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Four squad cars responded to the call. Two parked on the small side street, one on either side of the road, narrowing the road for other vehicles.
Since the Chicago Bubble Zone was first enacted in 2009, the majority of the trouble has taken place at the Planned Parenthood clinic at Division and LaSalle on the city’s Near North Side. The one exception was the first day the ordinance went into effect, when Ann Scheidler was told she could not stand within 50 feet of the entrance to the clinic.
Well, the situation at PP has cooled down ever since the arrest and subsequent dropping of charges against supposed bubble zone violators there.
Now the tension at Albany has increased. Four officers responded to the calls from the clinic about the pro-lifers this morning. The one in charge–and the least pleasant one–was one Sergeant Kivel.
An interesting incident occurred this morning at the Albany Medical-Surgical Center, the late-term abortion clinic located near our office on Chicago’s Northwest Side.
Two of us from the League were praying in the alley when the two women who had been counseling at the sidewalk entrance approached us.
They said that a police officer—who was now parked in a nearby parking lot overlooking the abortion clinic—had told them they couldn’t stand within 15 feet of the entrance to the clinic. He told them he was sympathetic to their cause, but that the administrator of the clinic was becoming increasingly insistent that a pro-lifer be arrested. [Continue reading ...]
In the Catholic liturgical calendar, the Gospel reading for today is the story of the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1-11).
One thing I find amazing about this Gospel passage is that it almost didn’t make it into the Bible. In fact, before the canon of Scripture was finalized in the late 4th century, some copies of St. John’s Gospel didn’t include this story.
St. Augustine tells us (cf. De coniugiis adulterinis, 2, 6) that many early Christians were afraid of keeping this story in John’s Gospel since it showed Jesus as being so merciful that they thought it might lead people to think that the reality of sin wasn’t as serious as the Church made it out to be.
April 5, 1997—League Director Joe Scheidler attends the Institute for Religious Life banquet in Mundelein, Illinois, at which U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anton Scalia (pictured left) is giving the keynote address. During the cocktail hour, Joe asks Justice Scalia how the Supreme Court can be so callous towards sidewalk counselors outside abortion facilities, noting that his wife Ann talked a woman out of abortion that very morning. Scalia appears surprised to learn that pro-lifers actually dissuade women from having abortions, rather than just making their presence felt.
Ambulance and squad cars tend to a victim at Planned Parenthood Aurora [Photo by Eric Scheidler]
Today League Executive Director Eric Scheidler and I were out praying and sidewalk counseling at Planned Parenthood in Aurora, Illinois. It was a cold, rainy April afternoon, but we were getting a lot of literature into people’s hands, mostly as they were exiting the clinic.
I got the impression that many people had not gotten the help they were looking for from Planned Parenthood and were happy to hear about other options, like Waterleaf Women’s Center, our local pregnancy resource center just down the street.
As we were getting to the end of our hour of prayer and counseling, an ambulance came tearing around the corner from New York Street and sped into Planned Parenthood’s parking lot. I’ve seen a few ambulances come to Planned Parenthood and this one was certainly moving with purpose. [Continue reading ...]
Two squad cars talk to Planned Parenthood’s director after a client spews obscenities at pro-lifers [Photo by Matt Yonke]
I’ve spent a goodly amount of time outside our local Planned Parenthood in Aurora, Illinois lately, and I’ve noticed a number of things happening there that don’t happen outside your local podiatrist’s office. Or that of your local dentist, pediatrician, or general practice doctor.
At Planned Parenthood Aurora yesterday, a young man waiting outside, talking on his cell phone while his significant other got an abortion, yelled at me and the two other pro-lifers there. He led off with asking whether we were going to adopt his baby if his girlfriend didn’t have the abortion. When we responded with an enthusiastic, “Yes, we will adopt your baby!” he changed his tack.
Next he started screaming, and I do mean screaming, at the top of his voice, that we should mind our own business and let people make their own choices. When I replied that we were only offering more options, not trying to force anyone to do anything, he finally ran out of arguments and started in with the vulgarity. [Continue reading ...]
March 22, 1997—League staff members are dispatched to Albany Medical-Surgical Center abortuary on Chicago’s northwest side to monitor police activities there. The previous week, police had threatened to arrest seven pro-life counselors and prayer partners if they returned to the facility, without citing any specific violation. Squad cars circle the abortion clinic repeatedly, but the police do not disrupt the pro-lifer ministry.
February 19, 1997—League director Joe Scheidler fields calls from multiple media outlets looking for comments on the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Schenck v. Pro-Choice Network of Western New York. The high court upheld fixed buffer zones at abortuaries, but rejected a “floating” bubble zone as a violation of free speech. But three years later the Court would uphold an 8-foot floating bubble zone in Hill v. Colorado, laying the groundwork for Chicago’s 2009 bubble zone ordinance.
February 4, 2005—Monsignor Philip Reilly, the founder of the Helpers of God’s Precious Infants, a sidewalk counseling ministry originating in New York City, travels to the Chicago suburbs at the invitation of the League’s Helper’s group. Msgr. Reilly celebrates Mass and a prayer vigil at ACU Health Center, an abortuary in Hinsdale, Illinois, then conducts a training session for 75 enthusiastic pro-lifers at nearby St. Isaac Jogues Parish.
December 20, 1986—The League alerts reporters to a drug bust at Biogenetics, a Chicago abortion clinic they routinely picket. This is not the first drug-related offense there. In 1983, clinic operator Clifford Josefik was arrested for unlawful use of a weapon while loitering in an area known for drug dealing, when police discovered a five-shot Derringer in his pants. Biogenetics’ legal troubles also includes numerous medical malpractice suits, frequently cited by sidewalk counselors to convince women to not have abortions there.