Los Pequeños de Cristo, Inc. | Devoted to the Roman ...



|Los Pequeños Pepper |

|Newsletter of Los Pequeños de Cristo |

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|March 2006 |Volume 8, Number 3 |

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|A Forbidden Reflection |Page 4 |

|An examination of Rev. Richard Rohr’s book: The Great Themes of Scripture – New Testament | |

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|Homosexual Orders |Page 7 |

|Oxymorons and other Chimerae | |

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|St. Peter and the Keys |Page 9 |

|Infallibility, Inerrancy, and Certitude | |

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|Five Hours Inside an Abortion Mill |Page 11 |

|Two pro-lifers describe their experiences. | |

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|Imagine |Page 14 |

|Replacing faith fuel with flower power. | |

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|Around the Nation; Around the Archdiocese |Page 15 |

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|Letters to the Editor |Page 15 |

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|March Calendar |Page 15 |

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Newsletter of Los Pequeños de Cristo

Stephanie Block-editor, Carol Suhr-copy editor

Correspondence to The Pequeños Pepper may be addressed to:

325 Ellen St. NW

Los Lunas, NM 87031

or phone: 505 866 0977 or

The Pequeños Pepper is published monthly

We are an Archdiocesan-wide Catholic lay organization committed to a charitable defense of the Catholic Faith by means of education, communication, and prayer. We are devoted to the Roman Catholic Magisterium, the Holy Father, and to the bishops and clergy in union with him. Our members believe what the Church believes and we promote what the Church teaches. To this end, we believe that no individual, whether cleric or lay person, has the right to alter the substance of the gospel message or moral truths which have been inerrantly and infallibly held by the Catholic Church since Her founding.

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Los Pequeños Pepper

Publication of Los Pequeños de Cristo

March 2006

A Forbidden Reflection

An examination of Rev. Richard Rohr’s book: The Great Themes of Scripture – New Testament

Page 4

Homosexual Orders

Oxymorons and other Chimerae

Page 7

Five Hours Inside an Abortion Mill

Two pro-lifers describe their experiences

Page 11

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Cover: Kiss of Judas, Anonymous, 12th c. School of Pisa. Florence, Uffizi Gallery.

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Excerpts from….

A Forbidden Reflection

Unveiling the book: The Great Themes of Scripture - New Testament by Richard Rohr & Martos

By Jean S. Charles

When the Lord called my name, I dropped everything and I offered myself to the parish of St. Elizabeth [in Lyndonville, VT] to serve unconditionally and faithfully, rain or shine. I started the Diocesan Lay Ministry Training Program in 2004, which will end in June 2006.

I also waited two years to get into the program. In January 2005, the course on the New Testament came with an assigned text by Richard Rohr and Joe Martos: “The Great Themes of Scripture - New Testament.”

I opened the book and right in the foreword, I found Eastern heresies and western esoterism. I was disappointed because these were precisely the kinds of harmful beliefs that I was running from…running from rain I fell into a pool!

I sent some emails to my classmates in the New Testament course but was asked, from the teacher herself, to stop. I did, but continued my research on Rohr (I don’t do well in solitary confinement) and it was a relief when the class ended. I am determined, though, to share my findings.

The Great Themes of Scripture - New Testament

Starting in the foreword, Richard Rohr refers to God as “Himself/Herself” and raises the red flag to watch out for heresies. In fact, referring to what he will be writing, he says clearly: “Most of it is heresy, some of it is absurd, and all of it is true.”

At the last part of chapter one (page 13), the authors write: “In the infancy narratives there is much more theology than biography, much more myth than history.”

A paragraph later the authors began to discredit the genealogy of Jesus as it appears in the Scriptures: “Upon close inspection” they write, “…it is a contrived and symbolic tracing of Jesus’ ancestry. Historically there must have been many more generations from Abraham to Jesus than the ones mentioned.” I waited in vain for proof of these remarks.

The authors next discredit the magi story, the Flight to Egypt and even the massacres by Herod of the infants in Bethlehem, reducing the Word of God to mythology.

Dissing the Church

Betraying strong misunderstandings about the Church, on page 24 they write: “Many Catholics have gone through 12 years of religious education and have never surrendered to Jesus as their personal Lord. They may never have heard the Lordship of Jesus Christ proclaimed except in a stream of words among so many other strings of words at Sunday Mass; they may have no idea that it ought to mean something to them personally….” “…There are many non-Catholics, on the other hand, who understand clearly the Lordship of Christ….”

On page 31, last paragraph, we read: “All too often in our history, however, we have behaved as though the Church were not the means but the end itself. We have preached the Church instead of preaching the kingdom and the Lordship of Christ.”

Page 32 says” “We ought to have the same attitude toward the Church and Catholicism. If we are truly disciples of Jesus, we should not proclaim the Church or exalt Catholicism. That misses the whole point of what Jesus was about. Worse than that, instead of furthering the kingdom, it subverts the kingdom. For it hides the good news of God’s reign behind religious works and institutional walls which , to many people, look like so much bad news. It breaks the First Commandment and makes an idol of the Church.”

Avery Cardinal Dulles, please come to my assistance. Tell this man about Ecclesiology.

Page 37, last paragraph, says: “ We don’t have to go to Rome or even to church to find [redemption].”

Here’s a lengthy quote. On page 44-45, Rohr and Martos write: “If only the Church had shared Jesus’ bias toward the bottom the past 2000 years! If only we had seriously believed him, how much sooner we would have seen the coming of the kingdom! If only we had truly listened to the gospels, how differently Western history would have unfolded! Instead we have made easy friends with power, prestige and possession –even in the name of God and the Church. We use the name of Christ and have fine theological terms for what we do, but often what we do is no different from what everyone else does. We run our dioceses and parishes the same way that governments and businesses are run. We ask what fund-raisers will save our schools, what strategies will rescue our religion programs, what speakers will draw the largest crowds to fill our empty auditoriums. Although we pray to God for help, we act as though good planning and hard work, theological reason, efficiency and organization will save the Church. Many Catholics have never known the kingdom which is the heart and soul of the Church. They have never been part of a network of believers which is built on kingdom values. They have only belonged, attended, or contributed but never really lived in a new way. Their life is not really an alternative to living in the world.”

Later, they write: “But traditional religion runs dry, so Mary comes to Jesus saying, ‘They have no wine’”… here in this story humanity is turning to Jesus, complaining that religion is empty, it no longer gives meaning to life, it no longer give joy to existence. We want to taste something better than the daily drudgery which the world and cheap religion offer us. The inability of ritualistic religion to satisfy us is symbolized by the empty water jars used for Jewish purification rituals. But if, like the waiters, we do what Jesus asks, he gives us something to replace what the old religious practices were meant to convey. Much of John’s gospel is directed against cheap religiosity. Well-run churches and sermons that are easy to listen to may appeal to us at first, but they do not really satisfy our deep spiritual hunger. They are empty, and what they seem to hold for us will turn out to be as tasteless as standing water.” (Page 52-53)

One last quote: “When we’re involved with mere religion, we’re often satisfied because we think we are fulfilling the law. But actually, the law of Christ can never be fulfilled. Jesus gave his followers only one commandment, to love as he loved.” As far as I know, Jesus did not abrogate the other Ten Commandments, did He?

New Age Practices

On the Center for Action and Contemplation web site (), one finds the name and symbol of Christ in the Catholic Church (the P with the X) is used by Richard Rohr to sell the Enneagram. (In another version, a naked female body replaces the Chi Rho symbol). The Enneagram, a nine-pointed star, was originally used for divination. It is not a Christian symbol. Rohr is mixing Jungian psychology with spirituality and the Gospel. A magical symbol cannot become holy by the sole virtue of Christo-centric application. Throughout the whole Scripture, God the Father is very resentful of such mixtures. King Manasseh in the Old Testament consulted “spirits” to his peril.

What attracts people to these practices? You might be lured since Rohr offers you power and elder titles (makes you feel good, hey?) and initiation ceremonies (such fun). He builds up your ego (makes you feel good). Follow him after many seminars. He may wind up your guru and you will be alienated from the Church and believe you have something better than the Gospel, that Catholics are all wrong and don’t understand Jesus, and don’t even appreciate the Eucharist. Rohr, on the other hand, has the “truth.” There are many groups out there with such beliefs and, just like Rohr, they use tapes, seminars and books to sell their fallacies. Some disguise themselves as Catholics. I am serious. They all use mind expansion techniques and eastern meditation. They do not praise God; they praise themselves.

Christianity is about redemption from sin, about salvation of the human race, a chance to recover from Adam’s fall and to have eternal life by the mercy of God. It is not about feeling “mature” and important. Feeling good and important is the way of the serpent’s lie in Genesis 3 “Your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is bad”.

There are those who seek the disappearance of the Church. The Church is not the physical parish, they say – it’s you. However, Jesus started His Church when he told Simon “You are Peter…” and after two thousand years, it makes no sense to abandon the entire infrastructure and still think we have a Church.

God approves the house of worship, the sanctuary where the Eucharist is kept, the whole building and real estate around it. We are a billion people. We cannot meet in backyards and living rooms alone; we must keep holy grounds where we go to pray and meet God in silence or in praise. (Hey – even Rohr’s Center for Action and Contemplation sports a Zen sitting room!)

Back to the Book

Next, please return to the book on page 166 and read about Richard Rohr’s ordination day: “I was feeling sort of numb, and even when the bishop laid his hands on me to ordain me, it seemed I was barely aware of what was going on.” It turns out, he explains, that the Church where Rohr was ordained was built on a spirit ‘vortex;’ a ‘touch down’ spot where, in the year 1900, the Pentecostal movement started. The “spirits” descended on a prayer group there. One has to wonder if Rohr’s current hostility against the Church hasn’t some supernatural roots in this history he provides. (

New Oxford Review will also be carrying a critique of Fr. Rohr’s work, prepared by Fr. Bryce Silbey.

Homosexual Orders: Oxymorons and Other Chimerae

By Marie P. Loehr

“Oxymoron: a figure of speech in which contradictory terms are combined…”

In November 2005 the Vatican issued an “Instruction Concerning the Criteria for the Discernment of Vocations with Regard to Persons with Homosexual Tendencies in View of Their Admission to the Seminary and to Holy Orders.” This is a timely teaching on who is eligible for the priesthood in light of the sexual scandals affecting the priesthood over the past few years, and gay insistence on the right to “marriage,” to adopt children, and so on.

This instruction states very clearly: “The priest, in fact, sacramentally represents Christ, the head, shepherd and spouse of the Church.” Christ is the Bridegroom and Spouse. This sacramental reality of Christ the Bridegroom is witnessed in St. Paul’s epistles, especially in Ephesians 5, where he likens the sacrament of Matrimony and the relationship of husband and wife to the bond between Christ and His Church. F.X. Durrwell, C.SS.R., describes this in his book, In the Redeeming Christ. He says Christ is the principle of life; the Church is the environment of life. This is to say, Christ is the Bridegroom, the seed falling into the ground, the principle of generation and begetting. The Church is the Bride, the ground that receives the seed, the principle of germination and bearing. In short, we are dealing with a spousal mystery, when we speak not only of Matrimony, but of Holy Orders, and the Eucharist. Furthermore, the source of this spousal relationship and covenant is the Trinity itself.

Therefore, the priesthood is conditioned by this Trinitarian reality of covenant who is the Father, communion who is the Son, and creativity who is the Spirit. The Father is the root or source of life, the Son is the trunk and branches or channel of life, the Spirit is the leaf, flower and fruit, or completion and fullness of the True Vine.

This Trinitarian relationship and reality is itself spousal. This is reiterated in Creation. God is the root or source of Creation, Adam is the trunk through which God works, and Eve is the flowering glory of God’s work in Adam. We see the same pattern in marriage, stated in Paul, 1 Cor. 11. As the Father is the root of the Trinity, so Christ is to the marriage. As the Son is the trunk and branches in the Trinity, so the husband is in the marriage. As the Spirit is the flowering glory of the Trinity, so is the wife in marriage.

This spousal order is equally true in Orders, as we will see.

The Trinity is the fountainhead of BEING, that is, LIFE. The Trinity is the source of all life, spiritual and material. It generates life. It germinates life. Its being and work is LIFE.

The Incarnation, the Son becoming man in the womb of the Virgin, is equally ordered to RE-generating both spiritual and material life in Creation, most particularly in the apex of Creation: Adam, i.e., man and woman. Thus Christ is truly Bridegroom. As God’s covenant with Israel was a spousal covenant [cf. Hosea, and the Canticle], so Christ’s covenant in redeemed Creation, with his Church, is spousal. He is the Bridegroom; the Church is his Bride. The Eucharist is his Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity. It is also “the seed [that] must fall into the ground and die” in order to beget new life. The Eucharist then is generative, ordered to generate and beget new life in each one of us, in the Church, in Creation itself. The Eucharist is spousal in nature, and potent with life, spiritual and material. Indeed, all the sacraments are ordered to generating new life within us, if we examine their nature, purpose, and effects.

Therefore, the priesthood itself is an instrument or principle of life--of generating and begetting new life through all the sacraments, but most particularly through the Eucharist and the power of the consecration, transubstantiating bread and wine to BE the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ, the Second Person of the Trinity BY his own generative power. This power is effected in each priest through the conferral of Holy Orders.

This is as truly a spousal sacrament and icon of the life of the Trinity as Matrimony.

The bishop and his priests “in persona Christi” are Bridegroom to the Bride who is each diocese or parish. They are charged to generate and beget new life in their people by the Mass and Eucharist, by administering the sacraments, by preaching the Word which is also the seed sown, in season and out of season. They are to give up their lives, pour themselves out, to generate and beget new life in their flock as Christ did for his Church, as husband does for his wife and family. (

To Be Continued…

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The Church as the Bride of Christ

Jean Bondol, Paris, 1372.

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Icon of Christ the Bridegroom

St. Peter and the Keys

Infallibility, Inerrancy, and Certainty

By Robert Levine

Getting to heaven!

To the end of gaining heaven, the salvific love of God is given, graciously, efficaciously through the One Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church; all holiness, grace, charity, goodness is bestowed by the Triune God through her upon us, His poor creatures. Christ is the one Mediator between God and man. Our blessed and Immaculate mother Mary, mediatrix, was chosen by Him to merit and distribute those graces to and for us.

This is not to say that only Catholics are saved, but that heaven is Roman Catholic and all salvation comes through the Church; that the good God visits salvation upon us according to the merits of Christ and His Church.

Two Keys

Reception of the Most Holy Eucharist is reception of our Lord Jesus Christ, true God and true Man, in the mystery of the hypostatic union, and through, with and in Him, the fullness of the first and third persons of the Most Holy Trinity.

The keys of St. Peter may be said, in one sense, to represent that union in this way: the first key, turning toward God, pertains to Peter’s Infallibility in matters of faith and morals; the sign of contradiction, the Church’s indefectibility, and proof of her eternal and sacred origin and birth in Our Lord’s Passion. To follow Peter in those matters is to pursue the path of salvation.

The second key, turning toward man, opens Heaven to the greatest number of souls, so that after Peter’s definition of what is essential to salvation (the ordinary Magisterium, the deposit of Faith), the Holy Father and Holy Spirit preside over the Church in matters of governance and discipline, inerrantly, to that blessed end. Once the Pope defines, as only he can, what is essential to salvation, charity rules and freedom prevails. As Saint Augustine wrote, “Love God and do what you will.”

Without the fullness of Christ, the Holy Trinity becomes unobtainable, thus the keys are inseparable, as in the mystery of the hypostatic union. In the Blessed Sacrament, the Holy Trinity becomes obtainable and the mystery of our salvation and our contingency is a cause of joy.

By God’s grace, St. Peter was given, and Peter’s successors hold, the two keys to heaven, each defined for purposes here in the documents of Vatican I. As with all things inexhaustible, this is not meant to constrain the infinite meaning of the Keys to the Kingdom.

Now, where there are two keys there are at least two locks:

0. The first Definition referred to in Vatican I proclaims Peter and his successors infallible in all matters of faith and morals. Thus does the will of God visit and direct us, unlocking that portal.

1. The second identifies Peter as primate of the first see, due obedience in all matters of ecclesiastical governance and discipline. It declares that disagreement with the definition of the Holy Father’s primacy and/or formal disobedience in such matters is anathema. This is the binding of the temporal to the eternal in the bond that guarantees souls for God, the strategy of salvation, at once containing all essentials and the means to them. Thus, the second key.

St. Peter and the Keys – Infallibility and Inerrancy

Only Two Schools of Error

To digress and hopefully, to reconnect, there seem to be only two systemic philosophical errors: relativism and determinism.

Relativism claims that there is no truth, no hierarchy of values, no difference between beings, in the long run, no distinctions at all. It denies cause and effect (natural law) and strips reality of its content. It equivocates, confuses, blinds to relation and degree. It is unbearably immanent. Ironically, relativism inevitably and invariably claims truth for itself while denying it to others and to reality, quickly spiraling into chaotic nihilism. This family of errors is more of the intellect. While its mask is warm and fuzzy, it is a cold day in Hell.

Determinism, the other side of the false coin, denies free will. It claims that one factor or another, beyond and apart from our will – society, environment, genetic disposition, race, gender, you name it –determines our decisions and habits and that we are, consequently, not responsible for moral decisions. Determinism is, ironically, a choice by which one would selectively take variables into account and then choose those that strengthen the preset. It is the argument by which one would eat his cake and have it too or, more precisely, be the exception to the rule. Making the rule, one would necessarily be apart from it, a position that invariably disproves the deterministic proposition. This family of errors is more about the nature of volition although its explication must be rationalistic. What the determinist cannot see is his pre-philosophical bias against the natural law, inverted to fit a parallel construction of cause and effect. Free will is freely voided. The moral law is the target.

Lock and Key

The two errors are, in this way, related to the two keys to heaven in an ironically subversive form, functioning as two locks, the former leading to sins of concupiscence through the diminution of form and the latter leading to sins of pride through the enthronement of disobedience, both of despair.

Set against form, distinction, objective response to value and eternal truth crowned by the Holy Trinity, relativism distorts all matters of faith and morals and can be ascertained in that compendium of all errors, Modernism.

Determinism seems more hell-bent on the notion that one can know better than the pope on the ecclesiastical and disciplinary matters that lead to salvation. However, the Holy Father has an exclusive (i.e., universal) relationship with the Holy Spirit that allows him to

1) unerringly distinguish between matters of necessity and of freedom, and

2) to correctly rule according to that distinction on how to save our souls.

Nothing, nothing is more disturbing to the soul than for it to distrust the Magisterium and disrupt the joy and order of being or to find itself in conflict with the Holy Father’s guidance toward eternal happiness.

To follow the turning of the keys, to follow the Holy Father with faith, hope, charity and a remorseful loathing of sin, to defend his defense of the Church and souls, is essential to the Church Militant. It is to read the signs that lead to salvation, to turn away from all the little religions – things arbitrary and our own, unnecessary or threatening to our eternal welfare. It is to possess the means to salvation with certainty; it is to embrace the keys to heaven. (

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FIVE HOURS INSIDE AN ABORTION MILL

By Mabel Ryan and Gail Zach

This story was first published in the Marion County Right to Life newsletter, October 2005, covering the authors’ experiences. On Feb. 2, 2006, it was presented at a Sarasota-Manatee Right to Life chapter meeting.

In the September issue of this newsletter, we announced that we were invited to spend a day inside an abortion mill located in Sarasota, Florida. This invitation was made to two officers of Marion County Right to Life: Mabel Ryan, president, and Gail Zach, vice president. This offer came from Lori Jacobs, executive director, Premier Institute for Women's Health. The visit was scheduled for Friday, Aug. 5, 2005.

We accepted this invitation for more than one reason. First, we believed that it would harvest a wealth of information never before available to pro-liters in their work for the unborn. Second, we saw it as an opportunity to bring prayer inside, to the scene of the greatest evil of our time. Third, we believe with all humility that we were on a mission for God and that He had arranged for us to be at a certain place at a certain time that resulted in the invitation being issued.

That day, a prayer group was in place at our parish, Queen of Peace in Ocala, to pray for us and for the mission before us. Other pro-life friends from many locations offered prayers for us that day. We entered the abortion mill strengthened and confident by these intercessions. We were warmly greeted by Lori Jacobs, abortion mill director, and less-warmly greeted by her staff. We were to meet later in the day with Dr. Matthew Kachinas, MD, who actually performs the abortions.

We were to be allowed to observe the actual abortion surgery only if or when one of the incoming mothers consented to our presence. We were to attend the counseling sessions of the mothers and fathers if they, the parents, allowed us to be there. We were to wear no pro-life shirts or to display in any way that we were other than observing medical personnel. We were not to speak directly to any client who might approach us. Those were the rules, which we accepted.

It was obvious from the start that the director invited us for one purpose: She would, she said, change our minds and we would see what a great service they were doing for pregnant mothers who wanted to “terminate” for any reason. (Abortionists almost always use the word “terminate,” not the word “abortion.”) She informed us that good reasons to “terminate” were: confirmed imperfect fetal development, a baby believed to suffer from Down's Syndrome, or if in the abortionist’s judgment the mother was not capable of properly rearing the child for any reason.

She brushed off our suggestion that some mothers have none of these reasons in play, but just do not want to be inconvenienced by a baby. She also avoided our suggestion that diagnostic mistakes are common in all fields of medicine, including that of determining fetal development. We did not debate with her our strong objection to this reasoning since to do so would have ended our interview.

She spoke of mothers who make an appointment to abort with the statement, “If I am more than 12 weeks pregnant when tested, then I will not abort.” When pressed on this, she became a bit tangled up but agreed that if it is a baby at 13 weeks, then it is a baby before that time. A small victory for our side.

We discussed adoption instead of abortion. Her view is that adoptions and abortions are the same -- the mother is getting rid of the baby. In another venue, what an argument we could have made on that statement.

We asked about her experience with mothers who saw their babies on sonogram; she assured us that no mother ever turns away from abortion because of a sonogram. This is contrary to all we have learned about the effect on mothers of seeing their baby on sonogram.

Finally we were told that a young mother would allow us to join her during her counseling session. This beautiful young woman, mother of two children, was here for her second abortion. The counseling was in name only. The only statement made that didn’t relate to questions on her admittance form was, “Have you considered not aborting?” The young mother answered, “No, the decision is made.” End of counseling -- no other choices, no options, no suggestion to not abort was ever made.

This young mother has never been married; the two children she gave birth to were fathered by someone other than the father of the baby being aborted. The father of the baby bound for abortion today was in the waiting room and, when asked, this mother wanted no one -- including the father of the baby -- to accompany her either in the operating room or in the recovery room. We did not observe the actual abortion but we were invited to examine the fetus after abortion. It was clear that the director believed that on seeing the fetus after abortion, we would come to believe the myth that “it is not a baby, it is just tissue.” Well, of course, after the baby has been surgically aborted, it might appear to be just tissue; to us it is still a baby who has been mutilated and put to death. We declined the invitation.

During the five hours we were inside the abortion mill, there were many clients coming and going. We quickly learned to listen to the doorbell-like chime that sounded each time the office received another

client. At the end of the day, three babies had lost their lives to the knife of the abortionist. We had no way of determining why so many other clients were there that day. We were told that after a woman has her abortion, she must be picked up at the back door, not the front door which she entered on arrival. All the clients entered by the front door, but only three left by the back door.

This abortion mill operates on a five-day schedule. While they advertise that they do other services there besides abortion, once the director went into detail what the abortion industry is all about, it was plain to see that their goal was and is only to perform abortions. She was not shy about saying that the big money is to be made in abortions. She informed us that it takes a maximum of six minutes per abortion and in no field of “medicine” can that amount of money be made so quickly. When we challenged her that a good, reputable specialist in any field could make the same or more money, she laughed in our face. She informed us that anyone can do abortions. It takes no real medical skill, and many abortionists are retired doctors who just pick up extra money by joining a “rent-a-doctor service.” She accused Planned Parenthood abortion mills of operating with rented doctors with no real connection to Planned Parenthood or to their clients. She informed us that her “clinic” was different and that the abortionist with her “clinic” had a financial interest in the business; somehow she gave the impression that she thought that made her business superior to Planned Parenthood.

We were not prepared for the animosity displayed between this abortion mill and every other abortion mill she could think to name. Abortionists are no “band of brothers.” We went there believing that networking would be in place between these mills but we were wrong! She named “terrible termination providers” that she especially loathed because, in her words, they had no respect for their clients. She saved the worst names for Pendergraft, the abortionist who owns the Ocala mill (and four other mills in Florida). She described him to us as a “short, fat bald, ugly black man.” In her opinion, he abuses women and gives her business a bad name.

Another complaint she voiced is that other abortionists refuse to let friends and acquaintances know that they work in abortion mills. Somehow she thought that would be of interest to us; I am not sure why. She told us of how her own staff is guilty of hiding what they are doing at work and how she is still trying to change this pattern of denial. She says she proudly tells anyone that her business is involved in helping women. Again, we did not debate with her on this opinion; it was not the place or time.

She told us that she took the entire staff to Washington to join the “March for Life” in 2004. They needed to see that the pro-life movement is strong and they needed to know that they must work to overcome it. She informed us that there were “thousands of them marching against abortion.” We did not share with her the fact that we both were among those thousands in Washington in 2004.

Finally, rather reluctantly, she brought the “doctor” in to meet with us. He had very few words to say, and actually looked anxious and uncomfortable (as well he should). We spoke with him and looked him

straight in the eye as we spoke. Making him feel comfortable was not our goal. We abruptly brought the meeting to a close, which seemed to startle them both. Five hours had gone by since we first entered the abortion mill.

We are still processing the information we received. The one thought that remains in our minds is, with so many women entering that abortion mill that day, why did just three of them remain for abortion? What turned the rest of them away? The “doctor” and the staff were on site all the time we were present - what were they doing for five hours? By their own admission, each abortion takes only up to six minutes; what took up the rest of their time?

We firmly believe that without the prayers that were being offered that day, for that location, many other abortions would have taken place. Certainly, they had many other clients coming through the front door, but only the three mothers of dead babies went out the back door.

We will be able to use the information we gleaned at the abortion clinic. It will give us greater insight in approaching mothers delivering their babies for death and we will be better able to counter what is being told them inside the abortion mill. We spent five hours in what Satan had claimed as his exclusive territory, but today his turf was filled with the power of prayer. By the mercy of God, fewer babies were aborted that day at that abortion mill in Sarasota. (

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12-week fetus

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Babies as early as 12 weeks yawn in utero

An alternative point of view…

Five Hours

By Carol Suhr

Recent reports in various pro-life media have me searching for the moral answer to a very disturbing question: Is it ethical to accept an invitation for a “show me” tour of an abortuary while abortions are being committed and accepting the abortuary’s terms for the interview which include posing as medical personnel, not revealing ones actual pro-life position, and not raising any embarrassing questions or trying to convert the person who is trying to convert you?

I applaud the courage of the women who went and do not doubt for a minute their sincerity, but what could they possibly learn in five hours that we don’t already know from the testimony of former abortionists like Drs. Bernard Nathanson, Carol Everett and Erich Harrah?

And is it more productive to pray inside an abortuary than outside where people know who you are and why you are there?

I have no credentials whatsoever, only a deep seated and sickening gut feeling that it is not right to play along with terrorists for any reason. The most egregious aspect of the whole situation is the statement “We were to be allowed to observe the actual abortion surgery”!

Although the women declined to watch the abortion or look at the remains of the aborted child, still, they were there when it happened. Does this imply that it would be o.k. to visit Saddam’s rape rooms, Hitler’s crematoriums, Stalin’s gulags, Pol Pot’s killing fields while atrocities were going on, as long as we didn’t look at what was going on?

Or should we take the position that, just like a journalist or photographer, it is necessary for someone to document the atrocities so the world will know the truth and hopefully put a stop to them?

Or, if this really is a “mission from God”, can we, like Mary or the prayer warriors outside the abortuaries, stand silently by while the killings go on?

If there are any moral theologians out there, please write in and give us some guidelines. (

Imagine

By Betty Ann McDermott

 

Imagine my reaction when I opened up the Albuquerque Journal on Friday (02/03/06) and saw the large ad quoting the lyrics of John Lennon's popular song “Imagine.” Pretty song, pretty words, pretty naïve application. Reading further and seeing the ad was sponsored by a coalition of Churches – including the Roman Catholic Church – I was first angry and then profoundly sad.

 

But I can “imagine” a better world, too:

 

▪ Imagine…Church leaders who understood Christ's message and purpose was salvation, one soul at a time. Society changes from the bottom up, not the top down.

▪ Imagine…Jesus Christ not reduced to a social worker but reclaiming His rightful role as Savior of the world.

▪ Imagine…Believing Christ when He told us “the poor ye shall always have with you.” It's not our job to eradicate poverty because, if we believe Him, we can't. It is our job, as individuals, to serve the poor.

▪ Imagine…Not every vote counting, but every soul and it's eternal salvation becoming the single greatest concern of our Church leaders.

▪ Imagine…Every political vote cast reflecting the true wisdom of our faith as shared with us by men divinely inspired by the Word of God.

▪ Imagine…Our Church leaders being more concerned about the spiritual hunger of their people than their own hunger for power. Hungry for truth, hungry for clarity, hungry for the real - not agendized and watered down - message of Jesus Christ.

▪ Imagine…Church leaders understanding that greed, corruption, poverty and all other societal ills were just as prevalent 2,000 years ago as they are now. Jesus Christ understood our human natures. He offered us a “peace that passeth all understanding,” even if the minimum wage wasn't high enough. He did not form unions or preach about the injustices of society. He spoke about the love we should have for God and for each other. That love ultimately resulted in His death and our salvation.

▪ Imagine…A world where people were not so empty that they had to fill themselves up with drugs and alcohol.

▪ Imagine…A world where that big hole inside of all of us was filled by the love of God as presented to us by His faithful servants, pastors, priests, and bishops.

▪ Imagine…A world where we understood that unless we held all life sacred, no life would have real value. How silly to be concerned about mentorship programs when we fight like mad to defend our “right” to kill our babies. There are consequences and the breakdown of the family and its “victims,” our children, are part of that fallout.

▪ Imagine…There is a Heaven.

▪ Imagine…There is a hell. I do, because He told me there was - and He told us how we get to each place.

▪ Imagine…if we believed Him and lived our lives accordingly.

Now, just imagine that(

Around the Nation

Another Campaign for Human Development grantee shows its colors: A June 23, 2005 United Farm Workers Press Release announced that the group supports California legislation to give same-sex couples equal marriage rights. “This is about one civil rights movement joining forces with another,” said one UFW director. Your Catholic donations have helped fund this woman’s salary.

Around the Archdiocese

On January 18, 2006, the Center for Action and Contemplation – Fr. Richard Rohr’s archdiocesan-approved and advertised retreat facility – held the event, Twilight Yoga: Breathing Into The New Year. On January 20-22, 2006, a similar retreat was held at the Spiritual Renewal Center. (See Letter to the Editor, below)

The January 14, 2006 PMD Express advertised an initiative of the Archdiocese’s Director of Ecology Ministry: Prayers for Water. It reads: “Our Hopi brothers and sisters invite people of various faith traditions to send small vials of water from the places where they live along with a picture of the place and a prayer for peace or healing. A caravan of 40 runners and elders in vans will relay the water through New Mexico in a sacred manner to the World Water Forum in Mexico City in March.” The World Water Forum includes a “women’s coalition” of international abortion advocacy groups.

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Letter to the Editor

I’ve found yoga and tai chi to be very helpful forms of exercise. Does your article in the February Pepper, “Retreating into Darkness,” mean that these are new age practices like the Enneagram? - EM

There’s no denying that yoga or tai chi can be beneficial exercises – although bowing to the “god within” one’s fellow practitioner (as is common at the end of many yoga classes) violates the first commandment.

The problem with offering these disciplines at a Catholic retreat center (presumably substituting some other form of graciousness than the idolatrous bow) is that they’re an irresponsible use of Catholic resources. Tai chi brings no one into the Church. Yoga has never catechized a spiritually ignorant Catholic. There are plenty of places around town to stretch, but where do the faithful go for an exuberant, Catholic spiritual workout?

So, until every Catholic is savvy and everyone else is Catholic, there’s work to be done. - Editor

March Calendar

Los Pequeños Monthly Meeting

Friday, March 24, 2006:

6:30 PM – 9:00 PM.

Call (505) 293-8006 for information.

All members welcome.

Pro-life Prayer:

Planned Parenthood Abortuary

701 San Mateo Blvd.

Catholic Knights Chapel: (505) 266-4100

12 noon, Thursday

Mass at the Catholic Knights of America Chapel

Fr. Stephen Imbarrato

For more information, call

(505) 266-4100

((

Please consider a donation to Los Pequeños.

((

Movie Buff? You might appreciate the website “Kids in Mind,” regardless of your age. Painfully detailed (almost to the point of absurdity) enumeration of each act of violence, profanity, sexual innuendo, and drug, tobacco, or alcohol reference, the site enables viewers to make informed decisions about which movies to watch.



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