WOMEN OF FAITH

See the Women Of Faith website at http://www.womenoffaith.com/ Excellent organization for, well, women of faith. Check their listings of conferences for one near you.

YOU DIDN'T HEAR THE POPE'S AFFIRMATION OF TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE? THERE'S A REASON.

You didn't hear Pope Francis affirmation of traditional marriage? There's a reason. The press that previously embraced him didn't like his comments so they gave it scant coverage.

See column  below by Terry Mattingly:

http://www.getreligion.org/getreligion/2015/6/17/that-other-papal-statement-heres-your-rare-250-word-rns-report-on-a-gay-rights-issue?utm_content=bufferac6ff&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

RESPONDING TO CANADA'S DEADLINE FOR ASSISTED SUICIDE

My dear friends at Canada's Association for Reformed Political

Action (ARPA) have put together an important video for Canadian Christians during these months leading to the deadline for assisted suicide legislation impose by the Supreme Court of Canada. I urge Canadian readers of this blog to watch the video and respond as ARPA Executive Director, Mark Penninga urges. 

There is a line Canada must not cross in how we behave toward the sick, disabled and depressed and my nation stands at the edge of it.

I ask American readers of the HumanLifeMatters blog to watch the video (below) laying out the precarious position Canada is in with regards to assisted suicide and fight against it with tenacity when legislation come to your state. If you are in a state that has already legalized it, establish or support ministries that reach out to vulnerable populations.

[Click on image below or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2ITKY00dKU]

SOCRATES MEETS JESUS (THE PLAY)

This blog post requires an hour and ten minutes of your time. Sorry about that. Below is a YouTube link to a play called "Socrates Meets Jesus" taken from a 2002 book of the same name by Peter Kreeft. The play was written by Kevin O'Brien and delivered by an amateur theatre group in Worcester, Massachusetts, at a 2013 conference of the American Chesterton Society. 

From the video: After reading the Bible Socrates says he is surprised by the name of God: I AM, That I AM. (Exodus 3.14)

"That name seemed very special to me. ... When He is telling his name He is telling us his identity, His nature. He is 'Being' itself -- "AM", as well as personhood "I" -- I AM. That revelation to Moses was utterly unique and unpredictable."

[Click on image below or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWxop3Kz8Fg ]

CALIFORNIA'S BILL FOR EUTHANASIA AND ASSISTED SUICIDE

Below is the text of an email I sent to California's State Senators on 02 June 2015 regarding the state's euthanasia/assisted suicide bill SB-128 presently being considered. I am informed it will be before the Senate this week.

______________________________

To: The Hon. Bill Monning, California State Senate Majority Leader, The Hon. Bob Huff, California State Senate Minority Leader

Dear Senators:

Please forward this email to your senators prior to debating Senate Bill 128.

You will soon be considering Senate Bill 128 “End of Life Option Act”. It would enact an Oregon style assisted suicide/euthanasia law for terminally ill Californians. I ask you to reject this bill outright. As you're probably aware, as the Oregon experience verifies, the parameters of laws quickly move outside terminal illness to include non-terminal chronic illness and disability.

I have been incurably ill and disabled with degenerative multiple sclerosis (MS) for over 30 years. During the early years with my disease, my sorrow was so deep and my heartache so sharp, my judgement became clouded by grief. Had I not been surrounded by people who lifted up my value – even when I doubted my own value – I might have taken my life at a low point. When I was a 30 year old man, before the onset of MS, if some clairvoyant told me I would one day be in an electric wheelchair with only 1 limb unimpaired by disease, I would have rejected such a life. Back then, being able-bodied, active and athletic defined quality of life for me. And yet today, at the age of 62, my life has quality. Why? My standard for quality of life changed over time. Today what gives me quality of life is to love and to be loved. I have five beautiful grandchildren I would never have known if assisted suicide had been available to me during the 1980s.

I am a Canadian. As you know Canada’s Supreme Court recently struck down my nation’s laws against assisted suicide, opening wide the gates for physician assisted killing of suicidal sick and disabled people. Please do not take California down a similar path. It is not the hallmark of a “civil society”. There is nothing civilized about euthanasia or assisted suicide. Do not be fooled by euphemisms for killing like “death with dignity”. Dignity is not bestowed on people by injecting them with poison when they are at their lowest point. That is abandonment not dignity. Death with dignity is not an event, it is a process, the end result of having lived a life with dignity, benefiting from the best 21st Century palliative care (which is capable of eliminating physical pain), and being surrounded by loved ones.

Someone may say “What about those who do not have loved ones?” Precisely! What about them? Is the answer to euthanize them or seek to include them within the tender embrace of community? Another person may say, “I should have the autonomous right to determine the time and place of my own death.” Really? That presumes decisions only affect the individual making them. That is not true. Our decisions always impact others. The idea independent personal autonomy is diametrically opposed to the concept of interdependent community.

If I choose suicide (assisted or otherwise) it will not affect just me: It will affect my wife, children and grandchildren. It will impact my community and my doctor for I will ask her to stop being my healer and  become my killer. And it will affect my nation by helping to entrench the notion that there are some lives unworthy to be lived.

No, good senators of California, do not pass SB 128. Seek options that affirm life with dignity -- even when that life is drawing to its close.  I have such love and affection for America; I do not want to see more states passing legislation that allows the taking of human life.  It makes a nation poorer not richer. I can tell you that with the real dread and apprehension of my nation of Canada.

I am,

Respectfully yours,

Mark Davis Pickup

Canada

TEACH ORPHANS TO SEW AND YOU CLOTHE THEM FOR A LIFETIME

http://www.gofundme.com/vvqtt8

There is an ancient proverb that says,"Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach him to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." So true.

My wife, LaRee Pickup, has been invited by Hands Across The Sea (HATS) orphanage and school in Haiti, to teach sewing to their children. 

Give children a garment you clothe them for a while. Teach them to sew and you clothe them for a lifetime. 

LaRee leaves for Haiti at the end of June. 

CENTRAL SEWING of Edmonton, Canada, has donated sewing machines which LaRee will have shipped to the orphanage before she leaves for Haiti. LaRee still needs supplies. To donate to this mission trip click on the link at the top of this post. 

Thank you. -- Mark

MY ARTICLE "A BATTERING RAM OF LIBERALISM" RE-PUBLISHED IN AMERICA

This morning, the American Life League (Stafford Virginia) re-

published my May 6th blog post "A BATTERING RAM OF LIBERALISM" on their website. This website reaches a massive Catholic audience across the United States.
See http://www.all.org/article/index/id/MTQ4Mzk/