Pro-life laws are reducing the abortion rate

Any time there’s a pro-life law, you can be sure pro-abortion activists will be on-hand to protest with vile and obnoxious signs; dramatic chanting of “abortion-on-demand without apology;” and their go-to symbol, a bloody clothes hanger. I witnessed this behavior firsthand when debates raged over pro-life legislation in Texas last summer.

It’s all a deplorable display. They’re willing to brazenly fight common-sense protections that ensure women’s health and safety. And they fiercely oppose any attempt to give women informed consent and true choice. Make no mistake; these individuals want absolutely nothing to stand in the way of abortion. And pro-life laws are proving to be their number one adversary.

How effective are pro-life laws at lowering the incidence of abortion? A study by Michael New, assistant professor at the University of Michigan-Dearborn, provides a meta-analysis of 20 years of abortion data compiled by the Guttmacher Institute and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. His research reveals that pro-life laws are reducing abortion rates. Here’s how:

• Public Funding Restrictions – Some states provide public funding for abortions. In 15 out of 18 cases, abortion rates fell after Medicaid funding was reduced. Specifically in the state of North Carolina, there was not only a decrease in the abortion rate, but an increase in the birthrate was observed months later. The findings concluded that 37% of the women who would have otherwise had an abortion carried their child to term when funding was not available.
  
• Parental Involvement Laws – Pro-abortion activists have denounced laws involving parents, saying you can’t legislate good family communication. Yet in 16 peer-reviewed studies there was a statistical decline in the number of abortions of minors in states where these laws were enacted. The difference ranged from 13% to as high as 42%.
  
• Informed Consent Laws – There are variations in how these laws are enacted. Some require a counseling visit prior to an abortion; others specify how information about development in the womb is communicated. It’s estimated that viewing color photos of the unborn baby’s development results in a 3% to 7% reduction in the abortion rate. In-person counseling can reduce rates by as much as 12%.
  

 The full article published by State Politics & Policy Quarterly is available at this link.

Pro-life laws are proving that abortion-on-demand is NOT the solution women want or need. By offering women life-affirming alternatives, more mothers are realizing that they can choose life for their babies. And the exciting part is we’re at the cusp of seeing more fruit from our efforts. Over 220 pro-life laws have been passed at the state level since 2011. Imagine the lives we’ll see saved in the next 5 to 10 years.

This celebration comes with a caution however. The pro-aborts fight us tooth and nail every step of the way. One recent example is US Senate bill 1696 with the misleading name, “Women’s Health Protection Act.” This is radical pro-abortion legislation that’ll wipe out all pro-life laws ever passed by both the federal and state levels of government. This will leave women completely vulnerable to the abortion industry, without any protections or regulations. They’re determined to make abortion-on-demand the law of the land. Obviously, it’s our responsibility to make sure that doesn’t happen.

Take a stand by contacting your senators today and ask them to oppose Senate bill 1696. Let them know that pro-life laws are making a difference and saving lives.

Reprinted with permission from Life Issues Institute, INC.

Brad Mattes, Executive Director, Life Issues Institute via LifeSiteNews.com

Tax-Funded PBS to Air Propaganda Film “Humanizing” Docs Who Do Third-Trimester Abortions

Looking for something to do on Labor Day? The taxpayer-funded PBS has an answer for you:  a move that “humanizes” late-term abortionists who kill unborn children in the third-trimester.

“After Tiller” profiles Warren Hern, Shelley Sella, LeRoy Carhart, and Susan Robinson, some of the last third-trimester abortionists left in the United States.
On September 1, PBS will be showing the pro-abortion propaganda film “After Tiller” that seeks to sanitize the practice of killing unborn children after viability in late-term abortions. The station also provides resources for people to host an at-home viewing party.

That may sound sick to you, but the taxpayer-funded television station prefers to describe the movie this way:

Martha Shane and Lana Wilson’s After Tiller is a deeply humanizing and probing portrait of the only four doctors in the United States still openly performing third-trimester abortions in the wake of the 2009 assassination of Dr. George Tiller in Wichita, Kansas—and in the face of intense protest from abortion opponents.

It is also an examination of the desperate reasons women seek late abortions. Rather than offering solutions, After Tiller presents the complexities of these women’s difficult decisions and the compassion and ethical dilemmas of the doctors and staff who fear for their own lives as they treat their patients.

The PBS web site even includes a quote from the liberal Washington Post extolling the virtues of the movie.

“After Tiller does viewers the great service of providing light where there’s usually only heat, giving a human face and heart to what previously might have been an abstract issue or quickly scanned news item.”

Promoting abortions after viability as a great service? Your taxpayer dollars at work…

LifeNews.com by Steven Ertelt

Illinois to double funding for IUDs, sterilizations after Hobby Lobby decision

 
In the wake of the recent Supreme Court Hobby Lobby decision, the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services (HFS) has proposed a massive increase in the amount of taxpayer-funded subsidies available for the contraception, sterilization, and abortifacient drugs most commonly opposed by religiously faithful employers.

The HFS is also threatening to force faith-based doctors who refuse to provide the drugs and procedures to refer their patients to people who will.

HFS Director Julie Hanos told the Chicago Tribune that Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn and the Illinois HFS were “very concerned” by the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Hobby Lobby case.  She said the department is working closely with Planned Parenthood and other groups to develop new guidelines to minimize the ruling’s impact.

The Hobby Lobby ruling came down in response to a challenge to the controversial Obamacare contraception mandate, which requires employers to provide health insurance plans that cover contraceptives, sterilizations and abortion-causing drugs without copay, regardless of religious objection.

The high court ruled that closely-held private companies can opt out of providing such coverage if it violates the owners’ religious beliefs.

In response HFS has proposed a doubling in the amount of reimbursement available through Medicaid for IUDs and vasectomies as an incentive for Planned Parenthood and other providers to offer them.
Although the increased funding will be available only through Medicaid – the state-run health care system for lower-income patients – and not employer-based health care, Hamos said the Hobby Lobby ruling fueled the changes and prompted the state to go public with them much earlier than planned.

“It is an opportune time when women across the country are paying attention … that's a time that we can really use that attention to focus on what's available to them through Medicaid," Hamos told the Tribune.

The department has also proposed increases in reimbursement rates for the controversial Essure sterilization method, which is billed as a less-invasive alternative to tubal ligation for women. Essure has come under fire by consumer advocacy groups after thousands of women have complained of dangerous complications ranging from infections, to chronic pain, organ damage and even death.

While the proposed changes in reimbursement apply only to Medicaid recipients, Hamos noted that many women on the lower end of the employment spectrum frequently switch between Medicaid and employer-based healthcare as they cycle through multiple jobs.  She said she hoped the changes would allow such women to obtain sterilization or long-term contraception regardless of whether area employers cover them or not.

As a means to that end, the proposed guidelines would also eliminate the current “step therapy” rules that require women to try less costly methods of contraception before forcing taxpayers to foot the bill for more expensive drugs or procedures.  "It should be all about preventing and respecting the choice that [a woman] makes and how to do that,” Hamos told the Tribune.

Meanwhile, Illinois officials are also examining whether they can circumvent federal conscience protection laws that prevent the state from forcing Catholic and other religious medical providers to provide information about contraceptives, sterilization, abortifacients, or other drugs and procedures to which they morally object.

Illinois’ proposed workaround would force such providers to refer any patients who ask for information about morally offensive treatments to providers who offer them without reserve.

Planned Parenthood praised the proposed guidelines.  "This is a great way to give women access to the contraceptives they need in a timely fashion and have every contraceptive available to them," Pam Sutherland, vice president for public policy and education for Planned Parenthood of Illinois, told the Tribune.

If approved, the new guidelines will go into effect October 10.

Illinois HFS is taking public comment on the proposed changes through September 15.

To comment on the proposed guidelines, you can e-mail Illinois HFS by clicking here.

LifeSiteNews.com by Kirsten Andersen

After Losing to Hobby Lobby, Obama Admin Pushes Crippling Fines for HHS Mandate Violators

After losing to Hobby Lobby at the Supreme Court in a case about whether certain businesses who object to paying for abortion-causing drugs for their employees must follow the HHS mandate, the Obama administration has revised the HHS mandate rules.


The revisions target religious nonprofits and those pro-life companies like Hobby Lobby.
The Obama administration released a fact sheet on the newly-proposed HHS mandate rule pertaining to non-profit organizations and closely held for-profit entities, like Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties. The factsheet on the new rules makes it clear that the HHS mandate violates the conscience rights of non-profit organizations and family businesses across the country.
According to the factsheet, the Obama administration will publish two new regulations relating to the HHS preventive services mandate. One is an interim final rule regarding an additional mechanism for non-profits to provide notification of their objection to the mandate. The second is a proposed final rule and request for comment on applying an accommodation procedure to for-profit businesses, like family-owned companies Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood.

The upshot of the new rules? As Arina Grossu, Director for the Center for Human Dignity at the Family Research Council, tells LifeNews, it’s “the threat of crippling fines on non-profits who stand up for their freedom of conscience.”

“What remains an insulting accounting gimmick does not protect the rights of Americans with sincere conscientious objections. It is simply another clerical layer to an already existing accounting gimmick that does nothing to protect religious freedom because the employer still remains the legal gateway by which these drugs and services will be provided to their employees,” she said. “It’s very disappointing that the Obama administration is doubling down on its plans to punish charities and non-profits that assist the poor and homeless, who in some cases have nowhere else to turn for assistance.”

“Effective immediately, this latest rule still orders charities like the Little Sisters of the Poor, non-profit Christian colleges like Wheaton College, and religious broadcasters like EWTN to violate their consciences simply because they legally contract for health coverage,” Grossu continued. “The government uses their contract as the basis to force their insurers to provide their employees with free contraception and drugs that can kill human embryos, against their sincere conscientious beliefs.”

“If these charities and non-profits follow their conscience and decline to participate in the meaningless accounting gimmick, the administration will make them pay huge penalties accruable on a daily basis — one hundred dollars per employee per day,” she said.

“Additionally, the government is also soliciting comment on new ways to force family businesses to violate their deeply held moral and religious convictions due to the HHS mandate in an attempt to address and skirt the recent Supreme Court ruling. However, the government’s actions here still force family businesses to be complicit in what they view as morally wrong,” Grossu added.

Per the CMS factsheet, the interim final rule will create an additional option for how religious nonprofits may register their objection to the HHS preventive services mandate. Instead of filling out the self-certification form (created in the July 2013 final rules), a religious nonprofit may notify HHS in writing of its objection.

Then, as the factsheet provided by CMS goes on to explain, “HHS will then notify the insurer for an insured health plan, or the Department of Labor will notify the TPA for a self-insured plan, that the organization objects to providing contraception coverage and that the insurer or TPA is responsible for providing enrollees in the health plan separate no-cost payments for contraceptive services for as long as they remain enrolled in the health plan. Regardless of whether the eligible organization self-certifies in accordance with the July 2013 final rules, or provides notice to HHS in accordance with the August 2014 IFR, the obligations of insurers and/or TPAs regarding providing or arranging separate payments for contraceptive services are the same, as discussed in this Fact Sheet. The interim final rule solicits comments but is effective on date of publication in the Federal Register.”

The accommodation created under the July 2013 final rule remains in effect. Today’s announcement creates another notification procedure, which produces the same effect. There are over 50 cases of religious nonprofits suing in objection to the adequacy of the accommodation created by the July 2013 final rule.

In addition, today’s announcement includes notice of a proposed rule to apply the “accommodation” to certain for-profit companies. This includes a request for comments on a new proposed rule for how to define closely-held corporations and how these for-profit organizations (like Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood) will provide notification of their objection to providing contraception coverage.


Grossu, of the Family Research Council, told LifeNews, “The Family Research Council urges the administration to offer a full exemption from the mandate to charities and non-profits that have sincere conscientious objections and to respect the Supreme Court’s ruling regarding family businesses like Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties.”
Lori Windham, Senior Counsel for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, told LifeNews that charities should not be punished for standing up for their pro-life beliefs.

“Religious ministries in these cases serve tens of thousands of Americans, helping the poor and homeless and healing the sick. The Little Sisters of the Poor alone serve more than ten thousand of the elderly poor. These charities want to continue following their faith. They want to focus on ministry—such as sharing their faith and serving the poor—without worrying about the threat of massive IRS penalties,” she said.

LifeNews.com by Steven Ertelt

Obama administration announces new HHS mandate rules

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The Department of Health and Human Services issued on Friday new rules regarding its contraception mandate, which address both non-profits and closely held for-profit entities.

Sylvia Burwell, HHS secretary, said Aug. 22 that the new rules will ensure access to free contraception, “while respecting religious considerations raised by non-profit organizations and closely held for-profit companies.”

The HHS department has issued a mandate under the 2010 Affordable Care Act which requires employers to offer health insurance covering contraception, sterilization and some drugs that can cause early abortions.

It has been particular burden for Catholics and others with pro-life religious and moral convictions. Non-compliance with the mandate is punished by severe fines.

While the mandate includes a narrow religious exemption for houses of worship, non-profit organizations had been offered an “accommodation,” under which a religious employer would sign a form authorizing another company or third party to provide payments for the products they find objectionable.

The new rules announced Friday “are in response to recent court decisions,” the HHS stated.

For non-profits, the newly issued rules “lay out an additional way for organizations eligible for an accommodation to provide notice of their religious objection to providing coverage for contraceptive services,” the Health and Human Services department stated Aug. 22.

“The rule allows these eligible organizations to notify the Department of Health and Human Services in writing of their religious objection to providing contraception coverage. HHS and the Department of Labor will then notify insurers and third party administrators so that enrollees in plans of such organizations receive separate coverage for contraceptive services, with no additional cost to the enrollee or the employer.”

“The interim final rule solicits comments, but goes into effect upon publication.”

Regarding closely held for-profits, such as Hobby Lobby, the HHS said it is “issuing a proposed rule soliciting comments on how it might extend” to them “the same accommodation that is available to non-profit religious organizations.”

“Under the proposal, these companies would not have to contract, arrange, pay or refer for contraceptive coverage to which they object on religious grounds. The proposal seeks comment on how to define a closely held for-profit company and whether other steps might be appropriate to implement this policy.”

On June 30, the Supreme Court ruled that closely held for-profit corporations – such as Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Services – are protected against the mandate by the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

The two closely-held businesses, run by Protestant and Mennonite owners, objected to aspects of the HHS rule that require them to provide coverage for drugs that they believe can cause abortions.

The ruling quickly led to the introduction in the Senate of a bill aiming to thwart the Supreme Court's decision, co-sponsored by Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) and Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.).

The HHS department's Aug. 22 release noted that the Obama administration “continues to encourage Congress to act to ensure that women affected by the Supreme Court’s Hobby Lobby decision have access to the same coverage options offered to others.”

At least 100 lawsuits filed by more than 300 plaintiffs have challenged the constitutionality of the HHS mandate. In the wake of the Hobby Lobby ruling, the closely-held entity Mersino Management Company won an injunction against the mandate from the Sixth Circuit Appeals Court, and the Supreme Court granted a similar injunction to Wheaton College, a Protestant liberal arts college in Illinois.

CNA/EWTN News

Abortion Activist Who Attacked Pro-Lifers Ordered to Pay Restitution

The abortion backer who attacked a pro-life man in a profane rant captured on video last month has been ordered to pay restitution and the case has been closed.

Mark Harrington, founder of Created Equal, whose group held abortion victim signs which enraged the abortion activist, provided the update on the case. Previously, Harrinton and Seth Drayer, who was physically attacked (video below) while leading a group of pro-life students in sharing the pro-life message in downtown Columbus, Ohio, said they would drop the charges if Victoria Duran would meet with them.

“We’re willing to drop the charges,” Harrington told Fox News, “In fact, I’ve asked for a meeting with her – if she’s willing to apologize. Seth and I are both Christians, we believe in forgiveness, we’ve already forgiven her. But, if she’s not remorseful she needs to own up to what she’s done.”
The video shows a woman in a Burger King shirt attacking the pro-lifers.

During the attack, she says, ““You’re just a white f—— privileged racist f—— male who doesn’t stand for women’s rights.” The abortion advocate adds, “No uterus, no right to talk about it. Understand, Mother f—–?”

The abortion backer has been identified as Victoria Duran and she is seen on video yelling at the protestors and kicking down their signs.

ABC6/FOX28 caught up with Duran hours later and asked her about her actions.

“The first amendment protects them from government interference it doesn’t protect them from people basically telling them they’re idiots. But you assaulted them? Assault I wouldn’t necessarily say shoving them aside and telling them to keep the camera out of my face as assault. You think it’s okay to push people? I believe that I had the right to tel them the did not have my consent to film me,” said Duran.


WARNING: The following video contains graphic images and language.


LifeNews.com by Steven Ertelt

Lefty Blogger Starts Taco-Or-Beer Challenge to Fund Abortion

As the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge sweeps the internet, abortion activists have decided to put their own spin on the viral fundraising effort. Instead of encouraging individuals to donate to charities to fight a debilitating disease like ALS, abortion activists are pushing for donations to fund the killing of unborn children. The so-called “Taco or Beer Challenge” calls on participants to enjoy a taco or a beer, or both, and then donate money to pay for abortions.

According to its originator, the “benefit” is that unlike the Ice Bucket Challenge, no one has to dump water on their head and someone gets funding for an abortion.

“Abortion is common. Abortion is normal. And abortion is safest when it is legal and accessible—something abortion funds help to ensure in an increasingly hostile political climate,” says Andrea Grimes at pro-abortion blog RH Reality Check.

However, the reality is that abortion is not safe and never could be. In every abortion, there are two victims; an unborn baby who loses his or her life and a mother who is left to grieve the loss.

Science shows us that by 20 weeks, an unborn baby is capable of feeling pain. As that baby is ripped limb from limb in a late abortion, he or she dies in excruciating pain.

And that horrific tragedy merits “charitable” donations? No, it doesn’t.

It’s pretty sad to watch a cause designed to aid vulnerable individuals struggling with a disease be twisted into an effort to raise money for the destruction of vulnerable unborn babies. Women should be empowered with resources and support to make life-affirming decisions that respect their lives and the lives of their unborn children.

In response, pro-life individuals should take this opportunity to stand up for unborn children and their mothers. While a radical fringe gives money to pay for abortions, we can do our part to support mothers-in-need and advocate for measures that ensure legal protection for unborn babies.

Donate to save lives, not destroy them: http://www.ifrl.org/ifrl/donate/

NRL News

This is not a conspiracy theory: Planned Parenthood is targeting black women with this dangerous drug

Why is Planned Parenthood pushing this dangerous vaccine on minority women? When I worked for Planned Parenthood, I found out.

Ben Johnson recently wrote a great article about the damaging effects of the Gardasil (HPV) vaccine. You should all take a minute and read it here.

In his article, he talks about women who have died, 96 to be exact. And those are just the ones that have been reported.  He talks about women who have lost their fertility after receiving the highly regarded HPV vaccine. But the main focus of the article is how the Gardasil vaccine is being heavily promoted to the African-American community through ad placement on BET (Black Entertainment Television).

When I read his article, my conspiracy alarms went off. Now, I’m not a conspiracy theorist (although I find people who are quite entertaining). But when I heard about these ads, my memory was triggered. Of course Planned Parenthood is trying to target minorities with this vaccine…they are getting big reimbursement for injecting their low income patients with this dangerous drug! Then I knew I had to write this article about my own experience inside Planned Parenthood regarding Gardasil.

When Gardasil came out, Planned Parenthood was PUMPED. “Such a wonderful way to serve women,” they said. “This will help prevent cancer for so many young women,” one of my coworkers raved. But then I heard the real reason behind the excitement, “We are going to make so much money off of this vaccine.” Bingo. Of course they were excited. Each injection was going to cost around $200, and women have to get three to be “fully protected.” Six hundred dollars for a vaccine. That was a lot of money.

 

But then I thought to myself, “Our clients don’t have $600 for a vaccine. This is going to be a huge flop.”

What I didn’t know about at that time was the “Merck Vaccine Assistance Program.” Merck is the manufacturer of Gardasil. This program would pay 100% for the cost of the vaccine itself. Our patients would just have to pay a little $30 “injection fee” per vaccine. Ninety dollars versus six hundred was definitely doable.

Next we were instructed to offer Gardasil to EVERY woman 11-26 who walked through our doors. “Oh, you are here for a vaginal infection? How about a vaccine, too?” “Oh, I see you marked that you had Herpes and need treatment. Well, you better get this vaccine so you won’t get genital warts, too.” These may seem funny, but it was seriously how we were told to sell this vaccine to our clients.

So, we started signing people up by the dozens. We faxed off countless applications for the “Vaccine Assistance Program.” Almost everyone was approved (most of our clients were low income). We were running out of vaccines. Those little bottles were flying off our refrigerator shelves at around $170 a piece, for which Planned Parenthood was being reimbursed by the Merck program.

I don’t know if any of these women came back in with complications. I don’t know if they presented to the ER with problems. It’s not like we did any follow up. Heck, I don’t even know if they got all three doses. My gut tells me that 80% of them did not. 

Back to the conspiracy idea. Planned Parenthood just ran a series of ads promoting Gardasil on BET (Black Entertainment Television). Ninety-six women have died, several have experienced sterility, and yet Planned Parenthood launches a big campaign targeting the African-American community?

The pro-life movement has talked for years about how Planned Parenthood targets our minority community in the United States. And even if we totally scrap the fact that the founder of Planned Parenthood, Margaret Sanger, was a raging racist we can still look and find racism inside of the organization.

I’ve written before about the document that we were NOT to talk about inside of Planned Parenthood…the "Jaffe Memo." Here is my article about that memo and what it entailed. This document was written in the late '60s by a high level official with Planned Parenthood. You will notice some really interesting ideas in the document.

“Fertility control agents in water supply”
“Eliminate Welfare payments after first 2 children”
“Encourage increased homosexuality”
“Compulsory sterilization of all who have two children except for a few who would be allowed three”
“Payments to encourage abortion”

The document was proposed to the Population Council (a eugenics-based population control organization led by its first president, Frederick Osborn, who also served as the President of the American Eugenics Society). This was one of Planned Parenthood’s first attempts (after Margaret Sanger’s shenanigans) to reduce the minority population.

We also know that currently over 70% of Planned Parenthood facilities are located in low income, high minority communities. We know that more than 50% of African-American pregnancies end in abortion. We know that Planned Parenthood has dumped tons of money into “Promotora” programs that go into Latino communities and convince them that Planned Parenthood is the ONLY place they can go for health care. And now, they are targeting these same communities for the dangerous Gardasil vaccine.

I mean, am I crazy? How is it that rational people can’t see what Planned Parenthood is doing here? I’ve never been of the belief that Planned Parenthood operates solely out of racism, but strictly sees money-making opportunities and goes for them…unfortunately, that is usually at the expense of minority women.

And the bottom line is that this will continue to happen until these minority communities wake up to the realization that Planned Parenthood is USING them to pad their bottom line. They don’t care about health care for minorities. They care about making money off of you! This won’t stop until people stand up to this abortion giant and say “NO MORE.” What will it take for these Black and Hispanic women to simply say, “We will not be used. We will not be your pawns. We will no longer be lied to. We are better than Planned Parenthood.”

Kris Ford, an African-American woman who runs Women’s Health and Justice Initiative, said it better than I can.  “Planned Parenthood has ignored the voices of women of color and the organizations that women of color lead for years. Planned Parenthood continues to raise large sums of money off of issues of reproductive justice while framing the issues as a binary that leaves out the experiences of women and communities of color.” It’s time to do something about it. Stop buying the lie.

LifeSiteNews.com by Abby Johnson

Ice Bucket Challenge Donation Sponsor ALS Funds Embryonic Stem Cell Research

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The popularity of the #IceBucketChallenge continues on social media across the nation. This is the campaign to raise awareness about amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), often called Lou Gehrig’s Disease.

The pro-life community has a soft spot in its hard for the disabled and terminally ill. After all, they are often targeted in abortion or euthanasia. Unfortunately, as LifeNews has documented, there is a chance your donation to The ALS Association could be used to support embryonic stem cell research.Embryonic stem cell research can only be done on the backs of destroying human embryos, unique human beings, for their stem cells. Unlike adult stem cells, embryonic ones have never worked in humans in part because of rejection issues by human immune systems and the fact that they form tumors. Only adult stem cells have ever actually treated human patients.

As LifeNews bioethics writer Rebecca Taylor wrote, ALS has supported embryonic stem cell research.

For example the ALS Association reported that that last year they gave $500,000 to Northeast ALS Consortium (NEALS), the largest association of ALS clinical researchers in the world. Likely, the ALS Association will give more to NEALS this year with the popularity of the Ice Bucket Challenge. 

NEALS helps run clinical trials for ALS. On their website, they say that a “NEALS-affliated” trial is one where the “sponsor of the trial has contracted NEALS Coordinating Centers to help conduct the trial. A sponsor may contract NEALS to manage an entire trial or just a portion of the work.”

I found a NEALS-affliated active trial on their website that clearly states it uses stem cells that originated from an electively aborted fetus. The trial is being funded by NeuralStem Inc. and the description states:

These stem cells have been engineered from the spinal cord of a single fetus electively aborted after eight weeks of gestation. The tissue was obtained with the mother’s consent.

Of course the fetus, from whom the “tissue” was taken, did not “give consent.”

And now we have more confirmation. From Religion News Service: Does the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge fund embryonic stem cell research?

In an email to Religion News Service, Carrie Munk, a spokeswoman for the ALS Association, said that the organization primarily funds adult stem cell research. 

“Currently, The Association is funding one study using embryonic stem cells (ESC), and the stem cell line was established many years ago under ethical guidelines set by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS); this research is funded by one specific donor, who is committed to this area of research,” she said. “The project is in its final phase and will come to an end very soon.”

Lila Rose of Live Action responded to LifeNews about the information.

“It is noble to combat a deadly disease, and the ice bucket challenge definitely puts a fun spin on philanthropic efforts.  That’s why it’s such a shame that the ALS Association, while striving to save some people, chooses to support research that thrives from experimenting on and killing tiny, innocent human beings,” she said. “Embryonic stem cell research, which requires the destruction of pre-born people, is inherently unethical and a violation of fundamental human rights, and even materialists must admit that promises of its benefits have failed to deliver.  There is no good reason to condone this practice; in fact, all it does is taint the ALS Association, whom I’d otherwise be happy to support.”

ALS, which is otherwise an excellent organization promoting a very good cause, funds “ethical” research that involves the destruction of human beings to supposedly benefit other human beings. For those with qualms, here are alternatives to consider.

LifeNews.com by Steven Ertelt

Cosmo Attacks Pro-Lifers, Calls Abortion "Miscarriage Management"

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In keeping with their recent “excellence in media” award from Planned Parenthood, the September issue of Cosmopolitan offers its young female audience a “Hot and Healthy Investigation” into how Texas Republicans have ruined the glorious opportunity to abort in the Lone Star State. Writer Amanda Robb hit every pro-abortion propaganda note about “clinics under attack” and pro-lifers compromising “the quality of care for women.” Or, to quote the story’s abortionist hero: “sometimes, bull[bleep] wins.”

The hero in Robb’s story was Dr. Lester Minto of Harlingen, Texas, who was getting around the new state law signed by Gov. Rick Perry requiring abortionists have hospital admitting privileges by hinting to patients that they go buy misoprostol pills in Mexico to begin a miscarriage, so he can finish off the “miscarriage management.” Robb compared him to the Wizard of Oz with one scared 17-year-old aborting Dorothy:

Dr. Minto sat down with the teenager. He took her hands. He looked like the Wizard coming out from behind the curtain, when he wisely but humbly tells Dorothy and her friends that anyone can have a brain, a heart, and courage. “I can only help you if you’ve tried something [to miscarry].”

The teenager’s name (at least for the story) was Vale, and this was her second abortion in four months. This time, she accepted the doctor’s recommendation of birth control. Robb also included the required lecture from NARAL:

“Do-it-yourself health care almost never ends well, whether it’s unregulated pills bought on the Internet or back-alley procedures that were the staple of our grandmothers’ youth,” says Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. “Research is conclusive all over the world: making abortion illegal or inaccessible doesn’t make the procedure less common. It only makes it far less safe and results in many more deaths.”

Robb also insisted “Fewer than 0.05 percent of U.S. abortion patients ever need to be hospitalized. If a woman finds herself in that rare situation, the professional groups all say that she should do the obvious thing: Go to an emergency room to be treated by someone trained in emergency medicine.” There is no space in Cosmo for young women dying when abortionists seemingly can’t be bothered.

Dr. Minto’s “miscarriage management” operation — now discontinued — hardly sounds ideal, but that is Robb’s point, that pro-lifers are making “women’s health care” more expensive, painful, and risky. A poor woman named Gabriela finished her abortion without much pain relief except for nitrous oxide (laughing gas). When she emerged from the procedure, “Gabriela’s expression was murderous.” Robb (and Cosmo) didn’t see any irony in the word choice.

LifeNews.com Note: Tim Graham is the director of media analysis for the Media Research Center, a media watchdog group. He was a White House correspondent for World magazine in 2001 and 2002. This originally appeared on the NewsBusters web site.

LifeNews.com by Tim Graham

The Pro-Life Movement is Winning the Abortion Debate Because We’re Having More Kids

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We used to call my dear friend, mentor and colleague, Dr. Jack Willke, the father of the pro-life movement. These days, as he nears 90 years old, we call him the grandfather of the pro-life movement. I’ve had the distinct honor and privilege to learn much from Jack over the years.

For decades, he’s been saying we’ll end abortion if not for the simple reason that pro-lifers are the ones having babies and the pro-abortion people aren’t. Eventually, we’ll outnumber them. Although that seemed a compelling theory, I wondered if we’d ever have tangible evidence to support it. Now, we do. A study from the Social Science Research Network proves he’s right.

Historically, public support of abortion rights increased following Roe v. Wade in large part due to the mistaken notion that just because it’s legal it’s okay. Since that time, public support for abortion has remained relatively flat and recent years are showing a reversal toward greater support for the pro-life position. This is significant because the percentage of opposition to abortion among young adults is particularly strong. And this trend is occurring while society is growing more liberal on other issues, such as homosexual marriage.

Why is the abortion issue different?

Researchers J. Alex Kevern and Jeremy Freese of the Department of Sociology at Northwestern University assert that there’s a connection between fertility and abortion attitudes. The basis of their research is 34 years of data compiled in the General Social Survey by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago between the years of 1977-2010. In-person surveys were conducted with over 55,000 respondents to collect both demographic information and opinions on issues varying from political to religious and social concerns.
The premise is that opinion on the abortion issue is largely determined from parent to child. When factoring in the issue of fertility, those who have more children are therefore more likely to shape the cultural opinions of future generations. It should come as no surprise that pro-lifers have had, on average, 27% more children than those who are pro-abortion. Estimates show pro-lifers have roughly 3 children (2.82) for every 2 children of those who support abortion. As those children come of age and have children of their own, the gap between pro-abortion and pro-life is widening in our favor.

The difference is seen generationally. When surveyed at ages 23-34, those born in 1950-1955, were 44.7% in favor of abortion. One generation removed, those born in 1975-1980 were surveyed at the same age and found that only 38.8% were “pro-choice.” It’s reasonable to expect that the next generation’s results will be even lower.

How can we help to ensure that this downward trend continues? We must invest in this nation’s most precious, renewable resource—our children. Start young, even as young as toddlers, help them to understand that babies grow inside their mother’s tummies. As they get older, use educational tools, such as books and the media to reinforce pro-life beliefs. Continue to affirm your values with teens, empowering them to be proactive and take a stand for life. You have the power to plant seeds of life that will grow for generations to come.
Furthermore, I found it interesting that their analysis revealed if there were no difference in the number of children between pro-life and pro-abortion individuals, the population would be about five percentage points more pro-abortion. Our families are making a difference. This shows that as parents, when we invest in our children and share our pro-life beliefs, we’re not just shaping our sons and daughters; we’re shaping the future of the world.

We’re winning the battle on many fronts. And I think it’s fitting that by actually giving life, we’re strengthening the pro-life cause even more. I’m going to forward this email to my married son.

LifeNews.com Note: Bradley Mattes is the executive director of Life Issues Institute, a national pro-life educational group.

LifeNews.com by Brad Mattes

New Movie "The Giver" Praised for Having a Life-Affirming Message

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The new movie, The Giver, adapted from Lois Lowry’s classic young adult novel, is being hailed by pro-life leaders as a genuinely pro-life movie.

Sometimes an author writes a story because she wants to write a good story, and Lowry’s story tells of the value of life and the tragedy of killing babies–and the elderly–we find somehow less valuable than others. Now, the story has been translated to the big screen, but pre-release reviews say the pro-life message hasn’t been changed. President of Student for Life of America, Kristan Hawkins says:

“The Giver will go down as one of the turning points in our ongoing efforts to protect the most vulnerable in our society. This movie beautifully articulates the dignity of each human person and the gift of life.”

President and CEO of Americans United for Life, Charmaine Yoest praised the film Tuesday and said on her Twitter they are taking the whole AUL team to see it. Yoest says:

“The Giver is a powerful, provocative and thought-provoking movie that provides a beautiful message about the power of love and the unique value of every human life. This beautiful depiction of the enduring nature of human dignity inspired me. This is the don’t-miss-it movie of the summer.”

In the Washington Post, nationally-syndicated columnist, Michael Gerson notes:

“No movie, in my memory, involves a more explicit depiction of infanticide, conducted at the Nurturing Center by Jonas’s father with a horrifying cheerfulness. ‘They hadn’t eliminated murder,’ Jonas realizes, ‘they had brought it home. They had just called it by a different name.’”

The novel itself is a dystopian work which shows what happens when a society attempts to equalize everything for the good of the community, giving all citizens  a chance at a fair life centered around their talents and abilities. It’s filled with striking parallels to our culture with its stark examples of such situations as the protagonist misusing the word love, which has been eradicated because it’s lost all its meaning.

Portraying a Big-Brother-esque world, the classic nanny state, The Giver is a novel that is read in middle school classrooms, has sold millions of copies, and is still a favorite of many people who read it in their younger years. The themes, however, are decidedly adult. In 1993, when Lowry penned her work, it was innovative and futuristic. Today it’s not as difficult to see it more as reality than fantasy.

Pro-life leaders are thrilled with the underlying message of life in the film, which is one that echoes the book. From the death of newborns to the death of the elderly, the Giver addresses the social issues with which society grapples, without making itself an issue-oriented work.


Winner of the 1994 Newbery award, one of the highest honors a work of children’s or adolescent literature can earn, the bestseller’s  film version opens nationwide Friday, August 15.

LifeNews Note:  Susan Michelle Tyrrell writes for Live Action News, reprinted with permission from Live Action News.

LifeNews.com by Susan Tyrrell

Group That Helped China Launch Its One-Child Policy Reveals How it Will Push Abortion Globally

“We do not mostly provide preventative medical care [or] cure diseases or prevent them. What we do is social change.”  So writes Daniel E. Pellegrom of Pathfinder International in a recent scholarly book marketed to educators, policymakers, and advocates for abortion and other aspects of “reproductive health.” Pathfinder boasts helping the Communist government in Beijing when it launched its brutal one child per family policy.

Critical Issues in Reproductive Health, released this year by academic publisher Springer, provides a revealing view into the current state of the worldwide debate over abortion, contraception, and the role of human reproduction in society.
Two of the most common strategies employed in the twentieth century to advance the abortion agenda were linking it to women’s health and population growth.  In this book, chapters addressing these and other topics demonstrate what critics have long contended: that these concerns were a pretext for making abortion more acceptable.

In a chapter on abortion laws and demography, sociology professor Dennis Hodgson observes that many of the countries with the most permissive abortion laws are now suffering from declines associated with aging populations and below-replacement fertility. He fears governments may restrict abortion to encourage more births.

Because African countries boast the highest fertility in the world and some of the strongest legal protections for unborn children, they are experiencing great internal and external pressure to legalize abortion. But fertility is declining there, too.

Hodgson warns that “The window for exploiting the antinatalist stress point is short, even for Africa.”  As fertility declines, policymakers “will be feeling noticeably less demographic pressure to liberalize their abortion policy.”

For a scholarly book devoting a considerable amount of space to abortion, this volume suffers from a relatively one-sided perspective.  Although Hodgson admits that “government leaders are far from a consensus about the proposition that all women should have uncomplicated access to abortion,” the pro-life position is viewed at a distance by the book’s many authors, who discuss it as a curiosity to be examined or an obstacle to be confronted, but fail to provide space for it to stand on its own merits.  Women Deliver president Jill Sheffield admits that “[l]egal abortion can be and often is unsafe” and suggests that by focusing on safety, “we allow those who oppose abortion to be part of the conversation.”

Daniel Pellegrom seems less conciliatory: “[W]e can reassure ourselves that the opposition is so voluble because it is losing.”  He accuses pro-life advocates of “harness[ing] the emotional reactions of the general public” using “simplified, emotive and manipulative” language and complains that abortion and contraception are often “treated according to cultural and religious principles and ideals, rather than scientific and evidence-based facts.”

Meanwhile, in a chapter about the semantics of reproductive health issues, sociology professor Alaka Malwade Basu attempts to bypass scientific evidence entirely in favor of readily-exploited confusion.  With regard to questions such as when life begins or when a human being acquires a soul, he writes: “Not only is there much scope for ambiguity in the answers to these questions, cultures can often actively encourage such ambiguity.”

Basu suggests that even where laws and societal norms clearly protect the unborn child, “the state, as well as organized religion may, through the right choice of words, make it much easier for women to obtain an abortion.”

While acknowledging the vast differences between Pathfinder International and Catholic Relief Services, Pellegrom argues that they share an interest in addressing poverty.  Then, citing Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger as a source of inspiration, he goes on: “The family planner doesn’t just want to alleviate poverty, the family planner wants to obliterate poverty.”

He closes with a call for legal abortion – with no mention of safety.  “This is not about public health; it is about public policy.”

LifeNews Note: Rebecca Oas writes for the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute. This article originally appeared in the pro-life group’s Friday Fax and is used with permission.

Academy’s R. Williams Tweet Not Pro Suicide

I have often worried about the near-invisibility of suicide prevention in the public discourse. But this is one time in which I think those on the side virtue and true compassion got it wrong.

In the wake of Robin Williams’ suicide, the Academy of Motion Pictures sent out a Tweet. From the Variety story:

The tweet, sent out Monday at 5:56 p.m., shows the genie from the 1992 “Aladdin” with the message, “Genie, you’re free,” which is a line from the film. The item was retweeted more than 320,000 times and received a staggering 69 million impressions. The Internet and Twitter have been filled with tributes to Williams, who voiced the genie in the film.

That didn’t set well with the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention:

However, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention worries about the subliminal message. Christine Moutier, chief medical officer at the AFSP, expressed concern about the tweet, telling the Washington Post Tuesday, “Suicide should never be presented as an option,” before adding, “(it) presents suicide in too celebratory a light.”

I think that’s a stretch..Cheap sentimentality in 140 or less characters, perhaps: That’s the bane of our times. But I don’t think the Tweet celebrates or glamorizes suicide.

If the American Foundation wants to do something valuable, how about a high-profile campaign against assisted suicide? That really pushes self destruction.

Alas, I have never seen the group oppose such blatant suicide promotion. Not only that, its web site is silent. Either that, or anti-euthanasia information is well hidden.

So, in the face of real suicide celebration, all we get from the American Foundation is the sound of crickets. That’s known as dereliction of duty.

By Wesley J. Smith 

Like it or Not – Abortion is an Issue in the 2014 Elections

We like it – they don’t. They – our opponents and many of their media supporters – would rather talk about a “war on women.”

That’s why, as sure as April showers, every federal election cycle we are told that the abortion issue “doesn’t matter.” The electorate is preoccupied with (fill in the blank).

Does it remind you of the adage that those who forget history are doomed to repeat it? Abortion, once again, is being written off as inconsequential. In fact, it will very much matter in the 2014 off-year elections.

Remember back in early 2014 when the contest for an open Florida seat between pro-life Republican David Jolly and pro-abortion Democrat Alex Sink was advertised as a “bellwether” election, a foreshadowing of what could happen this November?

While many political pundits argued that the abortion issue would play a diminished role in 2014, the stark differences on life issues between Jolly and Sink were highlighted on the campaign trail. And, their contrasting positions on Obamacare – in a district carried by Obama in 2008 and 2012 – were at the very center of the campaign.

As is so often the case, we defeated Sink, a candidate endorsed by the radically pro-abortion, loaded-with-money EMILY’s List. Despite Sink’s far greater name-recognition, Jolly won with 48.5% to Sink’s 46.7%. As is National Right to Life’s style, we worked quietly to educate, energize, and illuminate the vast differences between Mr. Jolly and Ms. Sink on life issues.

But everything we do is a partnership. That is where you, working with National Right to Life, play such an instrumental role.

National Right to Life created the National Right to Life Political Action Committee in 1979, and it is the most effective single-issue pro-life political action committee in the country. We have been involved in every federal election since Ronald Reagan’s victory over Jimmy Carter in 1980, and we have a proven record of success.

In 2012, a new independent expenditure political committee, the National Right to Life Victory Fund, was created to expand and enhance our political impact. The combined power and experience of National Right to Life’s political committees, and its network of dedicated volunteers, help make the difference in close elections, and very often provide the margin of victory for pro-life candidates. Consider the track record.

In 2012, 80% of the 290 federal candidates endorsed by National Right to Life won their elections.
Of those 290 candidates, we focused on 111 of the most competitive federal races. Despite being vastly outspent by pro-abortion groups, 62% of the 111 candidates supported by National Right to Life won.

Over the last four election cycles (2006-2012), EMILY’s List raised and spent more than $178 million – a 12-1 pro-abortion advantage in funding.

Despite that, in those four election cycles, National Right to Life-supported candidates won 48 of 74 head-to-head races against EMILY’s List candidates – 65%!

Allow me to close on a more personal note.

Often, you’ll see the scripture from Deuteronomy 30 on our PAC literature: “I have set before you life and death…choose life then, that you and your descendants may live.”

I’m from Morgantown, West Virginia. I am a direct descendant of Colonel Zackquill Morgan, Morgantown’s founder, who was my great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather. In order for me, my children, and my grandson to exist, the Colonel, his children, and his children’s children had to choose life.

In West Virginia, we know that our greatest resource is not our mountains, not our coal, but our children.

Long ago, pro-lifers warned that once we devalue the lives of our own unborn children, the slippery slope will lead us to devalue those in other facets of life – those who are sick, or those who are vulnerable at the end of their lives. Sadly, our country has rapidly moved into this culture of death.
It is difficult to exaggerate how imperative it is that we work to nominate and elect pro-life candidates, who can win in November, in order to protect the most vulnerable members of the human family – unborn children and medically disabled or dependent persons, whose lives are threatened by abortion or euthanasia.

The most important reason pro-life candidates benefit is because the American people are pro-life – you are pro-life. Thank you!

Choose life then, that you and your descendants may live.

By Karen Cross, National Right to Life Political Director

Editor’s note. This appeared on page one of the August edition of National Right to Life News. You can read the issue in its entirety at www.nrlc.org/uploads/NRLNews/NRLNewsAugust2014.pdf.

U.S. Supreme Court Must Resolve Clash Over Illinois Choose Life License Plates

Thomas More Society files amicus brief urging Justices to uphold free speech

On August 13th, the Thomas More Society filed an amicus brief urging the United States Supreme Court to hear a case involving "Choose Life" license plates, in order to resolve disputes among lower courts over how to treat specialty license plates. The brief is brought on behalf of Choose Life America, Choose Life Wisconsin, and Illinois Choose Life, and urges the Justices to hear the case and uphold broad free speech rights for license plates.

"Every American should have the opportunity to purchase a 'Choose Life' license plate," said Peter Breen, Thomas More Society vice president and senior counsel. "While most states allow a broad range of messages on specialty license plates, the ACLU and its allies have diminished free speech by preventing Americans from obtaining 'Choose Life' plates in many states. Because some lower courts have agreed with the ACLU and silenced free speech, we urge the Supreme Court to reaffirm the broad free speech rights of citizens to have the message of their choice on their license plates."

"Choose Life" license plates are available in 29 states and the District of Columbia, and the revenue they generate benefits adoption-related organizations, including pregnancy care centers that serve mothers in need. North Carolina, Wisconsin, and Illinois are among the states where "Choose Life" plates are not available, either due to inaction by the legislature or court action to suppress the plates.

"It makes no sense that the 'Choose Life' specialty plate is upheld by some courts and condemned by others," added Steve Crampton, Thomas More Society special counsel. "Thousands of drivers wish to purchase 'Choose Life' specialty plates in order to express their personal views in favor of an important societal issue, but they are not able to do so because of confusing contradictions in the lower courts. It's high time that this conflict is resolved once and for all--the forum of specialty plates should include all speech."

Read Thomas More Society's amicus brief here.

 

Contact: Tom Ciesielka

Source: Thomas More Society

Robin Williams: Abortion of His Unborn Child May Have Added to Struggle With Depression

Actor and comedian Robin Williams died August 11^th from a suspected suicide.  Fans from around the world are grieving the tragic loss of this talented actor and comedian.  Such an act of desperation reveals Williams was clearly in great emotional pain.   A headline on NBC News Online shares that Robin Williams Battled Demons for Decades Before His Death.

Many are aware that Williams struggled for years with serious addiction issues. However a lesser known fact is that one of those demons was an abortion that took place in the 1970’s.

From Robin Williams: A Biography by Andy Dougan

… His early days back in San Francisco after dropping out of Julliard (in the mid 1970’s) were among the unhappiest of his life. His relationship with his girlfriend, which had seemed so full of promise back in New York, had now come to a sudden and abrupt end…In an interview in Playboy magazine some years later, the subject turned to the Bush administration’s stance on abortion….Williams offered that making the decision to have an abortion was not an easy one, which begged the obvious question from interviewer Lawrence Grobel about whether he had ever found himself in that position.

 ‘Long, long, long time ago,’ Williams replied candidly, ‘and it was because we were too young and it wasn’t right.’  (Pg 35)

Is there a relationship between Robin William’s descent into drug addiction and depression that began in the 1970’s and his past abortion?

The Death of Young Love

Williams appears to have been very close to the mother of his aborted child and as the excerpt from his biography reveals, the period after the abortion and the end of the relationship were days of deep and painful darkness.  Even as he began to enjoy considerable professional success as an actor/comedian, he struggled with addiction.

Consider the emotional vulnerability of a young man and woman in their mid 20’s as Williams tried to make his way in the highly competitive world of entertainment in the 1970’s.  Think about how powerful a loving, caring and understanding relationship is in helping you negotiate the stress and challenges of such times.  When the relationship is sexual, you have the deeply intimate experience of sharing your body, heart and soul with another person.

This union of pleasure, joy and love between Williams and his partner results in a pregnancy as a new life has been conceived in this act of love-making.  When they decide to “end the pregnancy” by abortion, a very complex set of emotions are unleashed upon the young couple.

There were likely some rather pressured but reasoned discussions between the couple of why abortion was the only rational choice…as Williams shared:

…we were too young and it wasn’t right.’  

Few relationships survive the complex emotional pain and complicated grief that naturally follows the decision to abort one’s unborn child.  The powerful memories and emotions from such an experience defy our desperate rationalizations, and remain long after the relationship ends.  To think otherwise is a failure to respect the power, depth and complexity of human intimate relationships.

Uncomfortably Numb

The most common self-medication for these intimate and painful feelings and memories…sex, drugs and alcohol.  The 1970’s and early 1980’s were fertile soil for such acting-out with the widespread use of cocaine in music and entertainment circles.

In a Guardian interview in 2008, Williams shares about his behavior during his periods of addiction:

“You know, I was shameful…You do stuff that causes disgust, and that’s hard to recover from. You can say, ‘I forgive you’ and all that stuff, but it’s not the same as recovering from it.”

 Drawing upon the experience of hundreds of men’s testimonies about their abortion loss, Williams may have been making a thinly veiled reference to what society tells us does not exist…his post abortion trauma and complicated grief.

Let’s re-visit his quote above, but this time in the context of abortion loss:

You know that abortion was so deeply painful, and shameful…I am disgusted by my actions that led to the destruction of my unborn child, and struggle as a man and father.  That abortion procedure was the death of my partnership with the child’s mother and  it deeply wounded my heart and soul.  No drug can remove that pain.   I want to forgive myself and others…but I need to find a way to recover from this loss.

Author M. Alex Johnson on NBC News Online shares:

He never seemed to have full control of his fame…Williams talked of having become addicted to cocaine while he was appearing on “Mork & Mindy” (1978-1982.)…Cocaine, Williams told People magazine in 1988, “was a place to hide. Most people get hyper on coke. It slowed me down.”

Some will be quick to dismiss the relationship of his abortion in the 1970’s to his subsequent abuse and addictions to cocaine and alcohol, but look at Williams own words.  He was looking for a place to “hide”…hide from what?    There may have been other contributing factors in his vulnerability to addiction, such as his rise to stardom and the stress and temptations of the world of entertainment.  But given what we have learned after 20 years of research and recovery work with those who have experienced abortion lossaddictions are a common way that woman and men cope with the painful feelings and memories they bury after abortion.

 In 1982, Williams was doing coke with John Belushi the night Belushi died of an overdose.   Keep in mind that his association with Belushi the night of his death would naturally trigger his repressed post abortion pain and guilt connected to his role in the death of his unborn child.  He may not have made the conscious connection, but those emotions would help add gasoline to his already raging addiction issues.

Displacement of a Father’s Grief

Williams would later become a vocal advocate for abortion rights.  This reveals another common strategy of those that are unable to reconcile and recover from their abortion loss.  The energy that would be better directed toward healing this loss is instead focused on the need to promote abortion accessibility for the poor and protecting woman’s health.  This activism on behalf of abortion rights serves to deflect his conflicted emotions and complicated grief around his personal abortion, as it is displaced onto anti abortion activists and their political allies.

However the symptoms often tell the story and if you follow the trail, they will take you back to what was a life-changing event for Robin Williams and his partner in the 1970’s…the abortion of their unborn child.

Years of using drugs and alcohol to cope with abortion loss and other emotional pain and life stress takes a toll on the emotions and nervous system of addicts. The failure to recognize the role of abortion loss can be a significant factor in one’s addictive behavior and shuts the door on reconciliation and recovery from the abortion wound.

There is Hope and Healing

There is a way to recover from this loss.  If you are a man or woman who was part of an abortion decision(s) in the past, there is hope and healing available to you.  The abortion loss may be part of a larger tapestry of challenges that you have faced in your life journey.  But that abortion loss can be significant contributing and often causative factor in the anxiety, depression, addictions and other symptoms that you may struggle with.   Attending an abortion recovery program can help you learn to find healthy ways of grieving those areas of pain and loss that lead to reconciliation, resurrection and new life…not self destruction and death.

Source: LifeNews.com Note: Kevin Burke, LSW, is the co founder of Rachel’s Vineyard Ministries and a Pastoral Associate of Priests for Life. This originally appeared at the Priests for Life blog.

September 13 marks National Day of Remembrance for Aborted Children at gravesites

The National Day of Remembrance for Aborted Children on Saturday, September 13, 2014, was first marked in the modern era last fall, but memorialization of society's tiniest innocent victims is not a new idea.Citizens for a Pro-life Society, Priests for Life, and the Pro-life Action League have reached back to ancient Rome for the inspiration behind this solemn national event. Dug into the walls of the earliest Christian catacombs in the outskirts of Rome are countless small tombs, only a foot or two across. These are the burial places of infants cast out of their pagan homes and left to die of starvation and exposure - a common practice of that time. Members of the early church, charged by Christ to love all their neighbors, offered these newborn sacrifices to Roman cruelty the only act of love they could - that of burying their little bodies and mourning for them in prayer.

This tradition of mercifully burying abandoned children continues in our own day with the National Day of Remembrance for Aborted Children, taking place on September 13. Mourners across the country will visit the grave sites of aborted children, whose broken bodies were recovered from trash dumpsters and pathology labs and solemnly buried over the four decades of legal abortion in the United States.

Under the director of three national pro-life groups - Citizens for a Pro-life Society, Priests for Life, and the Pro-life Action League - simultaneous memorial services will be held at more than forty such grave sites, as well as at scores of other memorial markers set up in memory of the aborted unborn at churches and cemeteries.

Eric Scheidler, Executive Director of the Pro-life Action League, stated, "It's sobering to realize that grave markers for the unborn victims of abortion list only a date of burial. They have no birthdays because they were never allowed to be born. We can list no date of death, because those who killed them discarded their bodies like garbage. But they are not garbage to us. They are our brothers and sisters. That's why we buried them, and that's why we visit their graves to mourn for them and testify to their humanity."

Monica Miller, Director of Citizens for a Pro-life Society, added, "Since 1973, 55 million innocent unborn children have been killed with the sanction of law. A fraction of these victims of the American slaughter have actually been buried. The graves of these victims are scattered across America - graves of sorrow and graves of indictment on a nation that permitted the killing of the innocent. As we visit these graves on September 13, we call upon our nation to remember these victims and bring an end to the injustice of abortion."

"Abortion is not an abstract issue," explained Fr. Frank Pavone, National Director of Priests for Life. "Having a memorial service where these babies are buried reminds us that abortion is not merely about beliefs, but about bloodshed; not just about viewpoints, but victims. By visiting the graves of the aborted unborn, we allow our hearts to be broken for them, and we recommit ourselves to protecting other children from suffering the same fate."

The first National Day of Remembrance was held last September on the 25th anniversary of the solemn burial of several hundred abortion victims in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Prayer services were held at over 100 locations, with thousands of mourners participating. Response was so great that the National Day of Remembrance has been established as an annual event, to be held on the second Saturday each September.

For more information about the National Day of Remembrance, including the stories behind the grave sites of aborted children and the locations of memorial services being held September 13, visit AbortionMemorials.com.