in Pennsylvania's First Congressional District
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania's_1st_congressional_district http://archphila.org/pastplan/MAPS/Arch.pdf
and the Central Garden State

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Fw: WEEKLY RESPECT LIFE UPDATE

The weekly Respect Life Update from St. Ann's parish in neighboring Lawrenceville, New Jersey is being forwarded. It would be understandable for Catholics in Pennsylvania's 8th congressional district to be envious of our brothers and sisters in Mercer County, New Jersey:

Subject: WEEKLY RESPECT LIFE UPDATE
To: "St. Ann Friends of Life"
Date: Tuesday, August 31, 2010, 1:17 AM


We'll do another abbreviated update this week - just a "Hero of the Week," an "Anti-Hero of the Week," and the usual news on prayer witnesses, which will be held this holiday weekend. Note especially the witness at Princeton Women's Center is being expanded to four hours, from 7:30 to 11:30, which we hope will give more people a chance to stop by.

HERO OF THE WEEK

Our hero of the week is the Most Reverend Charles Chaput, Archbishop of Denver and staunch pro-life supporter. Here are a few excerpts from his address at the 15th symposium for the Canon Law Association of Slovakia this past Tuesday, as reported by LifeNews.com:

"If human rights do not come from God, then they devolve to the arbitrary conventions of men and women. The state exists to defend the rights of man and to promote his flourishing. The state can never be the source of those rights. When the state arrogates to itself that power, even a democracy can become totalitarian."

"My point in mentioning abortion is this: Its widespread acceptance in the West shows us that without a grounding in God or a higher truth, our democratic institutions can very easily become weapons against our own human dignity."

"In the United States, a nation that is still 80 percent Christian with a high degree of religious practice, government agencies now increasingly seek to dictate how Church ministries should operate, and to force them into practices that would destroy their Catholic identity. Efforts have been made to discourage or criminalize the expression of certain Catholic beliefs as 'hate speech.' Our courts and legislatures now routinely take actions that undermine marriage and family life, and seek to scrub our public life of Christian symbolism and signs of influence."

"Living within the truth means living according to Jesus Christ and God’s Word in Sacred Scripture. It means proclaiming the truth of the Christian Gospel, not only by our words but by our example. It means living every day and every moment from the unshakeable conviction that God lives, and that His love is the motive force of human history and the engine of every authentic human life. It means believing that the truths of the Creed are worth suffering and dying for."

"Living within the truth also means telling the truth and calling things by their right names. And that means exposing the lies by which some try to force others to live."

"Two of the biggest lies in the world today are these: first, that Christianity was of relatively minor importance in the development of the West; and second, that Western values and institutions can be sustained without a grounding in Christian moral principles."

AND THE ANTI-HERO OF THE WEEK................

Also courtesy of LifeNews.com, we learn that true to the typical values of the entertainment industry, eg., glorifying those actors and films that promote anti-life values, Al Pacino won an Emmy Award for his portrayal of Jack Kevorkian in the HBO film, You Don't Know Jack. During his acceptance speech, Pacino praised Kevorkian, a retired pathologist credited with killing more than 100 people in assisted suicides before the state of Michigan made the practice illegal.

Pacino called Kevorkian "brilliant and interesting and unique" and the euthanasia advocate received a round of applause from the audience after he stood up to accept Pacino's recognition. "It's really an honor to have had the pleasure to try to portray someone as brilliant and interesting and unique as Dr. Jack Kevorkian and the fun I had just trying to get inside his head, which, of course, I could never," Pacino said. Full story at LifeNews.com . Keep in mind the incredible influence Pacino & Company wield in our culture.

PRAYER WITNESSES

The Saturday witnesses at Princeton Women's Center and Planned Parenthood will be held as usual this weekend, and we assume the witness at Princeton Medical Center will be also.

The other big news is we are expanding the Princeton Women's Center to four hours, effective this Saturday and every Saturday, from 7:30 am to 11:30 am. That should be a help to those for whom Saturday is the one day they can sleep a little later. We are hoping also it may encourage parents to stop by with their children on the way to or from whatever is going on. The greatest gift you can give your kids is to pray with them!
Princeton Women's Center, Emmons Drive, West Windsor, 7:30 to 11:30, this Saturday morning and every Saturday morning. Park in back of the Palmer Inn on Route 1 South just past the Market Fair mall and we're right across the street. Come for as long or as little as you can.

Planned Parenthood facility at Clinton and State in Trenton at 9:45 this Saturday morning and every Saturday morning for the Rosary. That's all - one Rosary and we leave. You can park right across the street or in a state parking lot next door that is not used on weekends. On every Thursday morning from 8:30 to 9:30 the Rosary is recited at the rear of the facility. And there is also a prayer witness here next Tuesday morning and on the first Tuesday morning of each month from 10:00 to 11:00, when the Rosary is recited in front of the facility.

Medical Center at Princeton, Witherspoon Street, this Saturday morning and the first Saturday morning of each month from 9:30 to 11:00.



RESPECT LIFE MINISTRY, THE CHURCH OF ST. ANN

Saint Katherine Drexel - Defend Her Heritage!

Pennsylvania's 8th congressional district has the rare privilege of having been home to a canonized saint! Saint Katherine Drexel remains incredibly close to us. Her canonization came after her interecession led to restored hearing for two children from our congressional district!

In her time, Saint Katherine Drexel boldly confronted disrespect for the sanctity of human life. Tragically, pro-abortion public figures have been getting honored at the Catholic university which Saint Katherine founded. Please ask your parishioners to contact Xavier University, with regard to this matter. At http://faithfulinthe8th.blogspot.com/, they will find a link to automatically generate an email to Dr. Norman Francis, Xavier's president.

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Joe Sestak - Choice of Pro Abortion Lobby AND CATHOLICS???

NARAL, the National Abortion & Reproductive Rights Action League," gives 100% ratings to both Patrick Murphy & Joe Sestak. Yet according to a Franklin & Marshall poll, pro abortion Joe Sestak has opened a 7 percentage point lead over pro life Pat Toomey - AMONG CATHOLICS!!!
Monsignors and Fathers, are Pennsylvania Catholics aware of the seriousness of this issue?

Irena Sendler, "Angel of the Warsaw Ghetto," Catholic Social Teaching Champion, "Female Schindler," Nobel Prize Nominee, "Righteous Among the Nations"

As per a 2008 obituary by Jill Stanek,

  • "Irena Sendler - a Polish social worker who helped save some 2,500 Jewish children from the Nazis by smuggling them out of the Warsaw Ghetto and giving them false identities - has died....Sendler served as a social worker with the city's welfare department, masterminding the risky rescue operations of Jewish children from the Warsaw Ghetto during Nazi Germany's brutal World War II occupation....Under the pretext of inspecting the ghetto's sanitary conditions during a typhoid outbreak, Sendler and her assistants went inside in search of children who could be smuggled out and given a chance of survival by living as Catholics. Babies and small children were smuggled out in ambulances and in trams, sometimes wrapped up as packages. Teenagers escaped by joining teams of workers forced to labor outside the ghetto. They were placed in families, orphanages, hospitals or convents....In 1965, Sendler became one of the first so-called Righteous Gentiles honored by the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem for wartime heroics."

We are certainly not the first Catholics to be challenged with an absolute assault on young human lives. Will Catholics of Pennsylvania's 8th Congressional District stand up for human life and refuse to elect those who advocate abortion & embryonic stem cell research? How will our grandchildren and great grandchildren remember us?

Irene Sendler's story is really just beginning to be told....


Sunday, August 22, 2010

"Tough Love", the Catechism, Canon Law, & the 8th Congressional District

Today's second reading was a powerful reminder of how Jesus Christ's Church has long understood the notion of "tough love":

  • “what 'son' is there whom his father does not discipline?....all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain, yet later it brings the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who are trained by it."
Any responsible parent knows that discipline is the toughest part of the job! Yet, we discipline those in our care, because we want what's best for them!


The Catechism of the Catholic Church is absolutely clear with regard to its teaching on abortion:

  • "2270 Human life must be respected & protected absolutely from the moment of conception....
  • "2271 Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable....
  • "2272 Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life....The Church does not thereby intend to restrict the scope of mercy. Rather, she makes clear the gravity of the crime committed, the irreparable harm done to the innocent who is put to death, as well as to the parents and the whole of society."

This seems to be a notion that's especially difficult for the world to understand! The Church uses excommunication to remind those whom she loves of the seriousness of their sin!


Canon 915 of the Code of Canon Law tells us that: "Those who have been excommunicated or interdicted after the imposition or declaration of the penalty and others obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to holy communion." In 2004's Worthiness to Receive Holy Communion, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger made clear how this would apply to Catholic politicians. Judie Brown is a member of the Pontifical Academy for Life & the founder of the American Life League. According to the American Life League's Canon 915 Project, it is unclear as to whether Canon 915 is being followed in our Archdiocese:

Do we love Patrick Murphy (as well as Joe Sestak & others) enough to remind him of the serious error in which he has placed himself?

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

"Manhattan Declaration: God is raising you up!"

Please see today's update from the Manhattan Declaration....



Monday, August 16, 2010

Fw: "Casey & Specter Do Not Represent the Pro-Life Community"

As per today's edition of the Pennsylvania Pro-Life Online News, "The confirmation of the Obama Administration’s most recent nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court, Elena Kagan, has demonstrated yet again how Pennsylvania’s two U.S. Senators, Senators Bob Casey and Arlen Specter, do not represent the pro-life community. Both voted for Ms. Kagan despite her significant role in helping President Clinton defend his veto of the partial-birth abortion ban....In clear contrast to both Sen. Casey’s and Sen. Specter’s votes, Pat Toomey, the pro-life candidate facing pro-abortion Congressman Joe Sestak for the U.S. Senate this November, has unequivocally stated why he would have voted against Elena Kagan."

Considering who his dad was, Bobby Casey's betrayal is all the more painful. Won't someone please remind him of Matthew 16:26?

Sunday, August 15, 2010

more on the "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act."

This November, Catholics & all people of good will in the 8th congressional district will be able to select an authentically pro life representative for the U.S. Congress. For the time being, however, we are stuck with Patrick Murphy....

The Population Research Institute was founded by Father Paul Marx. As per the Population Research Institute's August 4th mailing, "we must mobilize many tens of thousands of other pro-lifers to...contact their Representatives in Washington, demanding support of Congressman Chris Smith's 'No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act.'"

Please, please remind your parishioners to demand that Murphy support the "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act." He can be reached at PA08MurphyPatrick@mail.house.gov and/or (215) 826-1963.

Friday, August 13, 2010

Pennsylvania for Marriage

Updates from Pennsylvania for Marriage are available at www.pa4marriage.org.

A Pennsylvania Marriage Protection Amendment has received endorsement from all eight Catholic dioceses in Pennsylvania as well as the Ukranian Catholic Eparchy, the Pennsylvania Catholic Conference, the Pennsylvania Councils of Catholic Women, the Pennsylvania Knights of Columbus, and the Philadelphia Chapter of Legatus. Yet, it has never received support from Senator "Chuck" McIlhinney or Senator "Tommy" Tomlinson (Say, isn't McIlhinney a member of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel parish in Doylestown?).

With regard to the other state senators in Bucks County, Bob Mensch previously co-sponsored a Marriage Protection Amendment and Stewart Greenleaf previously supported it. Hopefully, we will be able to rely on their continued support.


Though McIlhinney & Tomlinson are both up for re-eelection, neither of them are being challenged by pro-marriage opponents (One opponent is a graduate of Bishop Egan!). Catholics (& all people of good will) in these districts need to be aware of this information. Shouldn't they start looking for write-in possibilities who will truly support the sanctity of life and marriage/family?

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

"No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act"

Dear Fathers & Monsignors,

Please see the below message on the "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act"....



-----Original Message-----
From: "Brian Burch - CatholicVoteAction.org"
Sent: August 10, 2010 12:26:49 PM GMT
To:
Subject: It's your money

Dear CatholicVote Friend,

Think about this...

Every time our federal government spends OUR money on healthcare, the powerful pro-abortion lobby sings the same tune --
* Medical aid to help poor people in foreign countries? Fund Abortion!
* Hospitals to serve our troops on military bases? Fund Abortion!
* Healthcare for federal employees? Fund Abortion!
* Medical care for prison inmates? Fund Abortion!

The howls from the abortion lobby are relentless. We know they don't care about the real needs of people, especially mothers. They are focused on two things only: more abortions, and more
money.

Our money.

And now they want to use the new federal healthcare law to fund abortions. Last month pro-life activists halted their plans - for now. Each of these healthcare programs require separate
legislative action to keep abortion funding at bay.

That's why Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) and Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-IL) have called for a government-wide ban on virtually all taxpayer funding of abortions.

Their no-nonsense "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act" already has 162 co-sponsors. The bill needs just another 55 votes to pass the House. While the bill faces enormous obstacles this year, we must bring this debate to the American people, who overwhelmingly agree that taxpayer funds should not pay for abortions.

So here's what you can do:
* Sign our petition to the Catholic Health Association telling them to support legislation that would prohibit the new healthcare law from funding abortion. The CHA played a critical
supportive role in passing the pro-abortion healthcare bill. They could help repair their damage to the Church by supporting a new bill that would prevent this law from funding abortion. Sign at: http://www.paramountcommunication.com/Catholic_Vote/petition.php

* Find out if your Representative is a co-sponsor of this legislation here: http://catholicvoteaction.org/blog/cva/index.php?p=1928. If they are not on this list, call your representative at 202-224-3121 202-224-3121 and demand that they support this legislation. Even if your Representative favors legal abortion, they can still be called upon to support the principle that taxpayer (your) money should not be used to fund abortion. Tell them to support H.R. 5939.
* Attend townhall meetings and campaign debates this election season. Write letters to your local newspapers. Write on the Facebook wall of candidates. Put them on the record: "Do you
think taxpayers should pay for abortions? Or will you support the H.R. 5939 -- No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act that would ensure taxpayer dollars not pay for abortions?"

It is a tragedy that our nation fails to protect unborn children in law. But it's doubly outrageous that politicians would dare to force taxpayers to pay for this!

We have our work cut out for us, but we will never give up.

Make sure your elected officials hear from you this summer and fall.

Sincerely,


Brian Burch
President
CatholicVoteAction.org


P.S. Forward this message to your friends, too. Every voice counts. The Catholic vote will not remain silent on this issue.

Saturday, August 7, 2010

For a Civilization of Love (The Conclusion of the Vatican's Social Compendium)

A flyer concerning "For a Civilization of Love" is also available:


home page links

The 10 Commandments

The Beatitudes (from "Jesus of Nazareth")