It was announced today that Mississippi Initiative 26 failed to pass in a general vote today. This measure would have amended the Mississippi Constitution to recognize personhood as beginning at the moment of fertilization.
It failed by a rather narrow margin - 52% to 48%. In this New York Times article, we see that among its opponents are the "usual suspects" - NARAL, Planned Parenthood, the ACLU. That's so typical that it isn't worth the bother to comment. However, once again National Right to Life disappointed grass-roots pro-life activists. Sadly, it's no surprise and I learned long ago that National Right to Life is not to be taken seriously in terms of its political courage and resolve (or lack thereof).
However, the Catholic bishops of Mississippi have abysmally disgraced themeselves and their high offices by opposing the Personhood Initiative. Yes! The bishops joined ranks with NARAL et al to oppose the measure and thus throw babies under the bus! It's not strategic, you see? Their fears of it hindering "efforts to overturn Roe" (Efforts!??! What efforts??!?!?!) are nothing more than lame excuses for cowardice (and I hope for nothing worse).
Your Excellencies, if Initiative 26 would have been so harmful to the pro-life cause, don't you think the pro-aborts would have figured that out?? Instead of vociferously opposing the measure, they would have quietly let it pass - if what you said was true.
As noted before, the initiative failed by a thin margin. Had the Mississippi bishops lent their support to this measure - or at least not opposed it - perhaps Initiative 26 would have passed. Lame excuses to the contrary, I believe they failed the babies miserably and will answer for that, should they not change course.
Faith Of Our Fathers
2 hours ago
For once not being snarky: I know I could look this up elsewhere, but I know I'll get a far more interesting answer from you...does the Church ever allow for terminating an ectopic pregancy?
ReplyDeleteThis is actually an application of the Catholic principle of Double Effect - where a given action is placed that has both a good and bad effect. Here's a good treatment of that principle http://gerardnadal.com/2010/05/23/the-principle-of-double-effect/ and another that specifically addresses the ectoptic pregnancy scenario http://www.cuf.org/faithfacts/details_view.asp?ffid=56
ReplyDeleteThat second source states the criteria by which the Fallopian tube may be removed.
Evangelicals teach that one should speak aloud over one's life what one wants to happen. Jesus is "THE WORD" and God spoke and it was created. He wrote the Ten Commandments on tablets of stone (the 2nd time he made Moses do it himself).
ReplyDeleteCardinal McCarrick speaks homosexual civil unions over the radio waves of his diocese and within five years "homosexual marriage" has come to pass in D.C. -- and what ho! the "Catholic" governor and all the Catholic Democratic legislators (one a "married" homosexual) are making it their A#1 priority to force gay mariage on the rest of Cardinal McCarrick's diocese in 2012 (after trying and failing in 2011 due to the efforts of African American Protestant ministers and church congregations).
It really makes one wonder why the Catholic hierarchy is so consistently against declaring the personhood of the child in the womb.
Only say the WORD, Lord, and their souls will be healed!
Face it, if you can't pass an anti-abortion bill in Mississippi, the problem is the bill. Mississippi voted to ban gay marriage with 86% of the vote. It is one of the most conservative, anti-choice states in the union. If the bill had simply said "Roe v. Wade no longer applies here." it would have received almost 100% of the vote, and probably a few from neighboring states too. The bill was written such that a miscarriage would have to be investigated as an accidental death, and a promiscuous woman flying into Jackson from Tallahassee while on the pill could be arrested for interstate conspiracy to commit murder. Phyllis Schlafly didn't even get behind the bill. It failed because it was a bad bill, even for conservatives.
ReplyDeleteSide note: thanks for the link, but that's absurd that the church still puts an unsavable embryo over the life of the mother. Another non-snarky question: Would removal of the Fallopian tube not make a woman sterile?
The bill failed because we have some "gutless wonders" in our midst - and some of them wear mitres on their heads.
ReplyDeleteRegarding the side note: Neither mom nor babe is put over the other. All possible action is taken to save both. I'm not a doctor, but I think by the time the ectoptic pregnancy is discovered, the Fallopian tube is already irreparably damaged, so the removal itself would have no effect on the woman's fertility. As an aside, the woman could still conceive from her other ovary and Fallopian tube.