The Pope's Message: Will Minds Change?

Pope Francis spent much of his time in the U.S. speaking on the need to welcome immigrants, protect the environment and help the poor.

Regarding his speech to Congress, The Huffington Post writes, "In his wide-ranging 3,404-word address ... the pope called for action to protect refugees, eliminate capital punishment and stop war, yet used a mere 21 words to allude to abortion and only 54 to touch vaguely upon the fact that same-sex marriage is now legal across the United States.

"On abortion, the pope’s comments were tucked into a larger discussion on the the Golden Rule, which 'reminds us of our responsibility to protect and defend human life at every stage of its development.' But he did not say the word 'abortion.'

"On marriage, the pope had a few more words. 'I cannot hide my concern for the family, which is threatened, perhaps as never before, from within and without. Fundamental relationships are being called into question, as is the very basis of marriage and the family. I can only reiterate the importance and, above all, the richness and the beauty of family life.'"

So why is the pope calling upon the U.S. to accept more immigrants?

According to a 2013 U.N. report, "Trends in International Migrant Stock: The 2013 Revision," immigrants form 14.3 percent of the U.S. population.

They compose no more than 4.8 percent of any other country's population; 19.8 percent of all the world's immigrants reside in the U.S. No other country has accepted more than 4.8 percent of the world's immigrants. The pope's home country, Argentina, has accepted 0.8 percent!

There are 45,785,090 immigrants in the U.S. No other country has accepted more than 11,048,064 immigrants.

And why is the pope telling the U.S we must do more for the poor? Is there any other country that presently does more? In the U.S., we have Social Security and Medicare for the aged. We have Social Security Disability and Medicare or Medicaid for the disabled.

We have the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for the "poor." (A family of one with a maximum annual income of $15,301 is eligible, as is a family of four with a maximum annual income of $31,525.) We provide free K-12 public school education for every American child, and special education for disabled children. We provide unemployment insurance for those who lose their job. HUD helps apartment owners to offer reduced rents to low-income tenants to make affordable apartments available for low-income families, the elderly and persons with disabilities. HUD also provides the Section 8 vouchers to allow those with low incomes to pay for all or part of their rent. And nearly half of those (47 percent) who report income pay no federal income tax!

Is the plight of the "poor" in the U.S. more dire than the plight of the “poor" almost everywhere else in the world? If so, why do we have 45,785,090 immigrants? Why are Mexican and Central American immigrants pouring into this country? And why aren't people leaving the U.S. to live in Mexico, Russia or Ethiopia?

And why is he lecturing America on the need to be good stewards for the environment? Haven't we cleaned up the Great Lakes? Can you recall a time when raw sewage was dumped into our rivers? Don't we now have tertiary treatment? Can you remember driving through Gary, Ind., when smog continually hung over the city? Is that the case now? I can remember when some cars got seven miles to the gallon, and spewed exhaust. By 2016, won't American cars and light trucks have to average 34.5 mpg?

Would America be a better place if we immediately ceased heating and cooling our homes with fossil fuels?

In our courts, once the judge determines the witness to be an "expert,” that witness can give his opinion  on the ultimate issue in the case without stating facts that form the basis of that opinion, e.g., "I think Dr. X was guilty of malpractice when he removed Mrs. Y's appendix.” But what good is that opinion without setting out the facts that form the basis of that opinion? "Mrs. Y only wanted him to remove a wart on her big toe!"

So what will be the long-term effect of the pope's words?

When a pope addresses matters that traditionally are within the realm of "faith and morals," it is there that the pope is most authoritative — even for those who reject his infallibility. But when he speaks on quantum physics, absent a showing that he has a background in quantum physics, he lacks credibility. Similarly, his background as a bishop in Argentina in no way qualifies him as an expert on the U.S, our capitalist system or our immigration practices.

Of course, he may be utilizing material prepared for him by experts. But absent a showing of the expertise of his experts, it is entirely reasonable to discount the pope in areas such as biology, physics, chemistry, geology, economics and U.S. history.

Indeed, many of the same people who extol the pope's genius when he speaks on immigration and the environment would label him a "Neanderthal" when he speaks on things on which he should have expertise: abortion, contraception and traditional marriage.


For those reasons, I believe the pope's message will be largely forgotten or ignored within the week. Those who are opposed to "open borders” will remain opposed. Those who believe "God helps able-bodied people who help themselves" will continue in that belief. And those who believe "global warming" to be a scam will conclude the pope is out of his element. Meanwhile, the killing will go on in the Middle East, and in the Planned Parenthood clinics.

Posted: Friday, October 23, 2015 11:00 pm  QuadCitiesOnline

By John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

Save the Polar Bears, Murderers; Abort the Fetuses

         

More than 50 million fetuses have been aborted in America. Does anybody care? Can minds be changed?

On May 6, 2015, the New York Times, citing the New England Journal of Medicine, wrote,

"A study of thousands of premature births, found that a small minority of babies born at 22 weeks who were medically treated survived with few health problems. ...  Leading medical groups had already been discussing whether to lower the consensus on the age of viability, now cited by most medical experts as 24 weeks."

The U.S. House recently passed the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, to restrict abortions after the fifth month of pregnancy. Should it pass the Senate, the president -- who has opened the borders to save Central American Children --  threatens to veto it.

In the encyclical Laudato Si, Pope Francis has now tied saving the planet with saving unborn children:

"Since everything is interrelated, concern for the protection of nature is also incompatible with the justification for abortion. How can we genuinely teach the importance of concern for other vulnerable beings ... if we fail to protect a human embryo? ... If personal and social sensitivity towards the acceptance of the new life is lost, then other forms of acceptance that are valuable for society also wither away.”

So, will what doctors, Congress and the pope have to say change any minds?

Are humans -- including fetuses -- animals? The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animal's website inanely makes clear that the questions are irrelevant.

"PETA does not have a position on the abortion issue, because our focus ... is the alleviation of the suffering inflicted on nonhuman animals. … And just as the pro-life movement has no official position on animal rights, neither does the animal rights movement have an official position on abortion."

You would think the ACLU might care. After all, its Capital Punishment Project works toward the repeal capital punishment. Indeed, the ACLU claims,

"The death penalty in America is a broken process. … Death sentences are predicted not by the heinousness of the crime but by the poor quality of the defense lawyers, the race of the accused or the victim, and the county and state in which the crime occurred. From 1976 to 2015, 1,392 executions occurred in the United States, and 995 of them took place in the South. Time and time again, we have proven that the criminal justice system fails to protect the innocent and persons with serious mental disabilities and illnesses from execution. … Every method of execution comes with an intolerably high risk of extreme pain and torture.”

The ACLU states that in the U.S. during a 30-year period, there were 1392 executions; since Roe v. Wade there have been more than 50 million fetuses executed. It claims, "Death sentences are predicted not by the heinousness of the crime.” But the death sentence can be imposed only for a conviction of murder; are not all murders heinous by definition?

The ACLU is concerned about "the poor quality of defense lawyers.” But the murder defendant at least gets a lawyer -- unlike the fetus. And why is the race of the victim and the county and state involved of more consequence to a murderer than to a fetus?


The ACLU argues "the criminal justice system fails to protect the innocent."  Is the fetus less innocent than a murderer?


Is application of the death penalty in a murder case, after innumerable appeals,  more random than an abortion performed on a mother's whim?

What is the ACLU's position on late-term abortion?

"The ACLU opposes the so-called Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 … because it outlaws safe abortion procedures and thus threatens women’s health and reproductive rights. ...  it bans safe and common abortion methods used in the second trimester of pregnancy, well before fetal viability. It also lacks an exception to protect women’s health.”

But the act would also ban abortions on "viable" children, and third-trimester abortions. Are a mother's health and reproductive rights more important than the rights of a child not to be exterminated?

According to National Right to Life organization, during a partial birth abortion,

"The abortionist punctures the base of the baby’s skull with a surgical instrument, such as a long surgical scissors. ... He then inserts a catheter (tube) into the wound, and removes the baby's brain with a powerful suction machine. This causes the skull to collapse."

How many abortions are really necessary and performed to save the life or health of the mother?

Do churches really care? The pope has jumped aboard the planet-saving bandwagon, linking abortion with saving the planet. How many of those who march carrying placards demanding that we save the planet, whales and lab rats give a damn about saving unborn babies, who are scientifically
demonstrably human? How long has it been since you heard a homily condemning abortion? Urging the congregation to vote against a party or candidate who is pro-abortion?

I have previously argued that the fetus is unquestionably  -- as a matter of science -- more than a part of it's mother. It unarguably also carries its father's DNA. Ipso facto, it is a human being, distinct from both its mother and father.

The world condemns Hitler because he treated Jews as subhuman, and the slavery of the antebellum South because it regarded blacks as subhuman. We are appalled at the carnage of the Islamic State, which treats non-Muslims as subhuman.

So,  why does a convicted murderer have more human worth and evoke more compassion than an innocent fetus?

If we kill our children, how can our nation claim the high moral ground? Today, in America, more opprobrium attaches to kicking a cat.


If morality is not dead in 21st century America, then how can we ignore the pope when he asks, "How can we genuinely teach the importance of concern for other vulnerable beings … if we fail to protect a human embryo?"

Posted: Tuesday, July 7, 2015 11:00 pm QuadCitiesOnline

| Updated: 11:00 pm, Tue Jul 7, 2015. 

By John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

What Comes of Denying Humanity?

"I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked or boiled ..." -- Jonathan Swift, A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People From Being a Burden to Their Parents or Country, and for Making Them Beneficial to the Publick (1729)

Dr. Kermit Gosnell now has been convicted of murdering three infants who survived his botched attempts to abort (kill) them. So, why was that wrong?

Since the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, abortion has been legal in America. Since Roe, 55 million children have been aborted -- killed. The only conceivable moral justification for this, is that the fetus is not a human being. So, did it suddenly become one only after it was born so as to render Gosnell's killings murder?

There are three common methods of disposing of the bodies of first-trimester aborted babies:

-- Flushing them down a special garbage disposal

-- Disposing of them as biological waste in special plastic bags

-- Larger aborted babies frequently are sold for research purposes.

So, why not for food? I cannot but wonder what Johnathan Swift would have said about this. In 1729, Swift, after surveying the poverty in Ireland, penned his A Modest Proposal.

"It is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town or travel in the country, when ... beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four or six children, all in rags and importuning every passenger for an alms. These mothers, instead of being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced to employ all their time ... to beg sustenance for their helpless infants: who, as they grow up, either turn thieves for want of work, or leave their dear native country to fight for the Pretender in Spain."

Swift's bitterly satirical suggestion (which many benighted readers deemed to be a serious proposal!), was to fatten up the Irish babies until they were a year old, then sell the 100,000 who served no useful purpose to Irish landlords -- who already had stripped their Irish tenants of all other possession -- for dinner meat!

"The remaining hundred thousand may, at a year old, be offered in the sale to the persons of quality and fortune through the kingdom; always advising the mother to let them suck plentifully in the last month, so as to render them plump and fat for a good table. A child ... seasoned with a little pepper or salt will be very good boiled ... especially in winter."

A year ago, an op-ed appeared on this page that caused me to revisit Swift. "Roe v. Wade: This is what 40 years looks like to Planned Parenthood," was a panegyric extolling the Supreme Court's 1973 decision that highlighted the "benefits to women" in being allowed to "make their own personal medical decision."

It argued since Roe, rich women no longer have to travel to New York or Hawaii to have legal abortions. Poor women no longer have to seek abortions in back alleys. Women now are freer to pursue higher education, and obtain better jobs because they can prevent (end) unintended pregnancies. Indeed, each year publicly funded family-planning services prevent 1.94 million unintended pregnancies. (The piece did not specify whether those "unintended pregnancies" were prevented by contraception or abortion).

What I found reminiscent of Swift was its failure to mention how many unborn children are being aborted by Planned Parenthood either nationally or locally! I found this strange, because if abortion is indeed a positive good, why doesn't Planned Parenthood openly tell us the benefits accruing to the aborted fetus? Or at least, the salutary uses to which a fetus might be put?

The undeniable fact is that however much good abortion may do the mother, it is hardly a "blessing" for the aborted -- -murdered -- fetus (baby).

There is, of course, on the abortion issue, a divide between law and morality. Roe says a woman has a right to an abortion. At the same time half the country believes most abortion to be a moral wrong, a grave sin or even murder.

To me, the key issue is: What is the fetus/baby? Is it a human being? Or is it sub-human? Because it shares the DNA of both mother and father, I am forced to conclude it is a human being, separate and apart from its mother, and not just a part of its mother like a kidney or a boil, which only contain the mother's DNA. And because it has DNA of both parents, it cannot be said to be merely a part of its mother -- even while in the womb.

If I am wrong, I would rather face my God having erred on the side of the fetus.

The logical consequence of holding a fetus to be sub-human is that, if it could otherwise be useful to mankind, then treating it as medical waste might squander an otherwise useful resource. Swift might recommend the aborted fetus be canned and sent as food to the starving people of the Sudan. If it is less than human, what is the objection? Would that be any worse than grinding it up in a garbage disposal?

But, of course, if the fetus is indeed a person, such a Swift-ian proposal obviously would be utterly barbaric -- or perhaps "Gosnell-ian."


Posted Online:  May 17, 2013, 11:00 pm - Quad-Cities Online
by John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2013
John Donald O'Shea

Abortion Is More than Just Another Social Justice Issue

I have often wondered how the German people continued to support Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party, as they came to learn the things he was doing.

I can only suppose their justification went something like this:

"Since Adolf Hitler took office, German unemployment has fallen substantially -- from six million in 1932 to one million in 1936. In addition, his government has embarked upon a massive infrastructure improvement program. If you take time to look, you will see the dams, autobahns, railroads and other public works constructed by this administration.

"The Fuhrer has instituted an array of social welfare programs designed to provide employment for every German citizen, and has instituted programs for social justice to insure a minimal standard of living for every German citizen. Before the Fuhrer, the unfortunate looked only to the charity of the individual; with his Winter Relief campaigns, the resources of the state are being put to use in feeding the poor and clothing the needy.

"The extermination of Jews is not the only important issue. To ignore the good -- the social justice -- that Hitler has done, and focus only on the extermination of a few Jews, and perhaps a few, a hand-full of mentally defectives, is to ignore Christ's social justice teachings that we care for the least of our brothers."

Add to the argument that another German might make, "That the churches should unequivocally denounce Hitler for what he is doing to the Jews, and the Gypsies, and the mentally handicapped."
I imagine that the rejoinder went like this:

"We do not want to be a nation of sheep who do not think for ourselves and weigh all the pros and cons of the various issues. I strongly feel that one needs to decide for oneself what issues are most important and for whom to vote. We certainly don't need the churches telling us how to think and how to vote."

Now substitute the phrase "abortion of fetuses" for the phrase "extermination of Jews," change the venue from Germany to the U.S, and fast-forward from the mid-30s to 2012.

What Hitler did to the Jews was "murder." The Jews were "human beings." Medically and scientifically, they were human beings.

They were as human as any other German. Only their religion was different. But even when they converted to the Christian faith, it made no difference. They were legislatively transformed into "sub-humans," stripped of the citizenship and rights, and exterminated.

Similarly, the human fetus developing within the womb is unquestionably -- from a medical and scientific perspective -- a "human being." And even if you deny that, if it is allowed to come to term, it will unquestionably emerge from the womb as a human being. It is only by deeming fetus in the womb "sub-human" that abortion (without serious justification) can be anything other than a killing which is "in the nature of" murder. (Note, that I am talking only about abortion, not contraception.)

My point is very simple. Human beings with well-(in)formed consciences cannot ignore the extermination or murder of their neighbors, whether they are Jews, Gypsies, the mentally impaired. From a medical and scientific standpoint all were humans, even if the mentally impaired were not "good poster children for the master race." And only those who ignored what their eyes should have seen, could argue otherwise.

Nor can human beings with well-(in)formed consciences ignore what abortion really is.

From a medical and scientific standpoint it is the killing of a human baby. That baby may not be fully developed. That may take nine months. But if not killed, it will emerge as a human, as fully human as you or me. And only those who ignore what their eyes should see, can argue otherwise.

The argument that the fetus is "no more than a part of its mother" is specious; the fetus contains the DNA of not only its mother, but its father as well. The mother's parts do not.

There is something askew with the argument that killing (or enslaving) other humans beings is just another "important" (social) issue. The argument that the government is doing "social justice" in providing the elderly with a pension, the poor with food stamps, and the unemployed with unemployment benefits, and that those things outweigh the extermination of Jews, Gypsies and the mentally impaired, or the enslavement of blacks, or the killing of children (fetuses) turns the notion of "social justice" on its head. Where was Hitler's "social justice" for the Jews when he "redistributed their wealth," sent them to concentration camps, and murdered them?

The reprehensible fact is that over 50 million fetuses have been methodically killed, and half our country doesn't care. But when somebody abuses a dog or kills a cat, the public is outraged. How many babies have to be aborted before the churches cry out?

Or must we look to Hollywood and politicians for our moral guidance?

Posted Online: :   Nov. 07, 2012, 3:02 pm   - Quad-Cities Online

by John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2012
John Donald O'Shea