In a statement approved May 23 in Nuremberg, the association said many doctors under the Nazis were “guilty, contrary to their mission to heal, of scores of human rights violations and we ask the forgiveness of their victims, living and deceased, and of their descendants,” Medical Daily reported.

Also in this edition: Louisiana Senate passes pain-capable abortion ban, Doctor to pay $1,200 a month for care of child he failed to abort, and Georgia prohibits physician-assisted suicide.

The association’s statement also clarified the Nazis did not order physicians to experiment on or kill concentration camp prisoners during the Holocaust. Instead, the doctors participated as enthusiastic supporters of the Nazis, the association said.

“[O]utstanding representatives of renowned academic medical and research institutions were involved” in the mass killing of millions of people during the Holocaust, the association said, according to Medical Daily. “[T]hese crimes were not the actions of individual doctors but involved leading members of the medical community,” according to the association’s statement.

German physicians conducted experiments on prisoners and played a major role in forcibly sterilizing or euthanizing the mentally ill and others considered “unworthy of life,” Medical Daily reported.

“I don’t know if forgiveness will be forthcoming,” said Art Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania.

“But in the history of apologies for crimes and abuses carried out in the name of medicine this is the most important ever made,” Caplan wrote at his blog for MSNBC. “It does nothing to soften the horror of the Holocaust but it both ascribes responsibility where it belongs and ends any further efforts to deny or obfuscate what actually happened.”

Pro-life bioethics specialist Wesley Smith said at his blog the statement “doesn’t bring back the lives lost, but at least it does help set history straight. And, of course, none of the current members of the association bear any personal responsibility – undoubtedly making the apology easier to make. But it does help us accept that all that evil did not arise from ‘The Nazis,’ which too often becomes a defense allowing us to rationalize our own anti humanism because we don’t goose step on parade.”

The German Medical Association represents nearly 450,000 doctors.

Louisiana Senate passes pain-capable abortion ban

The Louisiana Senate approved unanimously May 22 a ban on abortions at 20 weeks or more into pregnancy based on evidence a baby in the womb experiences pain by that point.

The Pain-capable Unborn Child Protection Act, which the Senate passed 36-0, awaits action by the House of Representatives.

Benjamin Clapper, executive director of Louisiana Right to Life, estimated 150 babies a year will be saved if the measure becomes law.

“Currently in Louisiana, there is nothing to stop an abortionist from performing an abortion up until the moment right before birth,” Clapper said in a written statement. “Through [the bill], we can protect [an] unborn child at 20 weeks and put a dent in the abortion-on-demand mentality advanced by the abortion industry.”

Seven states have enacted pain-capable abortion bans.

Doctor to pay $1,200 a month for care of child he failed to abort

A Spanish judge has ordered a doctor to pay the equivalent of more than $1,200 a month to a mother whose baby he tried but failed to abort.

Judge Jose Perez Martinez’s decision called for the unnamed gynecologist and his clinic to pay a total of more than $338,000, which amounts to the monthly rate of more than $1,200 until the boy turns 26. Martinez also ordered the doctor to pay nearly $188,000 in “moral damages,” according to the Daily Mail, a British newspaper.

The mother underwent a supposed abortion in April 2011 at the clinic in Majorca, Spain, but returned three months later in the belief she was carrying another child, the Daily Mail reported May 24. Tests showed the previous abortion attempt failed. The clinic sent her to a Barcelona clinic, which declined to perform an abortion because the mother’s pregnancy was beyond the legal time limit.

Georgia prohibits physician-assisted suicide

Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal signed into law May 1 a measure prohibiting physician-assisted suicide.

Enactment of the bill followed a February state Supreme Court decision that invalidated a law that barred the advertising of assisted suicide services, according to American Medical News. The new law does not include in the definition of assisted suicide measures taken to relieve pain.

A health-care provider found guilty under the new law may receive a prison sentence of as much as 10 years.

The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission works to protect the sanctity of human life. If you would like to learn more about this issue, additional resources are available here. Our free, downloadable Impact resource is also available online. If your church is interested in purchasing materials on the sanctity of human life, please visit our online bookstore and erlc.com

Forty-one percent of Americans identify themselves as pro-choice — marking a drop of 6 percent since July and the lowest percentage since Gallup began asking the public in 1995 to self-identify as pro-choice or pro-life. The Gallup organization reported the dramatic downturn for pro-choice advocates Wednesday (May 23).

The same survey showed 50 percent of Americans identify themselves as pro-life, one point less than the record high, which was set in May 2009. The previous low of 42 percent for pro-choicers also came in the 2009 poll.

Pro-life leaders expressed no amazement at the trend — which was demonstrated among Republicans, Democrats and independents.

“This is not just an American phenomenon,” said C. Ben Mitchell, professor of moral philosophy at Union University in Tennessee. “Now that imaging technologies offer us a clearer picture of what’s happening in the womb, it is increasingly difficult to dehumanize the unborn person in a mother’s body.

“Even in our fallen, fragile world, human life in all its stages gives testimony to the image of God,” said Mitchell, a longtime consultant with Southern Baptists’ Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.

Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List pro-life organization, said in a written statement, “It comes as no surprise that more Americans are shedding the ‘pro-choice’ label as they come to terms with what is really meant by this hollow branding.

“The big [lie that] ‘abortion liberates’ … and those who promulgate it are becoming unmasked,” Dannenfelser said.

In the breakdown by political identification, the poll showed:

• Independents identifying as pro-choice dropped since May 2011 from 51 to 41 percent, while those labeling themselves as pro-life increased from 41 to 47 percent.

• Republicans pro-choicers fell in the last year from 28 to 22 percent, while pro-lifers grew from 68 to 72 percent.

• Democrats identifying as pro-choice decreased in the last 12 months from 68 to 58 percent, while those considering themselves pro-life increased from 27 to 34 percent.

While the survey demonstrated a noteworthy shift in Americans’ self-identification as pro-life or pro-choice, it showed little change on the questions of the morality and legality of abortion, Gallup reported. The survey found:

• 51 percent say abortion is “morally wrong,” the same as in May 2011, and 38 percent say it is “morally acceptable,” one point less than last year.

• 52 percent say abortion should be legal “only under circumstances,” a two-point increase in the last year, while 25 percent say it should be legal “under any circumstances” and 20 percent say it should be illegal “in all circumstances.” The last two results both reflect a two-point decline since last May.

Charmaine Yoest, president of Americans United for Life, said the latest poll “is only the tip of the iceberg. In fact, a growing number of Americans are uneasy with the unfettered, under-regulated and unsavory abortion industry as it exists today.”

Regarding the change in pro-choice and pro-life identification in the last year, Gallup did not offer a reason for the development but pointed to the focus on abortion in several news items, including: the congressional attempt to defund and its investigation of Planned Parenthood, the country’s No. 1 abortion provider; the reversal by cancer charity Susan G. Komen of its decision to halt grants to Planned Parenthood; and the Obama administration’s contraceptive/abortion mandate. That mandate requires health plans to cover contraceptives — including ones that can cause abortions of tiny embryos — and sterilizations as preventive services without cost to employees.

Dannenfelser cited the effort to require taxpayers to fund abortions as a key reason for the public’s move away from the pro-choice position, noting, “Those who would have us continue to fund abortion with our tax dollars are arguing in direct opposition to public opinion.

“President Obama, his allies in Congress and the abortion lobby have radically overstepped their bounds, causing Americans to turn away quickly,” Dannenfelser said.

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, also pointed to Obama’s policies as an explanation for the change.

The president’s “radical abortion agenda is finally putting a face on the ‘choice’ movement, and it’s not pretty,” Perkins wrote.

“What we’re witnessing is the nationwide backlash to three years of Planned Parenthood-style governing,” he said. “And led by the next generation, America is on the verge of a social revolution that will ultimately reclaim this nation as a culture of life.”

It would seem the use of ultrasounds to show images of unborn children continues to have an impact on opinions about abortion as well.

After public opinion peaked in favor of the pro-life side in 2009 at 51 percent to 42 percent, the gap shrunk the next two years. In 2011, pro-life Americans were at 49 percent and pro-choicers at 45 percent.

Gallup conducted the poll of 1,024 adults by telephone May 3-6.

At least 70 Washington residents died in 2011 as a result of taking lethal drug doses prescribed by doctors, the state’s Department of Health reported May 2. The total may have been higher, however. It was uncertain if five other people who died after receiving prescriptions of lethal medication did so after taking the drug. Another 19 people who received the prescriptions died without ingesting the medication.

Also in this edition: Oklahoma judge invalidates restriction on use of RU 486, British plagued by repeat abortions – nine for some women, and Indian mother dies during sex-selection abortion.

Oregon set its record of 71 assisted suicides in 2011.

In 1997, Oregon became the first state to legalize assisted suicide. The practice became legal in Washington in 2009. Both states permit terminally ill citizens to take their own lives with prescription drugs.

Oregon has recorded 596 assisted-suicide deaths since the practice became legal, while Washington has reported at least 157 such deaths.

As has been the case in Oregon, the three leading concerns expressed by Washington residents who received lethal prescriptions in 2011 were reduced ability “to engage in activities making life enjoyable” (89 percent), loss of autonomy (87 percent) and “loss of dignity” (79 percent).

Oklahoma judge invalidates restriction on use of RU 486

An Oklahoma judge struck down May 11 a state law that prohibited use of the abortion drug RU 486 except under the guidelines by which it was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

In his opinion, Donald Worthington of the Oklahoma County District Court said the law violated “the fundamental rights of women to privacy and bodily integrity,” according to the Tulsa World. The measure “can serve no purpose other than to prevent women from obtaining abortions and to punish and discriminate against those women who do,” he wrote.

The law’s supporters took issue with Worthington’s ruling. The law is intended to protect women who have been instructed by abortion providers to use the drug in an “off-label” manner. For instance, some providers have told women to use RU 486 vaginally, though the Food and Drug Administration approved the drug only for use orally. At least eight women have died in the United States after taking RU 486, and critics have blamed its “off-label” use in at least some of those cases.

“There are a lot of problems with the judge’s ruling,” including some erroneous findings of fact, said Rep. Randy Grau, a sponsor of the measure, the World reported.

Charmaine Yoest, president of Americans United for Life, said in a written statement, “It is astounding that the judge would find that allowing abortion facilities to hand out sometimes deadly drugs without regard to the safest protocols is somehow a state constitutional right. Ironically, this isn’t a ‘right’ for women; it is a ‘right’ created for abortion providers, allowing them to perform abortions in any unsafe manner they desire.”

The Center for Reproductive Rights, a leading advocate for abortion rights, challenged the law after it was signed by Gov. Mary Fallin in May 2011.

British plagued by repeat abortions – nine for some women

British women are having repeat abortions, some as many as nine in their lifetimes, and costing the National Health Service the American equivalent of more than $1.5 million a week for the repetitious, lethal procedures.

About a third of all abortions in England and Wales are repeats, according to a May 13 report by the Daily Mail. The new government statistics also show:

• About 189,000 abortions occurred in Great Britain in 2010, the latest year for which statistics are available, and more than 64,000 were for women who already had undergone at least one abortion.

• Half of the abortions in the London borough of Croydon were repeats.

• Unmarried women undergo five of every six repeat abortions.

• 85 women had at least their eighth abortion.

In the United States, nearly half of all abortions are performed on women who have had at least one previously.

Critics charged the British law enables abortion to act as another method of contraception.

“Abortion is an unpleasant and harrowing experience for women and to hear it is happening repeatedly makes your hair stand on end,” said the Pro-life Alliance’s Josephine Quintavalle, according to the Daily Mail.

“But is this surprising when we live in a society which says it’s all right to have an abortion once,” she said.

“If it’s fine, once, why not two, three or four times.”

Indian mother dies during sex-selection abortion

A 28-year-old, Indian mother has died as a result of a sex-selection abortion of a baby who would have been her fifth daughter.

Vijaymala Patekar, who died during an abortion May 18, did not want another female child, the police reported, according to the Press Trust of India (PTI). The procedure was performed in the Beed district, which has become notorious for having the most lop-sided male-to-female ratio in India’s Maharashtra state, PTI reported.

The police charged the husband-wife physician team of Sudam and Sarswati Munde with negligence under Indian law, including a measure that bars the use of ultrasounds for sex-selection purposes.

The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission works to protect the sanctity of human life. If you would like to learn more about this issue, additional resources are available here. Our free, downloadable Impact resource is also available online. If your church is interested in purchasing materials on the sanctity of human life, please visit our online bookstore and erlc.com

The gruesome trade originates in China, where some health-care providers are informing medical groups when babies are aborted or delivered dead, according to the Daily Mail. The babies’ corpses are dried in medical microwaves, then ground into power and placed with herbs in capsules, the British newspaper reported. Tests on the pills showed they consisted of 99.7 percent human remains, according to a San Francisco Times report cited by the Daily Mail.

Also in this edition: Georgia enacts ban on pain-capable abortions, Indian woman uncovers illegal ultrasound-abortion scheme and Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice selects Knox.

Some of the babies whose bodies were used in the pills may have come from China’s “dying rooms,” where children are left to die by parents who already have a child, the newspaper said, citing some unnamed reports. China has a coercive population control program, known as the one-child policy, that has produced a regime of forced abortion and sterilization, as well as reports of infanticide.

The capsules are considered to have medicinal powers, according to various reports, including the enhancement of sexual performance.

Ethnic Koreans who are from northeast China but now live in South Korea were the primary smugglers of the pills, a customs officer told the Daily Mail.

“Welcome to the brave new world,” pro-life lawyer Kristi Burton Brown wrote on Live Action’s website. “A world where even aborted babies do not go to waste. A world where murdered innocents are not allowed to rest in peace. A world where the money made off abortion simply isn’t enough anymore. A world where monetary profits reign, and human beings literally kill and consume one another. Welcome to the world abortion has created.”

Georgia enacts ban on pain-capable abortions

Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal, a Republican, signed into law May 1 a ban on abortions at 20 weeks or more into pregnancy based on evidence a baby in the womb experiences pain by that point.
Georgia becomes the sixth state to prohibit pain-capable abortions with legislation modeled on a bill crafted by the National Right to Life Committee. The others are Alabama, Idaho, Kansas, Nebraska and Oklahoma.

At least 1,500 unborn children a year will be saved under the law, said Dan Becker, president of Georgia Right to Life (GRTL), but he acknowledged it fell short of what pro-lifers desired. It was amended to include an exception for a “medically futile” pregnancy, giving a doctor the opportunity to abort a child if he decides a baby may have a condition that would cause his death after birth, according to GRTL.

“While this new law represents significant progress in saving lives, a last-minute amendment that allows doctors to end so-called futile pregnancies is a first step to establishing a eugenic policy in Georgia,” Becker said. “It opens the door to destroying babies doctors think may be less than perfect.”

In other developments in the states:

• Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton, a Democrat, vetoed two pro-life bills, one April 26 that would have required state licensing of abortion clinics and one April 30 that would have prohibited telemedicine, or Webcam, abortions by mandating a doctor’s presence to dispense the abortion drug RU 486, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported.
• Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, a Republican, signed into law May 1 legislation banning telemed, or Webcam abortions, by requiring a doctor to be present when providing a woman with RU 486, according to the Associated Press.
• The Kansas Senate voted 23-16 May 2 for a bill strengthening conscience protections for health-care providers who decline to take part in abortions or to prescribe abortion-causing drugs, AP reported. The House of Representatives already has approved the measure, and Republican Gov. Sam Brownback is expected to sign it into law.
• The Alabama Senate approved in a 30-2 vote April 24 a bill to bar plans in the state’s health insurance exchange from covering elective abortions, according to AP.
• The New Hampshire Senate voted 18-5 April 25 to ban partial-birth abortions and returned the bill to the House with amendments, AP reported.

Indian woman uncovers illegal ultrasound-abortion scheme

An Indian woman forced by her in-laws to undergo six abortions has helped uncover a ring of doctors and clinics practicing illegal sex-determination ultrasounds and abortions.

Amisha Bhatt, who married Priyavadan Bhatt in 2000, had six abortions from 2001 to 2009 under coercion from her husband and in-laws, who were intent on her having a son, The Times of India reported April 23. She gave birth to a daughter, Kamya.

Bhatt, 36, filed harassment charges with the police against her husband and his family, but she also sought data under the country’s Right to Information Act from health authorities. Bhatt’s request revealed her name was not on the lists filed with the government of those receiving ultrasounds, according to The Times. Her effort uncovered in three districts an illegal scheme between doctors and sonogram clinics performing sex-determination tests in arrangements with in-laws who sought male babies, according to The Times.

“This meant that the government had no information on the tests conducted on me, as mandated under [an Indian law],” she said, the newspaper reported. “There may have been many such women like me. The doctors were maintaining a secret list of patients on which sex determination tests were being conducted.”

As a result, two doctors lost their licenses, the government analyzed the rules governing the filing of reports and other women who had been forced to have abortions were rescued, according to The Times.

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice selects Knox

The Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (RCRC) has named Harry Knox as its new president.

Knox, who served on President Obama’s Council on Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships, previously worked for the Human Rights Campaign, the country’s largest lobbying organization for homosexual, bisexual and transgender rights.

RCRC, which works for the protection of abortion rights, represents 15 liberal denominations and religious traditions.

“Few liberal lobbies in Washington are as shameful as RCRC, which claims God opposes any restrictions on abortion,” said Mark Tooley, president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy, which works for renewal in mainline Protestant denominations.

The number of events for the May 3 observance was more than 35 percent ahead of last year at the same time, the National Day of Prayer (NDP) Task Force reported six days before the observance. In 2011, prayer events were held at about 40,000 locations.

The National Day of Prayer has been observed each year since Congress approved a resolution in 1952 calling on the president to establish it as an annual event. President Truman inaugurated the observance the same year, and presidents since then have recognized it with proclamations. In 1988, Congress amended the law to set the first Thursday of May for the observance.

In this year’s National Day of Prayer proclamation, President Obama invited Americans to join him “in giving thanks for the many blessings we enjoy, and I call upon individuals of all faiths to pray for guidance, grace, and protection for our great Nation as we address the challenges of our time.”

The president urged citizens to “be humble in our convictions, and courageous in our virtue. Let us pray for those who are suffering around the world, and let us be open to opportunities to ease that suffering.”

He also called for Americans to honor the members of the Armed Forces and pray for them and their family members.

The lead observance of the National Day of Prayer again was held at an event on Capitol Hill in Washington, with NDP Task Force chairman Shirley Dobson and honorary chairman David Jeremiah among the speakers.

This year’s theme, established by the task force, was “One Nation Under God,” which was based on Psalm 33:12: “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.”

Jeremiah, senior pastor of Shadow Mountain Community Church in El Cajon, Calif., and founder of Turning Point Radio and Television Ministries, gave the keynote address at the national observance in Washington. He also wrote the national prayer for the observance, which said:

“Heavenly Father, [e]very good gift and perfect gift comes from You. You are a faithful God and Your mercy endures forever. You have promised to bless the nation that trusts in You. Our currency proclaims ‘In God We Trust,’ but in our culture we are far from You. In the words of the prophet Daniel, ‘We have sinned and committed iniquity, we have done wickedly and rebelled, even by departing from Your precepts and Your judgments.’ We come before You once more, seeking Your forgiveness and mercy. You, O God, are our only hope…. Hear our prayer and, for Your honor’s sake, shine Your face upon this nation. Give our leaders the desire to seek Your wisdom and the courage to follow Your guidance. . . . and watch over the men and women of our armed forces as they sacrifice for the cause of freedom. We give You thanks for all You have done for us, and we earnestly pray that You will help us become, once again, a nation whose God is the Lord. In the name of Your Son, and our Savior, we pray this prayer. Amen.”

The NDP Task Force is a privately funded group that says the observance is for people of all faiths to participate in but the events it organizes are fulfilled “in accordance with its Judeo-Christian beliefs.”

Obama’s National Day of Prayer proclamation may be accessed online at www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2012/05/01/presidential-proclamation-national-day-prayer-2012.
—30—
Compiled by Baptist Press Washington bureau chief Tom Strode.

The Washington Center for Reproductive Medicine in the Seattle-area city of Bellevue is advertising its “gender determination” service in the Indo-Canadian Voice, a newspaper that targets people from India living in the far western province of Canada, the Vancouver Sun reported April 17. The ad has appeared in the paper’s print edition and on its website.

Also in this edition: Low birthrate expected to continue in China and Planned Parenthood spokesman joins HHS staff.

The ad shows a young boy and girl in traditional Indian dress with the headline: “Create The Family You Want BOY or GIRL.” It describes the service this way: “Pre-conception gender determination for family balancing purposes.”

The clinic tests embryos it creates to determine their sex, then implants in the mother’s womb those chosen for in vitro fertilization. Embryos not implanted typically are placed in frozen storage, destroyed or donated for research, which kills them.

The ad demonstrates the low esteem of females in the Indo-Canadian community, said Sabrina Atwal, a project director for the Indo-Canadian Women’s Association in Edmonton.

“A lot of times, girls are fighting for their lives before they’re even born,” Atwal said, according to the Sun.

Son preference is common among Indians in their home country and other countries, and advanced technology has enabled them to act on that preference in implantation and giving birth. That preference exists in the Indo-Canadian community because of dowries and the perception sons are more able to take care of their parents, Atwal said.

“There’s a belief that the family’s not complete until there’s a boy,” she told the Sun.

A study issued April 16 found Indian- and South Korean-born women in Canada have boys as second babies at a disproportionately high rate, according to the Sun. “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,” the study reported.

Low birthrate expected to continue in China

China, the world’s most populous country, expects to keep its low birthrate and maintain a population of less than 1.4 billion through 2015, according to its latest five-year plan.

China had more than 1.34 billion people at the close of 2011, according to China Daily.

The communist giant has prevented a larger population with the aid of a coercive population control program for more than 30 years. The one-child policy, as it is known, has resulted in many reports of forced abortions and sterilizations, as well as infanticide. It also has helped produce a gender imbalance because of the Chinese preference for sons.

The State Council’s report, issued April 10, said in five years there will be more than 200 million people 60 years of age and older. Meanwhile, the labor force will begin declining steadily after it peaks during the next five years, the China Daily reported. That could result in massive government spending on pensions and health by about 2028, said Lu Jiehua, a sociology professor at Peking University.

China Daily reported April 11 police in Hubei province broke up a ring believed to have conducted an illegal ultrasound operation. The group used ultrasound machines in cars, charging for the tests in order to identify the sex for mothers who wanted to abort girls.

Planned Parenthood spokesman joins HHS staff

The Obama administration has hired a Planned Parenthood spokesman to be one of its spokesmen.

The Department of Health and Human Services announced April 20 its hiring of Tait Sye, media director of Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA), as its deputy assistant secretary for public affairs, Politico reported. Sye had served in the PPFA position for 4½ years before accepting the HHS offer, according to the report.

Sye participated in PPFA’s defense of the HHS abortion/contraceptive mandate issued in January. That rule requires all health plans to cover contraceptives and sterilizations as preventive services without cost to employees. The contraceptives, as designated by the federal government, include some drugs that can cause abortions by blocking implantation of tiny embryos.

Sye is expected to deal with abortion and contraception as part of HHS communications involving the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institutes of Health, and the Food and Drug Administration, Politico reported.

“Personnel is policy. . . . This is one more example of how intertwined the Obama administration is with the abortion industry and Planned Parenthood,” Americans United for Life President Charmaine Yoest told Politico.

The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission works to protect the sanctity of human life. If you would like to learn more about this issue, additional resources are available here. Our free, downloadable Impact resource is also available online. If your church is interested in purchasing materials on the sanctity of human life, please visit our online bookstore and erlc.com

The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission joined local and national religious organizations in the April 20 brief that urges a federal court in New York to invalidate a Board of Education policy that bars churches and other faith groups from meeting in schools. The brief, written by the Christian Legal Society, also calls on the court to permanently block the policy from being enforced.

The U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last year that the ban was constitutional, affecting dozens of churches, including seven Southern Baptist congregations, that used public schools for corporate worship. Some moved their meetings to other facilities.

Some have been able to continue meeting in school buildings because of a Feb. 24 ruling by federal judge Loretta Preska of the Southern District of New York, which blocked enforcement of the ban while the case proceeds. The Second Circuit upheld the injunction five days later. The appeals court, however, urged Preska to release a final ruling by mid-June.

New York City’s school policy infringes on the opening two clauses of the First Amendment, according to the brief signed onto by the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission and other organizations. Those clauses say, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

The policy “is not one that feigns neutrality on its face, hiding an ulterior purpose to target religious exercise,” the brief says. “The Board’s policy openly and notoriously singles out ‘religious worship services’ for exclusion from the public space that is otherwise available for other social and civic functions.”

The brief contends a social function that includes the same attributes as a religious worship service — such as singing, praying and speaking on “moral” topics — would not violate the policy. “But once these activities are part of a religious event, they suddenly become outlawed,” according to the brief.

The school board rule transgresses the First Amendment’s establishment clause by trying to define religious worship, the brief says.

“The Board cannot get into the business of deciding what does and does not qualify as a ‘religious worship service’ without entangling itself in issues forbidden to its authority and without discriminating among religious organizations and beliefs,” according to the brief.

For the last 60 years, the U.S. Supreme Court “has repeatedly instructed that the state has no power whatsoever to determine what constitutes ‘religious worship’ and ‘religious worship services’ and what does not,” the brief says.

The brief also contends the use of public schools for worship does not constitute endorsement of religion when the Board of Education makes its facilities available to all groups. “The fact that more churches than mosques and synagogues use school facilities reflects simple demographics, not endorsement,” according to the brief.

The policy also contradicts a long-held practice in American life, the brief contends. By singling out religious groups among all community organizations, it “is inconsistent with historical practice and threatens the equal access of religious observance to public space still common in our country,” the brief says.

In addition to the ERLC, others signing on to the CLS brief are the National Association of Evangelicals, American Bible Society, National Council of Churches, General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, American Baptist Churches of Metropolitan New York, Council of Churches of the City of New York, Brooklyn Council of Churches and Queens Federation of Churches.

The case is Bronx Household of Faith v. Board of Education of the City of New York.

Henry, a sponsor of a pro-life life bill in his first term as a Republican in the state legislature, told the rally audience he went with his girlfriend for her abortion 20 years before, the Times Daily of Florence, Ala., reported.

Also in this edition: New Mississippi law bolsters limits on abortion doctors, Delivery service begins in London for ‘morning-after’ pill, and Pennsylvania shutters Allentown abortion clinic.

While they both chose abortion, he accepts most of the responsibility, said Henry, 41. “There was discussion and talk about it, but I do feel a heavy burden from the decision,” he said.

The reality of what he had done struck him when he accompanied his wife for a check-up when she was 12 weeks pregnant with their first of two daughters.

“I saw that ultrasound of my baby, my child, and it came down on me like a ton of bricks that I had murdered by first child. And I will carry that with me to the grave,” Henry told the pro-life audience. He was 30 years old at the time.

Henry proposed legislation to bar Alabama’s exchange plan under the 2010 federal health-care reform law from covering abortion.

He said he had not intended to tell his post-abortion story at the rally, but he also has not tried to hide it. He has shared it with his church and at least one other group, Henry said, according to the Times Daily.

“I will fight to save babies all day long and I will live with my regret for the rest of my life,” Henry said.

New Mississippi law bolsters limits on abortion doctors

Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant has signed into law a bill that requires abortion doctors to be certified in obstetrics and gynecology and to have hospital admitting privileges.

Abortion rights advocates have said the motive of the measure is to ban abortions, not protect women’s health. They have charged supporters of the new law with seeking to shut down the state’s only abortion clinic, Jackson Women’s Health Organization.

After signing the bill April 16, Bryant, a Republican, seemed to acknowledge it has both goals.

“This is a historic day to begin the process of ending abortion in Mississippi,” Bryant said, according to The Jackson Clarion-Ledger.

The new law is “something that I would think would be common sense and that everyone that is concerned about the health care of women should be in favor of,” he said.

Delivery service begins in London for ‘morning-after’ pill

Women in London will soon be able to have the abortion-causing, “morning-after” pill delivered to their homes or offices.

A courier service plans to begin delivering the drug, also known as emergency contraception, before the end of April, the London Evening Standard reported April 16. A woman will not need to see a doctor to receive the pill, although a physician is to review a form she fills out on the Internet, according to the report.

The “morning-after” pill, marketed under the name Plan B in the United States, is basically a heavier dose of birth control pills. Under the regimen, a woman takes a pill within 72 hours of sexual intercourse and another dose 12 hours later. Another “morning-after” pill, Plan B One-step, can be taken in a single dose within 72 hours.

The drug can restrict ovulation in a woman or prevent fertilization, but it also can block implantation of the early embryo in the uterine wall. The latter effect would cause an abortion.

Pennsylvania shutters Allentown abortion clinic

The Pennsylvania Department of Health has shut down an abortion clinic in Allentown, Pa.

The department rescinded the registration of Allentown Medical Services April 10 after it learned the clinic had lost its lease, thereby violating the terms of registration, The Morning Call reported. In revoking the registration, a state official said Steven Brigham, who had been the owner until recently, and clinic staffers had shown a “chronic inability . . . to comply with the most fundamental statutory and regulatory requirements,” according to the Allentown newspaper.

Brigham — who operates abortion clinics in at least four states – has encountered problems with various jurisdictions. The state’s attorney in Maryland’s Cecil County dropped first-degree murder charges against Brigham in March because he said his office lacked clear proof the killing of late-term, unborn babies took place in the state. Brigham had been starting late-term abortion procedures at a New Jersey clinic and completing them at a Maryland clinic.

The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission works to protect the sanctity of human life. If you would like to learn more about this issue, additional resources are available here. Our free, downloadable Impact resource is also available online. If your church is interested in purchasing materials on the sanctity of human life, please visit our online bookstore and erlc.com

“The momentum is in the right direction,” Southern Baptist public policy specialist Barrett Duke said.

“I believe we are going to see our country deal in a humane way with the question of the folks who are here illegally, but we do still have a lot of work to do at the grassroots level,” Duke said to a group of attendees at Q 2012, an annual conference that brings together Christians to focus on cultural renewal.

Evangelical Christians need to inform their members of Congress that they care about comprehensive immigration reform in addition to such issues as abortion, Duke said.

“What we have to do is get enough folks in their districts and in their states to say, ‘This matters also. We want you to take a position on this too, and this is the position we want you to take,’” he said.

Some agreement exists between those who support comprehensive immigration reform and those who want to deport all illegal immigrants, Duke told the briefing attendees.

“[T]here is some common ground when you begin to talk about the impact on folks who have been here for a long time,” he said. “And I think that’s a starting point … for us to begin to talk about the question of the impact [on] people when you drive them out of, in many cases, the only place they know and the only … situation they have where they can actually make a living.”

Messengers to the 2011 Southern Baptist Convention in Phoenix approved a resolution on immigration reform that called for the advancement of the Gospel of Jesus while pursuing justice and compassion. The resolution urged the government to make a priority of securing the nation’s borders and holding businesses accountable in their hiring. After securing the borders, the resolution also requested that public officials establish “a just and compassionate path to legal status, with appropriate restitutionary measures, for those undocumented immigrants already living in our country.” The resolution specified it was not to be interpreted as supporting amnesty.

Duke, at the April 12 briefing, said most Southern Baptists agree that “it is not Christian — not to mention it is not humane — to try to drive 10 to 12 million people out of the country.”

Southern Baptists “are in a very good position on this,” he said. “We continue to advocate for immigration reform. We’re going to be ramping up our efforts at the grassroots level as well, because it’s clear nothing’s going to happen in Washington, D.C., until the country demands it.”

Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, said an interesting shift has occurred in the debate.

“The story for so many years has been about the conflicts around immigration reform, about one side versus another,” Noorani said during the briefing. “Now the story is, ‘Okay, how do we get this solved, and how do we piece together the votes and the policy that will get a bill to the president’s desk?’”

He continued, “I think that conservatives are realizing that in order to compete for not only Hispanic voters but also non-Hispanic voters, they have to put forward a compassionate position on the need for immigration reform. I think your liberal politicians are realizing they just can’t play politics anymore, that they have to reach across the aisle and say, ‘Okay, how are we going to fix this problem?’”

Galen Carey, vice president of government relations for the National Association of Evangelicals, said the politics of the issue keeps it alive for some members of Congress.

“[S]ome people want to have the issue more than the result,” Carey said. “So, they want to have this issue so that they can beat up on the other party and say, ‘See those guys — they hate you.’ But if the problem were solved, then the issue would go away, and they don’t want that either.”

Noorani would not totally rule out passage of immigration reform this year, “but I think the chances are pretty slim,” he said. “But there’s a lot of important work that needs to take place in 2012.”

For several years, the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commmission has supported the same type of comprehensive immigration reform advocated in the 2011 convention resolution. A paper written by Duke and ERLC President Richard Land on the fundamentals of “just immigration reform” can be accessed here.

Richard Land, president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), asked Rep. Buck McKeon, R.-Calif., in an April 16 letter to maintain his vigilance in seeking to guard the conscience rights and religious freedom of military personnel. McKeon is chairman of the House of Representatives Armed Services Committee.

The Southern Baptist church-state specialist encouraged McKeon to give special attention to approval of the Military Religious Freedom Protection Act, H.R. 3828, which is designed to provide safeguards for the liberties in question.

Policies enforced last year that overturned the ban on open homosexuality in the military and permitted same-sex “weddings” on bases and by chaplains “pose a severe threat to the religious freedom of our military’s chaplains and service members,” Land said in the letter. The religious beliefs of many in the armed forces run counter to the lifestyles of those in the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, he said.

“[T]here is growing evidence confirming that service members who hold these religious beliefs face discrimination and career penalties if they remain true to their consciences,” Land wrote. “Regrettably, the Pentagon’s policies actively pressure these brave men and women to choose between serving their country and holding true to their deeply-held religious faith. It is a disgrace that our federal government would promote such an untenable climate for any service member of any creed.”

The Pentagon announced Sept. 30 two new policies, one authorizing homosexual “weddings” on bases and another permitting chaplains to participate in such ceremonies. The announcements came only 10 days after the official lifting of the ban on open homosexuality in the military.

The memos regarding same-sex “marriage” violated the Defense of Marriage Act, Land said in his letter to McKeon. That law, signed by President Clinton in 1996, defines marriage federally as being between a man and a woman. It also empowers states to refuse to recognize another state’s gay “marriages.”

The ERLC and other opponents of rescinding Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell — as the ban on open homosexuality was known — warned its repeal would result in infringements on the religious liberty of chaplains and other military personnel, as well as harm to the readiness, privacy and retention of service members.

The Chaplain Alliance for Religious Liberty, which consists of more than 2,000 largely evangelical Christian military chaplains, has said its members will not perform gay “weddings.” The Roman Catholic Archdiocese for Military Service also has said its members will not officiate at such ceremonies.

In addition to protecting the rights of chaplains and service members, the Military Religious Freedom Protection Act would prohibit same-sex ceremonies on military bases.

The bill, which is sponsored by Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R.-Kan., has 45 cosponsors.

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Compiled by Tom Strode, Washington bureau chief for Baptist Press.