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 |
|
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.
|
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."
Then stop making blanket statements like "Catholics vote Democrat". That's personally offensive to someone like me, who has never, not even once -- I'm 50 years old -- voted for a D Presidential candidate, and only on exceedingly rare occasions for a D in any other office. (I live in the South; sometimes Southern Democrats on the local level are more conservative than the Republicans.)
"The Catholic vote trends Democrat more than it should" is a statement I'll agree with you on. As long as the D party remains anti-life and anti-family, the solution to that is to make more Catholics into better Catholics who take their religion with them into the voting booth.
The trend in both America and in the Catholic church has been toward pro-life. The pro-life movement is winning this argument slowly but steadily.
Also, you must remember that the Democratic Party turned pro-abortion in fairly recent memory. It was only after it was hijacked by the anti-war crowd of John Kerry’s ilk that the Dem Party went south on abortion. I believe I read something recently about John Kennedy being solidly anti-abortion.
That is one reason so many democrats have only slowly come to realize it’s not the same pro-worker party of their grandparents.
We are all politically savvy, we know that when we talk about Catholics being a democrat constituency that we don’t mean each individual Catholic, the same goes for other generalities about voting blocks, no one should have to explain that we are pointing out how the majority of that block votes, not each individual.
Do you get upset when people mention the “Hispanic vote”, even though you know that Protestant Hispanics vote about 50/50 republican? In that case the distinction needs to be made, because in that case there is a clear difference between the Catholic and Protestant Hispanic that needs to be studied for the clues of how we can win the Catholic voters, we need to find the key that the republican party has never been able to find with the Catholic vote.
As a Catholic,I am not comfortable with the division of Catholics according to “white”, “Hispanic” and/or any other specified “ethnic” group, whether by voting habits or anything else..
I live in a pretty densely populated area. My residence is in a valley/foothill part of my county, and in this area alone we have 5 (Roman)Catholic parishes, two Chaldean Rite parishes(Iraqi Catholics) and 1 Maronite Catholic parish (Lebanese). As a larger community, we don’t classify ourselves according to white, Hispanic, Middle Eastern, etc-—we all consider ourselves...Catholic. We often visit each others churches. We are united in belief. We are outstandingly pro-life—all parishes are committed to serious pro-life endeavors, and by this I don’t mean just the voting booth, but hands-on work such as pregnancy counseling centers, helping women materially and emotionally through pregnancies that Planned Parenthood would gladly be paid to terminate.
My parish ministers to people from varied cultural communities—Filipino, Hispanic, Sudanese, Iraqi/Lebanon, and in the mid-1970’s we took under our care a large group of “boat people” who had managed to escape Vietnam. However, we don’t separate ourselves according to color or culture.
We who take our Faith seriously and are there consistently to worship, to put our faith to the test in our daily lives and to minister to each other are NOT “liberal”.
We can’t speak for those who are not consistent in their worship and daily life.
As Catholics, we don’t separate our parishioners according to color or race. We belong to each other in Jesus Christ.
So—no matter how polling “data” may wish to separate us in such a way, in real time/real life, the actuality of how we live and act as American citizens is the true barometer of us as Catholics.
Like you said, it was the polling firm that provided the separate data on different demographics within the Catholic Church.
But, like Jesus said, “When they see your unity, then they’ll know I was sent by my Father.”
Jesus agrees with you. I’d call that pretty good company.
Quite right on all those points. Another issue is the phenomenon of “cultural Catholics.” They self-identify as Catholics in polls, and somewhat skew the results. And, yes, the Democrat party didn’t used to be be the liberal party. It became that over the years starting really with Woodrow Wilson.
That’s not to say there aren’t big challenges in the Catholic Church with significant numbers of people voting for liberals; there is. But, it’s gradually changing. The sixties did a lot of damage throughout society, and the Catholic Church was no exception.
"White" Catholics have slowly been voting a little more Republican (52% voted rep in 2008, while 48% of Hispanic Protestants voted rep. In 2004, white Catholics and Hispanic Protestants both supported Bush by 56%), but Catholic immigration will more than make up for that. I think that we are in a period of the best that it is going to get for the Catholic vote, unless we come up with some dramatic strategy to make Catholic Hispanics conservative.
Obama got 54% of the Catholic vote, that isn't due to Catholics not knowing what they are voting for, they do know and Republicans at this point do not look likely to be winning more of their votes as time passes. In twenty years it will be worse, not better. We need some earth shattering way to change that future, and conservative Catholics need to figure something out, putting their heads in the sand and fighting to keep the truth from being known is not a winning strategy.
Look at that California, 2004 vote breakdown in post 41, we don't want all of America becoming like California.
Actually, the only three elections that we know for sure that the Catholic vote went republican, is since the 1960s, 1972 being the first one.
Thank you so much, xzins.
And thanks so much for all of your great postings.
You do realize the KKK strung up Catholics, So how can you associate the KKK to Catholics? See southern history.
I believe anyone with open eyes can see the stance the church has on Abortion and Life in general, for it is well documented. If a Catholic is for abortion they are not standing with the church, see Nancy Pelosi. Most Catholics who have a good understanding of their faith say Nancy should be refused communion for her acts. (now if the priest would step up and show some fortitude) So what makes you think a true Catholic stands for abortion?
“... unless we come up with some dramatic strategy to make Catholic Hispanics conservative.”
That bigotry just keeps pouring out. Sad.
I didn’t associate anyone, I said they both were democrats, which they were.
Would you explain how you find bigotry in this statement?
“... unless we come up with some dramatic strategy to make Catholic Hispanics conservative.”
What conservative, pro-lifer would disagree with it, do you?
Your spamming of Catholic threads with anti-Catholic and anti-hispanic garbage has been noted often. That you now just make snarky comments doesn’t hide the stench. You need to get help.
You really do only make personal attacks don’t you.
If you like the way that Hispanic Catholics vote, just say it out loud, be proud, show your support for that vote.
Yawn. Your odd behavior and weird spamming of Catholic threads is really sad. You need help.
Odd behavior is someone on a conservative site that likes the way that Catholic Hispanics vote.
Get help. Your anti-catholic, anti-hispanic spamming is getting very old. Bigotry is not a conservative value.
**we don’t want all of America becoming like California.**
To me this is a strange statement.
Catholics are against:
abortion,
contraception,
same-sex marriage,
embryonic stem cell research,
euthanasia,
and for the Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
What is your beef with the Catholic Church, please, really, down deep?
See post 41. Making things up is called lying.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.