Democrats in an Uproar Heath Mello is a Democrat running for mayor of Omaha, Nebraska. US Senator Bernie Sanders campaigned for him, making the news. Ah, but Mello sponsored a bill in 2009 that women thinking of abortion be told they had the option of seeing the sonogram of their fetuses. Many an article has reported this with outrage, referring to it as anti-choice or a restriction. Some of them (such as the one in the New York Times) were totally oblivious to the wording they themselves just used to report it: that the legislation actually gave women another option. Apparently, it’s supposed to be obvious that being in touch with the reality of abortion is anti-abortion, and therefore women are entitled to be kept in ignorance of that reality. Many articles, such as this one in the New York Times, responded to Sanders’ campaigning for Mello by saying that abortion is an economic issue: poor women need abortions because they don’t have access to family leave, child care, medical care, education, and other accommodations. It doesn’t seem to occur to the writers that the real economic issue is how to get women access to all those things, so they’re not stuck with others expecting them to kill their own children. Abortion is often used as an excuse to avoid that level of basic economic justice for women – witness how often the argument is made that taxpayer money spent on abortion saves welfare costs. Meanwhile, Democrats who argue this way are deciding that abortion availability is more important to them than winning elections. Tragically, even Mr. Mello has said he would govern as if he were pro-choice, despite personal feelings, a requirement to get national Democratic Party backing.
Latest Issue of Life Matters Journal is Online Put out by our member group Rehumanize International, Volume 5 Number 5 is now out, with an article on Electoral Backlash – what resistance looks like for life issues. There’s an essay on the “Culture of Convenience vs. the Culture of Life,” another on “Why Focus on Abortion?,” and more.
Multiple Executions in Arkansas With sadness we report that, while the full set of 8 executions that were contemplated didn’t happen, despite delays due to protests and legal challenges, one did happen Thursday, April 20, and a double execution took place on Monday, April 24. Accordingly, we revised the press release we mentioned last week and sent it out Tuesday morning.
A Civil Debate A panel called “Why Can’t a Feminist Be Pro-Life?” that included our friends from Rehumanize International and New Wave Feminists was held at Catholic University of America. The video is an hour and 41 minutes long.
Latest CL Blog John Whitehead offers “Three Reasons for Opposing the US Bombing of Syria.”
Quotation of the Week Michael Baxter, “From the Battle Field to the Medical Field” The Sign of Peace: Journal of the Catholic Peace Fellowship, Spring 2009, p. 1 We have always been mindful of the connection between violence in war and the damage it does to the lives of those who inflict it, including their family lives. The reverse is true too. When we do violence to those in our families, especially the unborn, the developmentally disabled, and the elderly, we make it easier to engage in, and approve of, the violence of war. The problem is that we get numbed to violence.
Remember to register for our conference, "Creating a Holistic Culture of Life: Bridging the Life/Peace Divide" August 4-6, Eastern University, near Philadelphia, PA.
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