Sincerity is one thing; stupidity is another.

Randall Terry of Operation Rescue and now spokesman for Terri Schiavo’s parents: ‘What in the name of God is going on when the entire US government prostrates itself at the feet of a tinpot judge?’ (Guardian, 29 Mar. 2005)

Rev. Patrick Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition: ‘Mahoney said that the fact that Schiavo has survived nearly 10 days since the removal of the tube that has supplied her with nutrition and water indicates that she wants to appear before the House Government Reform Committee.’ (CNN.com, 28 Mar. 2005) On the next day, Mahoney again cited Schiavo’s ‘endurance through 11 days without food or water as evidence that she wants to live … Mahoney shouted, “She is speaking from her hospice bed, saying, ‘I want to live. Will you help me?”‘ (Washington Post, 29 Mar. 2005)

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Filed in: Voluntary Euthanasia

Peter Stokes, Executive Officer, Salt Shakers, letter in Melbourne Age, 23 Mar. 2005:

Marrying a virgin and being totally faithful within your marriage is the only way to be 100 per cent sure your child is yours …
[But since we can't be 100 per cent sure that our partners were virgins, nor that they are always 'totally faithful' within the marriage ...]

Bob Larson, American exorcist, recently on tour in Australia, New Life, 24 Mar. 2005:

… I found Jesus and felt called to some kind of ministry. I travelled the world and wherever I went I attended any exotic ceremony I could find. One was a self-mutilation and torture group who, after going into a trance and having seizures, pierced their bodies with 100 three feet long skewers, put knives through their tongues and cheeks and walked three miles to a temple to worship, yet never shed a drop of blood. I asked why they did not bleed and they said their gods gave them the power. I said, ‘This is like what happened in the Bible’.
[Those pages must have fallen out of my Bible.]

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Filed in: Their Own Mouths

In a recent article about Tony Abbott’s adventures (‘After the DNA, will Abbott get a reality check?’, Melbourne Age, 24 Mar. 2005) Leslie Cannold asked whether ‘Abbott’s complex personal situation will lead him to question his rigid and long-held views of female sexuality and reproductive obligation’:

According to psychologist Dr Susie Allanson, a counsellor of 15 years at the East Melbourne Fertility Control Clinic, the odds are regrettably slim. Over the years Allanson has counselled a number of women who are not just morally opposed to abortion but have actively campaigned against it being safe and legal. Yet, when they have found themselves unhappily pregnant, they decide on abortion.

Essentially, such women convince themselves that they are special cases – to the point of being actually unique – and that their situations are thus quite irrelevant to the cases of all those female ‘murderers’ who have abortions.

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Filed in: Abortion

Christianity is supposed to preach love, compassion and forgiveness, but have a look at the words and actions employed by some of the self-proclaimed ’supporters’ of brain-damage victim Terri Schiavo.

Randall Terry of the extremist anti-abortion group Operation Rescue says that if Schiavo dies ‘there will be hell to pay’. Terry charges that Governor Jeb Bush, a former hero of the Religious Right, has now ‘caved in to a runaway judiciary’. (LA Times, 25 Mar. 2005)

Rev. Jerry Falwell, former head of the failed Moral Majority: ‘Just because there is a judge somewhere in the world who would give an estranged husband like [Terri Schiavo's] the time of day, tells you how bad the court system is.’ (Detroit Free Press, 25 Mar. 2005)

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Filed in: Voluntary Euthanasia

There have been various proposals put forward for suggested government action such as not funding late term abortions or only funding those that have occurred following the informed consent of the mother through viewing foetal images.

Frankly – that is not good enough. Right to Life Australia wants abortion defunded – as simple as that! Those who think we’ll win some concessions by making timid suggestions will find that they could end up with nothing.
Margaret Tighe, President RTLA, RTLA News, Jan.-Feb. 2005, 1

Anti-abortion advocates are a motley crew, ranging from Margaret Tighe types, who believe that all abortions should be outlawed regardless of the circumstances, to people like David van Gend who would apparently permit abortion ‘in cases of rape, incest, pregnancy in minors(!) or where it is necessary to save a mother’s life’ – www.australiandoctor.com.au/news/a1/0c0291a1.asp

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Filed in: Abortion

What would Jesus have done if he’d had to vote in the recent WA State election or perhaps in the Werriwa by-election held just yesterday? He looks at the ballot paper and sees not one, but two gold-plated, dyed-in-the-wool Christian ‘family’ parties, Fred Nile’s Christian Democratic Party (CDP) and the Pentecostal-based Family First Party (FFP), just begging for his vote.

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Filed in: Christian Right, Politics