Outreach Programs

The Obama administration has taken a variety of actions that directly limit religious freedom in the United States. Congressman Chris Smith of New Jersey stated in a EWTN interview with Raymond Arroyo that President Obama’s Executive Order supposedly ensuring that federal funds would not be used for abortion and that individuals who opposed abortion would be protected under a conscience clause, “was less than a fig leaf, it actually prescribes, allows, permits, mandates abortion in all of the health care that goes into effect in 2014.”

Congressman Smith continued, “So President Obama, the abortion president, is at it once again, saying one thing over here while doing aggressively something with the other hand promoting abortion and promoting an anti-conscious provision that is unprecedented in American history.”

Presented with the evidence that unborn children can experience pain as early as 20 weeks after fertilization, several states have now passed laws that protect unborn children from abortion after this time. National Right to Life’s State Legislation Department has been working to help draft the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act by encouraging legislators to pass them in many states across the country. So far the governors of Alabama, Kansas, Idaho, Nebraska, and Oklahoma have all signed the pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act into law that protect unborn babies after 20 weeks postfertilization.

These bills are based on a wealth of evidence that shows how unborn babies can feel pain. By 20 weeks after fertilization, nerves have connected the baby’s pain receptors, which are found throughout the body, to the baby’s brain. Dr. Paul Ranalli, a neurologist at the University of Toronto says that 20 weeks is a “uniquely vulnerable time” for unborn children. He explains, “The pain system [at 20 weeks post-fertilization] is fully established, yet the higher level pain-modifying system has barely begun to develop. As a result, unborn babies at this age probably feel pain more intensely than adults.”

Unborn babies react to touch as early as 8 weeks. And at 20 weeks, ultrasounds show unborn babies reacting physically to outside stimuli such as sound, light, and touch. Also at 20 weeks, unborn babies will recoil from stimuli that adults would consider as painful. Neonatal surgeons have seen unborn babies flinch or jerk away from sharp objects, and therefore anesthesia is routinely administered to the unborn baby during fetal surgery. When this anesthesia is used, there is a decrease in the unborn baby’s stress hormones.

Many state legislators have recognized the need to protect these unborn babies who can experience pain. “Modern medical science provides substantial compelling evidence that unborn children recoil from painful stimuli, that their stress hormones increase when they are subjected to any painful stimuli, and that they require anesthesia for fetal surgery,” said Mary Spaulding Balch, J.D., director of state legislation for the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC). “Therefore, the states have a compelling interest in protecting unborn children who are capable of feeling pain from abortion.”

These fetal pain bills are very important to the pro-life movement as they put the public’s focus back on the unborn baby and on how truly terrible and painful the abortion procedure is. While there can be great psychological and sometimes physical harm done to a woman during an abortion, at the center of the procedure there is a helpless baby who is being brutally killed despite his or her silent screams of pain.

On January 22, 2011, the 38th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion on demand, President Obama issued an official statement heralding Roe as an affirmation of “reproductive freedom,” and pledging, “I am committed to protecting this constitutional right.”

- Supreme Court: President Obama appointed Elena Kagan (2010) and Sonia Sotomayor (2009) to the U.S. Supreme Court. As a key political aide to President Clinton, Kagan helped direct a political strategy preventing enactment of a ban on partial-birth abortions during the Clinton Administration. Sotomayor had previously helped direct the litigation projects of a private organization that filed multiple pro-abortion lawsuits, including challenges to parental notification requirements.

- Health care law: In 2009-2010, after the House of Representatives approved an amendment to prevent funding of abortion in a massive health-care bill, President Obama helped defeat the pro-life amendment in the Senate. He subsequently won enactment of a health care law (“ObamaCare”) that will result in federal funding of health plans that pay for elective abortion, and that will lead to large-scale rationing of lifesaving medical treatments.

- Funding Abortion Providers: President Obama indicated he would veto the entire federal spending bill -- forcing a government shutdown -- rather than accept a provision cutting funding to Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion provider. The Obama Administration later blocked efforts by several states to cut off government funds to Planned Parenthood.

- Embryo-Destroying Research: In March 2009, President Obama issued an executive order to allow federal funding of research that requires the killing of human embryos.

- Abortion Funding: In 2011, the Obama White House issued formal veto threats against the Protect Life Act, a bill that would repeal the abortion-expanding provisions of the 2010 ObamaCare law, and the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, a bill to permanently prohibit any federal program from funding elective abortions. President Obama also succeeded, for 16 months, in removing a ban on government-funded abortion on demand in the District of Columbia.

- International Abortion Advocacy: In 2009, President Obama issued an order to fund private organizations that perform and promote abortion overseas. His choice as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, later told Congress that the Administration would advocate world-wide that “reproductive health includes access to abortion.”

- Appointments: President Obama appointed Kathleen Sebelius, a long-time opponent of curbs on abortion (including late abortions), as Secretary of Health and Human Services. President Obama has also appointed many other persons with histories as pro-abortion advocates to high government offices.

- Conscience Protection: In February 2011, the Obama Administration rescinded a regulation that had been issued by the Bush Administration, which would have protected health-care providers from being penalized for refusing to participate in providing abortions.

Cardinal Sean O’Malley, OFM Cap., of Boston has been elected as the new chairman of the Committee on Pro-Life Activities for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). He received 149 votes while Archbishop Allen Vigneron of Detroit received 84 votes.

In a homily at a Vigil Mass of Nascent Human Life on November 27, 2010, the Cardinal said that Pope Benedict XVI, “has asked us to begin this Advent Season in prayer for the unborn, for nascent life. It’s act of solidarity and in the whole world an act of witness of the sacredness of human life; a central theme in our Catholic Faith.”

He continued, “the hallmark of the pro-life struggle must be love and compassion, but we must try to bring the light of reason and faith to help people to understand how sacred human life is and our obligation to protect it particularly when it is the most vulnerable.”

The Cardinal’s pro-life commitment is reflected in the mission of the Pro Life Office in the Archdiocese of Boston which is committed to helping build a culture of life in the Archdiocese of Boston. It provides direct services through its Pregnancy Help crisis pregnancy center and its Project Rachel post-abortion ministry; educational outreach and training through its Respect Life Education program; and support to parish and diocesan pro-life activities consistent with the Pastoral Plan for Pro-Life Activities developed by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Cardinal Seán Patrick O’Malley, O.F.M. Cap., was born June 29, 1944 in Lakewood, Ohio, and was raised in Western Pennsylvania, where he entered a Franciscan seminary. At 21, he was professed into the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin and at 26 he was ordained a Catholic priest. Since his ordination to the episcopacy on August 2, 1984, he has served as the Bishop of the dioceses of St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands; Fall River, Massachusetts; and Palm Beach, Florida. Pope John Paul II appointed him Archbishop of Boston in July 2003. Pope Benedict XVI named him a Cardinal in 2006.

Cardinal O’Malley will serve as a consultant member on the board of the Committee on Pro-Life Activities until November 2012 when he will take over the responsibilities of chairman from the current chair, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, Archbishop of Galveston-Houston.