On Infertility: This article hits the nail on the head

This article hits the nail on the head with regards to how hard it is for faithful Catholics to deal with the cross of infertility.  My heart aches so that someday my husband and I may be blessed with a child.  We pray and leave it in God's hands but it is so hard for us...

This week is Infertility Awareness Week. According to the CDC, over 2 million married women in America are currently experiencing infertility. This is a deeply painful experience for any couple, but faithful Catholics face unique challenges in this department—yet in all the discussions about Natural Family Planning and how and when to avoid pregnancy, the struggles of our brothers and sisters in Christ who are not able to achieve pregnancy often get overlooked. So this week I spent some time chatting with friends who are facing infertility, including a woman whom I’ll call “A.,” who chronicles her journey online at This Cross I Embrace. They shared some of the challenges unique to being Catholic and infertile:

Temptation to Use Illicit Treatments: In modern culture, the words “infertility” and “in-vitro fertilization” go hand-in-hand. Even though IVF doesn’t always succeed, and often costs tens of thousands of dollars when it does, the success rates are high enough that it’s widely touted as a solution that is likely to give couples the children they so desperately desire. This is a source of temptation for the women I talked to, even though they understand and agree with Church teaching against IVF on an intellectual level. “I would never do it, but it’s like a punch in the gut when other women go to the IVF clinic and are then planning baby showers seven months later,” one friend said. Added to this, there can also be tremendous pressure from family members who don’t understand Church teaching and see IVF as a path to having grandchildren or nieces and nephews.

Loneliness: Catholics who face infertility often find themselves in a social no-man’s land. In terms of day-to-day lifestyle, they have little in common with fellow Catholics who have kids, and often find that friends with children are so busy that it’s hard to make plans with them. Sometimes it’s possible to find community among fellow Christians who are infertile, but tensions inevitably arise over differing views about IVF and other reproductive technology. Other childless couples tend to be much younger. “The main people you can really relate to are other infertile Catholics who are faithful to Church teaching, and they are few and far between,” one friend told me.  CONTINUED

Crossposted at Tu Ne Cede malis    

Muslim Intolerance: Muslim Woman Abducted by Parents Because She Married a Christian Man

Intolerance runs amok in the Islam community.  This is yet another example of Muslim intolerance and parents not respecting their adult daughter's wishes.  The parents go nuts due to, God forbid, a Muslim woman chooses to marry a Christian man. This crap needs to stop.  No more kidnappings, attempted kidappings, murders or attempted murders by Muslim parents just because their Muslim daughter wishes to convert to Christianity or chooses to marry a Christian.  If Muslims are going to live in the West, specifically in the United States, then they are going to have accept living within a country that believes in freedom of religion.  That may include the parents having to live with their daughters choosing a different religion. 


Islamic law forbids the marriage of Muslim women to non-Muslim men. Needless to say, that should not ever be enforceable in the greater Youngstown area. "Woman alleges capture, threats," by Denise Dick for Vindy, May 8:


A Campbell woman of Yemeni descent says she was abducted by her parents and taken to Hermitage, Pa., where they threatened to send her back to her homeland.

The victim, 32, told police she was leaving a doctor's appointment at an office on U.S. Route 224 when her father came up behind her, grabbed her in a bear hug and put her in the back seat of her car.

The father then got into the driver's seat, and her mother in the back seat with her. They drove to the Sheetz gas station in Hermitage.

No charges have been filed.

"I'm still gathering information and still trying to talk to witnesses," said Boardman Detective Glenn Patton.

The woman told police that her parents, who are Muslim, don't approve of her marriage to a Christian man.

Reached Friday, the woman, who was born in the United States, said she's OK and she wasn't injured.

Unidentified men brought the rental van the woman's parents had been driving to Sheetz, she told police. The men then took the woman's car. Police entered the car as a stolen vehicle.

She and her parents argued, and the parents told her that her brother was going to meet them, take her to New Jersey and that she would be sent to Yemen.

The woman sent her husband a text message, telling him she needed help.

Her husband went to Campbell schools, where his wife's daughter is a student, to remove her from school. Campbell Police Detective Sgt. John Rusnak said the husband was concerned that the girl was in danger and wanted to remove her from school.

While at the school, the husband encountered Sean Kilbane, the school-resource officer, Rusnak said, and relayed the story. Kilbane spent 11 months in Afghanistan while in the military and advised the husband to involve police.

Police called the woman's father's cell phone, but he told them he was at work. When police called his work place, they were told he wasn't at work that day, Rusnak said.

Patrolman John Gulu, who coaches the daughter's softball team, was able to reach the woman on her cell phone.

"The first thing he asked was, 'Are you OK? Are you safe?'" Rusnak said. "She said, 'No.'"

To keep from raising her parents' suspicions, Gulu asked yes-and-no questions, interspersed with questions about softball in case the woman's parents listened, the detective said. [...]

H/T Jihad Watch