Free Republic

Although a Catholic legislator’s vote in favor of legalizing abortion still falls short of the “formal cooperation” that carries with it automatic ex-communication, the church still considers such a vote a stain on the legislator’s soul. As such, unless he confesses his sin and does penance for it, he may not receive communion without committing the second mortal sin of sacrilege, a point that many American bishops and priests seem to have forgotten.After months of accusing Republicans of using “phony, trumped-up culture wars” to divide the electorate, the Democrats have chosen abortion, the mother of all culture war issues, as...

So much that you need to know about the Catholic Church’s social policy problems can be summed up in one word: Chicago. On race, abortion, guns, immigration and “community organizing,” Catholic Church officials in the Windy City have forged unholy alliances with radical left-wingers and enablers who undermine the faith—and the faithful. Exhibit A: the Archdiocese of Chicago’s Office for Racial Justice and one of its most notorious priests, the Rev. Michael Pfleger. This week, Chicago Cardinal Francis George—who also happens to be president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops—presided over a gala ceremony honoring Pfleger with a “lifetime...

Whether the victim is a kidnapped sex slave in Thailand, a trafficked child camel jockey in the Persian Gulf states, or a fifth grader assaulted in an American elementary school, the fact that children and young people throughout the world are regularly subjected to sexual and physical abuse is a horror that ought to shock the conscience of humanity. In the United States alone, there are reportedly tens of millions of victims of childhood sexual abuse. In the years between 1991 and 2000, according to Virginia Commonwealth University researcher Charol Shakeshaft, 290,000 students were sexually abused in American public schools....

"A nation that kills its own children is a nation without hope." - Pope John Paul II --------------------------------------------------------- It is sadly fitting that in preparation for Holy Week, our country has passed a bill which funds the persecution of innocent life. President Obama strategically used 104 Catholic congressmen to give me, a physician, expanded government resources to legally kill patients in order to provide better health care. "Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger ..., and not minister to your needs?" He will answer them, "Amen, I say to you, what you did not do...

The Catholic Health Association recently endorsed the Senate version of the health-care bill, giving President Obama “cover” to push pro-life House Democrats to vote for it. But the CHA’s statement is deceptive, and its history on the issue of life is highly suspect. The statement issued by Sr. Carol Keehan, CHA’s president and CEO, reads: “We said there could not be any federal funding for abortions,” followed by a description of how people who want abortion coverage in their government insurance will be required to write a separate personal check for the cost. Clearly the implication is that the “separate...

The Obama administration last week week attempted to argue that Catholic bishops didn’t oppose the Senate version of the ObamaCare bill as a way of “proving” that the bill won’t fund abortions. The US Conference of Catholic Bishops has responded by asking parishes to post and/or read aloud a statement that clarifies their position on the bill, which is adamant opposition. In the statement that many Catholic parishioners will find greeting them as they attend Mass, the USCCB not only declares its opposition but also urges Catholics to contact their elected representatives in Washington to stop it:

As usual, ABC, CBS, and NBC ignored Friday’s March for Life protest. (Even the Associated Press skipped over the tens of thousands marching.) But the PBS NewsHour at least offered a brief from news anchor Hari Sreenivasan: Thousands rallied in Washington in the annual March For Life. It was the 37th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision of Roe v. Wade that legalized abortion. The anti-abortion crowd rallied at the White House, and then moved on to the Supreme Court. A handful of abortion rights supporters were also present. NPR covered the trial on the murder of late-term abortionist George...

Reform: If Massachusetts is any guide, the passage of ObamaCare is almost certain to increase demand and worsen the shortage of doctors. Access to health care doesn't mean much if there's no doctor to provide it.Suppose health care reform passes and all are insured, by force or otherwise. The U.S. will be short 124,400 front-line physicians by 2025, according to the Association of Medical Colleges. That does not include the 15,585 new primary-care providers the administration plan is estimated to require. The Massachusetts reforms enacted in 2006, designed to provide universal coverage, provide an insight into what we might expect...

The immensity of the nation’s Catholic healthcare system could add clout for Catholic bishops as they advance their opposition to healthcare reform as proposed now. The Catholic Church demonstrated its legislative influence this year when it threatened to close Catholic hospitals if the Freedom of Choice Act passed, which effectively scuttled plans to introduce the legislation. The legislation would have defined abortion as a “fundamental right” and nullified conscience protections for healthcare providers. The Catholic health network includes 624 hospitals, 499 long-term nursing facilities, and 41 hospices nationwide, including 11 of the nation’s largest healthcare systems, according to the Catholic...

Health Care: Lost in the kerfuffle about a pro-choice president being honored at the University of Notre Dame was the damage the Freedom of Choice Act might do to the nation's health care.Specifically, how many Catholic hospitals will close and how many Catholic doctors will quit if it becomes law? According to the Catholic Health Association, Catholic institutions make up 13% of the nation's nearly 5,000 hospitals, and employ more than 600,000 people. CHA says one of every six Americans hospitalized in the U.S. are cared for in a Catholic hospital. A lot of federal funds flow through the nation's...

The nation’s Catholic bishops have told Congress that they oppose H.R. 3200, America’s Affordable Health Choices Act, as it currently stands, because the health-care reform bill would mandate funding and insurance coverage for abortion. In an August 11 letter to members of the House of Representatives, Cardinal Justin Rigali, chairman of the pro-life committee of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (U.S.C.C.B.), told lawmakers that health-care reform must “respect human life and rights of conscience in the context of abortion.” “Much-needed reform must not become a vehicle for promoting an ‘abortion rights’ agenda or reversing longstanding policies against federal funding...

Nearly 50 years ago Democratic presidential hopeful John F. Kennedy went before a group of Protestant ministers in Houston to reassure them, and the rest of America, that if elected president he, as a Roman Catholic, would not set policy on orders from the Vatican. "I am not the Catholic candidate for president," the Massachusetts senator said that night in September 1960. "I am the Democratic Party's candidate for president who happens also to be a Catholic. I do not speak for my church on public matters — and the church does not speak for me." Given the evolution of...

In the late afternoon of July 1o, President Obama met privately with Pope Benedict XVI for just over 30 minutes. According to official Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi, S.J., "The president explicitly expressed his commitment to reducing the numbers of abortions and to listen to the church's concern on moral issues." On July 13 in a Senate committee hearing, Sen. Barbara Mikulski was forced to admit under persistent questioning by Sen. Orrin Hatch that the new health-care bill includes abortion coverage. Planned Parenthood's Guttmacher Institute estimates government funding of abortion increases abortion by 20 to 35 percent. There were 1,206,200...

Bioethics: The former director of the National Institutes of Health, once an enthusiast for embryonic stem cells, now says their future has "dimmed." So why is the administration bailing out research into such therapies while troubled states like California have committed billions?Aside from creating or saving a few research jobs, the administration's decision to federally fund embryonic stem cell research is, as we've noted, a bailout of bad science. It throws money at an avenue of research that time and adult stem cell progress have passed by. Applauding the administration's move was Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa., who echoed the claims...

VATICAN CITY – Pope Benedict XVI stressed the church's opposition to abortion and stem cell research in his first meeting with President Barack Obama on Friday, pressing the Vatican's case with the U.S. leader who is already under fire on those issues from some conservative Catholics and bishops back home...Afterward, the Vatican said the leaders discussed immigration, the Middle East peace process and aid to developing nations. But the Vatican's statement also underscored the pair's deep disagreement on abortion. "In the course of their cordial exchanges, the conversation turned first of all to questions which are in the interest of...

The most overturned appellate court has teed up another case for the Supreme Court to consider — and likely soon. The 9th Circuit overturned an injunction in a district court case, allowing the state of Washington to force a pharmacy to stock and dispense morning-after pills, which causes the abortion of an embryo in the early days of a pregnancy. The pharmacy owners had objected, claiming that the law violated their religious practice:

PORTLAND, OR, March 1, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - "It is categorically impossible for the same person to state that he or she believes simultaneously both what the Catholic Church teaches and that abortion is just a choice," says Bishop Robert Vasa in a column released today by the Catholic Sentinel, the diocesan newspaper of the Archdiocese of Portland and the Diocese of Baker. Although Vasa, the Bishop of Baker, did not mention her by name, he was referring in his column to Democrat Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi specifically, and to all politicians of a similar ilk in general. ...

Code: ZE05100401 Date: 2005-10-04 Question Raised on Communion and Abortion Prefect of Doctrinal Congregation Presses the Issue VATICAN CITY, OCT. 4, 2005 (Zenit.org).- The new prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is urging the Synod of Bishops to discuss whether voters who support pro-abortion candidates should be receiving Communion. Archbishop William Levada, who succeeded Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as prefect of the dicastery, quoted No. 73 of the working document of the Synod on the Eucharist, in which reference is made to the relationship between the Eucharist, morality and public life. The archbishop today suggested that the...

[This is only available now in hard copy, and I cannot post but a few of the critical paragraphs.] WASHINGTON -- A new revelation by National Right to Life is timed to hurt John Kerry's standing with Catholic voters like Larry Arceneaux. Arceneneaux is a dyed-in-the-wool southern Democrat from Houma, La., who represents a vote that Kerry has seen slip from his grasp: the Catholic Democrat. When he heard National Right to Life's revelation that the top partial-birth abortion moneymakers were contributors to Kerry's campaign, Arceneaux was saddened by not surpriesed. The abortion issue was one of many that forced...

<p>Gov. James E. McGreevey sharply criticized the Vatican yesterday, saying it was wrong for church leaders "to force a false choice between one's faith and religious tradition and the importance of governing in an open, democratic society."</p> <p>McGreevey, a former altar boy who attended Roman Catholic schools, has long been reluctant to discuss the balance between his faith and public service, saying the topic was too personal.</p>