Author Archive for Ben Johnson

Undercover Video Catches Planned Parenthood Selling Aborted Baby Body Parts
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Undercover Video Catches Planned Parenthood Selling Aborted Baby Body Parts

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An undercover video released yesterday morning shows a national leader of Planned Parenthood admitting that the abortion provider uses the illegal and highly controversial partial birth abortion procedure to sell intact fetal body parts. The average asking price for fetal body parts? Between $30 and $100 per specimen. Dr. Deborah Nucatola has been senior director […]

Supreme Court Upholds Obamacare Subsidies in 6-3 Decision
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Supreme Court Upholds Obamacare Subsidies in 6-3 Decision

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The Supreme Court has upheld the Obama administration’s controversial implementation of the Affordable Care Act in a 6-3 decision yesterday morning. Americans are required to purchase an insurance program that follows federal guidelines, including no co-pay coverage of contraception, sterilization, and abortion-inducing drugs. In some cases, this includes a $1 abortion surcharge. The federal government […]

US Supreme Court Asks What Defines Marriage in Oral Arguments
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US Supreme Court Asks What Defines Marriage in Oral Arguments

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As they prepare to render a potential landmark legal decision on the issue of same-sex “marriage,” the Supreme Court’s justices made clear that their verdict will rest on a few questions: Is marriage based on biology or feelings? Who should decide whether to redefine an institution that stretches back for “millennia”? If justices begin tampering […]

UN Official Says Catholic Teaching on Abortion May be a Form of ‘Torture’
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UN Official Says Catholic Teaching on Abortion May be a Form of ‘Torture’

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During hearings that one participant described as “surreal,” United Nations representatives this week suggested that the Catholic Church’s opposition to abortion in the case of rape and incest constitute a violation of the UN Charter Against Torture. The Vatican was called before a two-day hearing in Geneva so a UN committee could question whether its […]

Judge’s Ruling Puts Polygamy on the Way to Legal Recognition
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Judge’s Ruling Puts Polygamy on the Way to Legal Recognition

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A federal judge may have put polygamy on its first step to legal recognition, striking down part of a Utah law that criminalized plural marriage. The lawsuit was brought by Kody Brown, star of the TLC reality series Sister Wives. Brown lives with Meri, Janelle, Christine, and Robyn, and their brood of 17 children. However, […]

Malta: Europe’s ‘Last Man Standing’ Against Abortion
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Malta: Europe’s ‘Last Man Standing’ Against Abortion

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With Ireland having passed its law allowing abortion, without gestational age limits, in cases where a woman threatens suicide, the tiny island nation of Malta has become the European Union’s last man standing against abortion. Malta’s MEPs were among a small bloc at the EU who worked against the recent failed proposal by socialists and […]

Catholic Bishops Say ENDA Could ‘Punish’ Traditional Religious Views
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Catholic Bishops Say ENDA Could ‘Punish’ Traditional Religious Views

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A bill to forbid “discrimination” against homosexuals and transgender employees could “punish” those who hold to traditional views about sexuality and biology, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) warns. The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) would penalize employers accused of discriminating against gay, bisexual, or transgender employees. But the Catholic bishops and other Christian critics […]

New Jersey Judge Rules State Must Recognize Same-Sex ‘Marriage’
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New Jersey Judge Rules State Must Recognize Same-Sex ‘Marriage’

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A New Jersey judge ruled on Friday that the state’s law protecting marriage as the union between a man and a woman violates the state constitution. Mercer County Superior Court Judge Mary Jacobson specifically cited the U.S. Supreme Court ruling striking down part of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in saying the state must […]

Report: 11,000 Late-Term Abortions Take Place a Year in the U.S.
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Report: 11,000 Late-Term Abortions Take Place a Year in the U.S.

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Some 11,000 American children are aborted every year after the 20th week of pregnancy, according to figures contained in a new Congressional report on the cost of banning such procedures. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is required by law to perform a cost estimate for every bill pending in Washington, so legislators will know the […]

House Passes Nationwide Ban on Abortions After 20 Weeks
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House Passes Nationwide Ban on Abortions After 20 Weeks

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The House of Representatives has passed a bill that would restrict all abortions nationwide to the first 20 weeks of pregnancy. The “Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act” (H.R. 1797), introduced by Arizona Republica Trent Franks, would end abortion after the point when scientists agree unborn children can feel pain. In a nearly party-line vote, the […]

IRS Ordered Pro-Life Group Not to Protest Planned Parenthood
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IRS Ordered Pro-Life Group Not to Protest Planned Parenthood

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When the Coalition for Life of Iowa applied to the IRS for tax-exempt status just as Barack Obama was about to take office, CFLI President Susan Martinek expected a rigorous process requiring full disclosure of all relevant information. But she told Congress yesterday morning there were a few things she had not anticipated: That the […]

A Roundup of Abortion/Marriage Legislation Around the Country
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A Roundup of Abortion/Marriage Legislation Around the Country

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As the Kermit Gosnell trial has led to a renewed surge in pro-life regulations, the abortion lobby and its allies on the political Left are suing to overturn the will of the people, on often confusing grounds. And California leads the way with multiple laws to expand abortion, punish those who object to homosexuality, and […]

Kermit Gosnell Convicted of First-Degree Murder
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Kermit Gosnell Convicted of First-Degree Murder

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A Philadelphia jury has found late-term abortionist Kermit Gosnell guilty of murdering three of four babies in his capital murder trial. He is also guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the 2009 abortion death of Karnamaya Mongar, a 41-year-old legal immigrant who died when his untrained staff administered an overdose of sedatives. The jury found Gosnell […]

DOMA Comes Under Fire at Supreme Court
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DOMA Comes Under Fire at Supreme Court

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The legislative impact of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) came under heavy fire during oral arguments before the Supreme Court yesterday, with enough justices questioning its effect to signal it may be struck down on states’ rights grounds. Meanwhile, the court’s conservative wing wondered if the “new regime” had instituted a “new world” […]

Pro-life Leaders Say Pope Francis Will Inspire the World to 'Promote the Culture of Life'
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Pro-life Leaders Say Pope Francis Will Inspire the World to ‘Promote the Culture of Life’

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Members of the pro-life and pro-family community say they are overjoyed at the selection of Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio as the new Pope of the Roman Catholic Church. As LifeSiteNews reported in 2007, the new pope, Francis, has called abortion the “death penalty” for the unborn. He has also taken a strong stance in favor of […]

NYC Schools Dispensed 12,721 Doses of Plan B Last Year Without Parental Consent
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NYC Schools Dispensed 12,721 Doses of Plan B Last Year Without Parental Consent

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New York City schools distributed 12,721 doses of the “Morning-After Pill” to students last year, according to documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. The 40 school-based “health centers” also performed thousands of injections of long-term contraception and implanted intrauterine devices (IUDs). Under state law, schools do not need to obtain parental consent to dispense […]

Dwelling on the Meaning of the Incarnation
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Dwelling on the Meaning of the Incarnation

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If properly understood, the Christmas holiday would be enough, not only to end abortion, but to destroy all sin. Even sentimental secularists wince when they connect the feast of Jesus as a Baby with the millions of discarded unborn. As resourceful people, they change the subject or take shelter in a quick mental hiding place […]

Supreme Court Will Hear DOMA, Proposition 8 cases
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Supreme Court Will Hear DOMA, Proposition 8 cases

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All nine justices of the U.S. Supreme Court announced on Friday that they will hear two cases dealing with same-sex “marriage” in 2013, examining whether the U.S. Congress or the voters in any state have the right to preserve the traditional definition of marriage. Both the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and California’s Proposition […]

UN Agency Declares Birth Control a 'Human Right'
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UN Agency Declares Birth Control a ‘Human Right’

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For the first time in its history, a United Nations agency, UNFPA, has declared access to contraception “a human right.” “Family planning is a human right. It must therefore be available to all who want it,” declares the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) annual report. “But clearly this right has not yet been extended to all.” […]

Supreme Court Upholds Obama Health Care Law
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Supreme Court Upholds Obama Health Care Law

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Kathleen Gilbert contributed to this breaking story. The Supreme Court has ruled the insurance requirement embedded in President Obama’s federal health care law is constitutional in a 5-4 decision Thursday morning. The High Court’s swing vote came from Chief Justice John Roberts, who was appointed by President George W. Bush. He joined the court’s liberal […]

43 Catholic Organizations Sue Obama Administration Over HHS Mandate
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43 Catholic Organizations Sue Obama Administration Over HHS Mandate

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In a coordinated defense of religious liberty, at 11 a.m. yesterday 43 Roman Catholic organizations filed a dozen lawsuits nationwide to strike down the HHS mandate. The plaintiffs include some of the most significant organs of the U.S. church, including the Archdioceses of New York, Washington, D.C., and St. Louis; the Dioceses of Dallas, Fort […]

Franciscan University of Steubenville Drops Student Health Plan Over HHS Mandate
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Franciscan University of Steubenville Drops Student Health Plan Over HHS Mandate

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Catholic religious leaders have warned that religious institutions may be forced to stop providing health care coverage if the Department of Health and Human Services does not change its mandate to provide contraceptives, including abortifacients, as part of their health care plans. Yeseterday, the first Catholic university has followed through by dropping its health care […]

Adam and Eve after the Pill: the Devastating Fallout of the Sexual Revolution
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Adam and Eve after the Pill: the Devastating Fallout of the Sexual Revolution

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Occasionally, a book perfectly marries expert insight with the tone and interests of its audience. Mary Eberstadt’s Adam and Eve After the Pill: Paradoxes of the Sexual Revolution (Ignatius Press) is just such a serendipity. In a rejoinder to decades of sexual liberation barbs and sexually libertine behavior, Eberstadt’s thin but illuminating volume introduces female […]

Justice for Pro-Life Sidewalk Counselor
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Justice for Pro-Life Sidewalk Counselor

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The Justice Department has dropped charges against a Florida pro-life activist and agreed to pay $120,000 in attorney’s fees just days after Attorney General Eric Holder filed an appeal against a lower court’s ruling in favor of the pro-lifer. Susan Pine, the president of the non-profit organization FACE Life, told LifeSiteNews.com that she learned federal […]