News
| 10/13/11 | Arizona Abortions Drop 30% After Pro-Life Law Takes Effect Showing pro-life legislation protecting women and unborn children has a tremendous impact in saving lives, new figures from Arizona show a new pro-life law has resulted in dropping abortions 30 percent. Last week, Cathi Herrod of the Center for Arizona Policy indicated the state released new abortion figures comparing the number of abortions in September 2011 with those done in September 2010. |
| 10/12/11 | Obama OKs More Embryonic Funding, Ignores Adult Stem Cells NIH Director Francis Collins has approved another human embryonic stem cell line for federal taxpayer funding. The line, HUES PGD 14, was added to the NIH registry today, bringing the total number of approved hESC lines to 136. |
| 10/12/11 | U.N. proposes euthanasia as right to health The United Nations is debating injecting euthanasia into the right to health and is considering a new treaty on the rights of the elderly to end their own lives for the benefit of society. At recent U.N. meetings on the issue of aging, it was reported that advanced age impacts the ability to exercise recognized rights and that it is a case of patient autonomy to decide to end life. The Holy See representative at the Human Rights Council said his delegation took strong exception to this argument. The idea is also not being well received by others who respect life. |
| 10/11/11 | California Bans Tanning Beds for Teens, Abortions Still OK California Governor Jerry Brown has signed a bill in the Golden State that prohibits minor from using tanning beds — in a state that has rejected three times efforts to allow parents to be notified when a minor girl is considering an abortion. “Minors in the state of California will no longer be allowed to use tanning beds after Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill on Sunday prohibiting anyone under the age of 18 from using ultraviolet tanning devices,” Reuters reports. “California is the first state in the nation to ban minors from using tanning beds, legislators said. Previously, California had banned minors under the age of 14 from using tanning beds, but allowed those between 14 and 18 years of age to use tanning beds with parental consent.” |
| 10/11/11 | Santorum: Obamacare Reg Shows 'Contempt This President Has for People of Faith' GOP presidential contender Rick Santorum denounced the Obama administration’s proposed regulation to require all health insurance plans to cover sterilization and contraceptives, including drugs that cause abortions, with a narrowly drawn religious exemption that would not include most Catholic charities or hospitals. “This is an assault on the First Amendment,” Santorum, a former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania, told CNSNews.com. |
| 10/10/11 | 2,000-plus chaplains saying 'no' to Pentagon Despite a recent Pentagon directive, a coalition of chaplain endorsers that represents more than 2,000 military ministers has pledged not to perform same-sex "wedding" ceremonies under any circumstances. Members the Chaplain Alliance for Religious Liberty are concerned about the memorandum issued by the Pentagon September 30 that authorizes military chaplains to perform same-sex "marriage" ceremonies and military chapel facilities to be used for "any private ceremony." |
| 10/10/11 | Feds Conclude California's Medical 'Marijuana Industry' Is a Sham Federal authorities in California vowed to shut down dozens of pot growing and sales operations in a major crackdown, saying the worst offenders are using the cover of medical marijuana to act as storefront drug dealers. The aggressive crackdown comes a little more than two months after the Obama administration toughened its stand on medical marijuana. |
| 10/07/11 | Abortionist's 'variance' expanded Operation Rescue is objecting to the special treatment being bestowed upon an Ohio late-term abortionist. Operation Rescue President Troy Newman explains that his group "has learned that the late-term abortionist Martin Haskell of Ohio has received special privileges from the Department of Health, giving him permission to violate the state statutes." |
| 10/07/11 | Pro-lifer: Ignoring abuse calls for greater punishment A Florida abortionist is in hot water for performing an abortion on a 12-year-old girl who was six-months pregnant by her mother's boyfriend. And one pro-lifer thinks his proposed punishment is not enough. |
| 10/07/11 | STD vaccine mandate looms in Calif. A pro-family leader is calling on California's governor to veto a dangerous bill that he and other family advocates believe undermines parental authority and the safety of children. Governor Jerry Brown has several days to decide on the fate of AB 499, a bill that would allow minors as young as 12 years of age to consent to "medical care related to the prevention of a sexually transmitted disease." The bill, introduced by Assemblywoman Toni Atkins (D), would allow children to agree to vaccines and treatments without the consent of parents, including the vaccine Gardasil. |
| 10/04/11 | Churches victim of 'viewpoint discrimination' A Baltimore-area festival recently rejected a church-sponsored pro-life booth, but Planned Parenthood was a welcomed guest. So one attorney says legal action may be on the way. Officials with HampdenFest rejected St. Thomas Aquinas Church's pro-life booth from the September 10 event, even though it has been part of the neighborhood arts festival for years. Planned Parenthood, however, was approved. |
| 10/04/11 | Mexico City Considers Two-Year Marriages Lovebirds unwilling to commit 'til death do they part will be able to sign short-term marriage contracts under a proposal being considered by Mexico City lawmakers. Couples will be able to choose the term of their marriage, with a minimum length of two years, and renew the contract if they stay happy, according to a reform put forward by the liberal Democratic Revolution Party (PRD). |
| 10/04/11 | Cross-dresser at Calif. elementary school A Christian attorney says it's imperative that a California law that requires positive instruction on alternate lifestyles be overturned, because a recent incident is evidence that it mandates the acceptance of lesbian, "gay," bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) lifestyles. Phyllis Fernandez was shocked when her two young daughters returned from school one day and asked why a man dressed like a woman was in their school cafeteria. The mother contacted the Sierra Sands Unified School District and got confirmation that what her girls told her was true. But apparently, the school district says it could do nothing about the worker's appearance. |
| 09/29/11 | 'Candy cane' case comes to a close A long-anticipated decision has finally been handed down by the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in the infamous "candy cane" case. The court ruled yesterday that the Plano (Texas) Independent School District violated the Constitution by not allowing student Jonathan Morgan to hand out candy cane pens with a religious message at his class "winter" party nine years ago. According to the ruling, a little girl who was threatened for handing out tickets to a religious play, as well as an entire class of children who were forbidden from writing "Merry Christmas" on holiday cards to American troops overseas, also suffered discrimination. |
| 09/29/11 | Census Bureau Admits It 'Artifcially Inflated the Number of Same-Sex Couples' The Census Bureau admitted Tuesday that it had “artificially inflated the number of same-sex couples” in the United States, initially reporting a number that was about 40 percent higher than what it now believes is accurate. The original data published by the 2010 Census set the number of same-sex households in the U.S. in 2010 at 901,997, including 349,377 same-sex married couple households and 552,620 same-sex unmarried partner households. |
| 09/27/11 | Christian groups threatened with shutdown A prominent American university has decided five on-campus Christian groups are in violation of the school's non-discrimination policy and has placed the groups on "provisional status" -- a move described by one conservative group as nothing short of religious bigotry. |
| 09/27/11 | Execution Looms for Iranian Pastor Who Refuses to Renounce His Christian Faith An Iranian pastor who refuses to renounce his Christian faith could be hanged as soon as Wednesday, after a trial court ruling this week upheld his death sentence for “apostasy.” Religious freedom advocates are calling urgently for governments to take up the case of Youcef Nadarkhani, a 32-year-old evangelical first sentenced to death late last year. If the sentence is carried out he will be the first Iranian Christian known to have been executed for his faith in 21 years. |
| 09/22/11 | Orange County Couple Threatened With $500-Per-Meeting Fines For Home Bible Study An Orange County couple has been ordered to stop holding a Bible study in their home on the grounds that the meeting violates a city ordinance as a “church” and not as a private gathering. Homeowners Chuck and Stephanie Fromm, of San Juan Capistrano, were fined $300 earlier this month for holding what city officials called “a regular gathering of more than three people”. |
| 09/22/11 | Protestors to Bachmann: 'You can't pray the gay away' Despite the claims of the homosexual lobby, one pro-family organization says presidential hopeful Michele Bachmann's involvement in counseling homosexuals "is not controversial at all." The Courage Campaign recently organized a "flash-mob" event to protest Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann's appearance at the California Republican Party Convention. Roughly 50 protestors danced to Madonna's "Like a Prayer" to show their disapproval of the presidential hopeful's involvement in offering counseling to homosexuals who want help with leaving that lifestyle. |
| 09/21/11 | State's late-night shenanigans legally questioned A California pastor says state officials waited until nightfall to remove three crosses that have stood in the region for 100 years because they feared controversy from the community. Last month, the California Department of Transportation removed three crosses from Inspiration Point, which is located off state Route 79 near the town of Julian. Workers took down the crosses overnight after receiving complaints from individuals who did not agree with the religious symbols being displayed on public property. On August 3, notices were posted to announce that the crosses would be removed. And at the end of the month, they were taken down and stored in a local facility that will eventually be handed over to a Julian pastor. |
| 09/21/11 | Planned Parenthood: 38.4% of Its Income Comes From Abortions Although Planned Parenthood officials like to talk about how a small percentage of the “services” it provides women are abortion-related, an analysis from Live Action indicates 38.4 percent of its clinic income is derived from abortions. Live Action spokesman David Schmidt says Planned Parenthood is misleading the public when it talks about how important and influential its abortion business is to its overall bottom line. |
| 09/20/11 | Direct Conversion Challenges Embryonic Stem Cell Research The Scientist has a great article called “Skipping Pluripotency.” What is pluripotency? Pluripotent is a term used to describe a cell that is undifferentiated. A pluripotent cell can become most or all of the cell types in the body. Pluripotent stem cells come from embryos, either made from IVF or cloning, that are ripped apart for the stem cell mass inside. Recently, scientists have been able to induce pluripotency. They are able to take a fully differentiated cell like a skin cell and reprogram it back to pluripotency. These are called induced pluripotent stem cells or iPSCs. |
| 09/20/11 | Nat'l motto, 1st Amendment don't apply in classroom A California-based federal appeals court has ruled against a teacher's right to display banners that mention God. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals recently sided with the Poway Unified School District in a case involving a high school teacher who was forced to remove banners that mentioned God, including one that displayed the national motto. A lower court previously ruled that the school district violated Bradley Johnson's First Amendment rights, but the Ninth Circuit overturned that decision, as the judges said the math teacher's banners had nothing to do with calculus. |
| 09/19/11 | Joni: Robertson wrong to justify divorce for Alzheimer's A Christian disability advocate is denouncing religious broadcaster Pat Robertson's statement that divorcing a spouse with severe Alzheimer's disease may be justifiable. Joni Eareckson Tada says she was "dismayed" by Robertson's statement on Tuesday's 700 Club broadcast. Robertson said that while couples vow to stay married for life, Alzheimer's is "a walking death" that can make it okay for the spouse to divorce and seek new companionship. |
| 09/19/11 | Abortion clinic standards on Virginia's horizon Virginia is in the process of adopting standards for abortion clinics -- but there may eventually be legal challenges from pro-abortion sources. In a 12-1 vote last week, Virginia's State Board of Health approved new rules that will effectively regulate the state's abortion clinics as hospital surgical centers. According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the vote could potentially force most abortion clinics in the state to undergo expensive retrofitting or face closure. |
| 09/19/11 | School board: Explicit survey unnecessary Because one mother stood her ground, public schools in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, have decided to stop administering a sex survey to young students. Arlene Tessitore was upset that her middle-school daughters were being subjected to the "Youth Risk Behavior Survey" without her permission. When she learned about the explicit content of the questionnaire, which asked students as young as 10 or 11 years old about sexual behavior, she asked The Rutherford Institute to step in with legal advice. |
| 09/14/11 | Republican Debate Touches on Pro-Life Issues, Parental Rights Last night’s Republican debate — unlike the one last week — touched briefly on pro-life issues and featured a heated exchange between a couple of the candidates and pro-life Texas Gov. Rick Perry over the issue of parental rights. Because none of the questions from the Tea Party participants or CNN moderator Wolf Blitzer queried about pro-life issues, Michele Bachmann, the pro-life Minnesota congresswoman, was the first to bring up the issue of abortion, doing so on her own. She repeatedly attacked pro-abortion President Barack Obama on Obamacare, promising to repeal the government-run health care plan that includes abortion funding and rationing concerns, but she also tagged Obama for a recent decision forcing insurance companies to pay for drugs that can cause abortions, birth control and contraception as “preventative care.” |
| 09/14/11 | Woman Who Killed Infant Freed by Canada’s Pro-Abortion Law A woman who strangled and killed her newborn baby has been released and will face no jail time thanks to a judge who cited support for legalized abortion in Canada, where abortions are legal and paid for at taxpayer expense. Katrina Effert of Wetaskiwin, Alberta gave birth secretly in the downstairs level of her parents’ home and then killed her baby son by throwing his body over the fence of their yard. Effert, 19 at the time of the infanticide, told the court she worried about what her parents would think of having to listen to the cries of a newborn baby in the house. Effert’s parents were not aware of the pregnancy and she initially told police she had not had sexual intercourse. |
| 09/12/11 | Post-abortion mental risks women need to know A pro-family advocacy group thinks women should know about new research that shows abortion is harmful to their mental health. The new study was published in The British Journal of Psychiatry, a resource that Jeanne Monahan of the Family Research Council (FRC) considers reputable. "It showed that 81 percent of women who have had an abortion have an increased risk for mental health," she reports. "This would include depression, alcohol abuse, suicidal behaviors, and other things as well. It takes into account 22 studies and over 877,000 women, and it spans 14 years." |
| 09/12/11 | Fall TV falls further into 'sex sells' mindset According to one group that works to advance truth and virtue in the public square, television viewers should prepare for another season of filth. Matt Philbin, managing editor of the Media Research Center's Culture and Media Institute (CMI), warns that the upcoming season proves "Hollywood is out of ideas -- and if they can't center a show around sex, they really don't have a show to sell." Hollywood claims it is simply filling the demand for smut, but Philbin suggests they live in a different world. |