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Washington D.C., Jan 26, 2017 / 03:39 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Just one decision can have a major effect on future generations, pro-life activists told a group of young people at the March for Life conference in the nation’s capital on Thursday.

“When you pull one life out of this world, it changes everything,” said Ryan Bomberger, founder of the Radiance Foundation.

The Radiance Foundation is a “faith-based, life-affirming organization to help people understand and embrace their God-given Purpose.” Bomberger, a black pro-life activist who has brought attention to abortion’s “disproportionate impact in the black community,” delivered the keynote speech at the 2017 March for Life Conference in Washington, D.C., the day before Friday’s march.

Bomberger was conceived in rape. His mother chose to bear him, and his foster parents adopted him along with nine other children into their family of 15.

“This is my family. This is the result of the power of one,” Bomberger said, citing the theme of the 2017 march.

That theme – “the power of one” – is in part drawn from the movie “The Fellowship of the Ring,” from the quote “even the smallest person can change the course of the future.”

It also was meant to draw attention to the actions of one man, Rep. Henry Hyde, who successfully worked to pass an amendment banning the use of federal Medicaid dollars to directly fund abortions except in cases of rape, incest, or when the life of the mother is at stake.

The policy, 40 years old, has been estimated to have saved over 2 million lives that otherwise may have been aborted.

This week, the U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill that would make the Hyde Amendment permanent, rather than requiring that it to be attached as an amendment on an appropriations bill, which needs new approval each year.

Bomberger used the march’s theme to point to the “power” of one person making one decision to choose life, and the effect that has upon the future.  

“It was one singular decision of my courageous birth mom,” he recalled, noting that “someone had to have spoken life into her” since she “could have gotten a therapeutic abortion” instead.

As for his adoptive mother, Bomberger said that she grew up in a “very rough home” and spent a year in a children’s home when her parents separated. At five years old, she noticed another disabled girl in the home who had no visitors.

“That so profoundly impacted a five year-old girl,” Bomberger said, that she prayed one night “God help me be a mommy to those who don’t have one.”

“Obviously, she followed through, as you can see,” he said, referencing a picture of his extended family which is 62 persons strong through three generations.

“Adoption isn’t just something that transforms the child. It transforms the family, it transforms the community, and sometimes, it even transforms the world,” he said.

“My family gave me love, and God gave me purpose,” he said. “My life has purpose…my children’s lives have purpose.”

A panel following Bomberger’s speech echoed the theme of “the power of one.”

Dr. Jeff Pauls of the Vitae Foundation, which conducts “right-brain research” of pregnancy centers and Planned Parenthood for the pro-life cause, said that according to research, “the vast majority of women who have chosen abortion would not have done so if just one person would have supported them.”

“You be the one,” he told the audience. “If you have somebody that comes up to you, tell them ‘you can do this, and I will help,’” and then “follow that up” through action.

Amy Ford, founder of the group “Embrace Grace” which helps churches minister to and help young mothers who experience unplanned pregnancies, recalled the story of one mother whose life changed after just one encounter with a stranger.

The young girl, who was unmarried and pregnant, had been told by her father that she would “be a horrible mother” and should have an abortion or give the baby up for adoption. However, in an answer to prayer, she met a complete stranger who directed her to others who could help her.

Ford recalled the girl’s words: “My dad said that he thought I would be a horrible mom, but that guy at the UPS store said he thought I would be a good mom.”

Just one person changed her life, Ford said. “We have to be the light of the world,” she said, “and we have to be that to every person that we meet.”

 

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Boston, Mass., Jan 26, 2017 / 04:05 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Meet Collette: a talented young baker from the Boston area, who has been working on her own original cookie recipes since 2011. She is also a young woman with Down Syndrome.

Despite her passion for cookies and her talent with baking, she was unable to find a job.

“After rejection over and over again when applying for a job and being told she had great skills but was not 'a good fit,' she was determined to own her own business,” reads her website.

Fueled with ambition, Collette opened a production facility in Boston, where she creates and bakes all her own cookies. Within the first 10 days, over 50,000 cookies were ordered.

She has also received over 65,000 letters from fans across the world, including 100 offers from volunteers who want to help with her new company.

Her business, called Collettey's, also has a website where her cookies can be ordered, shipped and delivered with a note from Collette herself. Currently, her facility in Boston handles about 4,000 daily orders of cookies.

But there is more to Collettey's than just the cookies. The ambitious young baker plans to grow her business, eventually creating facilities in every state across the U.S., which would offer jobs to individuals with disabilities who have trouble finding employment.

Behind every cookie is Collette's dream to employ the disabled. According to her website, 76 percent of the disabled community are unemployed, and she is setting out to change that number.  

After months of perfecting her original cookie recipe, Collette's most popular treat has been a chocolate chip cinnamon cookie, dubbed 'The Amazing Cookie.' She also has created 'The Healthy Breakfast Cookie,' which is made with oats, almonds and dried cranberries.

The determined young baker has become an international sensation, appearing in news articles around the world. Her story has been shown on CBS Nightly News, Good Morning America, CBS local Boson, and countless other magazines and journals.

Collette has started a GoFundMe page, where any donations made will be contributed to her growing business. She has currently reached over $18,000 of her $125,000 goal.

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London, England, Jan 26, 2017 / 04:37 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Proposed standards for U.K. medical professionals could force them to violate their religious beliefs on the job, both Christian and Muslim groups have warned.

David Clapham, a treasurer of the group Christians in Pharmacy, says the proposed changes could deter religious people from entering the profession and may make “the position of some excellent professionals untenable.”

“This would be to the detriment of the profession, patients and pharmacy as a whole,” he said, according to The Pharmaceutical Journal, a publication of the U.K.-based Royal Pharmaceutical Society.

The independent regulator for pharmacy in Great Britain, the General Pharmaceutical Council, recently announced proposed changes in professional standards.

Both the current and the proposed wording for the professional standards guidance say that pharmacy professionals must “recognize their own values and beliefs” but “not impose them on other people.”

However, current guidelines allow pharmacy professionals to make a referral to other providers in cases where their own values or beliefs prevent them from providing care. The proposed guidelines say pharmacy professionals should “take responsibility for ensuring that person-centered care is not compromised because of personal values and beliefs.”

Referrals usually concern the provision of emergency hormonal contraception, routine contraception and some fertility treatments.

“People of faith are usually people of compassion … even if they cannot agree in all conscience to supply certain medications,” Clapham said.

Hina Shahid, chair of the Muslim Doctors Association, voiced concerns that the proposed changes, like ending the right of referral, are “very restrictive.”

“It is important to recognize that adhering to a high standard of professionalism in the workplace involves respecting the rights of health practitioners and accommodating values and principles that are important to them, religious or otherwise,” Shahid said.

She objected that the changes treat patient-centered care and the values of health care practitioners as “mutually exclusive.”

Duncan Rudkin, the chief executive of the General Pharmaceutical Council, said that the proposal would not force pharmacists to act against their beliefs.

“The whole point of the guidance is (saying) think ahead so that they do not get themselves into a position where there may be a risk.”

At the same time, a consultation document for the pharmaceutical council itself acknowledged the standards represented changed expectations for pharmacy professionals when their values or beliefs might affect their ability to provide services. A referral to another provider “might not be the right option” or might compromise person-centered care, the document said,

A previous consultation, held in April 2016, found that most commentators on the relevant section thought that professionals should not be able to refuse services because of their religion or beliefs, the General Pharmaceutical Council said.

If approved, the proposed changes would be introduced in May 2017.

 

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Washington D.C., Jan 26, 2017 / 05:06 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- In a culture where abortion is prevalent, no one’s rights are safe, Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York insisted at a national pro-life Mass before the March for Life.

“We come together this sacred evening in a church we claim as a sanctuary, in a land historically termed a sanctuary, on a planet the creator intended as an environment of sanctuary,” said Cardinal Dolan, chair of the U.S. bishops’ pro-life committee, in his homily at the March for Life vigil Mass on Thursday.

“Why?” he asked. “To reclaim the belief that the mother’s womb is the primal sanctuary, where a helpless, innocent, fragile, tiny baby is safe, secure, nurtured and protected.”

The March for Life vigil Mass was held Thursday evening at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C.

The national march is the largest pro-life rally in the world, annually drawing hundreds of thousands of walkers. It is held on or around the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision of Jan. 22, 1973 that mandated legal abortion throughout the nation.  

Cardinal Dolan celebrated the Mass, joined by four other cardinals, 40 bishops, 320 priests, and 90 deacons. In addition, 545 seminarians were present, and an estimated 12,000 participants attended.

The Mass began a 14-hour overnight prayer vigil for life featuring devotions, confessions, and holy hours, that will conclude with a closing Mass at 7:30 a.m. on Friday, celebrated by Archbishop Gregory Aymond of New Orleans. At estimated 20,000 pilgrims will attend the Masses and vigil.

“In order for us to have a joyful pro-life witness, we need to be in a good place with God,” Deirdre McQuade, assistant director for pro-life communications at the U.S. bishops’ Secretariat on Pro-Life Activities, told CNA.

Churches and cathedrals were in ancient times places of shelter for refugees fleeing violence and persecution and “claiming the right of sanctuary,” Cardinal Dolan noted in his homily.

The pilgrims thought of America as a “sanctuary” as they fled persecution in 17th century England, he said, and “today refugees and immigrants continue to believe that this nation is still a sanctuary, as they arrive with relief and thanksgiving, and we pray this evening they are never let down!”

The environment is also a “sanctuary” for human life, he said.

However, as the “primal sanctuary,” if the mother’s womb is not a safe place for human life and is threatened by abortion, then no one is safe, Cardinal Dolan warned.

“Can any of us be safe, can any of us claim a sanctuary anywhere when the first and most significant sanctuary of them all, the mother’s womb protecting a tiny life, can be raided and ravaged?” he asked.

A host of evils occur if abortion is prevalent, he explained. “Should it shock us, my friends, as Pope Francis asks in his ongoing global examination of conscience, that a culture that violently intrudes upon the life of baby in the sanctuary of his or her mother’s womb, would soon lose reverence for all places intended by God as safe, secure, and nurturing?”

“That such a society would begin to treat, for instance, the sanctuary of the earth’s environment as a toxic waste dump? Would begin to consider homes and neighborhoods as dangerous instead of as sanctuaries where families are protected and fostered? Would commence to approach the poor as bothersome instead of brothers? Would burden the dying with guilt for just wanting peacefully and patiently to savor each day until God takes them, pressuring them instead to suicide?”

St. Peter’s Square, Cardinal Dolan noted, was constructed by the architect Bernini to resemble, with its sets of colonnades opened wide, “the arms of God the Father, the outreach of Jesus gathering us in, the embrace of our Mother Mary and holy Mother Church, all tenderly protecting her children.”

Likewise, the Church must be a sanctuary for all peoples, and the womb must be a sanctuary for all life, he insisted.

“So this evening, in this sanctuary, we praise you, dear God, for those assurances and encouragement of this evening; we have confidence in the sacredness of sanctuary, the sanctuary you intended this earth, this life, your Church, the womb to be, to protect your children and we entrust to you all our efforts to uphold the sacredness, the sanctuary, of human life itself,” he concluded.

 

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