Homosexual/Catholic/Republican/Pro-Life Couple hire Surrogate Mother, Abort 1 Child, Baptize 4

ABC News, Primetime Thursday ^

[Coleus]

Homosexual/Catholic/Republican/Pro-Life Couple hire Surrogate Mother, Abort 1 Child, Baptize 4 in Catholic Church
Michael Meehan and Thomas Dysarz are part of a nontraditional family that includes three adults and eight children, among them a set of quadruplets. (ABCNEWS.com)	A Different Arithmetic Pioneering Parents Raise New Questions About What Defines a Family Feb. 5 — In Lexington, Ky., there's a family that consists of eight children, three adults, and every conventional notion of family turned upside down.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There's one dad, Thomas Dysarz, and there's another dad, Michael Meehan. And there's one mom, Brooke Verity, who was only 25 years old when she gave birth to four babies, with Meehan as the birth father, before having another with Dysarz. She also has three children by an ex-husband.

 

Religious fundamentalists have traveled halfway across the country to protest this relationship. The law reels in the face of uncharted territory. This family's story is messy, lyrical, emotional, stressful, and real — with no guarantee of a happy ending.

Family Values

 

Dysarz and Meehan have been together for six years. They moved from Los Angeles because they wanted more traditional middle American values around them. The couple may be challenging convention, but they are decidedly conservative. Dysarz is anti-abortion rights, against divorce, devoutly Catholic, Republican. He and his partner are gay.

 

"We're just people," said Meehan. "I think people stereotype every gay person's like this, every Catholic's like this."

 

Meehan is an attorney and a former sheriff's deputy. Dysarz is a hairdresser. Together they opened a successful chain of hair salons and then began to plan to have a family.

 

Kentucky law doesn't allow gay couples to adopt. But in 2001, one of their clients who had three kids of her own, understood how much children would mean to the two men, and volunteered to carry their children for them.

 

Verity even agreed to put her life on the line for nearly nothing beyond expenses. Based on a standard agreement for surrogates, she would get $9,000 for living expenses and $750 for maternity clothes, in return for not smoking or drinking during the pregnancy and agreeing to never attempt to obtain custody after the birth.

 

"There's nothing like hearing your child's cry for the first time, and I just knew that I wanted to do it for someone else," she said.

 

Meehan supplied the sperm, and Verity became pregnant. But there was a problem: she was carrying five embryos, and the doctor insisted that at least one should be terminated for the safety of the mother and the others.

 

Dysarz is religiously opposed to abortion, and had a terrible time coming to terms with the choice. "I felt like I was the only one fighting for the last baby at the time," he said.

 

"I cried the whole way," Verity said. "It's a hard decision but one that had to be made."

 

One After Another

 

At 30 weeks — 10 weeks early, Verity was an awesome sight, and the doctors decided they would have to perform an emergency caesarean on her. On July 26, 2002, Taylor Meehan, the smallest quadruplet at 2 lbs, 14 oz, and only girl, was born. Jacob, Michael and Tristan followed, the largest at 3 lbs, 7 oz.

 

Verity admits she started to feel a little conflicted at the time. "I cried a lot. A lot of tears," she said. She did petition the courts to terminate her parental rights — but even as she did, another roadblock turned up for Dysarz and Meehan.

 

The court appointed someone called a "guardian ad litem" to argue for the children's rights — who rejected Verity's wish to give up her parental rights. It was the first time a guardian rejected the wishes of a surrogate.

 

Fearing the court would rule against them, the trio withdrew their position, and planned to take their case to a different court in a different jurisdiction.

Not a year after she had her quadruplets, Verity kept her promise to Dysarz and agreed to have children again, with him contributing the sperm.

 

But this time, the agreement was not for $9,000, but for cosmetic surgery. "I want to get my tummy tucked," she said. You can't have eight babies and still look good.

Familiar Relationship Problems

 

Dysarz's son Brandon, was born just weeks ago, on Jan.10. He and Meehan now have five babies under the age of 2.

 

But the reality of so many children is taking a constant toll. The two men are very different in some ways. Meehan is more disciplined, while Dysarz is more impulsive.

 

"His way of parenting is more the discipline type, structure," Dysarz said of Meehan. "Mine is more like the loving, you know, make sure that they feel like they're loved."

 

Meehan said, "The thing that bothers me is when Thomas disagrees with a decision I make, and says something that, it's not, I disagree with you, but almost critical of me in front of the children."

 

It's a tug of war parents all over the country might recognize. One in four marriages break up in the first few years of a baby — and they're usually dealing with just one.

 

And like so many marriages, the old wounds still exist. Dysarz still feels badly about having to terminate one of the embryos. "There's a certain part of me that won't let me get close, as close to Michael, because of that," he said.

 

With stress mounting at home, other issues also remain unresolved. Dysarz and Verity haven't discussed whether she will relinquish her parental rights to Brandon, but she is planning to start the process of giving up her parental rights to the quadruplets.

 

"I've been back and forth about it," Verity said. In the meantime, she is going to work at the hair salon where it all began.

 

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Godparents must be Confirmed Catholic, practicing their faith on a regular basis and receiving the sacraments, and if they are married, married in the Catholic Church. The Church prefers two godparents, one godmother and one godfather, but requires at least one godparent who is qualified.

Can. 851 The celebration of baptism should be properly prepared. Accordingly:

1° an adult who intends to receive baptism is to be admitted to the catechumenate and, as far as possible, brought through the various stages to sacramental initiation, in accordance with the rite of initiation as adapted by the Episcopal Conference and with the particular norms issued by it;

2° the parents of a child who is to be baptized, and those who are to undertake the office of sponsors, are to be suitably instructed on the meaning of this sacrament and the obligations attaching to it. The parish priest is to see to it that either he or others duly prepare the parents, by means of pastoral advice and indeed by prayer together; a number of families might be brought together for this purpose and, where possible, each family visited.

 

 

2376 Techniques that entail the dissociation of husband and wife, by the intrusion of a person other than the couple (donation of sperm or ovum, surrogate uterus), are gravely immoral. These techniques (heterologous artificial insemination and fertilization) infringe the child's right to be born of a father and mother known to him and bound to each other by marriage. They betray the spouses' "right to become a father and a mother only through each other."

Baptism is the sacrament of faith.⁵⁴ But faith needs the community of believers. It is only within the faith of the Church that each of the faithful can believe. The faith required for Baptism is not a perfect and mature faith, but a beginning that is called to develop. The catechumen or the godparent is asked: "What do you ask of God's Church?" The response is: "Faith!"

For the grace of Baptism to unfold, the parents' help is important. So too is the role of the godfather and godmother, who must be firm believers, able and ready to help the newly baptized - child or adult on the road of Christian life.⁵⁵ Their task is a truly ecclesial function (officium).⁵⁶ The whole ecclesial community bears some responsibility for the development and safeguarding of the grace given at Baptism.

Hate Free Lexington

On July 26, 2002 four beautiful babies were brought into the world here in Lexington, Kentucky. Their parents are Michael Meehan and his partner Thomas Dysarz.

On Saturday October 26, 2002 the 3-month-old children were baptized by the Rev. Paul Prabell at Lexington's Cathedral of Christ the King. Rev. Prabell blessed the men as he would any other parents.

If you would like to e-mail Fr. Paul Prabell of Lexington's Cathedral of Christ the King and express your Outrage or support of his decision to baptize the children and bless Michael and Thomas as he would any other parents, you can do so at Fr. Paul Prabell, Cathedral@cdlex.org,

Cathedral Staff
Cathedral Contacts

Contact Bishop Gainer by writing to Chancellor

Deacon Jim Paris E-Mail Deacon Jim Parish, Chancellor, 
telephone 859-253-1993.
Chancellor of the Diocese of Lexington

Diocese of Lexington

[Coleus]

`

[isom35]

that is one busy headline.

[little jeremiah]

Homosexual Agenda Ping!

Can it get any crazier? What's really sickening is the poor children.

These homosexual fools can claim they're devout Catholics, and I can claim that I'm a St. Bernard dog. Or that I'm a millionaire, or that I'm devastatingly handsome. Doesn't make it true.

[bc2]

Yeah this is weird. I have gay conservative friends, only 1 or 2 think that gay adoption is OK.

Personally I think it's a very interesting concept to be homosexual and still have part of yourself identifying with the primal desire to procreate and have a family.

I don't understand it at all.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[pax_et_bonum]

Just plain sick ping

[little jeremiah]

One explanation is that the desire to have children is a built-in, natural desire. But the desire for one man to have another man perform anal sex on him, and vice-versa, is not a natural desire. Rather, it is a desire caused by poor relationships with one or both parents, or absent parent, early seduction or molestation, and now, propaganda. Even "gay" informational books and articles admit that anal sex takes getting used to. They even advise not to give up, you'll get so you like it.

Plus, homosexuals who want to change often can, with therapy or religious awakening, or both. There's no necessity or reason to "get over" the desire to have a child. After all, without children, the human race would die out.

[SuziQ]

Personally I think it's a very interesting concept to be homosexual and still have part of yourself identifying with the primal desire to procreate and have a family.

It's not nice to fool Mother Nature! ;o)

[caisson71]

I cannot imagine where we are headed in the country when it comes to families and values. How will we ever get a handle on our social, spiritual and human worth when every day we are challenged with a lower scale of measuring our humanity?

[MarMema]

Thought you might want to ping this one out. For prayers for the kids, perhaps.

[workerbee]

This is wrong on so many levels. Where does one begin?

I pray for these children.

[Ronaldus Magnus]

Homosexual/Catholic/Republican/Pro-Life Couple hire^\s/ Surrogate Mother^{\rental uterus/}, Abort^\MURDERs/ 1 Child

[NYer]

Thomas Dysarz and Michael Meehan are an excellent example of why the pope issued this document.

"Homosexual unions are totally lacking in the biological and anthropological elements of marriage and family which would be the basis, on the level of reason, for granting them legal recognition. Such unions are not able to contribute in a proper way to the procreation and survival of the human race. The possibility of using recently discovered methods of artificial reproduction, beyond involving a grave lack of respect for human dignity,(15) does nothing to alter this inadequacy."

CONSIDERATIONS REGARDING PROPOSALS TO GIVE LEGAL RECOGNITION TO UNIONS BETWEEN HOMOSEXUAL PERSONS

Catholic Ping - let me know if you want on/off this list

[johnb2004]

I am a devout Catholic and engage in sodomy, IVF, abortion and accept and deny truth as it pleases me. This guy may have been baptized a Catholic, but he rejects the entire Catholic faith. What a sham.

This entire picture is deeply disturbing.

[Deo volente]

I remember that Judge Bork wrote that book "Slouching towards Gomorrah" to describe the utter breakdown of civilization we are witnessing.

It seems that this "couple" and their "surrogate mom" are racing towards Gomorrah with breakneck speed!

[Coleus]

Yep, that's what they did.

[Coleus]

Gay parents of quads have separated; court records show dispute
Lexington Herald-Leader ^ | June 20, 2004 | Valarie Honeycutt Spears

[SaintDismas]

I should probably have my head crushed for thinking it, but I really wonder if the dead child is the lucky one, we know that he is in the arms of the Lord, the others will be instructed in evil and have a hard hard life