The City Council of Portland has created a 39 foot buffer around a Planned Parenthood abortion clinic. The buffer zone was created in response to a weekly protest in which women going in to the clinic felt “intimidated and harassed.” Now, mind you, there hadn’t been any police charges filed against any of the protesters. It’s just people saying how they felt. The police chief even testified that they haven’t had to arrest anyone.
It is clear that besides being taxpayer funded, Planned Parenthood is a protected class in this country. And pro-lifers can’t even use the public sidewalk.
Now for my favorite part of the story. The judgmental as hell lecture from some pro-abortion lunatic about being non-judgmental. Ready?
“I suspect that God is very tired of being called down on both sides of this issue with such righteousness. I’m not going to try and guess what God thinks about this 39-foot buffer zone,” the Rev. Sue Gabrielson of the Religious Coalition Against Discrimination told the council. “But I also know that as a person of faith, it’s not my job to be judgmental.”
Come on, you can’t do much better than that for insane self-righteousness, can you? I love how she says “both sides” when everyone knows who she’s talking about.
I mean, she tells you what God thinks of the pro-lifers and then accuses them of self righteousness and then does a quick two step where she says she’s nonjudgmental. Wow. Even the East German judge would have to give her a 10 for pure mental gymnastics. Do you know how morally limber you have to be to pull that off? How intellectually flexible? It’s quite the amazing feat.
So now, pro-lifers will have to stand across the street from the Planned Parenthood.
Remember free speech is only for those with whom they agree. Everything else is hate speech.
November 21, 2013 at 11:50 pm
The main object is to prevent women getting help and deciding not to let this evil organisation kill their babies. Countless babies are saved, to the great relief and gratitude of their mothers, by those who reach out to them as they enter the killing factory. This is collusion to ensure mothers won't change their mind, or realise what they are going into.
November 22, 2013 at 8:22 am
PP used to be towards the edge of town. They had a parking lot and a fence. Respect for Life persons easily could stand on the sidewalk and pray or protest and both not interfere and be very visible.
A couple of years ago they moved in town to Congress Street – our "main street" that runs across the peninsula and through the middle of the city; from the Eastern Promenade to the West End and eventually all the way to New Hampshire. The present location is a block down from our premiere public square (Monument Square), the central bus stop, the public library, City Hall, our High School ( the back of the two buildings abut) the Central Fire Station and so on. This place is smack in the middle of Portland.
https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Planned+Parenthood:+Portland+Health+Center,+Congress+Street,+Portland,+Maine&hl=en&ll=43.658317,-70.258314&spn=0.004643,0.004823&sll=43.658584,-70.257649&sspn=0.004643,0.004823&oq=planned+portland+maine&t=h&gl=us&hq=Planned+Parenthood:+Portland+Health+Center,&hnear=Congress+St,+Portland,+Maine&z=18&iwloc=A
The City can push Respect for Life away from block, but they will still be quite visible to everyone.
November 22, 2013 at 2:59 pm
I've been reading this blog for at least four years, and generally I don't have a complaint. But I think CMR is showing signs of double standards.
When it's an issue you care about – pro-life – you are vociferous about how peaceful protests are framed as reactionary and evil by the left.
But when a group of traditionalists protest about an issue which doesn't rouse you in the same way – religious syncretism in Argentina – you jump on the bandwagon of liberal condemnation.
November 24, 2013 at 1:00 am
A state of affairs can only be called a "double standard" when the two cases are comparable, and nothing about the Argentina incident is remotely comparable to "it's perfectly legal to murder babies". Get over yourself.
November 24, 2013 at 1:09 pm
Getting over myself is a work in progress, with grace and the sacraments. What that has to do with the integrity of CMR vis-a-vis traditionalists, I don't know.
No two incidents are perfectly identical. I maintain the situations are comparable. You have two protests, both of which are framed as reactionary by the liberal media. In one case, CMR says "isn't it awful the way good people are treated as monsters by the media?", in the other case it says "Look! Monsters! The media says so!" If that isn't a double standard I don't know what is.
November 24, 2013 at 2:58 pm
The all-pervasive secularism has confused many.
November 24, 2013 at 5:39 pm
Pro-lifers are protesting mass murder. SSPX is protesting in favor of liturgical norms, against liturgical norms that are no less orthodox.
Abortion is as worth protesting and fighting over as whether Russia should be enslaved by the Ottoman Empire. The Novus Ordo vs Tridentine liturgy is as worth protesting and fighting over as whether Russia should cross itself with two fingers or three.
November 24, 2013 at 9:41 pm
On this occasion the protest was about religious syncretism, rather than the rite of the mass. Religious syncretism is highly relevant to a range of moral issues, including pro-life – if Catholics, especially the hierarchy, get into a habit of doctrinal mutism in order not to offend our separated brethren, who is to say where that will end? It could well end, further down the line, in Catholics downplaying pro-life so as not to give offense – Pope Francis has already said we should not be 'obsessed' with pro-life.
Now, there are only so many hours in the day, and I'm not saying that everyone should be protesting about ecumenism, if they aren't moved to do so. If others are, we should give them the benefit of the doubt, because as we've seen with this article, and in many other cases, often good people are condemned as nutters simply because they are promoting the faith.
On the liturgy, I remember more liturigal pusillanimity in my days at the novus ordo than I've seen at the Society. There was one EMHC at my old church who refused to give communion on the tongue, and there was a mass outcry about the change from 'all' to 'many' during the consecration.
November 24, 2013 at 9:46 pm
Well said.