A Colleague and a Friend Passes Away
Michael Schwartz, a good friend and a colleague to me and to the National Pro-LIfe Center passed away over the week-end after a difficult battle with Lou Gehrig’s disease.
Mike was the chief of staff to Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma. He was a devout Catholic. In spite of the strident opposition he often faced, Mike continually fought for the sanctity and dignity of all human life, from conception to natural death. Mike was politically engaged and loved conversations about the role of the Church in society. As many of his good friends have stated, “He was a friend of the high and mighty and the lowly and powerless alike. He was a loving husband, father, and grandfather.”
All of us at the National Pro-Life Center will miss him, but find solace in the hope that he will be forever with the Lord, and we will see him again.
Last year on the Senate floor, Senator Coburn delivered this tribute to Mike: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nH8_0Hmwrc
National Memorial for the Pre-Born At the DAR Constitution Hall
Friday was the 19th Annual National Memorial for the Pre-born and their Mothers and Fathers, and it took place just before the annual March for Life. The Memorial is a solemn remembrance of all those lost to abortion and the injury done to their parents—as well as a joyous celebration of God’s good gift of Life! Some 60 clergy from almost as many denominations led and hundreds of dedicated pro-lifers participated. We were close to the White House, we literally shouted out a respectful message to the President!
Please continue to pray with Fr. Paul Schenck, his twin brother, Rev. Rob Schenck, Rev. Pat Mahoney, Fr. Frank Pavone and many others for an end to the 40 years of wilderness wandering under Roe v. Wade—and the hope of God’s leading us into the promised land of Life! Pray also that the hundreds gathered with us served as a prophetic pro-life Christian witness to all of our top-level government officials, including President Obama—at his home across the street!
Following the National Memorial Service was the Annual March for Life where hundreds of thousands of people, mostly under 20, will trek from the Mall down Constitution Avenue all the way to the Supreme Court. Pray that this march to proclaim the sanctity and dignity of all human life served as a powerful prophetic witness not only to our national leaders but to all of America.
Founder of Dominos Pizza Wins Order Against HHS Mandate
The founder of Dominos Pizza won his bid for an emergency order to prevent enforcement of the mandate while the lawsuit it filed against the Obama administration over the HHS mandate that forces religious employers to purchase drugs that may cause abortions for their employees continues.
Tom Monaghan calls requiring businesses, schools and other religious places to pay for such drugs a “gravely immoral” practice and filed suit earlier this month in federal court for Domino’s Farms, a business development complex he owns.
To read more, click here…..
This article first appeared in LifeNews.com.
The Right to Life Is Non-Partisan
Father Paul Schenck and his twin, Rev. Rob Schenck of Faith and Action, defend the fundamental human right to life. In this photo, they are outside the U.S. Supreme Court with Rev. Myke Crowder and other members of the National Clergy Council.
By Father Paul C.B. Schenck
Founding Director and Chair
The National Pro-Life Center
September 17, 2012 – My brother, Rev. Rob Schenck, president of Faith and Action, chairman of the Committee on Church and Society for the Evangelical Church Alliance and a pro-life activist, was at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina – not to protest, but to speak. He addressed a gathering of Democrats for Life, a group incorporated within that party to oppose the abortion plank in the Democratic Party’s platform and to promote policies that support a woman’s choice for life. My brother was also at the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Florida and joined pro-life members of that party.
The cause for human life – and the opposition to anti-life policies – is non-partisan. The effort to support public policies that defend and protect human life actually transcends electoral politics. Outlawing abortions, funding services that support the decision not to abort, expanding access to health care, outlawing embryonic stem cell research and funding adult stem cell research, outlawing euthanasia and funding health care for the elderly, eliminating the death penalty and resisting unjust war doesn’t fit into the convenient boxes created by campaigns and candidates.
The sanctity of human life and the dignity of the person do not belong to one religion, theology community or way of life either. My brother is an Evangelical. All Christian denominations have strong pro-life movements, which is evidenced by the National Clergy Council in Washington, D.C., made up of representatives of the Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist, Pentecostal, Orthodox, Congregational, Lutheran – and Catholic – churches. There are also Jewish, Muslim and Buddhist pro-life movements.
My friend Nat Hentoff (pictured right), a founding editor of the Village Voice newspaper in New York City, who is a syndicated columnist for the Washington Post, a prolific commentator on the Constitution and a jazz music critic, is a left-wing atheist and thoroughly pro-life.
The defense of human life is an eminently human position. It belongs to everyone, every individual, family, community and political party whether or not it is acknowledged, honored, ignored or contravened. The protection of innocent life is an essential foundation of society. The abandonment of the innocent, the weak or the vulnerable is as intolerable on the Left as the Right, to members of any religious community and to skeptics as well.
We will diminish the prospects of success in reclaiming the sanctity of human life in our society if we claim it to be the exclusive possession of one political party, a particular religion or community. Life, by its very nature, belongs to everyone, no matter the religion, their politics or their lifestyle. We all enjoy the greatest of all gifts – the gift of human life – and we must promote it as human before all else.
We Applaud the Republican Platform: No ‘Abortion Rights,’ Only a Right to Life
Preface: The National Pro-Life Center is a non-partisan, missionary apostolate. We are not lobbyists, nor litigators. We are evangelists proclaiming the Gospel of Life on Capitol Hill. Still, we applaud every effort on the part of our representatives in government to secure the sanctity of each human life, the dignity of every person and the common good of all people.
Father Paul C.B. Schenck
Founding Director and Chair
The National Pro-Life Center
Excerpts from an op-ed by Deacon Keith Fournier
John Paul II Fellow of the National Pro-Life Center
August 22, 2012 (Catholic Online) The language of the Republican Platform is refreshingly clear: “Faithful to the ‘self-evident’ truths enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, we assert the sanctity of human life and affirm that the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed. We support a human life amendment to the Constitution and endorse legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children.”
To the consternation of those who oppose the right to life, the Republican Party passed a pro-life plank in Tampa, Florida on Tuesday, August 21. The platform will come before the delegates next Monday for a vote.
Sadly, the opponents of the fundamental human right to life of our youngest neighbors in the first home of the human race control much of the media. So, this heroic action by the Republican Platform Committee is reported in much of the media as a “rejection of abortion rights.”
The Republican Platform Committee did the correct thing. They should be applauded.
Earlier this month, the platform committee of the Democratic Party rejected meager efforts by pro-life members to even make room in their platform for those who disagree with their rejection of the right to life.
Many members of the media, who do not report with verbal integrity, lashed out against the Republican platform. They are more like ministers of propaganda than reporters. They use deadly loaded language. They promote the lie that there can ever be a “right” to kill children in the womb when they use language such as “abortion rights.” Such loaded language is an example of Orwellian “New Speak.” It obscures the insidious nature of an evil which is rotting our culture from the inside out.
In his 1946 essay entitled “Politics and the English Language,” George Orwell wrote that “One ought to recognize that the present political chaos is connected with the decay of language, and that one can probably bring about some improvement by starting at the verbal end.” That is why I again write to expose this loaded language.
The phrase is now routinely used by the mainstream media. They also call those who want to defend babies against pre-emptive lethal strikes against them opponents of “abortion rights.” The claim of a “right” to abort an innocent child is heinous enough when it is described as a woman´s “right to choose.”
People can and do make immoral and intrinsically evil choices such as taking innocent human life. The current state of the positive law in the United States – since the horrendous Supreme Court decisions in Roe and Doe – is that there is one group of human persons who can be killed by “choice,” our youngest neighbors.
That “choice” now wrongly is protected by the police power of the State. Rather than being outlawed like all other intentional killings, abortion has been given a status as some sort of “super right” in the United States. The media are now routinely using deadly loaded language to hide the evil. Their sophistry must be exposed and opposed.
The current approach of abortion on demand is no different than if the U.S. Supreme Court had somehow found a “right” to kill three week old babies after their birth in that “penumbra” pit from which the “justices” pulled this “abortion right” from in the Roe and Doe opinions. There is no moral difference between killing a baby in the womb and killing a baby outside of the womb.
Imagine if the proponents of slavery called it a “slavery right” just because the Supreme Court said it was legal. Well they did just that in the now dreaded Dred Scott decision!
We look back on that case in horror, as we should. The Supreme Court cannot make a wrong a right with the stroke of a judicial quill or a keyboard!
Abortion is feticide; its true horror is concealed by deadly loaded language intended to make it sound acceptable. Its advocates deploy rights language to try to make it sound noble. They repeat the phrase “abortion rights, abortion rights, abortion rights” ad nauseam. Their collaborators in the media use this deadly loaded language without even thinking about what they are saying or writing.
The notion that one method of intentionally killing an entire class of human persons should be called a “right” is despicable. Abortion is a lethal action which always takes an innocent human life.
The phrase “abortion rights” is an example of the “decay of language” of which George Orwell wrote.
Actions do not have “rights.” Only human persons can have “rights.” The shorthand phrase “abortion rights” is a linguistic tool used by journalists who have become, knowingly or unwittingly, tools of the proponents of the abortion deception.
We all know it. We simply pretend otherwise and use deadly loaded language to cover over the evil act.
Let´s look at some hard cold truth again. We surgically operate on our first neighbors in the womb. We then put them back in their home and allow them to continue to grow so they can be healthier upon their birth. We know they are members of our human family. Our 4D sonogram technology has made it possible to take baby´s first picture and send it as a birth announcement or place it on a Facebook or My Space page or send it through our social networks.
We rightly marvel at the image of those little babies at the early stages of what is a lifetime of development for every human being. However, we then use that same technology to direct the weapons of warfare which will dismember them in the womb and kill them. We do not want to see those pictures.
When one of these little ones dies due to a “miscarriage,” we all empathize and say that the grieving woman “lost her baby.” However when one of those little ones dies due to surgical dismemberment, the effects of ingested chemical weapons, burning by saline or death by suction we call that loss of the baby the exercise of a “right”?
We all know the truth. Every intentional killing of a defenseless innocent human person is wrong! There is supposed to be a moral foundation for our positive law. We forget that at our great national peril. Orwell´s words were prophetic: “[T]he present political chaos is connected with the decay of language, and one can probably bring about some improvement by starting at the verbal end.”
The following quote is also attributed to Orwell: “During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.”
It is time to tell the truth. Let´s bring some improvement to our discourse by starting at the verbal end. The phrase “abortion rights” must be rejected. There are no “abortion rights,” only human rights. And right to life is the first of those rights.
Therefore, we applaud the Republican Platform Committee for its integrity and courage.
When Defending Marriage Is Called ‘Hate Speech’ – Shooting at the Family Research Council
By Deacon Keith Fournier, Esq. (pictured below)
John Paul II Fellow of the National Pro-Life Center
August 17, 2012 (Catholic Online) – The shooting at the Family Research Council needs to be watched closely. Perhaps it was the act of a man with psychological problems. Perhaps it reflects something more ominous.
On Wednesday, 28-year-old Floyd Lee Corkins II of Herndon, Virginia, walked into the Washington, D.C. headquarters of the Family Research Council posing as a candidate for an internship and carrying a bag of Chick-fil-A sandwiches.
He was also carrying a gun and multiple rounds of ammunition. He had the evil intent to kill people who worked for this public interest organization precisely because they believe that marriage is between a man and a woman, and have dedicated their lives to defending the family.
The shooter’s evil intent was thwarted by the courage of an unarmed security guard named Leo Johnson, who was shot in the arm while preventing Corkins from using the 9mm handgun and 50 rounds of ammunition to take more lives. Clearly, his heroism prevented what could have been another tragic massacre in a nation which now seems to experience them all too frequently.
The charging affidavit of Special Agent Garrett Nabors of the FBI can be read in its entirety here. Corkins was arraigned on Thursday, August 16, in federal court.
He was charged with “Interstate Transportation of a Firearm and Ammunition” and “Assault with the Intent to Kill While Armed.” The federal magistrate, Alan Kay, ordered that Corkins be held without bond. He also set a bond hearing for August 24 and ordered a psychiatric evaluation.
For six months Corkins volunteered at the DC Center for the LGBT Community. (The acronym stands for lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgendered.) The group condemned the attack through these words from their executive director, David Mariner: “I was shocked to hear that someone who has volunteered with the DC Center could be the cause of such a tragic act of violence. No matter the circumstances, we condemn such violence in the strongest terms possible. We hope for a full and speedy recovery for the victim and our thoughts are with him and his family.”
Tony Perkins, the president of the Family Research Council, expressed his concern that an increasingly charged atmosphere is being promoted by groups such as the Southern Poverty Law Center. This allegedly “public interest” legal group has included the Family Research Center in its list of “hate groups” because it is committed to the defense of marriage as only between one man and one woman.
On Thursday, Perkins said: “Let me be clear that Floyd Corkins was responsible for firing the shot yesterday. But Corkins was given a license to shoot an unarmed man by organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center that have been reckless in labeling organizations ‘hate groups’ because they disagree with them on public policy. And I believe the Southern Poverty Law Center should be held accountable for their reckless use of terminology that is leading to the intimidation and what the FBI here has categorized as an act of domestic terrorism.”
Tony Perkins makes an important point. There are few news reports concerning this incident using the word marriage for what it is, the lifelong union between one man and one woman ordered toward love, the conception and rearing of children and the formation of family. The family is the foundation of society because it is its first vital cell.
Most of the reporting uses loaded language. The Family Research Council is accused of “opposing gay marriage” rather than defending marriage as what it is. Those who defend marriage as between one man and one woman are increasingly depicted as intolerant or, as demonstrated by the Southern Poverty Law Center, accused of using “hate speech.”
When sexual behavior between two men or two women is viewed as the foundation of some manufactured “right” to marry – and those who oppose this are characterized as being against the “freedom” to marry and “equal rights” - we must not remain silent.
Everyone at the National Pro-Life Center supports our friends at the Family Research Council. We thank Mr. Johnson for his heroism, and we thank God that Mr. Johnson is recovering from the violent injury inflicted on him.
Click here for Deacon Fournier’s entire article
Bishop Robert Morlino Affirms Paul Ryan’s Effort to Apply Catholic Social Teaching
By Deacon Keith Fournier
John Paul II Fellow of the National Pro-Life Center
Executive Director of the William Bentley Ball Religious Freedom Project on Capitol Hill
August 17, 2012 (Catholic Online) – Rep. Paul Ryan’s bishop, the Most Reverend Robert Morlino of Madison, Wisconsin (pictured right), is defending Ryan’s economic policies as in-keeping with Catholic doctrine and natural law.
Click here to read Bishop Morlino’s column on Paul Ryan.
Last weekend I attended the Norfolk, Virginia rally where Mitt Romney introduced Paul Ryan as his running mate. I wrote an article entitled “Romney Goes Bold: Pro-Life Catholic Paul Ryan Chosen as Republican Vice Presidential Candidate.” I suggested that some would quickly attempt to spin the positions of this good man as inconsistent with Catholic social teaching.
By Monday the effort had begun. Hecklers at the Iowa State Fair demanded that Paul Ryan “stop the war on the poor.” It’s the same phrase hecklers used on April 26, 2012 when the congressman gave an address at Georgetown University. At Georgetown he said: “There are some Catholics who for a long time have thought they had a monopoly of sorts – not exactly on heaven, but on the social teaching of our Church. Simply put, I do not believe that the preferential option for the poor means a preferential option for big government.” For many on the left, those were fighting words.
Congressman Paul Ryan, Catholic and Republican candidate for vice president of the United States.
In June of 2011, USCCB President Cardinal Timothy Dolan and Congressman Paul Ryan exchanged letters. The congressman explained the rationale behind his economic proposals within the framework of a sincere effort to apply the principles found within Catholic social doctrine. He cited the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church throughout the letter, referring to both the obligation of solidarity and its application in light of the principle of subsidiarity.
I suggested that the exchange of letters signaled the liberation of Catholic social thought from some who seek to use it as a proof text for their own political agendas. Now, Paul Ryan is the nominee of the Republican Party for the second highest office in the nation, vice president. The liberation has begun. This man not only knows Catholic social doctrine, he actively seeks to integrate the principles it offers into his own public service and the policy proposals he offers.
Groups such as “Catholics United” are leading an effort to disparage the vice presidential candidate by claiming that, as a Catholic, he does not support the social doctrine of his own church. This assessment is not only inaccurate; it constitutes calumny, which the Catechism of the Catholic Church condemns (CCC #2477).
The arguments “Catholics United” and other politically left leaning opponents have with Paul Ryan comes down to their disagreement with his economic policy positions. They have a right to disagree. Simply do so with charity and honesty.
Catholic social teaching is not “left” or “right.” It’s not “liberal,” “conservative” or “neo-conservative.” It’s not Democratic or Republican. It confronts what Pope Benedict properly called the “dictatorship of relativism” even before he assumed the papal office. It insists there are unchangeable truths which are revealed by the natural law, truths that can be known through the exercise of reason and should inform the social order in every just society.
At the foundation of those truths is the dignity of every human person at every age and stage of life. To be pro-life is NOT to be “single issue” in your political positions; it is about having a worldview. It is the dignity of the human person which requires a respect for every human life whether that life be in the first home of the womb, a wheelchair, a jail cell, a hospital room, a hospice, a senior center or a soup kitchen.
Click here for Deacon Fournier’s entire article.
Click here for Father Paul Schenck’s article: We Must Triumph Over the ‘Dictatorship of Relativism’
RIP Nellie Gray, Pro-Life Champion
August 14, 2012 – The National Pro-Life Center on Capitol Hill mourns the death of of Miss Nellie Gray, constitutional attorney and foundress of the annual March for Life in Washington, D.C.
Father Paul C.B. Schenck, NPLC’s founding director and chair, said: “Nellie Gray lived her life well, she was devoted to the most vulnerable members of her human community, to justice and right. She remains an inspirational leader, a woman willing to stand against the currents regardless of the cost. As a champion of the right to life, human dignity and the common good, she almost single-handedly sustained the longest enduring public protest in American history, the March for Life. May God receive her now and may He bless her work to the end that all human life is respected and protected.”
Nellie said that others helped her organize the first March for Life in 1974, but they needed somewhere to gather, so she opened up her apartment for the cause. Little did she know back in 1973 that the March for Life would become America’s largest longstanding series of marches on Washington - little did she expect it would take so long to overturn the Supreme Court’s devastating rulings.
In 2011, when WND interviewed Nellie, she said: “Why do we come out to Washington officialdom to mark the anniversary of the Supreme Court declaring that our innocent pre-born brothers and sisters are not persons and some people could intentionally kill them with impunity in America? Because the killing of one innocent person is the killing of too many. But over the last 38 years, America has suffered the intentional killing of more than 50 million pre-born children.”
August 13 Obituary from the March for Life Education and Defense Fund
Nellie Gray, Pro-Life Hero – 1926-2012
Nellie Gray, president of the March for Life Education and Defense Fund, passed away over the weekend at the age of 86. Nellie was a native of Big Spring, Texas. She served in World War II in the Women’s Army Corps. Nellie’s education included an undergraduate business degree, a master degree in economics, and ultimately a law degree. Nellie worked for almost 30 years for the U.S. Government in the Departments of State and Labor.
After retiring from her federal career, Nellie played a key role in founding the March for Life, the peaceful pro-life demonstration held every year on the anniversary of the Supreme Court’s infamous decision in Roe v. Wade. She soon emerged as the leader of the annual event and as an outspoken, eloquent advocate for the most vulnerable members of our society, the pre-born.
In addition to her heroic work for the March for Life, Nellie will be most remembered for her passionate stance that every life, born and pre-born, aged and young, must be cherished and protected: No exception! No compromise!
Until the very last moment of her life, Nellie pressed for unity in the pro-life movement. She firmly believed that not a single pre-born life should be sacrificed for any reason, and urged all pro-life organizations to adopt the March for Life’s signature statement, the Life Principles, as the guiding light for all participants in the noble cause to which she devoted her life.
Nellie has been a giant in the pro-life movement. As we approach the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, we will continue to honor Nellie’s memory by doing everything possible to protect every pre-born human person and to end the scourge of abortion in the United States.
The portrait of Nellie Gray comes from the March for Life Education and Defense Fund.
After Chick-fil-A: Let’s Make Election Day ‘Freedom Appreciation Day’
By Deacon Keith Fournier
John Paul II Fellow of the National Pro-Life Center
Project Director at the William Bentley Ball Project on Capitol Hill
August 6, 2012 – On Wednesday, August 1, something extraordinary happened. Ordinary Americans went to Chick-fil-A restaurants around the nation because they had had enough. Enough of the threats to freedom and the bullying of people like the owners of that restaurant chain, precisely because they had the courage to voice their convictions in the public square.
Deacon Keith Fournier
Because they defended marriage as what it is, they were literally threatened, not only by the strident cultural revolutionaries who seek to enforce a new cultural order upon us all, but by mayors of major cities who were willing to enforce that new cultural order at the expense of true freedom.
We see threats to freedom gathering everywhere around us like storm clouds. Recently, thousands around the United States gathered to stand up for what this nation has properly called the first freedom, religious freedom.
The Catholic bishops of the United States called for a Fortnight for Freedom and people gathered all over this nation which has long spoken of itself as the land of the free and the home of the brave.
There is no word which echoes more passionately within the heart of Americans than that word freedom – or evokes a deeper response. This nation was founded by men and women who experienced threats to freedom’s promise and potential – and responded to them with heroism.
It has beckoned from its birth to all who hear freedom’s invitation to come and see what true freedom means.
These compelling words written by Emma Lazarus are engraved on the pedestal of the Lady Liberty in New York’s Ellis Island:
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore
Send these, the homeless, tempest tossed,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
Freedom’s lamp still shines beside that golden door. However, that light is being diminished by counterfeit notions of freedom which fail to recognize its source, comprehend its promise, accept its obligations or believe in its potential to build a better future.
One of the architects of the freedom undertaking which brought down the Berlin Wall at the end of the last century, Blessed John Paul II wrote, “Human freedom belongs to us as creatures; it is a freedom which is given as a gift, one to be received like a seed and to be cultivated responsibly. It is an essential part of that creaturely image which is the basis of the dignity of the person.”
The struggle of our age is being waged over the meaning of freedom. It is a contest with extraordinary implications. Almost every contemporary concern that we face can be positioned within this struggle. How one defines human freedom will influence the way that he or she views almost everything.
Freedom has consequences. Our choices have the capacity to not only change the world around us, but they make us to be the kinds of persons we become. The capacity to make choices is what makes us human persons. What we choose either humanizes us further or leads us, ultimately, into slavery. The capacity to choose reflects the “Imago Dei”, the Image of God, present within every human person.
As the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council in the Catholic Church wrote in their document on the Mission of the Church in the Modern World: “Authentic freedom is an outstanding manifestation of the divine image within man.” (Gaudium et Spes (Joy and Hope), 17)
We should listen closely to the contemporary voices mouthing the word “freedom.” What do they mean when they speak the word? We need to heed the voices of authentic freedom and reject the counterfeits.
Pope Benedict XVI warned of a “dictatorship of relativism” at work in the secularist age. Relativism is a philosophy which denies the existence of objective truths upon which we can build our life together. When there are no truths, there can be no freedom.
The antidote to what ails us is a robust return to truth – and leaders unafraid to call us to it again. We need to reach down to the foundation stones upon which this experiment in ordered liberty called the United States of America was built and strengthen freedoms infrastructure by asserting again that “We hold these truths to be self evident” as proclaimed in the nation’s birth certificate, the Declaration of Independence.
We need leaders who are unashamed to insist that there is such a thing as truth, which can be known through the exercise of reason. Freedom must be exercised in relationship to that truth. Otherwise, it is illusory and will lead to new forms of slavery and anarchy.
The men and women of this age are asking the fundamental questions men and women of every age have asked. They hunger for truth and they yearn to be free. They will never be satisfied without God, who is the source, author and way to freedom because he is the source of all that is true and good.
The contemporary age has become intoxicated on the wine of a false notion of freedom as a raw power over others who are weaker. An example of the sophistry which accompanies all of this is the illusory claim of a “right” to do whatever one wills, including taking the lives of our first neighbors in the womb and calling it a “choice.”
On May 8, 2005 Pope Benedict spoke concerning legal abortion and creeping euthanasia: “The freedom to kill is not true freedom, but a tyranny that reduces the human being to slavery.” The new slavery of this age is its treatment of human persons as property to be used and disposed of at will.
By calling what is always wrong a “right,” contemporary men and women are being bound by the chains of their own self delusion, materialism and nihilism; imprisoned by the lie of what Pope Benedict once properly called “anarchic freedom.” It leads to anarchy and not ordered liberty.
Freedom is not about the fact that we can choose, but about how and what we do choose. This is what truly matters. Authentic human freedom will never be found in decisions that are made against God and against the natural law.
The struggle of this age is between anarchic freedom and authentic freedom. The future of the West hangs in the balance.
I suggest that what occurred on August 1 around the United States holds great promise for the coming national election. The real people of America, the salt of the earth, have had ‘ENOUGH!” Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day was not started by the owners of the restaurant chain.
Former Governor Mike Huckabee first mentioned it, former Senator Rick Santorum picked up on it and then it took on a life of its own. It was propelled by real people who still believe that the values which informed the American experiment in ordered liberty are still the path to a future of freedom.
It was right there, at a drive through Chick-fil-A window that the idea hit me.
If people went to Chick-fil-A to make this kind of statement they most will certainly go to the voting booth on November 6. There, they can cast their vote to affirm freedom and to promote the core values which will ensure that America’s greatest days are still ahead of us.
That is why I propose that we call Election Day 2012 “Freedom Appreciation Day” and mobilize for freedom.
Click here for Deacon Fournier’s entire article at Catholic Online
Chick-fil-A Day and the Victory for Marriage, Life and Freedom on Election Day
By Deacon Keith Fournier
John Paul II Fellow of the National Pro-Life Center
Project Director at the William Bentley Ball Project on Capitol Hill
August 2, 2012 – You sensed you were participating in something historic by simply purchasing a chicken sandwich. I do not doubt everyone wanted their chicken sandwich, especially after such a long wait. However, they were there, like me, for a reason much more important. They were making a collective statement of support for the restaurants’ willingness to stand up for marriage and family in the face of open hostility, ridicule and threats.
They were standing up for free speech and against political correctness. They were applauding with their purchase the courage shown by the owners of this restaurant. They did not back down in the face of forceful, even hateful, opposition from those who, while claiming to be tolerant have become so intolerant of those who do not agree with them.
The actions of this little David of a company facing the Goliath of hostility opposing their exercise of free speech ignited a firestorm of public support. Former Governor Mike Huckabee and former Senator Rick Santorum mobilized many to stand with Chick-fil-A. The great Protestant evangelist Billy Graham stood up for the company. Cardinal George of Chicago had the courage to take on the mayor of that city. He was joined by a multitude of other leaders from across the confessional spectrum who came to the defense of the restaurant.
In addition to countless families and singles across the USA, Poor Clare nuns made a statement on Aug. 1, 2012. Photo by NC Faith and Freedom Coalition.
However, what occurred on August 1, 2012 around the nation was unexpected. I suggest it holds great promise for the coming election. The real people of America, the salt of the earth, have had ‘ENOUGH!’ They came in in cars and on foot to Chick-fil-A restaurants everywhere. The reports of the numbers across the nation are astounding.
Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day was not started by the owners of the restaurant chain. Mike Huckabee first mentioned it and then it took on a life of its own. It was propelled by real people who still believe that the values which informed the American experiment in ordered liberty are still the path to a future of freedom.
As I received my chicken I said to the smiling assistant at the window: “Who would have ever thought this would happen?” She responded with a smile: “It gives me hope for America.” Me too! If people will go to Chick-fil-A to make this kind of statement, they will go to the voting booth on November 8, 2012. There, they can do something far more important.
They can cast their vote to affirm life, defend marriage, protect freedom and promote the values which alone will ensure that America’s greatest days are still ahead of us. Chick-fil-A Day reveals the way to a victory for marriage, life and freedom on November 6, 2012. Maybe we should call Election Day “Freedom Appreciation Day” and mobilize these same “salt of the earth” people to change history…
Click here to read Deacon Fournier’s full article at Catholic Online.
Click here for Deacon Fournier’s previous article A Catholic Hooray for Chick-fil-A
