Wednesday, February 16, 2011

What a Great Day for America's Unborn!!!

From the Family Research Council:

 

Richards Nixin' the Budget?

Planned Parenthood must have felt particularly jilted by House Republicans on Valentine's Day, because President Cecile Richards launched an angry video about the budget feud. Apparently, she doesn't take too kindly to Republicans meddling in Planned Parenthood's illicit relationship with Uncle Sam. But the time to clean, argue conservatives, is long overdue. Conveniently, Cecile never mentions abortion in the video--or her seven clinics caught on tape covering up child prostitution in the last two weeks. No, she resorts to the Left's familiar strategy: name-calling. "Unlike our opponents," she declares, "we care about women and families." Obviously, she and the House leadership have different ideas about what "caring" means. Most Americans would agree that caring about women means not misleading them, aborting them, or exploiting them for profit.
Contrary to what she and others are implying, this "horrifying agenda" does absolutely nothing to restrict abortion. It simply puts Planned Parenthood on an even playing field with all other nonprofits. Yet Richards actually believes that the "most devastating assault on women's health in American history," is pushing Planned Parenthood away from the public trough. Let me put Cecile's complaint in perspective. Family Research Council is a nonprofit just like Planned Parenthood. If you don't like what I'm saying, you don't have to contribute to FRC. But if you don't like what she's saying (let alone what her organization is doing), you still have to pay for it.
At least for now. Congressman Mike Pence (R-Ind.) is doing his best to pull out Planned Parenthood's federal funding by the roots. As part of the continuing resolution (CR) that Republicans have offered, Mike is working on an amendment that goes beyond even his Title X bill and asks that not one cent be made available "for any purpose"--not only to Planned Parenthood Federation, but to its 100-plus affiliates. Meanwhile, his colleague Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fl.) is attacking the issue from another angle: putting the administration on the stand. Now that he chairs the House Energy & Commerce oversight committee, he plans to haul HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius before Congress in a hearing. In light of the Lila Rose tapes, he wants to know why taxpayers are funding an organization that repeatedly covers up child prostitution and sexual abuse. "We're going to bring Health and Human Services Secretary Sebelius, put her under oath... and ask her to explain what she is doing about these videos," he said. "We're not going to wait for Attorney General [Eric] Holder to do anything. And if she lies, then we're going to ask the attorney general to investigate her."
America's biggest abortion factory is on the run. Contact your congressmen and tell them to defund Planned Parenthood! Click here to encourage your member to back the GOP's pro-life, pro-pocketbook budget!

Beautiful Women Get a Life!!!

Woo hoo!  This is thrilling news!  The power of God manifests Himself in these two powerful women joining together to protect lives; both of women and the unborn babies they carry:)


Abby Johnson and Lila Rose

Abby Johnson Brings Insider Knowledge of Corruption within Planned Parenthood

“Planned Parenthood often turns a blind eye to sexual abuse and trafficking.”

Media contact: Colleen O’Boyle,media@liveaction.org, (703) 683-5004 ext. 122

February 16, 2011 – Today Live Action announced the addition of Abby Johnson, former Planned Parenthood director and employee of eight years, to the Live Action team as Chief Research Strategist.

“Abby Johnson has seen the abuses inside Planned Parenthood with her own eyes and confirms the danger its clinics pose to women and young girls,” stated Live Action President Lila Rose. “She is a courageous trailblazer despite Planned Parenthood’s desperate attempts to attack her and silence the truth. We are thrilled and very thankful to have Abby join our team and are confident that her first-hand experience, conviction and guidance will provide invaluable counsel to Live Action as we advance our common goal of protecting women and children from the abuses of Planned Parenthood.”

Author of the new book “Unplanned,” Johnson worked and volunteered for Planned Parenthood for eight years until October of 2009 when she witnessed a 13-week old baby in an ultrasound-guided abortion lose the fight for its life in the womb. She is now a pro-life advocate. Since her conversion of heart, Johnson has also confirmed that the alarming incidents revealed by Live Action’s undercover investigations are not isolated incidents.

“I can tell you from experience that Planned Parenthood often turns a blind eye to sexual abuse and trafficking – what you see in Live Action’s videos is not a rare occurrence. But ignorance is no defense, especially when it has turned their clinics into a safe haven for those who sexually exploit women and girls. This is not a training problem so much as it is an ideology problem.  I am humbled and eager to begin this partnership with Live Action so that together we can expose the serious harm Planned Parenthood poses to the most vulnerable among us.”

Live Action has previously released more than a dozen hidden camera videos from ten states. This body of visual evidence shows several alarming patterns of illegal Planned Parenthood activities including the willingness to aid and abet the sex trafficking of young girls, the cover-up of sexual abuse of minors, the skirting of parental consent laws, citing unscientific and fabricated medical information to manipulate women to have abortions, and Planned Parenthood’s willingness to accept donations earmarked to abort African-American babies.

Monday, February 14, 2011

Friday, February 11, 2011

Saxon Math? Apologia Science?

Okay, so here it is, decision time...

Does anyone amongst my followers use either of these programs?  What do you think?  Pros?  Cons?  Let me know???

Pray for Egypt, Pray for Africa, Pray for Democracy!

From the Heritage Foundation:

The Obama Administration thought they had solved the crisis in Egypt. Yesterday in Marquette, Michigan, President Barack Obama told students at Northern Michigan University, "What is absolutely clear is that we are witnessing history unfold. It’s a moment of transformation that’s taking place because the people of Egypt are calling for change." But hours later, after Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak refused to step down, White House officials were "stumbling for their next step in a crisis that was spinning out of their control." How could President Obama have gotten events in Egypt so wrong?

The answer could be found hours earlier when both Leon Panetta, Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, and General James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, testified before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. First, Panetta touched off an avalanche of erroneous expectations when he testified that there was a "strong likelihood" that President Mubarak would step down by the end of the day. And where did Panetta get this valuable intel? The New York Times reports: "American officials said Mr. Panetta was basing his statement not on secret intelligence but on media broadcasts." The Washington Post adds: "Panetta, who had little intelligence experience before taking the CIA job two years ago, has been praised … for handling public controversies with a deft touch. … Unlike other senior intelligence officials who were more circumspect in their comments on Egypt, Panetta did not hesitate in offering assessments of the rapidly shifting events."

But the Obama Administration’s intelligence fumbling did not end there. Just 30 minutes after Panetta passed off CNN headlines as CIA intelligence, General Clapper created his own entire reality when he testified that Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood is "largely secular." This is, of course, completely false. In reality, the Muslim Brotherhood, founded in 1928, is the Middle East’s oldest and most influential Islamist movement. Outlawed in Egypt since 1954, when it attempted to assassinate former President Gamal Abdel Nasser, the Brotherhood retains the long-term goal of creating an Islamist state and implementing Sharia law. An offshoot of the Brotherhood, Egyptian Islamic Jihad, assassinated President Anwar Sadat in 1981, perpetrated a series of terrorist attacks in Egypt in the 1990s, and became part of al-Qaeda. Another offshoot, the Palestinian Islamist extremist group Hamas, won elections in Gaza in 2006, staged a coup in 2007 to transform Gaza into a terrorist base, and remains committed to destroying Israel.

Clapper’s office later issued a statement to "clarify" General Clapper’s testimony, but the original testimony—especially when placed in the context of Panetta’s claims and President Obama’s speech—shows an Administration that has far too much faith in the power of the President’s rhetoric and not nearly enough concern about our enemies in the Middle East.

The worst possible outcome of the present crisis would be to replace President Mubarak’s authoritarian regime with the Muslim Brotherhood, which has a totalitarian Islamist agenda. This would ultimately be a disaster for freedom in Egypt as well as for American interests in Egypt and the wider Middle East. Washington should work quietly behind the scenes with the leadership of the army and leverage its $1.5 billion in annual aid to Cairo to ensure the emergence of a government that respects the freedom and human rights of its own citizens, complies with Egypt’s international obligations to fight terrorism, and carries out its legal obligations under Egypt’s 1979 peace treaty with Israel.

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Pro Life Quiz

So this is a very interesting video from the March for Life.  A.L.L. went around and quizzed pro lifers on their basic recognition of PP and Lila Rose.  Amazing response!  Angelina Jolie anyone???

Tuesday's Biggest Loser Report

I firmly resolve...

Well, here it is 2 weeks later, and I'm back to the 10 lbs total mark.  I didn't post last week because I didn't lose weight.  I re-lost it again this week (if I'm allowed to say that?) and Mike and I have recommitted to our weight loss goals. 

It's all about resolve.  Resolve can form habits, and it can keep from breaking them.  I need to make healthy lifestyle choices into habits.  Otherwise its so easy to fall into the old habits.  But I'm resolved now and I hope it will make a difference.

Thanks for your prayers, and I'm hoping to post again next week!

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Why Be Catholic?

I have to admit it, I really hate being a Catholic sometimes.  I love the Church, I love her as a means of salvation, I love that Christ founded her as His Immaculate Bride.  I love her laws, I love her ways, I love her House, and that she holds within her the Body of Christ.  But man, sometimes I hate actually living it out.

Its because I live in, and prescribe to, a culture that does absolutely everything it can to be comfortable.  I spend countless amounts of time and money on my comfort.  On my appearance.  There is my hair styling products to help pump up my hair when it's gone limp, and the other products to keep it flat when its too full.  There is the makeup to hide the wrinkles, and the zits and blotches.  The concealer to hide the bags under my eyes.  There are the girdles to hide the fat rolls.  The perfume to hide the smell of sweat.  I hide so much of myself, is it any wonder that I hate confession?

And then I walk into Church and am greeted by so many members of my society trying to do the same thing.  All sending the very clear message..."Don't you dare judge me!"  Not because there isn't anything blatant to judge in our actions and persons, but because we're 'beyond such things'.  The same guy walking in front of me to receive communion was just bragging about his vasectomy at the boss's party last week.  The woman over there with her two kids was offended when asked if she was going to try for more "Me?  No way!  I'm done and I've had 'them' tied to prove it!"  But you'd better sit yourself down in the pew, pray up, and shut up, because I am 'above judgment'.  Come on...Let's be honest.  Being yelled at for judging a pew-sitter in the Catholic Church today is like being yelled at for walking into a strip joint and staring at breasts.

We sing these hymns as we sit there in our corpulent bodies "Lord, fill us".  What for?  Its obvious from our bloated fingers grasped in prayer, and our aching hips and knees on those kneelers, that we are overly-full.  Or those great hymns of "Companions on the Journey" or "Bread for the Journey".  Journey for what?  The blind leading the blind in a prodigal path, slipping further and further away from Him who Is the Truth.

I pretend to love the Holy Family.  I've even got myself convinced.  But birthing babies in an animal cave?  Raising my children in poverty?  That's for Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.  "Come follow me" was Christ's call.  "To the ends of the earth Lord!"  At least that's what I want to assure him of, and yet I can't even crucify my passions.

I look at the Saints in the Church.  Here are the great men and women that God put into this world to herald the great Faith.  And I know that for my part, I get in their way and drown out their message.  Saints were people who suffered and they understood the value of it.  They slept on boards, they watched their children get dismembered by lions, they were crucified backwards, forwards, and upside down.  I know I don't stand a chance - outside of God's mercy that is.  I feel it's suffering when I enter my "too small" house that's warm, lit, and has a working sewer system.  These great men and women would die for their Faith, I feel like its death when members of my family no longer speak to me, because I'm just "too Catholic".

Then there are those modern day leaders of the Church.  Those giants in the Catholic realm who stand apart for their witness.  Padre Pio used to groan for the hordes of people who would flock to see him.  Not because he didn't want to visit those whom Christ sent to him.  But because the more Christ would show himself in the Padre, the more Padre would have to suffer for it.  Do we really understand that?  Did Mel Gibson?  Did Bud MacFarlane?  Did Fr. Euteneuer?  No, and they fell.  So, if these guys who are stronger in so many ways than I - God have pity on me and spare me, a sinner!

Why is abortion legal?  There were 400,000 people who Marched for Life in Washington D.C.  a few weeks ago.  Did you hear anything about it?  But 30,000 people gather in a square in Egypt and its flooding the news.  So 30K are looking for the fall of tyranny in their country after 30 years, and yet we still tolerate it 34 years later in the form of abortion.  Let's face it.  Democrat politicians are blatantly pro-death.  Republican politicians are pro-death, but will call themselves pro-life in order to garner your vote.  We're being duped and we're allowing ourselves to be.  The political system in this country is broken, elections don't mean anything anymore, no matter whose hands we're in, whether we're asses or elephants.  If we're to be a moral and educated people, then why are we as a society so blatantly immoral, so blatantly uneducated?  We need to vote with our pocketbooks, and yet we still fund organizations that fund Planned Parenthood.  How was that McDonald's?  Shopped at Target lately?  If everyone in that crowd of 400,000 had withheld even one dollar for the day on these organizations, that might have been enough to turn us around.  But again, we're comfortable with the fact that we can get together once a year for one more year.

We're a missionary country - here in the United States.  And yet, how much evangelization for the Church takes place?  How many RCIA classes welcome people from all walks of life, to make it as "easy as possible" to enter the Church?  Yes, I went through the equivalent of this program when I became a Catholic.  I know how it works.  I never heard about the Catholic stance on birth control, on homosexuality, on the male Priesthood, I guess it was assumed I would understand all that as a former agnostic.  And the problem now is that there are few Roman Catholics in this country.  There are Americans in this country, who are trying to stake a claim in a religion that has become so watered down that the word 'catholic' could just be a common noun.  God forbid that you mention the Magisterium.  Scripture might be acceptable, but don't ever mention Tradition.   "...and the rich man went away sad."  "...many who heard this teaching were unable to accept it and went away."  "Will you leave me too?"  Not all who encountered Christ could endure what He stood for.  And yet His Church is whoring herself to sell the treasure of His Body and Blood real cheap.  It doesn't matter what you believe, just come.  It doesn't matter what you live when you leave, so long as you warm that bench once a week while you're here.  And when you're gone with the angels to the Judgement Seat, and you realize that what we've sold you is a bunch of malarkey, we'll assure everyone that you're in a better place.  Did we forget that Christ did not come to save the world?  He came to save souls, and yet we try to fool ourselves into acts of false charity in order to assure our salvation.  "Thou shalt not judge" has become the greatest commandment, eclipsing "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, thy whole mind, and thy whole soul."  When we love we come to know the other.  How can we know the other if we do not judge the knowing to be true and right.  By this new form of heresy, we're supposed to flounder around in the dark, keeping our light under a bushel basket.

Embarking on a journey of Faith starts only when the applause stops.  Faith is lived once you stop feeling good about it.  Charity counts only when it hurts to give it.  Hope is gained only when its the only thing left that you have to cling to.  When you encounter self and realize what a wretch self is...Hope is the only thing you can count on; hope for the mercy of God. 

And this is why I hate being a Catholic.  And this is why I'm starting to love it desperately.