Rep. Smith Voices Concerns Over International Promotion of Abortion to Hillary Clinton
Published February 28, 2010 | 
….“Pregnancy is not a disease. The child in the womb is neither a tumor nor a parasite to be destroyed” ….
Catholic News Agency, Feb 27, 2010
Washington D.C. – At a recent House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) addressed Secretary of State Hillary Clinton about the international promotion of abortion. Calling unborn children the most at-risk minority today, he said abortion is a form of child mortality.
“Pregnancy is not a disease. The child in the womb is neither a tumor nor a parasite to be destroyed,” he said at the Feb. 25 hearing on the International Affairs Budget for 2011.
Rep. Smith voiced concern that the Global Health Initiative (GHI) Consultation Document listed unintended pregnancy between HIV and tropical disease, seeming to relegate it to the status of a disease.
The Congressman also commented on the Obama administration’s elimination of the Mexico City Policy, saying that non-government organization partners of the initiative may seek to integrate abortion with “the many necessary and noble undertakings funded by the GHI.”
He asked the Obama administration to consider the views of those who see abortion as “violence against children” that poses significant risks both to women and to children later born to those women.
“Safe abortion,” he said, is “the ultimate oxymoron.”
“Child dismemberment, forced premature expulsion from the womb by chemicals like misoprostol, deliberate child starvation by RU486, can never, ever be construed to be benign, compassionate or safe.”
He cited the United Nations’ fourth Millennium Development Goal, which advocates the reduction of child mortality.
“Abortion is child mortality,” he commented. “Secretary Clinton, the most persecuted and at risk minority in the world today are unborn children.”
Rep. Smith cited studies showing an increased risk of breast cancer among post-abortive women and a “clear link” between abortion and mental illness in women.
Other studies show a significant association between abortion and subsequent premature births.
“Preterm birth is the leading cause of infant mortality in the industrialized world after congenital anomalies,” he added, listing several ailments and diseases to which preterm infants are more prone.
The Congressman also cited the document which came out of the 1994 Cairo meeting of the United Nations International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD). The document says governments should help women avoid abortion and also reiterates the primacy of national sovereignty on abortion.
He then warned against U.N. treaty implementations and some U.N. organizations that are pressuring nations to “legalize, facilitate, and expand” access to abortion.
Rather, Rep. Smith advised, access to proper maternal care, skilled birth attendants and safe clinics should be promoted.
He closed his comments by condemning China’s forced abortion policy for women who become pregnant without government authorization.
“Silence in the face of massive crimes against women in China… shouldn’t be an option.”
Secretary Clinton listened to Rep. Smith’s comments but did not respond.
GOP Congressman Trent Franks: Abortion Devastates African-Americans More Than Slavery Did
Published February 28, 2010 | “Half of all black children are aborted.”
The Sunday Homily: THE TRANSFORMING POWER OF THE CROSS
Published February 27, 2010 | Father James Farfaglia, February 27, 2010
The third transformation takes place at death. The suffering that the final moment brings upon us makes way for an amazing transformation. Eternal life in heaven, perhaps after a period of further transformation in purgatory, is granted to those who have been found worthy. The last transformation or transfiguration is completed at the Second Coming when our body is reunited with our soul. What awaits us is beyond anything that we can imagine.
The True Meaning of Lent
Published February 27, 2010 | Fr. Roger J. Landry
The Anchor
Editorial
February 26, 2010
The richness, depth and clarity of the homilies and catecheses Pope Benedict has given during his first five years as the successor of St. Peter have provoked several experts in Church history to start comparing them to the works of the greatest Fathers of the early Church. There’s a growing chorus that is predicting that in future centuries, his words will be studied and read right alongside those of Saints John Chrysostom, Augustine, and Leo the Great. More and more Catholics are beginning to become aware of this great spiritual treasure available to them and to subscribe to free email services like zenit.org to receive the Pope’s words each day and take them to their prayer.
On Ash Wednesday, Pope Benedict gave a catechesis on the real meaning of Lent that bore all the traits for which his discourses have quickly become renown. As we mark the tenth day of this holy season, it would be worthwhile to ponder what he said. We can break down his insights into four parts.
The first is that Lent is not meant to be primarily an individual journey of self-discipline, sacrifice, and personal prayer. It is an ecclesial pilgrimage. “We are not alone in this spiritual itinerary,” Pope Benedict clarified, “because the Church accompanies and sustains us from the start with the Word of God, which encloses a program of spiritual life and penitential commitment, and with the grace of the sacraments.” Lent is not a solitary hike from a dark valley up a high spiritual mountain, but a journey together with the whole Church in which God’s word and very life in the sacraments guide, strengthen and sustain us all. The Pope is calling us all to rediscover this communal dimension of Lent — in families, parishes, dioceses and beyond.
Second, the conversion asked of us in Lent is not something small, but radical and total. Commenting on Jesus’ words, “Repent and believe in the Gospel,” which constitute one of the two formulae used for the imposition of ashes, the Holy Father said that they call us to “conversion, a word that must be taken in its extraordinary seriousness.” In many places, he said, conversion is not treated with sufficient gravity, being viewed as something minor rather than major. “The call to conversion, in fact, uncovers and denounces the easy superficiality that very often characterizes our way of living.” In a passage that deserves to be read slowly and contemplated prayerfully, he specified what conversion really entails:
“To be converted means to change direction along the way of life — not for a slight adjustment, but a true and total change of direction. Conversion is to go against the current, where the ‘current’ is a superficial lifestyle, inconsistent and illusory, which often draws us, controls us and makes us slaves of evil, or in any case prisoners of moral mediocrity. With conversion, instead, one aims to the lofty measure of Christian life; we are entrusted to the living and personal Gospel, which is Christ Jesus. His person is the final goal and the profound meaning of conversion; he is the way which we are called to follow in life, allowing ourselves to be illumined by his light and sustained by his strength that moves our steps. In this way conversion manifests its most splendid and fascinating face: It is not a simple moral decision to rectify our conduct of life, but it is a decision of faith, which involves us wholly in profound communion with the living and concrete person of Jesus. … Conversion is the total ‘yes’ of the one who gives his own existence to the Gospel, responding freely to Christ, who first offered himself to man as Way, Truth and Life, as the one who frees and saves him.”
So the Lenten conversion asked of us, the Pope stressed, is an exodus from the slavery of moral mediocrity to the high Christian standard of sanctity, defined as a faith-filled decision to seek to live wholly in communion with Jesus in all aspects of our life.
Benedict’s words call to mind his predecessor’s Pastoral Plan for the New Millennium, where Pope John Paul II wrote, “Since Baptism is a true entry into the holiness of God through incorporation into Christ and the indwelling of his Spirit, it would be a contradiction to settle for a life of mediocrity, marked by a minimalist ethic and a shallow religiosity. To ask catechumens: ‘Do you wish to receive Baptism?’ means at the same time to ask them: ‘Do you wish to become holy?’ It means to set before them the radical nature of the Sermon on the Mount: ‘Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect’ (Mt 5:48). … The time has come to re-propose wholeheartedly to everyone this high standard of ordinary Christian living: the whole life of the Christian community and of Christian families must lead in this direction. It is also clear, however, that the paths to holiness are personal and call for a genuine ‘training in holiness,’ adapted to people’s needs.”
Lent is precisely a time in which this “high standard of ordinary Christian living” is re-proposed and the “genuine training in holiness” is meant to take place. This is what Pope Benedict on Ash Wednesday was calling the whole Church to recommence.
The Holy Father’s third insight was that this process of conversion from mediocrity to transforming communion with Christ is not a one-time event, but a continual process and way of life. Repenting and believing in Christ the Gospel incarnate does not happen “only at the beginning of the Christian life,” he stated, “but accompanies all its steps…. Every day is a favorable moment of grace, because each day invites us to give ourselves to Jesus, to have confidence in him, to remain in him, to share his style of life, to learn from him true love, to follow him in daily fulfilling of the will of the Father, the only great law of life — every day, even when difficulties and toil, exhaustion and falls are not lacking, even when we are tempted to abandon the following of Christ and to shut ourselves in ourselves, in our egoism, without realizing the need we have to open to the love of God in Christ, to live the same logic of justice and love.” Every day is part of our training in holiness, our turning away from sin and embracing Christ.
Finally, the Pope said that this process of continual conversion is meant to lead to nothing less than our death and rebirth within the death and resurrection of Christ himself. The second formula for the imposition of ashes, “Remember, man, that you are dust and unto dust you shall return,” the Pope declared, “reminds us of our frailty, including our death, which is the extreme expression of our frailty. In face of the innate fear of the end, … the Lenten liturgy on one hand reminds us of death, inviting us to realism and to wisdom, but on the other hand, it drives us above all to accept and live the unexpected novelty that the Christian faith liberates us from the reality of death itself.” The way that liberation occurs is in the passage from the “old Adam,” who returned to the dust from which he came, to the “new Adam,” Christ Jesus. Lent, therefore, is the time for a “more conscious and more intense immersion in the Paschal Mystery of Christ, in his death and resurrection, through participation in the Eucharist and in the life of charity, which stems from the Eucharist and in which it finds its fulfillment. With the imposition of ashes we renew our commitment to follow Jesus, to allow ourselves to be transformed by his Paschal Mystery, to overcome evil and do good, to have the ‘old man’ in us die, the one linked to sin, and to have the ‘new man’ be born, transformed by the grace of God.”
This is the deepest way of all in which the season of Lent is meant to lead us to experience the full joy of Easter.
http://www.catholicpreaching.com/index.php?content=articles&articles=20100226anchor
The Student Loan Problem
Published February 27, 2010 | By Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson, Catholic Exchange, February 27th, 2010
You may have seen the recent story about the 41-year-old doctor who graduated from medical school in 2003 with student-loan indebtedness of $250,000 that has since swelled to more than $555,000. She is now scheduled to pay $990 per month until she is 70 years old. Ouch!
This is an extreme example of a widespread problem. Only 40 percent of the $730 billion of outstanding student loans are actively being repaid. This isn’t healthy for financial institutions and it isn’t healthy for many young Americans. Just as was the case with the ongoing mortgage fiasco, there is plenty of blame to go around for this sorry state of affairs.
It’s easy to say that those who borrow to pursue their post-secondary education bear the primary responsibility. The first rule of survival in a market economy is caveat emptor (“let the buyer beware”). Nobody forced anyone to go into debt.
Still, it is significant that almost all student loans are taken out by Americans too young to know what it takes to pay their bills and make a living on their own. Undoubtedly, some unscrupulous students will borrow money with every intention of avoiding repayment; however, I believe that most borrowers sincerely intend to fully repay their debt. The problem is—due to their lack of maturity and, yes, intellectual development—they literally have no idea how hard it can be to repay $50,000 or $100,000 of debt.
My wife and I recently entertained two of her former college students—intelligent, talented young ladies laden with considerable debt. The one owes over $100,000 and has a bachelor’s degree in theatre. She has an entry-level position with a business, and no realistic prospect of repaying her debt before she turns 40. Much wiser now at age 23, she realizes the gravity of her predicament. She most emphatically wouldn’t have sustained such debt if she had known then what she knows now, but now she’s stuck.
Like many young adults in her position, the price for her indebtedness is more than monetary. There are very few young men out there who are willing to marry somebody with a six-figure debt chained to her ankle. (Apologies to all the romantics out there, but that’s the way it is.) Here you have someone whose strongest desire is to be a wife and a mother, but her student-loan debt makes her a leper to most men in the marriage market. Sad. Continue reading
Healthcare Summit: Chicago Style
Published February 27, 2010 | Government health insurance isn’t supposed to be cheap, it’s supposed to be bought.
By Jed Babbin, Human Events, 02/26/2010
Senate Democrat “moderates” probably slept well last night, but no House Blue Dog should have. In the marathon Blair House healthcare “summit,” the Chicago Obama family made it perfectly clear that the Senate Dems are protected “made men” but the House members are expendable in Obama’s pursuit of nationalizing healthcare.
The summit convened after a round of new polls showed — again — that most Americans don’t want Obamacare. A Quinnipiac poll showed Americans disapproved of Obama’s healthcare plan by 54-35 percent. Rasmussen said 56% opposed and 41% approved, and both Pew Research and PPP said 50% were opposed to it. The opposition will almost certainly rise after yesterday’s media event.
For that is what it was. It was precisely as Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence (R-Ind) characterized it to me last night. The “summit” wasn’t anything resembling an honest debate or a real negotiation. Pence pointed out that Obama opened the meeting with comments that directly contravened his stated objectives for the summit. Instead of opening the “summit” to a debate and negotiation of both sides’ positions, Obama began by stating that his purpose was to make the case for his healthcare bill.
The discussion illustrated, as Pence pointed out, the opposing ideologies. Obama and the Democrats insist on a government-controlled, government monopoly market for healthcare. The Republicans want a patient-controlled, free market healthcare system. The issue the Dems are concerned with is government control of healthcare, 17% of the economy that — unlike the financial markets and the automakers — remains in private hands.
Obama wanted the summit to prove — to worried Democrats and to the public — that his insistence on a “comprehensive” healthcare overhaul was the only way to go. It is comprised, according to the president, of many immutable parts, two of which he repeatedly argued for.
First, the unconstitutional individual mandate that will require every American to buy health insurance whether they want to or not.
Second is the requirement that no person be denied health insurance for a pre-existing medical condition
(regardless of the severity). Obama demands the individual mandate as the means to pay for coverage of those with pre-existing conditions.
Obama’s performance brought to mind one of the opening scenes in the Kevin Costner – Robert DeNiro movie, “The Untouchables.” In it, a store owner argues with one of the Capone gang. “That green beer you’re peddlin’ just ain’t any good,” he says.
“It ain’t supposed to be good. It’s supposed to be bought,” says the mobster.
The only difference between Capone’s beer and Obama’s healthcare plan is that the latter wants to maintain the pretense that it’s good.
For about seven hours, Obama, Pelosi, Reid and a cacophony of liberals argued that there is no good alternative to Obama’s plan and that there was no reason — and no time — to start over with a clean slate as Republicans suggested. (Of the seven hours, almost two were consumed by Obama himself, another three by other Dems and only about two hours by the Republican delegation).
Obama’s demeanor changed quickly and often, sometimes rude (he put poor old John McCain down harshly) sometimes lecturing, sometimes hectoring. He could often be heard chattering away in the background while others were speaking.
In an interview last night, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) told me it wasn’t at all clear what Obama was planning. Obama is running out of options. On one hand, McConnell said, Obama could be read as saying the bill could be put on the shelf for a few months or, on the other, as threatening to force it through the Senate with the reconciliation mechanism.
Some of the Republicans — notably Dave Camp (R-Mi), ranking member of the Ways and Means Committee and Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.), ranking on Budget and Sen. Tom Coburn, M.D. (R-Ok) – came well prepared and shot down many of Obama’s principal arguments. They defeated the Dems’ argument that Republicans are merely the “party of no” and had no good ideas.
But nothing deterred Obama. Most revealing were his closing comments.
After 5 pm, after everyone who wanted to speak had done so, Obama set the agenda for the rest of the year.
Obama began his closing argument by saying he’d come in with compromises he’d not agreed to before and said that it was time, in the next few weeks or months, for Republicans to do the same. But he quickly cut to the chase.
Obama pretended that he was still open to a real compromise, but he said, “I don’t know frankly whether we can close that gap. And if we can’t close that gap then I suspect Mitch McConnell, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and John Boehner are going to have a lot of arguments about procedures in Congress about moving forward.”
Meaning that unless the Republicans signed on to his approach soon, the reconciliation mechanism would be invoked to pass the bill through the Senate by a simple majority vote, precluding a filibuster. But his next remark was a direct threat to the House Blue Dogs, many of whom are facing very tough re-election battles this year.
Obama said, “We cannot have another year long debate about this. So the question I’m going to ask myself and I ask of all of you is: is there enough serious effort that in a month’s time or a few weeks’ time or six weeks’ time we could actually resolve something?
“And if we can’t then I think we need to go ahead and make some decisions and then that’s what elections are for. We have honest disagreements about the vision for the country and we’ll go ahead and test those out over the next several months until November.”
This is the biggest gamble of Obama’s presidency. Nancy Pelosi doesn’t have the votes to pass the healthcare bill through the House. Now, Obama has told the Blue Dogs that he is prepared to sacrifice them in order to get his bill. Will they cave in and throw away their chances in November, or will they finally live up to their “conservative” label?
For Senate Dems, reconciliation could be a career-saver. As a senior Republican senator told me about after the summit — is that it’s a way out for the wavering Senate Dems.
Harry Reid can, if he can maneuver around the parliamentary rules that supposedly govern reconciliation, afford
to let up to nine Dems vote against the bill and still pass it. That way Blanche Lincoln and others who might otherwise lose this year can put themselves on the side of their constituents and still remain in Reid’s good graces.
That’s a clever way for Obama to keep his Senate majority and still get Obamacare through the Senate this year. But — like the “Cornhusker Kickback” and the “Second Louisiana Purchase, the bribes that bought Ben Nelson’s and Mary Landrieu’s votes last year — this reconciliation ploy would be just another dirty trick.
Obama has split his party loyalty between the House and the Senate. How many Blue Dogs will follow Pelosi off the cliff to nationalize healthcare over the objections of their constituents? That green beer Obama is peddling just ain’t any good.
Mr. Babbin is the editor of Human Events and HumanEvents.com. He served as a deputy undersecretary of defense in President George H.W. Bush’s administration. He is the author of “In the Words of our Enemies“(Regnery,2007) and (with Edward Timperlake) of “Showdown: Why China Wants War with the United States” (Regnery, 2006) and “Inside the Asylum: Why the UN and Old Europe are Worse than You Think” (Regnery, 2004). E-mail him at jbabbin@eaglepub.com.
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=35792
Life of St. Francis
Published February 27, 2010 | For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
- Matthew 7:14
When Francis was assailed by temptations, he would throw himself naked into ditches full of snow or roll in a briar patch. He called his body, “brother donkey,” and denied himself many legitimate physical comforts. In later life, he would apologize to “brother donkey” for treating him so harshly. But God enlightened Francis to see the great value in a life of penance and reparation and his example has helped the whole world. He never proceeded in Holy Orders beyond the diaconate because he did not feel worthy of the honors of the priesthood. One of his outstanding virtues was his compassion, which reached out to all, but especially to the marginalized and the underprivileged. One of the biographers of Francis said of him, “Among the saints, he was the most saintly, and among sinners, he looked like one of them.”
GOSPEL & MEDITATION: Do You Really Want to Be Perfect?
Published February 27, 2010 | Father Barry O’Toole, LC – Matthew 5:43-48
“You have heard that it was said, ´You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.´ But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what recompense will you have? Do not the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brothers only, what is unusual about that? Do not the pagans do the same? So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
Introductory Prayer: Lord Jesus, you became a man in order to show me, in your own flesh and blood, the way to holiness. In every word and deed of yours recorded in the Gospel, you teach and reveal to me the secret of a life worthy of eternity. I believe that you are with me now, and that you will use these moments of prayer to increase my faith, hope and love. Here I am, Lord, to know, love and serve you with all my heart. Amen.
Petition: Lord, help me to seek holiness out of love for you and others. Amen.
1. True Perfection Who is telling us to be perfect? Christ the Word, he through whom all things were made, through whom we came into being: our Lord, our Creator, who from all eternity longs to see each one of us be made perfect in love. This is not a suggestion; it is a command. He says it to his disciples with energy, even knowing that for them alone it is impossible. For God, though, nothing is impossible. We are reminded today that our saintliness is a possibility; it is God’s plan. Miracles happen when we believe. God is not through with any one of us yet. All God asks is that we be perfect – not a whole life in one fell swoop – but, rather, every present moment, one at a time. That is what I have – this present moment. This is what I have to perfect.
2. Why the Demand for Perfection? God’s demand that we seek and strive after the perfection of holiness becomes more understandable when we contemplate the increasingly dire situation of our world. This world, so gravely in need of Christ’s salvation, is the starkest and most palpable reason why any one of us should pursue holiness. What is the value of Christian holiness in the world? One early Christian apologist put it in these terms:
To sum up all in one word –– what the soul is in the body, that are Christians in the world. The flesh hates the soul, and wars against it, though itself suffering no injury, because it is prevented from enjoying pleasures; the world also hates the Christians, though in nowise injured, because they abjure pleasures. The soul loves the flesh that hates it, and [loves also] the members; Christians likewise love those that hate them” (From the Letter to Diognetus).
3. The Work of Love In a world of shifting sands, we can offer solid ground; in a world of blind forces of spiritual and material violence, we can offer the persuasive power of Christian goodness. Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta was heard to say that holiness is not the privilege of a few, but the obligation of all. When with simple and profound faith, we delve into that link between our striving for holiness and the salvation of souls, we can discover a new impetus and a new strength. The challenge of seeking holiness can become a labor of love, driven by a heart aflame with zeal for the salvation of all our brothers and sisters.
Conversation with Christ: Lord Jesus, the world needs men and women of God; the world needs saints. I know this. I know you call me in a personal, urgent and insistent way to seek my holiness. For the sake of my brothers and sisters, for their salvation, Lord, make me holy. Amen.
Resolution: I will dedicate some time today to pray to Our Lady and entrust to her, with living faith and childlike simplicity, the entire project of my personal sanctification.
http://www.regnumchristi.org/english/articulos/articulo.phtml?se=363&ca=975&te=735&id=20302
BLESSED MARIA CARIDAD BRADER
Published February 27, 2010 | 
Maria Caridad Brader was born in Kaltburn, Switzerland, in 1860. Raised in a pious family, she was very intelligent, and received the best education her parents could provide. There were high expectations for her continued study, but instead she joined the Franciscan convent in 1880, made final vows two years later, and worked as a teacher. When it became possible for cloistered nuns to work as missionaries, Sr. Caridad volunteered to be one of the first six sisters to work in Ecuador in 1888. There she served as a teacher and catechist. In 1893, she was transferred to Colombia.
To prepare additional missionaries, she founded the Congregation of the Franciscan Sisters of Mary Immaculate in Tuquerres, Colombia, in 1893. She served as its superior general until 1919 and then again from 1928 to 1940.
Her congregation emphasized good education for the sisters and their students, and deep prayer lives for everyone.
Sr. Caridad died Feb. 27, 1943 in Pasto, Colombia. Her grave immediately became a site for pilgrimage and popular devotion. Sr. Caridad was beatified by Pope John Paul II in March 2003.
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/saint.php?n=160
Prominent Christian Leader Is Disinvited From Military Prayer Luncheon Over Gays in Service Issue
Published February 26, 2010 | “As one who took the oath to defend and protect our freedoms, I am disappointed that I’ve been denied the opportunity to speak to members of the military, in a non-political way, solely because I exercised my free speech rights in a different forum.”
Catholic News Roundup 02-25
Published February 26, 2010 | British students learn homosexuality;
Adoptive children get two parents;
No Holy Communion;
Catholic Healthcare Protest
Modernism’s Full Impact 02-25
Published February 26, 2010 |
Summit Over, Democrats Move to Ram Healthcare Into Law
Published February 26, 2010 |
By: David A. Patten, Newsmax, February 25, 2010
Early reviews suggested neither side scored a “game-changer” Thursday that would alter the political equation.
“This was no Baltimore,” commented political expert Dr. Larry J. Sabato, a reference to President Obama’s strong performance at the House Republican meeting last month. “The Republicans learned from that earlier encounter. Obama was simply first among equals at today’s table.”
The six-and-a-half hour meeting televised at Blair House was promoted as a way for Republicans and Democrats to find common ground. But disputes broke out over whether ObamaCare would raise the cost of insurance premiums, decrease the availability of coverage for seniors, and do further damage to the federal deficit.
One of the more pointed exchanges occurred when the president tried to interrupt his 2008 rival, Arizona GOP Sen. John McCain as he roundly criticized Democrats’ proposals. McCain shot back testily, “Can I finish?”
Once McCain completed his remarks, Obama delivered a pointed gibe.
“Let me just make this point, John, because we’ not campaigning anymore,” Obama said. “The election is over. We can spend the remainder of the time with our respective talking points going back and forth. We were supposed to be talking about insurance.”
McCain’s droll riposte: “I’m reminded of that every day.”
Asked during a break in the summit if he thought a bipartisan deal over healthcare was possible, House Minority Whip Eric Cantor, R-Va., replied with a terse “No.”
The impasse was clear, which means moderate House Democrats will soon face a critical decision: To push the unpopular bill through Congress via the controversial maneuver called reconciliation, or vote against ObamaCare despite the anger that will trigger from the political left? Continue reading
Another Perspective: Something Fishy
Published February 26, 2010 | 
Christopher Orlet, American Spectator, 2.26.10
Catholics, the world over, are in the midst of the Lenten season. Lent, of course, means many things to many people. For some, it is a time of preparation. For others, it is about sacrifice. For me, Lent has always meant, first and foremost, fish on Fridays.
When we were kids, every Lenten Friday’s menu — whether at school or home — featured Mrs. Paul’s fish sticks. Not only did this offal directly challenge my faith in an omniscient and loving God, but it instilled in me a lifelong fear and loathing of seafood. According to Mrs. Paul’s website, the villain behind fishsticks was a power plant worker named Ed Piszek. I’m sure Mr. Piszek was a swell guy and a capable power plant worker, but suffice it to say, he was no Julia Child. Piszek began selling devilled crab cakes in a Philadelphia saloon to earn money while the plant workers were on strike. One day, in 1947, Piszek made too many cakes. “There was a freezer in the back of the bar, so we threw ‘em in there,” he recalled. “It was either that or the trash can.” I guess the freezer was closer.
Piszek took on a business partner named John Paul. For some reason, they decided to name their frozen seafood company after Paul’s mother. Needless to say, it was Piszek and Paul’s gustatory atrocity that has turned me against seafood to this very day.
Even now there is no escape. Every Friday evening I somehow end up at the all-you-can-eat fish fry at our parish. Here in the Midwest, fish fries are both a traditional family outing and a cheap date night. Parishioners and non-parishioners alike indulge in greasy platters of deep-fried cod cut-ups, French fries, and gallons of draught Budweiser. (I fail to see how any of this counts as a Lenten sacrifice.) Still, I dutifully attend, if only for the camaraderie and because my girlfriend is the dessert lady. (How ironic that I, the least devout of all, should be the one making the greatest sacrifice.)
I GOT A REPRIEVE last Friday when I was invited to dinner at my brother’s house. My brother is something of a gourmet (doubtless a reaction to all those fishsticks); he prepared a lovely salmon pasta with San Francisco vinaigrette, a shrimp salad and copious amounts of cabernet sauvignon, and strawberry cheesecake dessert. Here was a meal fit for king. Again, I ask: where’s the sacrifice? Continue reading
What Didn’t Get Said at the Summit
Published February 26, 2010 | About halfway through yesterday’s all-day healthcare summit, Democratic Congressman James Clyburn of South Carolina told another of the many insurance company horror stories that peppered the proceedings:
I was talking to a man recently who had undergone a transplant. And when he was done, he was horrified to learn that his insurance would only cover follow-up procedures for three years. After that he would have to pay with his own money.
A gentleman was called in and he was very, very emotional. He was getting ready to have transplant surgery. But he was told that because he’s on Medicare, his post-operative treatment is going to be limited to three years. After that, he’s going to have to find some way to pay. He was very, very emotional.
Think about that for a minute. The patient is about to receive a transplanted organ (the Congressman didn’t specify what it was) and the horror is the government is only going to continue to pay his medical bills for three years. If this is the worst we can say about American medicine, are we really in that bad shape after all?
Yesterday’s all-day event went much better than it might have. There was no shouting, no screaming, no name-calling. Despite the talk that Washington doesn’t work anymore, the dialogue was very civilized. Deliberation seems to be alive and well.
Except of course, for the fundamental difference, which remains the same — Republicans want to reform and improve health care without destroying its free-enterprise base, while Democrats would be very happy to see the entire thing absorbed into a government-controlled system, as half of it has been already through the extension of Medicare, Medicaid and other government programs.
What became most outstanding is that President Obama and his teammates still do not have any real understanding of how the current system works. Take for example the President’s constant insistence that the problem is the insurance pools in which very sick people must shop and that the solution is to “get everybody into those pools” so that risks can be shared. That’s a very good idea and a very simple principle of insurance — people who aren’t sick pay for those who are sick. But “getting everybody into those pools” is precisely what the current system is designed to avoid.
Just as a guess, what percentage of the population do you think now buys their insurance individually on the open market? 15 percent? 20 percent? The answer is 6 percent. The figure has not changed for the last 15 years.
Only 6 percent of the population actually buys their own insurance. (And for this, we are painting the insurance companies as the villains of this melodrama?) Fourteen percent of the population is on Medicare, 14 percent on Medicaid. The other 66 percent do not have insurance but health benefits¸, which is not the same thing. Nine percent gets its benefits from government employment, 4 percent from the military and the remaining 43 percent get their benefits from private employment. The last 15 percent (there is some overlap) has no coverage at all.
President Obama kept talking about how it is these “large pools” in big companies that make insurance cheap, but that is not true. Large pools are only part of the equation. Equally important is that these employees are getting their benefits tax-free. This is a huge advantage not available to the uninsured population. Because the government is not getting its cut, employers are also eager to convey benefits to their employees instead of wage increases because they have more value. This is why, for many people, health benefits constitute the major reason for employment. Wages transfer easily from job to job but benefits do not. Continue reading
Pelosi’s Misdirection on Public Funding for Abortion
Published February 26, 2010 | Douglas Johnson, National Review, February 25, 2010
Speaker Pelosi has her own idiosyncratic dictionary, one in which federal agencies can pay for abortion on demand without spending “public funds” or “taxpayer funds” for abortion. In ordinary English, however, this is deceptive claptrap. Every version of the health-care bill has contained multiple pro-abortion mandates and federal subsidies for abortion — except for the version that was fixed by adoption of the Stupak-Pitts amendment, over Speaker Pelosi’s objections.
President Obama and Senator Reid succeeded in keeping that fix out of the Senate bill — indeed, the Senate produced a final bill that is the most pro-abortion single piece of legislation to reach the floor of either house of Congress since Roe v. Wade. It would result in direct federal funding of abortion through Community Health Centers, tax subsidies for private plans that cover abortion (including some federally administered plans), and pro-abortion federal administrative mandates, among other problems. The Ben Nelson language in the Senate bill is unacceptable, but most of the problems are entirely outside the scope of the Nelson language.
If journalists want to really understand the degree to which abortion policy issues bear on the prospects for this legislation in the House, they need to abandon their misconception that the two bills differ on abortion only on one narrow issue that they can summarize in one sentence.
— Douglas Johnson is legislative director of the National Right to Life Committee.
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=MjljMTFhY2I3NzQ0ZDIwNTFhOWRlOTgzNTIxZjI5Nzk=
Ducking and Dodging! A Bill Fraught With Gimmicks?
Published February 26, 2010 | ….What became clear at the health-care summit is that the Democrats just don’t have an answer to Rep. Paul Ryan’s arguments. They ducked, dodged, and changed the subject repeatedly, because Ryan’s numbers themselves are unimpeachable . . . The Democrats can’t explain away the gimmicks in their health bill….
STEPHEN SPRUIELL, American Spectator, THE HEALTH-CARE SUMMIT 02/25
“We have some strong disagreements on the numbers,” President Obama said after Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) concluded his devastating critique of the Democrats’ budget claims, “but I don’t want to get too bogged down.” In the ensuing debate, what became clear is that the Democrats just don’t have an answer to Ryan’s arguments. They ducked, dodged, and changed the subject repeatedly, because Ryan’s numbers themselves are unimpeachable.
The Democrats are touting an estimate from the Congressional Budget Office that their health-care bill would reduce the deficit by around $130 billion over the next ten years. What Ryan pointed out — and what no Democrat even attempted to counter — is that this is because the legislation front-loads tax hikes and Medicare cuts and defers costs, forcing the CBO to score ten years of offsets with only six years of spending. Looked at on a level playing field, the true ten-year cost of the bill is $2.3 trillion rather than $950 billion, Ryan said.
Then he brought up another gimmick: The bill is full of double-counting. “Savings” are counted as offsets for new health-care spending and at the same time set aside to pay for future entitlements. For instance, the Democrats claim $52 billion in offsets as a result of increasing Social Security payroll-tax revenues. But these dollars are already claimed for future Social Security beneficiaries. They can’t pay for both. The Democrats take another $72 billion in premiums intended to fund a new long-term-care program and count them as offsets for other spending. Ryan pointed out that Senate Budget Committee chairman Kent Conrad has called this “a Ponzi scheme of the first order, the kind of thing that Bernie Madoff would have been proud of.”
Perhaps most important, Ryan confronted the Democrats with the issue of the “Doc Fix” — a separate bill that would have added $371 billion to the Democrats’ legislation if it hadn’t been stripped out. The Doc Fix would have prevented Medicare reimbursements to doctors from plummeting by 21 percent, a drop that Congress put into the bill to improve its CBO score but never planned to allow, most political observers agree….. continued….. http://article.nationalreview.com/426321/ducking-and-dodging/stephen-spruiell
DRUDGE HEADLINES FROM THURSDAY’S HEALTH CARE SUMMIT
Published February 26, 2010 |
—-NOW WHAT?
—-News channels quickly lose interest in summit…
—-DEMS SPEAK 233 MINS VS. 114 MINS FOR REPUBLICANS…
—-‘I don’t count my time because I’m the President’…
—-TIMES OF LONDON: Obama bores America into submission…
—-RAHM-IT-THROUGH STARTS MONDAY; DEMS DECIDE TO PUSH –’THE BIG BILL’…
—-Pelosi: Health Reform Will Create 400,000 Jobs ‘Almost Immediately’…
—-McCain invokes 2008 campaign promise at summit…
—-President scolds Cantor for bill mountain on desk…
—-Biden: ‘It’s easy being vice president — you don’t have to do anything’…
—-New Dem Party tool aims at flooding talkradio airwaves…
Day 9 of 40 Days for Life: The Difference You Can Make
Published February 26, 2010 | Commentary by David Bereit, National Coordinator, 40 Days for Life, February 25, 2010, 40DaysforLife.com
Do you know how important your presence in front of an abortion center can be? Here are a few reports from local 40 Days for Life campaigns that just begin to tell the story.
One of the prayer volunteers in Houston, Texas says a mom and her young son arrived to pray at their vigil in front of Planned Parenthood. The woman had aborted her first child at that very location.
She HAD to be there to pray, she said. “I can’t help but think that if some pro-lifers were here” when she had the abortion, “maybe I wouldn’t have gone through it.”
Those sentiments were echoed by BJ, who posted a comment on the 40 Days for Life blog.
If only there had been someone praying outside Planned Parenthood in her city, 19 years ago, “it would have made all the difference in the world to me and my boyfriend,” she wrote. “I regret every day what occurred in that cold winter morning.”
Just BEING THERE can have a profound impact.
Joanne tells of a mom who brought her children to the 40 Days for Life vigil in Cranston, Rhode Island. While they were praying, her son noticed a woman sitting in a car in the parking lot. He looked in her direction once, and then again.
The woman looked at him, and their eyes locked.
“The woman began sobbing,” Joanne said. “Something in her heart moved.” Continue reading
LifeNews.com Headlines: Feb. 26, 2010
Published February 26, 2010 | OBAMA TOLD AT WHITE HOUSE HEALTH CARE SUMMIT AMERICANS DON’T WANT ABORTION
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – It took almost the entire length of the debate at the White House health care summit for the issue of abortion to come up and, when it did, pro-life Rep. John Boehner told President Barack Obama that Americans don’t want abortion funding in the health care bill Congress is considering.
NANCY PELOSI MISLEADS HEALTH CARE SUMMIT, SAYS BILL HAS NO ABORTION FUNDING
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi mislead participants at the White House health care summit today by making the false statement that the Senate health care bill she, President Barack Obama and Democrats are pushing through Congress contains no abortion funding.
AMERICANS OPPOSE RECONCILIATION, PRO-ABORTION HEALTH CARE BILL AS SUMMIT BEGINS
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – With President Barack Obama and top Republicans and Democrats meeting at the White House health care summit, Americans have a clear attitude towards the pro-abortion health care bill and the attempt by Obama and his allies to use reconciliation to pass it: they oppose both.
PRO-LIFE ORGANIZATIONS REACT TO WHITE HOUSE HEALTH CARE SUMMIT, ABORTION TALK
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – Several pro-life organizations have provided LifeNews.com with comment about today’s White House Health Care summit. The event say House GOP Leader John Boehner tell Barack Obama that abortion funding should be prohibited and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi mislead attendees on the main bill.
OBAMA MAY HAVE PLAN B, BACKUP PRO-ABORTION HEALTH CARE BILL IF MAIN BILL FAILS
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – President Barack Obama is using today’s White House health care summit as a last-ditch effort to win more support for the pro-abortion health care bill. Should that fail, and Democrats find themselves with too few votes to push the measure through, Obama has come up with a backup plan.
SECRETARY OF STATE HILLARY CLINTON FACES ABORTION LECTURE AT CONGRESSIONAL HEARING
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – Secretary of State Hillary Clinton testified before a Congressional committee on Thursday where two pro-life members of Congress presented her with a long lecture on abortion and how it hurts women. Clinton appeared before the House Foreign Affairs Committee to talk about the International Affairs Budget.
ABORTION BAN BASED ON FETAL PAIN COULD BE PARTIAL-BIRTH ABORTION BAN FOLLOWUP
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) – The ban on partial-birth abortions brought home the pro-life message that abortion kills an unborn child and was responsible for shifting public opinion on abortion squarely into the pro-life category. Now, Nebraska could pave the way for the next kind of abortion ban that could pique national interest.
FOCUS ON THE FAMILY FOUNDER JAMES DOBSON LEAVES PRO-LIFE GROUP AFTER 33 YEARS
Colorado Sprins, CO (LifeNews.com) – After three decades of leading one of the premier pro-life organizations in the country, Dr. James Dobson is saying goodbye to Focus on the Family. The psychologist turned the organization into one of the largest in the nation by focusing on moral values and helping families born and unborn.
Founder’s Quote Daily
Published February 26, 2010 | 
“Every new regulation concerning commerce or revenue; or in any manner affecting the value of the different species of property, presents a new harvest to those who watch the change and can trace its consequences; a harvest reared not by themselves but by the toils and cares of the great body of their fellow citizens. This is a state of things in which it may be said with some truth that laws are made for the few not for the many.”
–Federalist No. 62
GOSPEL & MEDITATION: Pretending to Be and Truly Being Holy
Published February 26, 2010 | Father Alex Yeung, LC - Matthew 5:20-26
“I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into the kingdom of heaven. You have heard that it was said to your ancestors, ´You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgment.´ But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment, and whoever says to his brother, ´Raqa,´ will be answerable to the Sanhedrin, and whoever says, ´You fool,´ will be liable to fiery Gehenna. Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar, and there recall that your brother has anything against you, leave your gift there at the altar, go first and be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift. Settle with your opponent quickly while on the way to court with him. Otherwise your opponent will hand you over to the judge, and the judge will hand you over to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison. Amen, I say to you, you will not be released until you have paid the last penny.”
Introductory Prayer: Lord Jesus, thank you for this time I can now spend with you. You constantly fill my life with so many blessings. How ungrateful I am at times! I wish to collaborate more perfectly in establishing your Kingdom on earth. I love you Lord, and with the help of your grace I will strive to become someone to whom any soul can come in order to discover your truth, your life, your love. Take my life, take this day and make it yours. Amen.
Petition: Father, help me to shun hypocrisy and seek true holiness.
1. Subjective Impressions How much righteousness would it take to surpass that of the scribes and Pharisees? Not much, we suspect. Theirs was holiness in appearance only, which is to say no holiness. And what would one discover on the “inside” of such a soul? Plenty of self-deception; plenty of self-indulgent complacency in a subjective impression of holiness; a repugnant holier-than-thou demeanor. It’s easy enough for us to read the Gospel and wrinkle our noses at those bad ol’ Pharisees. In fact, it’s about as easy as telling ourselves that we could never come under the spell of our own subjective impression of holiness. That is why we must always be ready to examine ourselves, before Christ and with an acute awareness of our misery and limitations. Do I live my life engaged in a genuine pursuit of holiness or in a genuine pursuit of my own vanity and self-glorification?
2. Humility is the True Test of Holiness Pride and personal holiness mix about as well as oil and water. Where our ego is, little if any room is left for God. What does it mean to be a disciple of Christ but to be someone who fills himself totally with God in order to bring him within the reach of everyone. But what union, grace or friendship with God can there be in a proud soul? What fervor, what degree of holiness? There is no possible compromise between God and a proud soul – either the soul would have to let go of itself, or God would have to stop being God.
3. Integrity is the Heart of the Matter At the heart of genuine holiness is the virtue of integrity, a virtue rich in nuances and meaning. Integrity means being a person with only one face, a person who is the same on the inside and on the outside: “what you see is what you get”. Indeed, integrity is foundational for holiness, because it constitutes the very essence of personal honesty and sincerity, which are fundamental for the moral life and the seedbeds for a host of other virtues. In our pursuit of holiness, we should never tolerate duplicity of any kind in our behavior. We should avoid like the plague the least hint of ambivalence in our motivations, or incongruity between our thoughts, judgments, choices and actions. There can be no holiness without integrity. In fact, there can be no genuine human happiness unless it lies on the bedrock virtue of integrity.
Conversation with Christ: Lord Jesus, I want you to be the meaning and center of my entire life. Let me disappear and you appear more and more in my life so that, with a holiness that is genuine, humble and true, I will always be an instrument for the salvation of all people. Amen.
Resolution: I will take a hard look at my life to identify the areas where duplicity manifests itself and take a concrete step toward living with more integrity.
ST. ALEXANDER
Published February 26, 2010 | 
St. Alexander was named bishop of Alexandria in 313 and was a champion of orthodox Catholic teaching. He dedicated his ministry to fighting against the Arian heresy which claimed that Jesus was not truly God and that there was a time when the Son, the second person of the Trinity, did not exist.
The bishop was gentle with the Arians and was exemplary in the pastoral approach he took with them for a long period before finally excommunicating Arius at a meeting of his clergy in 321.The excommunication was confirmed at a local synod in Alexandria. His epistle on the Arian heresy has survived and remains an important part of ecclesiastical literature.
It is assumed that St. Alexander also drew up the acts of the first General Council of Nicaea in 325, where Arianism was formally condemned. He died in Alexandria two years after his return from the council.
St. Alexander was also famous for his charity to the poor and his doctrine on life.
Wanda Poltawska: John Paul II’s Best Friend
Published February 25, 2010 | 
NY Archbishop on Outspoken Abortion Teaching: I’m Just Doing My Job
By Kathleen Gilbert, February 26, 2010, LifeSiteNews.com
NEW YORK – Following a period of relative silence since his installation last year, New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan eagerly took an opportunity to set forth Church teaching on controversial points, including the forbidding of public honors for pro-abortion politicians, in a recent interview with NY1. The bishop also asserted that his outspokenness on such issues was simply part of his job as shepherd and teacher of the faith.
When NY1 News reporter Roma Torre asked whether a pro-abortion Catholic should be invited to a “Catholic event” such as the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Dolan’s response was unequivocal.
“Actually, Roma, I don’t think we should invite anybody that would take a stance [in favor of] abortion, because this is not a Catholic issue,” he replied.
The archbishop later clarified that his answer pertained to giving public honors to such persons.
“In our mind, being opposed to abortion, is a civil rights issue, it’s a natural law issue, it’s not a Catholic issue,” Dolan continued. “We’d be uncomfortable in anybody that would, say, promote a stand that would be for bigotry, or against civil rights, because that’s contrary not only to the teaching of the Church but to what we would call civil rights and the natural law.”
The archbishop said that a pro-abortion Catholic such as New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo would be “welcome” to a Catholic event – but “there’s a difference between everybody being welcome, and providing somebody who is dramatically, radically, publically at odds with the Church on a particularly given issue to have a place of prominence and to receive an award.”
When the University of Notre Dame announced last year that the pro-abortion President Obama would offer the commencement address and receive an honorary law degree at the school, the New York archbishop condemned the invitation as a “big mistake.”
Dolan, who has earned a reputation for outspokenness promoting Catholic orthodoxy on life and family issues, explained that his goal is not to “look for headlines.” It was because of his office as teacher, he said, that he “won’t duck the tough issues.”
“It’s not like I sit down and say: How can I grab some headlines, how can I really cause a splash,” Dolan said. “You just try to do your work, and sometimes things get attention. …
“If people ask me, I feel obliged as a teacher, as the official teacher of the Archdiocese of New York, to try my best to give the Church’s wisdom here.”
Dolan noted that he was “grateful” that the New York legislature struck down a same-sex “marriage” bill last year. He also affirmed that the St. Patrick’s Day Parade should continue disallowing a gay pride banner, which would conflict with the parade’s “strong Christian identity.”
But, he said, it would be a mistake to understand the Church’s stance against such matters as mere naysaying.
Instead, he said: “the Church in a way is one big yes: one big yes to human life, one big yes to anything that advances, lifts up, enlightens, liberates legitimate human identity. We’re in the ‘yes’ business, not the ‘no’ business.
“So I get frustrated sometimes, when that’s interpreted as being ‘anti-gay,’ that’s where we kinda cringe,” he continued, “because believe it or not, we get attacked from the other extreme for defending the rights of gays and for the strong Church teaching that every single human being … is a child of God, deserving of dignity and respect.”
Dolan called the late John Cardinal O’Connor of New York, who was outspokenly pro-life, his “hero” – and acknowledged that his office calls for a “prophetic” voice, although he prefers using a persuasive tone when possible.
”There’s always a little bit of tension between those two,” said Dolan. “But occasions might call that I’ll have to be prophetic. I’m sure there’s gonna be times … that I’m gonna have to be a bit of a pitbull. In general, I like to be an Irish Setter.”
See the complete video of the NY1 television interview here
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/feb/10022615.html