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PAGE 4 — The Georgia Bulletin, January 19,1989
STATEMENT
Roe vs. Wade — A Minority Opinion
A timely book on abortion has appeared just
before the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review a
Missouri law that directly conflicts with its 1973
decision legalizing abortion on demand.
Harvard Law School professor Mary Ann Glen-
don contributes a comparative analysis of U.S.
abortion law and that of all other Western na
tions to the 16-year-old debate over Roe vs.
Wade.
Not an emotional text, her book points out that
the U.S. is the only Western nation forbidding
any regulation of abortion until after viability of
the fetus. All other countries have some kind of
pro-life counseling and a waiting period before
permitting even the earliest abortions to lake
place.
The contrast is heightened when one knows
that even the protection supposedly extended to
the fetus under Roe vs. Wade toward the end of
pregnancy is no protection at all. In Georgia in
1986, according to statistics of the Department
of Human Resources, 569 abortions were per
formed at 21 weeks of pregnancy or later; in
1985, 591 at 21 weeks of pregnancy or later.
States that have attempted to put even the
most basic protective'regulations in place are
stymied by Planned Parenthood legal challenges
that invoke the sweeping provisions of Roe vs.
Wade.
Did the Supreme Court intend that minor
teenage girls in Georgia, who are unable to ob
tain medical surgery without a parent’s consent,
be free to walk into a clinic and risk the medical
and psychological consequences of an abortion
without any caring adult even knowing?
Did the Supreme Court intend for abortions to
take place so late in pregnancy that babies
sometimes survive them?
The Missouri case offers the Supreme Court
the opportunity to reexamine the way Roe vs.
Wade has been implemented and manipulated
by pro-abortion organizations to prevent any kind
of state regulation at all for 16 years.
To question that decision is not to be an
emotionally - biased person. To question it is to
know that you’re standing closer to the view
point of the rest of the world.
—GRK
(A book review of Abortion And Divorce In Western Law
by Mary Ann Glendon, Harvard University Press, appears
on page 10.)
Julie Asher
George To George — Inaugural Prayers
WASHINGTON (NC) — Since George Washington took
the oath of office April 30. 1789. invoking God’s name and
entrusting the nation to him has become something of an in
augural tradition.
George Bush as the nation’s 41st president would be the
latest to swear to “faithfully execute the office of the presi
dent, so help me God.’’
Washington, in the nation’s first inauguration ceremony,
held at Federal Hall in New York, set the precedent when
he repeated the 35-word oath and added, “I swear, so help
me God.
Bush, taking office in the 200th year of the presidency,
said he wanted to use the same Bible as the first George to
head the nation.
A prayerful plea for God’s protection of the nation has
marked every inaugural address.
U.S. presidents have invoked the name of. asked bless
ings from, or offered fervent prayers to “the benign Parent
of the Human Race,’’ as Washington phrased it, or the
“Patron of Order,” “Fountain of Justice,” “Protector,”
“Infinite Power,” and simply “Being.”
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Early in his inaugural address. Washington said he felt
obliged to offer “fervent supplications to that Almighty Be
ing who rules over the universe."
In a “homage to the Great Author,” the first U.S. head of
state also noted that “no people can be bound to
acknowledge and adore the Invisible Hand which conducts
the affairs of men more than those of the United States.”
Martin Van Buren. who was the last sitting vice president
before Bush to be elected president, said in his 1837 address
that he looked to the “gracious protection of the Divine Be
ing whose strengthening support I humbly solicit and whom
I fervently pray to look down upon us all.”
Bush’s immediate predecessor, Ronald Reagan, in his
second inaugural address called the nation’s history “a
song..., we sing it still” and added that “we raise our voices
to the God who is the author of this most tender music.”
On Jan. 20, 1977, Jimmy Carter, the first president from
' the Deep South in 128 years, quoted the prophet Micah: “He
hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the
Lord require of thee but to do justly, and to love mercy, and
to walk humbly with thy God” (Mi 6:8).
The only Catholic president, John F. Kennedy, quoted
Isaiah (58:6) in his 1961 speech and urged the superpowers
and their allies to “unite to heed in all corners of the earth
the command of Isaiah to ‘undo the heavy burdens (and)
let the oppressed go free
“Let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking his bless
ing and his help, but knowing that here on earth God’s work
must truly be our own,” he said in conclusion.
Sometimes the prayerful plea has had a somber tone.
On March 4,1865, while the United States was still engag
ed in the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln was protected by a
heavy militia guard as he delivered his second inaugural
address.
He said that God gave to the North and South “this terri
ble war” to eliminate slavery.
“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firm
ness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive
on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s
wounds,” Lincoln said.
Franklin D. Roosevelt in a five-minute speech that
ushered in his fourth presidential term in 1945 echoed the
worries of the World War II era.
“The Almighty God has blessed our land in many ways....
So we pray to him now for the vision to see our way clearly
— to see the way that leads to a better life for ourselves and
for all our fellow men — to the achievement of his will, to
peace on earth.”
The Week In Review
NAMES AND PLACES — The heads of five U.S. dioceses
will turn 75 during 1989, the age at which bishops must sub
mit their resignations to the pope. Seven other U.S. dioceses
as of early January were either waiting appointment of new
bishops because of vacancies or had bishops who have turn
ed 75, but not yet had their resignations accepted. Those
who will turn 75 in 1989 and their birthdays are: Bishop
Gerard L. Frey of Lafayette, La., May 10; Bishop Francis
J. Mugavero of Brooklyn, N.Y., June 8; Bishop Joseph M.
Breitenbeck of Grand Rapids, Mich., Aug. 3; Bishop
Thomas J. Grady of Orlando, Fla., Oct. 9; and Bishop
Jerome J. Hastrich of Gallup, N.M., Nov. 13.
*****
AROUND THE NATION — Three more of a group of 21
nuclear weapons protesters were sentenced in Federal
court Jan. 10 for occupying nuclear missile launch facilities
in western Missouri last summer. Duane Bean and Kathy
Kelly, convicted of five counts of trespassing on federal
property, were sentenced to one year in prison and fined
$2,625 each. Gail Beyer, convicted of three counts of
trespassing, was sentenced to 20 days in jail, a $1050 fine,
200 hours of community service and three years probation.
Three other protesters, including Franciscan Father Jerry
Zawada, convicted in November of trespassing and
destruction of property charges, awaited sentencing.
Another protester, Bonnie Urfer, who pleaded “no contest”
to three criminal trespass charges and two counts of
destruction of property, began serving a two-year term
Dec. 16. The protesters, calling themselves the Missouri
Peace Planting ’88, were arrested Aug. 15 for trespassing
on Minuteman II nuclear missile launch facilities in
western Missouri.
*****
EVANGELIZATION tops a list of priorities in the Diocese
of Charleston’s new five-year plan of action. Other
priorities, announced Jan. 12 by Bishop Ernest L.
Unterkoefler, include programs aimed at personnel, clergy
and laity, and development of new parishes and missions.
Educational and missionary work within the church
itself and development of charitable efforts at the local
level were also listed as priorities. The Charleston diocese
covers the entire state of South Carolina. The evangeliza
tion effort would be aimed at the more than 1 million “un
churched” residents of the state and will “not interfere with
the successful ecumenical progress in the diocese,” the
bishop said. Vocations will be emphasized with recruitment
focusing on high schools, colleges, workplaces and all areas
of spiritual ministry. Older candidates for vocations will be
given special attention under the plan. Serious considera
tion will be given lay people's role in the life of the church
One goal is to have a church in all 46 counties of the state.
*****
SEVERAL PAROCHIAL SCHOOLS associated with
Detroit parishes that are slated to close will form partner
ships with other parishes, but one school is not certain it
will open in the fall of 1989. In a Jan. 8 press conference.
Cardinal Edward C. Szoka of Detroit announced that St.
Vincent de Paul Middle School, St. Theresa-Visitation
Grade School and St. Brigid Grade School will remain open,
despite the closing of their parishes. St. Vincent de Paul will
be under the care of the pastor of Most Holy Trinity parish,
St. Theresa-Visitation will be under the care of the pastor of
the new parishes which will be formed with the merger of
St. Theresa and St. Agnes parishes. The cardinal said St.
Brigid School will remain as part of a cluster with another
INTERNATIONALLY — The Diocese of Hong Kong has
formed a committee to oversee matters concerning Viet
namese refugees in the territory. The committee began
functioning in January and coordinates parish activities to
develop better understanding of the refugees, said Father
John Tsang Hing-man, committee head. He said a pastoral
center began offering services such as lessons in Cantonese
— Hong Kong’s main Chinese dialect — and information on
legal rights. The center aids Vietnamese who flee to Hong
Kong for political asylum, including those who have been
“screened out” by the government. Since June 16, refugees
arriving in Hong Kong have been subject to a screening
policy whereby they must prove the authenticity of their
refugee status, or be classified as "economic migrants"
and treated as illegal immigrants.
*****
THE SOUTH AFRICAN government said it suspects a
white, neo-Nazi ex-policeman of setting the fire which
severely damaged the headquarters of the Southern
African Bishops’ Conference last October. Law and Order
Minister Adriaan Vlok, making the announcement Jan. 10,
also said three members of the outlawed African National
Congress, an anti-apartheid organization, are suspected of
accidentally bombing Khotso House, the Johannesburg
headquarters of the South African Council of Churches, last
August. Vlok said Barend Strydom, arrested on charges of
shooting dead seven black South Africans in Pretoria in
November, was involved in the arson of the bishops’ head
quarters, called Khanya House.