New South Wales Parliament kills assisted suicide bill | LifeSiteNews.com

The following excerpts are from LifeSiteNews.com:

• Another euthanasia and assisted suicide bill was decisively defeated in Australia last week – this time in the Upper House of the New South Wales’ State Parliament.
• The private members bill was introduced by Greens MLC, Cate Faehrmann, who adopted the title of the original Northern Territory Bill that passed back in 1995, and which was overturned by the Federal Parliament nine months later.  The "Rights of the Terminally Ill Bill 2013" was principally an assisted suicide bill with the ‘option’ of euthanasia if the patient was found to be unable to take the drugs for themselves.
• A number of politicians had raised off-the-record concerns that Faehrmann’s bill was primarily a publicity stunt.  Faehrmann will resign from the State Parliament shortly to contest for a seat in the Senate in the September 2013 Federal Election for the Greens in New South Wales.
• Legislators overwhelmingly rejected the bill, with 23 votes in favour to 13 against. There were also five abstentions plus one non-vote due to a resignation.

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New South Wales Parliament kills assisted suicide bill | LifeSiteNews.com

Pope Francis to Hold Global Pro-Life Conference, Pro-Life Mass on June 16 | LifeNews.com

The following excerpts are from LifeNews.com:

• Pro-lifers held their breath the day the world received a new Pope. They did not question his pro-life credentials but wondered if he would speak forcefully.
• An old quote soon surfaced and concerns faded. “Defend the unborn against abortion even if they persecute you, calumniate you, set traps for you, take you to court or kill you. No child should be deprived of the right to be born, the right to be fed, the right to go to school.”
• On Sunday, June 16, Pope Francis will celebrate a Mass for Life in St. Peter’s Square.

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Pope Francis to Hold Global Pro-Life Conference, Pro-Life Mass on June 16 | LifeNews.com

Unethical Scientists are Making Human-Animal Hybrids, Again | LifeNews.com

The following excerpts are from LifeNews.com:

• How often we are told by “the scientists” that those outside the field have no business telling them what to–and more particularly, what not–to do. And yet, again and again and again, we learn that some scientists refuse to restrain themselves.
• A new story in Slate about scientists making human/animal hybrids is a case in point.

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Unethical Scientists are Making Human-Animal Hybrids, Again | LifeNews.com

Most Recent Blog Visits (Makes My Day)

The image below shows what country the most recent visitors to my bogs came from. 

You will see near the bottom, Vietnam as one of those countries. That visitor went to the "Daily Mass Readings" blog. So did visitors from Nigeria, the United Arab Emirates, Malaysia, Russia, and more. Some went to "Saint Quote of the Day" and "Favorite Prayers and Scripture", like the visitors from Lebanon and Saudi Arabia.

When you start feeling doubtful that anyone is reading your blogs, you can look at these, and see why it is important and worthwhile to keep on keeping on.

North Carolina abortion clinic shuts down: baby saved | LifeSiteNews.com

The following excerpts are from LifeSiteNews.com:

• Local pro-life activists reported on Facebook over the weekend that they have confirmed that A Woman’s Choice, an abortion clinic in Greensboro, North Carolina, has closed.
• While the reason for the closure remains unclear, a call to the police confirmed that the clinic had indeed permanently closed. Pro-life activists arrived at the clinic on Saturday to discover that the doors were locked and that the furnishings had been removed from the office.
• As a result, one woman who tried to go to the clinic on Saturday for an abortion spoke instead to pro-life sidewalk counselors. The mother took the closure as a divine sign and decided to keep her baby.

Read more by clicking below:
North Carolina abortion clinic shuts down: baby saved | LifeSiteNews.com

From The Dignitatis Humanae Institute: French Government: we will "dissolve" "religious pathology" and "excesses" in the Church

Note: The following is a press release from The Dignitatis Humanae Institute

Rome, 6 January 2013

The liberties of French Christians have long been in a perilous state, however now the recently elected Socialist Government is set to impose a new form of secularist surveillance upon the Church and lay organisations, seeking to discover and 'dissolve' any potential cases of what it deems 'religious pathology.'

The month of Advent saw a disturbing spate of attacks and desecrations of Christian icons and buildings across France; from the burning of a Nativity scene in Savoy, statues decapitated in Frejus and Churches attacked in Mayenne and Soissons. Yet rather than defend the religious liberty of her persecuted people, the French government is pushing ahead with a further curtailment of religious expression.

Announced by President Hollande, the new 'the National Observatory of Secularism' will come into being this year, tasked with closely monitoring religious organisations for any potential 'excesses.' French Interior Minister Manuel Valls highlighted various Catholic organisations, stating that "All excesses are being minutely registered in case we have to consider dissolving it."

This aggressive form of imposed laïcité is coupled with the proselytization of what the Socialist education minister Vincent Peillon called a 'secularist morality' within the state education system. This compulsory form of re-education will seek to remove any ethics other than the core, secularist, tenets of the Republic. The Federation of State School Parents has already protested against what could be viewed as child indoctrination.

In response to these worrying trends, Benjamin Harnwell, Founder of the Dignitatis Humanae Institute, warned of the dangerous precedents being created:

"The French government has already defied its own constitutional courts on its tax policy and now seeks to redefine its notions of justice and due process. A government that can predetermine your guilt before any actual crime has even been committed, based solely on a supposition of religious belief, has abandoned any claim to being a pluralist democracy and has become something far more sinister. This disturbing move marks yet another descent in a country which already heavily curtails the universal right to public displays of religious expression."

The Dignitatis Humanae Institute aims to uphold human dignity based on the anthropological truth that man is born in the image and likeness of God and therefore has an innate human dignity of infinite worth to be upheld. The Institute promotes this understanding by supporting Christians in public life, assisting them to present effective and coherent responses to increasing efforts to silence the Christian voice in the public square.

THE RULE OF LAW REQUIRES A LEGAL SYSTEM BASED ON NATURAL LAW

Vatican City, 26 September 2012 (VIS) - In New York on 24 September, Archbishop Dominique Mamberti, secretary for Relations with States, addressed the United Nations High-level Meeting on the Rule of Law at the National and International Levels.

Archbishop Mamberti spoke in his capacity as Holy See delegate to the sixty-seventh Session of the General Assembly of the United Nations. Brief extracts from his English-language remarks are given below.

"Faced as we are by challenges old and new, the calling of the High-Level Meeting on the Rule of Law is an important opportunity to reaffirm the will to find political solutions applicable at the global level with the aid of a juridical order solidly based upon the dignity and nature of humanity, in other words, upon the natural law.

"This is the best path to follow if we wish to realise the grand designs and purpose of the United Nations Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which remain relevant by means of various treaties on human rights, disarmament, and the codification of the great principles of international law and in the gathering and progress made in the norms of humanitarian law.

"It will be possible to advance if, as well as working through ever more specialised organs, including in economic and financial matters, the United Nations remains a central point of reference for the creation of a true family of nations, where the unilateral interest of the most powerful ones does not trump the needs of the weaker ones. Such will be possible if legislation at the international level is marked by respect for the dignity of the human person, beginning with the centrality of the right to life and to freedom of religion".

You can find more information at: www.visnews.org

The news items contained in the Vatican Information Service may be used, in part or in their entirety, by quoting the source:

V.I.S. -Vatican Information Service.

Copyright © Vatican Information Service 00120 Vatican City

From The Dignitatis Humanae Institute: Scrap Pakistan's Blasphemy Laws

Note: The following is a press release from The Dignitatis Humanae Institute

Nirj Deva MEP: Scrap Pakistan's Blasphemy Laws

European Parliament, 5th September 2012

Jesus Christ instructed his followers to remember these words: "No servant is greater than his master: if they persecuted me, they will persecute you also."  The truth of this warning has sadly never been more undeniable than in our present age, where in some countries today the very law itself gives itself as a pretext for persecution.  

The persistent violence and waves of terror currently waged upon Pakistan's besieged Christian population has today led the Dignitatis Humanae Institute to renew its calls for the Pakistan government to end its so-called "blasphemy trials".  

Christians in Pakistan have long lived under an unrelenting reign of persecution, yet the recent rise of injustices against Christians has caused many to despair for any future improvement under the current conditions.  In the last month we have seen the three-week holding of Rishma Masih in a high security prison and refused bail.  A young Christian girl with Down's syndrome, her alleged crime was the burning of the Koran; which now appears to have been a false allegation concocted by the local Imam.  While Rishma may be spared the death penalty, there is still the murder of an 11 year old Christian boy, Samel Yaqoob, to be resolved, his body found burnt, tortured and mutilated.

At the heart of many of these cases is Pakistan's continued enforcement of the blasphemy law - a legal framework with which the Islamic agitators in the country use to terrorise Christian communities for their refusal to adhere to Shariah Law.  A license to incite violence, the law is responsible for many attacks on those accused; only this July a defendant was lynched by a mob who stormed the jail.  

Today, Nirj Deva MEP, President of the International Committee on Human Dignity, called in the name of the Dignitatis Humanae Institute on the Pakistan government to put an end to the blasphemy prosecutions: "The great nation of Pakistan was the dream of Mohammed Ali Jinnah, who envisaged a state where people of all religions would be free to live in peace.  It is lamentable that this pioneering vision has been seemingly forgotten and suppressed in today's Pakistan.  The current blasphemy law and the safety of Pakistan's Christian minorities are not compatible, as the case of the two children Rishma and Samel and countless other examples sadly demonstrate, and I would therefore urge the Pakistani government to continue the work of the martyred Shahbaz Bhatti and bring an end to these blasphemy prosecutions; all the communities of Pakistan deserve better than this current state of perpetual fear."

The Dignitatis Humanae Institute aims to uphold human dignity based on the anthropological truth that man is born in the image and likeness of God and therefore has an innate human dignity of infinite worth to be upheld. The Institute promotes this understanding by supporting Christians in public life, assisting them to present effective and coherent responses to increasing efforts to silence the Christian voice in the public square.