Posted on 08/04/2011 8:36:59 AM PDT by NYer
When Bryan Kemper was getting started in pro-life activism about 20 years ago, he "was kind of paranoid at first" about working with Catholics, he said, having been taught by other Protestants that the Catholic Church was the whore of Babylon. "I was hellbent on saving all the Catholics," he recalled recently.
Kemper's younger self would likely be shocked to learn that he is part of a recent string of prominent pro-life activists — including Lila Rose, undercover videographer of Planned Parenthood, and former abortion clinic director Abby Johnson — who have decided to enter into full communion with the Catholic Church.
'One truth'
Kemper, now 44, had been baptized Catholic as a kid to appease his great-grandmother, but the faith was never practiced at home.
He spent his teen years doing and dealing drugs, getting kicked out of the military, and periodically living on the streets. His life began to change when he overdosed at a Grateful Dead and Bob Dylan concert in 1987 and a doctor "shared the hope of Christ" with him, he told Our Sunday Visitor.
| Former abortion advocates also converted |
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The ranks of Catholic converts include at least two people who played a key role in the legalization of abortion in America.
Norma McCorvey was the "Jane Roe" of the 1973 Roe v. Wade case that legalized abortion in the United States. She later renounced the pro-choice position, and on Aug. 17, 1998, she was received into the Catholic Church and confirmed by Father Frank Pavone of Priests for Life.
Dr. Bernard Nathanson, who died Feb. 21, helped found the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws (NARAL) in 1969. An obstetrician-gynecologist, he performed 5,000 abortions and oversaw tens of thousands more. In the late 1970s, as a Jewish atheist, he came to oppose abortion; he was received into the Church in 1996.
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He soon "gave his life over to Christ" and immersed himself in pro-life work. In 1993 he started Rock For Life, which led to spots on MTV and the Lollapalooza music tour. Later on, he started Stand True Ministries, which challenges young people to take a stand against abortion.
Kemper eventually came to realize that his Catholic colleagues "loved Jesus, too," he said, but that didn't keep him from trying to convert them. But his efforts didn't turn out quite the way he expected.
"Twenty-three years of debating my Catholic friends caused me to study the Catholic Church," he said. And although Kemper "fought it so hard" for the past few years, his study led him this past spring to return to the Catholic Church.
Historical facts, such as St. Ignatius of Antioch's early-second-century writings on the Eucharist, confirmed Kemper's sense that holy Communion was more than just a symbol. And he came to believe that "there's no possible way that God can be pleased with 40,000 denominations, and there had to be one truth," he said.
While in Brussels for the March for Life Belgium at the end of March, he talked with a monsignor and made "a pretty heavy-duty confession." After affirming the Nicene Creed at Mass, he was able to receive Communion.
In May, Kemper became the director of youth outreach for Priests for Life, and he's now preparing for confirmation with Priests for Life's president, Father Frank Pavone.
Tip of the iceberg
Kemper's story is far from unique among pro-lifers, said Father Pavone.
"When you see these leaders go through this [conversion], it's really a tip-of-the-iceberg phenomenon, because it's happening on the grass roots very commonly."
As Father Pavone travels around the country, people regularly tell him, "I became a Catholic through my pro-life activism."
There are several factors that lead pro-lifers toward the Church, Father Pavone said: the Church's consistent position on pro-life issues, its strong philosophical tradition and the trust that develops between Catholics and non-Catholics "rubbing shoulders" in the pro-life trenches that helps make non-Catholics more receptive to learning about the Faith.
Father C. John McCloskey, who has played a part in the conversions of several public figures, added that many people "learn about the Catholic Church for the first time through their involvement with pro-life."
Shaped by the saints
| Rose |
Rose was raised in an interdenominational church by devout parents who homeschooled her and her seven siblings. From an early age she was surrounded by the writings of saints such as Justin Martyr, Athanasius, Augustine and Thomas Aquinas. As a young teen, she read Catholic author Michael O'Brien's novel "Father Elijah" and Mark Twain's "Joan of Arc," which got her interested in the lives of the saints.
"All of these things began to influence me and shape my spiritual perspective from a young age," she told OSV. "I would debate with my very hard-core Calvinist friends about justification or transubstantiation or different principles of the Catholic faith."
As a sophomore at UCLA, Rose "stumbled across" an Opus Dei center near campus, attended a Mass and found a spiritual "mentor" in the woman sitting next to her. A year and a half later, on March 15, 2009, Rose was received into full communion with the Catholic Church.
Although Rose was impressed by the pro-life writings of Catholics such as Mother Teresa and G.K. Chesterton, "It wasn't the pro-life movement that brought me to the Church," she said, so much as her education and exposure to the saints.
Leaving abortion behind
| Johnson |
Johnson rose to national prominence in 2009 when, after witnessing an ultrasound-guided abortion, she left her job as director of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Texas and became a pro-life advocate.
After her pro-life conversion, Johnson and her husband, Doug, no longer felt welcome at the pro-choice Episcopal church they'd been attending.
Although Doug was adamant that they would not become Catholic, Johnson saw something special in her new Catholic pro-life friends in the Brazos Valley Coalition for Life. "I just saw how Christ was really real every day in their lives, and I thought, 'I want that too.'"
One Sunday they attended Mass after missing another church service, and they realized that the Catholic Church was where they belonged.
They completed their RCIA classes in the spring, and Johnson said they were awaiting an annulment ruling before they can receive what she most looks forward to about becoming Catholic: the Eucharist.
"It feels like torture to have to wait," she said, "but it just confirms that we're in the right place and that this is what we really want and that this is really God's desire for us."
The majority of Catholics vote Democrat, so how are they following an anti-abortion route?
Here is an example of the California voters and pro-life/pro-abortion voting for leaders and issues, the Catholic Church opposed prop 71, but Catholics supported it.
The majority of catholics don’t live in America. Even with them, though, I consider them the same as my conservative, evangelical, Baptist relatives in W. North Carolina. The tradition of being democrat hasn’t yet been replaced by careful consideration.
I, too, was a democrat once upon a time.
Catholics poll low on pro-life which befits their voting and would account for the pro-Obama vote.
If you post a graph, you need to attribute it and give some parameters about it.
If the stem cell bill was officially opposed by the Catholic Church, then there was something going on with that bill. I’m guessing that it didn’t distinguish between types of stem cells, but that’s purely a guess, so I’m as likely to be wrong as right.
Again, if you assume that Catholics are roughly 25% of the US population, and that only 2/3rds of that are voting age Catholics, then we’re talking about something like ((300/4)*.67=50.25) 50 million people out of a world-wide church of more than a billion. That’s 5%.
All you had to do was ask, it is a Gallup poll.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/118399/more-americans-pro-life-than-pro-choice-first-time.aspx
My point was that the church leadership was against it, but the rank and file Catholics were overwhelmingly for it, and voted for it because of their politics.
‘”The U.S. Catholic Bishops’ Pro-Life Secretariat and the California Conference of Catholic Bishops have weighed in strongly against Prop 71. Their main reasons urging a NO vote are:
Drawing stem cells from an embryo always destroys the human embryo, thus aborting human life.
From a social justice perspective, cloning embryos for the sole purpose of killing them is unjustified and manipulative and the Prop 71 denies funding for adult and umbilical cord blood stem cell research, while launching the State into a costly bond issue at a time when money is badly needed for health, education, police and fire services.
Embryonic stem cell research makes exaggerated promises of immediate help to people suffering from a of number debilitating diseases, while in fact adult stem cells mostly from bone marrow transplants have already helped patients with leukemia, Parkinson’s disease, spinal cord injury and dozens of other conditions.”’
I am not a Catholic myself, and don’t see myself ever converting to Catholicism, but I have to give the Catholics credit. Whenever I go to the abortuaries, 90% if not higher of those outside praying, counseling, protesting, etc, are Catholic.
The Protestants and Baptists all talk a good game on abortion, but where the rubber meets the road it’s the Catholics who show up.
Thanks, truthsearcher! You post the truth!
** The tradition of being democrat hasn’t yet been replaced by careful consideration.**
So true. The change is happening, but it’s slow and will take a long time.
On the other hand:
Before 1980, the Southern Baptist Convention officially advocated for loosening of abortion restrictions. During the 1971 and 1974 Southern Baptist Conventions, Southern Baptists were called upon "to work for legislation that will allow the possibility of abortion under such conditions as rape, incest, clear evidence of severe fetal deformity, and carefully ascertained evidence of the likelihood of damage to the emotional, mental, and physical health of the mother." W. Barry Garrett wrote in the Baptist PressBaptist PressBaptist Press is the official news service of the American Southern Baptist Convention based at the headquarters of the Southern Baptist Convention in Nashville, Tennessee.- Origins and bureaus :... , "Religious liberty, human equality and justice are advanced by the [Roe v. Wade] Supreme Court Decision." ."Found at: http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Pro-life
Freep-mail me to get on or off my pro-life and Catholic List:
Please ping me to note-worthy Pro-Life or Catholic threads, or other threads of general interest.
I’m saying that Catholics support the Democrat party and their politics, including abortion, and until conservative Catholics learn that, then they cannot fix it, the conservatives in the Southern Baptists for example wrested back control from where their convention was drifting, now they are probably the most pro-life vote of any church.
Fighting to remain ignorant of how Catholics vote, will never result in a solution to a growing problem.
I’m saying that Catholics support the Democrat party and their politics, including abortion, ....Your anti immigrant and anti Catholic bigotry align you well with the KKK and GOP bigots who tried to OUTLAW the Catholic schools and whose hatred has kept many Catholics away from the GOP. It is sad to see that some conservatives still spout that unholy line of intolerant know-nothingism.
The KKK was Democrat like the Catholics, making personal attacks on someone for making conservatives aware of the pro-life/pro-abortion vote is uncalled for, especially since this is a conservative political site.
Rather than defending Catholic abortion voters, and fighting nastily to keep their voting hidden from view of pro-lifers, try to figure out a way to change it, if you care.
The KKK and the GOP teamed up in Oregon to pass the ultimate anti Catholic law - banning Catholic schools.
In that election, voters also supported a Klan-endorsed initiative that effectively outlawed private and parochial schools.
In less than two years, the Klan recruited 14,000 members in Oregon, giving it perhaps the highest per-capita membership in the country. And in the 1922 election, it succeeded in unseating Congressman Clifton McArthur and Olcott, and electing a new governor, two Multnomah County commissioners and a slate of state legislators. It also helped pass a nationally notorious initiative aimed at putting Catholic schools out of business.Not ALL GOP types are bigots or supported the KKK, but the anti-immigrant, anti Catholic bigots tainted the GOP then - and now - to the point that many of us still view the GOP with suspicion.
” making personal attacks on someone for making conservatives aware of the pro-life/pro-abortion vote is uncalled for, especially since this is a conservative political site.”
Spewing bigotry and spamming Catholic threads with your one sided and false to fact bigotry is uncalled for, especially since this is a conservative political site.
Man, personal attack seems to be your only speed.
Voting for abortion and liberalism is not something that conservatives support, we consider it a problem.
You really want to defend the abortion voters and now try to create a myth that the KKK was not an organization of Democrats?
Bigotry and liberalism is not something that conservatives support, we consider it a problem.
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