Category Archives: Catholic Politicians

“Women Veterans Bill of Rights” Opens Door to Taxpayer Funding for Abortion at Veterans Facilities

November 29, 2010

Today the House will consider HR 5953, the “Women Veterans Bill of Rights”.   This legislation contains language that may be of concern to pro-life groups.

The first section of HR 5953 would establish a “Women Veterans Bill of Rights” which enumerates 24 rights to be “displayed prominently and conspicuously in each facility of the Department of Veterans Affairs and distributed widely to women veterans.”  The rights that women veterans “should have” according to HR 5953 include rights to health care and health care providers.  These rights could then be used as a basis to require funding for abortion and access to abortion at veterans facilities.

The Department of  Veterans Affairs (VA) does not currently provide abortions and abortions are currently excluded from the VA health benefits package, because abortion is excluded from the scope of ”general reproductive health care” that is authorized by P.L. 102-585. But that exclusion does not extend a prohibition to other authorities created by earlier or later legislation, this bill could lay the groundwork and legal precedent for the VA to provide abortions in the future.  More detailed areas of concern are listed below.

Possible pro-life concerns with HR 5953 are as follows:

- A right to “coordinated, comprehensive, primary women’s health care” could provide a legal basis to require funding for abortion because this language would be in conflict with current policy. (Right #1)

-A right to a “primary care provider who can meet ALL her primary care needs, including gender-specific…” could be used to mandate access to abortionists at every VA health facility. (Right #1)

- A “right to innovation in care delivery” raises concerns about the provision of “telemed abortions” through which abortion pills are dispensed without a physician present.  Instead the physician dispenses the abortion pills by entering a code over the internet. (Right #3)

- A “right to request and get treatments by clinicians with specific training and experience in women’s health issues” could be a used as grounds to demand access to an abortion provider and could create a funding conflict as well because it implies a right to have abortion paid for. (Right #4)

- “Gender equity” and “equal access” and “parity” in this context could also give rise to an abortion access and funding demands.  In the past, pro-life groups have oppose the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) unless an abortion exclusion is added for this reason.  The most recent example, New Mexico’s ERA was used as a legal basis for the courts to require state funded abortions.  (Right #6 and 7)

Call your Representative today at 202-225-3121 and urge them to vote no on HR 5953 as it leads to taxpayer funding of abortion.

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Goodbye, Speaker Pelosi. Hello, Pro-Life Congress!

November 3, 2010

Happy mid-term election, pro-lifers!

What a great 24 hours it has been as the polls closed and races were called, many of which put pro-life Representatives into office. This also means many pro-choice legislators were voted out of office, many of whom have had a lot of power and influence in pushing ObamaCare forward and advocating against the unborn.  

Here are several excellent rundowns from LifeNews.com on the biggest victories – both new pro-life blood coming in and bad anti-life going out.  

Pro-Life Advocates Capture House of Representatives, Topple Pro-Abortion Pelosi  

Obama Loses His Pro-Abortion “Yes Men” in Congress    

 

 

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Action Alert: Protest Anti-Catholic Democratic Ad

October 27, 2010

If this doesn’t get your blood boiling six days before midterm elections, I don’t know what will.

A new Democratic campaign ad has unleashed an anti-Catholic attack and we are calling on St Michael Society members to demand Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine denounce the slur.

See for yourself …

 “Democrats in Minnesota want to defeat an evangelical preacher, Dan Hall, who is running for the state senate there. So they sent out a mailer with this stunning image,” according to National Review Online.

Kathryn Lopez, story author, says it’s safe to say this is “unholy politics” and that Democrats can make their point “without the use of abuse of clerics.”  Read her full piece here.

A National Catholic Register reporter also calls this “THE most anti-Catholic political advertisement I’ve ever seen.” 

Please contact DNC Chairman Tim Kaine at 202-863-8000 or e-mail at dmca@dnc.org  

Ask him to denounce this anti-Catholic slur by the Minnesota Democratic Party.

The Catholic Church is the largest charitable organization on Earth. Defending the dignity of life is foundation of a moral vision for society and the motivating principle for Catholic charitable work including care for the poor.

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The Catholic Vote 2010 — Will You Vote Your Faith?

October 5, 2010

We are now just inside of one month until election day.  The question we have for our Catholic family, friends, fellow parishioners and co-workers is:  Are you praying, reflecting and ready to Vote Your Faith in 2010?  Given the nature of the mainstream media today, many folks simply don’t know where candidates stand on issues.  It is our goal to help educate committed Catholics about the issues in this campaign that impact our faith or are in direct conflict with it.

We as Catholics are called to practice our faith in the voting booth.  In fact, in the past two elections cycles Pope Benedict XVI outlined a three point model to reflect on before voting.

Benedict XVI said that the focus of public interventions by the Catholic Church “is the protection and promotion of the dignity of the person and she is thereby consciously drawing particular attention to principles which are not negotiable.”

The Pope spelled out these principles thus:

– “protection of life in all its stages, from the first moment of conception to natural death”;

– “recognition and promotion of the natural structure of the family — as a union between a man and a woman based on marriage — and its defense from attempts to make it juridically equivalent to radically different forms of union which in reality harm it and contribute to its de-stabilization, obscuring its particular character and its irreplaceable social role”;

– and “the protection of the right of parents to educate their children.”

Common to all

Benedict XVI clarified: “These principles are not truths of faith, even though they receive further light and confirmation from faith; they are inscribed in human nature itself and therefore they are common to all humanity.”

So, what are some important Catholic issues before us this election cycle? 

1.  Taxpayer funding of abortion in health care.  When President Obama signed the health care law, he signed a law that opened the flood gates for taxpayer funding of abortion.  Americans United for Life Action has launched a “Life Counts” campaign targeting specific members of Congress who voted to force taxpayers to fund abortion.  See if your Congressman is on the list here.  If so, call him or her and let them know you will not be voting for them because they support the radical policy of forcing taxpayers to fund abortion.

Find out:  Did candidates seeking your vote this November, support Obamacare? If they voted for Obamacare, they voted to force taxpayers to fund abortion.  Vote them out and support a candidate running to repeal Obamacare and end taxpayer funding for abortion throughout the federal government by supporting Smith-Lipinski (see number 2).

2. Ending taxpayer funding of abortion in all federal government agencies. Representatives Chris Smith (R-NJ) and Dan Lipinski (D-IL) have introduced a bipartisan bill to end taxpayer funding of abortion across the federal government.  The bill has 150 original cosponsors, including 16 Democrats.  Read more on the bill here.

Ask candidates for Congress or Senate in your state:  Do you support the bipartisan Smith-Lipinski bill in the House, which would end taxpayer funding of abortion across the federal government?  If they do, support them.  If they don’t, vote them out.

3.  Taxpayer funding of human experimentation through embryo research.  Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA) and Representative Diana DeGette (D-CO) have introduced legislation to not only have taxpayers fund embryonic stem cell research, but also opens the door to taxpayer funded cloning. To learn more about this issue go here.

Find out: Do candidates running for Congress seeking your vote support Specter-DeGette and taxpayer funding of human experimentation through embryo research?  If they do, vote them out by supporting candidates who oppose embryonic stem cell research.

4.  Traditional marriage is under attack across the country and key elections in Maine, New Hampshire, Minnesota, and Iowa could weigh heavily on the future of the marriage issue. In each of these states, public support continues to fall on the side of protecting marriage as the union of one man and one woman, yet we have elected officials who continue to push against the voters’ say on the marriage issue, and who are taking matter into their own hands – whether it be a Governor or a state supreme court justice. The National Organization for Marriage has all the info you need here.

Find out—do candidates seeking your vote support marriage as defined between one man and one woman?  If not, vote them out by supporting candidates that support marriage.

5.  School choice.  One would think all would agree that parents should have the right to decide what education, including homeschooling, options are best for their kids.  Yet many liberals and unions fight against this very basic civil right across the country from the smallest town to the largest city.  Learn more about school choice issues here.

Find out: Do candidates seeking your vote this November support school choice?  If not, vote them out by supporting candidates who do support school choice.

6.  Supreme Court and Judges:  Senators have amazing power.  They have a vote to determine who will sit on various levels of our federal judiciary and apply laws and bring justice.  Yet the biggest injustice our country faces today is the over 50 million babies who have been murdered thanks to a Supreme Court ruling.

It is important that as Catholics we vote for Senate candidates who commit to voting for judges who apply the law and not support judicial nominees who legislate from the bench.  The most notorious example of legislating from the bench was the 1973 Roe Vs. Wade decision in the Supreme Court, which made abortion on demand the law of the land.

Find out: Do your Senate candidates support judges who apply the law and consider Roe vs Wade legislating from the bench and a bad decision?  If they do, support them.  If they don’t, vote them out.  You can learn more about judicial issues here.

For more information you can also visit CatholicVote and Catholic Answers, both terrific organizations assisting Catholics seeking to learn more about issues important to Catholics and where candidates stand.

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Happy Birthday, St Michael Society!

September 29, 2010

Today on the Feast Day of our patron Saint Michael the Archangel, we stop to celebrate the St Michael Society’s 1st anniversary and say THANK YOU to the thousands of Catholics whose support is the reason this society has flourished.  

One year ago today we launched this effort with the goal of creating an active, faith-driven community of Catholics who worked together to defend and promote our faith and morals in the public square.  

Thanks to the overwhelming support from you – our members and readers – we have done just that.

Your dedication to reading the blog and engagement in posting on Facebook, Twitter and sharing our Catholic news and calls to action with your friends are only reason we’ve been able to build an incredible army for Christ and his Church across America and in six other countries!

Our blog has been read more than 460,000 times.

Facebook has become a huge tool for encouraging fellow Catholics to join our cause. We’ve seen more than 8,100 interactions transpire on our fan page and nearly 5,500 people have “liked” us in cities and towns across the U.S. We are also represented by our brothers and sisters in Christ in the Philippines, Canada, Indonesia, the United Kingdom and Italy.

Thank you, St. Michael Society members! We are excited to begin a new, fresh year and ask that you join us in our one, central goal:

Help us continue to build a Catholic community that is to mobilize quickly in defending our faith, both nationally as a Christ-centered influence and locally in our voting booths.

How can you help?

Keep spreading the word. Keep telling us what inspires and moves you on our Facebook page. Send us more ideas, prayer requests and most importantly keep praying for the Church and our country, that Christ and His Light be the driving force in each of us.  May the intercession of St. Michael defend us in every battle against abortion, assisted suicide and government-run healthcare; defend us against attacks on the sacrament of marriage; defend us against human exploitation; and defend us against our own weaknesses that lead us to sin and stray from God’s grace.

Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.  – Matthew 28:19

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Controversy Surrounds Taxpayer Funding of Research on Embryos

September 17, 2010

For more details and to follow this latest battle in defense of life, please visit Americans for Ethical Stem Cell Research

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What if Catholics, Voted Catholic?

September 16, 2010

There is a lot at stake for our culture and country as we head into the 2010 election cycle.  We cannot afford to sit idly by as bad health care law leads to rationed care and euthanasia….as taxpayers are forced to pay for human experimentation through embryonic stem cell research….as over 4,000 pre-born babies are aborted daily, some of them paid for by taxpayers….as our public schools and universities teach to a material, Godless world…as our elected officials propose policies that lead to population control….the list goes on and on.

This November, we need to work to get our Catholic family members, friends and fellow parishioners out to vote.

SMS will soon launch a Vote Your Faith Campaign.  Each week we will highlight key races, candidates and issues important to Catholics and a culture of life.

We will be working with other Catholic organizations such Catholic Vote and Catholic Answers to serve as an information provider to Catholics through the country.  We hope you will join us by becoming a Catholic Activist this election cycle.  All you need to do to be a Catholic Activist is agree you will consider voting your faith and see where politicians seeking your vote stand on key Catholic issues.

To get things off the ground, we encourage you to consider reading this letter from Catholic Answers President Karl Keating, outlining CA’s plans to produce and mass distribute Catholic Voter Guides throughout the country.  An excerpt from the letter could not make things clearer:

If Catholics—who are about 23% of the population—had consistently voted in line with Church teaching over the last few decades (and had insisted that their elected representatives do likewise), our society would look much different.

We have virtually unrestricted abortion? We wouldn’t, if America’s Catholics had raised a ruckus about it forty years ago—and kept raising a ruckus.

We have embryonic stem-cell research? We wouldn’t, if Catholics had told Congress, “Not with our money, you don’t!”

We have same-sex “marriage” and euthanasia and even human cloning making headway? We wouldn’t, if Catholics had been persistent in voting according to Church teaching on these matters.

But the sad fact is that Catholics haven’t voted like Catholics. They haven’t really made their faith part of their civic lives.

Please join us and help us spread the word.  Be an activist for our Catholic Faith.

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NH Battle Pits Pro-Life Catholic Lamontagne vs. Pro Sotomayor GOPer

September 9, 2010

A battle royal is occurring in the GOP primary in New Hampshire.  In a five-person Republican primary, the two frontrunners are purportedly “pro-life.”  The other three are “pro-choice.”  Let’s look at those two frontrunners:  Devout Catholic and pro-life conservative Ovide Lamontagne and former NH Attorney General Kelly Ayotte.  Pro-lifers have lined up on both sides in this political contest between the two frontrunners.  Recent polls showed Lamontagne having momentum and coming within striking distance of Ayotte, who has been in first place the entire race, having been anointed by the Washington Establishment and the GOP money machine.  As Lamontagne and Ayotte vie for the pro-life vote, it is important for New Hampshire Catholics and pro-life voters to know what they may be getting before they cast their vote.

Ovide Lamontagne is a lifelong devout Catholic and for his entire career has supported the right to life “from conception until natural death” — period.  In the final candidates’ debate last night, he quoted the Declaration of Independence to reinforce that our nation was founded on the premise that all human beings are endowed “by our Creator” with the unalienable right to life at the moment we are created — at conception.

Ovide has not just “talked the talk” — he has “walked the walk” as a pro-lifer.  He is the father of  two adoptive daughters and is the legal guardian of a special needs foster son.  He supports a Human Life Amendment to the Constitution.

Kelly Ayotte has no public record of being a prolifer and has made no public statements on the right to life of the unborn;  her campaign refers to how she has fought for “parents‘ rights” in her actions, as Attorney General for a pro-choice Democrat governor, in defending New Hampshire’s parental notification statute in the U.S. Supreme Court.  Of course, it as correct for her to defend that statute on legal grounds, and she did.   But when asked about her own position on abortion, press reports indicate that she is “prolife with exceptions”:  she would allow abortions in cases of rape, incest, life of the mother, and — depending on which press report you read — “health of the mother,” “danger to the mother,” or “medical emergency” — all of which amounts to abortion on demand.  At last night’s debate, one of the pro-choice candidates bluntly pointed out:  “Ms. Ayotte says she is ‘pro life with exceptions.’  That means she’s pro-choice.”

And during her campaign, Ayotte voiced support for President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, now Justice Sonia Sotomayor, saying that if she had been in the Senate at the time, she would have voted for the liberal judicial activist.  This is a major blow to the pro-life cause.  One day, with consistent prayer and hard work, we will overturn Roe v. Wade and return the Constitution to its true interpretation.  But we will not overturn Roe, and defend the unborn, if we support candidates who say they are pro-life, but when the time to lead comes they jump to the other side.

Watch Ayotte talk about her support for Obama liberal judge Sonia Sotomayor:

To many pro-lifers, Ayotte’s support for Justice Sotomayor is enough to disqualify her from our support.

For those who might turn a blind eye to Ayotte’s support for Sotomayor, here is our view of what occurred with Ayotte and the NH parental notification law.  Her actions suggest that her characterization of events is suspect at best, and is likely highly deceptive:

1. January 2006:  The U.S. Supreme Court in Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood rules that states do have authority to enact parental notification statutes, and that the lower courts were too harsh in striking down NH’s law entirely.  The case is sent back to lower federal court to address the proper remedy for a supposed constitutional violation in one part of the law.

2.  November 2006:  While the case is pending in remand in federal court, Democrats take over all levels of NH government — the legislature and the executive.

3.  January 2007:  The new Democrat leadership introduces legislation to repeal NH’s parental notification statute completely.

4.  February 2007:  Ayotte refuses to testify on the repeal legislation that would wipe NH’s parental notification off the books.  She has spent untold hundreds of thousands of dollars in NH taxpayer money to defend the parental notification statute, taking it to the Supreme Court. That law that has been validated in part is now threatened with being expunged from the books altogether.  Yet Ayotte – who was willing to go before the legislature to testify on other issues such as medical marijuana, gambling, and capital punishment, refuses to defend before the legislature the very law that she was defending in the court.

Ayotte could have testified against the repeal and said: “Don’t wipe this statute off the books.  We won!  This is constitutional!  This is good law that will save lives!”
Or she could have said “Don’t do this – we won!  Your action is going to waste all of our efforts and taxpayer money that went into defending it!”
Ayotte chose neither approach.  From a moral and fiscal standpoint, she utterly abdicated her role as an advocate that she claims to be.  I suspect it is due in part to: (a) her true feelings of ambivalence towards the life issue, and/or (b) caving into pressure from Democrats.

5.    July 2007:  While Ayotte stands by mutely, NH Democrats theirs the first state in our nation’s history to ELIMINATE a parental notification law.  Almost immediately thereafter, the federal court rules that because NH no longer has any parental notification law, the court case is technically “moot” and effectively dead.
6.  August 2008:  The judge rules that Planned Parenthood is the winner in the court case that Ayotte argued and says that as the “prevailing party,” Planned Parenthood is entitled to have its legal fees reimbursed by the state of New Hampshire, the “losing party.”   The judge directs Ayotte to go negotiate with Planned Parenthood on what the payment should be.
7.  March 2009:   Ayotte’s boss, pro-choice Governor John Lynch, nominates Ayotte to another four-year term serving as his Attorney General, through the year 2013.  In a four-week period, between the time that the Governor nominates her and the Executive Council approves her, Ayotte reaches a settlement with Planned Parenthood, the terms of which are not disclosed.   Ayotte never made any public protest against a judge ordering her — as the real winner of the Supreme Court case, which both she and Sarah Palin now tout that she “won,” — to pay the “loser,” Planned Parenthood.  Winners do not pay losers’ legal fees.  It makes no sense.  Yet Ayotte said nothing, and agreed to the payments, it was subsequently disclosed, of $300,000 in NH taxpayers money right into the coffers of Planned Parenthood.  She could have appealed this ruling, if she thought it was wrong.  She didn’t.  She just requested the Administrative Services Commissioner of NH to make two payments to Planned Parenthood, $300,000 in two equal amounts on April 1 and August 1 of 2009.
8.   July 2009:  Even before the final payoff is made to Planned Parenthood, and only 3 months after accepting a four-year term as Attorney General, Ayotte resigns as Attorney General to begin her run, as a “pro-life Republican,” for the U.S. Senate.
To learn more about the facts about the Planned Parenthood case go here

For many pro-life voters the Planned Parenthood debate is complicated and confusing.  What is not complicated and confusing, however,  is video of Ayotte in her own words saying she would have voted YES, as a U.S. Senator, to put an Obama liberal judicial activist like Sonia Sotomayor on the highest court in our land — a certain vote on that Court to endorse and perpetuate the atrocity of the 1973 decision Roe v. Wade that made abortion on demand the law of the land and has led to the death of 50 million innocent pre-born children.

Does a candidate for the United States Senate deserve the support of the pro-life movement and pro-life voters when she says she would have voted for President Obama’s liberal Supreme Court pick?

We think not.

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Culture of Death Knocks on Congress’ Door, Catholics Called to Action – Day of Prayer and Fast

March 13, 2010

Last week was a crazy and confusing week given the latest twists and turns emanating from the final days of the health care battle.  Pro-government run health care forces are doing all they can to play parliamentary games to try and pass pro-abortion, pro-euthanasia, government imposed health care on the American people, despite the peoples’ fairly obvious objection — over and over again. 

SMS has covered the health care debate ad nauseum.  This is because of the tremendous life-altering impact health care “reform,” as proposed by pro-abortion/euthanasia forces in Washington, mainly President Obama and his allies in Congress, Speaker Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, will have on the American people and our culture.  Obama, Pelosi and Reid are trying to pull out every trick in the book to force the American public, the taxpayer, to fund elective abortion on demand and sign up for policies that lead to rationing of care, as well as force doctors to perform abortions and engage practices that ration care. 

A new study out by the New England Journal of Medicine says that almost 1/3 of Doctors say they would leave the health profession if the Obama Democrats version of health care passes.  Yet we see little of this in the national media.

The USCCB issued a Call to Action that will appeared in many bulletins on Sunday urging Catholics to call their Represenatives and Senators and once again  make our voices heard in defense of the sanctity of life, from conception to natural death.  It also declares that a conscience protections clause must be in the final bill, protecting the rights of doctors, nurses and other pro-life medical professionals who refuse to engage in life ending practices or counseling on abortion or euthanasia.

You can read the Call to Action and bulletin insert here.

Additionally, SMS is asking our supporters to pass the word in joining Bishop Paul Loverde, Bishop of the Diocese of Arlington, VA in his call for Monday, March 15th to be a national day of prayer and fast to protect the sanctity of life in any health care legislation that comes from Congress. 

Learn more about the fast here.

Make no mistake, the health care bill that will be voted on this week will include taxpayer funding for abortion, will lead to rationing of health care and is devoid of sufficient protections for pro-life doctors, nurses and medical professionals.  The culture of death is knocking on Congress’ door.  Given that no life-protecting measures are in the bill to be voted on next week, SMS urges our supporters to call their Representatives and Senators and tell them to vote NO! 

Call your Congressman at 202-225-3121

Call your Senator at 202-224-3121

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Santorum: Opponents of Same-Sex Marriage Have Faced Persecution in California

February 10, 2010

Former pro-life, pro-family Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, has a terrific piece today in the Philadelphia Inquirer revealing the campaign of hate and intimidation waged by the pro-gay marriage community in California against supporters of Proposition 8.  In the November 2008 election Prop 8 was reaffirmed by a vote of 6,838,107 / 52.3% Yes votes to 6,246,463 / 47.7% No votes. 

Sen. Santorum reports:

The reaction of some Prop 8 opponents – the self-proclaimed champions of tolerance – was swift and fierce. They moved to harass and persecute Prop 8 supporters. 

Groups such as the misnamed “Californians Against Hate” published blacklists of Prop 8 backers that included supporters’ names and addresses. Prop 8 advocates became the target of harassing protests, phone calls, e-mails, and mailings.

A flier distributed in one town featured a photo of one Prop 8 backer, his name, the amount of his donation, and the name of his (Catholic) church. Next to his photo was the word “Bigot.”

Some Prop 8 campaign donors had to resign from their jobs or take leaves of absence to protect their employers and colleagues. Top officials of California Musical Theatre and the Los Angeles Film Festival were forced to resign just because they had donated in support of Prop 8.

That wasn’t all. These warriors for the oppressed also made a point of going after pro-Prop 8 Mormons and their church.

Despite having passed twice in California including by 61% of the vote in the 2000 election, the pro-gay marriage movement continues to try to reject the will of the people.

To learn more about the ongoing fight to defend marriage in California and throughout the country, you can visit www.nationformarriage.org.

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