Thursday, June 10, 2004

WASHINGTON (BP)--In 1983, President Ronald Reagan wrote an essay on abortion that pro-life advocates quote to this day.

He defended the life of the unborn in the essay, predicted that the nation's opinion on abortion eventually would change and expressed his desire to see Roe v. Wade overturned.

"He probably did more than any other one politician to put the pro-life agenda on the radar screen of the nation," Richard Land, head of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, told Baptist Press.

Reagan's essay, "Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation," was first published in The Human Life Review journal and eventually published in a book. The book, also called "Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation," was published again in 2001.

"We cannot diminish the value of one category of human life -- the unborn -- without diminishing the value of all human life," Reagan, who died June 5, wrote.

The book served as an encouragement to pro-family groups, who saw their nation's president go against the advice of some by publicly tackling a controversial issue.

"Despite the formidable obstacles before us, we must not lose heart," Reagan wrote. "This is not the first time our country has been divided by a Supreme Court decision that denied the value of certain human lives. The Dred Scott decision of 1857 was not overturned in a day, or a year, or even a decade."

Over time in the 1800s, Reagan asserted, Americans began to see the evil of slavery. Similarly, minds will change when people learn about the evil of abortion, he said.

"[T]he great majority of the American people have not yet made their voices heard, and we cannot expect them to -- any more than the public voice arose against slavery -- until the issue is clearly framed and presented," Reagan wrote.

As governor of California, Reagan disappointed pro-lifers by signing a bill easing restrictions to abortion. It was an action, though, he later regretted.

Land said that as president, Reagan was "a voice crying in the wilderness in Washington, D.C., for the pro-life cause." More...

Monday, June 07, 2004

(AgapePress) - A school district in Washington State has agreed to no longer bar Child Evangelism Fellowship from using school facilities.

The Mount Vernon School District had been charging CEF's "Good News Clubs" a rental fee, even though other secular clubs were given free use of the facilities. Once CEF overcame that hurdle, the district decided to prohibit the Good News Clubs from passing out fliers advertising its events to students.

The school system finally did a dramatic about-face, ending its discrimination against CEF, but only after the Florida-based Liberty Counsel legal organization issued lawsuit threats on three separate occasions.

Liberty Counsel president and general counsel Mat Staver points out that equal access means equal treatment in every respect, but he notes that the kind of discrimination happening in the Mount Vernon School District is all too common.

"There's a lot of Good News Clubs and other Christian after-school clubs that either are being denied access to the facilities or, if they have access, are being charged fees where the secular clubs are not. Or they're not being allowed to advertise their particular meetings in the same way secular clubs are allowed to do so," he says. More...