Doctors Refusing to Prescribe Ortho Evra Patch

By Hilary White

NEW YORK, November 22, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The recent flurry of publicity surrounding the Ortho Evra contraceptive patch has resulted in some doctors refusing to prescribe the deadly drug. The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that some doctors do not want to take chances after the manufacturer began including warnings of fatalities and stroke related to the patch.

Lee Shulman, incoming board chair of the Association of Reproductive Health Professionals and a consultant to Ortho-McNeil, said the company expected a "decrease in use" of the patch.

The patch is worn on the skin and delivers a massive dose of progestin and estrogen to the blood stream. The manufacturers, Ortho-McNeil, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, have agreed under pressure from lawsuits and the Food and Drug Administration, to include warnings of stroke and blood clot-related deaths to its packaging.

Dozens of suits are pending against the company for death and injuries related to the patch. To date, nearly twenty women have died as a result of wearing it.


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The Claims on Contraceptive Dangers are mounting

The truth will out, they say.

While we line up to purchase our "Fund the Cure" postage stamps, the true cure for breast cancer exists right in front of our own noses: hormonal contraceptives and abortion are linked to breast cancer.
While Ortho Evra and Planned Parenthood deceive women with the false glamor of the Patch, women are dying and lay on their deathbed from pulmonary embolism, stroke and dangerous blood clots. Where is the glamor in the death of a young woman?

Do these companies and organizations have true concern for women, their health and well being?

In the case of breast cancer, one might add that the more money the public gives to the cancer fundraising industry, the more women there are who develop the disease. In 1970, one in 12 women were expected to develop breast cancer. In 2004, more than 1 in 8 women will be diagnosed with it. The American Cancer Society expects 216,000 new cases of invasive breast cancer and 59,000 cases of in situ breast cancer in 2004.

If the cancer establishment were truly interested in reducing breast cancer rates, it would have exhibited an interest in preventing the disease. The best way to prevent breast cancer (and cut breast cancer rates by more than one-half) is to have more children, starting before age 24, and breastfeeding them longer.

If women's lives mattered more than fundraising and protecting the abortion and the pharmaceutical industries, then the cancer fundraising industry would have long ago fingered abortion as one of the culprits responsible for these recognized reproductive risk factors - childlessness, decreased childbearing, delayed first birth, and little or no breastfeeding.

If women's lives mattered, then women would have been told in 1986 when U.S. government scientists admitted that abortion is an independent cause of breast cancer. [Stadel B, Wingo P, et al. Letter to editor, Lancet, Feb. 22, 1986, p. 436]

Cardinal Arinze: The Mass is not Entertainment

Our Holy of Holies- the Presence of God Himself among us at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

This is the true gift- Christ revealing Himself, and Christ revealing man to himself.

The Mass is a moment of reflection and encounter with God, rather than a form of entertainment, says Cardinal Francis Arinze.

Here are some fav quotes:

Regarding "music in the liturgy, we should start by saying that Gregorian music is the Church's precious heritage," he said. "It should stay. It should not be banished. If therefore in a particular diocese or country, no one hears Gregorian music anymore, then somebody has made a mistake somewhere."

"The local church should be conscious that church worship is not really the same as what we sing in a bar, or what we sing in a convention for youth. Therefore it should influence the type of instrument used, the type of music used."

"I will not now pronounce and say never guitar; that would be rather severe," Cardinal Arinze added. "But much of guitar music may not be suitable at all for the Mass. Yet, it is possible to think of some guitar music that would be suitable, not as the ordinary one we get every time, [but with] the visit of a special group, etc."

"People don't come to Mass in order to be entertained. They come to Mass to adore God, to thank him, to ask pardon for sins, and to ask for other things that they need."

Referring to a negative tendency in the Western world, the cardinal revealed that an increasing number of Catholics have "a more Protestant concept of the Eucharist, seeing it mainly as a symbol."

"It was recognized so much that many of the synod fathers suggested that there be themes suggested for homilies on Sundays. Seeing that for many Catholics the Sunday homily is about the only religious instruction they get in a week, the synod fathers suggested that the four major areas of Catholic faith should be covered by the homily in a three-year cycle."

The four areas correspond to the parts of the Catechism of the Catholic Church: "First part, what we believe," Cardinal Arinze said. "Second part, how we worship, i.e., sacraments. Third part, what we live, life in Christ, so the moral law, the Ten Commandments, the Christian life lived; and the fourth part, prayer."

"There has been a bit of neglect of the holy Eucharist outside Mass," he said. "A lot of ignorance. A lot of temptations to showmanship for the priest who celebrates facing the people.

"If he is not very disciplined he will soon become a performer. He may not realize it, but he will be projecting himself rather than projecting Christ. Indeed it is very demanding, the altar facing the people. Then even those who read the First and Second Reading can engage in little tactics that make them draw attention to themselves and distract the people.

Contrary to what many think, he said, "even when there was the Tridentine Mass there were abuses. Many Catholics did not know, because they did not know Latin! So when the priest garbled the words, they were not aware of this.

Cardinal Arinze concluded that the liturgy "is not the property of one individual, therefore an individual does not tinker with it, but makes the effort to celebrate it as Holy Mother Church wants. When that happens, the people are happy, they feel nourished. Their faith grows, their faith is strengthened. They go home happy and willing to come back next Sunday."

The Cafeteria is Closed!

Pope to Bishops: Don't Water Down Church Teachings

By John-Henry Westen

VATICAN CITY, November 8, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In a meeting with Bishops from Austria Saturday, Pope Benedict XVI warned them against the false notion that church teachings should be watered down so as to prevent people from leaving the Church. "At times, those who direct this mission fear that people may move away if they are spoken to clearly," he said. "However," added the Pope, "experience has generally shown that the opposite happens. ... Catholic teaching presented incompletely is self- contradictory and cannot be fruitful in the long term."

The truth of Catholic teaching presented incompletely being self-contradictory and thus not fruitful in the long-run is nowhere more evident than in the teachings on contraception and in vitro fertilization.

A few years ago, Chicago Cardinal Francis George admitted candidly to LifeSiteNews.com that many Catholic bishops have "dropped the ball" on fighting in vitro fertilization (IVF). That inaction has come back to haunt the Church as IVF is the root cause of the embryonic stem cell research battles the Church and many other principled forces are now fighting.

Similarly, the reticence of some Catholic bishops to endorse the Vatican's re-affirmation of the traditional Christian opposition to artificial contraception led, in many cases, to Catholics embracing abortion as a natural backup measure for contraceptive failure. That separation of sex from procreation has also accerated the acceptance of homosexuality, same-sex "marriage" and many other forms of sexual licence with consequent severe damage to family life.

The Pope reminded the Bishops present of St. Paul's words in Ephesus: "I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God." The Pope said, "It is true that we must act delicately, but this must not prevent us from presenting the divine message clearly, even on those subjects that do not enjoy widespread approval, or that give rise to protest or even derision, especially in the field of the truth of faith and moral teaching."

Numbers of Abortions performed in the United States

Go here.