Free Republic

Washington, DC -- A new report from a pro-abortion group claims that family planning programs reduce the number of abortions. However, direct evidence from places where birth control and the morning after pill have been aggressively promoted show abortions increasing even with wider use.

Vasectomy has always been an unpopular operation in the dacoit-infested Chambal district of Madhya Pradesh, but it enjoyed a brief surge in popularity last year. More than 250 men put their private parts under the surgeon’s knife through 2008; this, in a place where the male sterilisation figure had never reached double figures in the past 20 years. They had an incentive: the government, in the form of Shivpuri District Collector Manish Shrivastava, had promised them an arms licence each if they underwent the operation. They did so in family planning camps where forms for gun licences were made available....

NFP — It Ain’t Your Momma’s Rhythm August 18th, 2008 by Mary Ellen Barrett “Are they all yours?”I get asked that question at least twice a week these days.  It doesn’t bother me very much since I realize that having seven children makes me a bit unique by societal norms. I can’t imagine why anyone would think I would willingly take other people’s children with me to Costco or the dentist (I wouldn’t) but it’s one of those questions that pop out of people’s mouths when they see me and my tribe out and about trying to accomplish those everyday...

The Elliot Institute has released a report that exposes America's forced abortion epidemic. Elliot Institute spokesperson Amy Solby tells OneNewsNow that one study found 64 percent of women who had abortions reported they felt pressured to abort by others. "Something like 80 percent of them said that they didn't get the counseling they needed to make a good decision, that often they were not given counseling at all, or that the counseling they had was inadequate," she explains.

That's one six-year-old's take on the facts of life. ... Frederica, 6: They come from Mummy's tummy. They start like an egg. I'm not sure how the egg gets there to begin with. I think it comes from food. You eat lots of food, very healthy food, and that makes the egg. But you do have to eat very healthy food, even like 18 broccolis a week...

When a pastor says something in a sermon that you do not like, goes the old joke, he has “gone from preaching to meddling.” He has stopped telling pleasant and comforting stories (or enjoyably convicting stories about the sins you don’t commit) and started interfering with your life. Many traditional Christians and cultural conservatives love what the family scholar Allan Carlson has called “the Natural Family” as a theory, because Americans love anything “natural.” It seems more direct, more genuine, more authentic, untainted by commerce and calculation. And it has its political uses: They love to appeal to Nature to...

The day after Pope Benedict XVI departed the U.S..., Blaine Harden of the Washington Post lamented the Catholic Church’s influence in the Philippines, specifically, the government of Philippines "acceding to Catholic doctrine" by "supporting only what it calls ‘natural’ family planning," rejecting "modern contraception" as part of family planning." Throughout his article, titled "Birthrates Help Keep Filipinos in Poverty," Harden painted a bleak picture of "the fastest-growing segment of the Philippine population," which is "very poor people with large families," and sought to blame their poverty and backwardness on their following Catholic teaching, brushing aside corruption and other factors that...

If a Democratic president enters the White House about a year from now, some experts in family planning anticipate a boon for mankind: a greater effort by the United States government to restrain world population growth. As it is, when a baby born today enters kindergarten, the number of people in the world will have grown by more than 300 million. That's on top of the 6.7 billion individuals alive today. That four-year population-growth projection is comparable to the 303 million people now living in the US – the third most populous nation in the world after China and India....

The push is on Planned Parenthood mounts campaign to pressure Gov. Schwarzenegger into signing bill that would provide millions more in state funding for family planning Planned Parenthood affiliates across California have geared up their PR machines once again, this time in an effort to persuade Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to sign a bill that could result in the state spending another $3.2 million a year on “family planning services.” Planned Parenthood, whose California affiliates typically end each fiscal year with budget surpluses in the millions, want the governor to sign SB-94, sponsored by Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Los Angeles. The...

"Pro-Life" Casey Votes Twice to Enable US Funding for Abortion Overseas By Meg Jalsevac WASHINGTON, DC, September 14, 2007, (LifeSiteNews.com) - Last week Senator Bob Casey, Jr. (Democrat-Pennsylvania) actively contradicted his largely pro-life campaign promises by voting to approve a funding appropriations bill that would provide US funding to foreign organizations that promote and provide abortions.       The funding bill (HR 2764) would effectively overturn the Mexico City Policy, a foreign aid policy which expressly prohibits the funding of overseas agencies involved in abortion.  The policy was first adopted by President Ronald Reagan and continued in the presidency of Bush, Sr. ...

by Steven ErteltLifeNews.com EditorAugust 29, 2007Beijing, China (LifeNews.com) -- A Chinese couple had filed a lawsuit against family planning officials over a forced abortion that has left the couple unable to have children. The suit hasn't been successful so far and it points to the problems associated with the population control policies in China that allow families just one child.Yang Zhongchen, a small-town businessman, hoped he could buy off family planning officials to allow him and his wife to have a baby.But one night just weeks before she was scheduled to give birth, authorities took Yang's wife Jin Yani from...

Poland Abortion Group Says Women Head to Other Nations for Abortions by Steven Ertelt LifeNews.com Editor August 28, 2007 Warsaw, Poland (LifeNews.com) -- In an effort to promote abortions in this pro-life nation, pro-abortion advocates in Poland are trying to make the case that abortion should be legalized because so many women travel to other European nations for them. The Polish Federation for Woman and Family Planning claims several thousand Poles head abroad every year. Wanda Nowicka, the head of the pro-abortion organization, says “Women from Warsaw most often choose either Britain or the Netherlands." The British Pregnancy Advisory Service,...

Julio Severo Interview - Part 1 Severo tells how he became involved in pro-life and how Brazil has been changed since the late 1980s By Matthew Cullinan Hoffman See introductory story at http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/aug/07082811.html SAO PAULO, August 28, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com)LifeSiteNews.com: How long have you been involved in pro-life and pro-family work?  How did you get started? Julio Severo: My first contact with the pro-life message was through publications from Last Days Ministries, in 1986. Through them I learned about Americans Against Abortion (a branch of Last Days Ministries). Before, I supported abortion in cases of rape and risk of life. Later,...

Chinese Courts Hear Unprecedented "Family Planning" Lawsuit By Peter J. Smith BEIJING, July 31, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - For the first time China's judicial system has accepted a "family planning" lawsuit from a woman who says that her forced abortion seven years ago has rendered her unable to bear children. Caijing Magazine reports that a Chinese appeals court has agreed to hear the case of Jin Yani and her husband Yang Zhongchen. The couple is suing a local department of China's State Population and Family Planning Commission, which forced Jin to undergo a brutal partial-birth abortion when she was 9 months...

US Mexico City Policy Under Fire in Congress New assault on policy prohibiting federal funds going to abortion-providing organizations is deceptive Editorial by Colin Mason of the Population Research Institute The Mexico City Policy is under fire in Congress . . . again. Last month, the House of Representatives, at the instigation of Congresswoman Nita Lowey (D-NY) voted 223-201 to pass a bill seeking to gut the Mexico City Policy. This Reagan-era policy prohibits American tax dollars from going to abortion-performing organizations in other countries. Pro-abortion organizations, which have lost hundreds of millions of dollars on account of this restriction,...

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa, July 20, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - World famous opponent of South African apartheid, Nelson Mandela, celebrated his 89th birthday last Wednesday by announcing the formation of a Global council of elders, known simply as "The Elders."So far The Elders includes Kofi Annan, Desmond Tutu, Gro Harlem Brundtland, Mary Robinson, Jimmy Carter, Li Zhaoxing, Muhammad Yunus, Ela Bhatt, Graca Machel, and, of course, Nelson Mandela.  The group of high-profile international leaders is intended to be an independent body of "wise" men and women that will use their combined experience to solve any of the host of problems currently...

Thousands of villagers in south-west China have attacked family planning officials, overturned cars and set fire to government buildings in a riot sparked by the state's "one-child" policy. Riot police have been dispatched to at least four townships in the Guanxi autonomous region after a weekend of disturbances that led to multiple injuries and unconfirmed reports of two fatalities, witnesses and Hong Kong media reported today. The unrest comes in the wake of a new crackdown by the Bobai county government against families that break birth control regulations. Financial penalties have increased and parents who fail to pay are being...

BEIJING, Jan. 23 -- Fines imposed on Chinese who violate the country's one-child-only policy may be reduced for the poor, a top family planning official said Tuesday, as authorities stressed a broader approach to population management. The announcement came a day after state media reported that many Chinese believe it is unfair that the wealthy can "buy" a second child by simply paying fines for breaking the one-child-only rule for most urban couples. "Rich people and poor people, they are all equal before the law," Zhang Weiqing, the head of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, told reporters in...

A Full Quiver A Growing Movement for Growing Families for God By TED GERSTEIN and JOHN BERMAN January 3, 2007 - In the Carpenter family's nicely decorated living room outside Nashville, Tenn., the "Nightline" team stared at a couch that couldn't possibly fit another human being. The eight kids squished together began shouting out their names, "PEYTON! COLE! OWEN!" The eight Carpenter children at home. Their parents are followers of the "Quiverfull Movement," which opposes birth control and family planning. (ABCNews) Ken and Devon Carpenter are the parents of eight kids, aged 1 to 15. It might sound like...

British scientists have developed a revolutionary pill that men could take as a one-off contraceptive just before a date. The tablet would prevent a man from being able to impregnate a woman, but within a few hours his fertility would return to normal. This would make it much more acceptable to men than other 'male pills' under development, which alter hormone levels and have to be taken over the long term. It is also more likely to be trusted by women as they are not relying on their man having to remember to take his pill every day for it...