Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch was among the honorees of Live Action’s Life Gala in Dana Point, California, on Sept. 17, 2022. / Screenshot of ETWN YouTube video
Denver, Colo., Jan 20, 2023 / 10:10 am (CNA).
This year’s National March for Life is the first since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the 1973 pro-abortion precedent Roe v. Wade on June 24, 2022.
Among its scheduled speakers is Lynn Fitch, attorney general for the state of Mississippi, who helped defend Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban before a court primed to revisit precedent in the case Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. The court sided with Fitch and other critics, overturning Roe in a 5-3 decision.
1. For Fitch, the Dobbs era is a new chapter for America.
“This year’s March is unlike any other,” Fitch told CNA on Thursday. “We are saying goodbye to one chapter of American history and starting a new one. In this new Dobbs era, the task now falls to us to ensure our laws reflect the compassion we have always felt for woman and child.”
“As we march into this new chapter, we do so with the same hope and resolve to ensure our laws empower women and their families and respect the dignity of all life,” Fitch said.
Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban passed in 2018, before Fitch had announced her campaign for attorney general. Challenges to the ban proceeded through the federal courts, and in 2019 an appeals court struck down the law. When she won the election in November 2019, it was left to her, the first woman to serve as Mississippi attorney general, to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold the law.
2. Fitch grew up on a farm.
Fitch is Mississippi’s first Republican attorney general since 1878 and the first woman to serve in the role.
The 61-year-old is a native of Holly Springs, Mississippi, near the Tennessee border. There, her father inherited land on the former Galena Plantation and worked to restore the family farm, BBC News reported. Fitch Farms became a famous hunting destination for figures including the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, another skeptic of the Supreme Court’s Roe precedent.
As a young woman, Fitch’s interests included riding horses and hunting quail on the farm. Her former campaign manager Hayes Dent told BBC News she was the “prototypical popular girl… leader, cheerleader, athletic, the whole nine yards.”
She attended the University of Mississippi, where she joined a sorority and earned an undergraduate degree and a law degree. After graduation, she worked for the state attorney general’s office before entering private practice. Her hard work, and some family connections, aided her ascent in Mississippi politics.
Before she took office as attorney general, she served as Mississippi state treasurer from 2012 to 2020. She previously served in the administration of Gov. Haley Barbour and as a legal counsel to the Mississippi House of Representatives Ways and Means and Local and Private Legislation Committees.
She was a member of the 2016 Republican National Convention platform committee and worked for pro-life principles there, World Magazine reported in November 2021.
Her official biography reports her support for charities for first responders and juvenile diabetes. She also supports Goodwill Industries and the American Red Cross. Fitch is co-chair of the National Association of Attorneys General Human Trafficking Committee.
According to her 2020 campaign website, she and her family are “active members” of Madison United Methodist Church in the city of Madison, Mississippi.
3. Her campaign theme was “Empower Women, Promote Life.”
After her divorce, Fitch raised two daughters and a son as a single mother. Her personal success, and the success of many mothers, helped inspire her campaign to defend Mississippi’s abortion ban and overturn Roe. For this campaign, she used the motto “Empower Women, Promote Life.”
One of her arguments against Roe v. Wade is that women’s situations have much improved since the 1970s.
In a Sept. 19, 2021, opinion essay for the Dallas Morning News, Fitch invoked the “Olympic Supermoms,” peak athletes who are also mothers.
“As a single, working mother, I raised three children and went from launching the Mississippi Bar’s first Women in the Profession Committee to becoming our first female attorney general. I know from experience that there is nothing easy about this, which is why I commend those Olympic Supermoms for proudly displaying their motherhood while the spotlight is on their professional accomplishments.”
“Abortion policy has been tethered to 1973, but women, men, and the workplace have all changed, facilitating our ability to have both a full family life and successful career,” she said.
“Over the past five decades, revolutions in cultural norms and public policy have opened opportunities for women who were previously told you could be a mother or a career woman, but not both,” Fitch continued. She noted that mothers of young children had doubled their workforce participation from 1975 to 2016.
“Technology and the advent of the gig economy have only increased options for freelancing, part-time work, and independent contracting for women to have more choices in life,” the attorney general said.
4. Fitch authored Mississippi’s Supreme Court brief for the Dobbs case.
Fitch made her case in favor of the Mississippi law and against Roe in a written submission to the court, leaving oral arguments to Mississippi solicitor general Scott Stewart.
She emphasized the need to strike down Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. They “shackle states to a view of the facts that is decades out of date,” she wrote.
“It is time for the Court to set this right and return this political debate to the political branches of government,” she said. “State legislatures, and the people they represent, have lacked clarity in passing laws to protect legitimate public interests, and artificial guideposts have stunted important public debate on how we, as a society, care for the dignity of women and their children.”
She repeated her case that women’s situations, and the ability to care for families, have much improved.
“A lot has changed in five decades. In 1973, there was little support for women who wanted a full family life and a successful career. Maternity leave was rare. Paternity leave was unheard of. The gold standard for professional success was a 9-to-5 with a corner office. The flexibility of the gig economy was a fairy tale,” she said. “In these last 50 years, women have carved their own way to achieving a better balance for success in their professional and personal lives.”
5. Fitch is continuing her legal efforts against pro-abortion federal policy.
After Dobbs, Fitch has continued legal efforts to challenge the spread of abortion.
On Jan. 18 of this year, she joined a brief supporting a Texas nurse’s lawsuit in a challenge to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. The VA is implementing the Biden administration’s plan to allow abortion at its hospitals, the Jackson Clarion-Ledger reported.
“In direct contravention of the Supreme Court’s opinion in Dobbs, President Biden has taken abortion policy away from state legislators, Congress, and, most importantly, the people and given it to political appointees in his own administration,” Fitch said in a statement. “The Dobbs decision was about the rule of law. This VA rule is precisely the opposite.”
Seventeen other states’ attorneys general have joined the brief.
6. Fitch supports a “safety net” for women and babies.
After the Dobbs decision overturned Roe v. Wade, a different Mississippi ban on abortion took effect, barring the procedure except in cases of rape or when the mother’s life is in danger.
In response to the new political and cultural landscape created by Dobbs, Fitch insisted on the need for a strong safety net.
“Now, we must all work together to strengthen the safety net that women need not only for healthy pregnancies but also as they build families where both they and their children thrive,” she said in July 2022. “We need our laws to reflect our compassion for these women and their children.”
She called for action to help address the affordability and accessibility of child care, child support enforcement, and requirements for fathers to be equally responsible for their children, workplace policies like maternity and paternity leave, streamlining adoption, and improving foster care.
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How about excommunication the bishops involved in the blessings?
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But then there might be schism, and the Vatican will loose all the German taxpayer money.
Better to worship Christ than Mammon and Sodom.
Maybe we can get the Russians to leave the Ukraine border and instead mass along the German border. Those renegade German bishops like Overbeck and his followers have got to go. Come to think of it, the Russians might already have that in mind. The Russians know from experience how Communism seeks to divide and destroy Christanity and that is exactly what these bad German bishops are doing. There will be a reckoning.
The CDF claims that the Church has no power to bless same-sex unions. Bishops or other ‘Catholic’ priests who then so bless do not act with the power of the Church. Such blessings are farcical, fraudulent, and false.
May God have mercy on lost schismatic souls.
May God strike lightning bolts within the pope’s heart and mind and soul. May the pope act decisively, with clarity, with consequence, in the name of his Lord. As the Vicar of Christ, the pope has the power to call the bishops of the Church to account so they may further the teaching of the Church.
Otherwise, inaction leads to nihilism, irrelevance, incompetence, and weakness not of Christ. A man with fortitude is needed. A man with God as his shield and his staff is needed.
In the glory of the Easter Season, with Pentecost soon to come, we pray for humility, sanctity, reason, and charity. Hear us, O Lord.
Excommunication for heresy and schism is long overdue for the large majority of German “Catholic” bishops and apparently a large proportion of the “Catholic” laity as well.
How is what the Germans are now doing not Schismatic in terms of Canon Law? Wouldn’t this qualify Overbeck and his buddies Latae sententiae excommunications?
Are you completely unaware this is all going according to the Pope’s yes, yes, no no strategy? Just wait the Pope will intervene shortly and make them some concession that will continue to move their modernist agenda forward incrementally.
“this is all going according to the Pope’s yes, yes, no no strategy” JJ you put the finger on the matter there, alright!
Not meaning to be crude, but what is it with these Bishops and sodomy?
That’s what they want blessed, at it’s core. One need to merely think about how gross that is in order to make a decision on it.
Matthew 7:14-16 (RSVCE)
14 “For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few.
15 Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. 16 You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles?”
Acts 20:28-30 (RSVCE)
28 Take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you guardians, to feed the church of the Lord which he obtained with his own blood. 29 I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; 30 and from among your own selves will arise men speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them.
Thank you for the well chosen Scripture Todd. It is indeed so true about the bad Shepherds in Germany as read in Ezekiel 34:4-25. The Lord will see to their evil for the sake of his flock Isaiah 66:4.
We also pray for their conversion and ask the Lord and his endless Mercy to send the Holy Spirit to rekindle the fire on them and melt away their sinful ways. We know that the Lord’s victory has already been won at Calvary. St Peter is at the gate and let’s hope and trust in the Lord with praying and fasting.
‘[This] plays a central role in one of four forums that constitute the “Synodal Process” underway in Germany.’
https://tenor.com/bl1ya.gif
It’s about even more than the Magisterium…
Humanae Vitae (HV, 1968) affirmed that “of such laws [the natural law] the church was not the author, nor consequently can she be their arbiter; she is only their depository and their interpreter, without ever being able to declare to be licit that which is not so by reason of its intimate and unchangeable opposition to the true good of man” (n. 18).
And the Catechism (1992) and Veritatis Splendor (1993) remind us of the same. But who needs any of this when you can have the license of logical positivism?
HV also warned against the arbitrary power of the state: “…a dangerous weapon would thus be placed in the hands of those public authorities who take no heed of moral exigencies” (n. 17).
Only “public authorities”? So, now, we have parody-blessings by German-speaking termites within the Church itself, so supinely swept along as they are by the current tsunami of “whatever.”
Get in front of the parade! We are reminded of the gay crowd admitted into the public/non-religious St. Patrick’s Day Parade in New York not so long ago. And of the frog on the stove.
There is an arrogance in that part of the world that has repeatedly led to disaster. When will there be a bit of humility that might derive from reflecting on the historical record. It’s fairly plain to see, and is not a record that inspires pride. Shame might even serve better. But the smugness and condescension is mind-boggling. These are the folks who demand that the rest of the Church and world see them as righteous trend-setters.
Why is it that Catholics — both clerics and lay — still consider themselves to be Catholic even when they don’t believe what the Church teaches?
Would they consider themselves New Yorkers if they lived in Walla Walla? In shape if they were morbidly obese? Female if they were born male?
Um, wait a sec. Maybe that last example is not the best analogy.
In fact I see now that analogies don’t actually apply when they are directed at leftism. Because leftists are themselves the arbiters of reality.
Whatever they say something is, it is.
So females aren’t female. Catholics are not Catholic. Riots are peaceful.
And so on.
(Sigh.)
I’m beginning to find this new leftist order a tad annoying.
One Bishop José Ignacio Munilla Aguirre Spain speaks out against same sex unions, that refusal of blessing implies and it’s heard around the world. Why are the majority of remainder dead silent? Is it that dead silence a pun or is it a form of moribund faith? What great impact if they stood openly with Bishop Munilla Aguirre for the faith, especially the suffering confused laity many leaving Catholicism precisely because of this insouciance.
Thank you, Fr, for your excellent comment! I just wonder why it cannot be done! Why can’t some bishop organize a group of like minded bishops to counter the German ideology. If the Germans do what they obvious want to do, it will spread through the world, especially America!
True Jeffrey. Apparently, it’s what James suggests that they lack the “temerity to demand a blistering correction from the bishop of Rome”. Bishops fear him, there’s heavy handed evidence of this with Josef Siefert [a layman] in Spain with pressure on their bishops to dismiss him, and the most obvious the humiliating demotion of Cardinal DiNardo as Pres USCCB effectively replacing his leadership with his lackey Cardinal Cupich. Simply because DiNardo attempted to address the real moral issue within the Church hierarchy, and among presbyters adult sexual networking [also, perhaps the successive deaths of Cardinals Joachim Meisner, Carlo Caffarra soon after they submitted the Dubia]. The strongest voice because of its direct theologically correct admonitions has been Fr T Weinandy OFM Cap. There is ingrained fear because he’s the pope, but if the pope abuses justice and acts errantly outside the jurisdiction of his office they are actually obliged to correct him. You’re correct, it’s becoming obvious exempting divine intervention that it’s up to the bishops to save the Church from apostasy.
The Pope needs to be very forceful in this matter.
If a German bishop blesses a gay union, such bishop must be excommunicated. The Pope then needs to name a successor bishop in each diocese that loses a bishop through excommunication.
It appears this faithful bishop cannot muster the temerity to demand a blistering correction of the Teutonic heresy from the Bishop of Rome. Is that not at the root of the problem?
These are the smoke of Satan that has entered the Church. They stay on to wreak heavoc within the Church (Satan come to kill , to steal and to destroy) and also to enjoy the good life in the Church system.
Why didn’t the Vatican remove these people ? Its because the Vatican itself is filled with the minions of Satan in its heirachy and administrative service.
https://www.universalis.com/20210411/today.htm – The explanation for the struggle that St.Thomas was allowed to undergo , before he could believe in the bodily resurrection of The Lord – the despair and its demands in the above situation also likely from the same root . The gentleness with which the Holy Father is dealing with it , an aspect of his wisdom in knowing that the attitude of the Prodigal’s Father is needed – he had long ago rightly pointed to the root of the issue as ‘searching for The Father .’- a Father that did not detest the bodily filth of the
son . The need to experience the sacredness in the body ? the great hunger of our times , from all the sins against same in our culture . In Germany too , the deep void in that realm, in spite of the material wealth , the cultural baggages with the related guilt , effects of pagan ties through Nazism that deny the sacredness of the body – can see why Holy Father want to be gentle and patient enough ; others in The Church as with the above Bishop being supportive with the right approach would be hopefully taken up by many of the laity too , also as reparation for misunderstanding the Holy Father and his good intentions .
There is the popular dieting regime called intermittent fasting of limiting food intake to limited hours a day etc : – even such , offered up united to the fasting days of The Lord , for the body to be set free from the effects of the rebellious self will against the Divine Will and the spirits behind such to be driven away so that The Spirit would take up His place in conveying the sacredness gained through The Passion of The Lord .Same then to enable the praise and gratitude for every heart beat , every drop of blood , affirming with the Psalmist , on behalf of oneself and the other –
‘ The Lord is My Shepherd , I shall not want ..’ .
May the unity of good intention in The Church bring forth the joy and feasting , after the moment of trial –
https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/devotions/pope-francis-prayer-for-protection-from-covid-19-14273
JPG:
Here the story of the Prodigal Son is employed by you. “…an aspect of his wisdom in knowing that the attitude of the Prodigal’s Father is needed – he had long ago rightly pointed to the root of the issue as ‘searching for The Father .’- a Father that did not detest the bodily filth of the son .”
The story of the Prodigal Son and the loving father’s response is a singular familial encounter after the son came back in repentance, however, the errant German bishop’s upcoming sinful act of proposing to bless would be sinful behavior is a completely different matter. It is incomprehensible to me that you can twist this beautiful story of a SON GONE WRONG who REPENTED, to German bishops blessing? would-be sinful unions. In your comparison there is no mention of scandal to the community at large, nor the approval of and aiding of some German bishops to setting precedent in blessing? a would-be sinful lifestyle.
The loving prelate father would help his charges to navigate their “predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex” toward “the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection”, having united their suffering to that of Christ.
Your comparison does not pass the smell test.
Read again for your own reflection CCC Chastity and homosexuality:
2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity,141 tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.”142 They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.
2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
2359 Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.
All the best to you.
Thank you for taking the time and trouble to analyze and respond ; the error is in misunderstanding the point that the Holy Father is the one waiting like the Father of the prodigal , for the return of any and all who condone the error and going against the decision from Vatican . The call by the Bishop for fasting and prayer is in from similar hope .
Today being Feast day of St.George as well as birthday of S.G Luisa of the Divine Will –
http://www.comingofthekingdom.org/the-way-of-sanctification/happy-birthday-luisa/
There in is likely the hope and patience in those who wait – like the Father of the prodigal .
Blessings !
The ‘mystery of suffering ‘- IIRR, St.John Paul 11 alludes to same ; most of us desire to be devotees to the Precious Blood devotion , in honor of the Love and Power our Lord desires to pour into our lives and we in turn , desiring to do so ,in our own baptismal roles , for each other . The 24 Hour of Passion meditations given through Luisa helps to make its aspects more explicit – the yearning to go around and share the blessings with all , to bring new joys to all – our Lord , in His great generosity , to bless us for our intention to be in oneness with His Will .
http://www.passioiesus.org/en/
The Bishops and priests , laity and all too in their sufferings and prayers and blessings , doing so even if in an indirect manner for us all.
The Church , as a good Mother , do not desire the children to go in the path of the Prodigal , in the rebellious self will and its evils that would need the long hard for the return – many may not return ; instead , She advocates the wisdom that persons would stay in the House of The Father , invite in the ‘friends ‘ there , in the ardent yearning through fasting and all , going around spiritually to share The Precious Blood with all , desiring conversion of all , all the while being grateful for our spiritual Fathers too through whom our Lord shares His Graces , thus to be a household of many blessed and holy relationships , in the trust and hope in The Lord and His Spirit .
Blessings !
Why is it wrong for them to perform a blessing that honors or recognizes the love between two people? I wasn’t aware that the blessing carries with it a stipulation that they must go have homosexual sex. Did I miss something there? Perhaps if the church valued love between persons of any background, i.e.: sex, sexual orientation, creed, nationality, gender identity, we might see fewer wars and human rights violations. The Catholic church has come along way but still has farther to go if we are to be a welcoming and loving family to anyone drawn to God through it’s teachings.
In the ways of Providence , the Holy Father was likely being prepared from his early years , to deal with the situation in Germany , in the trials ne was allowed , during the time he spent there – https://www.miamiarch.org/CatholicDiocese.php?op=Article_pope-francis-my-life-three-moments-of-solitude
Bl.Mother too , whose maternal care and love for him has been amply reciprocated by the Holy Father , on the many occasions of witnessing and exhorting The Church in same too , including his devotion to Our Lady ,as Undoer of knots – of ? German origin !
The Holy Spirit inspired decision of the Pope Emer. too , announced on Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes (as The Immaculate Conception that highlights the purity in marriage as well ) – likely related to the painful situation in own homeland that The Spirit likely had shown him that same needs the strength of ardent prayers , to support the ( new ) Holy Father in doing the heavy lifting with gentleness and warmth .
Good to have come across these words of the Holy Father too , on Fatherhood as closeness , compassion and tenderness , given us through the Sacred humanity of The Lord – that alone brings us the holiness that makes the sense of ‘closeness ‘ to be true and real , that we hear as in invoking The Precious Blood as ‘bringing forth virgins’ !
May the thirst in hearts and lives be recognized for what it is , to call on
The Mother along with the Holy Father and many to be the helpers to draw the waters to fill the jars all around !
http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Pope:-in-Iraq-to-meet-a-people-who-have-suffered-so-much-and-that-martyred-Church-52495.html
wow…now they are blessing an abomination. how pathetic
Any type of blessing of same-sex unions is a blessing of sinful behavior and is, therefore, completely unacceptable. The intrinsic evil nature of any type of sexual relationship between same-sex couples has been handed down through over 2,000 years of Church teaching, leaving the Church with no authority to make changes. This does not stop people of faith from reaching out to those suffering from same-sex attraction. However, such outreach must be in the context of bringing conversion of heart and repentance when sinful behavior is encountered. There are many living with a same-sex attraction that are committed to living a chaste life in accordance with Church teaching. They often need accompaniment on their journey as they are bearing a difficult cross.