“It is time to get off the bench and into the game.”

That was the message Matthew Jordan kept hearing that spurred him to get involved in the pro-life movement so long ago “the details of when and how I got started escape me”.  Today Mat is the President Emeritus of the Federation’s York chapter and one of the recipients of our Lifetime Achievement Award to be presented at the 2016 Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation Celebrate Life Banquet on September 29^th.

Mat’s story is like most. He admits when he started getting involved in the pro-life movement he felt “unprepared and intimidated by the prospect of getting up to speed with all of the information one needed to digest…” I imagine many on the sidelines of the pro-life movement feel the same way. They understand that abortion is a horrible, gruesome process that takes the lives of those most vulnerable among us, but they don’t know what to do about it, or how to get started. They’ve probably heard stories from pro-abortion advocates about “wild-eyed pro-life radicals” and hesitate to get involved with that type of person.  The truth is, pro-life advocates are the salt of the earth, and it’s those who advocate for abortion on demand who are the radicals…out of touch with the population as a whole, not to mention with reality.

Mat humbly says he and the York chapter are still accomplishing, and invites anyone interested to get off the bench and into the game. Whether it’s in York, or anywhere across the Commonwealth, we have chapters that need people to stand up for those who can’t stand up for themselves.  If you are interested in helping in any way, big or small, check out our list of chapters at www.paprolife.org/join-one or give us a call at 717541-0034 or email us at lifelines@paprolife.org and help us remind those around us there’s always a reason to choose life!

I have been pro-life my whole life, but never spent time outside an abortion facility trying to talk to the mothers and workers as they go in.  No good reason I hadn’t…I just hadn’t gotten around to it.  I felt like it was time to experience it for myself to see what it was like.

I’ve often heard these facilities described as dark, cold places…but that description doesn’t really do it justice.  As I walked up, I could almost feel myself becoming sadder…there was an evil presence there that was undeniable.  The building itself was cold and drab, and it felt almost like a black hole sucking the life out of anyone around it.  I know that sounds like hyperbole, but that’s the only way to describe the feeling as I walked up.

I had the honor and privilege of being there with a few great pro-life volunteers.  These women were not the wild-eyed “radicals” that abortion advocates like to portray them as, but rather loving, caring individuals (some of whom have personally experienced the horrors of abortion) who only want to help the women going in.  Generally, as one tried to talk to the women, the rest of us hung back and prayed.  At no time did we do anything to intimidate these women or block their access, unlike the popular narrative of the pro-abortion crowd. We simply tried to show them that the child inside them was not a burden or an inconvenience, but a life that needed protected.

Across the alley from the center parking lot where we were, there is a house owned by a pro-life organization called Undefeated Courage (for more on Undefeated Courage, listen to this interview I recently did with their President, Becky Biter).  This house is a place where sidewalk counselors can sit down with women in privacy, share with them the truth about abortion, and provide for them information about the resources available to them if they choose life. Upstairs they have outfitted the room facing the abortion center as a chapel where people come and pray for those going in to the abortion. What struck me most about the house was its warm, inviting feel…in stark contrast to the cold, heartless building across the street that offered nothing but death and suffering.

I wish I could say for sure we saved a baby’s life by our presence while I was there.  We know there was one man and woman who went in, but didn’t stay very long before leaving, so there is some likelihood they changed their minds, but we don’t know for sure.  As one of the volunteers stated, we’ll know when we get to heaven and meet those we saved.  I can tell you that it was an experience I will never forget, and I will do again soon.  My only regret is that I didn’t do it sooner, and I encourage all who read this to get involved…either by joining sidewalk counselors as I did, helping with a pro-life pregnancy center, or in whatever other way you feel comfortable. Lives are at stake!

When I was in college, I took a debate class, and one of the concepts that was instilled in me during that class, and really throughout all my education on rhetoric and persuasion, was the idea that it was important to understand both sides of an argument.  Therefore, to understand how to best advance the pro-life message, I spend a great deal of time reading article by/about avid abortion advocates such as Cecile Richards, Ilyse Hogue, and others.  I joke sometimes that after reading their opinions I often feel like I need a hazmat shower, but it’s important to understand their arguments to know where they are coming from.

The good news is, I also get to read a lot of pro-life writing. I get to soak in stories of babies saved, of abortion facilities closing, and of abortion workers who see the horrors of abortion for what it is and leave.  These life-affirming stories are what keep me going, and are some of the most popular posted to our Facebook page and shared on our Twitter account.

Recently, a book titled We Choose Life was published that compiles and shares many of these stories.  Edited by Dave Sterrett, it is a compilation of the stories of people like Jewels Green, former abortion center worker; abortion survivor Melissa Ohden; Kristan Hawkins of Students for Life; and Kristi Hofferber who was conceived in incest, plus a dozen more.

For those of us who have been called to ending the horrors of abortion, it is easy to get sucked into the dark side of the world in which we live.  Books such as We Choose Life bring light into that culture of death and provide a great opportunity for hope, compassion, and forgiveness.

For those interested, if you pick up the book on Amazon using your Amazon Smiles account, you can designate a portion of the proceeds to go to the Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation Education Fund…a win-win all around.

A recent report found that the National Association of Community Health Centers authorized AmeriCorps volunteers to transport women to abortion centers and that senior staffers were covering up several instances of “waste, fraud, and abuse.”

While the misconduct supposedly only occurred on a limited scope, this is not the first time AmeriCorps has fallen afoul of the law.  In 2011, AmeriCorps had “volunteers” working at Planned Parenthood centers, and in the past the group has received heat for “mimicking the work of lobbyists and political organizers for agenda-driven community organizations.”.  You would think these violations would make Congress pause before giving AmeriCorps more of our tax dollars, but instead, AmeriCorps received an increase in funding of over 50 million dollars just last year.

This violation is just another example of how the current administration has denied that the government finances the death of those most vulnerable, while at the same time stopping at nothing to force Americans to fund abortions and continue down the dark path of a culture of death.  As prolife advocates, we need to be ever vigilant to seek out these violations, while at the same time helping those who need it most to understand that there’s always a reason to choose life.

About a month ago I wrote a blog discussing the two sides of the free speech coin. Now, those two sides are currently playing out right in front of us at Georgetown University.

For those unaware, Georgetown University is a college in Washington DC.  Due to its Catholic origin and ties, there was some consternation when the college announced Cecile Richards, CEO of Planned Parenthood and therefore figurehead of big abortion, would be speaking on campus.

To put this in perspective, consider the reaction when pro-life speakers have been invited to speak at liberal universities.  For example, just in February of this year, California State University at Los Angeles cancelled a speech scheduled for pro-life advocate Ben Shapiro, instead offering Shapiro a chance to return when the university could line up other speakers to counter his point of view.  It is obvious our institutes of higher learning are less concerned with being a marketplace of ideas and more interested in indoctrinating the next generation.

Contrast this with the reaction to Cecile Richard’s visit to Georgetown.  Instead of demanding the university silence Richards, the pro-life group on campus is countering her propaganda with the truth.  They will have a “we don’t need planned parenthood” display set up in or near the building Richards is giving her talk, and are having Abby Johnson, the head of “And Then There Were None—A Pro-Life Outreach”, give a talk of her own that evening.  Michael Khan, president of Georgetown Right to Life, an affiliate of Students for Life America is quoted in this article by townhall.com as saying:

“Abby Johnson has personal experience at Planned Parenthood, and will reveal what the organization is really all about. It is important students learn about Planned Parenthood’s careless disregard for human life, and why Planned Parenthood is bad for women and children. Amidst media bias and abortion defenders, Abby provides clarity to this debate and will offer a positive, life-affirming message of hope and love that defends the most defenseless.”

Congratulations to Mr. Khan and the Georgetown Right to Life for showing Georgetown University, and colleges across the United States, what freedom of speech looks like in practice.  We hope others will take note and show those around them that there’s always a reason to choose life.

This post is definitely the most personal…and probably the most painful…I will write.  One of the reasons I am so ardently pro-life is because of my experience with our second child.  Early in the pregnancy, there were complications…bleeding etc. but nothing prepared us for the news when we went for our 13 week check-up that we would never get to meet the child we were expecting.  There was no heartbeat. Our baby was in heaven waiting for us.

I don’t tell our story for sympathy, or for condolences.   I tell it because our experience sheds a unique perspective on a topic many are not aware of—perinatal hospice and palliative care.  These services are available across the state, some through hospitals, and others through private organizations, for the families who receive the devastating news of a diagnosis of a major medical condition for their pre-born child.  It is important to be educated about what these services are, so you can best help those who need them at a time they most need your support.

Perinatal hospice and palliative care offer compassionate support for all involved when a baby is diagnosed with a life-limiting condition. Specifically, perinatal hospice focuses on the whole family, while palliative care is focused more on the baby itself.  This support is provided from diagnosis through the baby’s birth and death and includes planning for the birth, making medical decisions about the baby’s care (both in utero and after delivery) and helping the family grieve with memory making like photographs or hand prints/foot prints.

While there are programs designed specifically to support a family during this tragic time (a list can be found here), perinatal hospice is not a place or program, it is a state of mind designed to honor the baby as well as its family.  It is an alternative to aborting the pregnancy that significant research has found to help the mother and family heal emotionally from a devastating loss.

I’m not comparing our loss to the experience of a family with a child much further along who could benefit from perinatal hospice and palliative care.  Any loss of life is difficult to handle, and I can tell you that every year on the anniversary of that ultrasound, that day is a challenge to get through.  I can also tell you that the only way we have gotten through that day, and those anniversaries since, is by the love and support of friends and family.  I would ask you to be aware of those around you who may be in need of such services and support them in whatever way you can.

“We are known by the company we keep”
“Birds of a feather flock together”
Mantras like these are told to us at a young age, and repeated as warnings throughout life as we become teenagers and young adults. The same can be said of our country. Consider our “company” and the proverbial “birds” we flock with when it comes to allowing pre-born children to be torn apart in their mother’s womb in dismemberment abortions.
The United States is only one of seven countries worldwide that allow the horror of dismemberment abortions…a horror Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy referred to in Gonzales v. Carhart as “…laden with the power to devalue human life”. These countries include China, Vietnam, North Korea, and Singapore, all of whom perform horrible human rights violations such as political imprisonment, restrictions on freedom of speech, religious persecution, repression of minority groups, and detention without trial. Is this the kind of company the United States wants to keep?
Dismemberment abortions, which are performed on unborn babies as old as 24 weeks in Pennsylvania occur after the baby has brain waves, legs, arms, every organ in place, and have even developed teeth and fingernails. Of the approximately 1 million abortions performed annually in this country, almost 9% are performed on these pre-born babies. Approximately 1,550 Pennsylvanians died from this abortion method in 2014.
Thankfully, there IS something we can do to end our affiliation with the countries that currently allow this atrocity. House Bill 1948 will ban dismemberment abortions in Pennsylvania and lower the age of a legal abortion in Pennsylvania from 24 weeks to 20 weeks.
Call and email your representative in the PA House of Representatives with this urgent message: “Please support House Bill 1948, which bans dismemberment abortions in Pennsylvania. These abortions are brutal for babies and harmful for mothers, and they need to be outlawed.”
If you don’t know who your state Representative is, or you need contact information, click here. (http://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/home/findyourlegislator/#address ) Enter your address and a window will pop up with the names and contact information for your state Representative.
We need to act quickly to pass HB1948 to protect those who are most vulnerable among us from a horrible death. Passing HB1948 has the added advantage of removing Pennsylvania from the shadow of these countries with such terrible human rights records.

The National Right to Life Board of Directors has voted to support Texas Senator Ted Cruz in the upcoming Republican Presidential primaries, including the Pennsylvania primary which occurs April 26^th.

The National Right to Life Political Action Committee believes Senator Cruz is the only candidate for President who has always been pro-life, who has a 100 percent pro-life voting record, who can win the GOP nomination, and who can defeat pro-abortion candidate Hillary Clinton in November.

Senator Cruz is on record supporting administrative and legislative reforms that would make organizations that perform abortions, including Planned Parenthood, ineligible for federal funding (except hospitals). He has also worked tirelessly in the U.S. Senate to defund the abortion giant Planned Parenthood, which commits more than 300,000 abortions each year.

For more information about the Presidential candidates’ stands on the life issues, visit  http://www.nrlpac.org/pdf/2016-POTUS-comparison.pdf .

The Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation is a grassroots right-to-life organization with members statewide.  As the state affiliate of National Right to Life, PPLF is committed to promoting the dignity and value of human life from conception to natural death and to restoring legal protection for preborn children.

Modern technology is an amazing thing.  At a family gathering over the weekend, my cousin and I were having a discussion with my father and our uncle about how much easier school was for us than it was for our parents.  When our parent’s generation needed to do research, they had to take books out of the library, and if they were lucky those books had an index in them to help them find what they needed.  Fast forward a generation, and my cousin and I were able to do the same research from the comfort of our dorm room in our pajamas on a desktop computer.  Now, our children can do the same research from a tablet or smart phone…who knows how their children will be able to access information!

Medical technology has come a long way as well.  Diseases like malaria or smallpox, once a death sentence, are now preventable.  Disorders like Down syndrome are far better understood now than they once were….and become more and more so every year.

Technology in the area of fetal monitoring has improved dramatically as well.  When I was in my mother’s womb, my parents were lucky to hear my heart beating.  Now, doctors can take a 3d ultrasound image of a child in the mother’s womb, print it on a 3D printer, and give it to the child’s blind mother so she can “see” what her baby looks like.  Who knows what they’ll be able to do by the time I am anticipating a grandchild!

Of course, there will always be science deniers.  In the case of medical technology, the science deniers are abortion advocates.  They continue to claim the child growing in the mother’s womb is just a “bunch of cells” despite the window to the womb ultrasound technology has become.  They deny viability despite being able to see a child dance, clap, and react in utero.  Ignoring the technology that allows surgery to be performed on babies in the womb, they continue to deny the babies’ “personhood”.

The truth is, you don’t have to be a “religious zealot” (as these science deniers like to call us in the pro-life movement) to recognize life when we see it.  Thanks to modern technology, we can see the heart beating by 3 weeks, reflexive movement after 6 weeks, and spontaneous movement before 8 weeks (I’ll never forget the delight of my wife and I, watching my son kick/punch the TV remote off my wife’s stomach). We can watch them practicing breathing by week 11, and by four months, nostrils and toenails become visible.

Once a baby is born, his or her proud parents are understandably excited to share the baby’s milestones—their trip home from the hospital, first bath, sitting up, eating foods for the first time, rolling over, crawling, walking, first words etc.  Thanks to the power of technology found in ultrasound, we don’t have to wait for milestones outside the womb…we can celebrate their tiny milestones of life and growth before meeting them face-to-face!