LIFE DIGEST: Protests greet Obama speech at Notre Dame

By Tom Strode - Mar 24, 2009 -

Notre Dame University’s announcement President Obama will speak and receive an honorary doctor of laws degree at its May 17 commencement has elicited an outpouring of criticism from pro-life Roman Catholics.

By 11 a.m. (EDT) March 24, more than 60,000 people had signed a website petition describing the invitation as “an outrage and a scandal” and urging school President John Jenkins to rescind the invitation to the President. The announcement of the Obama invitation and honorary degree by American Catholicism’s best known university was made March 20.

Also in this edition: MP Promotes Assisted Suicide and Mom Forces Abortion and States Try to Protect Women and Legal Euthanasia Spreads

Even longtime Notre Dame professors protested in online columns.

The Catholic Church champions the sanctity of human life in its teachings with the support of many of its members, but many other members, including prominent politicians, support abortion rights.

Obama, who is not a Catholic, has enacted, or indicated he would enact, a number of policies undermining the sanctity of life in his barely two months in the White House.

He reversed the Mexico City Policy, which barred federal funds from going to organizations that perform or promote abortions overseas. His administration began the process of apparently withdrawing regulations to protect the conscience rights of health-care workers who oppose abortion and other procedures they find immoral. Obama rescinded a rule that barred federal money from going to stem cell research that destroys human embryos.

Evangelical Christian Hugh Hewitt explained his reading of the significance of Notre Dame’s action on his weblog March 24. A lawyer, radio show host and blogger, Hewitt said:

“In a single gesture, [Notre Dame] has undone much if not all of the work of last fall during which the Roman Catholic hierarchy in America labored mightily to deliver the message that the Church really does mean what it says about protecting the unborn. The public rebukes to Speaker [Nancy Pelosi] and candidate [Joe] Biden about their distortion of Church teaching on abortion underscored the resolve of the Church’s leadership to deliver a message about the centrality of the Church’s position on life to the Church’s mission in the world.”

Notre Dame’s invitation to the President sent “a message to the entire culture that those crazy bishops and Cardinals don’t speak for Catholicism in America,” Hewitt wrote. “The country’s pre-eminent Catholic institution just doesn’t care about abortion or embryonic stem cell research or even late term abortion or the Born Alive Protection Act, at least not enough to stand in the way of a good party and a lot of camera time.

“President Obama will soon have his reply to every objection to his abortion policies that will ever be mounted by any Catholic leader: ‘As I said in my commencement speech at Notre Dame’ will begin every answer he is ever obliged to deliver on the subject, a reminder to every voter on every occasion that no matter what the Church teaches about life, what the Church’s most visible institution in America has done about life is to demonstrate beyond argument that the issue doesn’t really matter to Catholics.”

The online petition is sponsored by the Cardinal Newman Society, which seeks to promote the Catholic identity of the church’s 224 American colleges and universities.

MP Promotes Assisted Suicide

Great Britain will have assisted-suicide clinics if a former Health secretary gets her way.

Patricia Hewitt, Health secretary for two years while Tony Blair was prime minister, is promoting the legalization of physician-assisted suicide. Her first step came March 20, when she offered legislation to bar the prosecution of people who aid family members and friends in traveling to another country to end their lives with assistance.

A member of Parliament since 1997, Hewitt said, “In the long term, we need a bill to change the law to allow terminally ill, mentally competent adults suffering at the end of their lives the choice of an assisted death, within safeguards, in this country.

“In the meantime, I hope that the amendment I have [introduced] will prompt the long overdue parliamentary debate necessary to bring the law on assisted suicide in line with the practice of the director of Public Prosecutions, and the courts,” she said, according to The Times of London.

In recent months, there have been some highly publicized cases of Brits traveling to Switzerland to die with the aid of Dignitas, an assisted-suicide organization.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said he opposes assisted suicide.

A foe of assisted suicide expressed concern Hewitt’s amendment would mark the beginning of “an opening of the floodgates” to abuse and coercion.

“Make no mistake: This amendment is just a precursor to a more general euthanasia law,” said Peter Saunders, director of Care not Killing, in a written statement. “Its advocates have made no secret of their ambitions.”

Mom Forces Abortion

A Miramar, Fla., mother of eight has been accused of forcing her 16-year-old daughter to have an abortion and trashing the baby’s body when he was born alive at home.

Broward County Judge John Hurley was so upset with the allegations he increased Tonuya Rainey’s bond from $14,000 to $185,000 March 20, keeping her in jail, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported.

“I believe that what has allegedly occurred is tantamount to murder,” Hurley said at the hearing, according to the newspaper. “So I’m going to set a bond in that regard and consistent with my feelings.

“I’ve handled murder cases in here,” he said. “I have handled sex cases. I’ve handled everything. This is it, this is the pinnacle. I have never been so disturbed.”

Rainey, 38, is not charged with murder, but she is charged with ending a pregnancy, unsuitable disposal of human remains, unlicensed practice of medicine and child abuse, according to the Sun-Sentinel. All are felonies.

Though her daughter wanted to give birth, Rainey told her she needed to have an abortion because she was too young for a child, the newspaper reported. Rainey crushed some pills into hot tea for her daughter to drink, according to a police search warrant. The daughter gave birth to a boy March 5 at home. She said both his hands and nostrils were moving, according to the warrant, the Sun-Sentinel reported. Rainey denied the boy was born alive.

The accounts of Rainey and her daughter also conflicted concerning disposal of the baby, according to the Sun-Sentinel. Rainey said she put him in a bag and placed it in the garbage, which was picked up by a trash company. Her daughter said Rainey dressed him and placed him in a decorated box, but she didn’t know what her mother did with him after that.

States Try to Protect Women

Some state legislatures are acting to protect women from coercive abortions and to give them more information before they undergo the procedure.

Recent developments in state efforts to inform abortion-minded women include:

  • The Kansas Senate passed March 17 and sent to Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, a Democrat, a bill that would require clinics to post signs saying forced abortions are illegal and would mandate a doctor offer a woman the opportunity to watch a sonogram of her baby before the procedure, The Wichita Eagle reported.
  • The North Dakota House of Representatives has approved by a 83-6 vote and sent to Gov. John Hoeven, a Republican, legislation requiring clinics to put up signs saying coercive abortions are illegal, according to LifeNews.com. In a 77-9 vote, the House passed earlier in the legislative session a bill to require a physician to give a woman the chance to view an ultrasound of her baby before undergoing an abortion, LifeNews reported.
  • The Missouri House voted 115-43 in favor of a measure prohibiting forced abortions, Focus on the Family CitizenLink reported. The legislation, approved March 13, also requires a doctor to offer a woman considering abortion the opportunity to view a sonogram of her child and to inform a woman of the pain her baby may feel during an abortion.

If Sebelius vetoes the bill approved by Kansas legislators, they appear to have enough votes to enact it regardless. Both houses passed the measure with more than the two-thirds majorities required, according to The Eagle.

Sebelius vetoed a bill last year that included the sonogram provision, The Eagle reported. President Obama has nominated her to be secretary of Health and Human Services, but the U.S. Senate has yet to hold a confirmation vote.

Luxembourg has officially become the third European county to legalize euthanasia.

The small country’s law, which went into effect March 17, protects from criminal charges and civil suits doctors who administer drugs to kill patients at their request, according to the news service Agence France-Presse (AFP).

The Netherlands and Belgium also permit euthanasia. Switzerland allows physician-assisted suicide, which involves a doctor prescribing lethal drugs for a patient to use in taking his own life. In assisted suicide, the physician may not administer the drugs.

Last year, Grand Duke Henri refused to sign a bill legalizing euthanasia. As a result, the parliament voted to drop the requirement the grand duke sign legislation before it becomes law, AFP reported.

The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission works to protect the sanctity of human life. If you would like to learn more about this issue, additional resources are available here. If your church is interested in purchasing bulletin inserts or other materials on the sanctity of human life, please visit our online bookstore and erlc.com.

Further Learning

Learn more about: Family, Abuse, Child Abuse, Life, Abortion, End-of-Life Issues, Stem-Cell Research, Suicide, Citizenship, National