Signs of the Times  

  In finishing up our week on pro-life and the abortion issue we submit this article from Free Republic:

      "Some parishioners walked out during a homily given by Fr. Walter J. McQuinn, O.S.A. of New York City-based Priests for Life at Sacred Heart Parish in Coronado the weekend of Nov. 14-16.  In his hard-hitting homily, Fr. Quinn Chided apathetic Catholic laity, particularly Catholic politicians for voting their finances instead of their faith.  The following are excerpts from the homily:


    "...There is nothing in our society that destroys more lives than abortion: not crime, sickness, disease, natural disasters, not even war.  There are more lives taken in this country by abortion in one year than all the wars that the U.S. ever fought, from G. Washington right up to the present.  The figures don't even come close.  Death by abortion in one year is 25 times greater."

   "...There are two generations of Americans who have grown up, especially if they went to public schools, hearing that abortion is somehow some kind of a right, and everybody else has to pay for it with their tax dollars.  Most Americans seem to be unaware and might be quite shocked to learn that there are 4,400 abortions in this country every 24-hour period.  That's more than died in the World Trade Center every single day..."

   "....The great tragedy of the last and the current century is the deliberate and brutal destruction of countless human lives, sanctified by government and bought into by all levels of society including the UN."

   "...Economics, education, war, capital punishment, jobs, whatever, none of these other life issues is equal to, superior to, can be equated with, or used as an excuse not to support the very right to life."

    "....Women do not get an abortion because of freedom of choice.  No.  They get them because they feel they have no freedom and no choice.  they feel trapped, desperate and afraid because they have no one to turn to except the abortionist."

   "...Legal abortion facilities in this country of ours are the most unregulated surgical facilities in the entire nation.  Unregulated.  Animal hospitals, vet clinics are cleaner and safer, held to higher standards and subject to stricter legal controls than are the facilities where 4,400 human babies are destroyed eveyr single day."

    "...At the March for Life in Washington in January, I usually stand at the corner of 7th & Constitution, because when you are in a parade, you don't see it.....There had to be 250 to 350,000 or more people there.  And yet we get phone calls and e-mails from all over the country in which people tell us that they didn't read or hear about it in their local press.  That's called suppression of truth."

     "....Human life is being destroyed on a massive scale and all lvels of society are looking the other way, just like they did in Nazi Germany in the 1930s."

    "...Don't be bullied by slogans that sound very, very nice such as pro-choice.  It sounds veyr fair, very feeling..very American.  But some choices have victims.  The child of abortion is the obvious victim, destroyed by the mother's choice."

    "....Those who continue to support and to vote for candidates, persons and programs that support abortion are simply making possible the deaths of millions of innocent human lives."

    "...It's long overdue that all those anti-life and so-called pro-choice Catholics begin to suffer a guilty conscience, because someday they will meet God and then they will know the meaning of God's will and God's grace."


    Fr. Quinn has been actively involved in the pro-life movement since the late 60s, long before the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision of the U.S. Supreme Court and the advent of the computer age.  He led parish groups to the annual March for Life in Washington and is founder of still-active pro-life groups at the parish level, both "Main Line Life Line" in suburban Philadelphia in the late 70s and Atlantic Life Line in Atlantic City, N.J. in the late 80s.
      Upon returning from Canada, he joined Priests for Life in September 1999.  "I am convinced that the main focus of the Gospel of Life reaches people in and through the Church at the parish level."  As the latest addition to the Priests for Life staff, he will be preaching on abortion and euthanasia to groups of clergy and laity throughout the nation encouraging all to "stand up and be counted" and be actively involved in this most important crusade of our time: to serve, protect and defend life from the innocent unborn to the oldest of the old among us!
    Those who would like Fr. Quinn to speak at an event or to ask questions, write to: POB 141172, Staten Island, NY 10314; Tel. 718-980-4400; fax: 603-908-3075.