You don't speak for me - Women's issues?

Who gave the Pro-Abortion side the right to speak for me?  I never did.  Why is abortion the ONLY thing they consider a woman's right?  It isnt a right I want, and by the way a right is not something you just want.  I want universal access to education for all people, not the right to end lives because they are inconvenient.  I want an end to hunger and homelessness for all people.  I want everyone to have the right to freely elect their leaders.  These are women's rights because they are human rights.  Only when all people have have the same rights will we have a free world.  No one has the right to end another life, ever, period.  If we lived 100 years ago we might have needed to execute murders to keep others safe but that is no longer the case.  Life is the ultimate right.  Don't tell me what to think and you have no right to speak for me.  I am a woman, and I can speak for myself.

Women should have the right to not fear being raped and to be made to suffer for unwanted pregnancies here and around the world.  We need to work for the day when no where in the world would a woman fear to say she had been raped for fear of being killed herself.  We need to work for a day when rape is not used as a weapon of war.  It needs to be unthinkable to violate any person.

In the past and still in parts of the world a woman pregnant outside of wedlock was doomed.  She couldn't marry or work so how could she support herself and her baby?  That should never happen.  We all make mistakes and things happen that we don't intend.  We shouldnt hold that against anyone. We should instead help them.  If we had done that from the beginning abortion would never have been thought of.  In a way abortion is our fault.

All human rights start from the most basic right, the right to life.  If we don't uphold that right then all the others can be taken away.  And all rights come from God not our governments.  If your rights come from your governement again they can be taken away when the government changes and when popular opinion changes.  Popular opinion can not change our rights.

What ProLife is and isn't

Over the last week I saw three interesting And disturbing posts on my Facebook page that for me crystallized what it is to be ProLife.  The first one pictures from Syria of a group of small children all about 5 years old or less who were victims of the blood shed there.  All were dead.  The next one was the picture of a beautiful and smiling young girl, a toddler, who has Downs Syndrome.  The last one was a meme that asked, "if the infant in the womb was gay would you still fight for its rights"?

For me the first picture was a reminder.  In all wars there are innocent victims who need to be protected at all costs.  Children have been killed during drone strikes, have I said enough about this?  Have I emailed my or called my Congressmen about this enough?  No I haven't.  I think that pictures like this though very disturbing, need to be seen.  We need to know so we can react properly.  Being ProLife means standing up for these lives.  I know these deaths happened in Syria, what am I going to do?  What can I do?  First, I can pray.  Second, I can call my congressman.  Third, I can use social media to bring attention to the issue.

The second picture of the little girl with Downs Syndrome was so beautiful.  Her smile made me smile.  There were people who objected to seeing the child's picture.  They didn't think the parents should post pictures of their child, like everyone else does, because of her condition.  They even questioned the parents love for their child.  They seemed to say we don't think you should be proud of your child.  Most people currently have the tests done to check for Downs Syndrome and abort the children if they have it.  We don't want these imperfect children.  The funny thing I'd that most of the people who responded who had downs syndrome children called them a blessing or angels.  ProLife means accepting ehat the world calls imperfect children and people.  We know that she is made in the image and likeness of God so she is perfect.

The third post made the most upset.  The meme that asked if we knew that the child in the womb was gay would we protect it's right to life?  Wholeheartedly yes.  The funny thing is that if there were a test for homosexuality how many of those infants would be aborted by so called progressives?  My guess is a lot.  In the quest for the perfect child many babies are aborted because they aren't "normal".    As Christians we are called to love everyone because they were made by God, even our enemies.  Gay people aren't our enemies and we have to love them so we could never abort them.

It's funny how the Pro abortion side tries to portray us as hypocrites.  In part because there are some hypocrites in the PrLife movement but we just need to educate both the pro abortion side and the hypocrites that ProLife comes from God and is based in Love for all of Gods creation.

Being ProLife means having Agape Love

I have to start with two definitions.  Agape, divine, self sacrificing love for God and mankind and ProLife, supporting the culture of life.  What does that mean to me?  Those two words are the foundation of faith.  Agape love is the kind of love God has for us and is the kind of love we should have for God and one another.  To have Agape love means to sacrifice both for God and our fellow man.  This kind of love isn't a warm fuzzy feeling but a decision to place others needs higher than ourselves.  Because of this I fail at it all the time.  We are fallen and so Agape is very hard for us.  Jesus came and shows us the ultimate in Agape love.

To be ProLife is to strive for Agape love.  To sacrifice for the good of the other.  To do so we can't kill one another, for any reason.  We have to work for the salvation of all, especially our enemies and those who might want to kill us.  You can not be ProLife and blow up abortion clinics.  To love with Agape love means to inconvenience yourself in your giving to help others.  Which is more important, the higher tier of cable service or feeding the poor and providing medical care to everyone?  Doesn't it also mean giving your time.  It an be as simple as giving your time to talk to a neighbor who is lonely.  Sometimes I think that we find it easier to write a check but God wants us to put ourselves out.  He died for us on the Cross we can give up a weekend to help run a food pantry or build a house.

Most infatically to love God and to be ProLife does not mean killing in the name of God.  It doesn't even mean being mean in the name of God.  Hurting grieving families with signs full of hate speech is not what God calls us to do.  It does mean remonstrating those who are going wrong and pointing out what they need to do, but that has to be done with love, not anger.

The problem with our society is we have forgotten love and given up ProLife for what is easy and feels goos at the moment.  If we don't respect all life, how can we expect others to respect our lives and the lives of our families?  Until we all, become more lovingly ProLife we will continue to suffer from violence.

Life is the most precious gift - a ramble caused by grief.

How precious is life?  If it were not the most precious thing then the Redeemer's sacrifice would not have been so important.  This is why destroying life is so wrong, no matter how you destroy it.  The funny thing is that this is the same reason why being a martyr is such a great thing.  We can give our life away as a great gift but we can't destroy it as if it means nothing.

It is so hard then when someone we love dies.  It is their life that is gone and not them.  They still are and we hope to see them again when we die.  We will see them forever and they won't be in pain, but still death causes grief.  Why is that?  Is it the loss of what they could have become if they were still alive?  Is it only their company we miss?  Is it really just that we miss them?  If no one misses someone who dies is their life somehow less precious?  I don't know other than to say life is so precious that everyone's life is precious.  

With life we have the hope of repentance.  I often think this is why the death penalty is so wrong.  I often wonder why atheists don't value life more than those who have a hope of the afterlife.  If you believe that this all there is shouldn't life have the highest value?  This maybe why we grieve when someone dies to some extent.  We know that they are either destined for heaven or hell at that point.  When a great saint dies we often feel that they have gone to their reward and that helps us in our grief.  

Life is so precious in fact that even the partial death of causing pain and suffering is wrong.  Driving someone to despair is like causing a partial death, and not helping someone in need is like not helping someone who is hurt.  ProLife has to mean more than being antiabortion or it is not ProLife.  If ProLife means shaming pregnant women or blowing up doctors are we any better than those who kill innocent children?  We might actually be worse because we should know better.  ProLife means a life of love.  Love all,even or especially our enemies.  I heard it once said that an enemy is simply someone you need to pray for.  

The Big Lie - Who is really fighting a war on Women?

The lie is that the Pro Abortion side is really on the side of women, they know what is best for us, how women should live.  Even if we don't want to.  They tells that we shouldn't rely on our families and other relationships for fulfillment.  Work is where we are to find our happiness.  We don't need children and love to be happy.  We can put off having children as long as we want and then, if we must, we can have a child later when we have our careers.  We don't even need to marry to have those children either, better in fact to be single moms.  This is bullshit.  Sorry to be blunt but I often wonder if any of the people who made this up are women.  After years of delaying my life to get my career going I now see that unless I someday become Jane Goodall or Jane Austin the meaning in my life comes from the impact I have on those around me, my family and friends.  I don't have children, and I regret that, I will always regret that.  I will however never regret that I didn't spend more time at work pushing papers and doing something that could be done by almost anyone else.  Talking, teaching,a nd being with young people is much more important to me.  Having an impact on their lives building them up is more important to me.  And why can't the world change and allow women to both have children and advance in their careers?  Why can't the world change to make being a family easier?  Do we have to buy into the idea that we all have to now fit in the old mold of working men?  Even men for that matter?  I challenge the young people of this world to not accept that we have to live to work.  We need to work to live.  When life is the focus of our lives we know that personal relationships, love, marriage, family, and community is way more important than money.  Success shouldn't be measured by how much money you have but how many relationships.  We are told that casual sex is what we should want and that if a child is conceived we can dispose of it without any consequences.  To do this people have to become objects to us that are there only for our pleasure.  A bit of our humanity has to die.  Then we are told that children are our right and we can do whatever we want to bring them about.  The child then becomes our possession and not a free gift of God.  Once we have that child, God forbid we want to spend time with them, unless it's to push them to become what we want.  A happy well adjusted child is sacrificed for a successful child who goes to the right school and gets right job.  Life is meant to be lived and enjoyed, we were made by God to love and be loved.  All else is illusion and fleeting.

Reflections on the Feast of the Holy Innocents - allowing the deaths of Children for political reasons.

This morning as we did Morning Prayer on the Feast of the Holy Innocents it came to me that the deaths of holy innocents is still happening.  We make political decisions every day in our world that cause the deaths of children.  We are all upset over the deaths in Newtown CT, they were definately innocents, but do we get upset over the children who have died in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Gaza etc? Are the children who die as "collateral damage" any less innocent?  If they are innocent what does that mean to us?  Can we really just say that is the cost of war?

If we are Pro-Life I think we have to be totally Pro-Life, cradle to grave, and not just the people we like and understand.  Children killed in poorly constructed schools in China, children killed in Chernobyl, children who die anywhere because it is politically expedient are all part of the continuation of Herod's murderous act.  We are horrified that he tried to kill our Savior by ordering the killing of all the children under the age of 2, and rightly so, but did we cry over the death of 8 children in Syria killed in a tank attack 2 days ago?

I think at times we refuse to let reports of the deaths of children to sink in because if we let all the reports in we would do nothing but cry.  But because we ignore these deaths to protect ourselves we don't take action.  It's easier to concentrate on the anti-abortion stance because we aren't taking part even in a small in the deaths so it's safe for us to think about.  If we think about the deaths of children as part of drone attacks, we have to recognize that we ourselves are in some small way Herod.

Herod killed those children to protect his regime.  Probably in his mind what he did, he did for the good of his country.  How often do we discount the welfare of children to save money on taxes, or to avoid government regulation, to our rights?  When we don't speak up for, protect, or decry the death of children we are in someway responsible for their deaths.

ProLife vs Anti-Abortion, or what ProLife means to me

For me being Pro-Life is so much more than being against abortion.  Pro-life to me means being for all human life and for that life to worth living.  It means protecting life by protecting people from abuse and bullying.  It means allowing people to have meaning fulfilling work that pays them a living wage.  If they have emigrate to find that work, legally or illegally then so be it.

What good is it to save babies but allow people to die because they can't afford the medical treatment they need.  It happens today in our country.  I knew a lady who had broken both legs and they didn't heal.  She couldn't work so she lost her minimum wage job and her insurance.  When I met her she was cleaning apartments using a stool to get around.  Her legs weren't life threatening so she didn't qualify for emergency treatment.  She suffered for months before she got help for charities.

I believe that mt faith needs to color every aspect of my life.  For me believing life means being anti-abortion, but also being pro-mother.  If we took better care of one another there would be less abortion, less suicide, and less murder.

I challenge anyone who reads this to examine their lives (including me) to see if there are places in there lives where they are supporting the culture of death.  If you knew your favorite brand of something was produced in a sweatshop, would you stop buying it?  Would you pay more for one where workers are treated humanely?  Is there someone at work that you talk about behind their back?  If you knew how much it hurt them would you stop?  I am far from reaching the lofty goal of being prolife through and through, buti want to try.

I've got work to do

I've got work to do on myself. I need to make sure that the Pro-Life movement doesn't get a black eye because of me. I need to make sure that no one thinks of me when they think of Catholics as not the "Good Guys". Sometimes we think that we are on the right side so everything we do is okay, but really being on the right side means we have to be even better. We have to convince everyone else that we aren't doing this to spoil their fun or to punish anyone for sinning. We have to recognize and admit our own sinfulness and our own past mistakes. We need to correct those in the Prolife movement who are elitist, racist, judgemental, uncharitable, or just plain mean. Above all we have to do all we do with love, true love where we wish all others to be with us in heaven. We have to be strong and we have to live our faith in our everyday lives. I have a lot to do and I will start with prayer.

January is Right to Life Month

I was so disappointed to hear someone today say that Right to Life wants to hurt women and take away their rights. I guess conversely then the other side would be helping women? How can they help women by refusing to give them information and denying that women might regret the abortions they had? Do they think it is more helpful to a woman to lead her to believe that her only option is to kill her baby? Would it be more helpful to a woman to give her the help she needs to bring her baby to term and to change society so that she is congratulated for the self sacrifice of bringing an unwanted pregnancy to term and giving the child up if that is her wish? We should support these women financially. If we are going to have government supported healthcare, it should pay the birthing costs for all women. Conservatives, put your money where your mouth is. If you want a woman to not abort her child, help her do it. Liberals, help the poor and disadvantaged by giving them an equal chance at life. Stop the genocide in America. Just because the bodies don't line the streets doesn't mean we aren't preferencially killing minority infants in the womb.

Crisis Pregnancy Clinics

Today I got an email from a group that I often get emails from to sign petitions to save wolves in Yellowstone or some other enviromental call to action. Today I got an email from them to sign a petition to limit funding for Crisis Pregnancy Clinics. Their claim was that these clinics were fooling women into coming in when they really wanted an abortion. So What! Too Bad! If a woman really wanted an abortion she could leave and got to the nearest abortion mill and get one, no one is holding her captive. All they want to do is make sure that she knows the alternatives and allow her to make a truely informed decision. How will letting a woman know the stage of developement of her child limit her ability to procure an abortion? If she still wants an abortion after she has all the facts she can still leave the Crisis Pregnancy Clinic and get an abortion. After a woman has an abortion, all the information in the world will not bring back her child. Imagine if you were a woman with an unwanted pregnancy and you thought you couldn't afford the healthcare costs to bring the child to term and then either keep it or give it up for adoption? Imagine if you stepped into an abortion clinic, would they tell you your options? Or would they take your money, tell you, you were doing the right thing and murder your child? Imagine then if you stepped into a Crisis Pregnancy Clinic. There they would help you to know your options and to help you get the assistance you needed to keep your child. Even then it is still the woman's decision what to do. Which place would you like to go to? Where would you like your daughter to go to?

I really wonder about enviromentalists who push the abortion cause. Do they hate people that much? Do they so want to save the enviroment that they want to destroy humanity. Or do they think that the people who find themselves in an unwanted pregnancy aren't good enough to reproduce? Liberal elitism at it's worst.

Another Day a new blog.

I realize that the person who needs to do more to support life is me. I'm the one who needs to do more to support candidates who I agree with. I'm the one who needs to talk more to people about life. I need to challenge those who say they hate abortion but still want to keep it legal for others. It's rediculous, if you think abortion is wrong then you can't support it. And I feel as strongly that you can't say abortion is wrong and allow other types of murder. Either all life is sacred or none is. None of us are pure and we can't say we are better than someone else, we don't know their hearts, only God does. God thirsts for their souls, even the souls of murderers. If a murderer fails to convert it is our own fault as well as theirs, especially if we kill them instead of keeping them in prison.

There are many souls in this world that are in darkness. I believe these souls are waiting for us to call them out of that darkness. If we never reach out to them and they never see the light aren't we also at fault? Some souls need intercessory prayer to prepare them the light. I need to pray more.