Matt O'Reilly, PhD

The Wall Street Journal is reporting today that Planned Parenthood has decided to stop “taking reimbursements for procuring fetal tissue.” For those who need a translation of this “newspeak” into the language of everyday folk, they plan to stop selling baby parts. Here’s the report: Planned Parenthood Federation of America said it is immediately stopping taking reimbursements for procuring fetal tissue for medical research, an attempt to tamp down controversy that has led to

Many of us thought it couldn’t get worse than seeing a medical doctor swill her wine and crunch her croutons while speaking of “less crunchy” ways to dismember and murder a baby while still in utero. Then we saw video of Planned Parenthood employees digging through pie plates full of dead baby parts looking for the bits that would get the best price. Again, we believed it simply could not get worse. But we were wrong. Dead wrong. With the release of the seventh video exposing

You’ve probably seen the second undercover video of a senior Planned Parenthood executive haggling over the price of aborted baby parts (if you haven’t, scroll down). Word is there are more such videos yet to be made public. In the second video, Dr. Mary Gatter, President of Planned Parenthood’s Medical Directors Council, is seen negotiating the price of pieces from aborted babies. During the conversation Gatter suggests $75 as an appropriate price for organs. The actor posin

Planned Parenthood is on their heels in light of the recent videographic evidence that they are engaged in the illegal and ghoulish activities of selling baby parts. Douglas Wilson has pointed out the importance of keeping them on their heels and intensifying the pressure, and one way to do that is to call upon organizations that fund Planned Parenthood to defend Planned Parenthood’s devilish actions. One of those organizations is United Way. The President and CEO of United W

StemExpress is a multi-million dollar company that supplies human blood, tissue products, primary cells and other clinical specimens to biomedical researchers around the world to fuel regenerative medicine and translational research. Founded in 2010, we offer the largest variety of raw material in the industry, as well as fresh, fixed and cryopreserved human primary cells. Ed Stetzer helped spread the word about StemExpress by posting screen shots from the company website whe

I came across an article last night reporting on a letter from Brad Pitt to the CEO of Costco calling upon the company to stop selling eggs from caged hens. Pitt articulated his deep concern about the horror of keeping chickens in small cages for the duration of their lives, and he expressed his disappointment that Costco was a party to such cruelty to animals. I wouldn’t have taken the time to write a post about such a letter had it not been reported only days after the vide

You’ve probably seen the widely shared video of a Dr. Deborah Nucatola, Senior Medical Director at Planned Parenthood, nonchalantly discussing the way Planned Parenthood traffics the body parts of aborted preborn babies. If you haven’t seen it, stop reading, scroll to the bottom of this post, and watch it. Then come back and finish reading. I’ve included both edited and full versions. In response, Planned Parenthood has defended themselves saying that (1) they are only being

You may have heard about a United Methodist leader mocking participants in the recent March for Life. Bill Mefford, who is the Director of Civil and Human Rights at the General Board of Church and Society, tweeted a picture of himself in front of marchers holding a sign that read, “I march for sandwiches.” An article at First Things picked up the story and got a fair bit of circulation on social media, and the picture showed up on a variety of other websites that were highly

The North Carolina Annual Conference passed a resolution earlier this month that is commendable in many ways, even if the content of the resolution sends some mixed signals. I’m grateful to Rev. Jeremy Smith for first pointing me to the resolution, which is titled, “The Trial of  Dr. Kermit Gosnell and the Response of the General Board of Church and Society” (pp. 6-7). I’m also grateful for Jeremy’s expressed concern for my health, though in the end it was unfounded as my hea

The General Board of Church and Society (GBCS) has released a statement on the guilty verdict handed down earlier this week in the trial of Kermit Gosnell, who killed numerous newborns and at least one woman. I’m glad the statement from GBCS condemned the horrible crimes committed by the former abortion practitioner as reprehensible. They certainly were. I’m also very glad that the statement does not contradict our United Methodist Social Principles. There are, nevertheless,

We must begin by recognizing that this tragic situation follows from the widespread efforts to normalize abortion in the United States. Not all will agree with that conclusion, but a variety of factors suggest its accuracy. Since abortion was declared a constitutional right in the landmark case of Roe v. Wade, the pro-choice movement has worked hard to undermine the full personhood of the preborn. We have been told again and again that the child in the womb is a fetus, not a

I’ve said before that I oppose the death penalty for the same reason that I oppose abortion. When it comes to questions of life and death, we should err on the side of life. But in the last week these twin convictions have come into tension, perhaps I should even say conflict. One of these two convictions, both of which are based on the principle of the immutable value of human life, has been challenged, and by the other conviction no less. What has precipitated this conflict

The team at Juicy Ecumenism was kind enough to publish my reflections on a few things the church must learn from the initial silence on the Gosnell trial by mainstream media outlets. Here’s an excerpt: Abortion and infanticide are two stops on a single road, and the road has a downhill slope. Make no mistake. The current situation in which abortion practitioners are engaging in infanticide is the result of our desensitization by the decades long effort to devalue and destroy

Forty years ago today the Supreme Court handed down it’s decision in the landmark case of Roe v. Wade making abortion-on-demand a constitutionally guaranteed right in every state. I’ve always been pro-life (my parents left me no choice), but I’ve never before read the Court’s decision in this all-important case. So, yesterday I decided to learn for myself just what it said. The Court’s opinion was written by Justice Harry A. Blackmun. The entirety of the document is quite int

The kings of Judah are categorized in scripture in terms of whether “they did what was right in the sight of the Lord” or not. Two of the kings whose reigns were marked by wickedness stand out. Ahaz and Manasseh are infamous for their idolatrous burning of sacrifices to false gods. They engaged in their idolatry in an area south of Jerusalem known as the valley of the son of Hinnom, and as a part of their worship, they burned their own sons as human sacrfices to pagan deity (

To say I am appalled at the news that Planned Parenthood of Indiana is selling gift certificates that can be redeemed for abortions would be an understatement.  This is depravity beyond words.  And I almost find it hard to believe that anyone, even a merchant-of-death company like Planned Parenthood, would stoop to such a level to peddle their evil services.  The leading provider of abortions in the United States says that the certificates are intended to encourage women not

Many Americans likely think that abortion is a modern issue over which Christians are rather evenly divided.  With A Love for Life, Dennis Di Mauro overturns this notion by demonstrating that Christianity has historically taken a very strong pro-life stance with regard to abortion.  As a doctoral student in church history, Secretary of the National Pro-life Religious Council, and President of Northern Virginia Lutherans for Life, the author is well-qualified to write this boo

There have been a number of interesting posts, as of late, by Evangelical bloggers on the a Christian response to the recent passage of healthcare legislation and its effect on government funding for abortions and whether or not Christians ought to pay taxes which are excessive, oppressive, and used to fund government programs antagonistic to biblical teaching. Doug Wilson not only argues that a tax revolt is the Christian thing to do, he outlines 10 principles underlying suc

I find it very strange that the pro-choice side of the abortion debate is often portrayed as advocating for social justice.  I find it strange because it is the pro-choice side that would have it remain legal to destroy over 1 million pre-born human beings every year.  If this is not unjust, I can’t imagine what is.  It light of this, I take abortion to be the single greatest issue of social justice in the world today.  No other cause involves speaking up for so many who are

Here are a couple more quotes on abortion from Di Mauro’s A Love for Life.  These are from some well-known church reformers. From his commentary on Genesis 25, this is Luther: “He [God] is not hostile to children, as we are.  But God emphsizes his word to such an extent that He sometimes gives offspring even to those who do not desire it, yes even hate it…How great, therefore, the wickedness of human nature is!  How many girls there are who prevent conception and kill and exp