Washington D.C., Feb 6, 2019 / 11:00 am (CNA).- The president’s annual state of the union address received a divided response after highlighting life issues. The chamber of the House of Representatives showed a clear divide in the legislature over President Trump’s call for a late-term abortion ban, with pro-life advocates offering their own reactions after the speech.
In the speech, delivered Tuesday evening, Trump encouraged lawmakers to choose “results” over “resistance” while making the traditional call for bipartisan cooperation.
After speaking about his legislative priorities for the coming year, including renewed calls for physical barriers on the southern U.S. border with Mexico and a nation-wide paid family leave program for parents, the president turned to recent abortion legislation at the state level.
“There could be no greater contrast to the beautiful image of a mother holding her infant child than the chilling displays our nation saw in recent days,” the president said, referencing the passage of the Reproductive Health Act recently passed by the state of New York.
That measure has been the subject of fierce criticism for allowing the possibility of effective abortion on demand throughout all nine months of pregnancy.
“Lawmakers in New York cheered with delight upon the passage of legislation that would allow a baby to be ripped from the mother’s womb moments before birth,” said Trump. “These are living, feeling, beautiful babies who will never get the chance to share their love and their dreams with the world.”
The president also referenced recent failed legislation in Virginia which would have allowed for mothers to terminate an unborn child even during labor. Citing the defense of the measure by embattled governor Ralph Northam, Trump called the bill a means to “execute a baby after birth.”
Regarding his own legislative suggestions for Congress, the president called for new laws to ban late-term abortions, saying he wished to see “a culture that cherishes innocent life.”
“Let us reaffirm a fundamental truth: all children — born and unborn — are made in the holy image of God.”
“To defend the dignity of every person, I am asking Congress to pass legislation to prohibit the late-term abortion of children who can feel pain in the mother’s womb.”
The proposal was greeted with a decidedly mixed reaction by some lawmakers, with Republicans standing in favor of the proposal.
While many Democrats, including a large block of women representatives who sat as a group dressed in white, remained seated with their arms folded, others, including Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), applauded.
Manchin later told RealClearPolitics that “late term abortions are just horrific…totally just wrong.”
Pro-life advocates were swift to praise the president’s speech.
Tom McClusky, the president of March for Life Action, said in a statement that he was pleased Trump spoke strongly in “condemning the extremist abortion propositions out of New York and Virginia.”
“The American consensus opposes abortion after the first trimester, yet some politicians continue to embrace and perpetuate an unprecedentedly radical pro-abortion agenda,” said McClusky, noting that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D) invited Planned Parenthood President Dr. Leana Wen as her guest to the speech.
These politicians are “out of touch with the American people,” said McClusky. “It is time for politicians, regardless of party, to stand up in favor of protecting innocent life.”
Ashley McGuire, senior fellow at the Catholic Association, agreed with McClusky, describing the call to end late-term abortions as a “welcome change from the left’s celebration of third-trimester abortions and infanticide.”
While much of the state of the union address appeared to highlight divisions between the two parties, there was considerable applause for the president’s condemnation of anti-Semitism.
“We must never ignore the vile poison of anti-Semitism, or those who spread its venomous creed,” Trump said. “With one voice, we must confront this hatred anywhere and everywhere it occurs.”
Judah Samet, who survived the anti-Semitic terrorist attack on the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh in October, attended the speech as a guest of the president. That attack left 11 people dead. Samet is also a survivor of the Holocaust and was imprisoned in a concentration camp.
The president’s legislative agenda and his call for increased cooperation will both be tested in the coming weeks. Congress and the president have until Feb. 15 to agree funding arrangements for parts of the federal government in order to avoid another partial shutdown.
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How DARE Paul Ryan call himself a Catholic. This is the Catholic Church that I remember.
I remember my outrage when the Catholic Church transferred Cardinal Bernard Laws to the Vatican after he was exposed for transferring pedophile priests in his diocese. I was even more infuriated when the Cardinal could participate in Pope John Paul’s funeral. For the first time in fifty years I questioned my devotion to the Church.
AND THEN I REMEMBERED:
A young black child attending and receiving communion without any fear or hesitation in all-white Catholic Churches in North Carolina and Virginia in the 40’s and 50’s.
Four Catholic nuns who traveled ten miles every Sunday on dirt roads to transport three young black children to Mass who had no other way to get to church.
I remember an elderly Catholic priest who brought communion EVERY Sunday for ten years to my disabled paternal grandmother even though she had nothing to contribute to the Church as she lived on $85.00 a month after my grandfather died.
I remember a big Irish Catholic priest who chose to work with the African-American community in the south in the 1950’s and organized a youth group among a handful of young black Catholics. That priest led this group of “rag tag” students down the main streets of a small southern city to protest segregation. One of those students, Joseph McNeil, went on to A&T State University where he organized and began the sit-down demonstrations at lunch counters in the Woolworth Stores. His actions initiated the integration of public facilities in this country. That lunch counter is enshrined in a museum in Greensboro, North Carolina.
I remember that same priest procured full scholarships for several young African-American women to attend the prestigious St. Mary College in South Bend, Indiana in 1959.
I remember requesting from the Josephites (priest’s community) a photo of Father Richard Swift to include in a book that I am writing and being astounded at a short bio included with the photo that chronicled his remarkable life of service.
I remember a wonderful Catholic priest who counseled and consoled me during my years of life with an alcoholic husband and severely asthmatic son.
I remember a jovial, happy priest who provided a full scholarship for my son to attend the local Catholic school when I couldn’t afford the tuition
I remember contacting a quiet Catholic priest, whom I had never met, and asking him to visit my son away in college in the hospital with a broken jaw that he sustained playing college football. Father Thomas Hadden went to visit my son without any hesitation and reported back to me. We became lifelong friends.
I remember a kind and gentle priest who helped me get the diocese to accept my divorces from two unhealthy marriages without any criticism or judgment.
During my second marriage, I had a daughter and I remember a very elderly Monsignor who held my hand, prayed with me, and counseled me when my husband walked out and left me with an eighteen-month-old daughter.
I remember two priests and two nuns who traveled with me to Wake Forest University to see that young lady graduate from college.
I remember a kindly Catholic priest, the son of a Methodist minister, who encouraged and supported a community clinic, food bank, dental clinic, and an unbelievable social outreach that turned no one away: all run by the Sisters of St Ursula and volunteers.
I remember all the Catholic clinics, food banks, and outreach programs sponsored by the Catholic Church throughout this country and the world that are supported by local priests and staffed by dedicated Catholic nuns and lay people.
I remember my years of involvement in all Catholic ministries, from training and assigning lectors to starting the first ever youth program at the St. Mary Cathedral in Wilmington, NC.
I remember a jolly, happy-go-lucky Irish priest obsessed with Notre Dame Football and a quiet, stern, holy priest with a wicked sense of humor; they changed my life forever. Their presence makes heaven a better place!
Pedophile priests should be excommunicated and so should those who continue to protect them. The behavior is unconscionable as young lives are destroyed. I weep when I learn of priests who continue to commit these horrendous acts and, I again, ask myself if I can continue to support the Roman Catholic Church ? THEN I REMEMBER:
“How DARE Paul Ryan call himself a Catholic.”
Huh. Is Paul Ryan a pedophile or a disgraced prelate? Did I miss something? Good grief.