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Twenty-One “Steps” of Love

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By Julie Anderson
Member, Hosea Initiative, Board of Advisors

Every year, my husband and I make at least one trip to our nation’s capital for a prolife event. And while I look forward to the event itself, I always make time for one personal stop.
While most trips to D.C. include sightseeing to many of the capital’s monuments and museums, my trips, (even if for only a day or two), always include a visit to the grave of my beloved paternal grandparents who served as my godparents.

After a career in the United States Air Force, my grandfather retired as a lieutenant colonel. As a result of his military service, he qualified to be buried at Arlington National Cemetery. My grandmother is buried in the same grave. Whenever I visit their gravesite, I leave yellow roses (my grandmother’s favorite), and I spend as much time there in prayer, given my schedule. Afterwards, and especially if we have someone else with us, we make a stop at the Tomb of the Unknown Solider.

Recently, while watching a video, I thought about the soldiers who stand guard at the tomb. During his shift, each solider takes 21 steps in one direction, clicks his heel, turns and walks 21 steps in the other direction, repeating the sequence multiple times. Around-the-clock, 365 days a year, no matter the weather, a solider stands guard at the tomb as he walks slowly, precisely, methodically, walking the same 21 steps over and over again.

As the scene played in my mind, I started wondering how we, as prolife-minded people, could “walk” 21 steps of love to promote the Gospel of Life here in our nation, especially as it relates to the new “Walking with Moms in Need: A Year of Service” launched on March 25. While launched by the Catholic Church, it’s intended to reach people of all faiths. The goal of the initiative is to highlight the many resources available to mothers who face unplanned pregnancies and to walk alongside those mothers, helping them to choose life. Yet, I’d like to suggest we can walk alongside mothers in need, directly and indirectly. Furthermore, we all can and must stand guard for the unborn each and every single day.

To that end, I’ve created a list below which hopefully inspires those who read this blog to stand guard for the unborn children. Anyway, here’s the list.

1. Pray daily for an end to abortion.

2. Spiritually adopt a child in danger of being aborted. Name the child just as you would name a newborn. Pray daily for that child by name.

3. Donate to a local pregnancy resource center or a prolife apostolate such as Hosea Initiative.

4. Buy diapers, groceries and/or children’s clothes for a single mother in your neighborhood.
Leave them anonymously on her doorstep.

5. Volunteer to answer the hotline of a pregnancy resource center.

6. Participate virtually in the 40 Days for Life campaign.

7. Post life-affirming messages of faith, hope and love on your social media account.

8. If you exercise in your home, jog in place for 23 minutes each day. Pray for the 2,300 children who die in America through abortion. Pray for the other victims of abortion such as the mother, father, siblings and grandparents.

9. Study the prolife conversion stories of people such as Dr. Bernard N. Nathanson.

10. Host a virtual screening of a prolife movie such as Unplanned. Afterward, connect via technology for discussion.

11. Fast from technology. Use the time to reflect on Psalm 139 which says, “You formed my inmost being. You knit me together in my mother’s womb.”

12. Start a prolife book club online. Meet virtually weekly to discuss a chapter or two from What If We’ve Been Wrong? Keeping my promise to America’s “Abortion King”.

13. Spend an hour in silence on Sunday morning. Ask God to guide you as to how to use your talents to serve the unborn child.

14. Contact your legislator via email or telephone. Ask for a telephone appointment to discuss his/her views on life issues.

15. Use a prolife curriculum as part of your church’s online religious education classes.

16. Ask your pastor to allow you to post prolife resources on your church’s website.

17. Host an online event such as a Liberated by Truth Conference for your church or other group.

18. Research the policy positions of those running for office during this election year and educate others as to the candidates’ positions on the important life issues such as abortion.

19. If you feel called, consider running for elective office. After all, the country could always use more prolife leaders to form public policy in a way that honors life in all its stages. If you’re unsure how to get started with a campaign, contact the Susan B. Anthony List.

20. Join or start Gabriel Project at your church.

21. Send messages of thanks and gratitude for those serving on the front lines of the prolife movement.

So, there it is-a list of 21 steps of love we can take to “stand guard” for the unborn. Will you answer the call?

Julie Anderson is a member of the Hosea Board of Advisors, a freelance journalist of 20 years and a prolife advocate. She writes from her home state of Kansas. For her full bio, see hosea4you.org.

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40 Days wandering in COVID-19’s “desert”

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By Clare Ruff

Derived from the Latin quadragenta, meaning “forty”, and the Italian quaranta giorni (“space of forty days”), the word quarantine is relational to the word Lent. No wonder COVID-19 is transforming my annual season of penance and sacrifice. I find myself identifying with the isolation of Israel in the desert, and wonder if their 40-year sojourn can help me conquer these 40 days of confinement with better insight and purpose.

Their “social distancing” was not punishment, but an opportunity to “tryst” with God in the wilderness. The goal was not minimalistic conformity to God’s code of righteousness, but acceptance of the Ten Commandments as a covenant and guidepost to authentic freedom.

Israel had become habituated to slavery after 430 years of captivity; it drove their actions, inactions and reactions. The rod of the taskmaster trained the people to act from fear. Israel’s desert isolation was the necessary school where they learned to choose: to commit to the Covenant, and discipline their unruly hearts in order to love God and each other freely. Slavery in Egypt was an outward sign of the inner reality of slavery to sin. God staged the Exodus to free His people from both.

Eyewitnesses to the miraculous plagues in Egypt (Ex. 7-12), including the escape from death of their firstborn children, the Israelites responded with impatience, bickering, and infidelity. Remember: they saw the pillar of cloud before them, and a pillar of fire distance them from Pharaoh’s army. They watched every chariot and charioteer be swallowed by the sea (Ex 14: 15-30).

But they panicked. They worried how they would eat and drink (as if their Deliverer would forget such a detail). Had there been toilet paper in those days, there would have been a rush on it! They murmured about missing their flesh pots, onions, and herbs! God dependably provided manna every morning, and every evening filled the camp with sufficient quail for the entire nation. But they complained, “Would that we were back in the land of Egypt” (Nu 14: 3). Many preferred the routine of slavery to the growing pains of freedom!

While Moses prayed on Mount Sinai for 40 days and 40 nights, the Israelites faithlessly worshiped a golden calf made with their own hands, even after ten plagues exposed the inadequacy of all Egypt’s false gods. The Lord gave them every reason to be faithful! They lacked courage, fortitude and mostly love.

So, what’s the point?
Can we learn from their mistakes? Can we apply their experience to ours? I think so.
The imposed “corona-cation” is a desert-like experience. Being isolated from each other and other nations can be approached as either an imposition or an opportunity to mature and deepen our relationship with God and each other. When denied our equivalent of “flesh pots and garlic”, we must depend on God’s providential care and exercise faith in the future promise ahead. COVID-19 and other calamities make us ponder why God is getting our attention! Is it to return to righteousness? Do we have our own “false gods” to shatter? “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts,” (Ps 95) encourages the psalmist. We have a unique chance to listen and respond.

Personally, I cannot help hear the cry of our nation’s unborn children. The death toll from Coronavirus is currently 487 (US stat Mar. 23, 2020), compared to 3,000 killed daily via abortion. Where are the 24/7 news reports, White House press conferences, and stimulus packages for the children obliterated on the altar “choice”?

And for those who may not be aware, another epidemic is sweeping our country, even more widespread than the current coronavirus. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), there is an alarming, exponential increase in sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Nationwide from 2014 – 2018, chlamydia increased 19 percent; gonorrhea rose 63 percent; primary and secondary syphilis jumped 71 percent; and congenital syphilis sky-rocketed 185 percent (see chart below).

The World Health Organization (WHO) states, “Syphilis is one of the most common sexually transmitted infections globally, with approximately six million new cases each year. If a pregnant woman who is infected does not receive early and effective treatment, she can then transmit the infection to her unborn infant. This is known as ‘congenital syphilis’ which is often fatal. It can also cause low birth weight, prematurity, and other congenital deformities.” WHO’s findings, published February 27, 2019, state that globally, there were “more than half a million (around 661,000) total cases of congenital syphilis in 2016, resulting in over 200,000 stillbirths and neonatal deaths” (emphasis mine).

I’d scratch my head--except we’re not supposed to touch our faces.

In review: (CDC Statistics Updated March 23 at 1:50 PM)

• USA COVID-19 : 41,126 confirmed cases, 487 deaths.
• Global [minus China’s unpublished statistics]: 366,860 confirmed cases, 16,098 deaths.
• The “pandemic” of congenital syphilis: 200,000 stillbirth and neonatal deaths (2016).
Number of Sexually Transmitted Diseases in the United States in 2018
STD # of Cases Increase*
Chlamydia 1,800,000 > 19 % Gonorrhea 583,405 > 63 %
Syphilis 1st & 2nd 35,063 > 71 % Congenital Syphilis
1,306 > 185 %
* Percentage Increase from 2014 – 2018

The CDC provides a downloadable pamphlet for physicians with recommendations regarding treatment of syphilis. It includes the following statement: “If sexually active, the surest way to avoid transmission of syphilis is to be in a long-term mutually monogamous relationship with a partner who has been tested and is known to be uninfected.”
Appropriate social distancing could eradicate more than one disease with alarming growth and mortality rates.

In the end, the Israelites revealed through its 40 year quarantine the secret to purposeful social distancing: do not distance yourself from God. I wonder if our nation will learn such lessons from COVID-19 over the next 40 days?

Clare Ruff has a BA in Theology
from University of St. Thomas, Houston, TX. She serves as Director of Events and Outreach for the Hosea Initiative and writes from her home in southeastern Minnesota.

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State Constitutions: Interpreting the “Law of the Land”

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By Julie Anderson
Member, Hosea Board of Advisors

“I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.”

To be honest, my husband and I have been feeling a lot like Dorothy in the “The Wizard of Oz” due to a ruling by the Kansas Supreme Court.

During the 2015 session, the Kansas State Legislature (by overwhelmingly majorities in both chambers) passed The Kansas Unborn Child Protection from Dismemberment Abortion Act. Signed into law on April 7, 2015, by then-Governor Sam Brownback, now ambassador at large for religious freedom, the law banned dismemberment abortions except in certain situations.

Before going any further, it’s important to first understand dismemberment abortion.

Planned Parenthood describes dismemberment abortion (also known as dilation and evacuation or D&E) as an in-clinic procedure using suction and medical tools to empty the uterus. It’s typically used for a pregnancy 16 gestational weeks or later.

In other words, the child is dismembered while still alive, then extracted from the womb, one piece at a time. According to Kansans for Life, nine such abortions occur in the state every week. That’s nearly 170 each year!

The new law was the first such ban in the nation. Other states started drafting similar laws, using the Kansas a model or springboard. Unfortunately, the law never took effect in Kansas.

Almost immediately after the law’s passage, two abortionists, the father-daughter team of Drs. Herbert Hodes and Traci Nauser, along with the New-York based Center for Reproductive Rights, filed a legal challenge in a case known as Hodes and Nauser, MDs v. Schmidt, a case which wound its way through the various levels of the legal system, ultimately reaching the Kansas Supreme Court.

The doctors claimed that sections 1 and 2 of the Kansas State Constitution (and not the United States Constitution) recognize a “fundamental right to abortion.”

Like so many other state constitutions, the first section of the Kansas Constitution draws from our nation’s founding documents. In fact, the first section is taken almost verbatim from the Declaration of Independence and reads, “All men are possessed of equal and inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Although the court heard arguments in March 2017, it took two years before the Kansas Supreme Court issued its final ruling in April 2019. Of the seven justices who heard the case, six agreed with the father-daughter abortionists. It’s interesting to note the justices took nearly 200 pages to explain their ruling, affirming the state constitution, drafted in 1859, contained not only a right to abortion, but “a fundamental right to abortion.”

Only one justice dissented, Justice Caleb T. Stegall. Perhaps he is the one who best understood what was at stake-the lives of innocent preborn children. He wrote, “In this imagined world, the Liberty Bell rings every time a baby in utero loses her arm.”

Currently, Kansas is poised to become an epicenter of abortion activity as a result of the ruling. The ruling threatens more than two dozen other laws enacted since 1997 which have allowed the people, through the state legislature, to regulate abortion and protect the lives of both women and children. Laws such as those which require a 24-hour waiting period before an abortion or parental consent in the case of a minor seeking an abortion have reduced the abortion rate in Kansas throughout the past 22 years by about 50 percent.

The other night, my husband asked me what I thought would have happened if any of the seven justices of the Kansas State Supreme Court would have viewed the1984 film, “The Silent Scream.”

Coproduced by Dr. Bernard N. Nathanson, the father of the abortion industry, a man who repented of his ways and later claimed responsibility for 75,000 abortions, the documentary is not for the faint of heart. In it, Dr. Nathanson calmly narrates the dismemberment abortion of an 11-week-old baby. Near the beginning, he cautions viewers that, “We are going to watch a child being torn apart, dismembered, disarticulated, crushed and destroyed.”

As a result of Marc’s question, I started thinking. What if the justices had seen the film? Would they have ruled differently? How did they arrive at such a ruling in the first place? And if a court can issue such a ruling here in the heartland of the nation, what is to stop other courts across the nation from issuing similar rulings?

For the past several months, prolife advocates in Kansas have been working towards passage of the Value Them Both amendment. The goal is to place it on the primary ballot in August for Kansans to “reverse the ruling,” which resulted from the Hodes and Nauser case.

The amendment would not ban abortions (as opponents claim), but would return the right to regulate abortion to the people through their elected representatives. Although more than 30,000 Kansans signed postcards of support, currently the amendment needs four votes in the Kansas House before it can be placed on the ballot.

While prolife advocates work towards that goal here in Kansas, I’d encourage you to understand the current situation in your own particular state. If a ruling such as the one handed down in Hodes and Nauser can be handed down here, I shudder to think how other state constitutions might be interpreted in view of “the law of the land.” If we don’t stay vigilant, all of us might be saying, “I’ve a feeling we’re not in the United States anymore.”

Julie Anderson is a member of the Hosea Board of Advisors, a freelance journalist of 20 years and a prolife advocate. She writes from her home state of Kansas. For her full bio, see hosea4you.org.

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Transcendentals

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By Clare Ruff

I recently accompanied my husband on an international visit to Costa Rica. Dental tourism was our purpose, and we chose for our first few nights’ lodging a posada, housing only 25 persons at full capacity. This former grand-villa-transformed-into-B&B lent itself to a unique experience. The public living quarters, open-air courtyard, well-groomed gardens, romantic, Spanish architecture set the stage for meaningful human interaction unlike anything we had experienced when staying in larger hotels with hundreds of guests.

Daily conversations with travelers from every corner of the world were commonplace. Soon I noticed a theme emerge from the interpersonal connections, a golden thread crossing the vast range of age, culture and continents: a yearning for the transcendentals of life. [ In classic, philosophical terms, transcendentals refer to the true (verum), the good (bonum), and the beautiful (pulchrum), often described as unseen realities which are discovered from what is seen.]

The first day, an elegant octogenarian speaking English with a charming French accent announced to me that she had decided to extend her two week vacation an additional month. Her adult children back home in Canada would need to “stop fussing.” “I found a paradise I don’t want to leave!” she exclaimed sipping a glass of Argentinian wine while listening to classical music played from her travel-sized SOUNDBOT. She summarized, “This place feeds my soul and gives me peace.”
I mused: transcendentals!

The following day, a gentleman of 40 years chatted with me pool-side about his adventuresome travel from Africa to London and then the final twenty hours journey to the posada. He was eager for a listening ear to unload his travel story and his burdened heart. “Me Dad’s had a stroke, and work is HARD! I needed to renew. The beauty here is magical, no?” he gestured toward the horizon of palm trees and purple-hued, volcanic hills rejuvenating his spirit. Ahh, transcendentals!

Even the innkeeper shared his personal story of meeting his wife in France, starting a family in his native Norway before coming to Costa Rica. “I worked two jobs and long hours before realizing I had no patience for the very things most precious to me – my wife and children!” So, he restructured his life to provide for his family in a way that he never left “home” to go to work. Seeking the deeper meaning in life is also a quest for transcendentals!

Bernard Nathanson, M.D. had a similar encounter moving from what is seen to what is unseen after an ultrasound image of a 16-week-old baby girl in the womb allowed him to glimpse not simply MATTER (as in cells and human tissue), but what mattered, the hidden VALUE intrinsic to something.
It’s not unusual for an obstetrician/gynecologist today to see 3D, even 4D images via ultrasound. But, in 1973, when Dr. Nathanson first experienced what he called “a window into the womb”, real-time ultrasound was a new invention. The inventors demonstrated the remarkable abilities of the equipment to Nathanson because of his prominence as Chief of Obstetrics at St. Luke’s Hospital in New York City.

What happened within a few moments changed Dr. Nathanson’s life. When he saw the child via ultrasound, what came to his mind was not faulty political rhetoric he fed to legislators, medical doctors and judges. His mind presented to him the horrors of the holocaust of World War II, and how those Nazis responsible for the mass-murder of the innocent, first stripped away the personhood of the Jewish people to justify the slaughter of the many. Nathanson then saw himself as the perpetrator of an equal injustice towards the child in the womb.

Once Dr. Nathanson saw what was unseen, that is, the value intrinsic to the human child, he changed his position on legalizing abortion on demand, a legislative prerogative he and Lawrence Lader as co-founders of NARAL (National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws, now known as NARAL Pro-Choice America) conceptualized and brought to birth in the United States in under five short years (1967 – 1973). Many do not know this dramatic reversal of Nathanson’s position as father of the industry of abortion happened just months past the Supreme Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.

In his letter to the Colossians, St. Paul directs his audience to, “Set your minds on things above, rather than on things that are of earth,” [Col 3:2] looking for the True the Good and the Beautiful, beyond what is seen with the naked eye to what is unseen. Yet, “unseen” does not translate to unreal or intangible as anyone who loves or hates or hopes or breaths can attest.

If our nation more readily acknowledged the hidden, yet intrinsic value of each child nestled in his or her mother’s womb and embraced these transcendental realities, legislative protection under the law for every child born or unborn would be non-negotiable.

Clare Ruff currently serves as
Director of Events and Outreach for
the Hosea Initiative, an educational,
prolife, non-profit, and writes from her
home in southeastern Minnesota.

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Louisiana Prolife Law Arguments to be Heard by Supreme Court This Week

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By Julie Anderson, Member of Advisory Board, Hosea Initiative

Amicae curiae.

The Latin phrase translates as “friend of the court.”

Online dictionaries define a friend of the court as a professional person or organization not involved in the legal matter at hand but one permitted by the court to advise it in some capacity related to the case.

On January 2, a “friend of the court” brief was filed in support of the Unsafe Abortion Protection Act known as Act 620, a law passed in 2014 in Louisiana which remains on hold as it winds through the judicial system.

Terry Beatley, founder and president of Hosea Initiative, is named in that brief.

In the brief, David DeWolf of Albrecht Law PLLC, along with Catherine Short and Alexandra Snyder, both of the Life Legal Defense Foundation, offer a summary of Terry’s book, What If We’ve Been Wrong: Keeping my Promise to America’s “Abortion King.”

The brief discusses Bernard N. Nathanson, M.D., as cofounder of NARAL now known as NARAL Pro-Choice America.

The attorneys write, “After having performed approximately 60,000 abortions, Dr. Nathanson resigned from NARAL and wrote three books exposing the tactics used to promote legalized abortion, including his development, along with the help of a public relations firm, of the slogan, ‘My Body, My Choice.’”

Later, the same attorneys write, “Dr. Nathanson was the father of the abortion industry. It was his idea to meet the demand in New York by ambulatory centers. Walk-in and -out, same-day surgery centers were focused solely on abortion services and removed the hospital ‘monopoly’ and control.”

Besides legal documents previously submitted, the Supreme Court of the United States has scheduled the entire day of March 4 to oral arguments focusing on Act 620.

After reading the complete text, I learned the law passed the Louisiana State Legislature with wide margins of support. The House of Representatives voted 85-6 in favor of the law while the Senate voted 34-3.

Secondly, I learned the law focuses on “continuity of care,” relative to someone’s medical treatment. In Section I, the Act states, “a physician performing or inducing an abortion shall: (a) Have active admitting privileges at a hospital that is located not further than thirty miles from the location at which the abortion is performed or induced and that provides obstetrical or gynecological health care services.”

In other words, if a woman suffers a complication such as a torn cervix or punctured uterus, she can be treated by “the same doctor who knows the exact nature of the complication” and who “can help the patient in the hospital, improving the continuity of care.”

It’s surprising to me those in favor of abortion would not see the value of this law. Even Dr. Nathanson, “the father of the abortion industry,” prided himself on creating a safe environment for his patients. In fact, he saw it as a moral imperative.

In the Hand of God, he wrote, “Having now achieved the law, we had to make certain that it was not thrown into disrepute by clumsy practitioners little more adept than the illegals they would replace. In short, our greatest fear was that this unprecedented liberty might be jeopardized by a poor safety record. To that end, I organized and staged a comprehensive symposium on abortion on July 1, 1970, at New York Medical Center.”

Later, Dr. Nathanson recalled, “At St. Luke’s Women’s Hospital, with the aid of Dr. Harold Tovell, then the director of obstetrics and gynecology, and Avril Lawrence, the director of the operating room, we devised an outpatient, walk-in, walk-out-three-hours-later program that worked efficiently and safely for our first-trimester patients. Women seeking late abortions (after thirteen to fifteen weeks) still had to be hospitalized, since the procedures we used were more complex and dangerous.”

Finally, Dr. Nathanson also commented that, “Another of my duties as chairman of the Medical Committee of NARAL (I was also a member of the Executive Committee) was to inspect the existing abortion clinics in the area and pass on their safety and medical effectiveness.”

So, in closing, if Dr. Bernard Nathanson, the father of abortion industry, saw the necessity of medical and safety standards, I think it logical that today’s abortionists should have admitting privileges. He or she would be intimately familiar with the patient’s medical situation, and in the event of an emergency, valuable time would not be lost.

Finally, as I close this blog, I’d like to offer a few ACTION STEPS we can all take, especially as the Supreme Court gears up for this important case.

Firstly, we should study the works of Dr. Bernard Nathanson including his books: Aborting America, Hand of God, The Abortion Papers and the two films he produced: The Silent Scream and Eclipse of Reason. Become better educated as American citizens, and who better to learn from than the father of the abortion industry himself?

Secondly, mark your calendar and, if possible, plan to join Terry Beatley, founder of Hosea Initiative, on the steps of the Supreme Court on March 4 at 9:00AM. If you are unable to be there in person, join us in prayer.

The prolife movement needs YOU!

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Hosea Blog

Twenty-One “Steps” of Love

40 Days wandering in COVID-19’s “desert”

State Constitutions: Interpreting the “Law of the Land”

Transcendentals

Louisiana Prolife Law Arguments to be Heard by Supreme Court This Week

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Twenty-One “Steps” of Love

40 Days wandering in COVID-19’s “desert”

State Constitutions: Interpreting the “Law of the Land”

​Transcendentals

Louisiana Prolife Law Arguments to be Heard by Supreme Court This Week

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Transcendentals