Current Events

Illinois Taxpayers Fund Record Number of Abortions

For the second year in a row, Illinois taxpayers are set to fund a record number of abortions at county health facilities, as stated in CitizenLink. One hospital reports a 78 percent increase over four years.

Stroger Hospital in Cook County, IL, one of the largest urban health care providers in Chicago, performs about 4,000 abortions a year—and bills taxpayers more than $1 million a year for those abortions. “If you subsidize something, you get more of it,” said Clarke Forsythe, president of Americans United for Life. “Unfortunately, taxpayers are footing the bill here.” Illinois is one of 17 states that fund most or all abortions for Medicaid recipients.

Mary Spaulding Balch, state legislative director for the National Right to Life Committee, said studies confirm that tax dollars often mean more abortions. “When neither a state nor the federal government pays for abortion, about 20 percent of people who might consider abortion do not actually go through with the abortion,” she said. “There’s an indication that even the pregnancy rate goes down.”

4-H Club Told to Leave God Out of the Boy Scout Expressions

Thanks to a complaint from one atheistic parent, a 4-H club in Virginia has been told that it cannot meet in a church, cannot pray, and cannot read the Bible, as stated in CitizenLink. In addition, new guidelines from 4-H headquarters restrict expressions of Christianity at every 4-H chapter because they can “create a barrier.” The Pathfinders 4-H Club in Montgomery County, VA, has emphasized community service for seventeen years, but now one parent is objecting to the club doing community service “for the glory of God.” 4-H leader Karen Dawkins said that she is baffled by the discrimination. “The kids wrote the constitution, the kids are the ones that have the chaplain, and they read from the Bible and pray before we start our club meetings,” she said. “They (National 4-H) told us we can not do that because it’s too specific.” National 4-H, which comes under the Department of Agriculture, is claiming “separation of church and state.” President Bush has been asked to intervene. “I would like National 4-H to change the policy,” Dawkins said, “and say that each club is autonomous and can decide what their program area is and if there is a religious background.”

Members of Parliament in Canada Balk at Sunday Voting Proposal

A parliamentary committee is recommending that Members of Parliament not support a Harper government bill that would effectively turn the Sunday before a federal election day into a second chance for voters to cast their ballots, as stated in Today’s Family News. The proposal is part of Bill C-16, the Expanded Voting Opportunities Act, which was introduced recently by government house leader Peter Van Loan. Its intent, he said, is to encourage more Canadians to vote by giving them effectively two days to get to their polling station. By law, federal elections must be held on a Monday, except for long weekends. Under C-16, the Sunday before voting day would become an advance polling day for all polling stations across the country. The idea has come under fire from several quarters, including Christians who testified before the committee regarding their concerns that it would disrupt the regular Sunday activities of both churchgoers and churches. Citing figures that show nearly a third of Canadians attend a Sunday worship service at least once a month, Jamey McDonald, executive director of the Baptist General Conference of Canada, suggested that such a move would “at least make the government vulnerable to irritating a fairly large segment of our population.” In the end, though, the all-party committee voted to recommend scrapping the idea. The amended bill is now back before the House of Commons for a third and final reading.

Pro-Lifers Convince United Way to Defund Planned Parenthood

The United Way of Jackson County, MI, was prepared to give a $10,000 grant to the local Planned Parenthood, but pro-life groups would have none of it. Following an outcry from Jackson Right to Life, Spring Arbor University, and others, United Way changed its mind. “When they had all the information needed to make the decision, they saw that it just wasn’t going to be a good move,” said Kathy Potts, president of Jackson Right to Life. The grant was to be used for teen-pregnancy prevention, but that’s not what Planned Parenthood is famous for promoting.

“Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the country,” said Denise Burke, vice president of Americans United for Life. She said that the victory is a great example of what grassroots activism can accomplish. “Businesses, those supporting Planned Parenthood and others, may be less likely to do so,” Burke said, “when they know there is a concerted effort by pro-life Americans to make their concerns known.”

Quebec Mayor Suggests All “Organized Religion” Should Be Subject to Government Control

By John-Henry Westen

HUNTINGDON, QC, December 18, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com)—Using as his reason the pretext of a radical extremist group which professes to hate homosexuals, Huntingdon, Quebec Mayor Stephane Gendron, has called for the state control of religion. Writing on his blog yesterday, Mayor Gendron says, “A modern and intellectually free society should submit all form of organized ‘religion’ to the dictates of the fundamental values of our society.”

“In the name of religion,” writes Gendron, “one can say anything and do anything, including sex and tax evasion,” which is done, he says, “not only by the Catholic religion’!

Gendron, who in addition to being Mayor is a radio host and political analyst for several media outlets, then goes on to describe in detail the antics of Fred Phelps and his nearly universally condemned organization. Phelps’ group, which pickets funerals with offensive signs, has been denounced by every major faith and family group.

Recent investigations of Phelps reveal that he has close ties to Democrats and substantial income that cannot be explained by his supposed Christian ministry. This has led some to speculate that his extreme antics may be a fraudulent strategy to discredit social Conservatives.

Gendron, a supporter of abortion and same-sex ‘marriage,’ stirs outrage with Phelps’ antics to call for actions against all religions which oppose homosexual sex acts. He says of such religions, “Why tolerate an organization which contradicts human values that we have taken thousands of years to understand and develop?”

Gendron concluded his blog entry advocating government control over religion saying, “Why live in accordance to religious values prescribed millenniums before us? Isn’t life too short to confine yourself in dogmas written in a time when man was almost nothing?”

The Quebec paper Le Soleil reports that Gendron was actually approached last year by the federal Conservative Party to run as a candidate. He told the paper that Federal transportation minister Lawrence Cannon was attempting to recruit him as a candidate.

Gendron is no stranger to controversy. In August 2006 he said in an interview with Le Soleil that “Israelis are modern-day Nazis,” and after a public outcry claimed he was only referring to the current Government of Israel.

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