Thread by me.
Commentary by David Bereit, National Coordinator, 40 Days for Life
March 3, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A young woman walked up to the 40 Days for Life vigil outside an abortion center in Austin, Texas recently. She signed up to join the others in prayer ... and then immediately sat down on the sidewalk and started to cry.
One of the volunteers stopped praying for a moment to approach the young woman, whom she had never met before, and asked her if she needed a hug. This volunteer assumed that the thought of what was going on inside the abortion facility had simply overcome this woman and brought her to tears.
But that wasn't the case. To her surprise, she found out this young woman was crying for another reason.
"I'm pregnant right now and don't want to be," she said. "I've already had four abortions.
She said she didn't have an abortion scheduled. "But I keep feeling this huge temptation to just go to an abortion clinic, pay my $400 and get it over with. I came to the sidewalk to pray, and to be around people who are like-minded as I am."
The young woman told one of the sidewalk counselors that she was twelve weeks into her pregnancy. She had already been to a pregnancy resource center, but was still a mess emotionally.
She had become a Christian, she said. "But with this pregnancy, I just feel so depressed. I'm living in a women's shelter, and the last thing I want right now is to be pregnant."
The sidewalk counselor took her to dinner, and they sat and talked for hours. "As they developed a long-term plan to get this young woman the help she needs," said Elizabeth McClung, the local 40 Days for Life coordinator in Austin, "she said something that should serve as an encouragement to every single pro-lifer who has ever thought about going to pray at an abortion facility."
"If you guys weren't out there praying," this woman said, "I would have pulled up to the facility, sat in my car for hours on end -- and ended up going inside for a fifth abortion. Since you were on the sidewalk praying, I knew I could find comfort and support there, so I went there to cry instead. Thank you for being there."
"Her story is the perfect example as to why we not only pray from home and from church, but we also go pray at the very places where lives are being hurt and taken," Elizabeth said.
She is now on a path to healing from her previous abortions, finding a job and taking her pregnancy one day at a time. And, Elizabeth said, "She is not going to have another abortion!"
Please pray for her, and for all who are desperate to break out of that cycle of abortion.
Thread by me.
PEORIA, Illinois, March 4, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - An Illinois senator is pushing legislation that would allow doctors to harvest organs from citizens who have not explicitly given consent for the procedure.
The Journal Star reported Monday that a hearing was scheduled this week for Sen. Dale Risinger's bill that would establish a "presumed consent" policy governing organ donation for individuals 18 and older.
"This is an important first step to getting a law in Illinois that helps us have more organ donors," said Risinger, a Republican. Risinger said he was open to public input suggesting revisions to the bill, and that it was not "in its final form."
Under the proposed legislation, individuals who wish to avoid donating their organs would have to explicitly opt-out of donating their organs prior to becoming incapacitated. If passed, the law would be the first of its kind in America.
Stephen Drake of the anti-euthanasia group Not Dead Yet pointed out the grave implications of such a bill, given the flexibility of the definition of brain death, which can vary from hospital to hospital.
Vital organs such as the heart become unusable after an extended period of complete cessation of bodily functions. Therefore, "brain death" is used as a parameter to determine when an individual is extremely unlikely to recover, even as functions such as the heartbeat continue, so that usable organs may be removed.
But the flexibility of that definition has raised considerable controversy.
"Most people assume that since the state they live in considers them a corpse if they're declared 'brain dead,' then the state also imposes some sort of uniform standards regarding how that determination should be made," wrote Drake.
"That's a comforting thought, but it's not the reality." Drake pointed to a 2008 article in the medical journal Neurology that discovered "wide disparities" in hospitals' determinations of brain death.
Drake also pointed to the well-known case of Zack Dunlap, who "miraculously" became responsive after being diagnosed brain dead, but minutes before his organs were to be harvested.
Prominent bioethics commentator Wesley Smith predicted that the legislation would only serve to breed mistrust between an already-strained doctor-patient relationship.
"Think about it: We already have bioethicists advocating for futile care theory, that is the right to refuse wanted life sustaining treatment based on quality of life judgmentalism, resource allocation, or both," wrote Smith on his Secondhand Smoke blog.
"Add in the motive for taking organs to this volatile field – and wary families will become even less trusting, and medical issues will become even more likely to end up in court," he continued. "Square that if we ever enact explicit health care rationing, or redefine death to include a diagnosis of PVS – as many luminaries in the transplant field advocate.
"If doctors ever start taking organs without explicit permission – even if allowed by law – there will be hell to pay."
What an amazing story!!