#647 - Peace & Life: Marched! / CL Action / PA Sex Abuse Referendum - February 3, 2023
March for Life Roundup, 2023
See here for the video of member Group Rehumanize International’s Meetup speakers; they hold this in conjunction with the March for Life every year.
From Georgetown University, The Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life, the video from their webinar is now available : The Consistent Ethic of Life in 2023: Solidarity with Those Who are Poor and Vulnerable.
The New York Times includes an article that, while it doesn’t mention the consistent life ethic, does at least mention Rehumanize’s opposition to the death penalty, and is more balanced than coverage usually is. Media coverage in general was more robust than usual this year, and tended to focus on it being a new era.
Action Foundation
The Consistent Life Action Foundation (CLAF) has given a grant to the Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (MADP). The funds will be used to amplify calls to action around clemency campaigns through ad boosts and videos on social media that uplift the humanity of those facing executions.
A similar organization, the Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (FADP) has just concluded its grant year.
The funds were used to create social media posts and to print fact sheets, in English and Spanish, on the relationships of the death penalty to mental illness, victims’ families, race factors, public opinion, and instances of innocence.
The FADP report provided impressive data on the increase in social media presence and networking at conferences that resulted from the fact sheets.
At this point, the CLAF would like to provide grants to organizations that deal with war, euthanasia, and perinatal hospice. Suggestions are welcome.
Update on Referendums
Our referendums website has information about ballot measures concerning our six core life issues. A referendum has been proposed for the Pennsylvania ballot that doesn't fall directly under our issues but that we encourage voters to support.
The measure would amend the Pennsylvania Constitution to create a two-year period in which persons can file civil suits arising from childhood sexual abuse that would otherwise be considered outside the statute of limitations.
We explain how this relates to abortion prevention on the Pennsylvania page.
Our Latest Blog Post
John Whitehead gives an appeal based on the latest news about Ukraine: Act Before We Reach “Midnight”: The Need to Seek a Cease-Fire in Ukraine.
Quotation of the Week
Richard Stith
The US Supreme Court has called life ‘the most basic human right’
Mercatornet, January 19, 2023
Perhaps its greatest gift to pro-life people, however, is Dobbs’s complete lack of interest in the subject of religion. None of the opinions treats as even worthy of debate the common suggestion in the media that abortion involves a war between religious theocrats and secular democrats.
Nowhere in the majority opinion, the concurring opinions, or the lengthy dissenting opinion is there any allegation that opposition to abortion arises simply from religious doctrine, rather than from a rational understanding of the universally acknowledged facts of human gestation.
The opinions as a group and the case as a whole bespeak not a battle of faiths but a straightforward struggle between liberty and life, with life now favored by law to win.
