1) Because it is not enough to be quietly horrified by Planned Parenthood killing babies and selling baby parts. The doors into your local abortion clinic are the gates of hell. You are called to exercise your prophetic charism and unambiguously witness to the truth. 2) Because Planned Parenthood and the abortion/baby part industry radiates … Read more
Abortion has long sat in the middle of a three-street ecclesial intersection, namely, those of Sin, Crime, and Sanction. The meeting of any two of these factors would make for a perilous perch but the confluence of all three is fraught with opportunities for confusion. At the risk of serious over-simplification, let me sketch the … Read more
Here’s a simple exercise in basic reasoning. On a spectrum of bad things to do, theft is bad, assault is worse and murder is worst. There’s a similar texture of ill will connecting all three crimes, but only a very confused conscience would equate thieving and homicide. Both are serious matters. But there is no … Read more
In the 1996 crime drama film A Time to Kill, a ten-year-old black girl named Tonya is violently raped by two white supremacists. She survives and the men are arrested, but before an all-white jury they will likely walk free. So Tonya’s father, Carl Lee Hailey (Samuel L. Jackson), takes the law into his own … Read more
A decade ago I was in graduate school studying international political economy and development, an interdisciplinary course meant to prepare idealistic young Americans for careers in relief organizations and international institutions. The horrors of Srebrenica and Rwanda didn’t seem as distant then as they do now, so genocide—alongside the awfulness of economic globalization—was a hot … Read more
Conservatives and pro-life activists have bemoaned the mainstream media’s lack of coverage of the ongoing video exposé of Planned Parenthood’s efforts to harvest the body parts of aborted fetuses for money. An examination of the organization’s surprisingly close ties to major media corporations can help explain why leading disseminators of the news in the U.S. have … Read more
As Planned Parenthood prepares to mount a legal defense for what faithful Catholics view as its indefensible actions surrounding the selling of fetal tissue—including organs and body part of unborn children—the organization will have plenty of help from a new generation of pro-choice lawyers trained at some of the nation’s premier Catholic universities. Law Students … Read more
Planned Parenthood has been exposed to the American public as a monstrous organization that egregiously trespasses on human rights. Videos released by the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) show Planned Parenthood officials negotiating prices for fetal organs, and discussing the means by which they cover up their illegal activities. We actually see small body parts … Read more
Rainbow profile pictures and equals sign bumper stickers are an easy way to share an anthropology. In a split second you can say, without having really to say, “I believe a human person is thus and such.” Why isn’t there a sticker or profile picture that will quickly and vibrantly communicate a different anthropology? Especially … Read more
For more than a century, abortion has created tremendous wealth for providers in the United States. That continues today as yet another shocking video has been released showing a top Planned Parenthood official discussing the sale of body parts of unborn children. And, although this news does not seem to disturb many on the pro-choice … Read more
Sometimes it’s better to stop digging. That at any rate would be my advice if I were in the business of helping liberal news outlets in their desperate attempt to downplay the significance of this now-infamous video, in which we see Planned Parenthood medical director Deborah Nucatola expounding on her expertise at killing half-born babies. … Read more
I currently live overseas, where our cable provider gets U.S. TV programs with some delay. Right now, they’re advertising the new “Candid Camera,” a takeoff on the old show in which people are observed in incongruous situations, their reactions recorded by means of a hidden camera. “Laugh, relax a bit,” is the advertising hook. One … Read more
It is inevitable that advocates for the Sexual Revolution will say all we need is a bit more of it. More orgasms. More sex-ed. More abortion. More contraception. Less guilt. More freedom, man. But they will never acknowledge that their revolution has been tried and found wanting, wanting being a fairly benign way of saying … Read more
A few years ago, when an undergraduate student research assistant of mine—a recent convert to Catholicism—told me that he was planning to meet with a well-known dissenting Catholic theology professor who was then ensconced in an endowed chair at a major metropolitan Catholic university, I told him: “Be careful, you might end up liking him … Read more
Mercatornet, a pro-life blog about end-of-life issues, has just reported the latest doublespeak percolating among the anti-life crowd: “dignicide.” How to describe killing yourself, or getting somebody to kill you? “Murder” is so gauche in our voluntaristic, nominalistic culture in which the will defines reality: can you really be murdered if you agree to being … Read more
In recent days a controversy has arisen over whether parents should be required to vaccinate their children. Some politicians with presidential aspirations were criticized for defending the rights of parents to make that decision. As an internal medicine doctor, I believe strongly in the efficacy of vaccines. I also believe strongly that our vaccines (and all … Read more
There is no way to end abortion short of changing the way we love and live. Without addressing abortion as a corruption of how we love, the greatest legal victory is a sand castle on a beach before the tide comes in. The tide will win no matter how large the sand castle, or how … Read more
There is a movement well underway to convince faithful Catholics they do not have a political home in the Republican Party. The effort is comprised of former political conservatives who now believe they are more Catholic than anybody else and therefore have cast a pox on both political parties, which is just another way for … Read more
This is a week for celebrating life. In Washington D.C., the March for Life continues its long tradition of marking the anniversary of Roe v Wade with a massive demonstration in remembrance of the unborn. Appropriately enough, Pope Francis set the week off by affirming the Church’s stance on artificial contraceptives on his visit to … Read more
Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “God offers to every mind its choice between truth and repose.” Those who choose repose receive release from the mandates of truth—but it is only temporary. Truth cannot be rejected forever. Those who choose truth, on the other hand, have no rest—and so they march. They march ever onward. The March … Read more
