I was checking my Yahoo! e-mail account when off to the side I saw an ad that showed a couple lying down, and then in the middle is a rather silly photo of Ken Cuccinelli, GOP candidate for governor of Virginia, photobombing this couple and wagging his finger at them. The ad reads, “Keep Ken Cuccinelli out of your bedroom.” There’s a link to “Find Out How,” and with how ridiculous the ad was, I just couldn’t help clicking on it.

I was then directed to this page. Instead of this silly Ken Cuccinelli wagging his finger at a couple lying down together, he’s wagging his finger at a woman in a wedding dress and two girls and a guy standing next to her. I don’t see how Ken Cuccinelli being elected governor would mean anything bad for this woman’s wedding, but, well, I don’t have the warped mindset that Planned Parenthood and Terry McAuliffe apparently have to make such connections.

Visitors to the web page are then encouraged to upload a picture of themselves to make their own image and “let others know how life would change if Ken is elected governor!”

It is worth noting that on the bottom of the ad clicked on and the website, it says, ”Paid for by Planned Parenthood Action Fund, Planned Parenthood Votes, and  Planned Parenthood Virginia PAC. Authorized by Terry McAuliffe, candidate for Governor.”

Now, I’m sure that Ken Cuccinelli is concerned about the citizens of Virginia, in the sense that he cares about their well-being and safety. I still don’t understand, though, how it’s plausible to come to the conclusion that if elected governor, Cuccinelli is going to insert himself into every single aspect of your life and get all up in your business. It seems more like the smear campaign idea someone would use in high school or maybe college, if he really hated his opponent and loved social media. But nope, this is the campaign of an adult man running for governor.

Except wait a second. This is the political arm of Planned Parenthood we’re talking about here! Because Ken Cuccinelli opposes abortion and the HHS Mandate, he obviously cares only about inserting himself into women’s lives to control what goes on in their bedrooms with their partners.

I decided to explore some of the rest of the website, to see what exactly Planned Parenthood and Terry McAuliffe were putting out there. The ”About“ page mostly describes where Ken Cuccinelli stands on abortion and other things Planned Parenthood likes to talk about. He is pro-life, including in cases of rape and incest. He also has co-sponsored personhood measures, wants to de-fund Planned Parenthood, ”and supports letting your boss decide whether you can “get access to affordable birth control[,]” which is Planned Parenthood’s way of saying that he opposes the HHS Mandate.

The website also likes to tout that Ken Cuccinelli is “the most overtly partisan attorney general in Virginia’s history.” This is mentioned on the “About” page, as well as on a section titled “The Facts,” which is, according to the Washington Post’s Editorial Board, in their opinions section. Besides yet another unflattering photo of Ken Cuccinelli, “The Facts” contains some information that is actually quite helpful for voters to make their decisions. If you believe that abortion is health care, you’re probably not going to be so thrilled with Cuccinelli as governor. However, for the opposite reason, this page is also actually helpful for pro-life voters as well.

They also point out that Cuccinelli “Does Not Support Safe and Legal Abortion” and mention that “… the only circumstance in which Cuccinelli supports abortion access is when the life of the woman is at stake.” Note the precise wording: to call it “abortion access” and to say “woman” instead of “mother.”

Planned Parenthood also calls personhood measures “Extreme and Dangerous,” and since they certainly don’t believe that “A Fertilized Egg As a Full Human Being is ‘Scientific Reality,’” they must be poking fun at what actually is a scientific reality, which is quoted because Ken Cuccinelli recognizes this as such.

It is also pointed out that Cuccinelli co-sponsored a bill making it more difficult for minors to obtain birth control, and requiring that parents be notified when their children seek information or treatment for STDs or contraception.

Planned Parenthood mentions “what Ken Cuccinelli has said on women’s health, IN HIS OWN WORDS… (all emphasis original). Those who are pro-life may also find these quotes interesting. As a pro-lifer myself, I know that I can’t really disagree with what Cuccinelli has to say, so I’m actually thankful to Planned Parenthood and McAuliffe for gathering this information and putting it out there!

Planned Parenthood and Terry McAuliffe seem to be up to cheap tricks when it comes to attacking a pro-life candidate. With any hope, the people of Virginia see such schemes for what they really are. Such efforts may even backfire.

Note: This article is not an endorsement of Ken Cuccinelli for governor, but rather intended to point out the campaign strategies of Terry McAuliffe and Planned Parenthood, as well as what the candidates stand for. 

There has been much coverage lately about abortionist and convicted murderer Kermit Gosnell, but very little about his co-defendant Eileen O’Neill on charges of conspiracy, racketeering, perjury, and false swearing.

Mrs. O’Neill worked for Gosnell’s clinic for eight years, despite having no medical license, and was a witness to Gosnell’s horrific crimes against innocent children (according to the Grand Jury Report). She began working for Gosnell after being introduced to him by Leroy Brinkley, owner of the Atlantic Women’s Services Clinic, where Gosnell would begin some of his illegal abortions. Leroy Brinkley is also the owner of the Delta Abortion Clinic in Baton Rouge, where O’Neill worked from 1998-2000.

Does Mrs. O’Neill’s previous employer – the Delta Clinic, which is just miles away from my own home – deserve further coverage? Is this clinic another Gosnell clinic?

The earliest documentation on Delta is a lawsuit in 1974 by Kathleen R., whose heavy bleeding after an abortion at Delta led surgeons to discover that she had a perforated uterus. Kathleen required a hysterectomy to treat her injury (4^th Circuit Louisiana Court of Appeals No. 9083).

Next there was a lawsuit in the 1984 death of 27-year-old Sheila Hebert. The suit alleged that Delta failed to monitor Mrs. Hebert while in recovery, failed to react properly when her condition was discovered, failed to call 911 promptly, and failed to have adequate emergency equipment available (East Baton Rouge Parish District Court Case No. 289518).

Also in 1984, Michelle P. filed a lawsuit alleging that she suffered from a retained fetal leg and a lacerated uterus following an abortion at the Delta Clinic (Baton Rouge Parish District Court Case No. 281159).

In 1990, a lawsuit was filed in the death of Ingar Lee Whittington Weber, who died of kidney failure following an abortion at the Delta Clinic.

In 1998 an investigation by Baton Rouge news station WAFB led to the discovery that a former patient, “Roxy D.,” suffered injuries at Delta that required her to wear a colostomy bag for eight months. This led to an investigation by Governor Mike Foster, and affidavits were gathered attesting to the filthy conditions at the clinic.

At the time of the WAFB investigations, Eileen O’Neill was an employee at Delta and after two years, in 2000, she relinquished her Louisiana medical license, saying that she had “post-traumatic stress syndrome”.

Two years later, Delta’s abortionist James Whitmore III lost his medical license after the board found that Whitmore used improperly sterilized equipment, reused single-use items, let tissue float in the sterilizing solution, and failed to provide proper care to a woman whose uterus he had perforated during an abortion, requiring her to receive a hysterectomy. Whitmore had previously been on probation for three years (starting in 1992), after his actions led to the death of one infant, the permanent injury of another infant, and other actions injuring at least five women.

In 2007, an unannounced inspection of the Delta Clinic found that patient records in 90% of the cases inspected were incomplete and lacked documentation of physical exams performed prior to abortions. No fines were assessed at this time.

In 2009, an unannounced inspection of the Delta Clinic found the following violations, and the clinic was fined $3,000:

• No governing body formed to establish rules,  procedures, and safeguards at the clinic
• No documentation in files regarding the administration of drugs to the patients during abortions
• No documentation in files regarding the condition and monitoring of patients receiving drugs during abortions
• No documentation in files regarding the beginning and ending times of abortion procedures
• Unsterile storing of pre-filled, leaking  syringes of drugs
• Failure to ensure private counseling of women prior to abortion procedures
• Failure to follow guidelines for the proper sterilization of vaginal probes between patients
• Failure to ensure that single use IV bags were not reused for multiple patients
• Failure to ensure policies in place to detect and report statutory rape
• Improper disposal of medical records
• Failure to ensure that expired supplies not being used
• Pre-printed and pre-signed prescription pad located on the front desk of lobby, needing only to be filled in with names

The most shocking of these violations is the one regarding statutory rape. Delta uses pre-printed information forms that already list the father as “unknown,” and workers admitted at this time that they didn’t ask or record information about the fathers.

Also shocking are the ones regarding sanitation – single-use IV bags were being reused, vaginal probes were not being properly sanitized, and leaking, pre-filled syringes of drugs were being stored in Ziploc baggies. Despite all of these violations, Delta remained open and was merely fined.

In 2011, another unannounced inspection found that there was still no governing board, and that the pre-printed forms listing the father as “unknown” were still being used; additionally the inspection found that there were parental consent forms missing from one of the patient files that was inspected. Delta again remained open, and was fined $2,000.

Also in 2011, a complaint was filed against Delta’s abortionist Mary Gardner, alleging that after two failed chemical abortions, a patient was told that she had  “a lot of crap inside that needs to come out,” then was physically assaulted and given a botched abortion without any anesthesia, which later required a hysterectomy.

After this complaint, the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals forwarded information from the complaint and the records from the inspections to District Attorney Hillar Moore for possible prosecution. No action was ever taken.

In December 2012, after hearing a news report about the pre-printed forms Delta was using, Congressman Charles Boustany wrote a letter to Secretary Bruce Greenstein of the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals, requesting that they look into this matter. No action has yet been taken.

With evidence of botched abortions, unsanitary conditions, multiple violations, and the protecting of rapists going back to 1984, and continuing to the past few years, it is extraordinary to find that Delta Clinic is not only open, but continues to be Louisiana’s largest provider of abortions. After reading all of these allegations and reports, one cannot help but wonder if the Delta Clinic of Baton Rouge is Louisiana’s 3801 Lancaster.

Hitler’s Germany will never be repeated. We will never advocate the slaughter of human beings, simply because they are disabled. Until we do. We despise gendercide, and the murder of women simply based on their sex. Except when we don’t. We will never be Ancient Rome – abortion exists so the horrors of infanticide won’t be needed. Unless convenience requires it.

We will never repeat Nazi medical experiments – using human life for body parts or science, without the consent of the person. Except that we do. The sale of body parts from aborted infants is a lucrative business in the United States – gruesome requests such as “whole intact leg, including the entire hip joint,” notations to ensure that dissection occur “within ten minutes of death,” and instructions for how the cuts must be made fill the pages of requests researchers make for human remains – requests for body parts coming from infants no more than 24 weeks old – all victims of abortions. Prohibitions on “selling” human remains are circumvented through the charging of “clinic fees,” and since researchers rarely request a full cadaver, one aborted infant can be dissected into many pieces and provide multiple facilities with “research material.”

Yet we will never be like those Nazis , men who justified human experimentation as necessary for the greater common good. Even if Brenda Bardsley, co-founder of fetal parts provider Anatomic Gift Foundation acknowledges, “maybe it makes it [abortion] easier for us knowing that something good will come out of it.” Even if women choosing an abortion are told they will benefit medical research, resulting in approximately 75% of women donating the corpse of their now dead child. And we will never be so barbaric as to make the sale of human body parts a mercenary endeavor. Even if a Frost and Sullivan study dated as far back as 1996 report $428 million in corporate revenues from the sale of aborted infants, and projected that the industry would reach 1 billion dollars by 2002. A lot of money. Of course, an infant’s trunk, even limbless, is worth at least $500, though liver and spinal cord retrieval are a bit less, according to a fee schedule provided to Life Dynamics by of America’s finest providers of “tissue.”

We will never destroy life in order to create it. Even if a Daily Mail article revealed nearly a decade ago that scientists had proposed, and nearly completed performing, cultivation of ovarian tissue from aborted baby girls, for the purpose of harvesting their eggs for use in IVF treatments. No one really knows at this time how far the research has progressed, only that it is currently legal.

We will never create life simply for the benefit of another, however. Except for the couple who created nine embryos so they could create a marrow donor for their firstborn son. Genetic screening identified two out of nine human embryos which were the most likely match, and those were implanted through IVF. Nine months later, the “savior sibling” was born.

Above all, we will never create life specifically for experimentation or harvesting. Until now. Until the first human clone was created. Until it was discovered we can, indeed, create life, and grow it to the stage of harvesting embryonic stem cells, for the benefit of other humans, and “advances” in society.

We will never go beyond this, however. We know where the boundaries are. The horrors warned of in science fiction stories, like Michael Bay’s The Island, where humans are not only cloned, but raised to adulthood, for their body parts, is simply that. Fiction. It will never happen here. Until it does. We will never be “those monsters.” Until we are.

Ah yes, religion – an oft-discussed but seemingly little understood thing in modern society.

Nearly everywhere you turn, it seems that someone is saying that people – specifically Christians – ought to put their “religion” away. When you send your kids to the local public school, they may get in trouble for writing a report on a book of the Bible or for wearing an evangelical t-shirt. If you’re a teacher, you’re not allowed to pray publicly with your students (something that used to be commonplace in the U.S.). At work, you may have been told “not to proselytize.” Scholars everywhere discuss the ever-expanding definition of “separation of church and state,” entirely forgetting the original context of that principle.

Indeed, it seems that nearly everywhere we turn, there’s someone who would tell Christians to “keep their religion to themselves,” to “stop forcing their beliefs on others,” and that “it’s personal.” Of course, the debate on Christianity in the public square could take quite some time to discuss, and that’s not really what we’re here for. Instead, we’re here to discuss whether religion – Christianity in particular – hurts the pro-life movement.

Does Christianity have a place in convincing others of the pro-life position? Should Christians quote the Bible in pro-life debates? Or should they check their faith at the door, so as not to offend or alienate any secular pro-lifers who are out there? Here are three thoughts I have as a Christian pro-lifer, directed at other Christian pro-lifers.

1)  Outspoken Christians – and the Bible – have had a major place in social reform throughout the centuries.

• Martin Luther King, Jr., the famous civil rights activist, was also a Christian pastor and often quoted from the Bible, basing many of his speeches off biblical passages.
• William Wilberforce, who not only was instrumental in ending the slave trade in Britain, but also fought for health care, for prison reform, and against cruelty to animals, was an outspoken Christian who was all for “imposing morals” on society. He said:

If … a principle of true Religion [i.e., true Christianity] should … gain ground, there is no estimating the effects on public morals, and the consequent influence on our political welfare.

• Harriet Beecher Stowe, the “little lady who started this great war” that freed American slaves, was a preacher’s daughter and very fond of evangelizing. Uncle Tom’s Cabin‘s central character is a natural evangelist who clearly shares the message of Jesus. Stowe also wrote a booklet that was sent out to all the missionaries with China Inland Mission in 1869.
• The Salvation Army – an organization that helps with a huge variety of social reform, including substance abuse, homelessness, human trafficking, elderly services, prisoner rehabilitation, and veterans’ affairs – was started by William Booth, an evangelist, and his wife, Catherine. Today, the Salvation Army’s mission is still abundantly clear:

The Salvation Army, an international movement, is an evangelical part of the universal Christian church. Its message is based on the Bible. Its ministry is motivated by the love of God. Its mission is to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and to meet human needs in His name without discrimination.

It’s pretty clear that many, many effective social reformers were outspoken Christians. They knew their facts, yes. They welcomed others into their movements, yes. But they also didn’t shy away from quoting the Bible and claiming Christ.

2) It is no more unifying to tell Christians to stop quoting the Bible than it is for Christians to be unwelcoming to secular pro-lifers.

The huge majority of pro-lifers are thrilled when anyone – Christian or not – joins our ranks. There is work for everyone to do, and there is a place for everyone, Christian or not. Each person should be welcomed fully into the pro-life movement. We ought to unite on the issues we can unite on. Any Christian who shuns a fellow pro-lifer because he or she is secular, an atheist, a Muslim, a Jew, etc. should stop immediately.

However, from my own experiences, I’ve seen very few Christians who would reject anyone who wants to work in the movement. We are happy each time someone new sees the truth about the preciousness and value of every human life. We welcome every new set of hands on deck.

In the same vein, secular pro-lifers (or pro-lifers of another religion) should not tell Christian pro-lifers to keep their Bibles to themselves, that quoting the Bible is “hurting the movement,” or that “spewing Bible verses” does not save a single life.

Any Christian knows that not everyone accepts the Bible. We are told, in fact, that many will be offended by it. We are commanded to season our speech with salt, to know how to answer every man, to be wise as serpents but gentle as doves – but still, to be the light of the world. We are not to hide the truth we know, and this includes our Savior and His Word. We can speak in wise and appropriate ways, but we don’t need to “be quiet” just because those who don’t believe as we do say we should.

Science – and Christianity – tell us that this is a human being worthy of protection. (Human fetus at 7 weeks of development.)

3) We can focus on what unites and still be outspoken Christians – in fact, this is what we ought to do.

It is entirely true that a person does not have to be a Christian to be pro-life. Science, reason, logic, basic human rights, common decency, and general dignity all inform us that abortion is the killing of an innocent, helpless human being and that it ought not to be permitted. Christians would do well to learn scientific and philosophical arguments supporting the pro-life position. We ought to be able to defend our position from a variety of bases. In fact, this is essential to reaching the world at large.

However, just because other sources also provide a basis for being pro-life does not mean that Christians need to abandon the Bible or make an effort to stop quoting it. The Bible – and Christianity – are pro-life. That is true and valid, and we do not need to run from this. We should never be ashamed that we are Christian pro-lifers. We should never let anyone tell us to “leave God out of it” or to stop quoting the Bible.

Should we know our audience? Absolutely. Should we plan out the best way to persuade those we are speaking to? Most certainly. Should we welcome those with various religious viewpoints into the movement? Yes. Should we, basically, be wise in how we explain the pro-life position and be familiar with a variety of supporting facts? Without a doubt!

Yet none of this should lead us to conclude that religion hurts the pro-life movement or that we should hide the truth under a bushel. We are Christian pro-lifers. We are not ashamed to claim that, while science and reason can compel anyone to be pro-life, it is our God Who has compelled us to act pro-life. We are called – because we are Christians – to be silent no more and to speak out for the innocent, to stop oppression, and to stand against injustice.

Without the calling and the actions of Christian pro-lifers, the pro-life movement would likely not exist today – at least not in its present force. We must refuse to put our Christianity in the background; we must never check our faith at the door; and while we must be both wise and gentle, we should never silence the words of our Savior.

Be confident to share this graphic – it’s accurate and easily defensible.

Twelve hundred babies surviving abortions in the U.S., even in just one year, is a conservative estimate. Thousands of children have survived abortions in the forty years following the national legalization of abortion in 1973.

Just eight years after Roe v. Wade, Liz Jeffries and Rick Edmonds were named Pulitzer Prize finalists for their series on the live-birth abortions already epidemic in the abortion industry. Jeffries and Edmonds recorded heartbreaking testimonies from nurses who held and comforted dying abortion survivors. They also revealed the magnitude of these horrors:

Dr. Willard Cates, an expert on medical statistics who is chief of abortion surveillance for the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta, estimates that 400 to 500 abortion live births occur every year in the United States.

Later, Dr. Cates added:

No one is so naive as to think there is reliable voluntary reporting of live births in the present climate.

In other words, the number of babies born alive after abortions is actually much higher.

Procedures have evolved since the seventies and eighties in an effort to more effectively kill the child in the womb. For example, less than 1% of abortions performed now are saline abortions, previously a method of choice. However, evidence clearly shows that infants are still born alive. Most of these are left to die.

In 2011, the CDC recorded 1,298 cases of infant death in the U.S. due to “Other perinatal conditions,” which includes ICD-10 category P96.4, death subsequent to a failed “termination of pregnancy.” Numbers have not been released for the particular category. If they ever are, we can expect them to be far lower than the actual death toll. As Dr. Cates reminded us, there is no “reliable voluntary reporting of live birth” after abortion.

In 2007, a study published in the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology concluded that about 1 in 30 abortions after 16 weeks’ gestation result in a born-alive infant. At 23 weeks’ gestation, the number reached 9.7%. By a very conservative estimate, this study would suggest that over 900 babies survive late-term abortions each year in the U.S [1].

The Daily Mail reported that in just one year, 66 babies in the United Kingdom who survived abortion attempts were left to die. Canadian government statistics indicated that an average of 49 such born-alive infants die each year.

Anecdotal evidence is just as shocking. In 2008, Students for Life of America conducted an undercover investigation of a Planned Parenthood late-term abortion clinic in Freehold, NJ. A nurse explained to the investigator that a 22-week abortion involves inducing delivery. The investigator then asked if babies are ever delivered alive. The nurse replied, “It does happen, where it’s still alive…but it wouldn’t be able to survive on its own, so eventually the baby does die.”

In Live Action’s Inhuman investigation, clinic workers and abortionists in New York and Washington, D.C. describe drowning born-alive infants in jars of toxic solution or leaving them to die without medical care. A clinic counselor at Family Planning Associates in Arizona admits that babies have survived abortions at the clinic. When that happens, she says, “[t]hey will not resuscitate.”

In 1999, Jill Stanek, a nurse, held a baby who survived an abortion until he died in her arms. Countless others were left to die on counters and scales in her hospital.

People like Melissa Ohden, Gianna Jessen, and Claire Culwell are also living, breathing, adult proof that babies survive abortions. Melissa was saved by compassionate nurses, but what of those who are not so fortunate?

The Grand Jury said Kermit Gosnell killed “hundreds” of babies who survived his abortions. Just a few days ago, Douglas Karpen’s former assistants accused the abortionist of killing “three to four” born-alive babies a day by cutting their spinal cords, forcing instruments into the soft spots of their heads, or even twisting their heads off their necks.

If his assistant’s estimate is accurate, Karpen alone could have racked up a death toll of 1,200 born-alive infants in less than two years.

In a USA Today opinion column, Amanda Marcotte joined the ranks of pro-aborts blaming pro-lifers for the Gosnell travesties. Her reasoning (if it can be called that) adds to a long list of strange bullet points (like this, this, and this) that have been proffered by the abortion lobby defending the position that Gosnell was a fruit of pro-life legislation and activism. Marcotte opines that pro-life measures somehow drive women into the arms of abortion practitioners like Kermit Gosnell because they limit access to so-called “safe, legal abortions.” According to the article:

Anti-choicers have suggested that what is needed is to pass more unnecessary regulations of abortion clinics that do more to shut down safe, legal clinics than they do to make abortion safer for women.

What exactly are safe, legal abortion clinics? This term suggests the idea that abortion facilities at large are safe places for women, while Gosnell is an anomaly standing alone among many law-abiding abortionists.

However, Live Action’s Inhuman investigation is exposing clinics across the nation that are functioning without legal intervention even though the physicians and staff at each one readily admit their willingness and propensity to commit malpractice and break the law on a regular basis. (For example, Dr. Cesare Santangelo said that if a child were born alive after a failed abortion at his facility, he “would not do anything to help that child.”) Therefore, suggesting that Kermit Gosnell’s patients were somehow the unfortunate women who did not have access to anyone else does not mean that under any other abortionist they would have received better or safer care.

The article also states that Gosnell was denounced by pro-lifers and pro-aborts alike, which is only half-true. Although organizations like NARAL lied and said that they had been opposing Gosnell from day one, pro-abortion organizations spoke up only towards the end of Gosnell’s trial, after the media storm against Gosnell was well underway, which itself occurred long after pro-lifers like our own Lila Rose began decrying his practices years ago.

The article then blames pro-lifers for the high cost of safe, legal abortions, saying that Gosnell took advantage of women in poverty who could not afford the former:

Gosnell mostly exploited women’s poverty, undercutting reputable clinics on their prices. For many women in poverty, getting the money together for a clean, safe abortion takes a long time, often so long that they are past the time when they can legally get one.

The pro-life measures in question, presumably (because the article does not back up its claim with examples), are those that hold abortion clinics to standards similar to those of other surgical centers. Some of these measures would include requiring wide hallways in case a gurney needs to be admitted to take away a woman who is bleeding out with sepsis or a perforated uterus. One such woman was a victim of Gosnell, named Karnamaya Mongar. According to the Gosnell grand jury report: 

[T]here might have been some slim hope of reviving Mrs. Mongar. The paramedics were able to generate a weak pulse. But, because of the cluttered hallways and the padlocked emergency door, it took them over twenty minutes just to find a way to get her out of the building.

If those pro-life measures (which look out for the well-being of the woman and her child, while pro-abortion measures support neither) were not implemented, so-called “safe and legal” abortion facilities would be effectively unregulated, and there would be very little, if any, differentiation between the unsanitary practices of Gosnell and every other abortion practitioner in the nation. Clearly, blaming pro-lifers for the Kermit Gosnells of the world is illogical and a distraction from the real issue, which is the unwillingness of abortion facilities to operate lawfully with the best interests of women in mind.

Next month, a group of intrepid, dedicated pro-lifers will support the pro-life movement by setting out on a week-long “Bike for the Unborn” pilgrimage around Southern California, retracing the steps of Catholic Franciscan role model Junipero Serra, who dedicated his life to spreading the Gospel message as a missionary in 18^th-century America.

Bike for the Unborn is a prime example of the fact that the pro-life movement truly has a niche for every personality and individual talent. While some write books or sidewalk-counsel to further the cause, others put their athletic abilities to use to raise money and awareness.

The bike pilgrimage will begin with a retreat at a beautiful Carmelite Sisters of the Most Sacred Heart of Los Angeles on Sunday, June 16. The rubber will hit the road the following day, Monday, June 17. Here’s the itinerary (subject to minor changes):

17: San Gabriel to Malibu Creek
18: Malibu Creek to Point Mugu
19: Point Mugu to Santa Barbara
20: Santa Barbara to Emma Wood State Beach
21: Emma Wood to Malibu Creek
22: Malibu Creek to San Gabriel

Visit the Bike for the Unborn Facebook page to learn more about the pilgrimage.

On Monday, pro-life advocates raised their voices against the ongoing injustices at Dr. Carhart late-term abortion center. Here is a highlight video of what the speakers and attendees had to say:

Today, Representative Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) held a hearing on H.R. 1797, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, originally for D.C. but now intended for the entire nation. On the “pro” side of the congressional divide were Reps. Franks, King (R-Iowa), Chabot (R-Ohio), and Gohmert (R-Tex.); the “anti” side comprised Reps. Nadler (D-NY), sporting a suspiciously large soft drink, and Conyers (D-Mich.), who divided his time among forgetting the number of the bill he had presented himself to oppose (H.R. 1793?), plugging ObamaCare, and sleeping.

Rep. Trent Franks.

Four witnesses testified – three for the bill, one against. The three in favor – Dr. Anthony Levatino, a reformed abortionist; Dr. Maureen Condic, a neurobiologist; and Jill Stanek, a nurse – presented unimpeachable testimony as to the “universal agreement” (per Condic) that a pre-born child does indeed feel pain at 20 weeks. Their testimonies are worth examining in detail, but I want to focus on the fourth witness: Ms. Christy Zink, a mother who aborted one of her three children.

Zink testified that she had received in 2009 “terrible news” about her son, at that point twenty-one weeks along – that he was, “in effect[,] missing one side of his brain,” and that he would live a life of “near-constant pain” should he be born. Zink followed her doctor’s advice and ended the boy’s life in utero. She said her abortion was “made out of love,” “to spare my son’s pain and suffering,” and that she was testifying “on his behalf.” H.R. 1797 is “downright cruel,” Zink said, because it would “inflict pain” on everyone who is not the pre-born child in question.

Now, Ms. Zink is characteristic of the sort of witness pro-abortion politicians like Reps. Nadler and Conyers like to bring to these hearings. She is not a doctor, let alone an abortion doctor, like Anthony Levatino, who can describe exactly what happens to the child during an abortion because he’s performed over 1,200 of them. She is not a neurobiologist, like Maureen Condin, who can lay out the parts of the human brain that respond to pain and explain how even “congenitally decorticate” children – i.e., children missing up to 80% of their brains – nevertheless respond to pain stimuli. (The specific young girl Condic mentioned, who was notably allowed to be born, also likes to dance to rock music.) She is not a registered nurse, like Jill Stanek, who cradled born-alive infants rather than leave them to die per her hospital’s orders.

Considering the overwhelming relevant expertise of these witnesses, one has to ask: why on Earth would Conyers and Nadler see fit to have Zink testify alongside them?

The answer, in short, is because she is political gold. Though not an expert in the relevant subject matter, she is a mother of three (two still living) with a sad story. Pro-aborts like Nadler and Conyers play emotional chicken using a woman like Ms. Zink: her story is the currency with which they gamble, and they dare Rep. Franks and the others to question it.

Often, people in Franks’s position under these circumstances blink; it’s hard not to. But not this time.

Rep. Louie Gohmert.

People from both sides of the room told their own stories; Levatino mentioned his daughter, the loss of whom convinced him to abandon committing abortions. Rep. Franks spoke of his brother, who lived a full life of forty years with Down syndrome. And Rep. Gohmert described his daughter, born premature, struggling to see and to breathe, on the verge of death. He quoted the NICU doctor: “It is so important that the baby hear your voice. Please talk to your baby, and caress her. Talk to her. Her eyes don’t work real well; she won’t recognize you. But she will know your voice, because she’s heard you in utero.”

“Ms. Zink,” Gohmert concluded, “having my great sympathy and empathy both, I still come back wondering: shouldn’t we wait, and see if the child can survive, before we decide to rip him apart?”

Pro-aborts like NARAL and Planned Parenthood will likely shriek that it’s cruel to call Zink’s testimony into question. But by treating Ms. Zink as a witness at a hearing instead of a pathetic pity-case, Franks, Gohmert, and the rest gave her the highest possible respect. That’s what she was there for – and Nadler and Conyers knew it going in.

Conyers, in a rare moment of wakefulness, declared Ms. Zink’s story “uncomfortable.” (He said no such thing in response to Stanek’s story, or that of Levatino, whom he called “Dr. Levantano.”) Rep. Gohmert, getting back on topic, asked Levatino how Conyers’s discomfort might compare to that of the child torn apart in the womb. Conyers desperately tried to sidetrack Levatino with a digression on ObamaCare – “Let me put it this way: can you just say you don’t like it?” Levatino, getting back on topic, bluntly demanded the relevance of the question. (Answer: thirty seconds of stuttering.)

The Republican representatives who matched Ms. Zink’s heartfelt pro-abortion story with their own pro-life ones were not cruel. The expert witnesses who used scientific evidence and medical experience to dismiss Ms. Zink’s personal testimony as irrelevant were not cruel.

No, what’s cruel is the rank cynicism with which abortion-peddling Democrat politicians like Nadler and Conyers prop up people like Ms. Zink. She got to be told, again and again, to her face, via both indisputable scientific evidence and powerful personal stories to match her own, that she made the wrong decision. For no reason, save as a crass appeal to emotion, Nadler and Conyers put this woman in a position to be reminded, over and over, that her son did live a life of “near-constant pain,” albeit a much shorter one – and this by her choice.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler.

After the hearing, NARAL tweeted their thanks to Reps. Nadler and Conyers. Pro-choice champion Nadler poisonously suggested in his opening remarks that pro-lifers were “gleeful” about the Kermit Gosnell case. (He agitatedly recanted his remark only after Rep. Franks called him out on it.) He then spent the rest of the hearing sucking his soft drink or lazily propping his face up with his hand. Pro-choice champion Conyers slept through one half of the hearing and spent the other ignoring the witnesses (three of whom were women) to chat with his neighbors, or else stammer through the fallout from his torturous attempts at gotcha questions.

Maybe Jerrold Nadler doesn’t know the astronomical abortion rate in his city, but I suspect he does. Maybe John Conyers has slept through every declaration of how abortion has wrought havoc on the black community, but I suspect not. These are NARAL’s crusaders for women – querulous, desultory old men who prop up a wounded woman and then sleep or snack through her testimony, expecting their pro-life opponents – because they are gentlemen – to abandon their fight for the very lives of innocent children so as to prevent Ms. Zink’s feeling worse than she does already.

A federal twenty-week ban on abortion is a step in the right direction, and I commend Rep. Franks for taking it. But even better is the congressman’s resolve to speak for the voiceless among us, regardless of the depths to which his opponents will sink, and regardless of the human collateral damage those opponents are willing to accrue to keep their sacred cow mooing.

As for Reps. Nadler and Conyers, they are a disgrace and an embarrassment. Nadler may whinge about the “war on women” – this ridiculous phrase was one of the first out of his mouth – but anyone who would leave a woman like Ms. Zink twisting as these two have would be better-served keeping his mouth shut when it comes to defending the fairer sex.

When I was a teenager, I always believed that abortion was wrong. As a new Catholic, my faith certainly led me to believe that I was pro-life. However, I remember asking my mother how it was that I could force my religious beliefs and morals onto other people who didn’t feel the same way. She didn’t really have an answer, and that was something I struggled with for years.

This is an inherent weakness in the pro-life movement: the inability to separate religion from our cause. How many people are we alienating when pro-life is practically synonymous with Christianity? This is one of the biggest clubs pro-aborts are able to beat us with. In a country that glorifies the separation of church and state, it’s easy to assume that if you’re aren’t an overly religious person, there’s no room for you in the pro-life movement.

Think about how much pro-aborts are able to capitalize on that. They claim that pro-lifers are forcing our morals and our religion onto everyone else. It not only makes abortion an even more divisive issue than it already is, but it makes people who aren’t religious feel as if they don’t belong.

Albany Rose, whose emotional video about reclaiming her abortion records went viral, has some experience with this. “I consider myself a Modern Deist,” she explained. “I believe in God, I believe in all He did for us. But I don’t believe in the bible or Christianity.” Instead of being welcomed into the pro-life movement, she’s felt that it often leaves her vulnerable to be attacked, saying, “I swear that it paints the biggest ‘come get me’ sign on my forehead!”

Most people who consider themselves atheists or non-religious don’t identify as pro-life – at least not publicly. Many of them probably feel the same way I did as a teenager: personally pro-life, but not wanting to force their morals onto anyone else. Add in that the pro-life movement is composed almost entirely of Christians using Bible verses to try to convert pro-aborts, and it can easily make someone shy away from pro-lifers. “When people stand strong in their faith, there is a beauty to it,” Rose explained. “So many people in the pro-life movement are hurting us because they believe the only way to ‘convert a choicer’ is to spew biblical quotes and tell them to repent. That even makes me not want to be pro-life much of the time.”

Why is there such an emphasis on using Christianity as a persuasive tool among pro-lifers? As Scott Klusendorf has pointed out, the science is on our side. This is ultimately what made my teenage self realize that this wasn’t an issue of forcing my religious beliefs onto someone else. They have nothing to do with being pro-life. It has to do with the inherent right of a human being to live, regardless of where they reside or how weak or vulnerable they may be.

A baby, at the moment of conception, already has a separate DNA strand from her mother. This person may only be a tiny embryo, but she is not part of her mother. The baby lives in the mother’s uterus, but from the very beginning, even when she is only a single cell, she is a completely separate being. Not only is religion not needed to convert people to the pro-life cause, but it can actually be alienating and harmful. In fact, we’re simply giving pro-aborts fuel for the fire when we focus on religion.

None of this is to say that religion has no place in the pro-life movement. I think that it is often religious organizations that do the most good for women seeking alternatives to abortion, through pregnancy and adoption assistance, as well as through helping post-abortive women to heal through ministries such as Rachel’s Vineyard. But using religion as a method to convert people can, too much of the time, not only turn people off to what it is we’re trying to accomplish, but create outright hostility towards us.

Pro-aborts are going through their own issues with being divided right now. That means that now, more than ever, we need to be united. We can’t afford to alienate people or lose credibility – not when we have the science of fetal development and embryology on our side. Think of how we could cripple the pro-aborts if we were able to take away their argument of “forcing our religious beliefs onto others.” That would be one less weapon in their arsenal to attack pro-lifers with. How much stronger would the pro-life movement be if we made religion less of a central focus?

Of pro-aborts’ many charms, two often stand out: they’re never content with what they have, and their rhetoric is so euphemism-laden that it’s sometimes hard to decipher what they’re actually saying. Nancy Northup, President and CEO of the Center for “Reproductive Rights,” displays both traits in a new open letter to Barack Obama. Fortunately, we here at Live Action are well-versed in Choicespeak-to-English translation.

She implores the president “to fulfill that promise” to fight for a woman’s “access to quality, affordable health care” and “right to make her own choices about her own health.” Normal English-speakers might assume that refers to, well, women’s health, in which case Ms. Northup would indeed be highlighting a promise Obama has failed to deliver — under ObamaCare, women will certainly face lost coverage, increased insurance costs, fewer choices, and worse care.

But later in the letter Northup lauds ObamaCare for “expand[ing] affordable access to family planning, prenatal and maternal care, and routine reproductive health check-ups to millions,” so her words can’t mean their plain meaning. No, the truth is that “women’s health” is just code for the legal privilege to have a doctor kill your developing child, with your fellow taxpayers footing the bill if necessary. Just coming out and saying that’s what they want would make the CRR’s job a lot harder, because then their communiqués couldn’t use gems like “drawing the line against the hostility, the cruelty” with a straight face.

Almost as preposterous is the premise that Obama needs to be told to keep appeasing the offspring disposal lobby. Abortion is effectively legal throughout most of pregnancy for any reason, often subsidized, and largely insulated from the democratic process. Not only is Obama committed to preserving that status quo, but he’s on the record in favor of third-trimester abortions, has stuck his neck out for outright infanticide in the name of preserving abortion, has endorsed disenfranchising the states on the issue via the Freedom of Choice Act, and routinely lies to butter up pro-aborts and defame pro-lifers. What more could Northup want?

The rights of women—and their ability to exercise them—now depend on where they live, and whether their state legislatures have been overrun by politicians hostile to women, doctors, and the rights of both.

So the only way to not be “hostile” to women and doctors is by letting them dismember a baby with various sharp implements, and/or administer various poisons that starve or suffocate the baby, or stop his or her heart. Which doesn’t sound hostile at all. To say nothing of the fact that “women” is a curious catchall for a procedure the majority of women don’t use.

This is a crisis of constitutional proportions. Action by the federal government is needed right now.

Um, no. Different states making different laws on contentious issues is exactly what the Constitution was designed to facilitate; it is therefore the opposite of a “crisis.”

Specifically, Northup demands:

Continue to push for the broad expansion of affordable access to the full range of essential reproductive health services through the Affordable Care Act and other means—and to hold the line against attempts to thwart this progress through refusals on the grounds of personal and religious belief.

Translation: force taxpayers to subsidize abortion, regardless of the individual rights and religious beliefs of the taxpayers from whose pockets said funds will be taken.

Prioritize the appointment of judges to the federal bench who will uphold the constitutional protections due the full and free exercise of women’s reproductive rights.

Translation: abandon all pretense that the judiciary is a separate and distinct branch with an apolitical purpose. Appoint judges who will fabricate constitutional rationales for usurping the people’s and the legislative branch’s rights and responsibilities on the subject of abortion.

Support the provision of comprehensive and accurate sex education in our public schools, improvements in prenatal and maternal care, the expansion of support for families in need, and other services that will benefit women and their families throughout their lives.

Translation: support greater promotion of underage casual sex and somehow produce results that are the opposite of the effect your health care plan will actually have.

Fittingly, the Choicespeak reaches its highest/lowest point near the end, as Northup justifies her stance thusly:

The federal government must ensure that the fundamental rights of all people are respected and protected, regardless of where they live.

Unless where they live happens to be in a womb. In that case, regard away. Their fundamental rights may be dismissed by a committee of one.

There is perhaps no other fundamental right that is under more ferocious attack than the right of reproductive choice—and we need you to help us fight back now.

Except maybe, oh, I don’t know, the right not to die. Think that might be just a smidgen more fundamental than the right to lethally cancel an almost-always-preventable nine-month condition?

Northup concludes by expressing how the CRR looks forward to “fighting alongside” Obama in the fake name of “reproductive rights.” And “fight” is right – the cause of abortion is not only a war on the unborn, but a war on facts and words themselves.

One of the ways that abortion advocates like to claim that abortion is “health care” is by claiming that it can sometimes be necessary for the health of the mother, or to save her life. Included in the “health of the mother” argument is mental health, because some women could become suicidal if not permitted to have an abortion. In such a situation, a woman should clearly be allowed to have an abortion, right?

Consider the case of “SB,” a British woman with a history of severe mental health problems, who just got legal permission to have an abortion at 23 weeks pregnant because she claims she would kill herself if forced to carry the baby.

The woman, known only as “SB”, is currently staying in a secure mental health facility, but appeared in court to make a direct plea to the judge. Her identity and the name of the health authority cannot be reported.

Justice Holman disagreed with the assessment of her doctors, mother and husband that SB was not capable of deciding and said it would be “a total affront” to her autonomy to say she could not.

He added: “The patient perfectly understands what’s involved in a termination… she perfectly understands the finality of the event.”

The background on this case? This was a planned pregnancy. SB has a history of bipolar disorder, paranoid delusions, and schizophrenia, which she had been able to manage with medication. She stopped taking it, though, when she became pregnant, and then claimed she wanted an abortion. Not only did her family and her husband say that she was not capable of understanding what she was choosing to do, but so did her doctors – yet the judge ruled in her favor anyway. She’s also tried to kill her husband twice.

Does this sound like a sane woman capable of making such a monumental decision?

SB’s case aside, what about your average woman who claims to be suicidal if forced to carry her baby?

The simple fact of the matter is, someone who is truly suicidal is not in a mentally fit state of mind. She is not capable of making rational decisions, and so how is it acceptable to allow her to make a decision that will forever change her life, but also rob another human being of his or hers? Someone who comes into an abortion clinic claiming to be suicidal needs psychiatric help.

If SB had said she would kill herself unless her husband was shot in the head, she would have been treated for her mental illness, not given a loaded gun. If she had said she would kill herself if she couldn’t cut her arm off, she would have been given psychiatric help, not handed a hacksaw. But in the case of an abortion, we’re supposed to just give the suicidal person what she wants and then send her on their way? This is especially mind-boggling considering that abortion increases the risks of mental health issues like depression and suicide!

People suffering from suicidal thoughts need help, as they are clearly suffering from a mental illness. And a mentally ill person cannot consent to an abortion.