Hillcrest Report #5

Today is the 5th Saturday of our nine-Saturday novena to the Holy Spirit for an end to abortion. There were nine prayer warriors out there today (five Healys and four others!).

We're more than halfway there - please come out and pray with us during one or more of the final four Saturdays!

Archbishop Burke Denounces Catholic Charity for Scheduling Sheryl Crow

In response to the news article discussed below I sent the following e-mail to the organizer of a fundraising event for a Catholic charity that featured outspoken abortion advocate Sheryl Crow:

Mr. Allred,

I cannot believe that you would feature an outspoken advocate of mothers killing their unborn children in order to raise money for the benefit of children. It would be like hiring a famous Nazi sympathizer to perform at a benefit for Jewish people who survived the Holocaust. It would also be like having a famous Klansman performing at a benefit for Blacks who were effected by slavery.

I urge you to reconsider your position.

Sincerely,

Joe Healy
Catonsville, MD

___________________________
ST. LOUIS — St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke denounced a Catholic charity for scheduling singer Sheryl Crow to perform at a benefit concert because of the singer's support for abortion rights.
Read on: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,268581,00.html
Glennon event organizer, Allen Allred, said he was disappointed with Burke's decision, but that Crow would appear as scheduled. aallred@thompsoncoburn.com
"This is not an event that's about ideology," Allred said. "This is about helping kids."
At the Cardinal Glennon website Allred is quoted as saying:
A..."very important aspect of the Board's work is advocacy on behalf of children."
Please email Mr. Allred at work today and let him know what a disappointment he is -- and how backward he is in his thinking... He won't play politics with Sheryl Crow but he will play politics with Archbishop Raymond Burke. He believes in advocacy on behalf of children, yet features a pro-abortion advocate to help raise money for kids!
aallred@thompsoncoburn.com
Thank you! ----- And forward this on to others!

Hillcrest Report #4

Praise be to God for the eight faithful souls who came out today to join in prayer on the fourth Saturday of our nine-week Novena to the Holy Spirit for an end to abortion. We even had a little tyke there wearing a St. Michael the Archangel T-shirt - how appropriate!

Prayer is a powerful thing. This Novena is a powerful prayer, particularly because it is being prayed together by a group of the faithful at the specific location where we are petitioning for the Holy Spirit to effect change. We can be confident that He will respond in a powerful way, and we must persevere in prayer.

Is it any coincidence that the US Supreme Court issued a decision during this Novena where the Opinion of the Court:

[R]ecognizes that respect for human life finds an ultimate expression in a mother’s love for her child. Whether to have an abortion requires a difficult and painful moral decision ... which some women come to regret.

And in the Concurring Opinion, Justice Clarence Thomas, joined by Justice Antonin Scalia, stated:

I write separately to reiterate my view that the Court’s abortion jurisprudence, including Casey and Roe v. Wade, 410 U. S. 113 (1973), has no basis in the Constitution.

Once again, I urge you to persevere in prayer and please join us next Saturday for the Fifth Saturday of our Novena! Click here for the details of the Novena: http://defendlife.blogspot.com/2007/03/novena-of-saturdays-at-hillcrest-clinic.html.

21st Century Barbarism

There is at least one doctor in Catonsville (Maryland) who commits unspeakable acts of violence against pregnant women and their unborn children. Not only are these acts perpetrated on a regular basis, but this doctor makes money (some from our own taxes!) for committing them.

Let me explain what this doctor does. First, this doctor forces the pregnant woman's cervix to dilate (open up) prematurely. Then a suction tube is inserted into the woman's uterus to break the protective amniotic sac and remove the amniotic fluid. The doctor then takes a long clamp and reaches into the woman's uterus until he grabs a part of the woman's child with the teeth of the clamp. Keep in mind that the child is still alive at this point.

Now take a deep breath and say a Hail Mary, then continue reading.

The doctor pulls the body part, most often a leg or arm, really hard until it is ripped off of the child and extracted from the uterus. He then reaches in and does this again with another body part. And again, and again, and again. At some point, the poor child dies while in excruciating pain. And sometime later the mother will most likely experience severe mental and emotional anguish. She will never be the same person.

This act of barbarism is called a Dilation & Extraction (D&E) abortion. It is the method used at Hillcrest Clinic on all babies who are aborted in the 13th through 16th week of pregnancy. It is the method used for most abortions after the first trimester. It is very similar to the Partial-Birth Abortion procedure that was banned by Congress and upheld recently by the Supreme Court. The only difference between the two procedures is that in the D&E abortion the child is killed in the womb and taken out piece-by-piece; in a Partial-Birth Abortion the child is mostly delivered, then is killed while part of him or her is still in the cervix, then is removed intact.

Why do I tell you this? Because I want you to wake up. I want you to see that abortion is much more than a woman's so-called right to choose. I want you to get active in the pro-life movement. As a Catholic, a Christian, a fellow human being, you cannot be silent while this is happening in your own backyard. Volunteer your time at the local Crisis Pregnancy Center. Pray outside of the Hillcrest abortion facility on Saturday mornings. Join your parish pro-life committee and take action. Write to your elected representatives. Contact me for ideas (e-mail joe@defendlife.org).

Hillcrest Report #3

Despite the cold temperature and threat of rain, 10 prayer warriors came out this morning to witness for life. Together we were one bright shining beacon in the culture of death and darkness. At times we can feel like, "What's the point? Are we really helping anyone by standing out here and praying for an hour?"

Prayer is a very powerful weapon. In a book I was reading in which St. Philomena was appearing to a mystic, she and the mystic prayed together for mothers contemplating abortion. When the mystic was discouraged, St. Philomena told her not to worry; their prayers that day had prevented 100 mothers from choosing to kill their children.

Today was the third day of our nine-week novena to the Holy Spirit to end abortion at Hillcrest, in Maryland, in this country, and throughout the world. This novena is being done in union with the Pro-Life Parish Project and is sponsored by the Missionaries of the Gospel of Life (MEV) and the St. Agnes Church Respect Life Committee.

We gathered on the sidewalk in front of the Hillcrest abortion facility on Rt. 40 in Catonsville and prayed the novena prayers. We prayed Pope John Paul II's prayer that he wrote at the end of his encyclical "The Gospel of Life" and added the Pro-Life Litany written by Fr. Frank Pavone, MEV. All of the prayers can be found here.

We then prayed the Rosary and Chaplet of Divine Mercy while walking slowly together on the sidewalk along Johnnycake Rd. and on Rt. 40.

To those who came out today, thank you very much! It is very special to join together and pray in solidarity for an end to abortion. To the rest of you, I encourage you to come out when you can. We will be praying at Hillcrest every Saturday morning after the 8:00 am Mass at St. Agnes. We are at the abortion facility from 8:45 am to 9:45 am.

God bless you all!

PP Howard St. Prayer Report #1

This past Saturday (April 7th) about 10 of us (2 more than last time, this keeps the record of two more people every time we go!) prayed outside of Planned Parenthood on Howard Street in Baltimore.

I am sad to say the day was very busy. I would love to say the mill was closed and nobody went inside, but that is far from the truth.

Instead many women went inside, despite our efforts. One woman told me she had 4 children and couldn't afford another.

As the day went on we were able to spread the message to many people. There were so many people we couldn't even stop to talk to all of them because we were already talking to others. One mill worker was forced to stop what she was doing and spend her day waiting inside the door to usher girls inside.

When we started to prepare to leave a sudden flood of women, obviously head management, started to show up and go inside. We waited a while longer, and we were rewarded. Right before we left one girl came outside, and I offered her some information on Rachel's Vineyard, and she laughed. She said she couldn't go through with the abortion and she walked out. The young lady and her boyfriend both looked VERY happy, and very relieved at their decision. We gave them information on groups that would help them, and thanked them for choosing life. The entire day was worth it for that one moment. God had an amazing save right there.

I hope this story encourages you, and maybe you will come with us next time.

Taxpayer Funding of Embryonic Stem Cell Research

I just wrote the following letter to Senators Mikulski and Cardin regarding Senate Bill 5. You can contact them via webform here:

Mikulski: mikulski.senate.gov/mailform.html
Cardin: cardin.senate.gov/contact.cfm

"I urge you to oppose Senate Bill 5, which would provide taxpayer funding for embryonic stem cell research (ESCR).

As I'm sure you know, an evil means can never be justified, now matter how good the end may be. It is wrong to create new human beings in order to use them in testing, experimentation, and harvesting for parts. A human embryo is a human being and has a right to be treated with dignity.

Funding ESCR would be similar to the Nazis using taxpayer funding to support the experiments they did on the handicapped, Jews, Catholics, and others during their time in power in Germany.

I strongly support ethical means to conduct stem cell research. Obtaining stem cells from cord blood, placentas, and adults are ethical means that have already proven to be successful in treatments and show a great deal of potential. Embryonic stem cells have been very problematic and have not produced any treatments.

It would be much better for Congress to direct taxpayer funding to support the types of stem cell research that do not require the creation and destruction of human embryos and to leave the unethical ESCR to be funded by private citizens."

Hillcrest Report #2

Today was the second day of our nine-week novena to the Holy Spirit to end abortion at Hillcrest, in Maryland, in this country, and throughout the world. This novena is being done in union with the Pro-Life Parish Project and is sponsored by the Missionaries of the Gospel of Life (MEV) and the St. Agnes Church Respect Life Committee.
We were surprised this Holy Saturday morning with a light dusting of snow and cold temperatures, but twelve brave souls came out and joined in the novena. Three others were there to pray but didn't join with us, and we once again had the protection of a Baltimore County police officer.
We gathered on the sidewalk in front of the Hillcrest abortion facility on Rt. 40 in Catonsville and prayed the novena prayers. We prayed Pope John Paul II's prayer that he wrote at the end of his encyclical "The Gospel of Life" and added the Pro-Life Litany written by Fr. Frank Pavone, MEV. All of the prayers can be found here.
We then prayed the Rosary and Chaplet of Divine Mercy while marching slowly behind our banner on the sidewalk along Johnnycake Rd. and on Rt. 40.
We do believe the facility was open today, as we saw one person enter the parking lot with her head down and her eyes shielded; we prayed in a special way for her and her baby.
To those who came out today, thank you very much! It is very special to join together and pray in solidarity for an end to abortion. To the rest of you, I encourage you to come out when you can. We will be praying at Hillcrest every Saturday morning after the 8:00 am Mass at St. Agnes. We are at the abortion facility from 8:45 am to 9:45 am.
God bless you all!

We Can't Support Giuliani for President

As if there had been any doubt about Rudy Giuliani's anti-life public position, he confirmed it yesterday when he said about abortion:

Ultimately, it is a constitutional right, and therefore if it is a
constitutional right ultimately, even if you do it on a state by state basis,
you have to make sure that people are protected.

He also affirmed that he supports taxpayer funding of abortion.

[Source: http://www.lifenews.com/nat3021.html]

Do not let Giuliani's "personally opposed to abortion, but women should make the choice" argument fool you. If he truly realized that abortion is the taking of an innocent human life and a severe act of violence against the mother, he would do all he could to put an end to it.

Once again I call you to remember that no Catholic can publicly support abortion in any way. Not only has the Vatican been very clear about that, but so have the US bishops (see my previous post "Living the Gospel of Life" http://defendlife.blogspot.com/2007/03/living-gospel-of-life.html).

As for me, I'm joining with Fr. Frank Pavone, Bobby Schindler (brother of Terri Schindler-Schiavo) and other pro-life leaders to support Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) (www.brownback.com) for president. He has a solid pro-life voting record and the talks he gave at the Blogs for Life Conference and the March for Life rally on the Mall were outstanding.