Defense of unborn is the 'premier civil rights issue,' Archbishop Dolan says
By Benjamin Mann
Yonkers Mayor Amicone and Archbishop Timothy Dolan
Three days after he called attention to an alarming 41 percent rate of abortion in New York City, Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan of New York extolled the work of both religious and secular pro-life activists, praising them for their commitment to “the premier civil rights issue of our day.”
The New York archbishop expressed hope for the pro-life cause at a Jan. 9 event marking the city of Yonkers' fourth annual “Respect Life Week.” He appeared along with the mayor himself, New York's Auxilary Bishop Gerald Walsh, and other local religious leaders as well as pro-life activists.
“Logic, biology, medicine, common sense, reason, American values, and ethics are dramatically on our side,” he reasoned. On the other hand, he acknowledged that “money, marketing, the media, most political leaders, and the chic molders of today’s style are not.”
On Jan. 6, at a press conference for the pro-life Chiaroscuro Foundation, Archbishop Dolan said New York City's 41 percent abortion rate made him “embarassed” on behalf of a “cherished community” he is otherwise proud to call home.
Reflecting on the city of Yonkers' civic observance of Respect Life Week, the archbishop indicated that in many quarters of American society, the issue of abortion was sometimes misunderstood as a “religious issue.”
Both historically and presently, this view of abortion as a primarily religious question has driven many prominent Catholic politicians –including New York's own onetime governor, Mario Cuomo– to declare themselves “personally opposed” to abortion, but supportive of its legalization and promotion.
While expressing heartfelt gratitude for the participation of Christians and other religious believers in the pro-life movement, Archbishop Dolan offered a different view of abortion– not only as a cause for people of faith, but as “the premier civil rights issue of our day.”
“We are asking,” he explained to the crowd, “that the equal protection of the law, promised by our beloved Constitution, be applied to the pre-born baby.”
“All we’re promoting is the noble right to life assured in our nation’s foundational documents, which list the right to life first among those inalienable rights no one has the power to take away.”
The fourth-largest city in the state of New York, Yonkers is alone among its municipalities in celebrating Respect Life Week. The city's mayor, Philip Amicone, is a relative rarity in state politics due to his strong stance against abortion.
Archbishop Dolan expressed his special gratitude to Mayor Amicone and the pro-life community in Yonkers. But he lamented that “our state and local communities, which I love and now am proud to call home, are less than receptive to our pro-life message.”
Such resistance, he said, made “our efforts all the more urgent, and your work all the more heroic.”
The archbishop shared an anecdote that he said clearly showed the scientific and medical truth about unborn life.
“A couple of weeks ago I went for my physical, and was in the X-ray room,” he recounted. “There, as clear as day, was the dramatic warning: 'X-rays can be dangerous to your unborn baby. Let the technician know if you are pregnant.'”
“We all know it,” he observed. “We’re not talking about a 'fetus,' 'a mass of cells,' but a baby. The X-ray technicians know it; the obstetricians who show the sonogram to a mom know it … Yet, right down the hall from the X-ray room with that sign, an abortion taking the life of that innocent baby might have been occurring.”
“This cannot stand!” he announced. “The truth will set us free.” He declared that America must “recover its birthright as a guardian, not a taker, of innocent life.”
“We unite as Americans this afternoon,” he stated, “eager to restore this premier civil right.”
Read more: http://www.ewtnnews.com/catholic-news/US.php?id=2438#ixzz1jdOyG7Ux
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