WASHINGTON, D.C., March 12, 2015 (LifeSiteNews.com) -- An anti-trafficking bill with bipartisan support has come to a screeching halt over Democratic opposition to a pro-life measure they say was snuck into the legislation, but which Republicans say only maintains the status quo.

S. 178, the Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act of 2015, relies on fines against traffickers to create the Domestic Trafficking Victims' Fund. The fines would be used to help trafficked women.

And according to Democratic senators, that help should include full access to abortion. They are complaining that including the Hyde Amendment in the five-year bill is unnecessary and inappropriate.

Democrats also say they didn't know about the Hyde Amendment language -- which is used to prevent annual appropriations funds from being used to fund elective abortions -- until after it passed the Senate Judiciary Committee with full bipartisan support.

"These provisions, my caucus did not know about," Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV, said on Tuesday. "The bill will not come off this floor as long as that language is in it."

"There was a representation that the controversial provision was not included in this bill. It turns out that it was," said Judiciary Committee Democrat Dick Durbin of Illinois. "I don't know how that happened or who was the author of it."

The bill passed the committee by voice vote -- meaning that it was so uncontroversial that it didn't even require a recorded vote. Its popularity from the 113th Congress was expected to continue this year, and did until Democrats realized abortion funding was restricted.

"A list was sent to certain members saying, 'Here are the changes from last year.' This provision was not listed among them," said Judiciary Committee Senator Chuck Schumer of New York.

And the committee's top Democrat, Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, said Republicans were using "debates about some of the most vulnerable among us to advance their own political agenda."

However, the bill's lead sponsor, Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, has said Democrats should have known the pro-life measure was included in the bill. He pointed to how the bill has Democratic cosponsors, was introduced nearly two months ago, and was marked up in committee in late February.

"That leads me to believe that some of the suggestions being made now, that there were provisions in the legislation the people didn't know about, are simply untrue," Cornyn said in a press conference.

“That presupposes that none of their staff briefed their senators on what was in the legislation, that nobody read a 68-page bill and that senators would vote for a bill — much less co-sponsor it — without reading it and knowing what’s in it. None of that strikes me as plausible.”

"All this does is maintain the status quo by making sure this Crime Victims Compensation Fund, that funds available from that fund, are constrained by the constraint that exists under all other federal law,” he added.

Democrats disagree, pointing to how the Hyde Amendment is only attached to the one-year budget appropriations funds considered by Congress each year, while the trafficking bill would be law for five years. Furthermore, those dollars exclusively come from taxpayer-collected funds, while the Domestic Trafficking Victims' Fund would be paid for by fines and fees.

According to Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards, inclusion of the Hyde Amendment's language would change the anti-trafficking bill from something "that was supposed to help women [to a bill] instead being used to hurt women."

"The Senate should protect victims of human trafficking, but should not do so at the expense of women's access to safe and legal abortion," said Richards. "The majority of human trafficking victims are women and girls, and they need access to the full range of reproductive health care services without barriers."

American Thinker Deputy Editor Drew Belsky disagreed, however.

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"It's no surprise that Planned Parenthood demands abortions for sex-trafficking victims," Belsky told LifeSiteNews. "For Planned Parenthood, abortion is the cure for everything, and a great moneymaker besides. We know from Live Action's investigations that Planned Parenthood has no qualms about profiting off abortions for trafficking victims and then sending them back to their abusers.”

"Counselors in Washington, D.C. and northern Virginia, a national hub for sex-trafficking, told Live Action's investigators that '[w]e see people from all walks of life here – for a while, we were treating all the girls at Paper Moon [a local strip club] and various other places around town.' Facilities in New Jersey and New York echoed this mentality," said Belsky.

Alveda King, director of African-American Outreach for Priests for Life, was likewise critical of Richards' comments.

“Abortion is not health care," said King in a statement to LifeSiteNews. "Abortion kills babies and hurts women’s spirits, souls and bodies. Victims of human trafficking need to be rescued from their desperate situations and helped as they regain their dignity and their lives. What they don’t need is to be bullied into abortion if they have become pregnant."

"Abortion doesn’t address the problem of human trafficking. It is just another way to victimize these women and to increase their trauma,” said King.

In a floor speech on Wednesday, Cornyn criticized Democratic leadership for holding up the bill. The Texas senator said that Republicans had attempted to allow an amendment by Democrats to strip the pro-life language, but that Reid has rejected the offer.

In addition to aiming words at Reid, Cornyn pointedly criticized Democrats who previously supported the legislation for changing their views. He said that unless Democrats end their opposition to S. 178, the bill would be unable to pass the Senate.

January 8, 2016 (NewsBusters) -- Churches must not be afraid to speak out against abortion in the 2016 election, according to one prominent pro-life group.

On Wednesday, Priests for Life hosted a press conference on abortion in light of the upcoming 2016 elections at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. The event centered on the question “How political can the Catholic Church be?” under its tax-exempt status and highlighted that “restrictions on political activity by churches are misunderstood” -- even by the media.

Priests for Life National Director Fr. Frank Pavone opened the press conference by stressing Church obligation during the election season.

“This is not about the Church becoming a political machine,” he said. “This is about the Church becoming more the Church.”

But instead, many churches have been undergoing a “massive self-censorship” to avoid losing their tax exemptions.

During elections, Catholic institutions and Christian entities send out instructions and memos, he said, "somehow telling us that we cannot really participate in the election process by doing, for example, clear teaching and preaching that the people of God have to elect public servants who know the difference between serving the public and killing the public.”

According to Fr. Pavone, churches too frequently veer away from teaching Catholic doctrine due to the Johnson amendment, which forbids tax-exempt organizations from intervening “directly or indirectly” in political campaigns.

He deemed the amendment a “law on the books which is being vastly misunderstood, misrepresented.”

“Whether it’s by the fact that we simply do not understand this particular law or whether it’s by the fact that we are using the taxman as an excuse for our own fears and hesitations,” he said, “we have not gotten in our institutional churches a proper understanding of what we really are allowed to do and what we aren’t allowed to do.”

But the vague rules directly influence diocese memos, said Fr. Pavone, like one, which read, “Do not even appear to endorse or oppose particular candidates for public office or political parties.”

Fr. Pavone deemed that mandate impossible.

“I ask you, brothers and sisters, how can anyone carry out that particular piece of advice?” he pressed. “How can you not even appear to favor or oppose a candidate who is in favor of child-killing throughout pregnancy when you represent a church that says no abortion is never morally permitted and that the law has to protect children from the beginning of their lives?”

Fr. Pavone stressed that the Church really is non-partisan in messaging.

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“Whatever my message today seems to favor or oppose when it comes to political parties or candidates, what if tomorrow those parties and candidates swapped their positions on abortion?” he challenged.

“Nothing changes,” he confirmed.

MRC Culture Exclusive Interview

Following the event, MRC Culture asked Fr. Pavone if he saw a pro-life president in the near future.

“I am very confident that a lot of pro-life candidates are going to be elected in 2016,” he said, “and the reason for that confidence is that the American people are learning much more about what abortion is.”

He also expressed confidence that the Priests for Life’s new initiative to encourage churches to speak out was “very much in line with the spirit of Pope Francis.”

“The pope has made statements about the fact that we shouldn’t be afraid to ‘mess things up,’” Fr. Pavone said. “In other words, don’t feel constrained by the limitations that are imposed just by an institution.”

While the pope takes a staunch pro-life stance in line with Church doctrine, he called the Church “obsessed” with certain doctrines, such as abortion, in 2013.

“This is what the pope means when he expresses concern,” Fr. Pavone told MRC Culture. “The Church is not defined by one or another particular issue.”

The Church, he continued, is defined by Jesus. And it’s in Jesus that “we find the reason why we’re pro-life and the reason why we take the stance on every other issue that we stand on.”

Fr. Pavone also addressed the media’s part in church restrictions.

“The media’s role in all of this, I believe, plays into the confusion as well, because I don’t believe that our friends in the media,” he said, “necessarily understand these limitations any better than the pastors do.”

Fr. Pavone encouraged his audience to visit www.politicalresponsibility.com and www.abolishingabortion.com and read his new book Abolishing Abortion for more information.

Attorney James Bopp, Jr., a law expert on church freedom in elections, Alliance Defending Freedom’s legal counsel Christiana Holcomb and Priests for Life executive director Janet Morana also spoke at the event.

Reprinted with permission from Newsbusters.

In a sweeping interview, the archbishop emeritus of Brussels warns that the ambiguity in the Synod’s final text was ‘very risky,’ but says he trusts the Pope will hold to his word and defend Catholic Tradition.

BRUSSELS, January 8, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) – Shortly after leaving the see of Mechelen-Brussels at the age of 75 – the official retirement age for prelates of the Roman Catholic Church – Archbishop André Léonard, former primate of Belgium, gave a wide-ranging interview to the French weekly Famille chrétienne. Bishop Léonard made unusually direct remarks about the crisis of vocations, the dangerous “ambiguities” of the recent Synod on the Family and other controversial topics. In liberal Belgium he had the reputation of being conservative and even narrow-minded – contrary to his successor, Jozef De Kesel, former auxiliary bishop to Cardinal Danneels of the infamous “Sankt-Gallen group.” Léonard was even attacked by a group of topless “Femen” activists in April 2013: they drenched him with water during a conference, accusing him of “homophobia” for his statements on the “abnormality” of homosexuality.

But he has never wavered. Responding to Famille chrétienne’s journalist, he said: “I am convinced that the Church’s Magisterium is valid, even on the most sensitive and controversial issues.”

Under his leadership, the number of seminarians progressed tenfold in his diocese, growing from four when he arrived to 55 on his departure. Archbishop Léonard is also known for his openness to traditional Catholic institutions such as the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP) and the Institute of Christ the King, both of whom he welcomed in Brussels. Just before leaving Belgium to retire in the French Marian sanctuary of Notre Dame du Laus, he celebrated Mass in the extraordinary form of the Roman Rite in the church of the Minims where he had named a priest of the FSSP as vicar several years before.

Of special interest to the readers of LifeSiteNews are Leonard’s interview responses regarding the Synod on the Family. Antoine Pasquier of Famille chrétienne asked him: “The second Synod on the Family took place in October. The final text is open to interpretation. How do you read it, having taken part in the first session?”

What is most fundamentally at stake in the Synod is the alliance – in all the joys and suffering of families and couples – of love and truth. 

Archbishop Leonard answered bluntly: “I didn’t get the impression of real progress from one synod to the other, rather there was a repetition of what had already been said. It left me a bit unsatisfied. There are good things in the final text, but I was a bit disappointed by the fact that they cultivated ambiguity around the most sensitive issues. Some bishops told me the texts were deliberately formulated in an ambiguous way, in order to leave them open to interpretation in different directions. Such ambiguity on key issues is very risky, as it could give way to practices that would be very difficult to reverse once they have been instituted and developed.”

“I therefore hope”, he said, “that we will have a nuanced and benevolent approach, but that it will remain clear on doctrinal and disciplinary teachings of the Catholic Church regarding marriage and the family. The ball is now in the Pope’s court. The time has come for him to fulfill his Petrine ministry of unity and continuity of Tradition, as he declared he would in his final declaration at the end of the first Synod on the Family. What is most fundamentally at stake in the Synod is the alliance – in all the joys and suffering of families and couples – of love and truth. So says Psalm 84: ‘Love and truth will meet; justice and peace will kiss.’ The Church must be all at once merciful, welcoming all with openness of heart, and faithful to her teachings on marriage and the family.”

Bishop Leonard was equally clear about the idea of delegating more power to bishops’ conferences in matters of discipline.

STORY: Archbishop prays while topless gay activists shout curses and douse him with water

“That is not a good idea”, he said. “I find it hard to see how discipline could be modulated from one country to another or from one continent to another. I would find it extremely risky for Western countries to be allowed a more flexible discipline. What sort of image would that give of the Church? Would Christians from richer countries, besides the greater comforts that most of them enjoy, also benefit from a more comfortable discipline? It would be a great scandal! On the other hand, there is a point where the diversity of locations should be taken into account: in implementing pastoral care with regard to the different problems that appear in different continents, so as to offer adequate solutions.”

Archbishop Léonard’s plain speaking earned him no little opposition during his five years as Primate of Belgium: an overwhelmingly Catholic nation which gave innumerable missionaries to the Church in the first half of the 20th century but where relativism has become a way of life and religious practice has plummeted. Seventy percent of under-thirties now declare they have no link whatsoever with the Catholic Church and only 25 percent of marriages involve a religious ceremony. The decline accelerated under Cardinal Danneels, who was Primate of Belgium between 1979 and 2010: he was of the vein of the majority of Belgian bishops who openly defied the teaching of Paul VI on contraception in Humanæ vitæ in 1968. How did Archbishop Léonard cope with this opposition both within and without the Church?

“Partly with strong convictions, partly by temperament,” he answered. “During my years of priesthood the Church’s conviction as it regards different aspects of human existence my own. And I am convinced that the Church’s Magisterium is valid, even on the most sensitive and controversial issues. I always judged my mission was to be an echo to the teachings of Christ and the Church on human destiny. So it never disturbed me to paddle upstream, sometimes, against the current of society and the spirit of the times. Wouldn’t you say that is a bit normal? A significant proportion of the Gospel goes against the grain. St Paul, speaking to the Romans, said: ‘Do not conform yourselves to this age.’”

If a man wants to give his life to Christ, the bishop should meet with him! When a young man feels he is important in the eyes of the bishop of his diocese: that will help him to make his decision.

Léonard went on to say: “My convictions prompted varied reactions: there were those who were happy to hear clear language that was truly encouraging them to live according to their Catholic identity, and there were others who protested, sometimes even among Christians themselves because they didn’t really like – even in a world where freedom is considered to be a supreme value – that a bishop should be thinking differently from the dominant mindset. This type of opposition or disagreement is, in a way, inevitable. It is its absence that would have troubled me. Jesus does not promise us success, but rather contradiction. But these small miseries are only a small part of my ministry, and they are nothing compared with what the bishops suffered during the first centuries of the Church, or what bishops suffer today in the Middle-East or in Asia!”

Despite his reputation of “rigidity” and “intolerance” hawked by the Belgian media, Léonard’s steadfast Catholic stances and clear condemnation of the manifestations of the culture of death in a country that has been a fore-runner in social engineering did not deter young men in Belgium from answering their call to the priesthood; quite the contrary.

When asked to explain the sudden in rise in vocations under his leadership in Mechelen-Brussels, Léonard made it plain that what counted in his eyes was the attitude of the bishop to young men who think they have a vocation: it requires welcoming and proximity, he said. “I never sent away a young man who came to see me, I never told him to first go and see the vocations office of the diocese, I always welcomed him. If a man wants to give his life to Christ, the bishop should meet with him! When a young man feels he is important in the eyes of the bishop of his diocese: that will help him to make his decision. I have no miracle recipe. I simply always remained open to the realities to which the Holy Spirit gives rise in the Church. (…) All those who present themselves will not necessarily become priests, discernment is necessary, but first of all there must be a welcoming attitude. What a joy for a bishop to meet a man who wants to consecrate himself to the Church! What a wonderful present!”

January 8, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) – Want to have a monthly collection of the most important Catholic news from LifeSite in a beautiful full color magazine? While some may not know about it yet, Faithful Insight, a publication of LifeSiteNews, has just published its fourth issue.  Dedicated to the service of Christ through Our Lady, this magazine, unlike LifeSiteNews, is specifically intended for Catholics, but like LifeSiteNews, hopes to strengthen faith, life, the natural family, and freedom, by arming readers with truthful news and views and many inspiring stories from a faithfully Catholic perspective.

The name Faithful Insight is one rendering of the Latin phrase ‘sensus fidelium’ better known in English as ‘sense of the faithful’ which the Catechism calls, a “supernatural sense of the faith,” where “all the faithful share in understanding and handing on revealed truth.” That sensus fidelium or faithful insight is bolstered as we see the truths of God confirmed in science and human experience.  Conversion testimonies, the words of true fathers of the faith and the witness of countless martyrs “manifest a universal consent in matters of faith and morals.”  

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Faithful Insight magazine is intended for an international audience but is currently only available in the United States and Canada. Faithful Insight launched in September as the last authentically Catholic news magazine in Canada, Catholic Insight, ceased its paper publication after more than 20 years of service. The first issue was dedicated to Fr. Alphonse de Valk whose courageous work in founding and running Catholic Insight has served the Church by helping countless Canadian Catholics to maintain and strengthen their faith in perilous times.

The guiding principle of LifeSiteNews will also permeate Faithful Insight – Caritas in Veritate – Love in Truth. It is not a love that is sentimental or afraid to risk loss of worldly respect, but the love a parent would show – a willingness to speak the hard truth out of love for the ultimate well being of their child.

It is rather painfully obvious we are living in times St. Paul warned about in 2 Timothy 4 when he said “they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears.”  But the apostle to the Gentiles strictly directed Timothy preach the truth nonetheless. “I charge thee, before God and Jesus Christ, who shall judge the living and the dead, by his coming, and his kingdom:  Preach the word: be instant in season and out of season: reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine.”

Finally, this magazine is consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. True Devotion to Mary is as St. Pope John Paul II said, “indispensable to anyone who means to give himself without reserve to Christ and to the work of redemption.”

Hopefully you will find Faithful Insight to be edifying for your spiritual lives. Please pray for us, for the success of Faithful Insight, and especially for the situations you will read about in the pages of this magazine.  Prayer is our most powerful weapon in the culture war.

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