President Bush created a council that represented the range of viewpoints held by reasonable and responsible Americans on the most urgent and divisive bioethics questions facing the country. Will President Obama do the same?
Pillar: The Human Person
The Human Person
The first pillar of a decent society is respect for the human person, which recognizes that all individual human beings have dignity simply because of the kind of being they are: animals whose rational faculties allow them to know, love, reason, and communicate. It also recognizes that human beings are persons, members of the human family who flourish in a community that respects their fundamental rights and who long to discover transcendent truths about the nature of reality.
Learn more about the Human Person: get your free eBook today!
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Our Struggle for the Soul of our Nation
In remarks delivered yesterday at the Cardinal O’Connor Conference on Life, Robert P. George reflected on the history of the pro-life movement and offered advice for its future.
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Hillary Clinton, Public Diplomacy, and the Middle East
America’s public diplomacy should be focused on fostering ideas in our interest that matter in key foreign audiences, not just on pro-America image marketing.
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Islamists Killed Tahar Djaout: We Should Give Life to His Ideas
The Algerian novel The Last Summer of Reason provides a powerful and strangely beautiful reminder of the danger of letting violent ideological fundamentalism fester. We would do well to heed this reminder now, not later.
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An Absolute Liberty of Conscience?
Freedom of conscience is an important, though limited, right. In some cases a state may prevent someone from acting on her conscientious judgments. But in other cases—such as those in which a pro-life doctor is required to perform an abortion—the violation of conscience is intrinsically unjust.
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What We Should Do About Natural Embryo Loss
While abortion opponents decry the deliberate destruction of human embryos, as many as half of all embryos are lost naturally. How should pro-life advocates address this problem?
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Will Islam in Germany lead to Mufti Merkel?
The German government’s attempts to promote moderate Islam may have the opposite effect.
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Aborting Conscience
The advice of a recent report by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists seeks to impose one contested moral view on an entire field of medicine.
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Social Conservatives Cannot Ignore Political Realities
John Haldane has reminded social conservatives in America of important political and moral truths, but he overlooks the necessity of engaging in partisan politics with eyes wide open to political realities.
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A Second Look at Syria
Spend some time traveling in this “Axis of Evil” nation and you’ll meet many people who will challenge conventional wisdom. Understanding the mixed-bag of Syrian social, political, and cultural allegiances will be key for U.S. foreign policy.
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The Reasons for Banning Abortion
One need not be religious to oppose abortion. A simple look at what it does to new human life and what it has done to contemporary society is more than reason enough. New horrors loom on the horizon, but there is reason for hope.
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Reducing Abortions: Responding to Faulty Methodology and Presentation
Michael New's criticism of a recent study has come in for criticism itself. He responds that the study suffers from methodological mistakes and faulty presentation.
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Islam: Obsession Reorientation
As the recent film "Obsession" points out, Islamist radicalism poses a grave threat to the freedoms of constitutional democracies. But "Obsession" largely ignores potential solutions and a host of moderate Islamic voices that have gone unheard.
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Abortion and Public Policy: A Response to Michael New
The author of a recent abortion study answers Michael New's criticisms.
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From Wrongs Abounding, May Good yet More Abound
Social Conservatives in America would do well to consider recent events in the U.K.
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A Letter to the Editor from Charles J. Chaput
Archbishop Chaput writes to the editors of Public Discourse
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The Pro-Life Case Against Barack Obama . . . and Doug Kmiec
The Obama apologists are at it again, this time attacking Archbishop Charles Chaput for speaking out against their candidate's pro-abortion views. But the latest salvo from Doug Kmiec is a tangled web of falsehoods and fallacies.
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Democrats, Obama, and Abortion: Turning Liberalism Incoherent
Can the Democratic Party's awkward position on infanticide and abortion be regarded as simply a lesser matter in an ensemble of "other issues" of higher standing? Or does that position challenge the very coherence of everything else that a liberal party proclaims itself to be?
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Does Increased Welfare Spending or Pro-Life Legislation Reduce Abortion?
Catholics in Alliance recently released a study questioning the effectiveness of pro-life legislation and arguing that greater spending on welfare programs was a better strategy for reducing abortion. Unfortunately, their study is seriously flawed. Rigorous analysis of their own data indicates that increased welfare spending only has little to no impact on abortion. Public funding restrictions and informed-consent laws, however, are effective at reducing abortion rates.
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A Dangerous Time to be a Black Baby
Nearly half of all African-American pregnancies end in abortion, and social inequality isn't the only reason why.
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Pro-Life Politicians Have Made a Difference, Pro-Life Laws Work
During the past 35 years, the pro-life movement has made real progress. The number of abortions has fallen in 12 out of the past 14 years and the total number of abortions has declined by 21 percent since 1990. These gains are largely due to pro-life political victories at the federal level in the 1980s and at the state level in the 1990s which have made it easier to pass pro-life legislation.
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When is it Acceptable for a “Pro-Life” Voter to Vote for a “Pro-Choice” Candidate?
The Golden Rule should serve as a guide to those weighing a vote for "pro-choice" politicians.
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Little Murders
In an address delivered on October 17, Archbishop Charles J. Chaput stated that ''Prof. Douglas Kmiec has a strong record of service to the Church and the nation in his past. But I think his activism for Senator Barack Obama, and the work of Democratic-friendly groups like Catholics United and Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good, have done a disservice to the Church, confused the natural priorities of Catholic social teaching, undermined the progress pro-lifers have made, and provided an excuse for some Catholics to abandon the abortion issue instead of fighting within their parties and at the ballot box to protect the unborn.''
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Obama and Infanticide
Obama's latest excuse for opposing the Illinois Born-Alive Infants Protection Act is that the law was "unnecessary" because babies surviving abortions were already protected. It won't fly.