null / Credit: Bumble Dee/Shutterstock
CNA Staff, Jul 12, 2024 / 12:55 pm (CNA).
A U.S. military base has disavowed a presentation in which the major pro-life group National Right to Life was implied to be a “terrorist” organization. A pho… […]
The Catholic bishops of the United States have been a prophetic voice in defense of the faith and the dignity of the human person. The bishops are attuned to the events that matter most to […]
Former President Trump recently got in hot water with the pro-life movement by criticizing Governor Ron DeSantis’ six-week abortion legislation as “too harsh.” After the Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Trump picked an unnecessary fight […]
Donald Trump. / Christopher Halloran via www.shutterstock.com.
Washington D.C., Apr 21, 2023 / 16:26 pm (CNA).
Even though former President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominees were instrumental in overturning Roe V. Wade, the 2024 presidentia… […]
Marta Lamas in "Conversation on the Feminist Movement." / Video capture / Metropolitan Autonomous University.
ACI Prensa Staff, Sep 13, 2022 / 15:00 pm (CNA).
A well-known feminist leader admitted in a video that recently went viral t… […]
Prior to June 24, 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court’s most important civil rights decision was handed down on May 17, 1954. Then, in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, the Court declared racially segregated […]
An image from the Canadian pro-life group Choice42’s animated video encouraging pregnant women to choose life. / Choice42
Montreal, Canada, Jul 5, 2021 / 11:00 am (CNA).
A viral video is challenging society and the media for pressuring women to choose abortion. Its message is simple: Women have an incredible Wonder Woman-like ability to choose life for their unborn baby – and succeed. They can, in other words, choose life for two.
Canadian pro-life group Choice42 released its animated video encouraging pregnant women to choose life on May 29. The short film follows a scared, wide-eyed young woman as she flees from the dark monsters of societal pressure and struggles to climb up a mountain. The video attracted hundreds of thousands of views on social media and was so successful that, on June 28, the group released a version in Portuguese, appealing to countries like Brazil. It empowers women with the truth that, yes, “you can do this.”
EWTN Pro-Life Weekly highlighted a clip from the two-minute video on June 26.
“So you’re pregnant. You didn’t plan this. You didn’t want it. And now you have a choice to make,” the narrator says as the animation begins. “Take a breath. You can do this.”
“No matter what’s going on in your life, you can rise up and take this on,” she adds. “You can rock this.”
But, the narrator cautions, “I’m going to be real with you.”
“The choices that our society and the media are going to present you with, they’re not all equal,” she says. “Right now, your baby’s heart is already beating. That started about 21 days after conception. We’re talking about another human being here, and not just any human being. Your baby.”
The video goes on to warn that “abortion is probably going to be suggested, even pushed on you” also “by the people closest to you.”
But, the narrator urges, “you’re already this baby’s mother.”
“This child is already here in the world, living and growing inside you,” she says. “And what these people are suggesting to you is that you murder your own baby.”
While the narrator acknowledges that her words might sound harsh, she says, “I’m not going to lie to you. Not when your baby’s life is on the line.”
But pregnant women are “not alone, not by a long shot.”
“Reach out for help if you need it,” the narrator says. “We’ll help you.”
As an organization, Choice42 does just that: It exists to expose abortion for what it is and to empower pregnant women to choose life by providing emotional support, educational programs, and financial assistance.
The founder and director, Laura Klassen, dedicates her time to creating videos like this and others, in which she often wears her trademark pink wig. This one, she said, took six months to create.
“We just thought, why don’t we just put this into a video,” she told EWTN Pro-Life Weekly. “Something really relatable to mostly younger women, and just put that out there so that hopefully we can reach more women with our message even if we’re not talking with them one-on-one.”
Washington D.C., May 25, 2021 / 11:05 am Every year, the president makes a budget request to Congress. As part of the funding process for the federal government, Congress then debates and votes on various […]
Washington D.C., Mar 18, 2021 / 07:00 pm (CNA).- The youngest Republican female member of Congress says her mother’s courageous decision to choose life is a narrative the pro-life movement needs more of.
“The thing that we struggle with,&r… […]
Washington D.C., Feb 18, 2021 / 11:16 am (CNA).- A Catholic president pushing pro-abortion policies should be seen as both a challenge and an opportunity for the Church, the head of the EWTN media network says.
In an interview airing on Thursday, the 200th episode of EWTN Pro-Life Weekly, Michael Warsaw, EWTN board chairman and CEO, said that President Joe Biden’s support for taxpayer-funded abortion “is very confusing for Catholics.”
“His positions, on the life issue especially, just simply are not in line with Catholic teaching,” Warsaw said, noting that Biden and his staffers have talked about “how devout a Catholic he is.”
“I think we’ve seen our bishops try to grapple with this, I think we’ve seen the tensions within the Church as we try to deal with this, and understand what this means,” he said.
Warsaw called the political moment a challenge, but also a “great opportunity.” EWTN, he said, can be a clear voice for communicating Catholic teaching in its entirety and on the issue of life.
“I think it’s for us to re-double our efforts and our mission to be very clear—and to make very clear to all who listen—what the Church’s teaching is, and that life is the preeminent issue,” Warsaw said. “I don’t think we can say that often enough.”
President Biden has stated that his administration’s “policy” will be to “support women’s and girls’ sexual and reproductive health and rights in the United States, as well as globally.” The term “sexual and reproductive health” is commonly used by international groups, including the United Nations, to refer to abortion and contraception.
On Jan. 28, Biden issued a memorandum allowing for taxpayer funding of international pro-abortion groups, and took the first step toward allowing funding of domestic pro-abortion groups in the Title X family planning program.
In addition, Biden has supported taxpayer-funded elective abortions by opposing the Hyde Amendment. The White House has reaffirmed his position in recent weeks, and on Tuesday would not guarantee that a proposed massive COVID relief bill would not include funding of abortions.
The U.S. bishops’ conference (USCCB) has stated that abortion is a “preeminent priority,” because of the high number of abortions, the attack on “life itself,” and because it “takes place within the sanctuary of the family.” Archbishop Jose Gomez, president of the USCCB, noted Biden’s support for abortion as contradicting the teachings of the Church, in his Jan. 20 statement for Biden’s inauguration.
Clarity on the “preeminence” of the life issue, Warsaw said, is “what is missing, in certainly this administration, and in certain quarters of the Church where there seems to be a tendency to want to try to go along to get along.”
“We can’t pursue some sort of artificial unity, just for the sake of unity, when there are fundamental issues here—the issue of life—that we have to speak out on, and continue to speak out on, and continue to engage on,” Warsaw said.
Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List, appeared on EWTN Pro-Life Weekly with Warsaw, and said that the pro-life movement “shouldn’t be distracted with all the disappointments of late.”
“Our greatest strength is in what we’ve already accomplished in the last six years, and that is through the Supreme Court, over 230 new judges across the federal court system, and all of the massive number of pro-life pieces of legislation coming up from real people in real states that want their voices and their opinions expressed in the law,” she said.
A top priority, she said, is to “make sure that the filibuster stays in place” in the Senate. If the filibuster is abolished, she said, then a simple majority vote in the chamber could increase the number of Supreme Court justices and allow for more pro-abortion justices and federal judges.
The late Mother Angelica, foundress of EWTN, “was very clear” in support of the life issue, Warsaw said.
“I think because of her own personal sufferings and the depth of that suffering, and all the things that she went through in her life—physical sufferings, emotional sufferings, all of these things—yet she was able to do these remarkable things through God’s providence,” Warsaw said.
“And I think that gave her just a unique insight when it came to the issues of life, and the value of life, and the importance of every life. And the meaning that every life created by God brings,” he said.
He cited Mother Angelica as inspiration for the pro-life movement today, to remember that “all is not lost” and “this is not a time to be down.”
“It’s a time to push forward. It’s a time to be even more vocal, and even stronger and more strident in our fight for life,” Warsaw said.
© Catholic World Report