#422 Buzzfeed coverage, Reproductive Justice - August 3, 2018
Buzzfeed Covers Pro-life Women’s Conference Ema O’Connor, reporting for Buzzfeed has written an excellent article covering last month’s Pro-life Women’s Conference (which we co-sponsored, tabled, and spoke at). Her coverage is through a pro-choice lens, yet she’s open-minded enough to give coverage at all: How Anti-Abortion Advocates Are Using A Pro-Woman Message To Appeal To A New Generation.
Catholic Worker National Conference Check under “Catholic Workers” in the list of member organizations of our network, and you’ll see quite a few Catholic Worker communities listed. The Catholic Workers held their national conference July 27-29 in Rochester, New York, with CLN Advisory Board members Mary Rider and Carol Crossed attending. Mary gave a workshop on the consistent life ethic, and about a third of those attending the gathering Sunday morning came to hear her.
Mary Rider (left) giving a workshop
There was also another presenter at a workshop on nonviolent living, Dan Marshall, who got up at a plenary on racism and spoke to the entire group about the racism of abortion. The group protested drone killings at Hancock Field, and you can see the video they made.
Summer Action Social Institute CLN Board member Lisa Stiller attended the Summer Action Social Institute (SASI), an annual social justice gathering of Catholics from all over the country. As usual, we had a literature table there. This year the focus was on immigration. Trafficking, poverty, climate change, and the death penalty (restorative justice) were also among workshop topics. Many sessions focused on welcoming the stranger. Especially impactful were three young people telling their immigration stories: challenges of school, how their families made cultural adjustments, and how programs that welcomed immigrants helped them to succeed. Kate Hennessey, Dorothy Day's granddaughter, spoke. She recently completed a biography: Dorothy Day: The World Will Be Saved by Beauty: An Intimate Portrait of My Grandmother. “The greatest resource we have is love,” she said. She encouraged people to examine how to act with love in their community and their relationships. Hennessey offered top lessons she got from her grandmother: “make yourself uncomfortable," "see beauty no matter what," and "love one another." She also reminded us to “laugh a lot, pray a lot."
Photo: Kate Hennessey speaks at SASI
Good News: Vatican Says Death Penalty “Inadmissible” Statements opposing the death penalty have been common by many in the Catholic hierarchy, but now a total prohibition is official: Pope Francis has made the inadmissibility of all executions part of the Catholic catechism. The Church will work “with determination” to abolish capital punishment in all cases. The Catholic Church is a large and influential organization, so non-Catholic abolitionists can also be pleased at this development.
Latest CLN Blog Post: Reproductive Justice
Julia Smucker, while tabling for us at the Wild Goose Festival, attended a workshop on the concept of “reproductive justice” – an idea that suits our predilections by expanding to all the forms of justice and life-affirming needs that involve reproducing, but which doesn’t fit our views because it assumes abortion is included. Julia describes the experience in Defining Reproductive Justice: An Encounter.
Quotation of the Week
Terrisa Lopez (Bukovinac)
Secular Pro-life Perspectives (blog), July 27, 2018
Based on my first-hand experience in San Francisco, there is reason to hope that the anti-capitalist and socialist movements will recognize the immense political and financial greed emanating from Planned Parenthood and the monstrous profit margins from the destruction of innocent human lives.
Photo: Left, Terrisa – sign says “Stop the War on Women’s Bodies”; Right, pro-abortion ad
Responses/News Tips/Questions to share are all welcome.
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