Several Christian and pro-life groups have filed a motion to intervene in a lawsuit challenging a court order which requires the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to allow the "Plan B" drug to be sold over the counter to minors.

The Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) filed a motion on behalf of Concerned Women for America, the Christian Medical and Dental Association and Christian Pharmacists Fellowship International. The groups say that the order disregards parental rights and the safety of minors.[..]

"The life and health of women, especially minors, is more important than the political agenda of pro-abortion activist groups. Minors are least of all in a position to make an informed decision about the life or death of a child, or even about their own safety. It is a lie that over-the-counter sales of this drug increase safety for women, including minors," remarked ADF Legal Counsel Matt Bowman.

Bowman said the organizations seeking to intervene in the lawsuit represent "thousands of medical personnel" who will be affected by the court's order and believe "strongly" that it will result in excluding parents and doctors from minor children’s care.

"The order allows minors to bypass being seen by a doctor who can check for sexually transmitted diseases and other potentially serious medical conditions," Bowman added. "Our motion argues that the case should be dismissed because, under the law, the plaintiffs have not established sufficient reason that they can even ask for an order like this."

Lila Rose, 20-year-old UCLA student and president of the non-profit Live Action, went undercover at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Birmingham and told a counselor that she was 14-years-old, pregnant by her 31-year-old "boyfriend." Rose said she needed a secret abortion so her parents would not find out about her sexual relationship with the older man.

After telling the counselor that her "boyfriend" is 31, Rose asks, "Is it a problem about my boyfriend?" The counselor, identified as "Tanisha" in the video, responds, "As long as you consented to having sex with him, there's nothing we can truly do about that." Rose then says that her boyfriend "said he could get in big trouble," and Tanisha acknowledges that "he could, especially if your parents find out that he's 31." She then tells Rose that the clinic manager, OB/GYN Dr. Desiree Bates, "sometimes does bend the rules a little bit" and states that "whatever you tell us stays within these walls" and "we can't disclose any information to anybody."

Alabama code 26-14-3 requires health professionals to disclose suspected cases of sexual abuse to state officials immediately.

"The law is explicit about a healthcare provider's duty to report, yet Planned Parenthood pretends they cannot say anything," Rose notes of the investigation. "Planned Parenthood increases its business and influence by circumventing state reporting laws, but inflicts terrible harm upon the vulnerable young girls sent back to statutory rapists."

In the video, Tanisha also seems to tell Rose that a signature from an "older sister that's over the age of 18" or someone "with the same last name" could function as a substitute for parental consent so Planned Parenthood could perform an abortion on a minor. Alabama Code 26-21-3 specifies that the written permission of either a parent or legal guardian is necessary before a minor may obtain an abortion.

A single termination raised the risk by 20%. Two or more increased the chances by 90%.

And women who have had more than one abortion double their risk of having a "very" premature baby - classed as being born before 34 weeks.

Lead researcher Dr Robbert van Oppenraaij said: "It can be concluded that a history of abortion is associated with an increased risk for premature delivery and very premature delivery."

He added more research was needed as the findings showed only an association between abortions and pre-term delivery and not necessarily a direct link.

The study also looked at miscarriages, finding that having more than one almost doubled the likelihood of congen-ital malformations in the baby. It also nearly doubled the risk of pre-term rupture of the membrane that surrounds the baby in the womb. This is known to raise the chances of an early birth.

The findings are to be presented today at the annual European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology in Amsterdam.

The pews were crowded, and I took an aisle seat next to a young man with Down syndrome. He quickly extended a hand and introduced himself with a friendly grin.

I responded, and we had a brief conversation. He told me that he was a teacher at Texas Christian University.

"That must be interesting," I said. "What do you teach?"

"I am Down syndrome, and I teach children with Down's."

He appeared to be in his early 20s. I noticed a couple sitting on his other side, apparently his parents.

"That is wonderful," I said, when really it was more than wonderful. It was exceptional.

What an extraordinary young man he was. I thought of Sarah Palin, who courageously refused to abort her unborn child when he was determined to have Down syndrome. Her courage certainly equals that of this enthusiastic and self-assured young man. What a tribute to his parents.

More than 450 youngsters below the age of 14 ended unwanted pregnancies between 2005 and 2008 - including 23 girls aged just 12, the Department of Health statistics reveal.

Over the same period, 52 teenagers terminated four or more pregnancies before they reached their 18th birthday, helping the number of repeat abortions hit record levels.

Across all age groups, 64,715 repeat abortions were carried out last year. This is the biggest figure on record and includes 46 women who had terminated at least eight pregnancies.

Nineteen pro-life Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives yesterday issued a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi urging that the president's healthcare reform package not place unborn children in more danger by including abortion in the federal healthcare plan.

"As the debate on health care reform continues and legislation is produced, it is imperative that the issue of abortion not be overlooked," wrote the lawmakers. "Plans to mandate coverage for abortions, either directly or indirectly is [sic] unacceptable."

The congressmen said that they would only accept a healthcare plan that "explicitly excludes" abortion. They said such restrictions would "save lives," citing a Guttmacher Institute survey that showed banning taxpayer-funded abortion prevents about one third of abortions that would otherwise occur.

The letter was signed by Reps. Dan Boren (D-OK); Bart Stupak (D-MI); Colin Peterson (D-MN); Tim Holden (D-PA); Travis Childers (D-MS); Lincoln Davis (D-TN); Heath Shuler (D-NC) Solomon Ortiz (D-TX); Mike McIntyre (D-NC); Jerry Costello (D-IL); Gene Taylor (D-MS); James Oberstar (D-MN); Bobby Bright (D-AL); Steve Driehaus (D-OH); Marcy Kaptur (D-OH); Charlie Melancon (D-LA); John Murtha (D-PA); Paul Kanjorski (D-PA); and Kathleen Dahlkemper (D-PA).

In a statement prepared by the Linacre Centre for Healthcare Ethics, the bishops said they do not believe that services which offer or refer for abortion should be allowed to advertise on broadcast media because "abortion is neither medicine nor a consumer product. Presenting it as either of these erodes respect for life, and is highly misleading and damaging to women, who may feel pressured into making a quick decision which can never be revoked."

"Allowing broadcast advertising of abortion services would contribute to a further 'normalisation' of abortion and its assimilation to a consumer service," the bishops said.

The 17-year-old girl, who is now eight months pregnant, was charged with first-degree felony criminal solicitation to commit murder in 8th District Juvenile Court. She entered the plea on Tuesday to a second-degree felony count of the charge.

The girl, who is from Uintah County, has not been identified because of her age.

Judge Larry A. Steele ordered the teen to be placed in the custody of Utah Juvenile Justice Services until she is 21. He denied a request that the girl be placed in her parents' custody, citing concerns about her welfare and that of the unborn child, which survived the attack. He also ordered her to undergo mental evaluations and attend prenatal and parenting counseling.

Court documents said the state also planned to file a petition to take custody of the girl's child when it is born.

Prosecutors said the girl paid Arron Harrison, a 21-year-old man from Naples, $150 to beat her up after her boyfriend threatened a breakup if she didn't get rid of the child.

Without offering any specific explanation, the video-sharing site YouTube has removed a new video by the student group Live Action that shows dishonest counseling practices at Planned Parenthood. The video first plays undercover footage of a Planned Parenthood counselor from Tucson, AZ telling a patient that images of aborted fetuses "are not real" and then shows photographs of a completed abortion and documentation of their authenticity.

Lila Rose, 20-year-old president of Live Action, calls on YouTube to re-instate the video in accordance with its own guidelines: "Since the video we posted does not violate any terms of use, we expect YouTube to re-instate it immediately. YouTube's own 'Community Guideline Tips' advise that intense or disturbing imaging should be 'balanced with additional context and information,' which is exactly what Live Action has done."[..]

"New media is vital to educating the public about the shocking realities of abortion practice in America," Rose emphasizes. "Our videos show hard truths about the abortion industry that must be seen and dealt with. Lawmakers and their constituents are recognizing this, but YouTube does everyone a disservice when they cooperate with Planned Parenthood in burying the evidence of abuse."

The appeals court split 6 to 5 in its ruling yesterday. Judge Paul V. Niemeyer, in the majority opinion, wrote that situations in which doctors would face criminal liability are so limited that it should not invalidate the law in every other circumstance. He wrote that Virginia law protects doctors who are taking prudent steps to save a patient's life and should prevent "a Morton's fork, where the doctor must choose between criminal liability or care that the doctor believes is not in the best interest of the patient."

In his dissenting opinion, Judge M. Blane Michael wrote that the Virginia law will have the effect of criminalizing the actions of doctors who seek to perform legal abortions but must resort to the banned procedure in rare instances. Michael wrote that such a law creates a "real fear of criminal liability" for doctors who perform standard abortions.

"This result places an undue burden on a woman's right to obtain a pre-viability second trimester abortion -- a constitutional right repeatedly reaffirmed by the Supreme Court," he wrote.

Virginia Attorney General William C. Mims said in a statement yesterday that he is pleased with the court's decision, as he and his four predecessors -- including Virginia gubernatorial candidate Robert F. McDonnell (R) -- have defended the statute over six years.

"This is a law that passed both houses of the General Assembly with bipartisan support," Mims said in the statement. "While we anticipate that the U.S. Supreme Court may be asked to review the decision, I am confident that the Supreme Court ultimately will uphold the law."

The group College-Bound Sisters was founded at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro by Hazel Brown, a maternity nurse who thought too many teens were having babies.

Brown said she hopes the program, which pays $1 each day to 12-to-18-year-old girls, will keep them from getting pregnant. In addition to remaining pregnancy-free, the girls must also attend weekly meetings.

The program is funded by a four-year grant from the state.

"Our three goals are that they avoid pregnancy, graduate from high school and enroll in college," Brown said.

Under the program, $7 is deposited into an interest-bearing college fund that the girls can collect once they graduate high school.

I brought her to a crisis pregnancy center in Boston when she was 5 weeks pregnant, so that she could explore her options other than having an abortion. The women at the center set up a date for her to get an ultrasound so she could see her child. We went to get her first ultrasound when she was 5 weeks pregnant. We weren't able to see much at this point, but we did see the heartbeat of our child. [..] We came back 3 weeks later for another ultrasound, and that's when we saw our baby. Our child was at 8 weeks gestation and had fingers, toes, eyes, everything. I saw and heard my child's heart beat and I cried. It was a very overwhelming and beautiful experience for me, until she looked over at me and said: "What are you crying about? Worms have heartbeats too". Her sister had offered to pay $500 for her to get an abortion. She insisted she was going to get the abortion, was planning to get one that weekend, and broke up with me right before.

I called the abortion clinic and asked what my rights were; they said "You don't have any". I then asked them, "What do you do with the aborted babies? I want to bury my child". They told me that it wasn't a child, it was a fetus, and to never call again or they would involve the police. My hands were tied. I, as a father had no legal right to protect my child from a death committed by a "doctor". I called everyone imaginable to see what my rights were and I got the same answer: "nothing".

The week before my child was aborted; I went to try one more time to ask the mother of my child to not do this. But she was adamant about having an abortion, and told me to leave. So I then asked her if I could do one thing before I left, she told me that was fine. I then got on my knees and kissed the stomach of the mother of my child and said "I love you, and Daddy will see you in heaven". I then took the ultrasound pictures and left.

The day my child was aborted was a very painful day for me. I was informed that my child had been aborted in the afternoon on December 2nd, 2006. It was the most painful experience I have ever been through. My relationship ended with the woman that I thought I was going to marry, and I lost my first child. I didn't want to go on; I was in too much pain. I didn't eat. I didn't sleep. I had nightmares of my child being aborted. The day after my child was aborted, I went to see my pastor and he suggested that I have a memorial for my unborn child. I took his advice, and had one the following Sunday at his church. I had my parents and a few friends come. It was a short ceremony, but very painful. I never thought that my child would meet God before I did.

The Senate voted 16-12 to complete legislation action on the measure, which the House approved in March. The number of affirmative votes was the minimum needed for passage by the 30-member Senate.

Under the bill, women seeking an abortion would have to wait 24 hours after their initial visit to the abortion provider. So-called "informed consent" provisions would require doctors to inform women specific information about risks and alternatives.

Also, an existing law that requires parental approval for minors seeking to end a pregnancy would be toughened. In addition, the bill would allow pharmacists and other health care providers to refuse to hand out emergency contraception on moral or religious grounds.

The bill now will return to the state House for transmission to Gov. Jan Brewer, an abortion critic who has voiced support for key elements of the legislation.

On Jan. 23, 1973, when the Supreme Court struck down laws criminalizing abortion in Roe v. Wade, President Richard M. Nixon made no public statement. But privately, newly released tapes reveal, he expressed ambivalence.

Nixon worried that greater access to abortions would foster "permissiveness," and said that "it breaks the family." But he also saw a need for abortion in some cases - like interracial pregnancies, he said.

"There are times when an abortion is necessary. I know that. When you have a black and a white," he told an aide, before adding, "Or a rape."

The fact is that we oppose abortion both for women and for men. The fact that men do not get pregnant does not stop them from choosing abortion. Indeed, anyone who has worked directly to stop abortions has seen many instances in which the "choice" in question was being made by the man, not by the woman. In the thousands of case testimonies I have in my office, time after time I read these or similar words: "My boyfriend wanted me to have the abortion; I was unsure," or "The baby's father said that unless I aborted the child, he would leave."

Of course. Abortion is not about women's rights. It is often about men wanting the right to be able to continue to have sexual relations without the "intrusive burden" of the child that can come about.

Morally speaking, the sin of abortion is committed when it is chosen, knowingly and willingly. Many factors mitigate the guilt, but the point here is that the choosing of abortion does not require that one be pregnant. Men choose abortion; men perform abortions. Men are therefore often guilty of the sin of abortion.

The lawsuit over whether to identify the person who gave $750,000 toward the failed 2006 vote to ban most abortions in South Dakota goes back to court Tuesday in Sioux Falls.

Secretary of State Chris Nelson sued state Rep. Roger Hunt, the Brandon Republican who set up the corporation Promising Future Inc. and gave the money to VoteYesforLife.com.

Hunt said the corporation did not meet the legal definition of a ballot question committee required to file financial reports.

But Nelson disagreed, saying campaign finance laws required the donor's identity to be public.

Tennessee legislators passed a law Thursday that threatens to strip Planned Parenthood of over $1 million in federal grant funding. Under the new statute, local community health clinics will be given priority for Title X family planning funds instead of Planned Parenthood.

Live Action Films says that the move was inspired by undercover videos by the group from a Planned Parenthood clinic in Memphis released earlier this year. The videos show a counselor urging a 14-year-old girl to lie about the age of the 31-year-old "boyfriend" who impregnated her so she can obtain a secret abortion.

"We are very happy that Tennessee legislators saw the harm Planned Parenthood is doing to little girls and took the necessary steps to ensure that the organization's negligence will no longer receive preferential treatment when taking our tax dollars," said Lila Rose, president of Live Action and the UCLA student who went undercover in the videos.

In their statement the bishops said, "The most sobering aspect of this law is its pretention to label abortion as a right that must be protected by the State."

The measure stipulates that up to fourteenth week of pregnancy, "the will of the mother becomes the absolute arbiter over the life or death of the child she carries in her womb," the bishops said.

"However, the right to life is not a concession by the State, it is a right that precedes the State itself, which has the obligation to always protect it. The State lacks any authority to establish a span of time within which the practice of abortion would cease to be an attack on life," they said.

"The inclusion of abortion within the means that are supposedly necessary to care for a person's health is in and of itself gravely false. Abortion never heals, it always kills. An authentic health care policy should always take into account the health of pregnant women, but also the life and health of the child to be born," the bishops said.

A Gaston County woman faces several charges after county police say she stabbed a woman who was pregnant with her husband's child.

The three lived together in a home on Hillcrest Road near Dallas.

Tabatha Logeais, 32, was charged with assault inflicting serious injury, communicating threats, and simple assault.

Police accuse her of stabbing Patty Simmons, 24, in the side. It happened when the two women got into an argument shortly before 6 p.m. Monday.

Simmons, who reportedly is six weeks pregnant, was stabbed in the side with a screwdriver and taken to Gaston Memorial Hospital. Her mother, Patsy May, 58, was treated for a wrist injury suffered when she tried to break up the fight. Family members asked the hospital not to release information about Simmons - or the condition of the unborn child.

Abortion is never going to be a cut-and-dried decision, except for
extremists for whom every abortion is murder. New technology--including the ability to discover grave abnormalities in utero-- make such decisions very complicated. As Sarah Blaffer Hrdy says, new technology "not to mention the increased care and staggering parental and societal investment required for the fetus to survive, are carrying us into novel terrain. There are no precedents--emotional, conceptual, legal or otherwise. This is total uncharted territory."

Roe, as imperfect as it may be, is probably the best solution for a decision that involves such moral ambiguity. In the earlier stages of pregnancy, a woman and her doctor should be allowed to decide with no input from the state. Late abortions must be done with the help of physicians who decide when they are medically necessary.

And "choice" needs to be defended as a moral good, not as an inevitable tragedy, or more dangerously, with terms like Baby Killer or Murderer.

District Attorney Angela "Spence" Pacheco said there's "no appropriate statute" to address issues surrounding the fetus in the case of 22-year-old Marino Leyba Jr., who faces two open counts of murder and other charges.

A Santa Fe County grand jury indicted Leyba on a charge of criminal abortion Thursday but prosecutors dismissed it Friday. Spence said pursuing charges in the fetus' death could interfere with the case involving the mother's death.

Authorities said Leyba, a security guard, used a 9mm handgun he carried while on duty to shoot the Benny Ray Lovato Sr. before shooting 17-year-old Sarah Marie Lovato. An autopsy report determined the infant boy was struck by a bullet.

The New York State Catholic Conference is asking Catholics to oppose a new bill it says would loosen the state’s abortion laws and promote abortion on demand.

The conference's Catholic Advocacy Network sent an advocacy alert to its members June 11, urging them to tell their state legislators and Gov. David Paterson that they oppose the Reproductive Health Act (S-5808), which, at Paterson's request, was introduced June 5 by Sen. Andrea Stewart-Cousins (D-Yonkers) and 23 cosponsors. The bill is similar to the Reproductive Health and Privacy Protection Act, which was introduced in 2007 at the request of then-Gov. Eliot Spitzer.

According to the Catholic conference, the Reproductive Health Act would -- like its predecessor -- legalize abortion for virtually any reason throughout all nine months of pregnancy, and make abortion immune to such state regulations as requirements for parental notification or informed consent. The conference says the bill also would allow any health-care practitioner to provide abortions.

Unlike the bill that had been promoted by Spitzer, the revised bill does contain a conscience clause that states, "Nothing in this article shall be construed to conflict with any applicable state or federal law or regulation permitting a health care provider to refrain from providing abortions due to the provider's religious or moral beliefs."

However, in its action alert the Catholic conference said that the language in this clause is ambiguous and inadequate, and likely applies only to individuals -- not institutions -- who do not wish to provide abortions. If the bill became law, the conference noted, it could be used to force religious hospitals to allow abortions, force employer insurance plans to cover abortions, force religious charities to counsel and refer clients for abortions, force Catholic schools to educate children about abortion, and force individual doctors, nurses and medical personnel to promote abortion.

Supporters claim that the Foreign Affairs Reauthorization Act (HR 2410) will promote women's rights around the world. But Rep. Chris Smith from New Jersey believes that the Bill is simply a veiled promotion of overseas abortions.

"In the context of what the Obama administration has already done, I think it is pretty evident," he told CNA. "This is clearly part of an effort to integrate abortion into everything."

Smith offered an amendment to HR 2410 that would have limited the new State Department office, authorizing it to help women in numerous ways but preventing it from promoting or providing abortions. According to Smith, his amendment would have made the Bill in question "truly about human rights, not a stealthily masked push for abortion overseas."

To objectors who claim that abortion is not the intent of the Bill, Smith responded, "I find that hard to believe with everything else this administration is doing." The Obama Administration has been "working aggressively" to promote "worldwide abortions," Rep. Smith charged.

"This is something that is already happening," said Smith, who believes that his opponents' suggestions that this Bill would not lead to more abortions is simply "a deceitful approach to confuse and mislead pro-lifers in Congress."

• Provide support to the 3,000 pro-life pregnancy resource centers across the country struggling to meet the needs of pregnant women.
• Withdraw federal funding from the nation’s largest abortion provider, Planned Parenthood, which receives $349,600,000 of taxpayers’ money every year.
• Maintain strong conscience protections for doctors and other health professionals so they are free to care for their patients without taking part in abortion.

"Loopholes" provided in the landmark Roe v. Wade decision that upheld abortion rights apparently will allow third-trimester abortions at a Bellevue clinic, the Nebraska attorney general said today.

"I'm disgusted and saddened," Attorney General Jon Bruning said, calling one of the exceptions so wide "you can drive a truck through."

Dr. LeRoy Carhart said Wednesday he plans to offer third-trimester abortions temporarily at his Bellevue clinic.

Carhart said he would offer the abortions only in cases where the fetus had organ damage or other medical problems preventing its survival outside the mother's body.

The doctor said he has not performed abortions in Nebraska past the 22nd week of pregnancy previously because he could refer women who needed them to Dr. George Tiller's clinic in Wichita, Kan.[..]

Carhart said he will offer them there only until he can open a clinic outside the state, probably in Kansas.

Nebraska law, which reflects the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, appears to allow the third-trimester abortions, officials said.

Bruning cited two exceptions:

Nebraska law says an abortion cannot be performed if an unborn child appears to have "clearly reached viability" outside the womb. In other words, it would allow an abortion if the fetus could not survive.

The law also provides for an abortion to "preserve the life or health of the mother." Bruning said the second exception could be interpreted, by some, to preserve the mental health of the mother.

"That's an exemption you can drive a truck through," the attorney general said.

Cardinal Sean P. O'Malley, concerned about the relationship between Caritas Christi Health Care and an insurance plan that covers abortions, is seeking modifications to the joint venture that the beleaguered Catholic hospital chain has entered into with a St. Louis-based healthcare company to provide insurance to low-income Massachusetts residents.

O'Malley, who has been criticized by several conservative Catholic and antiabortion activists for his handling of the Caritas venture, issued a statement yesterday declaring that "under no circumstances" will Caritas provide or refer patients for procedures prohibited by Catholic teaching, which include abortion, contraception, and sterilization.

And the Archdiocese of Boston said publicly for the first time yesterday that Caritas would not be permitted to profit from the provision of abortion services by others.

The archdiocese would not specify the changes it is seeking to the joint venture, called CeltiCare, which is 49 percent owned by Caritas Christi.

But the church sought to clarify its requirements for the deal after a number of conservative bloggers and interest groups had recently criticized the venture, accusing O'Malley, often in quite angry language, of abandoning the church's commitment to protecting the unborn.

This week, many of the activists have seized upon, as evidence of the problematic nature of the venture, the new website of CeltiCare. The website specifies the copayments for abortions (from 0 to $100, depending on the plan), and lists family planning and reproductive service providers, including Planned Parenthood facilities in Boston, Somerville, and Worcester.

The president of Caritas Christi, Dr. Ralph de la Torre, issued a statement yesterday saying that individuals covered under the new venture will be told to talk to their insurance company if they seek abortions or other services prohibited by Catholic teaching.

"When a patient seeks such a procedure, Caritas healthcare professionals will be clear that (a) the hospital does not perform them and (b) the patient must turn to his or her insurer for further guidance," de la Torre said. "This, in fact, is the practice currently in place in the Caritas system as we work with other insurance companies under state laws that mandate access to procedures not provided within the Caritas system."

Republican Sen. Bruce Starr said Tuesday he is drafting a bill that would create a crime of assault on an unborn child and expand criminal homicide to include the death of an unborn child.

On Friday, Heather Snively was found dead in the crawl space of a home, and her fetus had been cut from her womb. A woman has been charged with murder in Snively's death.

Under Oregon law, an infant must have drawn a breath to meet the legal threshold for murder charges to be brought. The district attorney is reviewing autopsy results on the infant in last week's attack to determine whether he was born alive.

"I believe that in the eyes of Oregonians, the killer of Heather Snively deserves to be tried not just for the death of Heather, but for the death of her son," Starr said in a statement. "New life deserves all the protection the law will provide."

Included in the bill is a 24-hour waiting period for women seeking the procedure and a requirement for doctors to inform patients about the risks and alternatives.

It also would allow pharmacists and other health care providers to refuse to participate in abortions or emergency contraception on moral or religious grounds. An existing law requiring parental approval for minors seeking to end a pregnancy would be toughened.

The U.S. House of Representatives is expected to vote Wednesday on H.R. 2410, the Foreign Relations Authorization Act. Focus on the Family has written a letter in opposition to the funding bill, which establishes an Office for Global Women's Issues that likely will promote abortion overseas.

"This office will be used to not only promote abortion worldwide, but also to stop pro-life laws," said Tom McClusky, vice president of government affairs at FRC Action.

H.R. 2410 also would require the U.S. government to track violence in other countries that is "based on actual or perceived sexual orientation and gender identity."

"People need to contact their representatives," McClusky said. "It is the role of the State Department to promote the United States abroad and not to promote an ideology that is abhorrent to the host countries."

"For LeRoy Carhart to mention the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who worked through peaceful and non-violent means, in the same breath with that of George Tiller, whose work ended peace and brought violence to babies in the womb, is offensive beyond belief," said Dr. King. "The analogy is just wrong."

"Dr. Carhart also speaks of hate crimes," added Dr. King. "I would simply ask him, is it not hateful to regard an entire class of people as non-human because they're unwanted?"

The State Coordinator of Feminist Organizations in Spain said this week that since 13-year-old girls can legally engage in sexual relations in Spain, "then they should also have the right to decide about the consequences of those relations," without input from their parents.

The State Coordinator of Feminist Organizations sent 12,145 signatures to the Spanish Congress this week opposing the proposed reform of abortion laws, arguing that abortion on demand up to the fourteenth week is "clearly insufficient" and that the proposed reform does not guarantee legal protection for women and health care professionals who perform abortions.

Yolanda Iglesias, the spokesperson for the office, said one of the organization's complaints is that the law should be broader. "We want the government's reform not to be so restrictive, so that it truly can be one of the most advanced norms in Europe, as Socialist lawmakers assert it is," she said.

The American-designed IntelliGender test kit, which can be used from eight weeks after conception, went on sale in Australia last month. Its Australian distributor hopes to launch it in New Zealand within a fortnight.

There are millions and millions of people who take an anti-abortion position. Many of us are located in the South, Southwest and Midwest, so millions of us are well-armed and proficient in the use of firearms. Were this a movement dedicated to violence, every abortion doctor would be in the morgue tomorrow.

But abortion doctors go about the bloody, immoral business of providing abortion on demand day in and day out unscathed. They are able to go about their business unharmed because abortion opponents protest peacefully. Yet they are labeled terrorists when mentally ill people take actions abortion opponents don’t sanction.

They are labeled terrorists because of a type of political opportunism I call "vulturism." Political vultures circle waiting for a tragedy, usually a death, and then they swoop down and feed off the corpse. They hope a death will paint their political opponents as murderers and sway others to their position. It's cheap, cynical manipulation.

It's also disingenuous to make a hero out of a man too immoral or obtuse to understand that crushing the heads of well-developed, unborn children for the sake of convenience is wrong. Some excuse his actions because he only performed late-term abortions on unhealthy children.

Maybe he'd have told Gene Stallings that John Mark Stallings wasn't healthy. After all, he had Down syndrome. Funny thing is, John Mark Stallings made more of a contribution to this world than millions of "healthy" people.

But making Tiller a hero is all pro-abortion forces have. Even Norma McCorvey, the plaintiff in Roe vs. Wade opposes abortion. They need a hero because they have no moral ground to stand on and public opinion has turned.

Pro-abortion forces can taunt their opponents. They can talk about "a woman's body," which is not the issue; it's the body inside the woman's body that is the issue. They can talk about what might happen if abortion isn't legal. But they can't talk about the act that they are promoting.

I never regretted my decision to terminate the pregnancy. But I also never believed that I had harmed an unborn child with the abortion. I'm not a Christian and I don't believe that life begins at conception. Life, to my way of thinking, has no beginning and no ending. The idea that it begins at conception always seemed rather arbitrary to me. And I also suspect that this life is not our only shot. There is quite a bit of evidence that we live countless lives. Check out the research of Ian Stevenson at the University of Virginia on the verification of past lives remembered by children. I think it's far more likely that when a pregnancy is terminated, that soul is simply born to a different mother. I don't deny that terminating a pregnancy can be a mournful event for a mother and a family. But I'm not so sure that it's a devastating event for the unborn child.

Attorneys S. Fenn Little Jr. and Jonathan D. Crumly earn most of their money from construction law and criminal defense cases. But their passion is pressing litigation to protect religious freedom and their view of family values.

The two are pursuing litigation against an Atlanta-area abortion clinic that has gained nationwide attention among groups opposed to legal abortion. The attorneys also have been promised funding help from a conservative legal action organization. The case allows the courts an opportunity to clarify how diligent health care providers must be in complying with a state law that requires parental notification -- but not permission -- when a minor requests an abortion.

That case is a suit filed on behalf of a Hall County, Ga., teenager, Renee Wymer, against a Chamblee abortion clinic. Wymer and her mother, Genevieve Patterson, allege that Northside Women's Clinic violated the state's parental notification law and Woman's Right to Know Act when it performed an abortion for the teenager without notifying her mother. Wymer and Patterson suffered "mental and physical pain and suffering due to the violence of the" abortion, according to the complaint. The teenager gave the clinic a note signed by her then-boyfriend's mother, who represented herself as the girl's mother.

Little and Crumly took the case on contingency and are seeking unspecified punitive damages against the clinic.

Bob Enyart, spokesman for Colorado Right to Life, which has demonstrated against Hern for decades, said that although his group doesn't condone Tiller's slaying, abortion providers should expect that violence begets violence.

"If a Mafia hit man gets killed, people recognize it's an occupational hazard," he said.

Hern has been familiar with the hazards for decades. After performing abortions for more than half of his life, the 70-year-old doctor has never been injured, but the constant threats with which he has lived since 1973 have transformed his life into a series of security measures: sleeping with a rifle, scanning rooftops for snipers, wearing a protective vest.

"It ruins your life," Hern said.

The son of a carpenter, Hern grew up in Englewood, a Denver suburb. Though his parents didn't make much money, he said, they were resourceful and determined to broaden his horizons. His mother took him to political events -- he saw Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy as they campaigned for president. At home, his family discussed current events and issues, although abortion was not one of them.

As he studied medicine, Hern said he encountered women ill from botched illegal abortions. In the early 1970s, Hern -- who had planned to become an epidemiologist -- became convinced that the Supreme Court's 1973 decision to legalize abortion would mean nothing if doctors would not perform them.

"I felt doing abortions was the most important thing I could do with my life," he said.

When Hern performed his first abortion, on a 17-year-old girl, he later wrote, he cried with a sense of relief because he had made a difference in her future.

A national Catholic education organization today rejected arguments by Marquette University theologian Daniel Maguire that religious and pro-life leaders are responsible for the murder of late-term abortionist George Tiller. The organization instead blamed the Jesuit Catholic university for negligence in providing Maguire a public platform for his pro-abortion advocacy.

"George Tiller's murder is shocking and reprehensible," said Patrick J. Reilly, President of The Cardinal Newman Society (CNS). "Abortion is also reprehensible, and a Catholic university that for many years has refused to discipline or remove a stridently pro-abortion, pro-gay marriage activist from its theology department is guilty of gross negligence."

"Marquette University does serious harm to the Church by granting credentials to a reckless theologian whose work has been condemned by the U.S. Catholic bishops, who persists in misrepresenting Catholic teaching and who advocates a moral right to killing innocent pre-born children."

During a speech at the University of San Pablo in Madrid, Aznar warned that Spaniards should be suspicious of a government that "manifests grave difficulties in distinguishing between what is human and what isn't," especially in a scientific sense, which he said was "especially alarming."

"To proceed down a path that leads to the destruction of the right to life and to pervert it into a false right to end life is, simply, to go backwards on the path of civilization," the former president said.

It is not the State's job, said Aznar, to come up with "new and degrading definitions of what a human being is," or to "torpedo the educational role parents have with their children."

He also warned that society should be concerned when the government uses its power to "obscure the ethical judgment of its citizens, especially of minors," or when the government "assumes the right to decide a matter that should only be the responsibility of the individual."

At first glance, the PETA billboards might make you think the issue was abortion, but the ads are actually promoting animal rights and vegetarianism. In this case, the terms "pro-life" and "pro-choice" are referring to whether or not you choose to eat meat.

"PETA has often made controversial comparisons and will continue to do so because it's really important to get what goes on behind the scenes of animal suffering into the forefront," PETA's Holly Beal said."The right-to-life issue is at an all-time high right now, and we want people to look at an animal's rights, and each time they sit down to eat, they can stop animal suffering by what they choose to eat."

While the murderous rage of Tiller's assassin is not representative of the broader anti-choice movement, I believe that the anti-choice community operates with a totalitarian impulse that generates a culture of terror rather than a culture of life.

Hannah Arendt suggested that totalitarians generate terror in part by cultivating profound loneliness among their targets. Loneliness locks human beings in isolation and hampers discourse, connection, and shared experience. When we believe we are alone and misunderstood we cannot form the bonds necessary to organize and resist. There are few experiences more lonely and isolating than facing an unintended pregnancy or facing the need to terminate a desired pregnancy in order to protect maternal health. The anti-choice discourse labels the women and families who chose abortion "baby killers." It is a strategy that dehumanizes these women and the doctors who care for them.

Almost three-fourths of the polled agreed that a woman should have the right to decide on abortion herself, and only 2 percent were against it.

Over three-fifths of the respondents said Czech law should enable euthanasia, while 27 percent disagreed with it and one in ten was undecided.

Some 16 percent of Czechs were of the view that abortion should be approved only over serious health and social reasons, 5 percent would allow abortion only if the mother's life were threatened and 2 percent would completely ban it.

Unwed pregnant teens and twenty-somethings who attend or have graduated from private religious schools are more likely to obtain abortions than their peers from public schools, according to sociological research published in the June issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior.

"This research suggests that young, unmarried women are confronted with a number of social, financial and health-related factors that can make it difficult for them to act according to religious values when deciding whether to keep or abort a pregnancy," said the study's author, sociologist Amy Adamczyk, an assistant professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the Graduate Center, City University of New York.

While previous research has investigated the link between religion and abortion attitudes, fewer studies have explored religion's impact on abortion behavior. To fill this research gap, Adamczyk examined how personal religious involvement, schoolmate religious involvement and school type influenced the pregnancy decisions of a sample of 1,504 unmarried and never-divorced women age 26 and younger from 125 different schools. [..]

Results revealed no significant link between a young woman's reported decision to have an abortion and her personal religiosity, as defined by her religious involvement, frequency of prayer and perception of religion’s importance. Adamczyk said that this may be partially explained by the evidence that personal religiosity delays the timing of first sex, thereby shortening the period of time in which religious women are sexually active outside of marriage.

Despite the absence of a link between personal religious devotion and abortion, religious affiliation did have some important influence. Adamczyk found that conservative Protestants were the least likely to report having an abortion, less likely than mainline Protestants, Catholics and women with non-Christian religious affiliations.

Regarding the impact of the religious involvement of a woman's peers, Adamczyk found no significant influence. However, Adamczyk did find that women who attended school with conservative Protestants were more likely to decide to have an extramarital baby in their 20s than in their teenage years.

"The values of conservative Protestant classmates seem to have an abortion limiting effect on women in their 20s, but not in their teens, presumably because the educational and economic costs of motherhood are reduced as young women grow older," Adamczyk said.

[..]But for Carhart, the response is deeply personal and filled with rage at the level of violence directed toward abortion providers.

He sees his friend's death as "a declaration of war" on the part of radical anti-abortion activists whom he calls "fundamentalist terrorists ... no different from al-Qaida, the Taliban or any of them."

Police had a suspect in custody, and major anti-abortion groups rushed to condemn the killing.

Yet Carhart said the debate is often framed around faith.

"These killers are not Christians. They're terrorists," he said. "People walking into restaurants with bombs on their backs, how is that any different than walking into a church and shooting a man down?"

NOW, the National Organization for Women, citing "a string of murders in the service of the anti-abortion cause" and referring to the Tiller murder, released the following statement:

"Bringing the killers to justice is not enough – the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security must root out and prosecute as domestic terrorists and violent racketeers the criminal enterprise that has organized and funded criminal acts for decades," said the statement, attributed to NOW President Kim Gandy. "We call on the new attorney general, Eric Holder, and head of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano to treat these murders in the same way they would treat politically-motivated domestic terrorism of any other kind and put the full resources of their two departments behind that effort."