As huge strides are made teaching people the truth about abortion, increasing numbers of Americans are confused by euthanasia, cloning, and embryonic stem cell research. Fewer youth believe the pro-abortion propaganda that was prevalent during their mothers’ college years, yet these same folks unwittingly believe the claim that euthanasia is necessary to help people “die with dignity” or that destroying embryos is necessary to help those who are seriously ill. The Pro-Life movement is responsible for continuing to educate individuals about these issues so that we can protect life from those who would dispense of it so readily.
Please read this issue of the Pro-Life Update carefully to understand some of the challenges we now face and how you, as a Pro-Life activist, can help advance the Culture of Life. Please share this information with your family, friends and church congregations. Make copies. Spread the news.
Decline of the National Organization of Women (NOW)
The National Organization of Women (NOW) has relentlessly fought for the right to abortion. However, their radical tactics and inflammatory language have lost appeal to younger generations. NOW has started the National NOW Young Feminist Task Force to try to reach out to this young Pro-Life audience.
The NOW webpage spotlights some contributions from “young feminists” who have pledged their support to the pro-abortion movement. One such woman stated, “I think that we must create and maintain a strong voice for young women in NOW. I hope that we can craft a meaningful campus outreach program for national as well as underrepresented populations. Recently I learned that the median age of NOW members is 61!!! We have a big job ahead of us…”
NOW has realized that the harsh pro-abortion message does not resonate with women as in the 70’s. Historically, college-aged women have been overwhelmingly pro-abortion. Recently, however, an explosion of support for the Pro-Life movement among young adults has occurred. Increasingly, young adults oppose either all abortions or they condone abortions only in the most extreme circumstances. Continued educational efforts from the Pro-Life movement, college outreach programs (such as those by Feminists for Life and Texas Right to Life), coupled with amazing new ultrasound technology have helped young adults to recognize the truth about unborn human life.
Ex-Nurse Admits to Euthanizing 30 to 40 Patients
A former nurse in New Jersey has claimed to have killed as many as 40 patients. Prosecutors say that he gave seriously ill patients lethal drug overdoses to end their suffering. Charles Cullen, 43, has been charged with murdering a Roman Catholic clergyman and attempting to kill another patient at Somerset Medical Center. More charges could follow based on Cullen’s claims.
Due to the limited reporting requirements on fired workers, Cullen’s shoddy record was never revealed from one job to another. Officials at the Somerset Medical Center found nothing wrong after checking his credentials.
Individuals like Cullen most often think of themselves as helping these patients by putting them out of their misery. We face this exact danger if we allow physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia. In Denmark, where physician-assisted suicide has been legal for years, doctors quickly took liberties to euthanize patients who had not even requested that their lives be ended. The Danes must carry cards stating that they do not want to be euthanized.
To truly respect the dignity of individuals is not to end their lives but to help them control their pain and respect them as important members of our society. In order to ensure that this dignity is preserved, one should designate a loved one to make life-preserving medical decisions in the event of incapacitation; this is vital in fighting the culture of death. A health care power of attorney is an important way to stress the dignity of those who are near the end of their lives or who have debilitating conditions. (A health care power of attorney should be separate from financially-related powers of attorney.) New Jersey Passes Human Cloning Bill
New Jersey has passed the most radical human cloning bill ever put into law. Democrat Assemblyman Neil Cohen, one of the bill’s sponsors, stated that “this bill is not the most significant law we’ll write this session—but this century.” The law will allow research to be performed on embryonic stem cells from embryos “left over” from IVF procedures. The bill will also legalize the implantation of cloned human embryos into wombs, gestatation of these embryonic humans for up to nine months, and then destroy them for use in research. The language used does criminalize the “cloning of a human being,” but, because of their definition of a human being, this terrible new law allows for the implantation and gestation of cloned humans as long as they are killed before being born. In essence, New Jersey has mandated the killing of unborn children.
The language in this bill authorizes the manufacture of human cloned embryos through somatic nuclear cell transfer. This is the same cloning procedure that was used to create Dolly the sheep. DNA from an ovum (egg) is removed and replaced with the complete DNA from another cell. The egg is then manipulated to begin multiplying, as a normal single-cell embryo would.
Three Republican congressmen from New Jersey stated, “We fully understand the drive to cure debilitating diseases and to improve healthcare for those who are suffering. But allowing human fetus farms for research is not an ethical or practical solution. Rather, the priority should be to fund the most ethical and the most promising avenues of research—adult stem cell research—which could find cures that will not exploit human life and incite controversy.”
