This small action by one man to another has “captivated” the world.  A Pope embracing a man covered in huge disfiguring boils – the kind that causes people to gasp and stare.  One person twittered: He Reminds me of a Jewish carpenter from Nazareth.  A punto, as the Italians say; exactly.

Both men radiate something that is distinctly human; love.  It sure gives hope for a broken world.

Dr. Priscilla Coleman spoke at a talk on Thursday night in Toronto, courtesy of the deVeber Institute. It was fantastic. She does research into the psychological effects after abortion. She estimates that 20% of women will experience negative mental health effects.

Based on these women’s stories told in the New York Magazine, that number appears to be much higher, perhaps somewhere around 50%.

They call it “26 Women Share their Abortion Stories.” But I’d call it “The Unhappiness we Nurture in the Name of Choice.” Whatever abortion is, it is not female empowerment by a long stretch.

PS. I really want someone (other than those fanatically dedicated to keeping abortion legal) to do the math on this notion that one in three women will have an abortion by age 45. I’d like to see it broken down by state/province. I’d like to see repeat abortions factored in. Any takers?

So sad. I would say this is not to read if you are yourself pregnant, at whatever stage. But this story gives an idea of the beauty and power of the human soul, no matter how shortly lived.

I felt an unholy storm move through my body, and after that there is a brief lapse in my recollection; either I blacked out from the pain or I have blotted out the memory. And then there was another person on the floor in front of me, moving his arms and legs, alive. I heard myself say out loud, “This can’t be good.” But it looked good. My baby was as pretty as a seashell. He was translucent and pink and very, very small, but he was flawless. His lovely lips were opening and closing, opening and closing, swallowing the new world. For a length of time I cannot delineate, I sat there, awestruck, transfixed. Every finger, every toenail, the golden shadow of his eyebrows coming in, the elegance of his shoulders—all of it was miraculous, astonishing. I held him up to my face, his head and shoulders filling my hand, his legs dangling almost to my elbow. I tried to think of something maternal I could do to convey to him that I was, in fact, his mother, and that I had the situation completely under control. I kissed his forehead and his skin felt like a silky frog’s on my mouth.

Read here.

When we look at the extraordinarily high rates of single motherhood in some places, we can see that fathers are indeed “opting out.” This has been happening for a long time.

So when I saw this article in the weekend National Post I was actually somewhat pleased to see feminists catching up with the logic of it all.

I remember once doing a radio debate with some pro-choice feminists and I raised the point that if women have the choice to abort, then men have the choice to walk away. And I was surprised that they didn’t buy it. They wanted it both ways, ie. we choose to abort, c’est la vie, and we choose to keep the baby and the man does what we want. That just doesn’t make any sense to me.

Melina and Bill Gates are holding yet another big population control conference co-hosted with Ethiopia’s Ministry of Health.  The purpose is, of course, to promote their massive contraceptive campaign on women in developing nations.  What is so particularly galling about their attempts to push heavy drugs like Depo Provera and Norplant on these women, is not just the condescending, patriarchal way that they go about it, it’s the fact that they are actually lying to these women.

This so-called contraceptive of “choice” promoted by population control enthusiasts carries a “black-box warning” issued by the manufacturer after million dollar lawsuits were brought against Pfizer in the U.S. and Canada. It is not recommended for use over 2 years due to the complications associated with severe osteoporosis. Studies have also indicated depo users to double their risk for breast cancer and be high risk to contract or transmit HIV.

Good satire makes me laugh, and this is good satire. Et voila. Namaste.

________

Faye adds: I just about died from laughing reading this. Awesome.

I also want my child bathed in San Pellegrino. But I want the fluoride removed first somehow. There’s a few parts per million per bottle.

Really, is there any other way to bathe my newborn? He deserves nothing less.

So I was at the gym this evening. As I did some floor exercises, holding a side plank, I had nowhere to look but at the girl in front of me, who had a tattoo. It said on her shoulder, “May I have joy, peace and happiness,” complete with the person who said this quote, like a footnote. Which made me laugh, a little anyway. What if you got a quote on your shoulder with the footnote on your ankle. Very academic! Anyhoo. Where was I? Oh yes, her tattoo. It wasn’t altogether terrible so far as tattoos go, but I did note the “I” at the centre. Hebrew blessings, just by way of example, tend to use “you” as in “May the Lord bless you and keep you…” Which, mid side plank, I could have used. Some blessing and keeping, as I haven’t done one in a very long time.

My point, you are wondering, is that we live in an egocentric age.

That’s my thought of the day. And now yours may be something like hey, that Andrea needs to work on being less judgemental. Indeed.

I love the beautiful, philosophical consistency of the pro-life position.  It really is a position of true reverence for all human life.  We don’t discriminate on any basis, and are often the only ones that see value in a human life, when the rest of the world scoffs, dismisses and discards.

Babies born with anencephaly is just one example.  Though their lives would appear meaningless, because they do not have a significant portion of the human brain, namely the cerebral cortex, the pro-life position is such that we would never advocate the killing of these babies as some kind of solution.  Rather, we uphold their dignity in the same manner as we would any other human being.  Most of these babies will not survive long after birth, but their short lives, when they are not aborted, are marked with profound meaning and incredible love.

I have known two couples who gave birth to babies with anencephaly.  Both couples bravely accepted their children’s fate and were dramatically changed by the experience of meeting their children, holding them and loving them for the short weeks or days that were given them.

This article, by Dr. Peter Saunders, makes that argument, that indeed, the disability does not define these babies.  Rather, it is their humanity that does.

“Benevolent sexism” (ie. gentlemanly door-opening) is identified by researcher Matthew Hammond, in this study, to be “flip side of the “hostile” sexism that would banish women to the kitchen.” He even goes so far as to suggest that woman who accept such forms of “benevolent sexism” are suffering a psychological disorder.

The study found that many women embraced benevolent sexism. Those women were also more likely to be psychologically “entitled” – a symptom of a narcissistic personality where people feel they are deserving or more special than others.

Brendan Malone comes to the rescue in this delightful rebuttal.

…when I look at women I see the feminine genius. A genius so profoundly complex, important and valuable that I adore it. I adore the feminine genius because I am a real man who has not had his masculine awareness dulled by erroneous ideologies about gender, or seriously messed up by pornography-fueled predatory attitudes towards women.