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Priest Advises a “Brokeback Lent”, Homily Encourages Propaganda Film

By John-Henry Westen

BOSTON, March 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The homosexual propaganda film Brokeback Mountain, besides winning three Oscars over the weekend, has shown itself as an adept tool for outing dissidents within the Catholic Church.  While committed Catholics have seen in the film as a dangerous propaganda tool which normalizes homosexuality, left-leaning Catholics have been hard-pressed to outdo one another in lauding the film.

First, the director for the USCCB Office for Film and Broadcasting Harry Forbes gushed over Brokeback saying, "Director Ang Lee tells the story with a sure sense of time and place, and presents the narrative in a way that is more palatable than would have been thought possible.”  (the review was substantially altered after LifeSiteNews.com exposed it http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/dec/05121607.html) 

Also, a prominent Dominican Leader, Rev. Tom Condon, student master for St. Martin de Porres Province of the Dominicans, lauded the film as “an engrossing story, a plea for tolerance, and a sad, emotional film that will touch anyone who has ever been in love.” ( http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/feb/06020703.html) 

Shortly thereafter, the liberal associate editor of Canada’s largest Catholic newspaper – the archdiocese of Toronto’s Catholic Register, extolled the films portrayal of the homosexual acts saying, “When the gay cowboy lovers first discover a way to be authentic with each other - truthful about their basic sexual attractions and the source of their happiness in each other - they achieve a resemblance to truth itself." (http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/feb/06021508.html)

 Finally, the new Archbishop of San Francisco, whose installation was appreciatively received by the homosexual community, called the film “very powerful”. (http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/feb/06021306.html)

The latest example has Father John Allan Loftus, S.J. the Director of the Jesuit Urban Center at the Boston Church of the Immaculate Conception recommending a “Brokeback Lent.”  In his homily for Ash Wednesday, March 1, Loftus urged congregants to watch the film. “I suspect many in this community have already seen Brokeback Mountain,” he said. “If not see it; if you have, see it again and reflect on the consequences of not being interiorly free, the consequences of not knowing who you really are and want to become, the tragic consequences and subsequent devastation that comes from only living in a ‘pretend’ world.”

Rev. Loftus proposed, contrary to Catholic teaching, that sexual sin is not real sin, whereas not giving in to one's desires is sin. “For too many of us, what we think of as ‘our sinfulness,’ our not yet even being the full human beings we are created to become, remains a paltry and cheap catalogue of peccadillos, usually having something to do with sex or not being ‘charitable’ toward each other.  Those so-called ‘sins’ are hardly worth setting aside 40 days each year to ponder; those sins of yours or mine are hardly worth mentioning, really.”  Loftus continued, “There is something much bigger at stake here than my petty sinfulness, my unkindness, my frustrated sex life, or my infuriating love life.  The sin that is before us always is our refusal to grow into the freedom for which we were born.”

The fact that Brokeback Mountain is a propaganda film to normalize homosexuality has been attested to by even the secular media, but has also been analyzed as such by an expert in the field.  Dr. R. Winfield, in an article on the controversial film writes, “Having studied propaganda and its effects on societies for over 50 years, I can state unequivocally that the film Brokeback Mountain is one of the most blatant propaganda pieces of recent times.”

Winfield’s must-read analysis of the film points out that scenery, music and lighting were all expertly utilized in the film to create a “most effective” piece of propaganda which “comes in under the radar, it's innocuous and appeals to our humanity and emotions.”  (see the full analysis: http://www.rense.com/general69/prop.htm )

To contact Boston Cardinal Sean O'Malley about Fr. Loftus

Seán Cardinal O'Malley, OFM Cap
Archbishop of Boston
Office:
2121 Commonwealth Av.
Boston, MA 02135-3192
Phone: 617-782-2544
FAX: 617-782-8358
http://www.rcab.org/Information/contactform.html

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The Pill: “the largest unregulated human trial that’s ever been conducted”

Birth Control Pill Link to Breast Cancer

By Terry Vanderheyden

CHICAGO, March 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A world leader in cancer causes and prevention has warned that the so-called birth control pill is “the largest unregulated human trial that’s ever been conducted.”

Dr. Sam Epstein, author of Cancer-Gate: How to Win the Losing Cancer War and Professor of Environmental and Occupational Medicine at the School of Public Health, University of Illinois at Chicago, told the CBC’s Marketplace that exposure to the hormones estrogen and progestin, as found in the pill, increase breast cancer risk.

Marketplace author Wendy Mesley, herself a breast cancer survivor, explained that the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer last year re-classified hormonal contraceptives as carcinogenic to humans.

Dr. Chris Kahlenborn, M.D. demonstrated that a woman who takes birth control pills before her first child is born has at least a 40 percent increased risk of developing breast cancer and a woman who has taken the pill for four or more years prior to the birth of her first child has a 72 percent risk factor in developing breast cancer. Dr. Kahlenborn’s book, “Breast cancer: Its link to abortion and the birth control pill,” published by One More Soul, is based on six years of study and a meticulous analysis of hundreds of scientific papers and other sources.

A European study, which looked at 103,000 women aged between 30 and 49 in Norway and Sweden found the risk of developing breast cancer rose by 26% for women who had taken the pill over those who had never used it. Moreover, women who had used the pill for long periods of time increased their risk of breast cancer by 58%. The study also found that women over 45 still using the pill had an increased risk of 144%.

The British Medical Journal revealed that the pill increases a woman’s risk of developing cerebrovascular disease by 1.9 times while increasing the tendency to cervical cancer by 2.5 times. The 25 year follow-up study with 46,000 British women also noted that the enhanced risk of death lasts for 10 years after women have stopped taking the pill.

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Professor Lies to Get Pro-Abortion Group into Catholic College

By Gudrun Schultz

BOSTON, Massachusetts, March 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A professor and a group of abortion activists at Boston College resorted to deception this week in order to bypass school officials and hold an abortion-rights panel discussion on university grounds.

The Women’s Health Initiative, an abortion rights group that is not recognized by the university, initially gained permission to hold the panel, called “The Future of Women’s Rights” by telling university officials that they were members of the College Democrats.

When the college discovered the deception, they withdrew permission for the panel.

BC sociology professor Charles Derber, who told the Boston Globe he supported the Women’s Health Initiative “in the name of academic freedom,’ then told the College he needed campus meeting space for the sociology department. The event took place that Tuesday afternoon.

Boston College does not recognize abortion rights groups. The university is a Jesuit school, and over 70 percent of the student body is Catholic. The school has a strong element of opposition to abortion, with at least three campus groups dedicated to supporting life. Last week was “Respect Life Week,” with students participating in a series of vigils against abortion.

Organizers of the abortion rights panel admitted that they misrepresented themselves as members of the College Democrats because they knew their group would not get permission to use campus space.

“The students from the Women’s Heath Initiative, in essence, were being duplicitous in trying to sponsor a prochoice event at a Catholic institution,” Jack Dunn, the school spokesman, told the Boston Globe.  

The abortion rights panel discussion, which drew some 80 students, featured the public affairs director for Planned Parenthood, along with three academics who are abortion rights supporters.

In December 2005, the university refused to permit a campus dance sponsored by a gay and lesbian group. The school said allowing the dance would be advocating homosexuality in opposition to the teaching of the Catholic Church.

To express support to Boston College, contact:

Academic Vice President and Dean of Faculties Cutberto Garza at
bert.garza@bc.edu
 
or

Administrative assistant to BC president William Leahy, SJ
denise.williams.1@bc.edu

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Churchgoers Shift towards Conservatives Driven by Moral Issues like Gay “Marriage”

By Terry Vanderheyden

OTTAWA, March 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Conservative Party popularity among churchgoers, and especially among Protestants, increased significantly this past federal election – driven largely by moral issues such as same-sex “marriage.”

Protestant churchgoers were 25% more likely to vote Conservative as compared to previous elections, according to an Ipsos-Reid Poll. And among churchgoing Catholics in Quebec, votes for the Liberal party were cut roughly in half compared to 2004.

“For the first time in the history of polling, Catholics who are regular churchgoers shifted away from the lending the largest measure of their support to the Liberals (42 percent voted Conservative, 40 percent Liberal),” as reported by Faith Today. Those who attend Catholic Church services more than once weekly were even more likely to vote for Stephen Harper. Ipsos-Reid identified moral issues like same-sex “marriage” as a key issue, with corruption in the Liberal party as a secondary concern.

See the Faith Today report:
http://www.faithtoday.ca/article_viewer.asp?Article_ID=198

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Canada “Not Ready” for Assisted Suicide Debate – Liberal Senator

by Hilary White

TORONTO, March 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Senator Sharon Carstairs, a Chretien appointee, spoke at St. Michael’s College at the University of Toronto on Friday on the situation of palliative care in Canada.

Senator Carstairs, once considered one of Canada’s most enthusiastic supporters of euthanasia and assisted suicide, seems to be softening her views. Speaking at the invitation of the Canadian Catholic Bioethics Institute, Carstairs said that Canada is “not ready” for a debate on assisted suicide or euthanasia until there is a comprehensive and quality end of life care available to all Canadians.

Regarding the push to establish an assisted suicide law in Canada, she responded, “I say we should change the tenor of the debate.”

“Unless every single Canadian can be guaranteed quality end of life care in which they have a legitimate choice to make, then I would suggest that we cannot start that other debate. We aren’t there yet. We are a long way from being there yet,” Carstairs continued.

In her reports on palliative care in Canada, Carstairs maintains that universal standards of care at the end of life must be established before assisted suicide can even be discussed. These standards, however, are the subject of much debate and in professional bioethics circles, even in Catholic institutions, support for euthanasia by dehydration and starvation is strong.

“If a person says to me, ‘I want to commit suicide,’ I would ask him what his needs are.” She said, people fear unbearable pain and loss of personal dignity and that the real challenge is to change public attitudes towards illness and dying. “Why have they lost their dignity? Is it because we have made them feel undignified?”

When asked directly if there were plans for Canada to follow the so-called Dutch model of legalized assisted suicide, which in the Netherlands is applied even to infants, Carstairs again said that Canada is not in a position yet to address the issue adequately. “There may come a time when we will have a debate on euthanasia and assisted suicide, but I would suggest to you that it is not now.”

Alex Schadenberg, executive director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition attended the talk and told LifeSiteNews.com, that Carstairs’ position is generally against assisted suicide, which is important considering that she knows Bloc Québécois MP Francine Lalonde will bring back another assisted suicide bill.

“If even Sharon Carstairs is saying that we are not ready for assisted suicide legislation, then we should take seriously the problem that we are not providing adequate palliative care in Canada now,” Schadenberg said.

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EU Court Denies Woman Her Frozen Embryos After Ex-Fiancé Refuses Permission

By Gudrun Schultz

STRASBOURG, France, March 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The European Court of Human Rights has ruled against a woman who wants to use her stored frozen embryos to have a baby.

Natallie Evens was left infertile after treatment for ovarian cancer, reported the BBC. She underwent IVF before the procedure to create children that were then placed in storage, with the collaboration of her partner at the time, Howard Johnston.

The couple has since split up, and Mr. Johnston has withdrawn consent for the embryos to be used.

Ms. Evans exhausted the UK courts before taking her case to Strasbourg. Her lawyers argued that the UK law, which will see her six stored embryos destroyed in October of this year, is a breach of her human rights.

Under UK law, both the man and the woman must give consent for IVF procedures, and that consent can be withdrawn up until the time of implantation. There is a five-year limit on the storage of embryos after one partner withdraws consent, after which they must be destroyed.

Ms. Evans lost her case before both the UK Court of Appeals and the High Court, and she failed in her attempt to take the case before the House of Lords.

The Strasbourg Court ruled, in a majority verdict, that Mr. Johnston’s right to withdraw consent overrode Ms. Evans’ right to a family life, found in article eight of the European Convention of Human Rights.

The court also decided unanimously that the embryos did not have an independent right to life.

Josephine Quintavalle of the pro-life group Comment on Reproductive Ethics, said of the court’s ruling: “It’s an inevitable judgement, but a very sad one.” She told the BBC Mr. Johnston had “become a father” when the embryos were created, and should have compassion for Ms. Evans.

Ms. Evans now intends to appeal the ruling to the Grand Jury of the European Court.

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Doctors Seek to Withdraw Life Support from 17-Month Old With Muscular Disorder

By Gudrun Schultz

UNITED KINGDOM, March 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Doctors of a 17-month old baby with normal brain function are petitioning for permission to take him off the ventilator he needs to help him breath.

The child’s doctors say the severe muscular atrophy he was born with gives him an “intolerable quality of life.” Born with a genetic disorder known as spinal muscular atrophy, the child’s condition in time will lead to almost complete paralysis.

The boy’s parents (no one involved in the case can be named) are fighting the doctors in court, the BBC reported today. They say his quality of life is reasonable—he can recognize them and respond to them, and he is happy when he spends time with his family.

“We are hopeful we can persuade the court that his quality of life is good enough so that treatment should not be withdrawn,” the boy’s mother said.

One doctor argued that the baby’s inability to indicate pain or distress had to be considered. As well, he said the child was going to experience a period of blindness, caused by treatment of his condition, and that splints used on his hands and feet periodically caused “discomfort.” He would also be at risk for fractures of his arms and legs during normal handling.

The child’s neurologist suggested the baby does not have normal mental capacity, but he said it was impossible to determine that for certain since the child cannot respond.

The case will be the first time a court has been asked to make a life or death ruling on a child with normal or near-normal levels of cognitive function, said Mr. Justice Holman who is hearing the case.

The incurable disease is a recessive genetic condition that affects one in 6,400 newborns.             

See LifeSiteNews coverage of related issues:

Dutch Say Child Euthanasia Happening Around the World
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2004/dec/04121407.html

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Liberal Columnist Admits it May be Time for “Liberal Catholics” to Leave the Church

by Hilary White

BOSTON, March 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – In a pair of dueling op-ed pieces, two regular contributors to the Boston Globe have laid out what the Globe thinks is the essence of the struggle between the Catholic bishops of Massachusetts and the state. The bishops are seeking legal means to opt out of the state’s requirement that they include homosexual partners in child adoptions through Catholic Charities.

The columnists, Jeff Jacoby and Joan Vennochi represent what the Boston Globe considers the two sides of a purely political debate: the former giving the “conservative” position and the latter, the “liberal” side.

The difference between them from a Catholic perspective is more significant, however. Jacoby is an observant Jew and says that since the Catholic Church is an independent religious body it can make up its own rules no matter how offensive some may find them. But Vennochi is a dissenting “liberal Catholic,” who is well known for her published diatribes against Catholic teaching. In former times she would have been billed as a “lapsed” not “liberal” Catholic.

Vennochi passes over the question of whether the Catholic Church should be forced to conform to secular values, and asks a question that frustrated faithful Catholics have been asking for decades, “Should Liberal Catholics Leave the Church?”

Characterizing Boston Archbishop Sean O’Malley as a “conservative”, Vennochi says that the Pope having named him as a cardinal, “is clear message to liberal Catholics who still hope the Catholic Church will shift their way: It isn't shifting.”

Vennochi complains, “Every pronouncement from Pope Benedict XVI draws another line between official church doctrine and liberal ideology. When do liberals choose one side or the other?”

“Liberals raised as Catholics,” she writes. “…think we can be prochoice, pro-gay marriage, pro-gay adoption, and in favor of married and female priests and still call ourselves Catholic. The people who make the rules say we don't meet the criteria.”

Vennochi reveals her attraction to Catholicism is based not on any love of its teaching, but on romantic attachment to its externals. Liberals stay in, she says, because of fond memories of “the lacy white communion dress and the innocence of childhood confessions.”

Vennochi has discovered that Catholicism is not an ethnicity that focuses on costumes and rituals, but a religion with a unified system of religious tenets that anyone is free to accept or reject and which are largely opposed to the tenets of secular, feminist liberalism.

“But give Vennochi credit,” writes Diogenes, the popular pseudonymous blogger for Catholic World Report. “Her column honestly raises the question of whether liberals should continue to profess membership in a Church whose doctrines they regard as-- her word—‘neanderthal.’”

Diogenes goes on to chastise Catholic authorities for failing to explain the reason behind the Catholic objection to homosexuality and gay adoptions.

A small group of US Catholic bishops have taken the opportunity for the “teaching moment” however, including Boston’s O’Malley who said in 2004, that Catholic objection to homosexuality is because of reverence for human dignity. “In reality we must communicate the exact opposite: 'Because we love you, we cannot accept your behavior,” he said.

Read Vennochi’s column:
Should Liberals Leave Catholic Church?
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/arti...

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California Court Overturns Sex Offender Registration for Oral Sex with a Minor

55 year-old with 16 year-old no longer a serious sex offence claims court

By Terry Vanderheyden

SAN FRANCISCO, March 7, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The California Supreme Court has overturned a law requiring that an adult who engages in oral sex with a minor be tagged for life as a sex offender.

The court handed down the 6-1 decision, arguing that for a 60 year-old to sexually abuse a 16 year-old is not serious enough an offense to warrant registration as a sex offender.

The sex offences registry law, promulgated in 1947, “violates the equal protection clauses of the federal and state constitutions,” said Justice Joyce Kennard for the majority, according to the AP.

Because the age of consent for consensual sex in California is 18, adults who have sexual intercourse with a minor age 16-17 had not been subject to sex offender registration. Sexual intercourse of any form with a child under the age of 16 would still require mandatory registration as a sex offender.

A lawsuit challenging the law was forwarded by 22-year-old Vincent Peter Hofsheier, convicted in 2003 for oral sex with a minor girl, aged 16, he met in an internet chat room. As reported by the L.A. Times, after getting the girl and a friend drunk, he told the teenager, “You owe me something,” as related by Justice Marvin R. Baxter, the only dissenting justice in the decision.

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LifeSiteNews.com NewsBytes

Episcopalian priest became Wiccan after reading Harry Potter
http://www.battlecreekenquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID...

U.S. Broadcast Indecency Bill Refined
http://www.family.org/cforum/fnif/news/a0039735.cfm

Attorney Hopes Illinois Will Pass Measure Protecting Pro-Life Pharmacists
http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/3/afa/32006f.asp

Quebec Tories get orders to set up election troops in all 75 ridings
http://www.thehilltimes.ca/html/index.php?display=story&...

Canadian Political parties in state of deep decline, political operatives say
http://www.thehilltimes.ca/html/index.php?display=story&...

World experts submit amicus briefs to stop legalization of abortion in Colombia
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=6162

Gaining headway: Colorado Catholic Bishops endorse revised sexual abuse bill, continue to fight another
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=6161

"Crash" stuns Oscars, wins best film
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060306/ts_nm/oscars_dc

Nevada May Consider Evolution Constitutional Amendment
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0039712.cfm

Disgraced South Korean scientist admits faking research
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_asiapacific/view/...

Homosexual Activists Launch New Attack on Ex-Gay Movement
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0039736.cfm

South Dakota pro-lifers are targets of eggs and threatening calls.
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0039731.cfm

Kids' TV Not as Harmless as Parents Might Think - Study finds more violence than in adult programs
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0039729.cfm

Alito Says Thank You; Liberals Cry Foul - A simple note of appreciation turns into a media storm.
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0039713.cfm

Abortion charge against woman won't hold up, attorney says
http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story.cfm?story=100574&...

The feminist anti-kid crusade
http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/careyroberts/2006/03...

Killers of Catholic youth, Javed Anjum, sentenced
http://www.asianews.it/view.php?l=en&art=5556

New Delhi fights “monstrous” crime of female foeticide
http://www.asianews.it/view.php?l=en&art=5558

Aborting Roe: State Abortion Bans Have Potential To Do More Than Overturn The Landmark Abortion Ruling
http://www.operationrescue.org/?p=360

ADF steps in after atheist entity challenges status of collegiate Catholic group
http://www.alliancedefensefund.org/news/story.aspx?cid=3695

Catholic bishops in Philippines speak of imprisonment fears
http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/content/news_syndication/article_0...

Collective Gasp as 'Brokeback' Fails to Win Top Honor
http://newsbusters.org/node/4309

WashPost On Hollywood's Lust for Liberalism -- Oops, "Social Issues"
http://newsbusters.org/node/4312

All the Bishops' Boys - California Prelates Will Continue to Ordain Homosexuals
http://catholiccitizens.org/press/contentview.asp?c=32165

Stem-cell filibuster hinges on 6 Democrats
http://washtimes.com/metro/20060305-111411-5190r.htm

Faith in 'Miracle Cures' Is Fading in South Korea
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-stemcell...

Italian journalist calls for Catholic “Anti-defamation League”
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=6144

Spanish Trans-Sexuals Can Choose Their Jails
http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1892464...

Conservative Jews Reconsider Same-Sex Unions, Gay Rabbis
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/06/national/06rabbi.html?_r=1...

Drudge: CBS Bosses Thank Howard Stern for "Record Revenue"
http://www.drudgereport.com/flash3hsa.htm

Peggy Noon on Embarrassing the Angels
http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/pnoonan/

Massachusetts Bishops' ban on homosexual adoptions may cost millions
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2006...

Los Angeles Times And New York Times Hypocritical on Religious Speech
http://www.catholicleague.org/06press_releases/quarter%201/0...

Left-Leaning Cardinal Sodano Headed for Replacement Says Vatican Expert
http://www.chiesa.espressonline.it/dettaglio.jsp?id=46410&am...

Nampa Woman Drives Car Through Anti-Abortion Rally
http://www.kpvi.com/index.cfm?page=nbcheadlines.cfm&ID=3...

Pro-abortion Students rip down pro-life posters
http://www.kpvi.com/index.cfm?page=nbcheadlines.cfm&ID=3...

Lesbian Named School's Homecoming King
http://www.fredericknewspost.com/sections/news/display.htm?s...

Chaput to flock: hit back - Archbishop claims pending abuse laws a 'systematic' attack against Church
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,D...

Orthodox Church raps 'Da Vinci Code'
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/view.php?StoryID=20060302-01491...

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