Letters
Anti-youth billboards
The war against children and the hatred of the innocence and unlimited potential of young persons are exemplified by the billboards in Toronto erected by Pattison Outdoor Advertising (May Interim, cover page). What is it but envy that causes someone like Kathleen Howes to urge young people to engage in illicit and futile sexual behaviour, as implied by the promotion of condoms? Envy is a blinding force. It wants to deprive others of a good one has lost oneself. Young people can find and must hope for much more out of life than a series of pointless, degrading and sinful encounters. Let them reject such a total waste of time and get on with the business of living.
Lise Anglin
Toronto, Ont.
Positive experience for March youth
I attended my first March for Life this year with 12 teenagers I teach at a Catholic High School in Oshawa. What a marvelous experience for each of us. It was so inspiring to hear some of our mp's sharing their commitments to life issues, and to join with so many others who care about life enough to be there. And so many young people. I had the opportunity to talk and listen to my young charges frequently during the day. For many of them, the crystallizing moment was the silent segment passing the abortuary on Bank Street. The "Show the Truth" witness at that site drove home to these young people the reality of all the rhetoric of abortion. Many were in tears, but tears of sadness, not anger. They came face to face with reality, and they knew it. One of my students shared afterward that her mother gave her life at 15 years of age, and she now clearly understood what she herself had faced while in the womb even though her courageous mother had chosen life over death for her daughter. These young people expressed their commitment to standing up for life, after this rivetting experience. They will not forget the truth of abortion. I wish to thank all those who organized the March and participated in it. I also wish to thank the Knights of Columbus council #4895 from St. John the Evangelist Parish in Whitby. You made a significant impact on the lives of 12 young people, and myself too. God bless you all.
Christopher Gainey
Oshawa, Ont.
Was Interim coverage of xenotransplantation unfair?
Although I usually love the coverage of issues in The Interim, the March issue was an exception. The xenotransplantation bashing article by James Wood on page 3 is fraught with all sorts of North American medical bias. Because our researchers have failed, does not at all mean that everyone has. Implicit in this perspective is that our medical orthodoxy is so good, that it just cannot get any better. Maybe a few knowledgeable ideas may help you to question this view?
About 20 years ago, I flew to Germany for a treatment for an incurable genetic condition called Friedreich's Ataxia. This treatment amounted to the injection of sheep cells into my lower back. This form of xenotransplantation, called cell therapy at the time, was given by a professor of medicine at Heidelberg Medical School, Dr. Franz Schmid. And just as our modern use of blood infusions have been modified over the years, so much so that the use of whole blood is very rare indeed, modifications were made to make these xeno-cells much more efficacious to the recipient. Even though Professor Schmid died years ago, this work is carried on by the Bridge Research Foundation in Ottawa.
I am highly perplexed at the (anti-xenotransplantation) article in a pro-life newspaper. I personally do not know of any medical procedure that is so simple yet effective. Personally, I went from being able to walk about 100 feet with a cane before treatment to walking a mile without a cane two months later. (Even today, any improvement is unknown to North American orthodox medicine for my condition.)
It should be noted that this technique was also used in Turkey using human fetal cells but that no additional benefits were found. Maybe this technique requires some closer scrutiny?
John McDonell,
Timmins, Ont.
Editor's Note: The article in question did not "bash" xenotransplantation. The point of the article was that little is known about animal-to-human transplants and that while it may provide some life-saving, life-enhancing treatments (and we certainly hope it can), that we should go down such a road very carefully. It should also be noted that there may be moral and scientific differences between cell therapies (such as the one that benefitted this letter writer) and actual organ transplants due to the level of risk involved in such treatments.
Bishops care. Does CFFC?
As I read the article in May Interim starting on the front page and ending on page 13, "Dissidents promote condoms in advance of World Youth Day" and the Catholics for a Free Choice billboard saying "Catholic People Care. Do Our Bishops," I thought to myself, yes they do. For all true Catholics think or should think as the bishops do. Pray not play, for as a saying goes, if you put your hand in the fire you'll surely get burned.
E. L. Jolicoeur
Renfrew, Ont.
Unborn are people, too
The definition of a human being will be discussed by Canada's Parliament and Standing Committee on the Justice and Human Rights on May 22, 2002. Section 223(1) of the Criminal Code of Canada states: "A child becomes a human being within the meaning of this act when it has completely proceeded, in a living state, from the body of its mother whether or not (a) its breathed, (b) it has an independent circulation, or (c) the navel string is severed." This definition contradicts the fact that a child is a human being before birth. Data is available which establishes beyond a shadow of a doubt that the pre-born child is alive from the moment of conception (fertilization). Intensive research in genetics and embryology have shown that this statement should have the full backing of the scientific world. Unborn children are entitled to receive medical treatment and may never be killed because they are unwanted. The Criminal Code needs to be amended so that the unborn child has full legal protection and may not be called "it." Psalm 139 : 13 "For you (God) created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mothers womb." (N.I.V. Bible)
Jerry Tillema
Chatham, Ont.
