My favorite piece of info is the grassroots movement on you tube.  You can post a video of an actual abortion on facebook and people see the horror for the first time.  I don’t do this on a regular basis.  But, one time, I did muster up the courage to post Fr. Frank’s video.  Most people were disgusted (Yuck, why did you post that)  but a couple hit “like” and my sister-in-law actually called me and told me that she never thought it was a real baby until she saw the clip.  It’s not every day that you change the heart of a relative.  Thanks to the Catholic Media conversion is happening everywhere!

Life is always the better choice we must be consistent on issues of life. The cultuer of life shoul be societys platform. God bless Dr Thomas

At my college, we’ve finally formed a pro-life committee at the Newman Center, and we’re fighting back against the culture of death making us pay for abortions with tuition dollars. School is expensive enough, thanks, we have no desire to be paying for murder on campus, too.

I’m always encouraged when I hear about people who have earned a living in the abortion business getting OUT of the abortion business. Their eyes are finally open to the evil of the work they’ve been involved in. Alleluia!

My favorite is a comment I read yesterday that pretty accurately takes the measure of the times we live in:

Ghandi: “First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win.”

Great post. I think my favorite piece of good news is just what I see in my inbox: Since I’m a convert on this issue, I hear from a lot of folks who have stories similar to mine. Just yesterday I got an email from a former abortion facility worker who is now a pro-life advocate!

Praying outside of clinics has brought me a deepened understanding of the Eucharist and appreciation for the Rosary.  I could never have anticipated all the fruits that keep showing up in my life because of those Friday and Saturday mornings.

At the clinic you are confronted by pure evil. So you stand with your brothers and sisters in Christ and you call upon the Blessed Mother, the Holy Spirit and St. Michael.  Then all together you fight for the beautiful souls of the men, the women and the children who are involved in and suffer at the hands of the devil’s horrifying work.

After, when I go to Mass, my Lord is sacrificed on the alter and pure love is offered to me in His humblest of forms.  It has brought me to tears, oh how unworthy I am for such an honor. 

Participating in Christ’s suffering on the Cross has allowed me to embrace more fully His victory.  If I simply counted the amount of women who turned a way I could become discourage. Instead, I focus on the amount of prayers that are being said on behalf of those who would otherwise have no one to pray for them. And in praying for them, I am also praying for me. “O my Jesus forgive US our sins and save US from the fires of hell especially those in most need of Thy mercy.”

Praise God, that He can turn even the ugliest and most offensive of places into a tool for His glory.

I am so encouraged when I hear my teenage daughter and her friends discuss abortion. Granted they go to a catholic school and are all living in catholic homes, but to hear them articulate their sheer disgust and deep sadness over the peers and friends they have lost is incredibly powerful.  They see it so clearly, that they were saved from this genocide, and it makes it an easy choice for them to be vocal and involved in the pro-life movement.  I am very hopeful for this 40 days of life, and all that the Holy Spirit is doing in our young people.  This may very well be the generation to see abortion laws change in our country!

My hope is in the younger generation. I was in school awhile back with kids 10-15 years younger than I was, and someone brought up abortion very casually, and just as casually, people were replying that it was wrong to kill a baby. That seemed to be the general consensus. Someone said, “I feel sorry for women who don’t have a choice” and someone replied, “I feel sorrier for babies who don’t have a choice.” It wasn’t an angry or vicious debate, but one in which the pro-life position was clearly in the majority. My heart soared. I’d never heard a conversation like that.

Simcha, I love your work. I am not sure you are endorsing the whole ‘expose the shonky abortionists’ sting but I think it is a red herring of gigantic proportions. What woudl stop a pro-death politician from seeing the exposure of corrupt practices and saying “You are SO right, we really need to clean up the act and LEGISLATE for more controls on abortions, (including, of course, who we can arrest for protesting or talking to anyone outside, or putting women ‘at risk’ by suggesting they shouldn’t abort). After all, what if the police came and cleaned up their whole act? We would have a squeeky clean, respectable, law-abiding factory which murders babies just like the old one. A few cheap scores, but no win for the culture of life. The problem with abortion mills is NOT that they do shonky deals or dodgy reporting or shifty book keeping but that they murder babies.

Sometimes the pro-lifers get so engrossed in the struggle they forget that the struggle is not “us and them” (so we can try any tactic to get “them”) but life and death.

I’m excited to see the work reaching out specifically to black Americans, including billboards which draw men’s attention to the fact that “fatherhood starts in the womb.” Obviously drives the liberals nuts, but the ads are so beautiful; I hope they inspire men and women to think about whether they should even be having sex with a partner they can’t see having a child with. If we draw that connection for people, it may help them see that if they are sleeping with a deadbeat or unable to have a child, they are in fact planning an abortion. Planned Parenthood has done such a good job of obscuring that rational connection that most people blame the product of conception for being unwanted, rather than the people producing said “product.”

I just heard that 40 days for Life in less than one week saved 38 babies from abortion! Don’t forget to sign up to pray and witness for life at your local vigil. Abby Johnson left Planned Parenthood because of people who prayed for her outside the mill she managed.

Peter, I understand what you’re saying (except the word “shonky” - that’s a new one), except that I think the exposure of corruption HAS led to a change of heart in the general populace, and once it becomes “safer” or more socially acceptable to be pro-life, or at least to have doubts, then legislation follows.  Some of the legislation has become about making abortion clinics cleaner and safer (and that’s a good thing, for crying out loud—we don’t want babies dying, but we also don’t want women dying of sepsis or hemorrhaging to death on a floor), but much of it has had the direct or indirect effect of limiting abortion.

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And don’t forget that if we change hearts, it really won’t matter much what is legal or illegal: we’re talking about individual women making a choice.  A woman who sees what abortion is like is not going to care what is happening politically—she will simply see that she can’t kill her child.  The culture of life is made up of individual lives, and every time a single women decides not to have a single abortion, there is rejoicing in heaven—that’s no “cheap score.”

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What I consider to be a red herring is when some pro-lifers insist on a single tactic.  Yes, it’s a matter of life and death; but life is complicated.  Some people are called to be warriors, and make a direct attack on the enemy; some have gifts more suited to fighting on other fronts.  Some people fight the black-and-white battle, and some use the incremental approach—both are necessary.  I don’t see why this is a bad thing, any more than it’s a bad thing to run a household or a church or any other united organization with the understanding that different people have different methods of achieving a common goal. 

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I also believe that it’s not possible for abortion to become a “clean” operation.  Because of its very nature, the corruption will show through in various ways—fiscally, hygienically, etc.  So if anyone is hoping to make the abortion industry legitimate, they’d be wasting their time—it can’t happen.  Making it more squeaky clean *will* make it more rare.

Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU for posting this!  Over the past couple weeks, I have felt as though my faith and my position as a pro-life woman have been seriously under attack.  I am not a warrior, and yet it seems I frequently find myself fighting these battles where I have not the skills nor the stamina to get anywhere!  It’s been very dispiriting. In fact, I’ve been considering hermitage as the answer. ;)  Your words are VERY hopeful and I feel fortified.  Thank you!

Every time I watch the March for Life in DC I am encouraged! Half a million young, enthusiastic protestors = what could be better? The pro-life movement is definitely attracting the younger generations, and this is very good. Let the aging feminists who put their careers before child-rearing die out. We have plenty of faithful youths to take their place.

Absolutely!  Thank you for posting this. More people really need to learn the truth of the lies the abortion industry.  Outright lies and “made up” statistics.  I recently read an excerpt from a book by EWTN’s Teresa Tomeo called “Extreme Makeover” http://catholiclane.com/book-review-extreme-makeover/  and was surprised, but not shocked, at the truth behind the abortion & contraception industry and the media promotion of it. Her book discussed how we can to be transformed by Christ to overcome all this.  When will society start paying attention and wake up that we are destroying ourselves and our children?

I am very joyful because this past Oct 3, Respect Life Sunday, our pastor actually gave a great pro-life homily and also included a pro-life prayer in the general intentions!  As a member of the Respect Life Ministry for many years at our parish….this is a big deal! We all need to remember…..“With God all things are possible” !!

I was so very encouraged to read the comments in newspaper articles on the “selective reduction” in twin pregnancies, even in such liberal publications as the New York Times.  There were a lot of, “I’m pro-choice, but something about this seems wrong…”  As much of a horror as that procedure is, I think that some of the extremes of abortion are forcing people to consider their assumptions.  Much like Jennifer Fulwiler, and myself for that matter, many people around my age (31) grew up thinking very little about abortion, and when we did it was like, “Well, early on it’s not really a baby, right?  I mean, when the mom has like a belly and it can move and stuff, that’s probably not cool, but, you know, whatever, my body, my choice RAWR!!!!”  I think a lot of us held these opinions not because we’d carefully considered the issue, but because they were the proper opinions to have for “enlightened, educated” young people.  So what’s encouraging to me is when I see people really sitting down and having a think about what life is, and when it begins, they can’t hide from the truth anymore.  And with the pro-abort contingent pushing the envelope for more extreme procedures and more visibility, ironically they’re forcing people to go through that consideration.  And when we think about it, it’s obvious what the truth is, isn’t it?

I am encouraged that, for many people, the definition of pro-life has expanded beyond opposing abortion, to opposing assisted suicide, “futile care” committees, and the euthanasia movement. People with disabilities are grateful to have been born (and far too few of us are). Increasingly, we find ourselves concerned that we will not be allowed to live our natural life span. But you wanted the good news; the good news is that these trends are being fought out loud and in the open.

My husband’s sister has been a nurse at Planned Parenthood for 10+ years.

Just yesterday she turned in her notice and is going to be working at a regular outpatient surgery center. We’ve never talked directly about these things—it’s not really encouraged in his family—but everyone has known how everyone else feels. I don’t know if her heart changed, or if it was because she suffered several miscarriages in the last few years, but she said the atmosphere at work was increasingly hateful and nasty. (That report ‘from the inside’ has really encouraged me!)

All I know is that this is an answer to a lot of prayer and that I can’t stop tearing up and saying Thank You!

Great post, as always!

As per that French abortionist:  “They use their ‘conscience clause’ to justify their lack of involvement.”

I think what he’s saying touches upon another issue, that of conscience.  What does it mean to have a rightly formed conscience, and absent of good formation, does conscience then mean anything at all but a “strong feeling”?  Fr. Jay Toborowsky over at his blog, Young Fogeys, said something similar about the younger generation of Catholic priests who actually care about things like the Church’s teaching on sexuality (which seem to be applicable to the younger generation in general):  that they were told to “follow their consciences” and did, and now they’re despised or lamented by the gang who taught it to them.

Thank you for linking to the NY Times article on “reduction,” though it was very difficult to even get through. Pro choice leaders love to paint a portrait of women in desperate situations needing abortion (that’s part of the story), but I think the whole industry is held together by people like the doctor in the article who believes we have a right to “fashion our lives” as we see fit. We can’t counteract that from the trenches (though we need to be there too) but from our homes, transforming culture for the better one generation at a time. Here’s to raising more people who aren’t afraid of life in abundance.

I have some good news! I have three children (5, 2, 9months), and am going to have more, God willing. And they are all gonna know that babies are awesome. Then, unless they get swept up with a religious vocation, *they’re* gonna have babies, who will have babies, who will have babies. And my husband and I will be praying all the way for the other pro-lifers. These days, I sometimes feel being pregnant and having ALL THESE BABIES is a riotous sort of protest.
It’s nice being healthy, fertile, and making babies. It’s almost insane. Insanely wonderful, that is!

Many of the individuals I know or come across who had abortions also have/had substance abuse problems. Abortion never helped them in recovery, it only made it worst as a set back. If I had a few abortions, I would consider shooting up heroin too for the emotional pain.

Yes, Parents who abuse substances can’t raise their children, but we aren’t giving them any hope or reason for a sober lifestyle by consistently telling them they’re own life is so worthless they should terminate their children.

Erika Evans, amen to all that you’ve written.  I’m in the same boat.  Despite being a cradle Catholic and having seen The Silent Scream (I think it was) in high school, I didn’t know how to articulate Pro-Life arguments, and I didn’t know how to answer secularists at university who would shout me down about my “unsophisticated and Medieval religion.”  All of that happened at the worst possible time—when I was questioning the faith myself (I only learned in retrospect that questioning the faith is healthy;  but it’s not an invitation to turn away, it’s an invitation to go deeper.  And I didn’t know how).  I also got hung up on the “in case of rape or incest” provision, in that I knew that killing a baby would still be wrong, but I didn’t quite know how to put a finger on why it was wrong.  It’s only recently that I had it articulated to me that when a woman is raped or is the victim of incest, wherein a baby results, we have two victims:  mother and baby.  Slap-up-the-side-of-the-head simple, no?

I think that comments at The New York Times on the “two-minus-one pregnancy” are telling:  people can sense that there’s “something wrong,” but aren’t able to articulate this clearly.  Therefore, this requires thought, and like you, I’m glad that more people are thinking about life and when it begins.  The truth will indeed out.  Also, the late Professor Elizabeth Fox-Genovese, herself a Catholic convert, once spoke to a group of college women about abortion.  According to her husband, Professor Eugene Genovese, she may not have won hearts immediately and minds, and the women there disagreed respectfully, but they were clearly unamused that their feminist professors hadn’t allowed them to consider Pro-Life arguments.

What does become quite clear, though, is that although we do approach it with a religious perspective, we have to be able to know when to marshal non-religious arguments, and when not to.  One thing that I’m noticing is that whenever somebody wants to support abortion “rights,” or indeed anything that the Church teaches on sexuality, they try to frame it as an exclusively “religious” issue before it segues into classic moral relativism (“don’t impose your morality on me!”).  And yet, we need to know to have a grasp of Sacred Tradition for whenever any “Catholic” politician wants to tell us that the Church Fathers condoned abortion, thus contradicting Catholic teaching in public and assuming that anyone’s understanding of what it means to be Catholic is mostly (and exclusively) a “personal choice.”

Peter,  Apparently you’re not aware of the original reason for making abortion legal - to prevent all of those deaths from “back alley abortions” (questionable statistics on those, btw).  The exposure of these filthy, abortion centers totally throws that argument out the window.  Since the “back alley” abortionist was legitimized by Roe v Wade many more women have been harmed or killed.

Wow—love this article. Exactly the kind of concise, hard-hitting arguments we pro-lifers need to learn.

The NY Times article was downright frightening—I would have believed it was an Onion article if I didn’t know better, based on the quote, “But we created this child in such an artificial manner — in a test tube, choosing an egg donor, having the embryo placed in me — and somehow, making a decision about how many to carry seemed to be just another choice. The pregnancy was all so consumerish to begin with, and this became yet another thing we could control.”

I find it fascinating that while married women “under-represented” (their word) among women having abortions, unmarried, cohabiting women and divorced women who are not cohabitating are over-represented. For just being a “piece of paper,” marriage seems to go along way toward making people feel secure about bearing children. On the other hand, it’s still shocking that 15 percent of women who have abortions are married. Something is dreadfully wrong with those couples.

Anyone who is interested should visit www.bloodmoneyfilm.com.  The film is well worth watching to get an insider look at the abortion industry.

I’m mostly in the ‘stay at home and pray’ stage of my pro-life work- but my daughters started a girls’ club called ‘Crafters for Life’ where they crochet, knit and sew stuff to give to crisis pregnancy centers to give to moms. My oldest has made 6 quilt tops in a month (yes, I’m bragging)

When I joined the movement “officially” 11 years ago, it was exactly as you said; we joined and pushed on because it was the right thing. Within the past couple of years, with the outing of horrible things like Gosnell, I’ve started to see the tide change. It excites me to see how different things are, and it gave me the confidence to try to be more active again. 40 Days for Life just started and I plan on going out to pray, something I never felt comfortable doing until now!

I’m a sign of hope.  I’m coming back to the Church after a long absence and nothing less than the Holy Spirit helped me to see the sheer idiocy of my former “personally opposed but it should be a matter of individual conscience blahblahblah” stance.  Keep praying for others who think this way; if I can be made to see the truth (I am someone who generally learns everything the hard way), then others can, too.

My son is a public-school seventh grader.  He has buttons on his binder from the ALL and MonkRock and other pro-life sites.  Some of friends say, “Why are you so obsessed with abortion?” or “Abortion isn’t a big deal, they are just taking a baby out of the mom’s stomach.” Like it’s oh so gently on a tufted pillow or something.  So he explains to them in his rudimentary 12-year-old way the truth about abortion, and they may roll their eyes now, but I pray that someday, something he has said will strike a chord with them or help them in some situation.  So our youth are the key to changing hearts.

A source of frustration is the lack of clergy on the sidewalks at the Planned Parenthood in my city.  Most of these girls are Hispanic, so probably culturally Catholic.  To see a priest in his black garb and Roman collar would, I hope, give them pause, maybe a little twinge of shame that would lead them to take the brochure from the sidewalk counselor or glance at the ultrasound. And to know that their Church is here for them.  I know priests are busy, but thousands of humans are being murdered every day.  I would think that would be a priority to them.

The decision by the Mexican Supreme Court is definitely good news:  http://www.zenit.org/article-33576?l=english

Here’s a little piece of good news: here in Ann Arbor there was a big pro-life event on the campus of the University of Michigan, complete with graphic pictures (and also posters warning people that graphic pictures were coming up soon), and the student newspaper did a story on it, but the story was…well, not quite sympathetic, but it said “pro-life,” not “anti-choice” and had tons of articulate and convincing quotes from the people who organized it, and just a couple at the end from the other side (which was a balanced thing to do, because the counter-protest was so tiny).  (This is a publication that usually busies itself doing things like defending a new store called “Thongz n’ Bongz” trying to open up downtown.)

A week ago or so Ray Comfort unleashed his award- winning Pro-life documentary: 180 Movie (http://180movie.com/). An awesome 33-minute look at how his peaceful dialogue (with a handful of mostly college students) changed their hearts. Please watch this!

Very good news for sure.  I do believe, however, the pro-life movement is lacking understanding and too often stands behind statistics, and scientific facts when dealing with human hearts.  Several years ago mine was one of them.  My husband and I were told that our fifth child would survive only in the womb and die shortly after birth.  I knew abortion was wrong, but was sincerely begging for someone to help me understand why I was asked to carry this cross?  My pro-life friends were quite ready to use me to help make a point, to further their cause.  My pro-choice friends were ready to convert me, to convince me I was being a martyr or falling on the sword, so to speak.
Each set of arms that reached out to me felt like scouring pads full of disinfectant bleach ready to scour my wounds.  Because of this I found myself night after night sitting before the Blessed Sacrament, I felt like I sat with my eyes scrunched and ready for Mary to say, “My goodness child, all of this pro-life training and you are dreading carrying this child - shame on you!”
After I found the courage to unscrunch my eyes and unplug my ears, she said, “Child, I understand your fear.  I know your fear of falling in love with a child that will die.”  She was the healing balm for my wounds.
Our child’s feast day was recently which we celebrated and daily ask for his intercession.  If we have all of the scientific evidence, statistics and victories in our corner but lack compassion and understanding - then we still have a long way to go.  The women that walk into the abortion clinic are seeking the exact same thing I was when I sat before the Blessed Sacrament, peace, healing and the desire to not feel so afraid and alone.  Do our actions as pro-lifers serve as an invitation for others to more deeply discover Christ and His Church?  Or, at least, an invitation that anyone would wish to accept?

I have been involved in the pro-life movement in Canada since 1969 and once again participated in the Life Chain last weekend. Like many others I have picketed, demonstrated, presented petitions, marched, attended Vigils but Sunday was the first time that I did not see one rude gesture or hear a derogatroy comment and we were on a very busy street which had many businesses and a large mall.

Your actions served as a true witness to the culture of life, sometimes hardship and pain brings forward a higher moral cause. God bless you and much love. Dr Thomas

http://www.wane.com/dpp/news/local/jury:-tyler-white-guilty-of-murder
Local news about a man whose prison sentence will be extended because when he killed his estranged wife, he was knew that she was 12 weeks pregnant.  What PP might call a “blob of cells” actually received some consideration, which was encouraging.
Always interesting how “wanted” = a baby and “unwanted” = a thing.

Claire, congratulations on entering the Church!  Stay strong.
Anonymous (at 3:32), I’m so sorry for the loss of your child and for the lack of sympathy from your friends.  I’m glad you found comfort with Mary.  I miscarried a few years ago and I always thought of St. Joseph holding my baby and taking good care of him.

@ anonymous….  Bless you for carrying that difficult cross when called to.  Bless you for even having to face that decision.  How absolutely heartbreaking, I ache for you.

If you have not yet come across this story… may I direct you to http://angiesmithonline.com/ ?  Angie and Todd Smith were in a similar situation with their fourth daughter… and decided to carry her as long as God would allow them.  Angie kept a blog during this crisis - documenting the life of their dear sweet Audrey, right up to the day she was born… and lived for two hours.    You may find comfort or solace in their story.
Her husband Todd is the lead singer of the Christian group Selah… and they recorded a song called, “I Will Carry You” (also the name of Angie’s book)  both are beautiful…. and I simply recommend seeking them out if you think they might speak to you.

Also a lovely resource for those who have suffered miscarriage.  When I got the book, I got 12 pages in and only set it down long enough to go to my computer to order and send a copy for my friend who had miscarried earlier that month…. with a note saying, “I don’t know when you will be ready to read this, but when you do, you will find a friend.”    It was a great help for her… and we now refer to the author as “our friend, Angie.”

In 15 years of toiling for the prolife cause (including at the homefront…we only have 8 children but with the grace of God we can catch you!) the greatest moments are the ones like this morning when a young woman approached a group of us praying outside the largest abortion provider in Jacksonville,Fl. She said,” Hi I’m Brandi and this is my son can we join you?” We responded"of course!” She said it was the only way she could imagine celebrating her 1 year old son’s birthday, as she had been on her way to abort him just over a year ago when she saw people praying in front of the clinic where she was going to kill her 2nd child.She changed her mind and is very happy to rejoice with her son today! God is great all the time! We should allow him to show us more often.

http://www.ewtn.com/vexperts/showresult.asp?RecNum=555885&Forums=0&Experts=0&Days=2008&Author;=&Keyword=leaving+the+99&pgnu=1&groupnum=0&record_bookmark=2&ORDER_BY_TXT=ORDER+BY+ReplyDate+DESC&start;_at=

My young son (six), overheard a discussion on abortion the other day, and asked, “What’s abortion?”  I prayed for a brief moment, then said, “And abortion is when a lady who is pregnant goes to a doctor and pays money to have the baby killed.”
There was total silence from his seat in the van.  My husband, who was driving, half turned and said, “Can you believe that, son?  I can’t.  Even before I became Catholic, I knew that was wrong.  Even before I became a daddy I knew that was wrong.  It’s just something people know is wrong.”

This, coming from a man who is wonderful and a faithful Catholic, but also very much in this world.  To know that even as a secular teenager and young adult, he always knew abortion was wrong gives me hope.

This article is like a glass of water into the desert of West relativism, as the good news, the Gospel of Life, alleluia!

The second to the last abortion clinic in the entire state of Missouri is effectively out of business- due to losing yet another abortionist. One more to go!

Early in the last century abortion was a non-issue.
My mother (in The Netherlands) gave birth to 16 healthy children.    As number 14 I was born in 1933. Seven of us are still alive and I am grateful being able to write this.

Thank you for this encouragement, Simcha. I have been very depressed during this beginning of 40 Days for Life. Seeing women and couples leave our local abortion mill has been so draining and sad.

Then, this past Sunday at Life Chain, one driver took both hands off the wheel to give us the middle finger on both hands, and he nearly crashed into the car in front of him. Another woman got as close to all of us as she could and laid on the horn as she drove down the line, waving her middle finger in the air.

It’s hard not to be depressed, ya know?

I will be doing the 40 days for life thing starting next week (after my midterms are over)... All I can say is, take this rule: For every “middle finger” you get, do an extra Hail Mary…

This morning I was outside a planned parenthood death camp and a young woman roled down her window and lambasted the two of us women who were standing there peacefully praying. Right across the street is a daycare center and her nephew goes there who is only 5 years old and we don’t have any business holding signs that say pray for and end to abortion. She asked us if we think at all about the consequences that we incur on parents and their young innocent children who ask about what an abortion is. She was really upset. After she left I was encouragd somehow in the spirit with this thought, “Let’s end abortion, eradicate it from this world and we can live in a better world.” This gave me energy to keep on keeping on. Let’s not ever give up on behalf of ALL children.

What is the truth?  Just a few weeks ago the news was that nearly all medical schools in the USA were not even allowing pre-med hopefuls in if they were not pro-abortion and that it was very difficult to find a truly pro-life OBGYN or doctor who delivered babies.  Now this article states the majority of doctors are pro-life and that the abortion doctors are dieing of old age.  Both articles can’t be correct.  What is the truth?

Your antichoice feelings are well and good and I support your right to have them.
However, how many of you are willing to adopt a child that you have decided must be born?  If you make antichoice the law of the land are you willing to fight for federal funding to support these “babies” after they are born.

Keep your laws off my body.  Women are not stupid human beings who don’t have command of their brains.  The choice should be between a woman and her doctor, not the government and not a bunch of people who have no stake in the matter.

Hang in there, Kate!  You may never know just how much you matter.  It helps to keep up with their blog.  They have saved 52 lives.  I heard one woman say that in our spot there was a “save” this morning.
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The second day it rained, and I for some reason am always sluggish when it rains…I thought, I can’t be losing steam already…that night there was a huge rainbow.  No kidding.  Noah got his at the end, how nice that we got ours at the beginning!
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When we get the finger, we have one lady who says quietly, “Yes we are Number One.  Thanks!” :)

Dear Cathy,
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I’m glad you support my right to have ‘feelings’—just so you know though, I am going to have them whether people support them or not.
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Would it surprise you to know that there is typically a six-month-to-a-year waiting list to adopt an infant?  Somebody is clearly doing it.  I’m afraid circumstances do not permit us all to.  Nobody can do everything.  Everybody can do something.
I did not decide to make a child.  Does it not follow that if one takes the actions that make a child, they should be prepared to follow through, or not act that way at all?
Why is it that you seem to think the only alternative is federal funding?  Doesn’t anybody remember how to do real face-to-face, neighbor-to-neighbor charity?
I will gladly keep off your body.  But the laws we want made are to keep an abortionist’s instruments off someone else’s body, namely, a baby’s.
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Re: ‘people who have no stake…’ I would argue that we all do have a very clear stake in this.  It’s about whether we as a supposedly civilized nation protect the small and vulnerable among us.  Ever read Donne’s Meditation?  You probably know it.  ‘No man is an island entire of himself…therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.’
I agree 100% that women are not stupid.  So, I am gently prompting you to look beyond the talking points.  We are not stupid, and more and more of us refuse to be treated as if we are when we are told that killing our own children is the solution to our problems.  Talk about patronizing!  Don’t you think?

There is another, incredibly beautiful side to the pro- life movement that has me encouraged - the growing army of families moving heaven and earth to rescue children with special needs out of orphanages all over the world.  The culture of death in our own country has all but eliminated Down Syndrome here (and there are waiting lists to adopt a child with DS domestically, too!), but in poorer countries these children are often warehoused and treated with less regard than any animal in the US. 

These families give beautiful witness to the sanctity of life both at home and overseas.  It is lifechanging to follow their stories and see the changes that the love of a family brings to these children.  Not many Catholics doing this as of yet, but praying this will change.

@Susie…. I heard about med-schools’ way of keeping out Pro-Lifers… which is why I planned that I would go to the interview, be all “crazy feminist pro-choice”... and if by the will of God I get to go to med school and (if I may dream some more) even graduate… then I’ll back-stab all those freaks and build a pro-life career. They can then sue me for every last penny I have and take away my right to practice…. but I will NEVER advise a young girl/woman to kill her HUMAN baby! I already know 4 pro-life christians in med-school… so there is hope!

@Cathy Carey What you’re saying is like telling the people who wanted to protect the Jews during WWII:” HEY, IF YOU’RE NOT GONNA ADOPT THEM…LET US KILL THEM….NAZIS (women) AREN’T STUPID AND THEY KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH THEIR COUNTRY (body)!”
And guess what? it costs $25,000 to adopt a healthy child from the private adoption agencies here in Canada…... how much does it cost for an abortion? $50? free? well…. switch the two prices, and you’ll see how people will flock to adopt kids!! Market 101 :P

No women has the right to kill the child within her and the women should be prevented from doing so. It is amazing that we as a culture have sunk so low into barbarism that we kill our own young. And even worse, people seem to think it is we (those of us against the murder of our children)that have the problem!

Malaka, you have every right to your opinion but you misunderstand my statement and you didn’t have to shout.

It seems that people in the prolife movement are much more concerned with the yet to be born than they are with the resulting children.  For example cutting funds for WIC, childcare, etc.

In no way did I mean to equate you with Nazi’s.

Dear Enness, Thank you for your thoughtful comments.  Would it surprise you to know that over the last 27 years the number of abortions has been reduced?  Perhaps children are not available for adoption because contraceptives are more readily available.  As for my belief in federal support it is because I rarely see good old fashioned charity anymore.  My point was meant to convey that the anti-choice movement seems to care more about the unborn than they do once a child is actually present in this world.

Can some one answer a little question for me?  Many pro-life movement seem to be working towards the eradiction of Planned Parenthood for their willingness to preform abortions and will point the women toward Crisis   Pregnancy Centers, which is all well and good - a great
alternative.  But what about the other services PP provides to women who lack money and insurance for health care?  I know many women who’d never dream of having an abortion, but have found that PP is the only place she can go to get screening for things like cervical cancer screening and prevention, breast cancer, UTIs, paps and other womens health issues.  While I don’t support one side of the PP business I do, in theory, support the other side (the solely womens health side) and I’d hate to see us loose a resource if another is not readily available.  Not wanting to start a debate on supporting an agency you don’t 100% agree on, just would love someone to point me in the direction of an actual resource.