Our article on marriage (see p. 2), generated the following response from father Anthony Zimmerman, longtime pro-life colleague of Father Paul Marx.
Dear Steve,
Of course, we favor a constitutional amendment declaring marriage to be a union of a man and a woman. But as politics go, the course is long, even risky. In the meantime we ought to promote and adopt alternatives.
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Give parents an extra vote for each child below voting age, mothers vote in place of daughters, fathers in place of sons. This can already be started at grass roots levels — township, county, municipal. It will immediately bias politics in favor of families with children.
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Provide a year of tax relief and public service exemption for newlyweds who marry properly and for the first time. There is a precedent in the Book of Deuteronomy: When a man is newly married, he is not to be drafted into military service or any other public duty; he is to excused from duty for one year, so that he can stay home and make his wife happy (Deut. 24:5).
Father Anthony Zimmerman,
Japan
Dear Mr. Mosher and PRI staff:
I received the newsletter on OTC/MAP. It is a frightening thought what will happen if MAP goes over the counter.
I did get a chuckle over the assertion that Tums (or even candy) is “safe.” (“The Dangers of the Morning-After Pill,” PRI Review, March-April 2004, page 8). Talk to an urologist and you’ll find out that Tums aren’t that safe.
In 1999 I had a kidney stone. Apparently, once a year a pregnant lady comes to see the urologist with a stone, due in part to over consumption of Tums and calcium pills. My urologist derisively calls them “calcium bullets” and was critical of ob/gyns who push them.
It’s pretty obvious that the potential for abuse with MAP (which a person shouldn’t take anyway) is considerable.
Kathryn Groening,
Midland, Ml
Dear Steve,
We want to deeply thank you for all the valiant help you gave to our March Against the Morning-After Pill on August 15, 2004, in downtown Lima.
We are grateful to Carlos Polo, who handled press inquiries and produced a video aimed at Peruvian opinion leaders.
Your financial assistance also made it possible for us to prepare a special banner for the march bearing the picture of an unborn baby and the slogan “Life Yes, Pills No.”
Thank you very much.
Dr. Blanca Neyra, Mrs. Sissi de Yapur, Eliana de Escudero
Unidos por la Vida [Coalition United for Life], Lima, Peru
Dear Steve,
A recent Weekly Briefing mentioned if a society in the past ever adopted homosexuality as the chief principle around which it organized its society it died out. Can you give us an example of a society this happened to besides Sodom and Gomorrah? Thanks for your help.
As you probably know we have the same battle down under at the moment.
Clare McClean,
Australia
Dear Clare,
I put the question in the conditional: if any society ever took homosexuality as its chief organizing principle it died out. No such societies, other than those you mention, are ever known to have existed.
Steve
