CNA Staff, Feb 2, 2021 / 01:00 pm (CNA).- Pro-life campaigners in Poland have unveiled a billboard campaign following a landmark ruling on abortion.
More than 1,000 posters depicting an unborn child inside a heart-shaped womb have gone on display in c… […]
Denver Newsroom, Jan 30, 2021 / 06:14 pm (CNA).- Lawmakers in Iowa this week passed a joint resolution proposing an amendment to the state constitution which would exclude a “right to abortion” or to public funding for abortion. House Joint Resolu… […]
Washington D.C., Jan 30, 2021 / 11:00 am (CNA).- Down syndrome abortions are “eugenics,” the Senate pro-life caucus chair told CNA in an interview this week.
“This is eugenics, and we cannot allow this to continue in our coun… […]
Imagine yourself the op-ed page editor of a newspaper that prides itself on rigorous editorial standards. A column comes in, declaring Donald Trump the greatest president since Lincoln and citing as warrants for that claim […]
Denver Newsroom, Jan 29, 2021 / 12:54 am (CNA).- A proposed South Carolina ban on abortion after an unborn child’s heartbeat can be detected has won approval from the state senate for the first time, drawing praise from the Catholic Diocese of Charlest… […]
Washington D.C., Jan 28, 2021 / 03:45 pm (CNA).- The day before the March for Life, several senators emphasized protecting the human dignity of the unborn.
In remarks on the Senate floor on Thursday, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said that “being pro-life isn’t just the right to be born; it also means the right to live and to thrive,” arguing that policies like an expanded Child Tax Credit would help build a culture of life.
Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.), the founder and chairman of the Senate Pro-life Caucus, spoke in support of the 48th annual March for Life on Friday.
“I believe every human being is created with God-given dignity and potential,” Daines said. “No court, no legislature, no law, can take that away.”
Senators also spoke out against President Joe Biden’s order allowing for funding of pro-abortion groups overseas. Biden repealed the Mexico City Policy, which prohibits taxpayer funding of foreign NGOs that perform or promote abortion.
The policy, originally enacted by President Ronald Reagan in 1984, has been in place during each Republican administration since, and repealed by each Democratic administration since. Critics of the policy sometimes refer to it as the “global gag rule.”
Rubio criticized Biden for prioritizing the repeal of the policy “[b]efore we even before we passed a bill to deal with the pandemic, or bring back good jobs back to the United States.”
Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), author of the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, said in a statement that “These pro-abortion executive orders from President Biden shock the conscience.”
“Our government shouldn’t be funding abortions at home, let alone overseas,” Sasse said. “Unity is important at times like these, but waging a culture war is only going to deepen divides and hurt innocent victims.”
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) also defended the Mexico City Policy in a statement, saying that its elimination “means our tax dollars will now fund groups that perform and lobby for abortion in foreign countries.”
“[Biden] claims his foreign policy is about ‘championing America’s values and human rights,’ but there is nothing more hostile to America’s values and human rights than killing innocent children,” Cotton said.
Daines also praised lawmakers for re-introducing a discrimination abortion ban, legislation that would ban abortion based on a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome.
“It is our duty to protect every innocent life, no matter how small, no matter how many chromosomes they may have,” Daines said.
Meanwhile, others praised Biden’s move to repeal the Mexico City Policy.
Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) said Biden’s repeal was “a win for reproductive freedom.”
<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>This is a win for reproductive freedom – glad to see these promising first steps from <a href=”https://twitter.com/POTUS?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>@POTUS</a>. <a href=”https://t.co/NXjTnTbgic”>https://t.co/NXjTnTbgic</a></p>— Sen. Maggie Hassan (@SenatorHassan) <a href=”https://twitter.com/SenatorHassan/status/1354901668572360705?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>January 28, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>
Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) also praised Biden’s move.
<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>I am thrilled President Biden is rolling back the <a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/GlobalGagRule?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#GlobalGagRule</a>. We've got to stop this vicious cycle where access to life-saving services is repeatedly removed and reinstated. It's time to pass the Global HER Act to PERMANENTLY repeal the global gag rule. <a href=”https://t.co/QqJDqmFgDJ”>https://t.co/QqJDqmFgDJ</a></p>— Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (@gillibrandny) <a href=”https://twitter.com/gillibrandny/status/1354872670022729730?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>January 28, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>
<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>A great step for reproductive rights—President Biden will put an end to the global gag rule, which has jeopardized women’s access to health care around the world.<br><br>It’s time to roll back this cruel Trump-era policy. <a href=”https://t.co/DV8A6do7Pe”>https://t.co/DV8A6do7Pe</a></p>— Senator Mazie Hirono (@maziehirono) <a href=”https://twitter.com/maziehirono/status/1354867910917971972?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>January 28, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>
Editor’s note: The following interview was given by Cardinal Müller to the kath.net and was originally posted on January 25, 2021. It has been translated for CWR from German by Michael J. Miller and reposted […]
Washington D.C., Jan 28, 2021 / 06:50 am (CNA).- Members of Congress announced on Thursday they would be re-introducing a ban on discrimination abortion, or abortion based on a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome.
Rep. Ron Estes (R-Kan.) and S… […]
CNA Staff, Jan 28, 2021 / 03:00 am (CNA).- Poland’s constitutional court published on Wednesday the rationale for its declaration that abortion for fetal abnormalities is unconstitutional three months after it made the ruling.
In the highly anticipated ruling on Oct. 22, the Constitutional Tribunal in Warsaw said that the law introduced in 1993 was incompatible with Poland’s constitution.
But the law did not come into effect until the ruling was published in the country’s Journal of Laws on Jan. 27.
The 154-page ruling said: “In the opinion of the Tribunal, an unborn child is, as a human being — a person who enjoys innate and inalienable dignity, a subject who has the right to life; and the legal system must, according to Article 38 of the Constitution, must guarantee due protection for this central good, without which this subjectivity would be deleted.”
The court’s verdict prompted a wave of demonstrations across Poland. Protesters directed their anger at the ruling Law and Justice party (PiS), but also at the Catholic Church, which welcomed the decision.
Demonstrators disrupted Masses while holding signs supporting abortion, left graffiti on Church property, vandalized statues of St. John Paul II, and chanted slogans at clergy.
The ruling, which cannot be appealed, could lead to a significant reduction in the number of abortions in the country.
Until now, Polish law permitted abortion only in cases of rape or incest, a risk to the mother’s life, or fetal abnormality.
Approximately 1,000 legal abortions take place in Poland each year. The majority are carried out in cases where the unborn child has a severe and irreversible disability or a life-threatening incurable disease.
Polish pro-life campaigners describe the legal provision as “eugenic.” Data from the Ministry of Health shows that in 2019, the likelihood of Down syndrome accounted for 40% of abortions.
Jerzy Kwasniewski, president of the Ordo Iuris Institute, said: “The justification of the judgment strongly emphasizes that, if the mother’s life and health are not endangered, the legal protection of the child’s life is complete. This is a step forward, firmly removing purely eugenic abortion from Polish law.”
Bartłomiej Wróblewski, a Law and Justice MP who was among those who asked the tribunal to review the law, wrote on Twitter: “Selecting people based on illness and disability is unconstitutional. I am glad that the justification for the court’s judgment in this case has been published.”
The constitutional court was asked to examine the law in 2019 by a group of 119 MPs belonging to the Law and Justice party, as well the smaller parties Konfederacja and PSL-Kukiz’15.
Oct. 22 — the day the court made the ruling — is the feast day of the Polish pope St. John Paul II, who led the Church from 1978 to 2005 and galvanized the pro-life movement in Poland and around the world.
CNA Staff, Jan 28, 2021 / 12:42 am (CNA).- The bishops of Virginia lamented the House of Delegates’ “tragic decision” to pass legislation that would permit abortion coverage for any reason in taxpayer health insurance plans on the state’s taxpayer-fund… […]
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