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Richard M. Doerflinger

Richard M. Doerflinger is a Fellow with the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture, University of Notre Dame, and Adjunct Fellow in Bioethics and Public Policy with the National Catholic Bioethics Center. He is the former Associate Director of the Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. He lives in Washington state.

3d ultrasound

What President Trump Is Doing (And Should Do) about Abortion

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Using only his executive authority as president, what actions could Trump take to respect the lives of unborn children?
euthanasia

Assisted Death and The Economist

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The American experience with assisted suicide should persuade Great Britain and other countries that the slippery slope to broader killing is disturbingly genuine.
Ideas vs. people

Ideas vs. People?

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I am not sure a commitment to ideas or “ideologies” as such is at the root of our problem. If anything, public debate today has little patience with ideas, directed instead toward the very motives and character of the people one likes or dislikes.
Photo of fetal heartbeat monitoring machine

Political Malpractice: Efforts to Mislead Physicians about State Abortion Laws

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While physicians may have legitimate questions about the new state abortion laws, the organized campaign to attack them as banning sound medical judgment is a disservice to physicians and patients alike.
supreme court

Women, Witches, and Abortion: A Misguided Attack on Justice Alito

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A Minnesota law professor’s attack on the draft Dobbs opinion seems based more on desperation than scholarship. This and other misguided efforts to demonize critics of Roe need to be refuted so we can focus our attention on the real issue of the ugly realities of abortion.
Cross

Giving One’s Life for One’s Friends: A Secular or Religious Value?

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The self-sacrificing love of friends has a religious origin, even if it has secular expressions. Precisely by putting us in touch with the sacred, with a perception of reality that transcends our day-to-day existence, such values give human life its meaning and make our “secular” civilization possible. Attempts to censor expressions of these values show how difficult it can be to disentangle their religious and secular uses.
suicide, depression, assistance

Assisted Suicide: The Ethics, the Laws, and the Dangers

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The people most harmed by this agenda are seriously ill people hearing from society and physicians that death by overdose will end their problems; other patients suffering from a reduced commitment to care; people with disabilities who are next in line to be seen as a “burden” on others; and lonely and depressed people of any age, seduced by the message that suicide is a positive solution. Adapted from a lecture delivered in June 2019 at the Vita Institute, an educational program for pro-life leaders sponsored by the University of Notre Dame's de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture.

New York Courts Rule Against “Aid in Dying” and Warn of Its Dangers

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The New York Court of Appeals has dealt a resounding blow to the state’s assisted suicide lobby.

A Life Well Spent: Learning from John Noonan

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With the recent passing of Judge John T. Noonan, Jr., Americans would do well to honor and remember his example of respectful engagement over fundamental moral issues.

Don’t Let Assisted Suicide Come to the Nation’s Capital

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DC’s assisted suicide bill is the most expansive and dangerous our country has yet seen.

A Pledge Betrayed: The Obama Administration Nullifies Conscience Rights

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The Obama administration not only enforces but unilaterally expands some civil rights laws, such as when “sex” became “gender identity” in Title IX. Yet it promotes exceptions, loopholes, and countervailing arguments for other civil rights protections, such as conscience rights for those who oppose abortion.
Public Discourse

Flirting with Death

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Did New Jersey’s Assembly approve an assisted suicide bill without understanding it? The bill is bad public policy, shot through with dangerous loopholes and contradictions that threaten to push many vulnerable citizens of New Jersey toward death.
Public Discourse

The HHS Mandate, Unborn Life, and the Professionals: A Cog in the Political Machine

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It’s time to realize that ACOG’s priority is not medical fact but thwarting protection for the unborn.
Public Discourse

On Abortion Rates: Good News and Cause for Reflection

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American abortion rates are falling significantly. Although the Guttmacher Institute tries to hide the chief causes of this trend, cutting through the spin reveals that pro-life laws and attitudes help reduce the abortion rate and the abortion ratio.
Public Discourse

Conscientious Abortions? We Don’t Need New Laws Protecting Abortionists

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A recent argument that abortion providers deserve the same legal protection as pro-life medical providers is philosophically flawed and ignores legal and popular consensus on the evil of abortion.
Public Discourse

Is Conscience Partisan? A Look at the Clinton, Moynihan, and Kennedy Records

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When did respect for conscience rights, once a bipartisan consensus, become a “Republican war on women”?
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