Learning More About How Some Abortion Providers Think           A video taken at the recent San Francisco conference of the National Abortion Federation, the largest U.S. organization of abortion providers, has some interesting clips of what they say to each other in speeches. It is of course edited to include those points of most interest to pro-lifers, such as how they respond to fetal images. What is especially interesting is the points of audience laughter. We quote a couple of excerpts:           “Our stories don’t really have a place in a lot of pro-choice discourse and rhetoric, like the heads that get stuck that we can’t get out.” [laughter]               “Ignoring the fetus is a luxury of activists and advocates. . . . If you’re a provider, you can’t ignore the fetus, right? Because the fetus is a marker of how well, how good a job you did . . . if you don’t account for all the parts, you may be setting someone up for infection or a hemorrhage . . . women know what’s in there . . . I actually think we should be less about denying the reality of those images, more about acknowledging that yeah, that’s kind of true. . . . Let’s just give ‘em all. The violence. It’s a person. It’s killing.”           This is a recent addition to the list of admissions, not only of abortion being violence, but justifying violence with reference to war as “justified” killing.   ^^^^^^^   Award to Peacemaker           Consistent Life Advisory Board member Tom Webb attended the Pax Christi Northern California assembly and staffed a CL table. Pax Christi gave their Northern California Peacemaker award to Lorrain Taylor (pictured below at the CL exhibit table), whose organization 1000 Mothers to Prevent Violence works with surviving victims of gun violence by offering grief counseling.          Lorrain lost her twin sons to gun violence, so she  reached out to others who had suffered similar losses. She theorizes that one cause of gun violence is unresolved grief.         Her program offers counseling, works with police departments to help them identify grieving behaviors, and offers community-based education in faith communities and civic groups, where surviving family members of gun violence often congregate.           Tom writes about Lorrain Taylor and 1000 Mothers to Prevent Violence.   ^^^^^^^   Quotation of the Week Jessica Keating Dorothy Day and the Scandal of Mercy, October 29, 2015 Editor’s note: The full article discusses Dorothy Day’s thoughts on the consistent life ethic.             A society that fails to defend its most vulnerable members will soon find that it is unable to fight for better working conditions, for the rights of workers, for the poor; indeed, such a society will find that what is considered fair, what is considered a right, or what is considered an act of mercy or a sign of love will be increasingly determined by the powerful.         Such a vision reveals the inner connection of all life issues. We do well not only to remember that the realities of war, migration and economic exploitation often disproportionately affect the most vulnerable among us, namely children, but also that all offenses against human life, in different ways and with different moral gravity, participate in a logic of violence and callous disposal indicative of a throwaway culture.

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