Health Care Proposals and the Stupak Amendment

Here is an email I just sent to my two Senators in Washington:

As a Catholic, I understand and appreciate that there is a pressing need to make health care more affordable and accessible for those in need. So, I appreciate the Senate's efforts in this direction. However, I understand from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops that the current legislation is "an enormous disappointment, creating new and completely unacceptable federal policy that endangers human life and rights of conscience."

Please adopt the House-approved Stupak Amendment that upholds longstanding policies against abortion funding, and please protect conscience rights in health care reform. I also do not believe that it is a good idea for immigrants to lose or to be denied health care coverage.

Let's Pray for Each Other

Here is an email I've just sent to President Obama: I am praying for you to succeed in your mission as President. With God's help, I know that you can do good for our country. And I ask you to join me in praying for the unborn, who are being cruelly assaulted today.

BEATITUDES, BABIES AND BASEBALL: The Persecuted Right Fielder

"Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you." Matt. 5:10-12. This essay here concludes a nine part series which examines whether abortion is consistent with or opposed to the beatitudes at the core of Christian faith and action. Each essay examines a beatitude in three relationships: our relationship with God, with His laws and with others, particularly the least favored of humanity. Each begins with mention of a famous baseball player who demonstrated some characteristics of the beatitude. Can you recognize this last player before reading his name? 9. The Persecuted, but Appreciated, Right Fielder. After he was traded to his third team in his first four years in the major leagues, he won the League’s Most Valuable Player Award twice the next two years, edging out the established hometown hero. Sadly, many people criticized him as an unworthy upstart when he passed the home run record then held by America’s greatest sports hero. Instead of being rewarded for this accomplishment, he faced a lot of hostility from the baseball public. "They acted as though I was doing something wrong, poisoning the record books or something," he said. As they had done for their other superstars who preceded him, though, the Yankees accorded him honor and retired the jersey number of this right fielder, Roger Maris. Christ calls us in the last Beatitude to accept persecution not to pursue excellence, but to pursue Him. The characteristic of this Beatitude is fellowship with Christ, His law, and those least fortunate among us because He is with them also. The beatitude reminds us that this fellowship embraces also those who have gone before us in His name. The prochoice side, however, calls for the destruction of the least fortunate among us. It persecutes those who would protect them. Its laws stand in opposition to God’s laws and disregard those giants, the prophets and saints who suffered persecution themselves for the sake of Christ. We must choose which team we will be on. Let it be His team and let us strive to be the best teammates of those closest to Him, the unborn who are presently least among us. Then, they will grow in size and stature and become the teammates we will need in our declining years. Let us recognize the sacrifice made by those mothers in crisis pregnancy who maintain the lives of their unborn children. They are truly heros whether they raise those children themselves or place them with others to do so. Let us remember too the sacrifice made by the men and women daily who have stood on the front line of the abortion holocaust for the sake of the unborn, and ultimately for their mothers and families, especially when they have been persecuted for doing so. Finally, when we pass from this earth, may we be part of that victorious celebration with Him, the prophets and saints, and all those millions of people who were not permitted to walk this earth.

BLOG HOME PAGE LINK Illinoislife.blogspot.com

SMI VP to speak at 1/19/10 rally

James Lansberry, vice president of the Peoria-based Samaritan Ministries International, a health care sharing organization, will be the keynote speaker at the Jan. 19, 2010, Sanctity of Life Rally at Sacred Heart Church in Peoria.

The Central Illinois Right to Life Board confirmed that decision at its November meeting on Monday.

Huge Expansion of Federal Abortion Funding

I fired off an email to my guys in Washington:

Dear senator or representative:

As a Catholic, I am very concerned that the proposed health care reform will include expanded federal abortion funding. From what I have read in our Catholic newspaper, the five health care reform bills currently under consideration "would permit or mandate the use of fereral revenues fotr coverage that includes elective abortions." This quote is from "The Catholic Post," 11/1/2009 issue, page 4, "What some would 'Hyde'."

The article says that the Hyde Amendment does not apply to any of the health care reform bills, and it says "An explicit prohibition must ... be included in the final health care reform bill to avert a huge expansion of federal abortion funding. Without it and notwithstanding their strong support for health care reform, the bishops will have no choice but to oppose the final bill vigorously."

BEATITUDES, BABIES AND BASEBALL: The Center Fielder Who Bucked Systemic Persecution

"Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." Matt. 5:11

This essay, like the previous seven in this nine part series, examines a beatitude in three relationships: our relationship with God, with His laws and with others, particularly the least favored of humanity. It begins with mention of a famous baseball player who demonstrated some characteristics of the beatitude. Can you recognize the ball player before reading his name? The center fielder who bucked systemic persecution. When his team traded him, he wrote to the commissioner of baseball: "After 12 years in the major leagues I do not feel that I am a piece of property to be bought and sold irrespective of my wishes. I believe that any system that produces that result violates my basic right as a citizen and is inconsistent with the laws of the United States." White or black, ballplayers could only bargain with one team. Seven months before the Roe v. Wade decision, Supreme Court Justice Blackmun wrote the majority opinion in this ballplayer’s appeal, ruling against him. Only 3 years later, however, free agency began, but too late for this seven time Gold Glove Award winning center fielder, Curt Flood. In the real world, persecution for the sake of righteousness can be a far greater sacrifice than giving up a baseball career. Likewise, frequently more is at stake than the principle of contract freedom. In any event, to accept persecution voluntarily, people must have faith in God who is in control over even the persecutors. Accepting persecution also requires total commitment to God’s law, even to the point of sacrifice to follow it. The hardest part about persecution, however, is the powerlessness one feels when persecuted. This powerlessness transforms a person into one less favored, and perhaps even one of the least favored of humanity. The prochoice position, by contrast, follows from unrighteous conduct and leads to the avoidance of persecution. When they become pregnant, unmarried women are five times more likely to abort their unborn children than married women are. Unmarried women have four out of five abortions. Those who have rejected God’s law by their sexual conduct have more difficulty turning in faith toward God, trusting Him, recommitting to His law, and taking up the cross of personal sacrifice necessary to accept the relative powerlessness of the persecuted. Clearly, unless we can stem the tide of sexual activity among the unmarried, the pressures they have to abort their unborn children will remain overwhelmingly high. To reduce substantially the pressures to abort, we must work to reduce the pressures unmarried persons have toward sexual activity. Those pressures are in a real sense persecutions against those who resist them. Rather than avoiding persecution by running from it, Christ teaches us to accept it. To accept this persecution requires unmarried persons to have faith that God is in control of their lives. That faith gives them the fortitude to withstand pressure. They must be totally committed to God’s law so that they can sacrifice to follow it, even when that means accepting a position of less power. Whatever we can do to aid the unmarried in accepting persecution for righteousness will help drive down abortion.

BLOG HOME PAGE LINK Illinoislife.blogspot.com