Free Republic

The Springfield School Committee has given first-step approval to a policy that would make condoms available to students as young as 12. The committee voted 5-1 Thursday night in favor of the "Comprehensive Reproductive Health Policy" in an effort to prevent sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancy. The policy also includes a provision for student counseling. The policy also allows parents "to deny permission (opt out) for access to condoms for their students." It still needs a second vote of approval before it is final.

CHICAGO, IL March 15, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) – On behalf of local residents and the Missionary Sisters of St. Charles Borromeo, Thomas More Society attorneys demanded that the Village of Stone Park, Illinois, put a halt to construction of a three-million dollar strip club, “Get It,” located several feet from the property line of the Sisters’ convent. “For over 60 years, the Sisters of St. Charles have devoted their lives to teaching the children of Stone Park – service for which they’re now being repaid with a ‘porno palace’ towering over their convent,” said Peter Breen, executive director of the Thomas...

When the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, i.e., ObamaCare, was being debated in public and in Congress during 2010, Americans who supported life were told again and again that the legislation would not cover abortion. But like so many other aspects of Obama’s healthcare overhaul, what was promised and what was received turned out to be two different things – especially considering that many legislators read the bill only after they signed it into law. For example, the Obama administration has now made it clear that the individual mandate in ObamaCare will contain a charge—an “abortion premium mandate”—to forcibly...

The Obama Regime has mandated that Americans MUST fund abortion by exactly one dollar per month. This is done by mandating that the service commodity of health insurance must be purchased as a condition of lawful residency in the United States. Caesar Tyrannus Obama, I will not submit. Attached as a separate surcharge to every health insurance policy that covers abortion (and TRUST that the regime will soon mandate abortion coverage - just as they have done with contraception, sterilization and abortifacients) will be an "abortion surcharge" of $1.00 per month, to be billed as a separate transaction from the...

I have little to add to Kathryn’s excellent summary of the U.S. Bishops’ statement “United for Religious Freedom.”I do want to register my disappointment with Reuters, however, which attempted to muddy the waters of the bishops’ crystal-clear resolve the day before they issued their statement — while presenting absolutely no evidence to support that narrative: “Facing small but clear signs of discontent within their own ranks, U.S. Catholic bishops may be poised to rethink their aggressive tactics for fighting a federal mandate that health insurance plans cover contraception, according to sources close to influential bishops…… dozens of bishops, meeting this...

SUDBURY, Ontario, March 15, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A Sudbury Catholic girls school is under fire this week after grade 7 students brought home handouts showing them how to perform oral sex. The flyer was given out last Thursday at Marymount Academy, a Catholic all-girls school for grades 7-12, at an event to mark International Women’s Day. Carmen James-Poulin, 62, says her granddaughter, who is in grade 7, “could not believe” it was handed out. “It’s not educational. It’s vulgar. It belongs on a porn site,” James-Poulin told QMI Agency. The flyer, produced by the Toronto-based Canadian AIDS Treatment Information Exchange...

The question has been asked: "Why are President Obama and the Democrats spending so much time and effort on universal coverage of contraception?" Surely they knew that there would be religious objection. Surely they did not think that such a decision would not go unchallenged. Why waste time and resources defending a controversial stance with so many other things going on? Recent polls show President Obama's approval numbers dropping among female voters, despite the "War on Women" attributed to the Republicans, and religious leaders have spoken openly from the pulpit, decrying the legality and morality of the contraception mandate, despite...

On the list of the world’s most unnecessary occupations—aromatherapist, golf pro, journalism professor, vice president of the United States​—​that of medical ethicist ranks very high. They are happily employed by pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, and other outposts of the vast medical-industrial combine, where their job is to advise the boss to go ahead and do what he was going to do anyway (“Put it on the market!” “Pull the plug on the geezer!”). They also attend conferences where they take turns sitting on panels talking with one another and then sitting in the audience watching panels of other medical ethicists talking...

A Planned Parenthood CEO has been arrested in Lubbock, Texas after being charged with indecent exposure. Tony Ray Thornton, President and CEO of the Lubbock affiliate, was arrested and released on bail Tuesday.

A pro-abortion activist writing at one of the leading pro-abortion web sites is admitting what many the pro-life movement has always known but what leading defenders of abortion refuse to admit. Until now.Jessica DelBalzo, an activist writer from Flemington, New Jersey who has written for numerous progressive web sites, puts her extreme pro-abortion views on display at RH Reality Check, where she candidly admits in a headline, “I Love Abortion: Implying Otherwise Accomplishes Nothing for Women’s Rights.”“I love abortion. I don’t accept it. I don’t view it as a necessary evil. I embrace it. I donate to abortion funds. I...

Churches and psychological professional associations are harming people suffering from unwanted same-sex attraction, both spiritually and medically, by their acceptance of the "gay-affirming" ideology pushed by the homosexualist lobby, a Christian psychotherapist told LifeSiteNews.com in an interview today.Lesley Pilkington, a psychotherapist in the UK who was famously the subject of an undercover" sting" by a homosexual activist and journalist, said that there is a "huge gap" in public perception of homosexuality that has been created by a lack of balance in media representation and by the failure of churches to clearly articulate their objections. Pilkington is currently facing professional discipline...

Obama’s hatful war against America’s mainstream religions has been in full rage since the spring of 2008. This is a list of his attacks. April 2008 – Obama speaks disrespectfully of Christians, saying they “cling to guns or religion” and have an “antipathy to people who aren't like them.” February 2009 – Obama announces plans to revoke conscience protection for health workers who refuse to participate in medical activities that go against their beliefs, and fully implements the plan in February 2011. April 2009 – When speaking at Georgetown University, Obama orders that a monogram symbolizing Jesus' name be covered...

St. Patrick must be rolling over in his grave -- and I can say that because I'm part Irish.Instead of receiving the best of what the U.S. has to offer, Ireland has been receiving the worst of what the U.S. has to offer, specifically in the form of boatloads of blood-tainted money from liberal American billionaires.From a March 13 piece at LifeSiteNews.com: The abortion industry is, of course, particularly discomfited by the fact that, according to the United Nations, Ireland, without recourse to abortion, is the safest place in the world for a mother to have a baby. And...

March 13, 2012 (Thelifeinstitute.net) - Ireland’s experience in banning abortion is hugely important for the global pro-life community. That’s because our record proves that we best serve mothers and babies when our laws protect unborn human life. Ireland is the example pro-life activists the world over can point to, because the Irish experience shows that abortion is never necessary. The abortion industry is, of course, particularly discomfited by the fact that, according to the United Nations, Ireland, without recourse to abortion, is the safest place in the world for a mother to have a baby. And Irish medical experts have...

March 13, 2012 (Pop.org) - Sex-selection abortions have been illegal in Great Britain since 1967. But that hasn’t been stopping British abortionists from performing them. A far-reaching undercover investigation carried out by the London Telegraph found that doctors, counselors and medical staff across the country were not only perfectly willing to perform sex-selective abortions, but they were even willing to forge paperwork to cover up their crime. According to The Telegraph, a counselor at a British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) clinic openly admitted to the undercover operative that she would lie on her official paperwork to make sure the abortion...

NEW YORK, NEW YORK, March 12, 2012, (LifeSiteNews.com) – American Idol judge Steve Tyler and his then-girlfriend still regret her abortion. So does former Britney Spears backup singer Kelly Clinger. So do millions of other famous and anonymous women across the country and around the world. Not Amanda Chatel, a self-described “selfish” New York-based freelance writer. In an online article posted on the website The Gloss on Friday, she claimed she had an abortion in 2005, calling it “the best decision of my life” and writing that she prefers the companionship of her Jack Russell terrier to motherhood. Chatel left...

A Virginia bill set to become law will protect the right of faith-based adoption agencies in the state to limit adoption placements to heterosexual couples. The bill, which cleared the Virginia Senate last Friday by a vote of 22-18, allows private adoption agencies to refuse to participate in adoptions that “violate the agency’s written religious or moral convictions or policies.” It also protects the agencies from being denied government licensure, funds, or contracts based on that refusal. An identical bill had passed the state’s House of Delegates early last month, by a vote of 71-to-28. All House Republicans and three...

Iain Duncan Smith will make the Coalition’s most explicit official statement in favour of parents marrying and staying together. He will say that children from such homes are most likely to end up with a good education and a job. The Work and Pensions Secretary will make the declaration as he announces an Early Intervention Foundation to raise millions of pounds from private investors to help disadvantaged children. The Social Justice Strategy Paper will set out plans to tackle the causes of poverty and disadvantage. It makes clear that the stability of parents’ relationships is a key factor in children’s...

It’s official. The concern pro-life organizations had about the ObamaCare legislation funding abortions has been confirmed, as the Obama administration has issued the final rules on abortion funding governing the controversial health care law. Nestled within the “individual mandate” in the Obamacare act — that portion of the Act requiring every American to purchase government — approved insurance or pay a penalty — is an “abortion premium mandate.” This mandate requires all persons enrolled in insurance plans that include elective abortion coverage to pay a separate premium from their own pockets to fund abortion. As a result, many pro-life Americans...

[According to] a Japanese government study: Almost a third of Japanese boys aged 16-20 and three-fifths of girls say that they have no interest in sex. The hormones of late adolescence evidently rage in vain against some cultural barrier that makes young Japanese "despise" sexual relations, according to the Japan Family Planning Association's report [1]. It turns out that the ultimate victim of sexual revolution is sex itself. What makes the Japanese hate sex? The same things that make a growing proportion of Americans hate sex. Joan Sewell's 2007 book I'd Rather Eat Chocolate became the manifesto of American women...