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by Joel Brind, Ph.D.
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Dr. Brind briefly explains exactly what birth control pills and morning after pills are, how they affect the body and what risks they entail. He then asks why there is a campaign to make these substances available without a prescription for contraception and abortion in one case, when the same substances are unlawful for athletes to use under any circumstances.
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12/16/2005
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by Joseph Capizzi
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A fundamental goal of good governance in a liberal society is the protection of the weak from the actions of the strong. Today, economic and social pressures are leading the strong in the United States to see the physically weak as obstacles to their good. We should note that claims of a right to die through assisted suicide are coming not from the disabled communities but instead from the able-bodied. Good law and good governance fulfills its obligations when it resists these claims to fictional rights and instead protects the inalienable right of all to life.
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12/15/2005
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by Andrew Cannon
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A summary of the difference between embryonic stem cells and adult stem cells.
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12/15/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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After four years as chairman of the President's Council on Bioethics, Leon Kass participated as an associate member of the council for the first time last week. The council held its first meeting under the leadership of the new chairman, Edmund Pellegrino. In an interview with Culture & Cosmos, Kass reflected on the work of the council under his leadership.
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12/15/2005
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by Eugene F. Diamond, MD
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Dr. Diamond appeals to common sense and good will concerning abortion.
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12/14/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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In multiple interviews the president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops said that "deep-seated homosexual tendencies" are equivalent to "deep-seated heterosexual" tendencies. Spokane Bishop William S. Skylstad made the remarks to the Washington Post and the Catholic News Service in discussing the recent Vatican instruction that addresses whether or not homosexual men should be ordained.
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12/07/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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This past Thursday the South Korean cloning scientist Dr. Woo Suk Hwang publicly admitted to having obtained human egg cells unethically as part of his laboratory's work on human cloning. Hwang also announced that as a result of the scandal he was resigning his position as director of the World Stem Cell Hub, a major international research consortium.
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12/02/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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Recent allegations that the famous Korean engineer of the world's first cloned human embryos obtained the eggs for those clones from his own team of junior researchers have jolted the scientific community.
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12/02/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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A Catholic medical doctor and bioethicists who enjoys the respect of his peers across the ideological spectrum is the new chairman of the President's Council on Bioethics. Dr. Edmund D. Pellegrino will begin leading the prestigious council when they next meet on December 8 and 9.
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12/02/2005
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by Catholic Medical Association
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Homosexuality and Hope is the statement of the Catholic Medical Association concerning the medical and pastoral care of persons having SSAD (Same Sex Attraction Disorder).
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11/21/2005
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by Gerard van den Aardweg, Ph.D.
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Gerard van den Aardweg, Ph.D. provides an insightful critique in his comments on the controversial US Conference of Catholic Bishops' Pastoral Letter: Always our Children
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11/21/2005
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by Richard Fitzgibbons
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Dr.s Richard P. Fitzgibbons, M.D. & Joseph Nicolosi, Ph.D. explain the early signs of Gender Identity Disorder, the sources of the disorder and council parents on strategies that can be counterproductive as well as strategies and therapies that are helpful and effective.
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11/21/2005
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by Richard Fitzgibbons
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Dr. Richard Fitzgibons presents the pathology, as well as the early identification and treatment of SSAD (Same Sex Attraction Disorder) in Men and Women.
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11/21/2005
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by William E. May
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Dr. May presents and explains various positions taken on the question of caring for patients in a 'persistant vegitatave state'. Dr. May then presents and defends the position taken by JohnPaul II in his address of March 20, 2004.
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11/18/2005
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by William E. May
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Dr. May explains the moral arguements used to attack the inviolablility of innocent human life and goes on to explain the moral arguements that defend the inviolability of innocent human life.
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11/18/2005
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by William E. May
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Dr. William E. May presents John Paul II's teaching concerning the preciousness of all human life as a great and surpassing gift of God.
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11/18/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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Texas voters continued the 18-state winning streak for traditional marriage by overwhelming supporting a constitutional amendment declaring marriage in Texas to be solely the union of a man and woman. The measure also forbids the state from creating or recognizing any legal status identical to or similar to marriage, including such relationships created outside of Texas. Proposition 2 passed with more than 76 percent of the vote, among the highest in the nation.
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11/15/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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A prominent doctor and scientist told a Congressional committee yesterday that a recent study claiming unborn babies are unlikely to feel pain before 30 weeks gestation is based on an outdated definition of pain and used a questionable methodology that puts its findings into doubt.
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11/14/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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A Catholic theologian who opposes Church teaching on divorce and supports creating a betrothal ceremony for cohabitating couples just led a colloquium to assist US bishops with writing a pastoral letter on marriage.
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11/14/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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The quest to find a moral means of obtaining embryonic–like stem cells took a giant leap forward this week when a team of scientists announced that they had successfully generated pluripotent stem cells from mice using a process know as altered nuclear transfer (ANT). Though some Catholic ethicists caution that in its present form the procedure may be immoral, even those ethicists are heartened by the news and say it shows that a morally acceptable version of ANT could be developed.
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11/14/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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One of the most important Christian conservative grass roots organizations in America has issued a memo that is a shot across the bow of the nomination of Harriet Miers for the US Supreme Court. The memo, released on Monday by Concerned Women for America (CWA), falls just short of outright opposition to the Miers nomination. Though it withholds final judgment, it strongly scolds the White House for what CWA sees as a weak nomination followed by insulting talking points in her support.
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11/14/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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Following the recent announcement from the Food and Drug Administration that they are postponing the decision on whether or not to grant over the counter approval of the drug Plan B, the FDA announced they are soliciting public opinion on how to regulate the controversial drug also known as the morning after pill. The agency is seeking to address a series of complex regulatory questions regarding how to make the drug available to women 17 years and older while keeping it prescription-only for those who are younger.
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11/14/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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The Bush administration has asked the Supreme Court to reinstate a federal ban on partial birth abortions according to a brief filed by the solicitor general's office on Friday. Pro-lifers will watch the case even more closely than normal as it will serve as the first significant test of the extent to which John G. Roberts' decisions are determined by previous court decisions and how willing he is to overturn precedent.
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11/14/2005
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by Leon Kass
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Dr. Leon Kass testifies before the US Senate Committee on the Judiciary concerning the urgent need to ban human cloning whether intended for reproductive or theraputic purposes.
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11/02/2005
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by Whitehead Institute
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Scientists at Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research have successfully demonstrated that altered nuclear transfer is indeed possible, at least in mice.
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10/18/2005
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by Michael J. McManus
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Confession time. I was brought up Catholic and attended weekly Mass through my college years, but I became a Protestant at age 22 in 1963 in part because I did not believe in the Catholic Church's position on birth control.
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09/25/2005
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by Archbishop Charles Chaput
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My purpose in this pastoral letter, therefore, is simple. I believe the message of Humanae Vitae is not a burden but a joy. I believe this encyclical offers a key to deeper, richer marriages. And so what I seek from the family of our local Church is not just a respectful nod toward a document which critics dismiss as irrelevant, but an active and sustained effort to study Humanae Vitae; to teach it faithfully in our parishes; and to encourage our married couples to live it.
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09/25/2005
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by Archbishop Charles Chaput
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In the weeks following the publication of his pastoral letter to commemorate the 30th anniversary of Humanae Vitae, Archbishop Chaput answered some common questions about family planning and related issues in his regular Denver Catholic Register column. We offer our readers some of his answers. The questions are as follows.
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09/25/2005
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by Mark Adams
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In the love between husband and wife, God creates children to be reared and educated by the parents. This is the norm. Any deviation from normalcy could interfere with God's plans for children at His choice. Any technology, which seeks to create human life outside the normative conjugal act of husband and wife, is immoral precisely because it circumvents God's plan for generation of the human person.
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09/25/2005
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by William E. May
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An extreme form of artificial reproduction, cloning differs from artificial insemination and in vitro fertilization insofar as it is achieved without the contribution of two gametic cells; it is, consequently, asexual and agamic in character. Thus even from a biological point of view, cloning is far more radical as a method of artificial reproduction than artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization, and their permutations and combinations.
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09/25/2005
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by Fr. Larry Kutz
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The objective of this essay is to articulate the nature and purpose of human sexuality as it can be known by the human person on the basis of spontaneous observation and reflection. It is in those truths of nature and purpose that the specific ethical norms for personal and societal life in the matter of sexuality are rather immediately discovered. The appeal here is not to authority (except insofar as truth by intrinsic evidence commands acceptance) but to common observation and the basic testimony of human history; the meaning and normativity of human sexuality can be known with certainty in this way. Old Testament Judaism and New Testament Christianity have confirmed and deepened this universal understanding.
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09/25/2005
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by Dr. Chris Kahlenborn
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Artificial fertilization or artificial reproduction can be a tempting consideration for the couple who has spent years suffering with the emotional pain of infertility, however, a number of ethical questions arise. In order to understand why participation in artificial reproduction conflicts with the Lord's moral order, we must understand how artificial reproduction works.
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09/25/2005
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by Mark Adams
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Women who undergo abortions are at greater risk for mental health problems in subsequent years, according to a new study presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Society (APS) held this June in Miami Beach, Florida.
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09/25/2005
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by Michele Jackson
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It is impossible to become energized to fix a problem if you do not know it exists. Many Black Americans do not know that over 1.3 million babies are dying from abortion each year. They do not know that about 34% of those dying are Black babies, meaning some 440,000 Black children die by abortion each year. Many Black Americans perceive abortion as a political fight, something having little to do with their daily lives. They could not be more wrong. We must make our community see abortion as a problem in our homes. Otherwise how can we ask that abortion be put on the agenda of critical problems to fix within the Black community?
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09/25/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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One of the Senate's best known Catholics has worked to reject a proposal by President Bush that would have given families displaced by Hurricane Katrina financial aid to send their children to private or parochial schools. A bipartisan student relief package put forth by Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy and Wyoming Senator Michael Enzi did not include a provision that would have given students up to $7,500 because Kennedy opposed the provision, according to a high level Congressional staffer who spoke with Culture & Cosmos.
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09/23/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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There are signs that as the Left's control over the judiciary continues to slip they are taking increasingly drastic steps in a last ditch effort to defeat the nomination of John G. Roberts and tarnish the reputation of the practitioners of conservative judicial philosophy. In the last week, a liberal Jewish political advocacy organization apparently attempted to trick a conservative organization into getting the "Roberts Playbook" while Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz accused the recently deceased Chief Justice William Rehnquist of acting like a Nazi in college.
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09/23/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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As organizations like Catholic Charities and Red Cross solicit donations in order to provide basic necessities for Hurricane Katrina evacuees, Planned Parenthood is asking for money in order to hand out contraceptives and abortifacient morning after pills to victims of the storm making their way to the Houston area.
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09/23/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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With one week to go before confirmation hearings begin, several liberal activist groups have finally announced their unequivocal opposition to the nomination of John G. Roberts to the Supreme Court. In a flurry of activity last Wednesday and Thursday, People for the American Way, the Human Rights Campaign, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays all announced their opposition to Roberts. At the same time a coalition of conservative women and a separate group of black leaders announced their support for the Supreme Court nominee.
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09/23/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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Scientists at Harvard have turned ordinary human skin cells into embryonic-like stem cells – known as pluripotent stem cells – using a new reprogramming process. The scientists' findings are set to be published in the next edition of the journal Science and if the method proves successful it may pave the way for production of pluripotent stem cells without destroying human embryos. Two prominent opponents of embryo-destructive research say that the new procedure is not without problems but both agreed the findings represent a step in the direction of ethical stem cell research.
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09/23/2005
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by Allan C. Carlson
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The health of a society might be judged by the welcome that it gives to babies. A vital community encourages the formation of families, through marriage and the birth of children. In the good society, large families are especially prized as the source of new community members raised within the integrity of homes. The surest signs of societal decay are a retreat from marriage and a decline in marital fertility.
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08/17/2005
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by Max Heine
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We indirectly consume future generations in a financial sense through rising debt, sinking savings, increasing taxes, and the shifting of wealth away from fertile couples. More directly, we consume children as we accept a new ethic concerning fetal life. Each trend sprouts from the same root of self centered consumption.
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08/17/2005
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by Gracie S. Hsu
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Whether through USAID or by congressional appropriations to multinational corporations such as the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the World Bank, or the International Monetary Fund, American taxpayers routinely fund population control projects that coerce foreign governments, communities, and individuals to "accept" draconian population control measures, all under the rubic of protecting against overpopulation and promoting humanitarian aid.
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08/17/2005
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by Deacon Keith A. Fournier
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I continue to assert that I am neither liberal nor conservative, I am Catholic. The labels are becoming increasingly confused, and provide little assistance in addressing the major issues we face at the dawn of the Third Millennium of Christianity and the beginning of the twenty first century. It is time to move beyond "liberal" and "conservative" in our efforts to build a more just society.
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08/17/2005
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by William E. May
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My purpose here is, first, to consider briefly the reasons why human sexuality is in need of redemption. I will then reflect on the great normative truths in whose light we are able to make true moral judgments and good moral choices whenever the goods of human sexuality are at stake. Attention will then focus on the significance of marriage as a reality that enables men and women truly to love one another as sexual persons and to honor the great goods of human sexuality.
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08/17/2005
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by Jameson Taylor
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Advocates of legalized prostitution employ an argument similar to that used by proponents of legalized abortion: Prostitution should be legalized so that the state can regulate it and, hence, “protect” women from STD’s and unscrupulous pimps. In other words, women around the world will be better off once prostitution is legalized. For this reason, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), a UN vassalage, has led the way in the recent push to decriminalize prostitution.
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08/17/2005
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by Dr. Janet Smith
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Christians no longer need to offer apologies for their insistence upon sexual morality, for their insistence upon reserving sex for marriage. Some in high public places are now beginning to counsel abstinence before marriage and to extol faithful monogamous marriages. They have begun to see these as practices of great practical wisdom. In a certain sense, Christian morality-especially sexual morality-is quite similar to natural or commonsense morality. One does not need to be a Christian to understand why certain sexual practices are wrong.
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08/17/2005
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by William E. May
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My purpose in this paper is to articulate as clearly as I can the basic argument used by advocates of euthanasia and assisted suicide to support their claim that it ought to be legally permitted and then to offer a somewhat detailed critique of this argument.
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08/17/2005
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by Multiple Authors
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In recent years a radical change has taken place in the practice of medicine, a change still developing yet already grave with consequences both for the interests of each individual and for those of civil society as a whole. The clearest manifestations of this change have clustered around the manner in which it is to be determined that a person has died. From this perspective, the recent and proposed changes in law that have imposed "definitions of death", appear as attempts to have society accept and approve this reorientation of medical practice. What is not so clear is that society has understood the issue sufficiently to have given informed consent.
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08/17/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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Despite their decision to pull a misleading television ad that accuses Judge John G. Roberts of defending violence against abortion clinics, NARAL Pro-Choice America remains strongly opposed to Roberts' nomination to the Supreme Court. Their website, ProChoiceAmerica.org, features a special section devoted to providing talking points and other documents designed to hurt Roberts' confirmation chances including one that continues to portray him as a defender of clinic violence.
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08/17/2005
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by Culture & Cosmos
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In a strongly worded statement released at the end of last week, the Vatican condemned the idea of homosexual marriage and homosexual adoption, saying that political support of either is “gravely immoral.” Directe | |
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