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Canadian Gay Activists Oppose Child Porn Law
Issue No.: 20: by: Tim Dailey
October 22, 2005
Would Same-Sex "Marriage" Lead To Polygamy? In the Netherlands, It Already Has
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Issue No.: 20 – by: Peter Sprigg
At the heart of the argument for same-sex "marriage" is the belief that government should not restrict a person's choice of marriage partner. One of the weaknesses of that argument is the fact that applying such a principle would require eliminating other longstanding restrictions on a person's marriage partner. For example, if such a choice cannot be restricted based on gender, why should it be restricted based on number? The idea that legal recognition of same-sex "marriage" would lead to the legal recognition of polygamy as well is the "third rail" of the whole debate, which pro-homosexual activists refuse to touch.
Yet the predictions of a "slippery slope" towards polygamy have already been borne out in the Netherlands--the same country that was the world's first to legalize same-sex civil "marriage" a scant four years ago. A Dutch man recently became the first to enter a civil union (the legal equivalent of marriage) with two bisexual women. For more details, see the link below.
Additional Resources
Brussels Journal: First Trio
http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=LK05I127&f=CU05I32
Open Letter On Bill C-407 – By Linda Klassen
To: Bloc MP Francine Lalonde
Cc: MP Walt Lastewka
PM Paul Martin
Stephen Harper, Leader of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition
Re: Bill C-407
Dear Ms Lalonde:
I write to assure you that Canadian citizens are not as insane as the politicians playing god in Parliament, nor are we as stupid, as you may hope. Seriously, Madame, what makes you or anyone on Parliament Hill think that we are foolish enough to trust any of you with matters of 'our' life and death when for the past several decades politician in power have proven themselves more and more corrupt than the administration before them? Why, government can't even be trusted with 'our' money! And you cannot seriously suppose we would trust a Bill such as C-407 that gives you power through the medical profession to take 'our' lives!
Your Bill C-407, Madame, is nothing more than a transparent attempt to expedite the elimination of those assessed by your ilk as the 'weak and less than desirable' elements of society through openly legalized iatrogenocide. It's not enough that thousands of Canadians are killed through 'medical mishap' and 'medication error' every year with no one held accountable for these offences. Now you want to make it an 'acceptable practice' to kill Canadians with their so-called 'consent'!
I realize, and wish more Canadians were astute enough to recognize, that our current government, supported by such as yourself, is committed to a global project of 'depopulation', to 'thin out' our numbers to reduce us to a more 'manageable' bevy of political and corporate slaves. Don't dare try to persuade us that you give a damn about our 'dignity'. If you did give a damn at all, you'd be fighting for our right to safer 'health care' rather than promoting a Bill that amounts to a 'medical guillotine', licensed to kill Canadians for what you gods decide are 'legitimate reasons' to end a life.
If you had given a damn, you should have researched the euthanasia issue thoroughly before drafting your Bill and if you have, you must also have encountered the very disturbing reality being experienced in the Netherlands where a law, just like the Bill you are proposing, has been in force since 1981 and you must have studied the reports of the multitude of abuses of that law and the thousands of homicides committed through those abuses. But if you have indeed studied the existing evidence of the very real danger posed and the harm done by laws just like your Bill C-407 and you drafted and introduced it anyway, obviously you don't give a damn about Canadians but agree with the sentiment that the earth is overpopulated and needs to be depopulated and the means already in use to accomplish this goal just aren't working quickly enough.
Your Bill, Madame, would legalize both euthanasia and assisted suicide, and as written, would allow any person, as long as they are assisted by a medical practitioner, to euthanize or assist the suicide of a person who is in chronic mental or physical pain. The bill also states that the individual in pain does not need to seek treatment before requesting to be assisted in suicide.
The evidence of how easily abused such laws as your Bill C-407 have been in other countries ought to be made known to the as yet unsuspecting people of Canada, who have no clue as to what you and the government are up to, let alone what a very present and lethal threat you pose to their literal lives. If you had any genuine respect for the 'dignity' of Canadians, you would demonstrate at least some respect for them by making it known to them that you are trying to pass a law that legalizes yet another 'death solution' to a plethora of human problems, real and/or imaginary.
You would point Canadians to such information as: Euthanasia in the Netherlands http://www.internationaltaskforce.org/fctholl.htm; and perhaps highlight some pertinent data for them such as:
"Some physicians use this distinction between "euthanasia" and "life-terminating treatment" to avoid having a patient's death classified as "euthanasia," thus freeing doctors from following the established euthanasia guidelines and reporting the death to local authorities. One such example was discussed during the December 1990 Institute for Bioethics conference in Maastricht, Holland. A physician from The Netherlands Cancer Institute told of approximately 30 cases a year where doctors ended patients' lives after the patients intentionally had been put into a coma by means of a morphine injection. The Cancer Institute physician then stated that these deaths were not considered "euthanasia" because they were not voluntary, and that to have discussed the plan to end these patients' lives with the patients would have been "rude" since they all knew they had incurable conditions. (5)"
This "life-terminating treatment" already being practiced in Canada without its victims or their loved ones even knowing about it in the form of 'pain management' treatment. This reality came to light for me this past July when I witnessed my own father being increasingly overdosed with 'pain management medication' until he became comatose and ultimately died without the least ability to utter a whimper or raise a finger. As for 'pain management', it was just as obvious that my father still experienced pain, by the tormented expressions that crossed in his face whenever the hospital staff moved his emaciating, body. He suffered just as much as he would have without the 'pain management' drugs, but he was just too doped up to communicate it to anyone. The overdose of drugs killed my father before the disease had the chance to do it, but my father wasn't informed that this was the only 'treatment' he'd be getting.
Since government already permits the practice of iatrogenocide', (the terminating of human life through drugging without the knowledge or consent of the victim), in our so called 'health care system', the only reason you could have for wanting a law such as the one you propose in Bill C-407, is to kill even more Canadians with greater ease and speed, outside as well as inside medical institutions, for lesser and lesser medical or mental complaints and problems.
There is absolutely nothing 'dignified' about taking a human life, inside or outside of the womb. Weak people such as yourself and far too many other weak persons who have crept into Parliament, have either fallen for the popular propaganda around this issue or have been corrupted, as weak people tend to be susceptible and prone to such temptations. Either way, you pose a threat and are an offense to Canadians, to dignity and to human life.
In short, the response from Canadians, if they only knew what you intend to do to them through your Bill, is "NO! to Bill C-407". Let's see whether you give a damn about us enough to actually listen and hear and do the 'right' thing which is what WE want and demand of you politicians in Parliament.
Sincerely,
Linda Klassen
St. Catharines, ON
The Next Big (Bad) Thing Heading Canada's Way...
From: "LICIA CORBELLA" licia.corbella@calgarysun.com
... As for euthanasia, I'm very passionate about stopping this. We must not let it be legitimized. It is a great evil. As abortion has proven, once the genie is out of the bottle, you can't get it back in. We must never let them even remove the cap on the bottle. This needs stopping, but we all must understand the issue first. There is a great site on this: http://euthanasia.com. The Remmelink report will make your hair stand on end.
Perhaps you can point out to your readers that before they enter into any debate on euthanasia they need to understand what the issue is. There is a vast difference between letting someone die and making someone die. Letting someone die, or letting nature take its course, is NOT euthanasia. Removing someone from life support is NOT euthanasia.
Administering a toxic substance to someone to hasten their death is murder and is what euthanasia advocates are pushing for. I have written dozens of columns on this. Here is one that shows how quickly this slippery slope becomes a vertical skating rink.
Licia Corbella
Editor, The Calgary Sun
Right To Die Turns Into 'Duty' – /Slippery slope of Euthanasia can quickly become an icy cliff/
Sunday, October 3, 2004 – By Licia Corbella, Editor
All last week, proponents of the right to die were trotted out on radio and television shows across the country and were frequently described as "experts." Their warped soapbox – built mostly on lies – was quickly re-erected when it was discovered that on Sept. 25, a 59-year-old Montreal mother called police when her son died. The mother admitted that she had helped kill her 36-year-old son – because he was in pain from multiple sclerosis.
This story about a mother's so-called "compassion" for her suffering son has re-energized this dangerous cause. If these so-called "experts" were really honest and really did their homework, they would discover that in countries or regions that have legalized euthanasia and assisted suicide, what inevitably ends up happening is the "right to die" very quickly turns into the "duty to die" and very often into murder. What's utterly maddening to me when people spout off about this topic is how little most know about its realities.
I now ask everybody who says they are in favour of these murderous practices if they have ever researched the facts surrounding it. Not surprisingly, most have not. I heard one of these so-called experts on the radio this past week scoff when someone arguing against it said even with strict guidelines, the slippery slope very quickly becomes a
treacherous cliff. Read on and consider if the following is just a gentle slippery incline or an icy cliff.
In the Netherlands, so-called "mercy killing" has been practiced openly since the 1980s, but was only legalized in 2002. In a report written in 1991, while euthanasia was still technically illegal in Holland, it was determined even back then that in about one-third of the cases of euthanasia examined, the patient had NOT given consent.
This first government study on Dutch euthanasia, called The Remmelink Report (after Prof. J. Remmelink, attorney general of the High Council of the Netherlands, who headed the study committee) made disturbing revelations. It found that: In 1990, 1,040 people died from involuntary euthanasia, meaning doctors actively killed these patients without the patients' consent; 14% of the patients were fully competent and 72% had never given any indication that they would want their lives terminated. Nobody was prosecuted or went to jail for these killings that violated the supposed "strict" guidelines to prevent murder. Right-to-die advocates often argue euthanasia is an issue of "choice." But the Dutch experience clearly shows that when voluntary euthanasia and assisted suicide are accepted practice, a significant number of patients end up having no choice at all – forever.
In 1990 – 12 years before euthanasia was legalized – the Dutch Patients' Association felt the need to develop wallet-sized "do not kill me cards" which state that if the signer is admitted to a hospital, "no treatment be administered with the intention to terminate life."
Of course, back when euthanasia was being debated and had never yet openly occurred in Holland, the patter was that only the very ill elderly would be granted such "mercy." That lasted at best a few years when the practice started. Now disabled infants are killed regularly in Holland. It is called pediatric euthanasia.
A paper entitled: "Assisted Suicide: Not for Adults Only?" by Rita L. Marker, an attorney and the executive director of the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide, states that in July 1992 – that's 14 years ago – the Dutch Pediatric Association announced that it was issuing formal guidelines for killing severely handicapped newborns, something that had been going on for years anyway. According to Dr. Zier
Versluys, chairman of the association's Working Group on Neonatal Ethics: "Both for the parents and the children, an early death is better than life." Three of the eight centers on neonatology surveyed by the Dutch Pediatric Society were performing euthanasia on handicapped newborns. Infants who were deemed eligible for death included not only those who were terminally ill but children who were mentally retarded or faced the
prospect of living with a chronic illness. These killings – and this is well documented – occur after the doctor decides it's best and does not require the need for parental approval. A 1997 article in a British medical journal found that 8% of the infants who die in the Netherlands are killed by their doctors. If this information does not turn your stomach, might I suggest you join the Clifford Olson fan club. Don't get me wrong. I am not opposed to parents deciding on behalf of their infant, not to undergo a bunch of
invasive operations that might help them survive. Not accepting medical treatment and allowing a person to die naturally is ethical and OK. But actively administering drugs to kill someone is murder. The moral divide is not small and fuzzy but immense and very clear.
But in Holland the killing of children doesn't just end at infants. That, of course, would be discriminatory and unfair. In Holland 12-to-15-year-olds are allowed to request euthanasia with the consent of their parents. Those aged 16 and 17 can demand euthanasia – and while their parents must be informed – the teen is allowed to make the final decision. As with adults and infants, these teens need not be terminally ill or even in physical pain. Mental anguish (what teen doesn't have angst?) is enough, and many, mildly depressed teens are killed by their physicians in Holland every year. Oh, but surely that could never happen here, right? Well, since 1997, doctor-assisted suicide has been legal in the state of Oregon. Already serious debates about allowing depressed youth to decide on death have been conducted. That's not a slippery slope. It's a vertical ice rink.
© Copyright 2004, The Calgary Sun
Police Tap Into Child Exploitation Database
About a dozen police forces across Canada are now making use of a national information database aimed at combating the worsening problem of the sexual exploitation of children over the Internet, the Saskatoon StarPhoenix reported last week.
The Child Exploitation Tracking System (CETS) is the brainchild of a Toronto police officer who successfully approached Microsoft founder Bill Gates in January 2003 for help in providing the technology necessary to crack down on the pedophiles and child pornographers who use the Internet to prey on children.
Gatesresponded by ordering the development of a database that allows participating police forces across Canada to share information on cases involving child exploitation.
CETS was launched last April as a joint project of the Toronto Police Service, the federal government, the RCMP, and Microsoft Canada. The software is headquartered within the RCMP's National Child Exploitation Co-ordination Centre in Ottawa.
Saskatoon's police force is the latest to connect to CETS. It expects to be linked up in a matter of days. Acting Sergeant Debbie Altrogge believes that working cooperatively benefits everyone.
"The Internet has no boundaries," she told the StarPhoenix. "It doesn't mean that when Saskatoon is investigating somebody that they're necessarily from Saskatoon because the Internet is so widely used."
Altrogge adds they plan to enter local cases into the database dating back two years.
Can Religion And Politics Coexist?
Roman Catholic bishops should as "a sad necessity" withhold Communion from political leaders who profess to be faithful Catholics but whose decisions violate the basic tents of their faith, says Edmonton Archbishop Thomas Collins.
"Politics is a sacred vocation. It's a life where we need people with a conscience," he told the Toronto Star.
Collins is currently in Rome along with 256 Roman Catholic bishops, cardinals and heads of religious orders from 118 countries to attend a three-week Synod – the first to be called by Pope Benedict XVI since he was elected in April to succeed John Paul II.
One of the issues being raised at the Synod is thelinkage between a person's faith and the Church's place in society.
In a homily on the opening day of the Synod, Benedict stated, according to Reuters: "The type of tolerance which permits God as a private opinion but refuses to allow him in the public arena, is, in the reality of the world and our life, not tolerance but hypocrisy.
"There can be no justice where man makes himself the only master of the world and of himself."
Earlier this year, the Vatican denounced Catholic politicians in the United States, Spain, Italy – and Canada – for their failure to oppose abortionand homosexual marriage. One Canadian parliamentarian so far has been denied Communion for having voted in favour of Bill C-38, which legalized marriage for same-sex couples across Canada.
It is a position that apparently most Canadians do not support. According to an Ipsos-Reid-Associated Press poll released in June, 72 per cent said that religious leaders should not try to influence government decisions. As one television newscaster recently claimed, "Canadians have long had a tradition of separation of church and state."
But Sudbury Star columnist Claire Hoy, a Presbyterian, counters that this so-called tradition "was never meant to bar religion from politics. In fact, it was meant to protect [the American] people from the state imposing a religion upon the people, as England had done." Indeed, it "has absolutely no legal, historical or constitutional standing whatsoever in Canada."
Churches of any denomination, Hoy added, are "entitled to say to a politician that you can't have it both ways: you can't, on the one hand, try to win votes among people of your faith by making a public show of attending the church of your choice, only to turn against church teachings on political issues and then expect no repercussions...
"[Either those] who take Communion – and partake in other church rites, whether Catholic, Protestant, or any other faith - uphold their end of the bargain or [they] lose their rights to participate."
Hoy also spoke to the common argument that politicians who get elected should disregard their religious beliefs when making political decisions.
Report from Medjugorje – October 15, 2005
© Children of Medjugorje 2005
Permission is given to spread the text of these reports under two conditions:
Report from Medjugorje – October 15, 2005
Dear Children of Medjugorje! Praised be Jesus and Mary!
1 – On October 2, the apparition to Mirjana gathered a very big crowd. At the end, Mirjana asked that the message be translated and given away to all present. Let's notice that this fact of getting the message of the 2nd is new, it has been happening for several months only, therefore it might be meaningful for us today! Here is the message transmitted by Mirjana:
"I come to you as a Mother. I bring you my Son, peace and love. Purify your hearts and take my Son with you. Give true peace and happiness to others."
Mirjana added, "The Gospa blessed each one of us as well as the religious objects that we had brought. Then she insisted again on the importance of the priest's blessing."
2 – I seizethis opportunity to make clear that there are several kinds of blessings, which it is important not to confuse. When a priest blesses (or a Bishop, a Cardinal or the Pope), it is Jesus Himself who blesses, through his ordained minister. Jesus Himself then pours out his divine sanctity upon us. He takes some of His good and gives it to us. This blessing is a huge grace that does not depend on the inner state of the priest. If the soul that receives the blessing is open and recollected, then Jesus opens the treasures of His Heart and spreads them in plenty, according to the openness of the soul and the measure of the soul's faith. The humble soul receives the most. Since the blessing reaches the soul directly, the intelligence may not be conscious of the effusion that is beyond its grasp; this is the reason why it is so easy to be distracted and miss the giving of the gift. This is a shame, because the soul comes out enriched, fortified, pacified, and protected; and the most precious aspect is that it can unite the soul with God in a more intimate way. The fruits of a blessing are such that they immediately are recorded for eternity and give the soul a special beauty. As is true for all gifts from God, the more zeal in the giving or the receiving of a blessing, the greater its efficacy.
In Medjugorje, the Blessed Mother said, "If priests knew what they give when they bless, they would bless day and night!" And, "A priest's blessing is greater than mine." (This is a personal message to Marija, undated.) The reason is that the priest received the sacrament of Holy Orders.
This is only a small preview of the priest's blessing! Lay people may also bless, and the Church recommends that parents, for example, bless their children every day. Our Lady asks that children be blessed every morning and night (undated message from the 80s). Children may bless their parents too! The power of this blessing depends a lot on the person giving it; that is why Mary's blessing is particularly powerful! If a mother on earth may bless her child, how much more can our Mother from Heaven do it!
In Medjugorje, the Gospa gives her blessing at each of her apparitions. After greeting us, saying, "Praised be Jesus, my dear children!” she prays for us with her hands stretched out. One day I asked Marija why the Gospa sometimes gives us her "blessing of joy", sometimes her "maternal blessing", or her "solemn blessing", etc. What is the difference between these blessings? Marija answered: "The Gospa did not explain." Well, let us just receive the gift with confidence and gratitude, and our Heavenly Mother will do the rest according to our needs! Another point should be underlined: In Medjugorje, on the mountain or in some monthly messages, Mary has given us her "special motherly blessing" (see June 25, 1999 message for example) and she invites us to transmit it to all creatures. The message on Mary's "special motherly blessing" was received by Marija, the visionary. This explains why some misunderstandings may have arisen in the past when one or another visionary, after being asked about the "special motherly blessing", may have mistakenly answered, "The Gospa never gave that." Since each visionary has received something in particular from the Gospa, it is important to refer directly to him for the topic that concerns him. The same applies to the messages on suffering given to Vicka, for instance, or those given to Mirjana about unbelievers.
3 – The Year of the Eucharist and the Synod are over. However, this time of grace was given to us for a new start in order to walk on the way to holiness with our Eucharistic Jesus. More than ever, it is our whole life that becomes Eucharistic little by little and turns into a continuous celebration! Such was the goal of our dearest Jean Paul II a year ago, when he proclaimed the Year of the Eucharist!
An Irish friend, Ann Marie Collins, 33 years old, came recently. May her testimony inspire more initiatives for the sake of Jesus in the Eucharist!
"I was a Montessori teacher and my family had a grocery shop, which didn't do so well. We made a little pact with Our Lady: if she sold our business for us, we would go to Medjugorje. Our Lady is a wonderful businesswoman, and in three weeks after we put the shop for sale she had a buyer for us! So we kept our pact and came to Medjugorje on August 25th, 1999, and that is when it all began for me. It was a very special week, and I was just totally in awe of the people and their reverence and I knew I wanted some of that because that was missing in my life. I was just kind of going to Mass out of habit and I had been going to fortune tellers and just also been searching in some way for something, questions to be answered whatever. "The first day at English Mass the homily was all about astrologers and fortunetellers. I felt the priest was speaking to me, that particular homily was for me, so I went to confession to him. I will never forget this confession! Among other things, I confessed that I had been to fortunetellers. Going out of the confessional, I knew that I was not a "Leo" as they had me believe, but as a child of God I was under the sign of Jesus! I was freed!
"Our Lady really took me by the hand so many times during the week, on Apparition Hill and Krizevac, and then I had a special experience of her just the day before I went home. I was sitting outside the church with my mum. I was looking down at my Rosary beads praying, but I just felt my head being lifted up and I looked up and saw Our Lady was standing, looking at me, smiling. I will never forget the smile on her face. There were no words spoken but they were not needed because her smile just said it all. It was such a loving smile like she just wanted to embrace me there and then. She was just beautiful! From that moment I was changed.
"I was engaged at the time, to be married. When I went back home, I called my boyfriend. I told him I had a brilliant week and I shared what I had experienced. But he shook his head, he didn't believe. Things changed for us, I wanted to go to Mass everyday, you know, and I joined a prayer group and we just drifted apart. So I prayed to Our Lady and I said, 'If you want me to break up this relationship and this engagement, do not let me have a broken heart'. I said to my friend, 'I just can't do this anymore, you are not the guy Our Lady has in store for me.' He knew we were not getting on well. I just felt like a weight lifted off my shoulders.
"In the beginning Our Lady just gave me a desire for Holy Mass, so I went everyday and I still do. Then slowly and gradually she would give you a desire for something else, it was Eucharistic adoration the next year; she is so gentle! She knows that she has to spoon-feed us because we are not able for solid food.
"So last year, when the Holy Father proclaimed the Year of the Eucharist, some friends and myself got together and we decided to do something for this. Our Lady had given us the gift of adoration from coming in Medjugorje; she has made us aware of her Son and His presence in the Blessed Sacrament. So we decided to set up a web site to inform people of the schedule of Adoration in their region (in Ireland). We called all the priests we found in the telephone book and quite often we were well received by them! Some of them have even accepted perpetual adoration in their church or chapel.
"I was at the hospital in Dublin for three weeks and they diagnosed Addison's disease, which is a very rare disease that affects your adrenal glands. So I am on steroids every day to keep this functioning. I get very tired because I don't have natural adrenalin (see PPPS). But when I go down to the Blessed Sacrament, Jesus really gives me the grace to carry this cross, to accept it and to get on with daily life. I wouldn't have had the strength to cope with this illness if I didn't have Jesus. I just get all my strength from adoration because without Jesus' presence, I really would be nothing. Adoration gives me so much strength each day, physical and spiritual strength.
"Our Lady is our Mother, she is always protecting us, wrapping her heavenly mantle around us, and holding our hand. If we just put our hand into her hand she will guide us. If we just start off simply by saying the Hail Mary, she will come in and guide us. She will bring us back to her Son Jesus. We just have to hold her hand and let her do that, because she knows best."
Ann Marie returns to Medjugorje regularly. Each time, she is more enthusiastic for the Eucharist and also more courageous in her sufferings, since up to this day, the Lord hasn't healed her from this painful illness. By consecrating her life to promoting Adoration (on top of her job), not only does she draw many souls to Jesus in the Eucharist, but also she beautifully witnesses that the way of the cross can indeed become the way of joy!
4 – In her message of July 25, the Gospa invited us to pray novenas. Well, let's join together and offer a Novena for the Poor Souls in Purgatory! This act of mercy will bring much reward and blessings in this world and in the world to come! You may find on our website, www.childrenofmedjugorje.com, the text of a Novena, starting on October 23, ending on All Saints' Day, November 1st.
5 – At his general audience of Wednesday October 12, Pope Benedict XVI has again invited the Catholic families to pray the Rosary together. "In this month of October dedicated to the Rosary", he said, "I invite you to pray the Holy Rosary together, in your families."
Dearest Gospa, we don't know what your plans are, but, we want to take your hand in order to be always where God wants us, together with you!
Soeur Emmanuel +
PS – In Medjugorje, you may buy the videos of the apparitions to Mirjana on the 2nd of each month, only at Foto Dani, (on the left bank after the first bridge), for 15 Euros or equivalent. No mail order is available. Telephone: (387) 36 650 006 or mobile phone: (387) 63 324 077. Email: ivankovic.damir@tel.net.ba
PPS – Good news for pilgrims to Medjugorje via Split! The airline German Wings offers good prices for flights to Split via Cologne or other German cities. Please look up at: www.germanwings.com for reaching Medjugorje, the obstacle of the price will fly away for many!
PPPS – Saint Elisabeth of the Trinity (Carmel of Dijon, France) died of this illness, which was not treated at the time.
UN AIDS Envoy Can’t Stomach Abstinence
Money and ideology are more important to U.N. apparatchiks than saving lives in Africa, which explains their fervent advocacy of risky condoms over effective abstinence programs in preventing HIV/AIDS.
Steven W. Mosher, President
PRI Weekly Briefing – 13 October 2005 – Vol. 7 / No. 40
UN AIDS Envoy Can’t Stomach Abstinence – By Joseph A. D’Agostino
Stephen Lewis, the United Nations' special envoy to Africa for HIV/AIDS, has little good to say about the Bush Administration's efforts there. That the United States is spending more money than any other nation on stopping the spread of AIDS in Africa counts for little. He is upset with the U.S. emphasis on abstinence, which he accuses of causing a condom shortage in Uganda.
Now Uganda happens to be the only sub-Saharan African country that has achieved a large reduction in her HIV prevalence rate. Its adult HIV infection rate has dropped from 18% to 5-7%. No other nation in the world has achieved such success. Most sub-Saharan African nations, following the pro-condoms model, continue to suffer from rising HIV infection rates. But then, other African nations do not have leaders like Ugandan President Museveni and his wife. This dynamic duo has consistently promoted an abstinence-first model that has successfully changed Ugandan culture. Ugandan surveys show a reduction in premarital sexual activity among Ugandan youth and a reduction in extramarital activity among adults. The result: less AIDS.
This is, in Lewis's worldview, all wrong. He complains that the Bush Administration’s shift of funding from condoms to abstinence promotion under its PEPFAR program has led to a shortage of the prophylactics in Uganda. “There is no doubt in my mind that the condom crisis in Uganda is being driven by PEPFAR,” said Lewis. “To impose a dogma-driven policy that is fundamentally flawed is doing damage to Africa."
This is a bizarre inversion of the truth, and threatens to do grievous harm to the one HIV/AIDS prevention approach that has actually worked.
Uganda’s health minister, Jim Muhwezi, denies that there is any shortage of condoms in his country. “It is not true that there is a condom shortage,” he said. “There seems to be a coordinated smear campaign by those who do not want to use any other alternative simultaneously with condoms against AIDS.” In fact, Uganda officially uses the ABC approach: Abstinence before marriage, be faithful in marriage, and use condoms if you don’t do one or two.
But this isn't good enough for UN officials, whose love affair with condoms knows no bounds, and who are also angry with America for funding her own AIDS initiative in Africa instead of giving the money to them.
“Alas, from Stephen Lewis's point of view, the U.S. is deplorably ‘unilateralist’ and spends its billions of AIDS dollars directly in Africa rather than sluicing them through the UN, where now that the Oil-for-Fraud program is no longer ‘needed,’ many bureaucrats are itching to bring their humanitarian expertise and efficiency to bear on another great slab of cash,” wrote Mark Steyn in the Canadian Western Standard, Oct. 3. “Once the usual UN administration fee had been deducted from Bush's pitifully inadequate $15 billion, there could easily have been enough left over to buy, oh, twenty thousand bucks' worth of second-hand condoms from a rubber factory co-owned by a nephew of Kofi Annan and a cousin of Boutros Boutros-Ghali. Instead, the U.S. decided to spend the cash itself.”
Why not? The UN’s approach has failed, and its own statistics show it. HIV rates keep rising, to over 30% in some countries. Two decades of pornographic sex education and massive shipments of condoms have sent millions of young Africans to an early grave.
But who on the Left cares about the facts? The UK Guardian sneers at Ugandan First Lady Janet Museveni’s abstinence campaign, ominously hinting that it is driven by her Christian beliefs. It scorns the poster campaigns that Mrs. Museveni has backed. “In one poster campaign, signed by the office of the first lady, the slogan alongside the picture of a smiling young woman says: ‘She's saving herself for marriage – how about you?’” said the paper.
It is this sort of thing that the UN and left-wing newspapers fear that Bush is going to promote in Africa.
Lewis is no new kid on the block shooting his mouth off. A former Canadian ambassador to the United Nations and former Deputy Executive Director of UNICEF, he is a long-time member of the establishment. His wife, Michele Landsberg, is a pro-abortion feminist activist and former columnist for the Toronto Star.
In August, the Global Fund for Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria pulled all funding from Uganda’s highly successful AIDS prevention program, alleging financial irregularities.
Apparently, achieving results isn’t good enough for international grandees. It’s death by condom or nothing. But we think the Bush Administration will stay the course.
Joseph A. D'Agostino is Vice President for Communications at the Population Research Institute.
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The pro-life Population Research Institute is dedicated to ending human rights abuses committed in the name of "family planning," and to ending counter-productive social and economic paradigms premised on the myth of "overpopulation."
Lifeissues.net Newsletter #247 – October 16, 2005
Item #1 – More Co-Operation, Security, Solidarity Among Peoples And Cultures To Combat Terrorism In South East Asia
Sydney (Fides Service) – More political co-operation and equal and just laws, more solidarity among peoples and cultures, more intense inter-religious relations are the weapons needed to fight terrorism in south east Asia again recently targeted in Bali. This is the opinion Jesuit Father Mark Raper, provincial of the Society of Jesus in Australia and for several years director of Jesuit Refugees Service international.
"When we see evil we must call it by its right name. The bomb blasts in Bali were criminal; brutal acts perpetrated by a vile ideology of people with neither conscience nor scruples. No religion can justify this sort of behaviour. Violence must be opposed by all believers and especially Christians called to be 'builders of peace'".
The Jesuit fears these latest attacks may provoke widespread trauma and dejection: "At the social and political level we must not abandon the path of dialogue and diplomacy" on the one hand reinforcing security measures and on the other keeping channels open with Islamic communities, encouraging them to be our allies in the fight against violent fundamentalism.
Fr. Raper said that putting the role of the United Nations again at the centre of international politics is an important step towards world peace. For its part the Australian government can contribute at the level of political co-operation, working to intensify social and cultural relations with the countries of south East Asia different in ethnic origin, culture, language and religion.
In the meantime in Indonesia after the recent attacks in Bali the Bishop of Denpasser, the main town in Bali, has urged Catholics to pray for the victims and their families, particular in this month of October dedicated to the prayer of the Rosary. Special prayers for peace in the world have been organized in Catholic parishes, religious communities and associations and schools all over the country.
Source: (PA) (Agenzia Fides 6/10/2005 righe 26 parole 271)
Item #2 – Seoul's New Diocesan Pro-Life Commission Keeps Watch On Bio-Ethical Progress To Protect All Life Including That Of The Unborn Child
Seoul (Fides Service) – The Catholic archdiocese of Seoul has formed its own Pro-Life Commission. The news was announced by the Archbishop Nicholas Cheong who explained that the commission will keep watch on bio-ethical matters and developments and serve as the local Church's channel for defending human life from conception to natural end. The commission, whose members are bishops, doctors, jurists, theologians, experts in bio-ethics, will be chaired by Bishop Andrew Yeom-soo Jung auxiliary of Seoul.
The Commission – the archbishop said – "will decide whether scientific studies and developments in the field of genetics and embryology are in keeping with the order of Creation". "Following the example of Jesus Christ who showed his love and concern for the sick, we fully support medical-scientific studies to alleviate pain especially the suffering of terminally ill patients", he added. The faithful have been asked to support the work of the Commission with donations of money.
In Korea bio-ethical developments have been in the spotlight in 2005 and the local Church was swift to act. When it was announced that a team of Korean scientists led by Prof. Hwang Woo-suk of the National University Seoul had cloned human embryos, the Catholic community staged a street protest to demand respect for human life from the first instant to natural end; respect for the rights of the human embryo which is not an object; prohibition of the aberrant practice of human cloning in which the human takes the place of God; respect for life of every person irrespective of the 'quality'.
Source: (PA) (Agenzia Fides 7/10/2005 righe 28 parole 287)
Item #3 – Taly Resumes RU 486 Abortion Drug Trials, Catholic Paper Protests
The Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano is condemning trials of the RU 486 abortion drug in Italian hospitals. Sant'Anna hospital Turin had been conducting trials of the drugs to determine if they should be allowed for sale in Italy as they are in many other European nations and the United States.
The newspaper cites an Italian law stating that abortion should not be used as a form of contraception, but it says that's what would happen with the mifepristone abortion drug, which has been responsible for the deaths of five women in the United States and others elsewhere.
"The common roots of contraception and abortion are ever more clearly in evidence," L'Osservatore said. They are "two fruits of the same tree," and the connection is "only on the cultural level but on the technical level as well."
The newspaper condemns the "obscurantism of the conscience" that allows some people to favor the destruction of human life through abortion. "One more time, science is put in the service of death."
View full text at LifeNews.com: http://www.lifenews.com/nat1673.html
Item #4 – Mothers Concerned That Doctors Pressure Abortion For Disabled Babies
Some parents of disabled unborn children are concerned that doctors are increasingly pressuring women carrying babies with physical or mental handicaps to have abortions. The concerns come after a leading pro-life senator highlighted the issue during the hearings over Supreme Court nominee John Roberts.
During Beth Allard's pregnancy, her doctors found problems with her unborn son Ben during a routine ultrasound. They told her, "This is not good news."
An amniocentesis revealed Ben had Down syndrome, a condition that causes mental disabilities. However, Allard told ABC News that what disturbed her more was her doctor's characterization of the nonfatal disease as a problem and urging an abortion.
"They called me at work to tell me, and then said, 'You have two weeks to decide if you're going to keep this child. Either way, it's an awful thing,'" Allard said.
View full article at LifeSiteNews.com: http://www.lifenews.com/nat1694.html
Item #5 – Chinese Breast Cancer Deaths Jump 40% Since One Child Abortion Policy
(LifeSiteNews.com) – Chinese state media has reported a sharp increase in the number of cases of breast cancer in China in the last ten years. According to official statistics from the Ministry of Health, about 40% more women are dying from breast cancer and the disease is striking women at younger ages than ever before.
According to the officially released statistics reported in China Daily, the fatality rate of breast cancer rose 38.7 percent for women living in urban areas and 39.1 percent for rural women between 1991 and 2000.
Xu Guangwei of the China Anti-Cancer Association put the increase down to stress and greater consumption of fatty food, which have been linked to cancer in many studies. A much easier explanation, however, is the communist country's obsession with limiting its population with abortion. The link between abortion and instances of breast cancer is much better documented than that between stress and cancer.
The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer points out that an identical increase in breast cancer in US women was found between the mid-1980's and 1998, "the increase took place entirely within the Roe v. Wade generation – the group of women who were under age 40 in 1973 when abortion was legalized."
Karen Malec, the group's spokesman said, "The Chinese government, like the American government, isn't telling women why they're getting more breast cancers. Here's a little clue for the Chinese and U.S. governments. Nations that prohibit abortion (like Ireland and Poland) have significantly lower breast cancer rates."
The connection between abortion and breast cancer, though verifiable in many studies, has been assiduously blocked, says the Coalition, for years because of politics. Most national medical associations and physicians' organizations have accepted abortion as a great boon to women's health and routinely accuse any report finding otherwise of "political" bias.
For more information on the medical connection between abortion and breast cancer: http://www.abortionbreastcancer.com/start/
Item #6 – First IVF Baby Born Of Single Father
India's first surrogate in vitro fertilization (IVF) baby of a single parent has been born in a city clinic, raising questions about the newborn's legal status and the single father's parenthood rights.
Amit Banerjee, whose childless marriage had ended in divorce years ago, is apparently the country's first single father whose son was born through IVF method on Sunday.
View full article at HindustanTimes.com:
http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1507887,000600010003.htm
Item #7 – Embryonic, Fetal, And Post-Natal Animal-Human Mixtures: An Ethical Discussion
The potential power of embryonic and fetal inter-species mixtures became clear about a decade ago in a series of dramatic experiments in which small sections of brains from developing quails were taken and transplanted into the developing brains of chickens. The resulting chickens exhibited vocal trills and head bobs unique to quails, proving that the transplanted parts of the brain contained the neural circuitry for quail calls. It also offered astonishing proof that complex behaviors could be transferred across species.
Although moral intuitions about the creation of animal-human mixtures, especially at the embryonic and fetal level, may vary, it is subject to deep ethical concern to many for whom the creation of animals with certain kinds of human characteristics or with human brain and reproductive cells, would be offensive.
In a report published in 2004 and entitled Reproduction and Responsibility: The Regulation of New Biotechnologies, the President's Council on Bioethics of the USA indicated that in the context of procreation – of actually mixing human and non-human gametes or blastomeres3 at the very earliest stages of embryological development – the ethical concerns raised by violating the animal-human species barrier were especially acute. Thus, the drawing of clear lines limiting permissible research in this area should be specifically considered.
View full article at CBHD: http://www.cbhd.org/resources/bioethics/scottishcouncil_2005-10-07.htm
Item #8 – Little Progress In Stemming Stds
There are an estimated 19 million new cases of STDs each year in the United States, up from 15 million nearly a decade ago. Experts don't have exact numbers because not all diseases are reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta and many people don't know they're infected.
Among the most shocking estimates are that one in five Americans has genital herpes and more than half of women will contract HPV, or human papillomavirus, which causes genital warts and can lead to cervical cancer. At least a million Americans are living with the deadly AIDS virus.
STDs can cause lesions, discharge and other symptoms, but oftentimes they are "silent" and show no outward signs.
View full text at MSNBC: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9504789/
Item #9 – Women Bypass Sex In Favour Of 'Instant Pregnancies'
Women are increasingly seeking inappropriate IVF treatment because they do not have the time or inclination for a sex life and want to "diarize" their busy lives.
The cost of a single IVF treatment is at least UK 2,500
Wealthy career women in their 30s and early 40s, some of whom have given up regular sex altogether, are turning to "medicalized conception" – despite being fertile and long before they have exhausted the possibility of a natural conception.
They are prepared to pay thousands of pounds for private IVF treatments– even though they have unpleasant and potentially harmful side effects – because they believe it offers them the best chance of "instant" pregnancy.
View full article at news.telegraph:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=M0SU3F31Q2GODQFIQMGCNAGAVCBQUJVC?xml=/news/2005/09/25/nivf25.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/09/25/ixportaltop.html
Item #10 – Teen Sex And Drug Use Raises Depression Risk
Depression may be the result rather than the cause of risky teen behaviors.
A new study shows that teen sex or drug use raised the risk of depression a year later.
Researchers say the results challenge the notion that teens become sexually active or engage in drug use to "self-medicate" their own depression.
"Findings from the study show depression came after substance and sexual activity, not the other way around," says researcher Denise Dion Hallfors of the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, in a news release.
For more information check FoxNews.com: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,169961,00.html
Item #11 – Philippines Uses UN Population Control Money For Natural Family Planning
(LifeSiteNews.com) – Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has announced that family planning monies from the United Nations will be used to promote effective modern natural family planning methods rather than artificial contraception and abortion as the UN monies are used in many other nations. The announcement has received praise from Cebu Cardinal Ricardo Vidal, who has called on promoters of artificial means of birth control to withhold legislative counter-measures until the success of the natural family planning can be assessed.
Fides news agency reports that President Macapagal-Arroyo announced the imminent adoption of the method in the Philippines during a recent meeting of leaders of the Interfaith Dialogue and Conference for Peace, and she reiterated it at the United Nations General Assembly in New York. Cardinal Vidal praised the President calling her "courageous in deciding the new family planning policy".
The Cardinal asked opponents of the natural method of birth regulation to "declare a multi-partisan moratorium on all legislative action to allow all the time to assess these policies, genuinely intended to protect Filipino women, the family and society, at large."
Item #12 – UN Anger Over Uganda's Successful Abstinence Program Fueled By Loss Of Funds Says Researcher
(LifeSiteNews.com) – The United Nations envoy to Africa, Canadian Stephen Lewis, is highly critical of an abstinence campaign that has downplayed the role of condoms but been hugely successful at reducing HIV transmission in Uganda. Population Researcher Institute's Joseph A. D'Agostino suggests that the success in combating AIDS in Uganda "isn't good enough for UN officials, whose love affair with condoms knows no bounds, and who are also angry with America for funding her own AIDS initiative in Africa instead of giving the money to them."
Uganda, whose abstinence campaign has been so successful as to be likened to a highly effective vaccine, has reduced HIV transmission rates from 18% to 5-7%. "No other nation in the world has achieved such success," writes D'Agostino. "Most sub-Saharan African nations, following the pro-condoms model, continue to suffer from rising HIV infection rates. Ugandan surveys show a reduction in premarital sexual activity among Ugandan youth and a reduction in extramarital activity among adults," D'Agostino added. "The result: less AIDS."
Lewis is highly critical of the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), which has drawn the focus of AIDS prevention away from condoms to the successful abstinence model adopted by Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni and his wife Janet. "There is no doubt in my mind that the condom crisis in Uganda is being driven by PEPFAR," Lewis said. "To impose a dogma-driven policy that is fundamentally flawed is doing damage to Africa."
"This is a bizarre inversion of the truth, and threatens to do grievous harm to the one HIV/AIDS prevention approach that has actually worked," writes D'Agostino. Even Ugandan Health Minister Jim Muhwezi denied there is no "shortage" of condoms. "There seems to be a coordinated smear campaign by those who do not want to use any other alternative simultaneously with condoms against AIDS," he said.
In 2003, the UN itself (United Nations AIDS agency – UNAIDS) admitted that condoms have a disconcerting failure rate. The study revealed that condoms are ineffective in protecting against HIV an estimated 10% of the time. The admission from the UN, which is far lower than some studies which have shown larger than 50% failure rates, is a blow to population control activists which have aggressively and misleadingly marketed condoms in the third world as 100% effective.
"The UN's approach has failed, and its own statistics show it," D'Agostino emphasized. "HIV rates keep rising, to over 30% in some countries. Two decades of pornographic sex education and massive shipments of condoms have sent millions of young Africans to an early grave."
"Apparently, achieving results isn't good enough for international grandees," D'Agostino concluded. "It's death by condom or nothing. But we think the Bush Administration will stay the course."
See related LifeSiteNews.com reports:
United Nations Report says Condoms Fail to Protect against AIDS 10% of the Time: http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2003/jun/03062303.html
Uganda's First Lady Warns Teens against Condom Use: http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2004/jan/04011205.html
United Nations Official Slams US for Abstinence Approach to AIDS in Uganda: http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/aug/05083101.html
U.N.'s Top AIDS Envoy Forgets Diplomacy in Demonizing U.S. Abstinence First Strategy:http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2004/jul/04071602.html
Uganda AIDS Prevention Success Being Undermined by Infuriated UN Condom-Pushers: http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/feb/05020408.html
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Special Prayer Request
I had bad news last Friday as my boss called me into his office and said that my job was eliminated! I was absolutely floored because I had just started here 9 months ago after having my job eliminated from the last job (8 1/2 years).
The car I've been using is a company car so that, along with my company cell phone, will all have to be returned once I leave.
Please say an extra prayer for me, as well as Tracey and Chad (since they got their lawn equipment stolen about a month ago out of my driveway which put them out of business) as they are looking for full time employment as well. Darlene needs a full time job, as she is a single parent.
Please pray for Darlene Wiegand and family.
Message of October 25, 2005 - Medjugorje
"Little children, believe, pray and love, and God will be near you.
He will give you the gift of all the graces you seek from Him.
I am a gift to you, because, from day to day, God permits me
to be with you and to love each of you with immeasurable love.
Therefore, little children, in prayer and humility,
open your hearts and be witnesses of my presence.
Thank you for having responded to my call."
Secular Franciscan Order (SFO)
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