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Denver Archbishop: Planned Parenthood Offends Minorities

A new Planned Parenthood clinic in a minority neighborhood of Denver should be taken as an offense, affirmed the archbishop of the city.

Archbishop Charles Chaput said this at a prayer vigil and march at the site of Planned Parenthood's new clinic in a primarily Latino and African-American suburb of Denver...

"Planned Parenthood is the largest single provider of abortion and family suppression services in the United States," he explained. "This facility in this minority neighborhood should offend every African-American and Latino family, and all of us, because every child lost to abortion here subtracts one more life, one more universe of possibilities and talent, from the future of this community. […] The business of Planned Parenthood is the prevention of the future -- and business is good, and very profitable, at the expense of this community."

HT:The Curt Jester

Last year, when a woman in Berryville, Arkansas went into the hospital to deliver her baby by Cesarean section, she did not request or authorize her doctor to also perform a tubal ligation. But that minor detail didn't stop Dr. Shirolyn Ruth Moffett from doing just that. Dr. Moffett claims that she surgically ensured that this woman would never have another child because she feared that the patient's uterus would burst if she ever got pregnant again.

Not only did Dr. Moffett perform this procedure without permission, she failed to inform the woman after the fact and made no notation of what she had done on her medical chart.

I personally think this happens a great deal, but the doctors are able to convince the patient after-the-fact that it is what's best for them, so the patient just goes along with it. I have heard many stories if not where the doctor has succeeded, where they have made attempts.

Myself included.

I had one doctor who kept writing "tubal ligation" on my chart and never brought it to my attention until I saw another doctor in the practice and she asked me about it. I said that was a mistake. I saw my regular doctor later, and oddly, it was on my chart again. I told my doctor I was 22, and had two children, and didn't want a tubal. She told me I had too many children, and ordered me "don't you come back to this office again until you decide a method of birth control for after you have this baby!"

Oddly, I went back to that group with the next pregnancy (insurance, they were supposedly anti-abortion, I was young and stupid), and the same thing happened.

How many women did this tactic work with?

Danielle Bean has an excellent article over at Inside Catholic that I so needed today.

I read this and I started to cry:

When a battle-weary mother stands alone in her bathroom looking with disbelief at two tiny pink lines on a pregnancy test, it's too late for family-planning discussions of clinical effectiveness. We've got a baby to take care of. And his mother...

"Soon after I announced that we were (unexpectedly) pregnant with our eighth child," an older mom once wrote me, "I came out of Mass one day and found an NFP flyer tucked under the windshield wiper of my van. I even wondered if it was our pastor who put it there."

Shame on us.

Whether we love NFP or hate it, whether we choose to use it in our marriages or not, whether we have one child or 16 children, we Catholics have no business receiving new life with anything but charity and joy. We have no business labeling our fellow Catholics, in their time of need and vulnerability, as crazy or irresponsible.

It takes courage for many Catholic couples to continue to refuse contraception, to remain open to life in their marriages, even when their circumstances are already difficult and they are hoping to avoid another pregnancy. The "99 percent effective" number people like to throw around about NFP becomes a much smaller one when translated into "user effectiveness."

Thank you and God bless you.

I had my prenatal visit the other day and the PA mentioned that at 18 weeks, if I so choose, I could get genetic counseling, a level II ultrasound, and perhaps an amnio to look for birth defects-specifically Down Syndrome. I am now 35, therefore officially of "advanced maternal age" making the chances of having a Down Syndrome child go up substantially. The more advanced my age, the more "up" my chances go, and from what she described, it seems once I hit 40, well, don't even try reproducing (ha ha, I just made a funny..."try" ha ha).

She said this is just and offer (about 100 x's), and not necessary (I had the feeling the fact that i was pro-life showed somewhere). I said I would ask my husband and so I did. He said if it makes me feel comfortable, sure but in his estimation we do not need it. It's our baby, nothing they reveal would stop us from having the baby, end of story. Good answer. In my pregnancy brain, I flip flop back and forth over the dumbest details and I think were I asked this when I wasn't pregnant, it would be a cut and dry answer, but now I am emotional and I worry, and am indecisive and I need a partner in all this life stuff to tell me what to do until I'm sane again.

13 years ago, when I was 22 years old and pregnant with my Number 2, Posco, my AFP Triple screen came out "funny" (according to the doctor who left a message on my answering machine). So they sent us to genetic counseling, an ultrasound and an amnio. We of course opted to go because the doctor scared the living daylights out of us and gave me the impression that this was simply the next step after a Triple Screen. And I of course *thought* the idea was to give us a head's up to prepare for a child who might have special needs (I was actually thinking Spinabifida more so than Down's).

The genetic-screen-counselor person told me I had about the same chance of having a baby with Down Syndrome as a 35-year-old woman (oh, the irony) which was pretty high (according to them).Before I had a 1 in 1 million chance of having a child with Down's Syndrome, now it was like 1 in 200 (I don't remember the exact stats, but they were startling). We had the ultra sound, we had the amniocentesis and the doctor who did the procedure said "18 weeks is still early enough along to take care of it if we find out there is bad news today." I felt stupid and angry and felt that by participating, I unwittingly contributed somehow to the philosophy that children are disposable. I told my mother this story and she rolled her eyes at my melodrama (as par the course) and said her doctor told her these tests were to perhaps fix an anomaly that could be fixed or to prepare parents in advance.

I know the usual pro-life mom tagline is simply to reject these tests, and I don't think I had a Triple Screen again after that incident with my following 4 children. Like my husband said, I will most likely turn down the tests this time around. But it makes me wonder: preparing ahead if you have a child who needs special attention does not seem anti-life to me. I think if I had a pro-life, NFP only doctor, I might opt for the tests. Do women who are lucky enough to have NFP only docs, who feel confident that abortion is not an ulterior motive accept these tests? Or do these doctors simply not offer these tests? I guess the overall question is what would women's health care look like if the industry wasn't so obsessed with birth control and abortion and you had confidence that your doctor was genuinely trying to take care of you and not sterilize you.

Spirit and Life® readers will be well aware of the ongoing campaign to legalize abortion on demand in the Caribbean nation of Jamaica. Our valiant pro-life friends in Jamaica have just informed us that they need prayer this coming week as the abortion issue comes before their Parliament.

Details at Island Breezes.

News flash: having the Olympics in Beijing really is turning out to be a bad idea. First there is the fact that they are um, Communist, then there's that disgusting One Child Policy complete with forced abortions, their disproportionate capital punishment rates, they eat cats and dogs. And guess what? They hate black people too. OK, I know the last one seems almost laughable compared to the other crimes against humanity, yet it seems like the one people might stand up and notice the most.

Seriously though, why do we do as much business as we do with them? This country is a like a delicious sundae of immoral joy. Every opportunity people try to give them to prove "hey China is not that disgusting, they say "yeah we are, watcha gonna do about it?"

Well nothing apparently. We just continue to support them economically.

Dawn Eden links to this wonderful article from America Magazine about a woman's intellectual journey from being a pro-choice atheist to a pro-life Catholic. I recommend it, it is an enjoyable read.

Some of the comments made me chuckle. Take for example comment #73 by Tricia Harrigan:

73. OK, abortion is killing a baby; agreed. Not to be
done. But contraception? why is that wrong? Must
one have a baby a year? We were well on that
path, when our third child was born before our
eldest was three years old. We tried the rhythm
method and almost lost our marriage. The scars
remain. Our fourth child was born by choice, and
then I took the pill, which had just become
available. This was the time of Vatican II; we had
great hopes that the church would listen to the
faithful and come to a less 'all or nothing'
approach to marriage; a commission was appointed to
study marriage and eminent Catholic leaders like
the Crowleys from Chicago were on it. But when the
group presented its conclusions, they were the
wrong ones, i.e. they did not echo the church's
position, so they were dismissed. What after all
did married people know? So we don't listen to
celibates on the subject of marriage! A
grandmother of 10, married 50 years.
By Tricia Harrigan on July 6, 2008 at 6:11 PM

I don't know where to begin. This sounds so Diocese of Albany and so that 60's generation. This is the generation whose philosophy is closing Churches left and right and watering down the faith.

I suppose I could go on about the abuses of folk music Masses, and stupid "cool" homilies about Bravo TV shows etc. etc, but I will stick to the topic at hand. I don't understand this woman's philosphy. I don't understand my parents or my grandmother or my in-laws. I don't get being Catholic except in regard to the birth control issue.I totally get how having another child when you are not planning on it is a struggle. But it seems like every time you make a choice to do something right, the immediate consequences seem very difficult compared to the alternative. However, the long term good makes life better.

I don't get fighting the Church on this issue. It makes no sense to me to say "I am certainly Catholic and I agree in the Church's wisdom on everything...except this. This is just dumb." Do they think the Church is being cute and sentimental but doesn't really mean it on this issue? I used to think they thought they were championing some cause or helping people by saying "you must go on birth control" but all that has happened is the opposite: it has turned people who desire to follow Church teachings and have more than 2 children into a pariah.

People always fall back on the economical reasoning-people should not have too many children that they cannot afford. That sounds logical and makes sense, but I think the philosophy behind this thinking has more to do simply with selfishness. Somewhere in this generation, or the one before, selfishness became a virtue. I cannot tell you how many times I hear people of that generation say things like "I enjoy my things", "this belongs to me", "I need my time", "I deserve This". It's like a mantra, and they are used as excuses for reasons why they do not have to come visit their grandchildren on special occasions, or help with families or whatever, as well as simple random declarations of their life mission statements. It baffles me why people are not embarrassed to make such proclamations. If I was simply too tired to attend an important event, I would at least make an excuse. My mother-in-law just two days ago told us we are not worthy to make the 3 hour trip to visit. She has better things to do. For the life of me, I cannot understand how this is fulfilling. I don't think it is. One of my girlfriend's mother used to tell her constantly she should have been aborted. Growing up, everyone but her mother took care of my friend, her grandparents, neighbors, after-school programs.The woman dated, partied, finished school and obtained many graduate degrees, and acted in shows. Now that she is grown and her mother is in her fifties, her mother announced to her that her daughter "stole her youth away". I wish I could say this is so weird and was just her, but it is not. Maybe to this extent yes. Not sure, my husband was a "we should have aborted you" child yet his parents invested no time or effort into raising him. They claim all the time they did, the sacrificed so much. It is OK to say that because it "would have been the right thing for me".

I am so glad to have many Catholic friends in my generation, who in the very least, abandoned folk music Masses. If I had to sit around with my friends and talk about how great that generation was because of Woodstock and liberation theology, I would lock myself in my closet and never come out.

In the comboxes below, DRF comments:

What about the women and girls who are forced to continue pregnancies that they do not want? What about the women and girls who are subject to violence just for getting pregnant in the first place? Murder is already illegal. Doctors having sex with their patients is already punishable. Holding a gun to your daughter's head is already a crime. Recriminalizing a necessary medical procedure is not the way to solve these problems.

Welcome DRF, thanks for stopping by. You make some valid points.

The focus of the site is not about making abortion illegal.The focus of this site is to show how what was supposed to be a women's right has become more of another method to control and abuse women. While I am pretty sure it attracts and is most likely written by (although I really am just speculating, I don't want to make that assumption) many pro-lifers who believe abortion is murder, the message here is about the fact that many women are being coerced psychologically and even violently into aborting against their will. If you are pro-life or pro-choice, coercing women into abortion is unacceptable. Am I correct in believing that pro-choice means just that, it is a women's choice what to do, and that choice should not be limited to abortion OR if she decides on abortion, she should feel it is totally her decision?

Many of the examples given are of the violent aspect of coercion into abortion, and may seem extreme, but as Peony blogged about before, homicide is becoming the leading cause of death of pregnant women. She also linked toto this WaPo article about this scary trend. It is a slippery slope, once one type of abuse becomes common, people become desensitized, and what you see is a step worse the next time around. Murder aside, I can say that many of the women I know who had abortions had people around them pressing hard on them to have abortions. I know a few women who opted not to abort, such as myself, who had tons of pressure to abort, but for some reason they held fast to their decisions, perhaps realizing the people who were pressuring them were not going to be around to pick up the pieces.

The abortion issue is a complex one, and there are many areas we can agree on and contribute equally to. Helping pregnant women in need doesn't have to be "anti-choice"; acknowledging and helping women through Post Abortive Stress Syndrome should not to be limited to pro-lifers (nor does pretending it doesn't exist further the choice cause, and in the case discussed here, women should not be forced into abortion.

As a matter of fact, the site states:

Compassionate Americans on all sides will want to know ... about these injustices and risks to women. People on all sides are ready to open the door to healing after decades of:
* Unwanted abortions,
* Coercion or even force from all sides,
* Deceptive or negligent counseling and medical practices,
* Coercive, often systemic negligence,
* Risk to teens, including coercion, sexual molestation, and injury
* Risks to all women, ranging from pregnancy-related discrimination and coercion to health risks and post-abortion trauma and death
* Domestic violence toward pregnant women, which can lead to homicide, the leading killer of pregnant women
* Post-abortion issues, including:
* grief
* trauma
* physical injury, including infertility
* 6-7 x higher suicide rates
* 3.5x higher risk of death in abortion's aftermath (3)

Interesting, but sad, website.

Coercion is significant. It comes "from all sides." It can escalate to violence, even homicide –– the #1 killer of pregnant women.
* A husband jumped on his wife’s stomach to force an abortion ...
* A mother forced her daughter at gunpoint to go to the abortion clinic
* Outside a parking ramp, a mother was forcibly injected by a physician –- the baby’s father – with an abortifacient drug ...
* Discrimination against pregnant employees or renters
* Violence against pregnant mothers
* Homicide is the leading killer or pregnant women.
* Learn more by downloading Forced Abortion in America,
which includes the single-page Forced Abortion fact sheet

HT: Ashli

...In 1939 Sanger created the above-mentioned “Negro Project,� which aimed to get blacks to adopt birth control. Through the Birth Control Federation, she hired black ministers (including the Reverend Adam Clayton Powell Sr.), doctors, and other leaders to help pare down the supposedly surplus black population. The project’s racist intent is beyond doubt. “The mass of significant Negroes,� read the project’s report, “still breed carelessly and disastrously, with the result that the increase among Negroes...is [in] that portion of the population least intelligent and fit.� Sanger’s intent is shocking today, but she recognized its extreme radicalism even then. “We do not want word to go out,� she wrote to a colleague, “that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members.�...

So forget about intent: Look at results. Abortion ends more black lives than heart disease, cancer, accidents, AIDS, and violent crime combined. African Americans constitute little more than 12 percent of the population but have more than a third (37 percent) of abortions. That rate has held relatively constant, though in some regions the numbers are much starker; in Mississippi, black women receive some 72 percent of all abortions, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Nationwide, 512 out of every 1,000 black pregnancies end in an abortion. Revealingly enough, roughly 80 percent of Planned Parenthood’s abortion centers are in or near minority communities. Liberalism today condemns a Bill Bennett who speculates about the effects of killing unborn black children; but it also celebrates the actual killing of unborn black children, and condemns him for opposing it...

Read the full article.

HT:The Dawn Patrol

but it's going to be that way, for a little while anyway. As long as I am involved in this "thing", campaign, mission, whatever you want to call it in regard to the Planned Parenthood opening up here in Amsterdam, I am going to whine and kvetshn. I am no fool, there is no true way to fight PP. They are a huge corporation. But what they are bringing with them is not simply a birth control clinic, they are bringing a philosophy and a culture. I am also not so naive to think that Margaret Sanger's culture. She herself invented the terms "birth control" and "family planning". She financed development of the first Pill all to fuel her anti-minority eugenics program. How many people pay and swallow hormonal contraceptives without understanding the philosophy behind their creation? (I will save the rant about racism and health issues for another entry...I guess tomorrow. And yes, I know I am preaching to the choir.)

My question for today is about the culture Margaret Sanger created: How was she so successful?

Planned Parenthood's President, Janet Colm, May 2008:

Research indicates that emotional problems resulting from abortion are rare and that for most women the response is relief...Anti-abortion groups have invented [“post-abortion syndrome (PAS)�] to further their cause. All of the studies that purport to prove PAS contain flaws – and all of them studied women who already self-identified as having problems after abortion.

Annie's reply?

Flat.out.bullshit

Gotta love it. She has much more intelligent stuff to offer. "Bullshit" was all I could muster up at the moment.Read the rest.

In an attempt to combat the newly opening PP in Amsterdam a few volunteers (read 4), myself included were granted a bit of closet space in the local Catholic Charities to distribute diapers and other baby supplies to mothers (or fathers) who come in and need them.

Our first day open was Monday evening. We didn't expect anyone to show up that night, or even the next day for that matter, until word got around that we had free baby supplies.I was not even slotted to volunteer that night, but I live right across the street, so I said I would go and help out the girl who was volunteering. She had not been to the CC and was not there while we set up, so she needed someone to show her where we were stationed. Lo and behold we had a small line. I guess it was a good thing I was there.

We are supplied by donations. I pray the Lord continues to supply for our needs. As it is, we have tons of newborn diapers, yet everyone who came requested size 5. If you can offer up a "Hail Mary" for us, we would be much obliged!

Jill Stanek links to an old debate between George Bush and McCain on the abortion issue.

She sums up the gist of it in her WND column:

Pro-lifers voting for president in November will have to choose McCain. He knows that. We know that. But if he makes one wrong maverick move on the pro-life issue from here until then, such as trying to weaken the Republican pro-life platform, many of us will bail.

The same old dilemma-being Catholic and voting.

PS-I agree with Alan Keyes: if you are going to be pro-life, be pro-life. If you feel that is a child who is being murdered, the circumstances of their conception makes no difference. If you do not feel it is murder, then why be pro-life? Makes no sense.