Twenty-five years ago, I first sat down in a tiny, borrowed office in a rectory of my home town of Port Chester, N.Y. I had no staff and I didn’t even know how to turn on the computer. I sat at the desk and said to the Lord, “Now, we begin.” It was my first day as the leader of a two-year-old organization known as Priests for Life.
Most of us are familiar with the term, “census” because we are familiar with the Christmas story of the Roman census that brought Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem. Every ten years, we also have a census in the United States. It serves to update population statistics and demographics, and also regulates the best way to distribute federal funds to local communities.
No matter how much money, Hollywood glitter, political power and media dominance “pro-choice” advocates enjoy, they cannot take the stigma out of abortion.
The Pope has updated the Catechism of the Catholic Church to strengthen the Church’s opposition to the death penalty. Rather than saying it should only be used in extreme circumstances, the Church is saying it should not be used at all, while preserving, of course, the right of the state to protect its citizens from wrongdoers.
The Trump administration is at it again, praise God!
Since the announcement of the retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy, the Left has been obsessed with Roe vs. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion throughout pregnancy. With invocations of Armageddon and cries that the sky is falling, voices of the Democratic Party, Planned Parenthood, and numerous other abortion-supporters are painting nightmare scenarios of the disappearance of Roe vs. Wade, and along with it, of any semblance of women’s rights in America.
We at Priests for Life are grateful and encouraged by the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, and are encouraging others to support him with confidence. That’s because Priests for Life has personally experienced Kavanaugh’s constitutional leadership. He was one of the appellate judges who helped Priests for Life during our battle with President Barack Obama’s overreach in his HHS mandate. Obamacare was bent on forcing our Catholic pro-life organization to act contrary to our mission and our consciences and offer abortifacients in our healthcare plan. Kavanaugh defended our religious freedom.
Independence Day is one of my favorite days of the year, and my work in the pro-life movement has only made that more and more true each year. The great American holiday of July 4th is very much a pro-life holiday.
This past Thursday, the US Supreme Court issued its ruling in Minnesota Voters Alliance v Mansky, regarding a Minnesota statute which prohibited "political attire" from being worn at the polling location on Election Day. The decision has important implications for pro-life groups and Churches relative to the midterm elections this year.
Father Frank Pavone
