CatholicVote.org

New Live Action Sting Reveals: Planned Parenthood Happy to Commit Gendercide

(Thomas Peters) — Wed, 30 May 2012 18:11:37 +0000

Live Action’s latest campaign shows Planned Parenthood willing to aid and abet a woman who says she wants to abort her baby only if it turns out to be a girl:

This expose puts all the more urgency behind today’s congressional efforts to introduce a national ban on sex-selective abortions [please take action now if you haven't already!]. Because of special legislative circumstances the bill will actually need to pass by two-thirds instead of a simple majority.

Honestly, I don’t know how any politician could possibly claim themselves to be pro-woman after voting down a ban on sex-selective abortions which, we know indisputably, vastly disadvantage unborn baby girls. Or how politicians in DC can claim Republicans are waging a “war on women” when they refuse to face the real war being waged on the most vulnerable women in the womb.

After you call your Representative in Congress and ask them to support HR 3541 (“PRENDA”), visit ProtectOurGirls.com to sign Live Action’s petition and keep up on related news (including more future videos, possibly) at LiveActionNews.org.

This legislation and conversation about the reality of sex-selective abortions are yet another opportunity to change hearts and minds and reveal the evil paradoxes of the “pro-choice” movement. Please do everything you can to help the cause!

Good Signs: New Polls Show Obama Falling Among Catholics; Majority of Americans Support Religious Freedom

(Thomas Peters) — Tue, 22 May 2012 18:08:10 +0000

Encouraging signs from a newly-released Knights of Columbus-Marist Poll:

“…the survey found that nearly three in four Americans (74 to 26 percent) say that freedom of religion should be protected, even if it conflicts with other laws. Majorities would also protect the First Amendment conscience rights of hospitals, health care workers and insurers.

And even on the details, a majority of Americans support individual health care providers and organizations opting-out:

“Strong majorities would let individual health care providers and organizations opt out of providing: abortion (58 to 38 percent), abortion-inducing drugs (51 to 44 percent), in vitro fertilization treatments that could result in the death of an embryo (52 to 41 percent), medication to speed the death of a terminally ill patient (55 to 41 percent) and birth control pills (51 to 46 percent).”

Amazingly, only 50% of respondents said they had heard of the debate over the HHS mandate.

That means we need to be talking about all of these issues more, because half of America isn’t even aware of what’s going on!

Back to the encouraging findings: “Nearly 9 in 10 Americans (88 percent) also agree that religious leaders should speak out on issues of religious freedom.” — so don’t believe the people who try to say Americans don’t want to hear from our religious leaders, or the bishops. They do.

Further evidence of the silent majority being on our side:

The survey found that an overwhelming majority of Americans said that forcing health care workers and doctors to provide abortion – when they object for religious reasons – is morally wrong (72 to 27 percent). Majorities also said that abortion (58 to 40 percent) and same-sex marriage (52 to 45 percent) were morally wrong.

In other words, we have the truth on our side and a majority of Americans support us in defending these truths. What we have to continue doing is being vocal about it and continuing to reach out and educate our friends and family who are not yet engaged in the fight.

One thing we have to realize is that this task of informing our fellow citizens is not going to be aided in any serious way by the mainstream media. As Brent Bozell points out, the evening news broadcasts yesterday “all but spiked the largest legal action in history to defend our Constitutionally-protected religious freedom”.

Nonetheless, those Catholics who have heard about this fight for religious freedom are now beginning to abandon their support for President Obama, as Maureen Malloy Ferguson and Ashley McGuire point out in their article for FoxNews:

Obama was ahead among Catholics by 9 points in early March, and is now trailing by 5 points.

The Pew survey finds that, among Catholic voters with an opinion, 47% would today vote for President Obama, and 52% for former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney.

That same margin, were it to hold on Election Day, would mark a swing of 18 million voters away from Obama.

The loss of these Catholic votes alone would remake the 2008 electoral map, delivering Florida to Governor Romney and leaving the president no margin for error in Colorado or Ohio.

It’s up to us to see that these numbers hold true and improve leading up to November.

Tim Stanley, blogging for the UK Telegraph, reminds us of the mostly untapped cultural and political power of authentic Catholics:

“…the great strength of the Church remains its ability to direct the energies of a smaller group of committed activists and voters, big enough in real terms to make a difference in swing states like Ohio or Pennsylvania. In short, the lawsuits now being filed against the administration mark the beginning of the Catholic Church’s official resistance. Unless Obama backs down with grace, it could also mark the moment when the culture war advantage swung from the Democrats to the Republicans.”

No wonder liberal Catholics like E. J. Dionne are hitting the panic button. It never ceases to amaze me how the dwindling Catholic left so desperately seeks to accomodate President Obama’s numerous attacks on the Catholic Church and more broadly on all people of religious conviction.

Luckily, we have Catholic heroes like Mary Ann Glendon in the Wall Street Journal and George Weigel at National Review who are writing voluminously about what is actually at stake here. Both of their recent essays are required reading, I think.

So, bottom line: be encouraged, take heart, and redouble your efforts!

We Only Lose Marriage If We Spend All Our Time Saying We Will Lose Marriage

(Thomas Peters) — Fri, 18 May 2012 13:45:01 +0000

[NB: This post is not in reaction to Emily's recent post on a similar subject. She focuses on the importance of witness and I want to focus on the importance of fighting on all fronts to keep Catholic witness alive, while also addressing an ongoing problem I'm noticing about how Catholics are unilaterally tempted to give up a winnable culture war.]

In the battle to protect marriage, we can’t choose to win, but we can choose to lose.

By this I mean that we can’t know with 100% certainty that we can win this struggle over how marriage is defined in law and understood by culture. But we can very well decide, and sadly many Catholics have been tempted to decide, that we’re going to lose whether we put up a fight or not. This is no way to win, and it’s the only way people ever lose — by deciding they’re going to lose.

I’m not sure how much more good news in the fight to protect marriage I can give before some fellow Catholics give up their deep-seated conviction that we’ve already lost. A massive 61% victory in North Carolina (including a +8% victory among people under 45). Clear signs that Obama’s choice to endorse same-sex marriage has hurt him in the polls. Pollsters telling the Wall Street Journal they feel the real support of same-sex marriage is barely 40% nationwide. Gallup saying marriage is up seven points over it was last year, marriage winning at the ballot box 32 times…

… and these are all supposed to be signs, somehow, that we have lost?!

At least, that’s the impression you might come away with when you hear many Catholics talk about marriage. And the next time this happens to you, here are three big points to keep in mind.

First big point: Catholics who believe we have inevitably lost marriage have succumbed to a deep cultural pessimism that has everything to do with how they view history and the future and has nothing to do with marriage. So how about we stop blaming it on marriage? Pro-marriage has a better shot of winning (and so does pro-life, by the way) than any of our pre-conceived notions about how bleak the future will look like. It’s up to us to write the future, and how good that future is will be hugely impacted by how much optimism we view it with. History does not move in one direction, it moves in the direction we move it, by God’s grace. And momentum is as easily gained as it is lost, or reversed.

Second big point: I’m really starting to lose patience with people telling us that “don’t worry, I’m going to keep fighting for marriage” in the same breadth as saying “… but we’re going to lose.” Really. We’re going to lose? So why not save the breath and just let the inevitable take us sooner? Seriously, who has ever felt encouraged by the coach who said “Jimmy, I think you should run that race, but let’s face it, you’re coming in last.” I bet you coaches who tell their runners that don’t win many races. And yet so it goes for what passes as pro-marriage pep talks in many Catholic circles.

Third big point: Witness matters. You bet it does. And what kind of witness do we give when we publicly confess our fear that we have lost the fight to protect marriage? A soldier besieging a city feels elation when he hears his enemy behind the battlements whispering the harbinger of defeat: “We will lose.”

But shame on those within the walls who shout their despair from the cornices and thereby encourage the attackers outside! When Christ told the disciples to be “wise as serpents” he was giving us a clue that proclaiming and defending the truth might require a modicum of strategic thinking.

Here’s what I mean, back in practical terms: if we lose the public battle over marriage ALL of the Church’s ability to witness and minister to foster strong vocations to marriage will be in jeopardy. If anyone seriously thinks that after the public definition of marriage is changed to be genderless that will have no effect on, oh, pre-Cana programs, priests being able to speak from the pulpit about marriage, Christians being able to council couples, you name it, just try to think of the last time you saw a church that said “Whites Only” or a marriage crisis counselor with an “Irish Need Not Enter” sign — because the lethal promise of the pro-gay marriage movement is that if you oppose gay marriage you are like someone who opposes interracial marriage and is therefore a racist … and the government has ways of dealing with people like that. In the two examples I mention above, with good reason, in the case of marriage, for no reason that’s going to be good for (or kind to) us Catholics.

Don’t believe me? It’s already happening. It’s happening because opponents of marriage know their best chance at getting us to give up our beliefs and is to bully us into abandoning them. The persecution is getting more intense because we are more stubbornly opposing their efforts. But if we think the persecution is bad when they are at the gates, imagine what it will be like if they make it into the heart of the city.

Marriage defined by law, uniformly, nationwide, is the only thing that can stand in the way of this great threat of same-sex marriage: it’s ability to push out of the public square, silence, intimidate and threaten anyone and everyone who believes in marriage as the union of husband and wife. Our marriage laws are the last (and first) bulwark of a health society and the foundation of strong families.

Or, to put it simply, if we agree witness matters, I can promise you this: same-sex marriage will snuff out our ability as Catholics to witness to the beauty and truth of marriage. For the sharp architects of same-sex marriage, this consequence is a feature, not a bug, of redefining marriage. So, in response, the way we are called to witness, yes witness, to the truth and beauty of marriage is to make publicly, unequivocally clear that we will never, ever abandon our efforts to protect the reality of marriage in law and culture.

That’s how we can and will win.

But if we abandon this political and cultural fight to protect marriage, the personal witness will inevitable crumble, or more likely be stamped out by those who were busy fighting this war on all fronts while we decided to retreat from our greatest strength — marriage.

VICTORY! Benetton Apologizes for Mocking the Pope; Promises to Donate to Catholic Charity

(Thomas Peters) — Tue, 15 May 2012 14:37:36 +0000

180 days ago I called for a boycott of Italian clothing brand Benetton after they posted a photoshopped image of Pope Benedict “kissing” an Imam with the caption “UNHATE.”

Over 800 papists joined this page on Facebook promising to boycott Benetton. We also began a Twitter campaign under the hashtag #ByeByeBenetton. Since then I personally haven’t set foot in a Benetton store, even though in the past I had been their customer.

Today I was alerted to the happy news that Benetton has apologized, removed all instances of the offending image they could find, and has promised to donate to a Catholic charity as a gesture of good will:

The Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said on Tuesday that the dispute between the Holy See and the Benetton Clothing Group over the incorrect use of the Pope’s image has been resolved.

Father Lombardi’s statement came after Benetton issued a press release last Friday apologising for having upset the feelings of Pope Benedict XVI and believers and pledging that it had withdrawn all photographic images of the Holy Father from every publication of the company. It also promised not to use any images of the Pope in the future without prior authorisation from the Holy See and to use its best efforts to stop further use of the photo montage by third parties on internet sites or elsewhere.

… Father Lombardi said Benetton’s statement marked the end of the dispute which came following meetings between the lawyers of the Holy See and the Benetton Group. He said the Holy See did not wish to ask for financial compensation but instead wished to obtain a moral compensation for the harm caused and reiterated its determination to protect — even through legal means — the image of the Pope. Father Lombardi said instead of financial compensation, they had asked for and Benetton had agreed to make a financial donation to help the charity work of the Church. He said this concludes an unpleasant affair that should not have occurred but which has hopefully taught a lesson about the need for due respect for the image of the Pope, just as for any other person, and for the feelings of the faithful. [Vatican Radio]

If this resolution satisfies the Vatican it satisfies me, so I hereby declare the boycott OVER.

Now, I think it’s just as important to THANK organizations when they try to make amends for having mocked and offended Catholics as to boycott them when they don’t. So please join me in thanking Benetton on their Twitter and Facebook accounts in your own words, or simply saying something like “Thank you Benetton for apologizing to the pope! I am no longer boycotting your products.”

If you are on Twitter please use the #ThankYouBenetton hashtag like I did here.

Ph/t: B-Bach’s Beat.

BREAKING: Obama Mentions Christ as Reason He Endorses Same-Sex Marriage

(Thomas Peters) — Wed, 09 May 2012 19:30:08 +0000

Just moments ago President Barack Obama said he was in favor of same-sex marriage.

During the interview, here’s how he says his understanding of Christ and his Christian faith inspired him to do so:

“This is something that, you know, [Michelle and I have] talked about over the years and she, you know, she feels the same way, she feels the same way that I do. And that is that, in the end the values that I care most deeply about and she cares most deeply about is how we treat other people and, you know, I, you know, we are both practicing Christians and obviously this position may be considered to put us at odds with the views of others but, you know, when we think about our faith, the thing at root that we think about is, not only Christ sacrificing himself on our behalf, but it’s also the Golden Rule, you know, treat others the way you would want to be treated…”

Contrast this to his public position in 2004:

In 2004, as a candidate for the US Senate, he cited his own religion in framing his views: “I’m a Christian. I do believe that tradition and my religious beliefs say that marriage is something sanctified between a man and a woman.”

He maintained that position through his 2008 presidential campaign, and through his term as president, until today.

Fellow Catholics, we have a lot of work ahead of us. More from me soon.

Oh and by the way, the people of North Carolina overwhelmingly rejected same-sex marriage 61%-38% last night. Now that President Obama has come out in favor of same-sex marriage, the Democratic convention which will be held in North Carolina in a few months will probably put this position in favor of redefining marriage in the official platform of their party.

Fellow Catholics, we all have a very clear choice ahead of us this November.

On the Radar: Protecting Marriage in North Carolina, Fighting for Catholic Unity in Georgetown, & Much More

(Thomas Peters) — Tue, 08 May 2012 20:27:12 +0000

This is one of those dawn-to-dusk sort of days that I love.

Time for a quick breather and catch up!

The majority of my energy has been focused recently on helping turn out pro-marriage voters in North Carolina in support of the Marriage Protection Amendment being voted upon there today.

If you live in NC, or know folks who do, please make sure to get to the polls! One way you can do that is to join the 22 online Catholic activists who have re-tweeted this message already:

Plenty of papists on the AmericanPapist Facebook page have already said they voted for marriage today!

I’m trying to track down a fascinating report I saw that Pope Benedict mentioned this effort to protect marriage in his homily today. The bishops of North Carolina were visiting with him in Rome yesterday for their ad limina visit, after all, so it is not out of the question. (If anyone has seen news on this, please let me know in the comments!)

In addition to doing radio and media interviews for the North Carolina vote, I’ve been helping keep the NOM Blog active with all the latest and greatest marriage news — so go check it out! — including, of course, our Catholic Vice President’s embarrassing words this weekend in support of redefining marriage. I hope his bishop was watching, that’s all I can say about that right now. You can read CV’s Stephen White for more.

Meanwhile, Catholic Vote has launched an open letter to Georgetown University entitled “Catholics For Unity” (a concept I really like) which is already well on its way to 15,000 signatures. Once you have signed it please share it on Facebook and help me get this tweet trending:

The thought also strikes me that we should try to use the hashtag #catholicsforunity to keep up momentum! I think the open letter is very concise and charitable. The concept of building up Catholic Unity is one that I will be reflecting on and writing more about in the days and weeks ahead.

And on a related note, here’s another AmP first — an AmP Activist Pin on Pinterest promoting the CatholicsForUnity campaign! So if you are on Pinterest, please re-pin it!

I’ll be watching the election results roll in tonight and tweeting them @AmericanPapist if you are on Twitter. Suffice it to say there are lots of exciting things coming up soon, so stay tuned!

Gay Marriage Activists Give Up in North Carolina!

(Thomas Peters) — Fri, 04 May 2012 13:25:05 +0000

Well, to be more precise: opponents of North Carolina’s Marriage Protection Amendment have completely given up the effort to defeat the amendment on the issue of marriage.

Instead, they’ve chosen to put all of their TV money into ads claiming that the Marriage Protection Amendment will somehow make it harder for the law to protect unmarried women who are the subject of domestic violence. These opponents are even avoiding calling the amendment what it is, instead preferring to call it simply “Amendment 1.”

The Vote FOR Marriage NC coalition, which is organizing the effort to pass the amendment, organized a press conference of local law enforcement officials debunking these false charges and also released a TV ad in response to the opposing sides’s claims. They also link to this study which provides more scholarly and legal evidence that the Marriage Protection Amendment will take away no common sense protections:

On April 18, three professors of law at Campbell University School of Law issued a report called “The Meaning and Potential Legal Effects of North Carolina’s Proposed Marriage Amendment.” In their report, the legal scholars state, “same-sex couples would still be protected under domestic violence laws…and could continue to receive public health insurance benefits.” The professors were speaking as independent legal experts and not on behalf of the university.

“The study by the law professors is the second analysis of our opponents’ claims that has concluded they are false. Opponents of this Amendment know that they are fighting an uphill battle, and as a result, have sadly decided to take North Carolinians on an emotional roller coaster,” said Fitzgerald. “Greensboro News & Record editorial writer Doug Clark studied the claims and concluded ‘they’re crying wolf.’”

North Carolina law (General Statutes 50B-1) provides wide-ranging protections for citizens against domestic violence that are not dependent on the victim’s marital status. Out of the extensive six different sub-categories outlined in this statute, even roommates qualify under these protections regardless of marital status. [Vote FOR Marriage NC]

There are more signs that the movement to redefine marriage is failing to get traction in North Carolina, besides the fact that opponents of protecting marriage have given up their attempts to argue on the grounds of marriage anymore.

For one thing, opponents of the amendment have taken to sign destroying as their primary grassroots activism, it seems. While this is hardly a new tactic for their side, the scale is impressive — roughly half of the pro-amendment yard signs around the state have been stolen or vandalized, according to a campaign spokesperson.

If that’s not “signs” of a desperate movement I don’t know what is.

And so, despite editorials by the New York Times claiming the amendment is nothing more than “bigotry”, and despite the fact that opponents of the amendment are outspending supporters by at least a 2-1 margin (not to mention all the favorable coverage they receive from the media), the amendment appears to be heading towards a win next Tuesday, according to all the recent polls.

Why? Because of a winning coalition of Catholics (bishops and lay people), Southern Baptists, Evangelicals, African Americans, Republicans and Democrats, and a deeply committed and professional campaign (which, I’m especially happy to see, has been utilizing social media very well).

Early voting continues in North Carolina through Saturday and then everyone goes to the polls next Tuesday, May 8th. If you live in the Tar Heel State or have friends and family who do, please choose to support marriage and pray for the protection of this institution, which is a precious gift of God to society.

And join me in watching the poll returns on the night of next Tuesday on Twitter…

UPDATE — by the way, I forgot to mention Pope Benedict’s general prayer intention for May: “that initiatives which defend and uphold the role of the family may be promoted within society.” Bravo, North Carolina papists!

Video: David Barton’s Defense of Religious Freedom Earns Him the Top Search on Google!

(Thomas Peters) — Wed, 02 May 2012 20:31:48 +0000

[UPDATE: I removed the links to The Blaze because I think they have a security issue on their website.]

I did a double-take when I saw this headline and article on The Blaze:

David Barton is Today’s #1 Google Trend After Talking About Religious Freedom on “The Daily Show”

That’s simply incredible — to become the top search on Google. I’ve met David Barton. He’s a kind and charismatic man.

But what could he have said on the Daily Show that would earn such widespread interest?

At 2:10 in this video they discuss religious freedom and the HHS mandate. Maybe people watching the Daily Show were being exposed to Barton’s viewpoint for the first time and were hungry to learn more!

The Daily Show
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

You can watch the other two parts of this interview here.

What do you think — what made this interview go viral?

Video: Gay Activist Group “Angry Queers” Claims Responsibility for Church Vandalism in Portland

(Thomas Peters) — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 16:16:10 +0000

LifeSiteNews (which hosted an excellent gala this weekend which I was happy and honored to attend!) reports on this news story which broke last week:

A homosexual activist group calling itself “Angry Queers” claimed responsibility for smashing nine windows in a church known for teaching traditional sexual morality early Tuesday morning.

“Upon arriving at the church, we discovered nine separate windows had been smashed in with rocks, including two beautiful 100-year-old stained glass windows,” wrote Tim Smith, pastor of the Portland campus of Mars Hill Church. “We estimate the damage to be several thousand dollars.”

The vandals sent an e-mail to local television station KOIN-TV stating they took the action, because “Mars Hill is notoriously anti-gay and anti-woman.”

Church members say they hold to “traditional Bible-based views on homosexuality.”

Eyewitnesses told police they saw six young men wearing “dark, mask-like partial face coverings” flee the scene around 2:30 a.m.

“This certainly saddens us greatly as our pastors in Portland have made many efforts to build relationships with the homosexual community in Portland,” Smith said. “Even though they chose to destroy our property and scare away people trying to worship Jesus, we wish them no harm.”

The Oregonian reported “black-clad demonstrators…some of whom wore kerchiefs to cover their faces, shouted profanities at adults and children” last October, when the new campus of the Seattle-based church opened. About 20 protesters blocked the entrance and screamed, “Shame on you homophobes. You’re not welcome here. You’re going to burn in Hell.”

Some of the anecdotal evidence suggests that this vandalism could also be tied to the area Occupy Movement protest. I hope the police track down these criminals and bring them to justice.

Also I must point out that there has been no condemnation of this act by local gay activist groups. You can be sure that if an LGBT center was vandalized by self-professed Christians, they would be clamoring for an apology, and the media would be covering it.

Special thanks to LifeSiteNews for filling in the gap left by mainstream media once again.

Reuters Profiles George Zimmerman’s Catholic Faith

(Thomas Peters) — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 17:00:56 +0000

I’m not going to try to render judgements about the George Zimmerman v. Trayvon Martin controversy. But I did find this excellent Reuters article on George Zimmerman’s background fascinating for its presentation of Zimmerman’s Catholic faith.

Now, obviously, Catholic people can commit crimes and sins just like everyone else, but I thought it fascinating to see how Reuters presented his Catholic background as an important part of his personal profile:

“…The 28-year-old insurance-fraud investigator comes from a deeply Catholic background and was taught in his early years to do right by those less fortunate. He was raised in a racially integrated household and himself has black roots through an Afro-Peruvian great-grandfather – the father of the maternal grandmother who helped raise him.

“… Gladys [Zimmerman's mother] came to lead a small but growing Catholic Hispanic enclave within the All Saints Catholic Church parish in the late 1970s, where she was involved in the church’s outreach programs. Gladys would bring young George along with her on “home visits” to poor families, said a family friend, Teresa Post.

“…Zimmerman served as an altar boy at All Saints from age 7 to 17, church members said.

“He wasn’t the type where, you know, ‘I’m being forced to do this,’ and a dragging-his-feet Catholic,” said Sandra Vega, who went to high school with George and his siblings. “He was an altar boy for years, and then worked in the rectory too. He has a really good heart.”

The trial of George Zimmerman will no doubt be a media circus. And just as I would ask us to keep the repose of Trayvon Martin in our prayers, let’s hope Zimmerman’s humanity is not trampled upon in the weeks and months ahead.