Komen Foundation and Abortion

You've seen that "Susan G. Komen Foundation" pink ribbon and logo on just about every product you can buy. It, especially in the last few years, has been popular for companies to financially support the Komen foundation by making their products pink. I recall seeing pink AA batteries a while back. Some NFL players wore pink and there's even a pink fire truck driving around. KFC, the chicken restaurant, went so far as selling chicken in pink buckets and donated $4.2 Million to the Komen Foundation.

All of this to raise awareness and funds to combat breast cancer in women by providing breast cancer screenings to women who might not otherwise get them.

Of course we want to do every morally acceptable thing we can do to fight cancer. Nobody would disagree with that. And I do realize not all of the "pink" out there supports the Komen Foundation, but a huge amount of it does.

The problem is that the Komen foundation gives large sums of money to Planned Parenthood so that that organization can perform breast cancer screenings. This is a terrible idea. Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the United States. Their annual report last year pointed out that they recieved $487.4 million in TAX DOLLARS, did 329,455 abortions, and made fewer referrals for adoption than previous years.

On January 31st, the Komen Foundation said it was going to stop giving grant money to Planned Parenthood. This was a very good thing. Anything that removes support for Planned Parenthood is a good thing.

What is amazing is the absolute outrage that followed, especially among our nation's leaders, about this relatively small amount of money. At least 22 Senate Democrats signed a letter calling on Komen to reconsider its decision. There were speeches given in protest of this decision in our congress. One petition calling for Komen to reverse their decision garnered 250,000 signatures ... in about 3 days. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg plans to give $250,000 to Planned Parenthood in the wake of this news.

The rage of so many people that are speaking in the media and in our government toward ANYTHING that might threaten their sacred institution, Planned Parenthood, is itself outrageous.

Unfortunately, the Komen Foundation caved under this pressure and have reversed their decision. They continue to support Planned Parenthood.

Planned Parenthood should be destroyed. We should stop giving them tax money. We should stop supporting anyone who supports them. We need to support organizations that actually help women, not ones that abort them and push contraceptives. None of these help women or society. Write your legislators to tell them that you want any government support to these organizations cut off.

-Fr. Jason