Dear Friends,

We have been through with Christmas and New Year’s Day. Now, everything seems to be normal again. Yet, even though we hope the New Year will usher in a new world filled with joy, peace, prosperity, we know that many people still suffer from poverty, diseases and war. It seems that the fight for life for such people is a lost cause.

In the U.S., the fight for life has never been more poignant as this country marks the 30^th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion (Jan 22, 1973). All of you are too young to know this tragic decision but its consequence is still seen today as more than 1 million unborn babies killed each year since and the promotion of what Pope John Paul II calls "the culture of death". When abortion is considered a fact of life and the lives of the unborn babies are denied, what we see next is the compromise of human life through the acceptance of physician-assisted suicide, embryonic stem-cell research, cloning.

In the thirty years since Roe v. Wade, many people committed to a culture of life have fought for the reversal of this tragic decision. In a sense, they have gained some success as more people are aware of abortion and its horrendous consequences. Then, we can be hopeful that the year of 2003 will bring some changes with regard to this issue. Of course, what we ultimately look forward to is a change of attitude in the mind of American people. Meanwhile, what we can do is to inform those are still confused about abortion, to support those who feel abandoned as they got pregant and pray for its end.

Together we will succeed in the fight for the lives of many vulnerable unborn babies.

Your friends,

Tess Nguyen

______________________________________________________________________

Know as "Jane Roe," Norma McCorvey was the plaintiff in the infamous 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court case that legalized abortion. Poor, pregnant, and desparate, Norma McCorvey fell into the hands of two young ambitious lawyers. They were looking for a plaintiff with whom they could challenge the Texas state law prohibiting abortion, and Norma signed on. Little did she know that her signature would one day make her a national symbol for legalized abortion.

Twenty years later, still firmly believing in abortion, Norma found herself working in a Texas abortion center. Then, on March 31, 1995, the pro-life group Operation Rescue (O.R.) opened an office next door. Shortly thereafter, Norma was befriended by the Director of O.R and the 7-year-old daughter of a pro-life volunteer. Their love and friendship touched Norma, and eventually led her to completely change her mind on abortion.

Today, Norma has dedicated her life to speaking publicly against abortion and she’s currently working to reverse Roe v. Wade. Norma’s testimony - with all its startling revelations - can be found in her 1998 book, Won By Love. To learn more about Norma’s conversion and her experiences while working in the abortion in the abortion industry, go to www.roenomore.org.

__________________________________________________________________________

WASHINGTON, DC, Dec, 2, 02 (LSN.ca/CWNews.com) - More than one-fifth or 22 percent of Americans in a nationwide Buffalo News/Zogby poll of 1,009 people say they are "less" in favor of abortion today than they were 10 years ago-- twice the number (11 percent) who say they've become more pro-choice.

Among the other findings were that young people tend to be more opposed to abortion than the baby boomer generation (one-third of people aged 18 to 29 said abortion should never be legal, in contrast to about 23 percent for those aged 30 to 64 and about 20 percent for those aged 65+); people's opposition to abortion doesn't necessarily affect their voting choices; and that two-thirds said that if someone close to them were considering an abortion, they would advise against it; and that about one-third said their views on abortion had changed in the past decade.

Laura Echevarria of the National Right to Life Committee credited ultrasound technology that has provided a window for the younger generation on the developing life within.

Answer: A woman’s body does not have two beating hearts, two blood types, two heads, four eyes, four arms, and four legs. A pregnant woman and her baby have all this and more. And what about when she’s pregnant with a male baby? That’s not her body.it’s a unique, baby boy growing in her womb.

Answer: Fetus - literally meaning "little one" in Latin - refers to the preborn baby after eight weeks gestation. Some people seem to have forgotten they once lived and grew in the womb as a "fetus". Would it have been okay if they had been aborted when they were "only a fetus?"

Answer: The U.S. Supreme Court has been wrong on many major decisions and then overturned itself. Remember the Dred Scott case on slavery? If the Supreme Court suddenly declared child abuse or rape legal, would that make them right? Would we ignore such injustices and do nothing to protect the innocent?

Answer: How can anyone claim they have "freedom" or "right" to kill an innocent baby? The only "choice" in abortion is between a dead body and a live baby. Plus, those who defend this "choice" aren’t consistent. Why is it only in the case of abortion they argue that "choice" should be absolute? Using the same rationale, wouldn’t people have the right to "choose" to use drugs ("it’s my body") or the right to "choose" to practice prostitution? Humane societies don’t tell people they have a "freedom of choice" to kill their own children.There are right choices and wrong choices. In recent history, millions of innocent people died because of terribly wrong choices that slave owners and Nazis thought they had a "right" to make Terrible choices have led to dead slaves, dead Jews and dead babies.

Answer: Our Declaration of Independence declares that each of us has an "inalienable right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness." Thomas Jefferson defined government’s role: "The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only object of good government." Government should protect all of us, especially before we are born, when we are most vulnerable.

Answer: What about other moral issues such as rape, robbery, child abuse, arson, and murder? What if politicians said, "I’m personally opposed, but." about racism? If abolitionists had bought this "personally opposed, but" argument, some states could still be saddled with slavery today. Every law ever passed set standards that reflect someone’s (or a body of lawmakers’) morality. A politician who won’t vote against something he/she is morally opposed to doesn’t have an ounce of honesty in his/her blood.

Answer: The Court was wrong. Nobody has a right to injure or kill another person "privately." Does a right to "privacy" also protect parents who abuse, molest and kill their born children in the "privacy" of their home? Why not? What their "right to privacy"? How is it that Roe v. Wade determined that unborn children are not "persons" even though they have the right to inherit property, the right to be protected from a drug-addicted mother, the right not to be killed by a drunk driver, and many other rights? Some states have entire sections of law outlining crimes against unborn children in which they’re protected from negligent or willfull harm or death from conception on.

Answer: It’s important to remember that the child conceived through rape or incest is no less human than any other child. Abortion compounds the problems of a raped woman. Abortion makes her an aggressor against her own innocent child and it never makes the painful memories of rape go away. If a small child were killed in the street by a negligent driver and it was lagter determined that the child had been conceived in rape, would the driver be held less responsible? Is that child’s death less tragic?

Answer: Every baby has a mother and a mother. Why should fathers be denied their parental rights? Why shouldn’t men defend the innocent and the weak? More than half of America’s pro-life movement is made of women who ask men to join their cause. Many women become pro-life after discovering their own abortion was a terrible mistake. They discover how painful abortions is from first-hand experience, then they ask men to help expose abortion so that fewer women and babies become victims.

Surgical Abortions in the U.S. (1965 - 1996)
Since the first states legalized abortion in 1967, there have been over 42 million legal surgical abortions in the U.S. Some 1,878,990 were committed before abortion was legalized nationwide by Roe v. Wade in 1973. An average of 1.6 million babies are killed annually.

Chemical Abortions in the U.S. (1965-1996)
Because most contraceptive measures are abortifacients (drugs that induce or cause abortions), it is important not to overlook the number of children killed by chemical abortions. Since 1965, an average of 10.8 million women have used abortifacient methods of birth control in the US at any given time. Without throwing the equations at you, about 14 million chemical abortions are committed in the US each year, giving us a total of 450 million chemical abortions between 1965 and 1996.

Total abortion in the US (1965-1996)
If you add up the number of surgical and chemical abortions, over 486 million abortions have been committed in the US from 1965 to 1996! Keep in mind that it is now 1999, three years after the US government and Planned Parenthood stopped tracking the number of abortions committed. If you add on another 1.6 million surgical abortions per year (4.8 million) and another 14 million chemical abortions per year (42 million), the numbers jump to over 530 million babies killed in the US alone!

(Source: Rocforlife.org)

1859 — The American Medical Association (AMA) condemns abortion except as necessary to preserve the life of either the mother or child

1875 — Every state in the United States has adopted laws banning abortion.

1917 — Margaret Sanger forms the Birth Control League (now Planned Parenthood) to promote contraception and abortion.

1959 — The American Law Institute proposes the "Model Penal Code" urging that abortion be performed in licensed hospitals when necessary to preserve the mental or physical health of the mother or in cases of rape or incest.

1967 — Colorado becomes the first state to allow abortion for cases of rape, incest or threat to the mother's life.

1970 — Fourteen states were allowing abortion in certain circumstances.

1973 — Roe v. Wade. Stating that a constitutional "right to privacy" exists that protects a woman's decision to have an abortion, the U.S. Supreme Court legalizes abortion on demand. The Court permits states to outlaw abortions from viability until birth (third trimester) except when necessary to preserve the mother's life or health.

1973 — Doe v. Bolton. The Supreme Court defines "health" (of the mother) to include all factors - physical, emotional, psychological, familial and the woman's age. This basically allows a woman to have an abortion at any time during her pregnancy and for any reason.

1976 — Planned Parenthood Association of Central Missouri v. Danforth. A Missouri abortion law, requiring the consent of parents in the case of minors, and husbands in the case of a married woman, is ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

1993 — President Bill Clinton signs five executive orders into effect, allowing fetal tissue research and harvesting, RU486 research, abortion counseling in federally funded family planning clinics and abortion services in U.S. military hospitals.

1994 — President Clinton signs into law the Freedom of Access to Clinics Entrance Act (FACE) virtually eliminating the First Amendment rights of pro-lifers to peacefully protest, demonstrate and provide sidewalk counseling at abortion clinics.

2000 — Stenberg v. Carhart. On a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court declared that Nebraska's partial birth abortion law unconstitutionally placed an undue burden on a woman's so-called right to a late term abortion.

(Source: Rocforlife.org)