Free Republic

DAYTON — After her best childhood friend died from breast cancer, Ruth Deddens began researching the causes of the dreaded disease. The Oakwood woman’s investigation eventually led her to Angela Lanfranchi, a clinical assistant professor of surgery at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in New Jersey and president of the Breast Cancer Prevention Institute. Deddens, active in the “40 Days for Life” movement, decided to bring Lanfranchi to town as part of this year’s local pro-life campaign. Lanfranchi — who insists there are proven links between breast cancer, abortion and birth control pills — was the featured speaker at...

Estrogen – from artificial contraception pills, consumed daily by tens of millions of women – is making its way through sewage treatment plants and severely pollutes our waterways with chilling consequences. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar reacted to an August report that emissions from coal-fired power plants have led to widespread mercury pollution in our rivers and streams by saying: "this science sends a clear message that our country must continue to confront pollution, restore our nation's waterways, and protect the public from potential health dangers." Who, after all, wants toxic levels of mercury in our rivers? But mercury is not...

Are New Vaccines Laced with Birth-Control Drugs? During the early 1990s, the World Health Organization (WHO) had been overseeing massive vaccination campaigns against tetanus in a number of countries, among them Nicaragua, Mexico, and the Philippines. In October 1994, HLI received a communication from its Mexican affiliate, the Comite' Pro Vida de Mexico, regarding that country's anti-tetanus campaign. Suspicious of the campaign protocols, the Comite' obtained several vials of the vaccine and had them analyzed by chemists. Some of the vials were found to contain human chorionic gonadotrophin (hCG), a naturally occurring hormone essential for maintaining a pregnancy. hCG and...

" chemist who led to the invention of the birth control pill says he regrets the demographic catastrophe that has resulted from people using the contraceptive device to separate reproduction from sexuality, reports Baptist Press. Carl Djerassi, the 85-year-old Austrian chemist who was one of three whose formulation of synthetic hormones paved the way for the pill, wrote an opinion piece in the Austrian newspaper Der Standard lamenting the way the pill has been used. Austria's population now includes more people over age 65 than under 15, and Djerassi said the country soon will face an "impossible situation" as the...

This could be dismissed as anti-human - but the theory the environment can be saved by encouraging the use of birth control is one that has been popular with media some environmentalists. CNN's Lou Dobbs certainly hasn't shied away from the idea. On his Sept. 21 broadcast, Dobbs revisited an early report that the true path to environmental salvation wasn't by curbing greenhouse gas, but instead by subscribing to a Malthusian theory that slowing the growth of human population was the best path. "We have more tonight on a story that we first brought to you last month, Dobbs said....

LONDON – Giving contraceptives to people in developing countries could help fight climate change by slowing population growth, experts said Friday. More than 200 million women worldwide want contraceptives, but don't have access to them, according to an editorial published in the British medical journal, Lancet. That results in 76 million unintended pregnancies every year. If those women had access to free condoms or other birth control methods, that could slow rates of population growth, possibly easing the pressure on the environment, the editors say. "There is now an emerging debate and interest about the links between population dynamics, sexual...

Progressives exist in a state of constant angst, agonizing over snail darters, incandescent light bulbs, and of course global warming. But the issue that drives liberals to a state of tongue-wagging, eyeball-popping hysteria is population growth — what doomsayer Paul Erlich once termed the "Population Bomb." And history shows liberals are willing to take almost any measure to keep the population in check — just so long as the program can be cloaked in mesmerizing happy-talk. Want to stop the beating hearts of 46 million unborn children each year? Then just call it "promoting choice and empowering women" — doesn't...

INDIANAPOLIS -- A popular, relatively new birth control pill is the subject of several television ads from attorneys that ask people to come forward if they have suffered side effects. The controversy involves Yaz, a contraceptive taken by mouth that has been on the market since 2006, 6News' Sarah Cornell reported. When it came out, the label listed very few side effects, and that's partially the reason law firms, including Ken Nunn, are pursuing legal action. Attorneys are actively gathering clients to sue Bayer, the manufacturer of Yaz, claiming that the company neglected to list side effects, such as blood...

Catholic villagers in Thua Thien-Hue province say they have tried their best to follow Church teaching on the use of artificial birth control methods in the face of the government's two-child policy. Huong Toan villagers, just like Vietnamese elsewhere in the country, are required to have no more than two children per family since 1994, when village authorities launched a nationwide family planning program. Families with more than two children have to pay rice to the government as a fine. Many local Catholics say they have done their best to remain true to Church teaching but some have had to...

“Birth control,” [Margaret Sanger] declared in 1923, “is nothing more or less than the facilitation of the process of weeding out the unfit, or preventing the birth of defectives or of those who will become defectives.” Her mission: to stop ”keeping alive thousands who never, in all human compassion, should have been brought into this world.”Sanger was ambitious. She actively advocated for sterilization of the great unwashed - the “feeble-minded, insane… deaf, deformed and dependent,” including “orphans, ne’er-do-wells, tramps, the homeless and paupers.” Talk about a hard knock life.

A cancer awareness group says as schools pass out birth control to young girls, they are failing to notify them about an increased health risk. According to Karen Malec, president of The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer, young girls who are prescribed estrogen+progestin-based birth control by their school nurses are at an increased risk for breast, cervix, and liver cancer. World Health Organization conducted a study in 2005 and found that type of birth control carcinogenic. "In other words, they cause cancer in human beings," she notes. "And they assign these drugs the highest level of carcinogenicity -- the highest level...

Sex Sermonist's Heroes: Pope John Paul II and Hugh Hefner Devout Catholic Christopher West Lays Out Unexpected Vision of What Sex Can Mean for Christians Christopher West is not your average sex therapist. He's a devout Catholic who believes one of the most important ways we can get closer to God is through great sex.   "As Christians, we are desperately in need of a renewed vision of our sexuality," West has sermonized. "The union of man and woman itself is meant to be here on planet Earth an image, a foretaste, a little glimmer of the eternal ecstasy that...

Among some conservative Christians, a movement is giving new meaning to the biblical mandate to "be fruitful and multiply." The movement, called Quiverfull, is based on Psalm 127, which says, "Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are sons born in one's youth. Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them." Those in the Quiverfull movement shun birth control, believing that God will give them the right number of children. It turns out, that's a lot of kids. 'We Actually Didn't Want Children' While cooking a typical predawn breakfast in the Swanson household in Shelby, Mich., 10-year-old...

Tuesday, March 17, 2009 Do Condom Corporations Kill You for Your Money "When used consistently and correctly"... Abstinence = 0% Chance of Infection / 100% safe Condoms = 20% Chance of Infection / 80% safe "In one study, condoms failed to prevent HIV transmission 17% of the time (ref. 51). A review of several studies found that HIV infection rates for couples using condoms ranged from 13-27%" http://www.thefreelibrary.com/The+barrier+performance+of+latex+rubber-a014089514 "...experts estimate that consistent condom use reduces the risk of HIV transmission by about 80 to 90 percent. We are unable to quantify this protective effect more precisely..." http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/354/25/2642 "...no barrier method...

CNN) -- Dr. J. Stephen Jones had seven vasectomies to perform in a day. Some urologists around the country are reporting increased numbers of patients coming in for vasectomies. "My staff came to me and said, what's happening?" said Jones, the chairman of the Department of Regional Urology of Glickman Urological and Kidney Institute at the Cleveland Clinic. "Why are we suddenly having an explosion in guys asking for vasectomies?" They looked at their statistics and realized the uptick started around November as the economic crisis deepened. October went down in the history books as one of Wall Street's worst...

The estimated 39 percent of American college women who use birth control pills could enjoy relief from big price increases over the last two years thanks to a provision in the budget bill signed by President Barack Obama. Students had seen prices for oral contraceptives at college health clinics shoot up two- and threefold — the apparently unintended consequence of a deficit-reduction provision that went into effect in January, 2007. The bill Obama signed Wednesday restores an incentive for drug-makers to offer discounts for the pills, although it doesn't guarantee they will do so. Still, college health officials were celebrating...

Senate-Backed Stimulus Bill Contains Birth Control Bailout for Planned Parenthood by Steven ErteltLifeNews.com Editor March 11, 2009 Email RSSPrint Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- The so-called economic stimulus bill the Senate approved on Tuesday contains a bailout package for Planned Parenthood that will give the abortion giant hundreds of millions of dollars to promote birth control. President Barack Obama is soon expected to sign the bill into law.Specifically, a provision buried deep in the legislation clears the way for expanded federal funding of contraceptives through Medicaid for those who aren't even poor.A Clinton-era program allows states to seek a waiver...

Eighty five year old Carl Djerassi the Austrian chemist who helped invent the contraceptive pill now says that his co-creation has led to a "demographic catastrophe." In an article published by the Vatican this week, the head of the world's Catholic doctors broadened the attack on the pill, claiming it had also brought "devastating ecological effects" by releasing into the environment "tonnes of hormones" that had impaired male fertility, The Taiwan Times says. The assault began with a personal commentary in the Austrian newspaper Der Standard by Carl Djerassi. The Austrian chemist was one of three whose formulation of the...

Margaret Sanger, the leader of the birth control movement in America, talks to Wallace about why she became an advocate for birth control, over-population, the Catholic Church, and morality.

A Prophecy Fulfilled Fr. Stanislas de Lestapis, a French Jesuit, died in 1999 at the age of 94. He had been a member of the Papal Commission on Birth Control and was one of the signatories of its so-called Minority Report. He had published a book on Birth Control, of which the third edition appeared in 1962, long before Humanae Vitae (1968). In Chapter 7, on The Contraceptive Civilization, he made the following bold prophecies: 'We do not hesitate to say that the acceptance of contraception will produce profound changes in our civilization. These changes are already taking place in...

Amanda, age 30 -- I've changed her name and those of other women I interviewed for this story in order to protect their privacy -- is a daughter of the sexual revolution. Her mother taught her that "sex was free, and successful motherhood could be accomplished through good intentions," she says. Sexual freedom and successful motherhood, Amanda learned, meant one thing: birth control. The message she received, she says, not only from her mother but from her teachers, her friends, and the entire culture around her was, "Sex means fun, and the consequences of sex have passed."   At...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)--A chemist who led to the invention of the birth control pill says he regrets the demographic catastrophe that has resulted from people using the contraceptive device to separate reproduction from sexuality. Carl Djerassi, the 85-year-old Austrian chemist who was one of three whose formulation of synthetic hormones paved the way for the pill, wrote an opinion piece in the Austrian newspaper Der Standard lamenting the way the pill has been used. Austria's population now includes more people over age 65 than under 15, and Djerassi said the country soon will face an "impossible situation" as the working...

WASHINGTON (AP) - House Democrats are likely to jettison family planning funds for the low-income from an $825 billion economic stimulus bill, officials said late Monday, following a personal appeal from President Barack Obama at a time the administration is courting Republican critics of the legislation. Several officials said a final decision was expected on Tuesday, coinciding with Obama's scheduled visit to the Capitol for separate meetings with House and Senate Republicans. The provision has emerged as a point of contention among Republicans, who criticize it as an example of wasteful spending that would neither create jobs nor otherwise improve...

PELOSI SAYS BIRTH CONTROL WILL HELP ECONOMY To the Editor: Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi boldly defended a move to add birth control funding to the new economic "stimulus" package, claiming "contraception will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government." Pelosi, the mother of 5 children and 6 grandchildren, who once said, "Nothing in my life will ever, ever compare to being a mom," seemed to imply babies are somehow a burden on the treasury. The revelation came during an exchange Sunday morning (January 25) on ABC's THIS WEEK. In 1984, former Democrat Governor Richard Lamm...

Looks like it wasn’t a gaffe, but official Dem policy . . . When I saw the big headline in Drudge this morning about Nancy Pelosi defending money included in the stimulus package for birth control on the grounds it will reduce government costs for children’s health care and education, I figured it was an embarrassing mistake that would soon be corrected. But then Bob Wexler went on Hardball and said very much the same thing. Looks like the Dems have made it official policy to promote a reduction in the number of births as a cost-cutting measure . The...

Operation Reservoir Tip Mail all "New-Unused" Condoms to: The Honorable Nancy Pelosi H-232, U.S. Capitol Washington, D.C. 20515 202-225-0100

Goodness! We haven't even buried Msgr. Bill Smith yet, and the politicos are making contraception an issue again after all these years. Remember how, during the previous administration, liberals were popping veins because America was "out of step" with the rest of the world? Remember how Mr. Obama was going to talk to everyone who didn't like us, magically making them all like us again because he talked to them? Well, there could be no clearer illustration of America being out of touch with the rest of the world than a comparison of the following two stories. The first is...

No details yet, it's the main headline though...

The Hour Is Late January 19th, 2009 by Patti Maguire Armstrong Ladies and gentleman,May I have your attention please?  Put down the birth control.  You heard me.  Put it down and walk away.I don’t like to be harsh, but the hour is late.  The citizens of many countries belong on the endangered species because they are dying out.  Never before in the history of the world have so many countries lost so many people without disease or war to blame.  This loss is by choice and it’s downright suicidal.Why?I am not telling you to have more children if you do...

Missionaries, not aid money, are the solution to Africa's biggest problem - the crushing passivity of the people's mindset. Before Christmas I returned, after 45 years, to the country that as a boy I knew as Nyasaland. Today it's Malawi, and The Times Christmas Appeal includes a small British charity working there. Pump Aid helps rural communities to install a simple pump, letting people keep their village wells sealed and clean. I went to see this work. It inspired me, renewing my flagging faith in development charities. But travelling in Malawi refreshed another belief, too: one I've been trying to...

It's the latest and trendiest in the contracepting world - "Essure coils" (one pictured at left): Getting your tubes tied is not the most appealing phrase, but it's way more user-friendly than sterilization. Maybe that's why the maker of Essure--a newer, cheaper, faster, scalpel-free alternative to tubal ligation--is marketing the procedure as "permanent birth control."... The 1 1/2-in.-long (38 mm) coils--which are like pen springs but smaller and softer--contain fibers that irritate the tubes and prompt scar tissue to grow into and around the tiny loops. After three months, the Fallopian tubes are blocked, preventing eggs from reaching the uterus...

Where should a young couple wanting to know, practically and theologically, what the Catholic Church has to say about natural family planning go these days? Well among other places they could go to a Protestant couple. In particular, they should look for Sam and Bethany Torode....

Sanger's plans for genetic cleansing for the sake of "racial health" were racist as well. She was horrified by the fertility of the immigrant "Slavs, Latins [i.e., Italians], and Hebrews," ...As for the black population in the United States, Sanger "did not want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population..."

Ministers have ordered council and health chief executives to increase the uptake of "long-acting" contraception in teen pregnancy "hot spots". The government also wants more school-based clinics to administer the jabs,which can make girls infertile for up to three months. Teenagers can receive the injections or implants without their parents' knowledge. Critics warn that the controversial move will promote promiscuity and that injections and implants will not protect against the rampant spread of sexually transmitted disease. Some health experts also say that the drugs are unsuitable for girls who are still growing. In letters demanding "urgent action to accelerate progress...

Cardinal Martini's Jesus Would Never Have Written "Humanae Vitae" He is a Jesus who struggles against injustice. So he also opposes the "lies" and "damage" of the encyclical by Paul VI prohibiting artificial contraception. So writes the former archbishop of Milan in his latest book. But in the meantime, in another book, two scholars take a different approach to the spirit of that document by Sandro Magister ROMA, November 3, 2008 – In his latest book-interview, published first in Germany and now also in Italy, Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini calls himself not an anti-pope, as he is often depicted by...

Johnson & Johnson has paid at least $68.7 million to settle hundreds of lawsuits related to its Ortho Evra birth-control patch, which has been linked to harmful blood clots. The patch exposes women to higher doses of estrogen than ordinary contraceptive pills. Some studies have suggested that increased exposure raises the risk of blood clots, which can lead to strokes or heart attacks. J&J says the patch is safe if used according to its Food and Drug Administration-approved label. According to the wire service: Of 562 complaints reviewed by Bloomberg News, the vast majority of users alleged the patch caused...

Pope reaffirms Church opposition to contraception VATICAN CITY (AFP) — Pope Benedict XVI on Friday reaffirmed the Catholic Church's condemnation of artificial birth control, a position that has driven millions of people away from the faith. Contraception "means negating the intimate truth of conjugal love, with which the divine gift (of life) is communicated," the leader of the world's 1.1 billion Roman Catholics wrote on the 40th anniversary of a papal encyclical on the controversial topic. The message came two months after an appeal for a retraction by some 60 Catholic groups who said the Church's stance had been "catastrophic"...

Austin, Aug 13, 2008 / 09:15 pm (CNA).- Citing a desire to let their faith in God guide their sex lives and to trust Him in every aspect of their existence, some Protestants have become practitioners of Natural Family Planning (NFP). Eschewing contraceptives, some are now joining Catholics in fertility classes and returning to traditional Christian teaching.The Austin American-Statesman reports that the number of NFP practitioners who are Protestants is difficult to quantify. However, Rev. Amy Laura Hall, a Methodist minister and associate professor at Duke Divinity School, says there appears to be growing interest. She said that, as...

New York, NY (LifeNews.com) -- If there is any place in the nation women can get free or low-cost birth control, it's New York City. But a new report indicates the abortion rate in the nation's largest city is three times higher than the national average despite the easy access to birth control and contraception. While a survey from the Alan Guttmacher Institute, a part of Planned Parenthood, shows fewer than 20 percent of all pregnancies nationwide end in abortion, 72 pregnancies end in abortion in New York for every 100 births. http://www.lifenews.com/nat3624.html More than 250 abortions are done every...

Contraception and the Language of the Body — Part 3 of 6 July 31st, 2008 by Christopher West ·Print · ShareThis We continue our series [Part one, Part two] commemorating the 40th anniversary of Humanae Vitae. Pope Paul VI released this oh-so-controversial encyclical on July 25, 1968, re-affirming the constant teaching of the Church on the immorality of contraception. To this day it remains a “thorn in the side” of many. It was once a thorn in my side as well. John Paul II’s “theology of the body” helped remove that thorn and show me the glorious fragrance of the...

It’s not just about the filioque or the Immaculate Conception, folks. Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI have encouraged Catholics to reach out to Orthodox Christians, to respect them and learn their traditions. Catholics by and large have accepted that the Orthodox really are very close to Catholicism in many areas. But many would be surprised to learn that some Orthodox hierarchs (and Oriental Orthodox hierarchs) are soft, even permissive on the issue of abortion–soft like Anglicans.His Holiness, Patriarch Karekin I of Etchmiadzin of Armenia (Oriental Orthodox) who came on a pastoral visit to the US had this...

More than 50 dissident Catholic groups from around the world have written an open letter asking Pope Benedict XVI to lift the church's ban on birth control. Taking a half-page ad in the Italian daily Corriere della Sera, the groups said Friday that the Church's ban on artificial birth control has had "catastrophic effects," particularly in the fight against AIDS. The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said the accusation was "clearly unfounded" and insisted the Church is active in combating AIDS. The groups published their appeal on the 40th anniversary of the 1968 encyclical "Humanae Vitae" ("On Human Life")...

...by Mary Eberstadt,  a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, is a great article in the August/September issue of First Things and is available online. I'll get you started: That Humanae Vitae and related Catholic teachings about sexual morality are laughingstocks in all the best places is not exactly news. Even in the benighted precincts of believers, where information from the outside world is known to travel exceedingly slowly, everybody grasps that this is one doctrine the world loves to hate. During Benedict XVI’s April visit to the United States, hardly a story in the secular press failed to mention...

Does Contraception Foster Love? — Part 2 of 6 July 22nd, 2008 by Christopher West We continue a series of reflections on the issue of contraception in light of the 40th anniversary of Humanae Vitae. When Pope Paul VI issued this document on July 25, 1968, it fell like a bomb. Many people wished the issue would just go away. It hasn’t. And it won’t. In fact, it can’t “go away.” This encyclical takes us to the very foundations of human life (humanae vitae).In the last column, we looked at how contraception has played a key role in the cultural...

Planned Parenthood's political action committee released a new TV ad today hitting presumptive Republican nominee John McCain's stand on birth control. The ad highlights a pregnant pause when McCain was asked last week about some insurers covering the erectile dysfunction drug Viagra, but not birth control measures. "I don't know enough about it to give you an informed answer," McCain, hand stroking his chin, finally answered in an interview that has made the rounds of the liberal blogosphere ever since.

Philadelphia has one of the most backward and incompetent city governments in America. It suffers from a combination of failed civic institutions, a deeply embedded racial paranoia that undermines law enforcement, and a local culture that has come to shrug at the urban chaos this produces. In 2006, the one-or-two-a-day-and a-dozen-on-weekends murder spree that earned "Killadelphia" its rap as an urban abattoir resulted in 406 people dead. It's clearly not all about poverty. Miami, America's poorest major city, saw 79 homicides in all of 2006. In March 2006, more Americans died violently on the streests of Philadelphia than in Iraq...

Journey to the Truth May 23rd, 2008 by Anna Pier Day I argued with the priest — the strong-willed one — who sat opposite me in the confessional. For every argument I presented, though, his response was the same: a calm, understanding, but firm, “There are no exceptions to the Church’s teaching against contraception.”Truth be told, if the Church had been less wise and had made exceptions, our family situation might have qualified as one. A few months earlier, after the birth of our youngest son, I had suffered from an acute depression with accompanying suicidal thoughts and a brief...

'Might our religion be killing us?' That's what a Baptist minister was asking recently in an editorial in USA Today. Rev. Oliver "Buzz" Thomas writes: Be fruitful and multiply," says the book of Genesis, and Lord knows we have. To the tune of more than 300 million at home and more than 6 billion abroad. But as we go about the heavenly task of multiplying, a poignant question arises: Might our religion be killing us? Insert the deep dark foreboding music. We all remember the Aztecs. Some say their religion, with its penchant for violence and human sacrifice, played a...

(IsraelNN.com) Israel re-opened Gaza crossings Thursday for shipments of humanitarian aid after terrorist attacks forced a restriction of shipments on Wednesday. The Nahal Oz fuel depot also was re-opened, and 180 tons of cooking and 681,000 liters of fuel were transferred. More than 160 trucks moved through the Sufa and Karni crossings with medical supplies and medications, fruit, poultry, cleaning products, meat, juice, dairy products, sugar, garlic, nylon, fish, carrots, salt, soy sauce, meat preservatives, nylon for greenhouses, wheat and corn.

Fr. Thomas Euteneuer  Other Articles by Fr. Thomas EuteneuerPrinter Friendly Version   In Persona Christi: The Priest and Contraception March 24, 2008 In Persona Christi, the priest stands for the Bridegroom in ministering to His Bride, the Church. In bringing new life to the Bride in the sacraments, especially the Eucharist, he acts in a husbanding role and as a father. He cultivates. The marriage bed is the altar of the domestic Church. Just as the priest brings new life spiritually (zoe) to the Bride on the altar, the husband brings new biological life (bios) to his wife on...