Thursday March 28, 2002
See today’s LifeSiteNews stories- ONTARIO LIBERAL LEADER URGES CATHOLIC SCHOOL TO ALLOW HOMOSEXUAL PROM DATES
- STUDY FINDS LOWER INFANT DEATHS IN CANADA LINKED TO MORE ABORTIONS
- DR. DOBSON TELLS CHRISTIAN PARENTS TO REMOVE CHILDREN FROM CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS
- CATHOLIC BISHOP DEFENDS ABORTION HOLOCAUST DISPLAY FROM RABBI’S CRITICISM
- STUDY FINDS WORSHIPPING GOD BENEFITS MENTAL HEALTH
- INTERFAITH COALITION TO DEFEND RIGHTS OF RELIGIOUS PARENTS AT SUPREME COURT
- TANZANIA TO DESTROY SHIPMENT OF DEFECTIVE CONDOMS FROM UNFPA
- LIFESITE NEWSBYTES
ONTARIO LIBERAL LEADER URGES CATHOLIC SCHOOL TO ALLOW HOMOSEXUAL PROM DATES
“Catholic” Liberal leader takes strong anti-Catholic position
TORONTO, March 28, 2002 (LSN.ca) – Ontario Liberal Leader Dalton McGuinty and admitted homosexual and fellow Liberal MPP George Smitherman have written Durham Catholic District School Board trustees asking them to allow a male student to bring a male date to his prom. In the letter, obtained by LifeSite, McGuinty, a Catholic, accuses the school board of being “unfair” and offending “the freedoms that have made Canada a welcome home for people in all their diversity.”
McGuinty alleges the student is “being denied some of his most basic rights as a human being and as a Canadian.” Concluding his letter, McGuinty writes, “I am appealing to you as a Canadian, as a Catholic and as the father of four to change your decision.”
The Toronto Sun reports that the openly homosexual Toronto Centre-Rosedale Liberal MPP George Smitherman said he’ll be unveiling a list of high-profile people who are lobbying the school board. On the other hand, political observers note that officials defending traditional principles frequently do not hear from the many people who agree with them and who sadly take courageous actions for granted.
Michael Powers, principal of Monsignor John Pereyma Catholic Secondary School in Oshawa, told 17-year-old student Marc Hall that allowing his 21-year-old homosexual ‘boyfriend’ as a date for the prom would contravene Church teaching and school policy. The school board backed the decision. Earlier this week the head of the Canadian Auto Workers union attacked the school over its decision.
Thomas Langan, president of the Catholic Civil Rights League stated: “In entering into this debate in this fashion, Mr. McGuinty apparently does not understand the true meaning of a pluralistic society. If the leader of the opposition for Ontario is pressuring an institution as fundamental and major as the Roman Catholic Church to change its beliefs and not be true to its faith, how can we respect his balancing of rights in society as a whole?”
The CCRL President also questioned continued Catholic support for the Party. “Traditionally, many Catholics have supported the Liberal Party in Canada and Ontario precisely because it wanted to help Catholics fight for basic human rights. Now the Liberal leader too wants to interfere with and ignore basic Catholic morality and Catholic rights.”
See related LifeSite coverage:
MEDIA CIRCUS OVER CATHOLIC SCHOOL BANNING STUDENT’S HOMOSEXUAL DANCE PARTNER
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2002/mar/02032002.html
AUTO UNION WORKER PRESIDENT THREATENS CATHOLIC SCHOOL OVER HOMOSEXUALITY
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2002/mar/0203254 .html
To express your support for the board all trustee emails are listed at:
https://www.durhamrc.edu.on.ca/html/about_dcdsb.html
Express your concerns to Liberal Leader Dalton McGuinty:
[email protected]
STUDY FINDS LOWER INFANT DEATHS IN CANADA LINKED TO MORE ABORTIONS
Advances in Prenatal Search and Destroy Techniques Increases Killing Rate
OTTAWA, March 28, 2002 (LSN.ca) – A study published in the current issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association links a major increase in late term abortions to a decline in infant mortality.
Lead researcher Dr. Shiliang Liu MB, PhD of the Health Surveillance and Epidemiology Division, Centre for Healthy Human Development, Health Canada found infant mortality dropped from 6.4 and 6.1 per 1000 live births between 1991 and 1995 to 5.5 per 1000 in 1997. The rate of infant death from congenital anomalies also declined 21% after 1995 from 1.86 per 1000 in 1995 to 1.47 per 1000 in 1996 and 1997. Moreover the study reported that “Fetal deaths due to pregnancy termination at 20 to 21 weeks increased by 578% from 3.2 per 100,000 in 1991 to 20.9 per 100,000 fetuses at risk in 1998.”
The researchers said the timing of the abortions suggest they were performed after congenital defects were detected through prenatal diagnosis. “Many of these cases would have ended as late stillbirths or deaths in the first year of life,” Dr. I.D. Rusen, a community medicine specialist at Health Canada, and a co-author of the study told Reuters.
Mary Ellen Douglas of Campaign Life Coalition Canada pointed out: “the child dies in both circumstances; with death due to abnormality it is natural death, but abortion is murder.”
See the Reuters coverage and the abstract from the journal:
https://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u;=/hsn/20020327/…
https://jama.ama-assn.org/issues/v287n12/abs/joc10704.html
DR. DOBSON TELLS CHRISTIAN PARENTS TO REMOVE CHILDREN FROM CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS
COLORADO SPRINGS,CO, March 28, 2002 (LSN.ca) – In his widely heard radio broadcast today Focus on the Family’s Dr. James Dobson stated “In the state of California, if I had a child there, I wouldn’t put the youngster in a public school…. I think it’s time to get our kids out. And I’m going to get hit for [saying] that.”
Marshall Fritz, President of the Alliance for the Separation of School & State, congratulated Dobson and said that the public schools have become government indoctrination centers.
Fritz said that approximately 15,000 people have signed a Public Proclamation for the Separation of School and State and that “the Proclamation goes even further than does Dr. Dobson–it calls for the end of government involvement in education”. Others who have endorsed the Proclamation, range from Dr. D. James Kennedy and Dr. Tim LaHaye to Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J., and from Rabbi Daniel Lapin to Iman Hamza Yusef Hanson. The Alliance notes that others can be seen at:
Protestant: https://sepschool.org/VIPList.html#protestant
Catholic: https://sepschool.org/VIPList.html#catholic
LDS: https://sepschool.org/VIPList.html#lds
Jewish: https://sepschool.org/VIPList.html#jewish
Muslim: https://sepschool.org/VIPList.html#muslim
Support for Dr. Dobson may be sent to
James C. Dobson, Ph.D.
Focus on the Family
8605 Explorer Avenue
Colorado Springs, CO 80920-1049
(800) 232-6459 voice comments
(719) 548-4670 fax
Dr. Dobson¹s broadcast in Real Audio is available at:
https://family.org/fmedia/broadcast/
The remarks on the public schools start in minute 15 of the show.
If looking for it later than today, use:
https://family.org/fmedia/bcpast.cfm
CATHOLIC BISHOP DEFENDS ABORTION HOLOCAUST DISPLAY FROM RABBI’S CRITICISM
BOISE, March 28, 2002 (LSN.ca) – Bishop Michael Driscoll of Boise City has defended a pro-life display featuring photos comparing abortion to the Nazi holocaust and the lynching of blacks. Rabbi Daniel Fink of Congregation Ahavath Beth Israel in Boise asked the bishop to withdraw the diocesan co-sponsorship of the display at Boise State University scheduled for April 8-12.
“Even if one is strongly anti-abortion, the notion that a woman who chooses to abort an 8-week-old fetus (or a doctor who performs such an abortion) is in any way analogous to Nazis or white supremacist lynch mobs is abhorrent. This demonizes women and doctors, creating the kind of environment that makes for clinic bombings and terror,” Fink wrote in a letter to Driscoll. “The Nazis systematically destroyed Jewish individuals, communities and cultures. Southern white supremacists did the same to black southerners. To say that abortion is no different is to trivialize the suffering of blacks and Jews,” he said.
In his reply Bishop Driscoll said, “I have not come to the conclusion that the exhibit is ‘hateful, bigoted and unjust.'” The bishop wrote: “I think reference to the Holocaust was meant to address those who deny that the Holocaust happened. We, of course, know that the Holocaust happened. At the very least, there are thousands of pictures and accounts proving this fact. I think the point being made … is that aborted fetuses happen and, depending on the method used, some are gruesome.” He concluded, “With that in mind, I do not see a need to ask the St. Paul´s Catholic Community, serving BSU, to withdraw its sponsorship with the other Christian organizations.”
See the coverage in the Idaho Statesman:
https://204.228.236.37/Story.asp?ID=6164
STUDY FINDS WORSHIPPING GOD BENEFITS MENTAL HEALTH
OTTAWA, March 28, 2002 (LSN.ca) – The first known Canadian study examining religious commitment among psychiatric inpatients has found that religion is beneficial for mental heath. The study indicates that certain religious practices may protect against severity of symptoms, hospital use, and enhance life satisfaction among psychiatric inpatients.
The study, published in the current issue of the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, looked at 88 consecutive adult patients (50% men) who were admitted to a Canadian tertiary care psychiatry inpatient unit and were interviewed about their religious beliefs and practices.
A total of 59% believed in a God who rewards and punishes, 27% had a high frequency of worship attendance, and 35% prayed once or more daily. More frequent worship attenders had less severe depressive symptoms, shorter current length of stay, higher satisfaction with life, and lower rates of current and lifetime alcohol abuse when compared with those with less frequent or no worship attendance. In contrast, private spirituality was associated with lower depressive symptoms and current alcohol use only, and prayer frequency had no significant associations.
The clinical implications of the study urge professionals to:
– Address the spiritual aspect of patients’ lives whether positive, negative, or neutral in order to address the person as a whole.
– Support this potentially significant coping resource.
– Involve spiritual advisors, such as the clergy or chaplains, when needed. See the study in the Journal at:
https://www.cpa-apc.org/Publications/CJP/2002/march/orReligio…
INTERFAITH COALITION TO DEFEND RIGHTS OF RELIGIOUS PARENTS AT SUPREME COURT
OTTAWA, March 28, 2002 (LSN.ca) – The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada (EFC) is intervening with the Archdiocese of Vancouver, the Catholic Civil Rights League and the Canadian Alliance for Social Justice and Family Values Association in a Supreme Court of Canada case dealing with homosexual propaganda aimed at children.
On March 22 EFC filed its written legal arguments (factum) in its intervention in the Supreme Court of Canada in the Chamberlain v. Surrey School Board case. The issue in the case is whether the requirement that British Columbia schools be run on a “strictly secular” basis precludes school boards from making decisions that respect the concerns of religious parents. The Supreme Court has scheduled the hearing for June 12, 2002.
The case arose when the Surrey School Board decided not to approve books promoting homosexual parenting for use in kindergarten and Grade one, largely based on the concerns of religious parents. James Chamberlain, a kindergarten teacher in a Surrey school, challenged this decision in court. The British Columbia Supreme Court overturned the school board decision on the basis that “the Board made a decision significantly influenced by religious considerations” and that this was contrary to section 76(1) of the Schools Act that schools be “conducted on strictly secular.principles.”
The British Columbia Court of Appeal overturned the B.C. Supreme Court ruling. The Court of Appeal found that the Supreme Court judge erred in her interpretation of “secular.” Section 76(1) of the Schools Act did not require that religious parents be excluded from the public school decision-making process. Indeed, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights grants to parents the right to ensure that the moral education of their children is in conformity with the religious beliefs of the parents. This means at least that religious parents have the right to participate in public debate about the moral appropriateness of books approved for classroom use.
The factum is available online on the EFC website.
https://www.efc-canada.com
TANZANIA TO DESTROY SHIPMENT OF DEFECTIVE CONDOMS FROM UNFPA
TANZANIA, March 28, 2002 (LSN.ca) – The BBC Monitoring service reports on a Radio Tanzania broadcast indicating that condoms from the United Nations Population Fund are to be destroyed by the Tanzanian government because the prophylactics were found to be defective. Testing revealed the undisclosed defects were found in three shipping containers of Singaporean condoms, valued at about $770,000.
Pro-life observers wonder how many deaths UNFPA may be responsible for by shipping defective condoms around the world. Condom distribution in the third world has provided a false sense of security especially among youth, encouraging AIDS-inviting sexual promiscuity.
LIFESITE NEWSBYTES
BY-ELECTIONS IN 7 RIDINGS TO BE HELD MAY 13
The writs of by-election were issued on Wednesday, March 27, 2002, for federal by-elections that will be held Monday, May 13, 2002, in the ridings of Windsor West (Ontario), Saint Boniface (Manitoba), Saint-Léonard-Saint-Michel (SQuebec), Bonavista-Trinity-Conception (Newfoundland and Labrador) and Calgary Southwest (Alberta) to fill vacancies in the House of Commons created by the resignations of sitting members of the House of Commons.
https://www.elections.ca/content.asp?section=med&document;=mar…