Written by HLI’s director of education and research, Dr. Brian Clowes, A Pro-Life Pastoral Handbook was specifically designed to help priests, seminarians and other religious and lay teachers of the Catholic faith examine questions about contraception, abortion, end of life issues, assisted reproductive technologies, and the Sacrament of Marriage.

Korean translation of A Pro-Life Pastoral Handbook.

“I am pleased to inform you that the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of Korea published the Korean Version of A Pro-Life Pastoral Handbook … with the collaboration of the ‘Pro-Life Activities’ division of the Committee for Bioethics of the CBCK,” wrote Father Thaddaeus Lee Ki-rak, executive secretary of the CBCK, which is based in Seoul, South Korea, in a May 2012 letter to HLI President Father Shenan Boquet. “The book was sent to every priest in Korea [at no expense to them].”

The Korean language version of the book is entitled Gunggumhan Sangmyeong Munje-ae Daphada (Answers to the Questions on Life Issues). HLI granted CBCK President Bishop Gabriel CHANG Bong-hun permission to translate and publish the Handbook.

“HLI’s mission is to serve the greater work of building a Culture of Life and Civilization of Love throughout the world, and I am glad we can be of assistance to the Bishop’s Conference of Korea in accomplishing this goal,” said Father Boquet. “I am confident the priests in Korea will value the Handbook and find it very helpful in their formation and teaching on the dignity of the human person.”

Several thousand copies of the book, which is also being translated into Spanish, have been sold since it was originally published in 2010, and hundreds more have been given away at pro-life conferences and events around the world.

HLI’s founder Father Paul Marx said of the Handbook in 2009, “This book is a compact and indispensable guide for priests, seminarians and active lay people who need to answer difficult moral questions in a concise and understandable manner.”

The book is exclusively sold on HLI’s online store.

And this trend is supported by other objective evidence of a changing of America’s heart on the issue of abortion. Nancy Keenan, the president of NARAL, is stepping down in the face of the fact that pro-lifers are young, energetic and armed with the truth about the horrors of abortion, while she and her sterile colleagues are, not surprisingly, not appealing to young people with their ever-more-obvious deceptions and thinly veiled contempt for children. That just isn’t a winning message long-term.

The radical selfishness and dishonesty of the “pro-choice” movement is more obvious to young people than it is to the aging generation of media executives, editors and reporters, who have for decades equated women’s rights with a barbaric practice that leaves women harmed emotionally, and often physically.

More and more doctors are refusing to take part in the destructive and soul-sucking work of abortion, which is forcing the still very powerful, well-funded and politically connected pro-abortion elite to look for ways to keep abortion accessible.

Likewise, the legal battle for the right to life is trending in the pro-life direction, and the “pro-choice” abortion lobby is struggling to keep up. More and more abortion clinics are closing as they are held accountable to the same health standards as real healthcare providers, and the cover of darkness that had obscured their disdain for the women they serve is becoming clear.

Abortion never was pro-woman, and more young women realize that now. I expect that the Gallup polls will continue to wax and wane as far as public perceptions, but there is no reversing the pro-life trend, and the pro-life movement that is increasingly led by young women in collaboration with those who always knew the harm caused by abortion.

This trend will not reverse.

This article appeared on CNSNews.com and is reprinted with permission.

Father Shenan J. Boquet is the president of Human Life International (HLI).

March for Life in Italy.

We should of course keep in mind that in many, if not most, cases, the tragedy of abortion is being exported by the United States to the rest of the world. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that the healing of the deep wounds that four decades of abortion have inflicted on the lives of countless post-abortive women and men should begin in America. It can no longer be denied that abortion is deadly, both for the child and for the mother, and it will take a concerted effort to end this holocaust.

In German-speaking countries, many people, especially young people, are finally beginning to realize the truth about abortion; a development which is the result of the tireless efforts of pro-life individuals and groups who have remained committed to raising awareness about its devastating consequences (despite constant ridicule by the media and the never-ending nature of the task at hand). Slowly, an appreciation for the beauty and dignity of every life is spreading, and the issue of abortion and the healing of its wounds is gaining more traction in the public conversation.

So what’s next? Without a doubt, the challenge of raising awareness remains at the forefront of pro-life activities. Our American counterparts have been exemplary in this respect, as well as in showing that the pro-life cause is very much a cause of the young generation. Contrary to the media’s portrayal of the pro-life movement as a collection of backwards extremists, the images from the U.S. March for Life and its European equivalents have put a new, young face on the cause for life.

Cardinal Raymond Burke and HLI's Monsignor Barreiro at the March for Life in Italy.

This year in Brussels, young pro-life leaders organized thousands for the March for Life in the EU capital. During pro-life demonstrations in Slovakia, around 500 young people marched for the first time in Bratislava, and in the city of Kosice more than 1,500 people participated in the march. Young people filled the streets for the March for Life in Prague. And Romania had its biggest March for Life ever with 20 cities participating. Being pro-life is not simply a vestige of a generation gone by but rather the passion of today’s generation and, by any indication, of tomorrow’s generation, too.

Just this weekend in Rome, Italy, estimates as high as 15,000 people of different ages and regions came to this year’s March for Life to express their solidarity with the unborn, many of them young pro-life advocates. It was a complete success, as organizers were expecting 5,000 people at most to attend.

Monsignor Ignacio Barreiro, the director of the Rome office of Human Life International (HLI), who helped to organize the march, told LifeSiteNews that the march was a “demonstration of a new commitment to defend life” in Italy, particularly among the young

American Cardinal Raymond Burke also participated in Italy’s March for Life, telling the Catholic News Agency that it brought back memories for him of “so many marches” in America.

“[The marches] serve a very important function,” he said, “first to give a witness in our whole country to the inviolable dignity of human life but second, to awake consciences to what is happening.”

Joannes Bucher (right) at March for Life in Italy.

“I can only imagine that it will grow and increase every year and that it will be an important part in Italy, as it is in America, for the restoration of the respect for the dignity of human life,” he said.

So we have every reason to be optimistic in Europe that young pro-life leaders will finally turn the tide. Endurance, tenacity, knowledge and courage are vital to our success, and so is faithfulness. Our young pro-life leaders in Europe have all these qualities and more. The abortion lobby may be a Goliath, but young David is here, and David is advancing.

Joannes Bucher is the regional coordinator for Europe at Human Life International (HLI).

Young pro-lifers fill House gallery.

As the congressional session resumed in the Philippines on Monday, hundreds of young pro-life activists filled the gallery of the House of Representatives in a show of opposition to the Reproductive Health (RH) Bill which continues to threaten the protections for life and family guaranteed by the Filipino Constitution.

The youth activists, all dressed in red (the color of the pro-life resistance to the RH Bill) were greeted in their seats by members of the nine Young Legislators (9YL) of the House of Representatives who last year vowed to fight against the RH Bill. Those representatives are Lucy Torres-Gomez (Leyte, 4^th district), Karlo Alexei Nograles (Davao City, 1^st District), Gabriel Quisumbing (Cebu, 6^th District), Irwin Tieng and Mariano Michael Velarde (Buhay Party List), Lord Allan Jay Velasco (Marinduque), Dakila Carlo Cua (Quirino, Lone District), Rachel Marguerite Del Mar (Cebu, 1^st District) and Fatima Aliah Dimaporo (Lanao del Norte, 2^nd District).

Earlier in the day, a group of young pro-life leaders representing a coalition of organizations held a press conference to present and sign the “Our Voice, Our Vote” youth manifesto opposing the RH Bill.

“The youth are the foremost victims of the Reproductive Health Bills pending in both housed of Congress. It is our generation that will face the reality of the many risks so intimately involved in this measure. It is our welfare that is on the line,” the statement begins.

“[P]regnancy is not the disease that can find a cure in contraception. Massive government spending for products with known health detriments is tantamount to a government serving our people harm,” the statement reads in part.

Pro-life youth sign manifesto opposing the RH Bill.

An “RH Youth Forum” was also held Monday in the Philippines where around a hundred youth leaders gathered to hear pro-life speakers and discuss their activities to oppose the RH Bill. Human Life International (HLI) Philippines Director Dr. Rene Bullecer was one of the speakers, and helped to organize the forum.

“If we made it in the last 14 years, we must be able to sustain our battle until the 15^th Congress closes on February 18, 2013. Trusting solely in God’s mercy, we are more determined than ever to fight and win against the anti-life agenda through prayers, dedication and activism, all for faith, life and family,” Dr. Bullecer said in an email sent to HLI’s office in the United States.

Among other objectionable provisions, the RH Bill would force medical professionals and businesses to promote and perform a full range of “reproductive health services,” regardless of conscientious objection. The bill promises to fine and jail opponents who spread as-yet-undefined “malicious” falsehoods about the bill, and would pay for contraceptive services with taxpayer funds. It is feared that the RH Bill will move the Philippines one step closer to legalizing abortion, which is currently illegal under any circumstance.

The fight against the RH Bill is the subject of a documentary produced by Human Life International last year. “The Philippines: Preserving a Culture of Life” was featured last weekend at the Life Fest Film Festival in Los Angeles, California. The film, which debuted on Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN) last August, will return to EWTN on May 9^th and 10^th in the Philippines, and will also re-air in the U.S. and Canada on EWTN on Wednesday, May 9^th at 2:30 pm, and Friday May 11^th at 5:30 pm EST.

“That so many young people are active in defending life and family in the Philippines is truly a sign of hope for the pro-life community, not only in the Philippines, but around the world,” said HLI Vice President for Missions Father Peter West. “The Filipino youth who are leading the fight against the RH Bill need our prayers and support to defeat the RH Bill once and for all. May God bless their efforts in the defense of life.”

Follow Adam on Twitter: @adamcassandra.

My first experience began at 5:00 AM when I joined pro-lifers in a prayer vigil outside one of Mexico City’s public abortion mills.  Many of these warriors for life had been gathered since 4:00 AM in anticipation of the mill’s opening at 6:15 AM. Monday thru Saturday this mill opens its doors and facilitates per day a maximum of sixty women seeking an abortion. Those defending life and the dignity of women told me there is never a lack of clients seeking the termination of their pregnancies, the death of their innocent children.

The sidewalk was lined from one end of the building to the other with young mothers, husbands, boyfriends and parents with one goal — obtaining an abortion. Adding to this mixture of humanity was another line of young mothers and fathers. These, instead, were waiting to enter the family clinic for assistance with the healthy delivery of their children. What an irony! On one side there is joy and on the other fear, anxiousness and regret — a testimony to the authentic battle lines of today’s society.

The decision of a pregnant mother to choose life or death for her child is influenced by many factors, and perhaps one of the most unfortunate is not recognizing the truth about when her child’s life begins. The propaganda machine of “pro-choice” abortion promoters never speaks of the child, a human being, in the womb. They blatantly deny the reality of life blossoming within the womb and instead speak of the child as only tissue and matter. They also lecture about the inconveniences for the mother and her family if the baby is born.

HLI’s Mexico affiliate, however, with the power of modern technology and hearts filled with love for their neighbor, intervenes into the darkness of fear and fabrications to cast the light of truth. They muddle through the uncertainties and anxiousness to reveal the wonder of life stirring within through ultrasound technology. They put a face on the little child, one so small and seemingly insignificant, and offer this beautiful young mother the opportunity to meet her baby. The results of such an encounter are met with mixed emotions, but nearly 90% of all fetal ultrasounds end with life being saved and the dignity of the mother being preserved.

On this particular morning I witnessed first hand the intervening power of love. One group prayed the Rosary while another group of trained sidewalk counselors began a dialogue with those waiting in line to procure abortions. I watched as these warriors for life gently and patiently encouraged their sisters to talk about their situation, and if there was openness, led them to the mobile ultrasound unit. It was a fluid movement of genuine concern, and I saw the Gospel of Love and Life at work.

That early morning, before the sun had risen, I witnessed lives being saved. I watched as ten children were saved through the powerful intervention of love. Each mother who emerged from the ultrasound trailer was not the same. Expecting to see nothing more than a glob of tissue or a mixture of unorganized matter, the mother instead saw a baby, her baby, with little hands and feet. The lie she was told had been revealed, and light entered in and cast aside the darkness.

For the mothers who chose to keep their babies, continuing care and support were given. The pro-life community offered counseling, assistance with work opportunities and basic health care. I saw joy on the faces of a number of mothers who were saved from the horror of abortion and offered genuine care and love.

At the conclusion of our vigil, I was privileged to meet a young couple in their early twenties that decided to keep their child. They both were filled with tears of joy as they accepted the gift of life and opened themselves to its wondrous beauty. I could see fear disappear as they embraced in love their child and each other. I could also see the humble joy of those that had intervened. It was a moment of grace and awe.

I wish I could say that we had succeeded in saving all sixty children that day, but through the loving efforts of pro-life warriors ten were saved at our location, and the dignity of these beautiful mothers upheld. Through the combined efforts those defenders of life witnessing at other public mills in Mexico City that morning, a total of thirty-two children were saved.

The apparition and message of Our Lady of Guadalupe in 1531 to Juan Diego forever changed the life of the Mexican people, and her message more than ever is needed today. As in the day of the apparition, life is threatened and the dignity of humanity is being undermined by the powers of evil. Our Lady of Guadalupe presents herself with child to forever remind the world of the precious gift of life. I met a wondrous people during my visit, and I am convinced that under Our Lady of Guadalupe’s intercession and motherly care legalized abortion will come to an end in Mexico.

Our lady of Guadalupe, pray for Mexico, the Americas and the world.

Father Shenan J. Boquet is the president of Human Life International (HLI).

According to the United Nations, every hour of the day and night there are thirty less Japanese in the world. By the end of this year, there will be 200,000 less, and by the year 2050, Japan will have lost nearly a quarter of its population.

Such is the legacy of a country which has so eagerly embraced materialism and the Culture of Death.

Japan is invaluable as a demographic laboratory because it is practically a closed system, with almost no emigration or immigration. Its 99 percent ethnically homogenous population gives us a rare glimpse of what the future holds for the entire world.

Japan's population based on UN figures and projections.

The problem is simple: Japanese women have virtually stopped having babies.

The total fertility rate, or TFR, is the number of children each woman must have in order for a nation to have a stable population. For an advanced nation like Japan, this is 2.1 children per woman. However, Japan’s population was the first in the world to dip beneath replacement fertility fully half a century ago (in 1960), and its TFR has continued to plunge. It now stands at an astonishing 1.1 children per woman (half that required for replacement), and will continue to decline to 0.6 children per woman by 2050.

When women stop having babies, the result is unavoidable ― the nation’s population briefly peaks, then declines. Japan’s population reached a maximum of 126.5 million two years ago, and is now one million less. This trend will accelerate until the nation is losing a million people a year.

A declining native population is not in and of itself a critical problem if a steady stream of immigrants is helping to replace the younger age groups that are not being replenished. This is currently the case in Singapore. However, Japan has always been extremely reluctant to allow foreigners to live within its borders, and makes it nearly impossible for them to live and work there. Less than one percent of foreigners who wish to live in Japan pass the mandatory language proficiency exams.

The result is that Japan is being severely pinched at both ends of the age spectrum. The numbers are stark in their ominous simplicity:

• The number of Japanese children under 15 has declined for thirty consecutive years, from 24% of the population to its current 13%. Japan now has less children than it did a century ago, in large part to the forty million abortions it has suffered since it legalized the practice under the Eugenic Protection Law in 1949. Due to the strong government push for women to enter the workforce in response to the economic downturn, fully 70 percent of single Japanese women now say they do not want to be married. The Japanese “business first” mentality sees having a child as a career-ending decision.
• The number of people over 65 has increased for sixty consecutive years, from a mere five percent of the population in 1952 to its current 23%, and is projected to increase to 43% by 2050. Japan is currently the oldest nation in the world, with an average age of 45, and this will increase to an incredible 60 years old by 2050.
• Thus, Japan has the greatest percentage of people over 65 of any nation in the world, and the lowest percentage of children under 15 of any nation in the world.

The combination of a shrinking young population and an exploding elderly population inevitably has profound economic implications.

To begin with, there are less and less workers supporting more and more retirees. In 1950, there were ten Japanese workers supporting each retired person. Now, there are just 2.5 workers supporting each retiree, compared to China’s 8:1 ratio. By 2050, each Japanese worker will have to support one retired person, the lowest worker:retiree support ratio in the world.

The inverted Japanese population pyramid (more elderly than young) also means far more pension and health care spending. Baby boomers are retiring now, and by 2025, 70% of government spending will be consumed by debt service and social security spending.

At the other end of the spectrum, less young people means less workers, which means less tax-derived income for the government. More spending plus less tax revenue means an increase in the public debt.

People concerned about the economy delay marriage and childbearing, and so a kind of demographic negative feedback loop, or “vicious cycle,” continues.

Since 1995, the Japanese government has tried everything to get women to have more babies, including greatly increased child care benefits, but without any result. In 2006, the “Year of the Dog,” former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said that “Dogs produce lots of puppies and, when they do, the pains of labor are easy.” The government even pays for so-called “speed dating.” But once you get people addicted to things and tell them for decades that babies are a burden, that they interfere with your wants and your needs, and they are bad for the environment, your nation is doomed. No nation in history has recovered from a total fertility rate as low as Japan’s.

The Lesson to be Learned

What may we learn from the ongoing slow-motion Japanese disaster?

Just as Japan is a closed system, so is the world. Just as Japan’s population leveled out and began to plunge, so will the world’s, and very soon. This will lead to gigantic economic consequences and human suffering on a scale never before known.

Yet the population control cartel continues to abort, sterilize and contracept the people of the world just as fast as they can.

Worldwide demographic trends have the momentum of a supertanker. The world’s total fertility rate will hit replacement in just two years. Its population will peak in only three decades and then begin to decline.

The time to end population control programs and promote larger families is now.

Dr. Brian Clowes is the director of research for Human Life International (HLI).

On Sunday May 1, 2011 I had the singular honor to participate in person with my wife, 19 month old daughter, mother-in-law and 1.5 million faithful as Pope Benedict XVI formally beatified John Paul II in St. Peter’s Square. For most of my life he incarnated the papacy. His globetrotting “personal mission” to fulfill Christ’s command to bring the Gospel to all nations – he visited 129 nations as pope! – seemed to be the “normal” state of affairs. Only gradually did I realize what a unique gift from God he was.

Karol Wojtyla was forged as a pillar of strength in the great totalitarian convulsions starting with fascism and continuing with communism. His faith and resolve were deepened by the suffering of his beloved Poland. After his shooting in St. Peter’s Square in 1981, he not only recovered from four wounds that would have killed most men, but went on to have the most vigorous pontificate in history.

In many ways, John Paul II defined his era, not least in coining the phrase “culture of death”. This did not contribute to his popularity, but the Catholic Church is called to denounce the dominant errors of every age. The paradox is that she is so often called “backward and behind the times,” but the champions of “progress” – the Arians, Iconoclasts, Cathars, Communists, radical feminists, etc. – are the ones who end up in the ash heap of history, not the Church.

No one could do or write as much as John Paul II did without generating controversy among many of the world’s more than 1.1 billion Catholics. At the same time, his giant personality and ability to touch the hearts of people everywhere created a real temptation of “santo subito”- proclaiming him a saint instantly – without a thorough study of his life and heroic virtues. That is one reason why I am grateful the Church requires an objective miracle for beatification and a further one for canonization: These important checks remind us that God has ultimate control of who is proclaimed blessed or a saint.

Great figures emerge in periods of crisis, and who can deny that the Church and the world are in the midst of a decades-old tribulation? John Paul II was not granted the joy of taking us out of our troubles. Still, his decisive contribution to the Soviet Communist Empire’s downfall was a tremendous victory that left worldly observers astonished.

I cannot regard it as a mere coincidence that John Paul II was elected in 1978, a few months after Italy legalized abortion, and died only two days after Terri Schiavo. The morning of the assassination attempt he had met with French pro-life hero Dr. Jerome Lejeune. The defining moments of his pontificate were impressed with the signs of our anti-life times.

The “Pope of Life” gave us a constant example in word and deed of what it means to be pro-life to the end. John Paul II inspired and encouraged our work to achieve respect for innocent human life and to triumph over the unprecedented killing fields of the last half century.

Please join me in praying that we will be sustained and strengthened by Blessed John Paul to finish the urgent task he laid out for us all, and which he so mightily began.

Joseph Meaney is the director of international coordination for Human Life International (HLI).

Actually, it is a city-state, and it is consistently rated as the most law-abiding nation in the world. Singapore has one of the best health care systems, resulting in the lowest infant mortality rate and longest life expectancy in the world. Illegal drug use and violence are almost nonexistent, which is rather shocking for a city of over five million inhabitants.

The city is one of the four original “Asian Tigers,” nations whose economies were, when the expression was coined, rapidly growing (the others were South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong). More than ten thousand multinational corporations have headquarters or major offices in Singapore. It ranks number one in almost every business-oriented ranking, and one of every six households is worth more than a million dollars, the highest ratio in the world. In fact, the average gross domestic product per capita is $60,000 — 50 percent higher than that of the United States.

Singapore’s spectacular skyline is dominated by the recently-completed Marina Bay Sands Hotel and Casino, which is topped by a gigantic swimming pool and skypark, and by the world’s largest Ferris wheel, the 541-foot-tall Singapore Flyer. The streets are spotless; the only piece of trash I saw when I was there a few years ago was immediately picked up by the next passerby.

But despite the façade of dynamic growth, all is not well in this pecuniary paradise. People say that the young dislike Singapore because of the stringent control the government exerts on every aspect of their lives, and because of the incredibly high costs of living (it costs $80,000 US just to buy a permit to obtain permission to buy a car, for example). As they grow older, however, people like Singapore more and more because of its low crime rate and because they tend to make a lot more money than they would almost anywhere in the world.

The real problem is immediately evident to any child-oriented person who visits Singapore: There are very few children visible anywhere, even on the weekends. For a developed nation to replace its population, every woman must have 2.1 children. Singaporean women have not achieved this replacement total fertility rate (TFR) since 1976. They have only 1.1 children on the average, making theirs the third-lowest TFR in the world. If this trend continues, the TFR will be a disastrously low 0.70 within a couple of decades.

The failure to have children is the primary factor that leads to a rapidly-aging population. The average age of Singaporeans was just 18 in 1965; this has more than doubled to 39 now, with a projected average age of 58 by 2060. In order to counter this aging trend, the government has been strongly encouraging women of childbearing age to take their places in the workforce, which is a primary contributor to the low birth rate.

A total fertility rate this low would usually result in a rapidly-declining population, but Singapore has opened its doors to the immigration of both professionals and domestic workers, so its population is continuing to grow at a slow rate. However, the “native” Singaporeans are being displaced by immigrants and will be a minority in their own city-state within twenty years. Additionally, more people left the workforce than joined it for the first time in 2011 as the wave of “Baby Boomers” begins to retire. This means that the number of workers supporting each retired person will plunge from a relatively healthy 6.4 now to an unsupportable 2.4 in less than twenty years.

The root of the problem in money-mad Singapore is a more concentrated version of what is happening in the United States and around the world — a preoccupation with things rather than people. Abortionist Saifuddin Sidek put his finger on the problem when he said that “A lot of them [abortions] are because of the current economic climate. No matter what incentives the government gives, parents may find it a bit hard to make ends meet, especially if they already have more than one or two children.”

Ironically, the focus on wealth may ultimately destroy that immense wealth; the leveling population growth caused the Singaporean economy to suffer a sharp dip for the first time in its history in mid-2011, according to former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew.

The government is schizophrenic the issue of population. On one hand, it launched a “Dating Campaign” in 2010 to get young couples to have more children, but it also forces Catholic schools to promote condoms.

Fortunately, Singapore has the economic reserves needed to withstand a stagnant population for a decade or so. However, even the gigantic structure of a tightly-controlled economic paradise will eventually sink if it is built on a foundation of extremely low birth rates. This is the lesson of history; it has happened before, and it will happen again in Singapore unless the authoritarian government adopts a strong pronatalist stance.

Dr. Brian Clowes is the director of research for Human Life International (HLI).

(Zenit.org) – In 2010, an article appeared in the UK newspaper The Telegraph reacting to a proposal to cut government funding for a certain beverage in schools. The author made the argument that the drink might be “doing more harm than good” and cited “negative side effects,” while noting that his viewpoint was heard relatively rarely in comparison to the large industry which vigorously promoted its product through advertising and with the support of government subsidies[1]. The substance in question was milk, which would seem on the surface to be more innocuous than those fearsome beverages that have also come under fire for being available in schools in recent years, soft drinks[2].

While the role of government in regulating access to these beverages in schools has varied, a key factor influencing school policies is the input of parents. A 2005 survey found that parents of adolescents had strong opinions regarding nutrition in schools, and encouraged health professionals in school settings to engage with parents in promoting good nutrition within the school environment[3]. While it may not be practical or even possible for a parent to monitor everything a child consumes while at school, this fact reflects only that substances like milk or soft drinks are widely available, and not subject to additional restrictions under the law. Furthermore, parents are not expressly prohibited from knowing their children’s dietary habits by mandate of either the school or the government.

However, while parents’ input may be welcomed with regard to students’ intake of sugar, substances available only by prescription are being distributed to students at school-based clinics without their parents’ knowledge or consent. Recent reports from both the US and the UK reveal that students are receiving oral and implanted contraceptives while on school property, through government-funded initiatives.

Birth control implant similar to what was used on young girls in Britain.

A story aired on National Public Radio in March, discussing a provision of the new health care law that increases funding for school-based health centers, which exist to treat sick students, but which are also widely used to distribute condoms and oral contraceptives to students[4]. The story focused on one such clinic located in California, where, according to state law, students older than 12 years of age can legally obtain prescribed contraceptives without their parents’ knowledge or permission. While the legal right of minors to obtain prescribed contraceptives confidentially differs by state, 21 states explicitly allow minors to give consent to contraceptive services, meaning that parental consent, and consequently, knowledge, is not required[5]. This is reflective of an international trend: in February, The Telegraph reported a story describing British girls as young as 13 being fitted with contraceptive implants at school clinics without the knowledge of their parents, and without consulting the students’ primary physicians[6]. Given that the introduction of these implants requires minor surgery, many parents were outraged. Just as in the US, this UK initiative was supported by a government effort to reduce teenage pregnancy.

While the use of contraceptive measures to prevent pregnancy is in clear violation of the Church’s teaching, these examples touch upon another key issue: the duties of parents and the larger society toward children, including older minors still under their parents’ legal guardianship. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states: “The family must be helped and defended by appropriate social measures. Where families cannot fulfill their responsibilities, other social bodies have the duty of helping them and of supporting the institution of the family. Following the principle of subsidiarity, larger communities should take care not to usurp the family’s prerogatives or interfere in its life”[7]. Furthermore, in his 1994 Letter to Families, Blessed John Paul II writes, “Only in those situations where the family is not really self-sufficient does the State have the authority and duty to intervene”[8]. It is notable that in neither of the cases recently reported were the parents of these minors who were given contraceptives deemed to be in any way unfit or lacking in self-sufficiency.

It is worthwhile to note that the controversy regarding milk distribution in schools was in reference to children five and under, and the distribution of contraceptives is occurring among minors 13 and older. Clearly, society recognizes that personal responsibility increases as a child becomes more capable of making his or her own decisions, as evidenced by the fact that minors can be held liable for criminal activity. One might question whether UK policy is logically consistent, however, when girls of 13 can be implanted with contraceptive devices without parental knowledge, yet they must wait until the age of 18 to get a tattoo. Similarly, in the US, a parent or guardian must not only give consent, but must physically accompany a minor under 17 who wishes to go to a movie with a “Restricted” rating. It would seem that government regulations are frequently willing to defer to the wishes of parents with regard to the health and well-being of their children – except where their reproductive capability is concerned. Moreover, as numerous independent studies as well as the labeling of hormonal contraceptives clearly demonstrate, their use is not without risks and carries the potential for negative side effects. Dispensing pills or implanted devices to students in their early teens without consulting parents or primary physicians increases the likelihood that important information regarding familial medical history or other medications being used concurrently might not be taken into account.

The final argument in The Telegraph article criticizing the policy of offering free milk in schools states: “no other species in nature regularly consumes another’s milk”[1]. While this might seem to be a poor measure by which to judge much of human activity, it cannot be denied that, unlike cow’s milk, the synthetic hormones in contraceptive pills, which are known as progestins, do not occur naturally, and no other species regularly takes active steps to limit its fecundity. Nevertheless, parents who entrust their children to educational institutions rightly have concerns regarding their children’s exposure and access to many things on school grounds, from substances such as cow’s milk or contraceptive pills to controversial curricula. That this access may occur without their knowledge is a troubling thought to many parents, but that such information is deliberately being kept from them constitutes a dangerous shift in the role of the parent and the state in safeguarding the well-being of those who are not yet legally adults.

This article originally appeared on Zenit.org and is reprinted with permission.

Rebecca Oas, Ph.D., is a Fellow of HLI America, an educational initiative of Human Life International. She writes for HLI America’s Truth and Charity Forum.

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(1) Marszal, Andrew. Free school milk: the white stuff might not be the right stuff. The Telegraph. August 17, 2010. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/7949773/Free-school-milk-the-white-stuff-might-not-be-the-right-stuff.html

(2) Hawkes, Corinna. The worldwide battle against soft drinks in schools. American Journal of Preventive Medicine. 2010.

(3) Kubik, M.Y., Lytle, L.A., Story, M. Soft Drinks, Candy, and Fast Food: What Parents and Teachers Think about the Middle School Food Environment. Journal of the American Dietetic Association. 2005.

(4) Weiss, Kelley. Health Centers At Schools Get A Funding Boost. National Public Radio, March 6, 2012. http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2012/03/06/148066270/la-school-health-centers

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“Our findings raise the possibility that couples originating from India may be more likely than Canadian-born couples to use prenatal sex determination and terminate a second or subsequent pregnancy if the fetus is female,” according to the study published on April 16 by the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

Researchers in the study said that on average there are 105 males born for every 100 females, but among Indian-born mothers having a second child, the ratio was 111 males to 100 females, and it jumped to 136 males to 100 females for the third child.

While researchers found that the male to female ratio of children born to women who had more than one child was significantly higher among those from India, immigrants from South and East Asia in general were more likely than their Canadian-born counterparts to give birth to a male infant.

The study, which was led by Dr. Joel Ray, a physician at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto, also cited previous research showing a preference for males among Indian born women, and suggested that cultural factors may contribute to the skewed gender ratios.

“An interesting finding in our study was the difference in the male:female ratios between parous women born in India and those born in Pakistan. Although they are neighbouring countries, India is a secular state, whereas Pakistan is an Islamic state in which abortion is religiously prohibited.”

Joseph Meaney, director of international coordination for Human Life International (HLI), was not surprised by the study’s findings. Meaney travels around the world giving presentations on sex-selective abortion, or gendercide.

“The Canadian study highlighted the fact that abnormally few girls were born to mothers from India or Korea. This correlates with the well documented fact that sex-selection is most practiced in the Far East,” said Meaney. “China and India are at the epicenter of the crisis with tens of millions of missing girls.”

“Evidence from multiple sources is mounting that the global scourge of sex-selection abortion, the use of modern technologies to determine the gender of the preborn child and eliminate those of the undesired sex, is occurring in Canada, the USA and Europe,” Meaney said.

Meaney cited the research of noted demographer Nicholas Eberstadt to point out that the gendercide phenomenon is global, with examples of nations on all continents displaying birth ratios skewed in favor of boys.

“This still-growing international predilection for sex-selective abortion is by now evident in the demographic contours of dozens of countries around the globe — and it is sufficiently severe that it has come to alter the overall sex ratio at birth of the entire planet, resulting in millions upon millions of new ‘missing baby girls’ each year,” wrote Eberstadt in the Fall 2011 issue of The New Atlantis. “In terms of its sheer toll in human numbers, sex-selective abortion has assumed a scale tantamount to a global war against baby girls.”

“In the USA there is strong evidence similar to that recently found in Canada pointing to sex-selection abortion of girls with immigrant parents from China, India and South Korea,” said Meaney.

A 2008 study examining “male-biased sex ratios” among U.S.-born children of Chinese, Korean and Asian Indian parents based on the 2000 U.S. Census found that the ratio of male to female births exceeds the biological norm.

“We interpret the found deviation in favor of sons to be evidence of sex selection, most likely at the prenatal stage,” wrote the authors of the study.

According to Meaney, scientific research is now backing up and stirring the debate on what pro-life advocates have known for a long time – that abortion discriminates against women.

“Pro-lifers have equated abortion with discrimination against women for a long time, but demographers are now providing concrete scientific proof for those assertions,” he said.

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