According to a Jan. 29 press release from CatholicVote.org, “After several days of negotiations, an NBC representative in Chicago told CatholicVote.org late yesterday that NBC and the NFL are not interested in advertisements involving ‘political candidates or issues.’”

See the video that you won’t see during the Superbowl here.

I had to get a shot of my Steelers in here. Polamalu would have aired the ad.

Thomas Peters at AmP raises some good questions:

Political candidates or issues? NBC is telling us there will be nothing aired during the Super Bowl that involves a political issue? No health care ads? Global warming ads? Unemployment ads?

So, while watching Superbowl commercials, keep an eye out for these.  I for one will be shocked if President Obama isn’t mentioned in any of them.

Congress has failed to stop President Obama’s overturning the Mexico City Policy.  Your tax dollars will once again fund the taking of unborn lives in other countries.  How did your senators vote?  Michelle Malkin has the yeas and nays.

VirtueMedia Ad

VirtueMedia‘s pro-life ad campaign aired for the first time this year (from September through November) on BET and MTV.  As Drake shares,

During a five-week campaign between late September and early November, the commercials generated nearly 22,000 requests for help from abortion-vulnerable women. Organizers estimate that during that time at least 11,000 babies were saved from abortion.

Read the NCR article for more details.  It’s really a pretty incredible story, and one the whole pro-life community would do well to take study.  While it’s important to reach and encourage like-minded people to keep fighting for life (pretty much what I try to do here), we cannot forget to reach out to those in circumstances right now who are making life-and-death choices.  VirtueMedia seems to have found a very effective way to do this, for what their website proclaims is “14 cents a life!”

Hannah and Her Father

Hannah Garman
259 North Reading Rd.
Ephrata, Pa. 17522

Thanks Michelle for the tip.

80 percent of women who had had abortions suffer from symptoms of depression, and 40 percent have contemplated suicide.  In addition, 70% of such women exhibit irritability, 60% suffer behavioral disturbances, 40% experience sexual disturbances, and 30% have been involved in drug abuse.  The report also states that women who obtain abortions have a mortality rate 3.5 to 6 times higher, and a suicide rate between 6 and 7 times higher than that of women who give birth.

The article I linked to above highlights that this is particularly telling as it comes out of Spain.  In that country abortions can only be legally procurred in “cases of rape and fetal deformity, and danger to the physical and psychological health of the mother.”  Ninety-five percent of Spanish abortions occur due to the final reason listed.   This study shows that the effect of these abortions may have the exact opposite of their stated intent.

The Illinois Supreme Court agreed to hear an argument against the 2005 rule issued by Gov. Blagojevich that forced pharmacists to distribute the Plan B abortifacient pill, even if doing so violates their religious beliefs.  (See here for more information about that drug.)

When Gov. Blagojevich was asked about exceptions to this rule at the time it was made, he responded that pharmacists with moral apprehensions “should find another profession.”

Recent news about the Illinois governor makes me glad that I never looked to him for guidance in any moral decision.

Honestly, I’m trying to be optimistic.  I don’t want to just paint our incoming president with the same broad brush that many on the left used with President Bush for the last 8 years.  Still, it’s getting pretty hard to see the proverbial glass as anything but, well, almost empty.

Please share any bright spots you see!

CE has the story Another Indiana Planned Parenthood Caught Covering up Felony Rape about the same team responsible for exposing Bloomington’s Planned Parenthood office doing it again – this time in Indianapolis.

An Indianapolis Planned Parenthood counselor, after hearing that this 13 year-old was abused by a 31 year-old man, tells the girl that “Yeah, he, he is over such and such. And you can do statutory rape and whatever but it’s going to be in the papers.”   After this, the counselor advises her that she can circumvent Indiana’s parental notification laws by going to a  neighboring state to have an abortion.

You can watch the video on YouTube.

The Indianapolis Star reports Representative Jackie Walorski of the Indiana General Assembly today requested that the state attorney general investigate both the information revealed by the videos.

“When I saw the second one, I thought it was not an isolated incident; it was a pattern,” Walorski said. “This starts becoming an issue that’s worthy of a statewide investigation.”

• $1 BILLION dollars in taxpayer funding for International Abortion Groups
• $700 million in taxpayer funding for “Title X” Health Clinics (aka your local Planned Parenthood affiliate)
• $65 million for the UNFPA, an international aid organization connected to coercive abortion as part of China’s coercive one-child policy
• Repeal the Hyde Amendment – Vastly expanding federal taxpayer funding for abortions
• Include Abortion coverage in any taxpayer-subsidized national health care program
• Expand taxpayer-funded abortions on military bases
• Expand taxpayer-funded abortions through the Peace Corps program
• Expand taxpayer-funded abortions for federal prisoners

Contact your Senator and let him or her know that you don’t want your money funding any more abortions!

Thanks to AmP for the head’s up

Single Adult Stem Cell Can Self Renew, Repair Tissue Damage in Live Mammal from Catholic Exchange

Politics Aside, Pro-Life Effort Progresses from the Indianapolis Star

New Vatican Document Reaffirms Opposition to Cloning, Embryonic Research from LifeNews.com

Pro-life groups demand UN take action from Talk Radio News
Pro-Life World Coming to the Defence of Luxembourg Monarch’s Stand against Euthanasia from LifeSiteNews.com.  This one is an update from my earlier post.

• Provide $1 Billion for International Family Planning Programs
• Restore Funding to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)
• Increase Funding for Title X Family Planning Program to $700 Million
• De-fund Abstinence-Only Programs”

These are not just the hopes and dreams of fringe groups too extreme to be taken seriously by major political figures.  Hudson lists these recommendations and others from a document called “Advancing Reproductive Rights and Health in a New Administration.”  Not only was it signed by “dozens of pro-choice organizations,” the document is actually posted on the President-Elect’s official website, change.gov.

Read Hudson’s article to learn more!

1. Quote the court’s description of the partial-birth abortion procedure.
2. Name the defenders of partial-birth abortion. Tie them to it.
3. Remind others why partial-birth abortion should be illegal.
4. Ban more procedures, immediately.

How can we, as individual pro-life advocates, go about taking these steps?

According to the About page on his site, Decent Films includes:

• A rigorous but easy-to-use four-part ratings system that evaluates films for overall recommendability, artistic-entertainment value, moral-spiritual value, and age-appropriateness.
• Robust new search options that allow the user to browse and search reviews by a wide range of criteria, including film title, genre, or any of the Decent Films ratings.
• Ratings information from the Motion Picture Association of America and the US bishops Office of Film and Broadcasting.

I have come to trust Mr. Greydanus’ reviews.  I appreciate his commentary on movies’ moral victories and failures, as well as the artist’s eye that he brings to the reviews that he writes.  Take a look – Decentfilms.com may become a favorite of yours, too.

Pope Benedict decried the tactics of developed countries that “make economic aid conditional upon the implementation of anti-life policies” to countries suffering from AIDS.  The message pointed out that developing countries with higher birth rates have a better chance to emerge from poverty, and concluded, “Population is proving to be an asset, not a factor that contributes to poverty.”

Meanwhile, rejecting the strategy of education, the UK launches a pilot program to distrubute pharmaceutical contraceptives to girls in their mid-teens without a prescription.  CE reports:

Though numerous studies have shown that teenage pregnancy rates are not reduced by easier availability of condoms, pills or sex education, the UK government seems bent on following the advice of prominent pro-abortion “family planning experts.”

The culture of life and the culture of death meet yet again – this time, it’s in the news cycle.

As yesterday’s BreakPoint commentary explained, this movie has more than changed hearts – it has saved lives.  Read (or listen to, both options are available from this link) the commentary and learn more about the women “who decided to keep their children as a result of seeing the film,” including Bella’s lead actress!

That’s some movie.

I was saddened but not surprised to read Catholic Politicians Funded by Abortion Lobby on InsideCatholic.com this morning.  It does not seem like much of a stretch for those who politically advocates of abortion to accept donations from abortion-promoting organizations like “Planned Parenthood, Emily’s List, NOW, and NARAL Pro-Choice America.”  No, it doesn’t seem like much of a stretch – even if those politicians are Catholic.  That still does not make it right.

As distressing as this is, I thought, there is nothing I can do about it.  This article showed me I was not entirely correct.  There is a little something that you and I can do about it. We can sign the petition on OneNationUnderGod.com.  At that site you can see how much money each Catholic Senator and Representative has received from abortion advocacy groups.

This petition will be sent to the USCCB’s president, Francis Cardinal George, “to call upon all Catholic politicians to no longer accept campaign donations from pro-abortion groups.”  As Cardinal George has already issued a strong warning that Catholic politicians who vote for the Freedom of Choice Act could face automatic excommunication, he has shown how seriously he takes this issue.    It’s time for all of us to do the same, and show the Cardinal that we support him in this.

As Deal Hudson said in the InsideCatholic.com article, (emphasis mine)

It should come as no surprise that the vast majority of Catholics in Congress have abysmal voting records on the life issues. When a Catholic accepts a campaign contribution from NARAL or Planned Parenthood, he or she is declaring an intention to support their pro-abortion policies. With the Freedom of Choice Act looming on the horizon, you can bet these groups are looking for a return on their investment.

I’d like to add that signing this petition certainly seems like a small matter, but as Christ said in the Parable of the Talents, “Well done good and faithful servant; you have been faithful over a little, I will set you over much; enter into the joy of your master.”  (Matthew 25, RSV-CE)

The Trappist Monastery in Kentucky where Merton once served.

My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think that I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always
though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear,
for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

Marriage between one man and one woman is a historically shared value that transcends time and cultures. Untying the knot that holds together traditional marriage will unravel the family, destabilize the culture, and hurt children.

I think these two sentences sum up the best secular argument for protecting traditional marriage.  What do you think?

My favorite cookie to make and share around the holidays is my family’s biscotti recipe.  It came from one of my Italian immigrant great-grandmother.  I received it from my grandmother at my bridal shower.  (The directions have been modified slightly to accommodate modern measurements and cooking methods.)

Christina’s Biscotti

Ingredients:
2 sticks of butter
1 3/4 cup of sugar
6 eggs
1 small bottle anise oil or 3 TBSP vanilla
1 tsp baking powder
6 cups of flour

1 cup sliced almonds or walnuts (optional)

Steps:
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees
Cream butter and sugar with mixer
Mix in eggs 1 at a time
Add anise or vanilla
Gradually blend in baking powder, flour, nuts (if using)
Mix with hands, then remove to clean, flat work surface and knead
Shape into 2 long loaves
Line a half sheet cookie pan with foil
Place loaves long ways on cookie sheet
Flatten loaves with hand
Bake for 35 minutes
Cool slightly
Pull foil off, with loaves still on it
Slice loaves into cookies (about 1 inch wide)
Lay cookies on their side on the now foil-free cookie sheet
Toast cookies for 8-10 minutes at 400 degrees for 8-10 minutes
Turn cookies to the other side, and toast for 3-5 minutes

These cookies keep very well in a paper bag (lunch bags or grocery) in a cool, dry place.  While I know that they last for a long time, I’m not sure how long.  I’ve never had any around long enough to be bad.

If you’d like more favorite cookie recipes from mom bloggers, visit Faith and Family Live.

Chuck Colson

In yesterday’s Breakpoint Commentary, appearing today on CE, Tolerating Bigotry, Chuck Colson makes the point that new laws are needed to protect health care workers who refuse to violate their consciences.   He shares the unfortunate reaction that many on the left had to President Bush’s proposed regulations to “ensure that health care workers could opt out of performing abortions, or refuse to prescribe the “morning after” pill, without fear of losing their jobs.”

I especially appreciate his reflection:

If you dig deeply enough into these cases, you can’t help but realize that they are not about protecting access to abortion or the “morning after” pill or in vitro fertilization for lesbians; plenty of doctors and pharmacists provide them. Instead, they’re about forcing everyone, including religious believers, to shut up and follow the ideological line: that killing innocent babies and homosexual parenting are morally acceptable.

I would add that the Freedom of Choice Act, while it would cause sweeping deregulation of the abortion industry, is also about forcing that same ideology.

—

As a side note, Chuck Colson himself is a truly fascinating guy.  If you’re unfamiliar with his story, check out Colson’s brief bio from Prison Fellowshiop’s site.

Yesterday a mommy-blogger favorite of mine, Elizabeth Foss, posted a letter she

Sarah

wrote to her infant daughter, Sarah.  It was her due date, but Sarah actually arrived over 5 weeks prematurely.  This sweet, intimate gift from a mother to a daughter will melt your heart – which is more than I can say for a crooked politician.