Pro-LIFE NEWS

Vol. 13 No.2 - Winter Edition 1996                                  Print Post Approved - 33L385/00042

Contents:

- Special Membership Drive
- Editorial
- A Win for Babies
- Former Abortionist finds his epiphany in 'Hand of God'
- Are You A "single Issue" Person?
- World View

The simplest way to raise funds for all the important work of Pro-Life Victoria would be for each member of Pro-Life Victoria to recruit one new member for our Association. Our membership would be doubled overnight. No hard work involving street stalls, theatre nights, silver circles for people, as pro-lifers invariably are, already heavily committed to multiple good causes. Just the effort of approaching another family member, friend, work colleague or fellow church-goer. Membership of the pro-life movement means membership of the most important movement of the 20th century. Pro-Life Victoria publishes quarterly newsletters and intermittent action alerts, keeping supporters of the prolife cause informed and providing them with the opportunity of contributing to the defence of human life. It also encourages an "esprit de corps" in a world increasingly committed to a culture of death.

In this issue of Pro-Life News we have included a recruitment flier and reply paid envelope for each member to use in "signing up" a new member. We appeal to you to please make this small effort to make a big difference to our funds and influence. Twice as many people will be informed and active if each and everyone of us contributes one new member to our support base. Each year in any Association, there is a natural attrition. Members move away, for-get to renew, become ill etc. so that we must always seek not only to replace this loss, but to be always increasing our numbers of supporters. This is a very important part of our organisational strategy. Every year we have had new challenges to face, new attacks on human life to defend, new battles to wage. Right now we must take time out to strengthen our ranks. We are asking all our members to do this for us - by this one simple act. Please recruit a new member. Please use the enclosed recruitment flier.

In our next Pro Life News we will be able to report to you just how effective this special operation has been, just how many new members have joined our pro life family.

It really is an honour to be part of such a special movement.

When you invite others to join, this sense of privilege should be conveyed to them - the "privilege" of being part of the most important cause of the 20th century.

¬ Project "How You Began" Co-ordinator Joseph Cummins and Committee member David Harding unpack further shipment of 100 sets of foetal models for placement In Victorian Schools.

Top of Page

Have you noticed what a time warp in which the media is caught regarding abortion? Take the Melbourne Age newspaper. Twenty three years since its editorial first supported a womens right to have her unborn baby killed, its May 18 editorial "A question of Choice" on the passage of the Therapeutic Goods Amendment Bill restricting importation of the French abortion drug RU486, still trots out the same tired old cliches "The choice is... between safe, legal abortions and unlawful unsafe abortions" when the issue of RU486 is really about restricting the range of techniques by which a women may have her baby killed. Nowhere is it admitted that it was penicillin not permissive abortion laws which caused the drop in the death rate from illegal abortions. And The Australian newspaper, June 1-2, still has Beatrice Faust referring to the stillborn baby of Tracie Wooding (whose boyfriend caused the babys stillbirth by kicking her in the abdomen) as a "32 week foetus". Whoever heard of an 8week old premature baby being called a "foetus"? Or for that matter, whoever, even in the earliest weeks of pregnancy, heard any parents announce they were "having a foetus", anyone congratulate a couple on "expecting a foetus", or any wife come home from the doctors consultation and say "Guess what, darling, were having a "foetusi" Ms Faust’s attempt to dehumanise the preborn baby by insisting on calling it a foetus at 7 months is transparently obvious.

The hostility of the media to the pro life philosophy is particularly evident on the women’s Accent pages of The Age. On December29 last year Accent editor Sonia Harford ran a full page spread titled "Women we love" saluting women who made an impact in 1995. Six reporters from The Age were asked to compile a list of women they "loved" in 1995. Sonia Harford herself nominated such pro abortion "luminaries" as Eva Cox, Carmen Lawrence and Hillary Clinton. Regular columnist, pro abortion Pamela Bone’s list was even worse!

The six lists of ten ended with an invitation to readers "who believe we have overlooked their heroines of the day" to write to Accent with their lists, with the promise Accent would report back in 1996.

As a regular reader of Accent for the last 23 years, I dutifully sent my list of 10. No further lists appeared. Suddenly Ms Harford seemed to think it wasn’t such a good idea after all!

Just because The Age displayed a lack of generosity of spirit and sense of fair play, I don’t think we should be deprived of rejoicing in the inspiration afforded us all by the 10 women I nominated as women I loved in 1995. The 10 The Age refused to print are as follows:

1. Naomi Wolf, feminist and pro choice writer for having the honesty to admit the pro life slogan "Abortion stops a beating heart" is "incontrovertibly true". In October in The New Republic she argued that by resorting to abortion rhetoric that recognises neither life nor death, pro choice people "risk becoming precisely what our critics charge us with being callous, selfish and casually destructive men and women who share a cheap view of human life".

2. Norma McCorvey, of the infamous Roe Versus Wade U.S. Supreme Court Decision (She didn’t have the abortion) a fragile hurting being who still cares enough to tell U.S. Nightline "They (the swings on the playground swing set) were swinging back and forth, but they were all empty and I lost it. And I thought, ‘0 my God, the playgrounds are empty because there’s no children, because they’ve all been aborted". May she continue to enjoy the company of the pro life volunteers who befriended her outside the abortion clinic in which she no longer works.

3. Australia’s own Margaret Tighe, for her steadfast loyalty to the plight of the unborn children and their mothers as evidenced in the network of Pregnancy Support Services she has established over the last twenty five years. For her consistent defence of their rights in our Parliaments and on the international stage from Cairo to Beijing.

4. Rita Joseph, for "knowing her stuff’ and countering the misinformation of the population control industry. Health workers as far flung as Kenya, Papua New Guinea and Peru are testifying to the fact that health centres are flush with unused and unwanted I.U.D.’s and contraceptives. While the pill or I.U.D. can be found in the remotest health delivery centre, the same can’t be said for the simplest lifesaving antibiotic, a vial of penicillin which costs only a few cents" she told us in 1995.

5. The feisty feminist Renate Klein, who with her associate Dr Lynette Dumble told the male dominated reproductive technologists they have gone too far. I particularly appreciate her concerns about the effect of the French abortifacient RU 486 on womens health.

6. Freelance journalist Melinda Tankard-Reist who exposed on the Accent page of the Federal Government’s amendment to the Migration Act disallowing forced abortion and sterilisation as grounds for refugee status. Her account of Dr Xiao Ying Wong’s search for asylum in Australia after six years of being forced to do abortions and sterilisations on women who had violated the one baby policy quota confirmed the barbarity of China’s population control policy.

7. Rosa Monckton, the 41 year old managing director of London jeweller Tiffany’s for her loving acceptance of her daughter Domenica’s Down Syndrome. "One or two acquaintances have since asked us ‘Didn’t you have the tests?’ My wife says it will be difficult to remain friends with such people". said her husband Dominic.

8. Nula Scarishrick, of Britian‘s Life organisation. In 1995 they celebrated 25 years of help for pregnant women. Over one million calls in that time, 120 caring centres established and 50 houses run to cater for the needs of expectant mothers.

9. Gianna Jessen, a true story with a happy ending. She was aborted at 6 1/2 months and lived to tell about it. She is now an attractive 18 year old singer who despite her cerebral palsy travelled widely in 1995 using her voice to demonstrate her gratitude for life and in defence of life.

10. Nadia Maffei who used her own breast cancer to help other women survive it. And who in her final days spoke out against legalising euthanasia "If my family had listened to doctors I’d be dead" she chirped.

Denise Cameron

Top of Page

Australian prolifers have cause to be very grateful for the successful passage through Parliament on May 21 of the Therapeutic Goods Amendment Bill 1996 (No. 2) preventing the importation or registration of the French Abortion Drug RU486 without written approval of the Health Minister.

Europe, England and China have not been able to stop the use of this human pesticide and North America looks unlikely to be able to do so either.

The Bill was proposed by "long time pro life campaigner Senator Brian Harradine. It was supported by the Coalition, Labour and the West Australian Greens. The Australian Democrats was the only party to oppose it. Unborn Australian children and the pro life movement will be forever indebted to Senator Harradine for his untiring, outstanding efforts in investigating and exposing attempts to introduce this evil weapon to continue the war on Australia’s unborn. One can’t help but ask "Where would we be without his ever faithful and ever reliable efforts on their behalf?".

The response of the anti life media was swift and predictable. Women were depicted as being deprived of something good and "controlled" by politicians. The Age newspaper editorial (May 18) suggested in a bewildered tone, that "The reasons this Bill has the support of Parliament can only be guessed at." Surely Labor Senator Belinda Neal, representing the Shadow Health Minister in the Senate can be believed when she told Parliament the ALP would not oppose the Bill because of the general concerns in community about abortion drugs, and that she was sincere when she stated "In these particular circumstances the issues at stake are much greater than just health issues and the efficacy of the particular drug I think it is appropriate that the decision be made directly by the Minister".

How selective can The Age get? Can it forget so easily the fact that some members of Parliament see themselves as responsible for representing and defending the most vulnerable members of society and surely the most vulnerable are "the choiceless"?. It expects Parliament to stand up to the gun lobby, but to cave in to the abortion lobby.

The Health Minister still does have the power to allow the importation of RU486. The Abortion Lobby has already signalled its determination to see the drug methotrexate already in Australia, used as an abortifacient. It works by dissolving rapidly growing tissue destroying a newly concieved baby.

It is therefore important that prolifers write to thank the Health Minister for supporting Senator Harradines Bill and expressing concern about the use ofmethotrexate for abortions.

Please write to:

The Hon. Michael Wooldridge

Health Minister

Parliament House

Canberra 2600

Prolifers should also write to:

        Senator Brian Harradine

Parliament House

Canberra 2600

to thank him for all he has done for Australian preborn children.

Top of Page

By Father Frank A Pavone - National Director, Priests for Life, USA

Begin speaking and acting against abortion, and it won’t be long before you’ll be called a "single issue" person.

But precisely why do "other issues" exist and what is their importance? Other issues exist because people exist. If there were no people, there would be no issues and nobody to discuss them. The bottom line, in other words, is life. Any issue is important because life is important.

Why should we be concerned about unemployment? It is a concern because people have a right to make a living. Why do they have a right to make a living? Because they have a right to live!

Why is poverty also an important issue? It is important because people have a right to food, clothing and shelter. Why do they have a right to these things? Because they have a right to live!

It all comes down to life. That’s why abortion is the key issue. Deny that a person has the right to live, and you undercut the importance of every other issue. It is impossible to speak up coherently about any issue impacting human life if you are allowing the life itself to become a disposable item. Abortion is more than abortion.

The fact that abortion is a non-issue for many people is what makes the "single-issue" accusation so misplaced. It adds insult to the injury already inflicted upon the children (a fatal injury) and their mothers. "Why don’t you take care of people already born?" we are asked. Our response is, "Why are you making the distinction in the first place? We speak more often of the preborn precisely because we are trying to undo the unfair distinction made between them and the born. The preborn have equal rights with the born, and we demand that those rights be respected in the same way.

To accuse pro-lifers of not having concern for the born is as unfair as accusing prison chaplains of not having concern for those who are free, or helpers of the blind of not having concern for those who see! Having a universal concern for human rights never excludes a person from having a specific focus on one group of people in need.

The preborn, furthermore, are in most need. Is any other group of people killed at the alarming rate of 4.400 a day, at set times and places, accompanied by the indifference of so many and by the efforts of others to make it seem so legitimate? These deaths are not accidents; these deaths are "authorised" by the government. Is there really another issue that shows such contempt of life, or another group of human lives so unable to defend themselves?

What would happen if tomorrow a policy were announced whereby 14 year olds could be put to death at the discretion of their mothers? Would the policy last until sunset? Wouldn’t people rise up in revolt? Then suppose those who had set the policy said, "Okay, we’re sorry. That was a bad policy. We will push it back seven years. Only seven-year olds may be put to death, at the discretion of their mothers".

Would that policy be any different? Would it be any better? Then suppose the policy makers said, "Okay, we were wrong again. This time we’ll push the age back another seven years. Boys and girls in the womb may be killed at the discretion of their mothers".

The first two cases were fantasy, but now, welcome to reality. Here’s the key question: Is this policy any different, any better? No! Yet where is the outcry? Why do those who do cry out get accused of being "single issue" people? Have we somehow believed the lie that abortion is morally better than killing a seven year old? If seven year olds were legally killed, would those who spoke up be called "single issue" people?

Because of prayerful action of pro-lifers, many children have been saved from abortion. Ask those children if they think that being saved from abortion is a "single issue No, for each of them it is every issue; it is life itself For us, it is every issue regarding that child and everything that will ever touch his or her life. The child lives. The issue is his or her every need, blessing, mission, interaction, and contribution to this world! The issue is no less than the living image of God Himself

Yes, in the end there is only one issue. The issue is life. And ultimately, life defended and affirmed is identical with that single issue called love.

Top of Page

Spiritual quest leads to Catholicism - from Washington Times 27th March 1996

Dr Bernard Nathanson, the Jewish abortion doctor-turned-atheistic pro-lifer, is turning another corner in his often unhappy life.

The man who presided over 75,000 abortions in the 1960’s and 1970’s hopes that around this corner will lie the end to the torment, the sense of sin and death, that has haunted his sleep.

This spring, Dr Nathanson, 69, coauthor of the influential book "Aborting America", will be baptised a Roman Catholic.

Pro-lifers have long awaited this switch, which may take place at the residence of his new friend. New York Cardinal John O’Connor. Pro-life activists such as Joan Andrews will be invited, along with a godmother, godfather and the doctor’s spiritual director, the Reverend John MsCloskey of the Catholic order Opus Dei (Work of God).

Dr Nathanson’s new book, "The Hand of God", details the reasons for his conversion, one of them being the fear of hell.

"I have such heavy moral baggage to drag into the next world," he writes, "that failing to believe would condemn me to an eternity perhaps more terrifying than anything Dante envisioned in his celebration of the redemptive fall and rise of Easter. I am afraid."

That fear of the inexorable judgment, for which he was unprepared by his Jewish upbringing, led him toward Catholic theology, which makes space for guilt in the sacrament of confession. Along with that comes absolution by a priest, a fellow human who can assure him that he is clean and "that someone," he writes, "died for my sins and my evil two millennia ago."

"The New Testament God was a loving, forgiving, incomparably cosseting figure in whom I would seek, and ultimately find, the forgiveness I have pursued so hopelessly for so long."

The turning point in his decision to become a Christian happened at an Operation Rescue anti-abortion demonstration in front of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Manhattan.

It was a cold, winter day in 1989, and Dr Nathanson was there to research a magazine article on ethics of blockading clinics. The sight of 1.200 demonstrators praying and singing while surrounded by seemingly hostile news media and police led him "seriously to question what indescribable force generated them to this activity.

"For the first time in my entire adult life, I began to entertain seriously the notion of God."

Born the son of a Jewish doctor in Ottawa. Dr Nathanson attended Hebrew school before moving to a mostly Jewish private school in New York, but found his religion "stern, unforgiving, alienating" even after his bar mitzvah at the age of 13.

In 1948, he encounted Dr Karl Stern, a world-renowned psychiatrist who was one of his professors at McGill University Medical College in Montreal. Five years before, Dr Stern had converted from Orthodox Judaism to Roman Catholicism and later wrote a book, "Pillar of Fire," about the dynamics of conversion.

By then he had been involved in abortion for nearly 30 years, beginning in 1945, when persuading a pregnant girlfriend to abort their child "served as excursion into the satanic world of abortion."

Years later, between marriages, he impregnated another women and aborted that child himself By this time he had founded what was to become the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League and for a time directed the country’s largest abortion clinic.

"What is it like to terminate the life of your own child? he writes. "I have aborted the unborn children of my friends, my collegues, casual acquaintances, even my teachers. There was never a shred of self doubt, never a wavering of the supreme self-confidence that I was doing a major service to those who sought me out."

With the advent of ultrasound in the early 1970’s Dr Nathanson began questioning the morality of aborting something he could see moving about in the womb. He gradually repudiated abortion, joining the ranks of the pro-lifers in the early 1980’s with a movie, "The Silent Scream.’ This ultrasound film of a child being aborted earned the scorn of former pro-choice allies.

He also began to question his own life. One option was suicide, not only because of the abortions but because of his three failed marriages; his having violated the Hippocratic Oath, which forbids abortion; and his failures at fathering his son, Joseph, now 30.

"That’s not to condemn the religion," he said in an interview, "but I just didn’t find in it what I needed."

The Jewish understanding of sin differs theologically from Catholicism, says Rabbi Barry Freundel of Congregation Kesher Israel in Georgetown.

"In Catholicism, sin is with a capital ‘S.’ In Judaism ifs with a small ‘s,’ the rabbi says. "It’s missing the target. It does not imply horrible wrongness or existential angst about being guilty. It’s ‘I did something wrong. I need to ask forgiveness. I need to do better.’"

If that’s not enough, "then I’d recommend a series of actions to try to make a positive impact on the world, to balance out his sense he’s done wrong," the rabbi adds. Draw on the resources of your native religion before going to something else."

But the doctor had long since dismissed his Judaism as inadequate. Except for getting married for the first time in a Jewish ceremony and getting his son barmitzvahed, he hardly functioned as a Jew after his mid teens.

Soon after the Operation Rescue demonstration, he started to study the literature of conversion, rereading Dr Stern, Malcolm Muggeridge, C.S. Lewis, Simon Weill, Richard Oilman, Blaise Pascal and Cardinal Newman.

He took a year off to take courses at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics at Georgetown University and began seeing Father McCloskey, a Bethesda-born Priest.

"He’d heard I was prowling around the edges of Catholicism. He contacted me, and we began to have weekly talks," the doctor says. He’d come to my house and give me reading materials. He guided me down the path where I am now. I owe him more than anyone else."

Father McCloskey says, "Dr Nathanson has come to the realisation of the enormities of what he’s been involved in long before I met him.

"I think he’s been doing enormous penance for the pro-life cause since the late 70’s, when he changed his mind. In a human sense, he’s been making reparation. The cross of Jesus Christ and the sacrament of baptism washes away any guilt and temporal punishment for his sins.

"Once he’s baptised, he’s a different man. That’s the whole essence of Christianity," he said.

Until then, Dr Nathanson attends a parish in Manhattan’s Chelsea district although he cannot take part in any sacraments.

"I will be free from sin" he says. "For the first time in my life, I will feel the shelter and warmth of faith."

Top of Page

Euthanasia Views Spark Protest - German protesters yesterday tried to storm a building where Monash University Professor Peter Singer was presenting his new book on euthanasia.

About 50 people jeered at the Bonn Press Club as Professor Singer who has argued that severely handicapped children should not have an automatic right to life, launched the German edition of his book, How Are We To Live. When he began to speak the protesters some in wheelchairs, chanted "Singer Raus!" (Singer out). Three MP’s from Germany’s Christian Democratic Party compared him to Adolf Hitler’s henchman Martin Bormann.

from Melbourne Herald-Sun - May 9, 1996

1. For every 3 black babies born, two are aborted.

2. In 1983, 2% of the black race was wiped out through abortion.

3. 1.6 million babies are aborted each year, 500,000 of these are black babies (3 1.25%) Family Planning Perspective, Jan/Feb 1987 Alan Guttmacher Institute (Alan Guttmacher Institute is an affiliate of Planned Parenthood).

4. Every month 133,333 babies are aborted .... 41,667 are black babies.

5. Every day 4,384 babies are aborted 1,370 are black babies. Family Planning Perspective, March/April 1985, Alan Guttmacher Institute.

6. A 1990 study of maternal deaths from legal abortion 1972 to 1985, found that minority women were three times more likely to die after legal abortion than a white woman. Hani KAtrash, MD, et al, "Legal Abortion in the US: Trends and Mortality". Contemporary OB GYN February 1990, Vol 35, No 2.58 - 69.

7. "Bellvue Hospital, a large metropolitan hospital whose patients are mostly black, is now aborting 2.3 babies for every live birth". Abortion, Poverty and Black Genocide pg. 11 by Erma Clardy Craven.

8. From 1973 - 1994, 10 million blacks were aborted.

from Right to Life of Greater Cincinnati, Inc. -Feb. 1996

US Reaction to President Clinton’s Veto of banning partial Legislation birth abortions

Cardinals protest before the Clinton’s Veto: In a remarkable public pro-life witness, Washington’s Cardinal James Hickey, Boston’s Cardinal Bernard Law and two other bishops led over 500 pro-life demonstrators for several hours in a driving rain in front of the White House. Their candlelight vigil was an appeal to pro-abortion President Bill Clinton not to veto the Bill to ban partial birth abortions. The Bishop’s Committee on Pro-Life Activity, chaired by Cardinal Law, sponsored the picket. This was the first time in American history that two Cardinals had sponsored and participated in such an obvious demonstration before the President.

Cardinal Bernard Law: "If he vetoes for many, this will take them over the edge, and this will lose votes for him without any doubt."

The Wall Street Journal: In its lead editorial April 25 The Wall Street Journal said: ‘With capital punishment back in vogue, we ought to devise a modern method of execution for particularly fiendish criminals — the Unabomber, if convicted of the diabolical acts of which he’s suspected, for example - we have a modest proposal. Why not stick a catheter in his brain and suck it out until his skull collapses? ... We jest, of course. No one would think of doing this to another human being, even the Unabomber, but the President of the US stands four-square for doing it to babies still in the womb nearing birth."

The Pope: The "shameful veto" was an "incredibly brutal act of aggression" against human life. The US is "moving closer to accepting infanticide" This rare attack on a national leader was because the issue is "of such importance for the Holy See and the Catholic Church worldwide".

The Cincinnati Enquirer: "By refusing to reduce the most shocking method of abortion, Mr Clinton has moved away from the mainstream and closer to the fringe."

Ecumenical Unity was shown by a joint statement from a coalition of 30 major churches which strongly supported the Catholic protest.

Senator Bob Dole differed, saying that Clinton had "bowed to extrememists... It’s a big mistake. He’s out there on the extreme edge." If elected Dole said he would "sign this important legislation into law."

Missouri Synod Lutherans condemn Veto: In a letter to the White House, the Synod’s President, Rev’d. AL Barry, noted that it was rare for the Church to intervene in government matters. "However, we view this veto as a severe violation of the government’s responsibility from God to protect and defend human life."

from Right to Life of Greater Cincinnati, inc. - May. 1996

Top of Page

Back to newsletter archive