Our prayers go out on behalf of His Holiness Pope John Paul II. The pope was taken to a hospital in Rome on Tuesday after coming down with the flu.
World Prays for Pope’s Recovery
Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls reported that the Pope had “just a little fever,” and said that the decision to admit him to a hospital was “mainly precautionary.” He quickly dismissed rumors and speculation that his health was worse than it is, saying that the Pope’s condition was “no cause for alarm.”
The Holy Father was able to concelebrate Mass on Wednesday from his hospital bed, and will likely return home to the Vatican in a few days. Please pray that he will make a speedy recovery.
La Quinta Kicks Out Tiller
A few weeks ago, Troy Newman, president of Operation Rescue, announced that the group had uncovered evidence that notorious late-term abortionist George Tiller was using the La Quinta Inn in Wichita, KS as a labor annex to his abortion facility. The group had long known that La Quinta offered discount rates for Tiller’s out of town patients, but new evidence revealed that Tiller had been maintaining a full-time nursing staff on site to dispense medication and monitor women who had begun the 3-4 day abortion process.
On January 18, Operation Rescue called for a national boycott of La Quinta Inns until they stopped allowing Tiller to use their facilities. The boycott worked. Within two weeks, the chain’s corporate offices notified Tiller that he must immediately stop the practice–which a La Quinta representative declared was illegal–and could no longer use the hotel’s name to promote his abortion business.
Newman wishes to thank the “hundreds of men and women of conscience who called and brought Tiller’s association with the La Quinta to the attention of the corporate office.” He added, “We are thankful that the La Quinta Corporation has done the right thing and sent Tiller packing.”
So are we. Hats off to Newman and his supporters for bringing to light La Quinta’s business arrangement with Tiller and subjecting the chain to public scrutiny. Operation Rescue’s action should serve as an example of the powerful effect that a well-publicized, well-executed boycott can bring to bear on a company that supports abortion. We hope to see many more such efforts in the near future.
OR’s “Life of the Party” Tour
Not content to rest on their laurels, the good people at Operation Rescue don’t plan to take a break from activism any time soon. On the contrary, the group is currently in the midst of its “Life of the Party” Tour, in which a fleet of Truth Trucks, complete with graphic pictures of aborted babies, descends upon massive gatherings of partygoers.
The Truth Trucks are currently in Tampa, FL, for the Gasparilla Pirate Festival, which regularly draws crowds of half a million people. The fleet will be at the Super Bowl parade and pre-game festivities in Jacksonville this Sunday, and, following that, at the debauchery that is New Orleans’ Mardi Gras.
Bishops Campaign Targets Abortion
The U. S. Catholic bishops have recently launched a new advertising campaign titled the “Second Look Project.” The campaign is designed to get the American people to take a “second look” at their views on abortion.
Cathy Cleaver Ruse, of the pro-life office at the U. S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, commented on the project: “Three decades after Roe v. Wade, many people still do not understand basic facts about legal abortion— like the fact that abortion is legal through all nine months of pregnancy.”
Referring to a 2004 AP poll, the results of which were published prior to the presidential election, Ruse noted:
Recent polls showing support for Roe v. Wade describe Roe as the decision which legalized abortion in the first 3 months of pregnancy, a flagrant distortion of the truth. Roe created an unlimited right to abortion and most people think an unlimited right to abortion is wrong.
The Second Look campaign features 500 advertisements that have already begun to appear on metropolitan trains and buses in the Washington, DC area, and plans are in the works to run ads in several major Catholic and secular newspapers as well.
In the battle against abortion, knowledge truly is power.
