Monthly Archives: October 2019

What the Pink Ribbon Campaign Leaves Out

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by Bonnie Finnerty, Education Director

breast cancer ribbon

Breast Cancer Awareness Month is here and gone, a very worthwhile effort to be pro-active in preventing the second leading cause of cancer deaths in women. Because of heightened awareness, earlier detection, and medical advances, more women are, thankfully, able to live longer and live better.

Yet, despite the ubiquitous pink ribbons, community fundraisers, and plentiful media attention we witnessed this past month, one critical piece of information is continuously omitted.  Planned Parenthood did not include it in their breast cancer awareness email this month, nor did the Susan G. Komen Foundation in their solicitation letter to me.

Induced abortion increases breast cancer risk.

Research studies on this topic are being ignored by the very people who claim to be women’s champions against breast cancer. But the facts are undeniable. The Breast Cancer Prevention Institute website (www.bcpinstitute.org) provides fact sheets referencing studies that establish a link between abortion and breast cancer. A comprehensive explanation is also provided.

In short, during the first 32 weeks of pregnancy, there are significant changes in breast tissue that increase the risk of breast cancer. After 32 weeks, elevated pregnancy hormones allow sufficient maturation of cancer-resistant breast tissue to occur. “Therefore, whether a pregnancy ends before 32 weeks with a premature birth, a second-trimester spontaneous abortion (this is, miscarriage), or an induced abortion, a woman’s risk of breast cancer is increased.”

A woman who chooses to abort “will deny herself the risk-lowering effects of full-term pregnancy, and will either remain childless or delay pregnancy, both of which increase her risk of premenopausal breast cancer at a rate of 5 percent per year of delay.” Even without the other factors, abortion itself poses an independent risk of breast cancer.

Breast cancer in pre-menopausal women has increased alarmingly over the last several decades. In a study published in the 2013 Journal of the American Medical Association, rates of metastasized breast cancer in women aged 25-39 were shown to rise 2% every year from 1976 through 2009.

It makes sense that when a natural process of the body is suddenly halted by an outside force, there are consequences. In the case of abortion, one such consequence is an increased risk of breast cancer.

But you certainly will not hear this from Planned Parenthood, who has almost tripled the number of abortions they perform since 1990. Acknowledging the link between abortion and breast cancer would not only compromise the most profitable segment of their business, such disclosure would shatter the oft-promoted illusion of caring for women by providing breast cancer screenings. In truth, the abortion giant does not provide mammograms anywhere to anyone and during the last 10 years their breast cancer exams have dropped by 65%.

Furthermore, it’s disturbing that Susan G. Komen has sent hundreds of thousands of dollars to Planned Parenthood over the years.  The organization that is supposed to be waging war against breast cancer is helping to feed an organization that provides a service linked to breast cancer. How is this good for women?

I’m all for pink ribbons, but I am even more so for full disclosure of the truth. It’s what every woman deserves.

A Seed Planted: The Beautiful Fruits of a School Pro-Life Club

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By Bonnie Finnerty, Education DirectorIMG_0075Pregnant with her first child in 1973 when Roe vs Wade was handed down, Connie Fenice hoped that legalized abortion in this country would be short-lived. Like so many others, she was dismayed to instead see a culture of death take hold.  In 1994, as a new teacher at St. Margaret Mary Catholic School in the Diocese of Harrisburg, she decided to do something that has had a long-lasting impact. She started a student-led pro-life club, an organization that is now entering its 26th year and has yielded great fruit for the pro-life movement.

Connie’s goal was to heighten awareness of the sanctity of all human life through education and prayer.  Every month students updated a pro-life bulletin board with information and pictures on fetal development, a visible sign to the whole school on the miracle of pre-born life.  This ritual still carries on today.

For a quarter century, the Children of Mary Pro-Life Club has participated in a variety of activities. They’ve attended the annual Life Chain held in October and the Walk for Life benefiting a local pregnancy center. They’ve organized school-wide drives to collect items for a maternity home and then visited the home to learn more about that ministry. They’ve hosted baby showers, sold cupcakes and lifesaver lollipops, and raised money through a Baby Bottle Blessing Collection.

But perhaps most fruitful is the Spiritual Adoption program. Early in the school year, students are invited to spiritually adopt and name their baby. During the next nine months, they follow the baby’s growth, praying that the mother will have the love and support needed to choose life for her child. A baby carriage with a 12-week-old fetal model is placed upon the prayer table in each classroom, while every month a student leader shares information about fetal development over the school PA system.  A few years ago during daily prayer intentions, a student spontaneously prayed aloud for her spiritually adopted child and soon all the students followed her example, remembering publicly every day the life for which they had promised to pray.

When Connie transferred to the local Catholic high school several years later, she became co-moderator of their large, robust pro-life club. She was gratified that many of the officers and active members were from the elementary club she had started.   Some of these students went on to become teachers and pro-life leaders themselves, carrying within them the profound life lessons that were nurtured early on. In this way the pro-life seeds long ago sown continue to bear new fruit.

All of Connie’s children were active in pro-life activities through college. Her oldest child’s five children have all been leaders in the pro-life club that their grandmother started. This is bittersweet, as Connie explains, “I would not have wished to see the child that I was carrying when Roe v Wade was passed grow up to face the same issue. I would have thought that surely her children, my grandchildren, would not have to be part of the struggle. But it gives me great hope to watch this new generation, armed with knowledge, drawing from 46 years of the aftermath of such a terrible Supreme Court decision, go forward and take up the battle.  It is these beautiful young faces that we see at the March for Life each year. It is their love, their energy that uplifts me and gives me the courage to continue the fight.”

Now retired from teaching, Connie coordinates a very active Respect Life Ministry for her parish which includes adults who were once members of the Children of Mary Pro-Life Club.

Although under new leadership, the school pro-life club has the same mission as when it started: through education and prayer, teach our children that all life is a precious gift to be loved and protected.  Imagine how many students over the last 25 years have carried this message in their hearts, back home to their families, into their workplaces, and out to the world!

Plant the seed early, nurture it often, and watch the beautiful fruits of LIFE come forth and witness to a world that so desperately needs it.  That is what one woman did and what we are all called to do in some way.