Word: statements
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Herold, Sandra • inadvisability of keeping 200-pound chimp as house pet is vividly demonstrated to, though, astonishingly, given the horror of the scene, still not vividly enough to prompt statement from that things would have been done differently by if the opportunity was presented...
Much has been made of the statement on abortion that Pope Benedict XVI issued earlier this week after meeting with Nancy Pelosi. But the Vatican's choice of words as they related to the Speaker of the House was quite predictable, given her pro-choice stance and her position as a high-ranking Catholic Democrat. The Holy Father simply made clear their differences on the issue and reminded the American politician of her responsibilities as a Catholic to protect life "at all stages of its development...
What was quite surprising, and overlooked, had to do with a different branch of the U.S. government. If you read it carefully, the statement is actually quite radical - perhaps unintentionally so. The brief message - just two short paragraphs - draws no distinction between the moral duties of Catholic policymakers and Catholic judges to work against abortion. (See pictures of Pope Benedict XVI's trip to America...
...Pelosi could not feign surprise at being called upon by the Church to use her gift for persuasion to restrict abortion legislatively, or at least not to be its advocate. But until now, the Church had not formally instructed judges in a similar fashion. As written, the Pope's statement has the potential, at least theoretically, to empty the U.S. Supreme Court of all five of its Catholic jurists and perhaps all other Catholics who sit on the bench in the lower federal and state courts...
...Holiness," the statement read, "took the opportunity to speak of the requirements of the natural moral law and the church's consistent teaching on the dignity of human life from conception to natural death which enjoin all Catholics, and especially legislators, jurists and those responsible for the common good of society, to work in cooperation with all men and women of good will in creating a just system of laws capable of protecting human life at all stages of its development." (See the top 10 religion stories...