Michelle Lynch - Mother of 16

    I have a say, and I say I am proud to be a Catholic woman, a member of the Church which speaks up for those who are denied a voice.  As the 3rd in a family of  7 children, one of whom died shortly after birth, I have a say because my parents were open to life.  My younger brother and sister are alive because my parents remained open to life despite the difficulties presented by Rh incompatibility before the finding and implementation of Rhogam therapy.  As the mother of 16, five of whom have died before birth, I have a say, and I say that each and every one of my children has been a precious gift from a loving God, despite the sorrow we have endured at each loss.  I have a say and I say that the daughter who was stillborn at 20 weeks was not a parasite, nor a blob of tissue, but a beautiful baby, and no one will ever convince my older children who held the body of their tiny sister to say hello and goodbye that an unborn child is not a person.  I have a say and I say that I grieved for each of the 4 children I miscarried.  Their lives were not of no consequence .  Their lives, no matter how short had significance.

    I have a say, and I say that there is no love without sacrifice and service.  I say we are aborting the very lives that have the most important lessons to teach us, the lessons of compassion and love with no strings attached.  I say we are becoming a society that has lost the use of reason all the more as we have become less and less compassionate.   I say it is time to stop this insanity of  calling enslavement to uncontrolled sexual desires "freedom".  True freedom is being able to choose that which we ought to do. 

   I have a say, and I say that I love all of my children, despite their flaws and sins, as I must...as my Father God has loved me despite my flaws and sins.  I say that being loved despite my sin does not mean that my sin is not sin from which I must repent.  I say it is not hatred or "phobia" to call a sin a sin, but rather an act of charity, for if we do not recognize our sin we will not repent from it.

   I have a say and I say that yes, many Catholic women have used contraception, many due to the well meant but wrong advice of their confessors, but that does not change the constant teaching of our Church that the use of contraception is intrinsically evil.  I also say that the 98%  dissenting of all Catholic women touted in the MSM is a very skewed and manipulated number.  Only 30% of the women in the survey who self identified as Catholic attended Mass weekly.  Any woman who was not sexually active was not included, thus leaving out all of the single women living a chaste life.  Any woman who was pregnant or trying to achieve a pregnancy or  who was postpartum was left out, thus leaving quite a number of the faithful young married Catholic women living chastity in their marriages.  Also left out were any women over 44 years old.  And thus it is reported that 98% of ALL Catholic women have used contraception...yet my math adds things up to say that percentage should be less than 89% of  the women included in the survey which used contraception, as it showed 11% used no birth control method. And the survey ignored the existence of faithful Catholic women!  I say it is time for the truth to be told! I further say that it does not matter in the least, as far as the rightness of the HHS contraception mandate goes and the matter of freedom of religion and conscience how many women fail to live up to the Church's teaching, it is still the teaching and it is still the truth and we cannot to provide contraceptives, sterilizations and abortifacient drugs to others.  I say it is time to stand up for the truth and expose the lies that are being perpetrated before it is too late for our country to survive.  I say it is time for our priests and bishops to proclaim the truth from the pulpits loudly and clearly and without fear.