of those stories that leaves you wondering what the pro-choice crowd will come up with next. Have you heard about the laws in Baltimore (and now Austin!) that target the free speech and exercise of religion rights of pro-life pregnancy care centers?
The Greater Baltimore Center for Pregnancy Concerns is one target of recent city legislation requiring pro-life organizations to post signs stating that they do not provide abortion services or birth control.
The Archdiocese of Baltimore, which donates space to the pregnancy center, isn’t taking the legal bullying lying down. They’re suing:
“The lawsuit claims that pro-life groups are targeted by this ordinance which ‘targets for speech regulation only one side of a contentious public, political debate.’ ... ‘Filing a federal lawsuit against the city is a big step and we wish the city had not put us in this position,’ Mr. Caine said. “However, the principles at issue are so important and the ordinance so clearly violates the law that we felt we needed to file the lawsuit. We believe the ordinance targets these centers because of their pro-life mission.’
The archdiocese also asserts the signs are forcing the CPCs to lie. The CPCs do provide birth control - in a fashion - it said in the lawsuit, in terms of abstinence and natural family planning (NFP), a system by which couples time their sexual intimacy according to a woman’s monthly cycle. It quotes a federal Department of Health and Human Services Web site as asserting that NFP and abstinence both constitute birth control.”
If truth in advertising of services is really a concern here, I think truthful signs should be required at abortion clinics too. How do “We won’t help you keep your baby” or “We won’t report cases of child rape” or “We will hide facts about your body and your baby’s development from you” sound?
Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, the “pro-choice” city council president who introduced this ordinance in the first place, has since gone on to become mayor of Baltimore (Congratulate her—she’s going to be a “special guest” at Planned Parenthood-Maryland’s upcoming gala fundraiser event!).
With that kind of connection and cash flow, I don’t know what this law suit’s chances are for finding success. However it turns out, though, I am gratified to see the archdiocese standing up for the rights of the little guys—pro-lifers who truly care about and support women and their babies.
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As a neighbor to this diocese (and former ‘member’) this is the usual tact of the city. Ignoring the huge amount of great work the diocese does for the poor and underserved people it is attacking an amazing work.
It is so hard not to be amazed at the bias of the ruling in that it so clearly targets pregnancy centers. They are not asking PP places to put up signs saying they won’t help with baby clothes, formula or every day costs should the mother chose life. Nor do they tell a hardware store to inform customers that they don’t sell milk.
This action against the centers is just one more way the abortion industry is determined to show women - particularly pregnant women - as stupid.
Heaven forbid a woman should accidentally let her baby live.
I agree with Rachel—this is really getting ridiculous.
I actually agree with this. I think all pro-life facilities should-on their own free will-post such signs.
Even though the tactic bullying is wrong, the policy in of itself is a good thing. The signs should’ve been posted in the first place.
They should just put up a sign:
This is a no kill pregnancy center.
Maryland is a prime test area for any type of social engineering or radical left-wing policy. Pro-abortion activists really fear the message that women may get once inside the walls of a Crisis Pregnancy Center. They want to have this type of bullying against these caring agencies become law across the country.
Congratulations to our Archbishop and the Diocese for contesting this ordinance in the courts.
The thought control police is not an idle consideration. “Face the facts fearlessly” as Fr. Paul Marx OSB lived and taught us. If Baltimore CPCs and Austin CPCs are forced to use language which describes their services, Danielle Bean is right… Abortion clinics should be so regulated. I nominate Caution: Entering Baby Killing Zone. What do you recommend?
Obviously, considering that lack of abortion is the gravest violation of civil rights since the beginning of humanity is the root of it. A woman won’t have her baby chopped up: that’s a bad thing? Rwanda in 1994 underwent something even worse (cf. Immaculee Ilibiganza’s book “Left to Tell”: where was Planned Parenthood stepping up for rights there?
As for another potential planned parenthood requrement:
We’ll take care of your baby, so you don’t have to.
To some degree as well though, I think a pregnancy help center would already be known as a not-abortion place. In all honesty, why is Planned Parenthood so adamant about having them post signs? A gas station doesn’t have to say, “Notice: we sell gas”.
Also, if my first message gave any hint I like Planned Parenthood, I didn’t communicate well. They are not a help for anyone wanting to do REAL good: only to feed emotion and then to fill their pockets. As well, they aren’t helping to plan parenthood, since parenthood actually means to have children (at least that’s what humanity has understood since, well, forever).
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