Monday, October 24, 2005

Here's Something We Really Need To Be Worried About

OK, people, Catholic issue here -- a real pro-life challenge if there ever were one.... Time to get on the ball
UN charity Unicef says 18 million children in sub-Saharan Africa could be orphaned by Aids by the end of 2010.

The warning comes as the children's charity launches a global campaign to help the disease's youngest victims.

Unite For Children, Unite Against Aids, will focus on Africa but also target central Asia and eastern Europe.

Unicef says millions who lose their parents to Aids get no financial support and less than five percent of HIV-positive children get medical help.
The stats are almost numbing. But, if anything, that just adds to how imperative the challenge is.

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5 Comments:

Blogger Jeff said...

The foundational element in all these things is respect for life. That means: at least don't kill the innocent. You have to start there or your house is built on sand. If you build on an indifference to the mass slaughter of children by their own parents, you will never get where you want to go.

People who raise their children and don't send money across the world to help AIDS sufferer may not be doing enough and should be told so. People who slaughter their children for convenience or are indifferent to their neighbors doing so and point to perennial problems of death and disease across the globe are not taking care of their OWN immediate, direct responsibilities. "Even the pagans do that." But not THESE pagans. Imperfect is one thing. Grossly negligent and guilty as hell is another.

No, the premier human life issue, the nonpareil human life issue, is killing the innocent here at home and making excuses about it, sneering at the people who treat it like the jaw-dropping abominination that it is.

Parents killing their children, children devouring their parents and trying to live a happy-go-lucky life while all that is going on are not going to care, or not much or not for long, about the other side of the earth. After all, it certainly doesn't get invitations in all the right quarters, does it?

24/10/05 21:46  
Blogger Regina said...

It is a good cause, but Unicef is not the organization to do it. Catholics who want to assist children with AIDS in Africa ought to donate through a religious order or Aid to the Church in Need, or some other more trustworthy organization. It is irresponsible to donate money for emotional reasons without ensuring that the funds will be used in a manner consistent with your own values.

25/10/05 07:06  
Blogger justplaincath said...

Regina is dead on the money. No branch of the UN is a fit organization to expend money on this pressing pro-life human need.

If we as Catholics do not help those in Africa, you can bet that the Protestants will. The Lutheran Church--Missouri Synod has a program to help Africans in Kenya, particularly with the AIDS epidemic.

Any thing we as Catholic Christians do to support life is by definition pro-life, even if it doesn't address Jeff's criteria.
The sooner those of us in the pro-life movement articulate the fact that abortion is about motherhood, and by extension about fatherhood, the better for all of humanity. The sooner we recognize that a person deciding to have an abortion is operating from the amydala (the brain's fear center) rather than from the pre-frontal cortex, the better.

I am sick to death about people crying about "killingbabies killingbabies killingbabies" while they blithely ignore the pain of the parents--both those who have had children and those who have had abortions. Anything that affirms life anywhere is a positive pro-life statement. If we can't start with being nice to one another, we don't deserve the designation of pro-life.

Read the Project Rachel website, why don't you?

25/10/05 11:13  
Blogger justplaincath said...

The link is:
http://www.noparh.org

and it should have read "amygdala."
Sorry for poor proofing

25/10/05 11:22  
Blogger George Collie said...

http://www.thechildrenleftbehind.org/intro.htm

27/10/05 17:00  

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