It comes as no surprise that women are marrying at an older age and, frequently, bearing children later in life also. The Pew Research Center has recently released a study confirming these facts. In 2008, one in seven babies in the United States was born to a mother older than 35 years of age. By contrast, the teenage birthrate has been declining since 1990 except for a couple of spikes, and births to women younger than 20 declined in 2008 to one in ten babies.

These statistics reflect significant changes in society, as women often choose to delay marriage and childbearing while they pursue education and get established in a career. However women’s goals may have changed, the perception of children seems to have remained positive. When asked why they decided to have their first child, 87 percent of the parents in the Pew study said, “The joy of children.”

As I reflect on my own mother, I want to salute all women who have risen to the challenge of motherhood and accepted the responsibilities of this high calling. I wouldn’t place mothering in the glamorous job category, but how do we place a value on a mother’s invaluable contributions? Mothers, of course, are the bearers of life itself. Beyond that indispensable role, they are often the emotional “glue” that holds the members of a family together. When a marriage dissolves and the family is torn apart, it is most often the mother who stays with the children and raises them to adulthood.

A former national leader once stated, “The family is a sacred institution entrusted with the world’s most important work. Society is only as strong as the families who live within it.” Thank you, moms, for all you have done and are doing to strengthen our families and our nation.

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Watching the recent NFL draft, I noticed that emotions ran high and hugs abounded. The athletes were exuberant in expressing their excitement and gratitude to family and friends who had gathered to share the realization of a lifetime dream to play professional football. There were extended and seemingly more meaningful hugs, however, for the mothers of some of the football players. Noticing the long hugs, sometimes accompanied by tears, made me wonder what untold stories these mothers and sons shared.

We have all heard countless stories of young athletes applauding their moms for being the “glue” in their lives. Often the dad was unavailable, and mom was the one who encouraged them to stay in school, to get good grades, to work hard and “hang” with good friends. Mom was the one who often worked an extra job or two so her kids could go to college. She was often the provider and the encourager, but she was also the enforcer when discipline was needed. But, pats on the back didn’t come until these young people came of age and realized the enormous impact their mother had on their development and character.

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As the brutal consequences of China’s one-child policy that became law in 1978 are becoming fully known, it is apparent that unborn females, young girls and young women are the real victims of this law.

Chinese parents have traditionally preferred sons, since a son carries the family name, inherits family properties and supports his parents in their old age, while Chinese daughters become part of their husband’s family. Thus, limiting families to one child has resulted in the sex-selection abortion of girls as Chinese parents are forced to choose between their future security and the lives of their daughters.

The magnitude of this situation and the vast numbers of Chinese women missing because they were aborted is being acknowledged, as Chinese boys now outnumber girls by the millions — resulting in a dire shortage of eligible brides for China’s young men. The most calamitous consequence of the shortage of Chinese girls is the growing trade of foreign girls and women from many countries — especially Korea — being trafficked into China for the purpose of forced marriages and sexual exploitation.

China’s one-child policy is a triple whammy against women. It begins with the women who are forced to make the horrendous decision to abort an unborn baby girl because sons are preferred in a one-child family. Then, the life of the aborted baby girl is snuffed out, obviously without her consent. Now, women beyond China’s borders are paying the price of this misguided and cruel policy as they are forcibly trafficked into China to sexually satisfy China’s disproportionately male population.

As this travesty against women is perpetuated in China and surrounding countries, one wonders where the female “pro-choice” defenders are when it comes to these women who are being forced into unimaginable situations, clearly not of their own choosing. Rather than speaking up for millions of women in this dire situation, a coalition of women’s groups in the U.S., including Women’s Media Center, National Organization for Women and the Feminist Majority Foundation, are galvanized and unloading their fire on a Super Bowl ad about one woman who tells of choosing life for her son. Pam Tebow chose to continue a risky pregnancy rather than abort her baby, and her inspiring story is one of celebrating life and families. You can read here the opinion of a pro-choice Washington Post staff writer, Sally Jenkins, who agrees that the nation can learn much from the Tebows.

As the Tebows are telling their story of choosing life, other compassionate people are working through their local pregnancy resource centers (PRCs) to provide healthy alternatives to abortion. Please log on to www.apassiontoserve.org and read about the extraordinary contributions made by the nation’s PRCs in meeting the needs of women, youth and families.

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Heartbeat International, an association of more than 1100 pregnancy help centers, is providing an opportunity for women served by these centers to bring their babies to Capitol Hill. These moms, accompanied by their babies, will meet with Members of Congress on January 21, 2010 to express their gratitude for the life-saving work of pregnancy help centers.

Our elected representatives need to know that pregnancy resource centers exist in most of their districts. These help centers are serving communities by uniting thousands of compassionate individuals with a passion for life, who also fund the community-based centers and serve as volunteers, to provide the emotional and practical help women facing unexpected pregnancies need. This network, including doctors, lawyers, nurses, social workers, educators and other professionals, provides the vital information women need to make an informed decision, the facts that abortion providers often leave out. As Peggy Hartshorn, President of Heartbeat International, stated, “Alternatives to abortion must be available so no woman ever feels forced to abort her baby.”

Moms and babies saved by pregnancy help centers want to send the clear message that pregnancy resource centers (PRC) are good for America. You can find out more about the untold story and impact of the PRC movement, and the tremendous good being done in our midst, at www.apassiontoserve.org. A combined services report, A Passion to Serve, A Vision for Life, records the development and vital work of the three major pregnancy resource network groups—Heartbeat, CareNet and the National Institute of Family and Life Advocates (NIFLA). If you are interested in locating a pregnancy resource center, you can access http://www.optionline.org.

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The furor over David Letterman’s outrageously crude comments regarding the 14-year- old daughter of Gov. Sarah Palin being “knocked up” by New York Yankee Alex Rodriquez has quieted down. Governor Palin accepted the apology of the 62-year-old Letterman on behalf of young women like her daughters who want to draw the line, in her words, with “men who ‘joke’ about sexual exploitation of girls.”

After much prodding even the National Organization for Women (NOW), certainly not fans of Sarah Palin, had a statement on this situation. NOW’s website said: “Comedians in search of a laugh should really know better than to snicker about men having sex with teenage girls (or young women) less than half their age.”

Letterman may have dodged a bullet in the Palin incident. However, his lewd sexual comments exposed again the hard, ugly truth that criminal sexual abuse of underage girls by older men is occurring in communities all across America. Adding insult to injury, the abuse is actually being covered up by some who claim to help young women.

Consider the findings of a young student at UCLA, Lila Rose, who did some investigative reporting on Planned Parenthood clinics around the nation. Equipped with a hidden camera and posing as an underage girl impregnated by a much older man, Lila produced videos and audio tapes of her interviews with Planned Parenthood personnel.
Lila’s work exposed sexual abuse, including unreported statutory rape, as well as other blatant violations by Planned Parenthood of state statutes that were intended to protect young girls.

Above is a video of Lila posing as a 13-year-old girl going to a Planned Parenthood clinic in Indianapolis, IN for an abortion because she is pregnant by her 31-year-old boyfriend. The counselor violated Indiana law by not reporting the apparent statutory rape of a minor girl. Further, she went on to coach the young girl on how to conceal an abortion and get around parental consent laws by going to a “surrounding” state for an abortion.

For more examples of criminal violations of law by Planned Parenthood go here.

Sarah Palin was right—sexual exploitation of young girls is no laughing matter. There is nothing funny about it.

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February is Black History Month, and we are reminded of the many African-Americans who have made remarkable contributions to our great country. Sadly, I am reminded also of the huge number of African-American babies aborted every day in the United States snuffing out enormous future potential from this community. Adding insult to injury, evidence has surfaced over the last few months concerning anti-African-American attitudes in the abortion industry.

I refer to the explosive news regarding racist behavior by employees of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. A student reporter at UCLA who did some investigative journalism released some shocking recordings showing that the eugenic and racial origins of Planned Parenthood are evident in the work of the organization even today.

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In the window of the Martin Luther King Library in downtown Washington, D.C., is a sign with a quote from Rev. King, the famous pastor and civil rights leader. It reads, “In the end we will not remember the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends.”

For too long, women and men who know better have been silent about the negative effects of abortion on the women and babies who undergo the procedure and on their family and friends.  Women in high stress situations of unplanned pregnancies, and the babies they have conceived, have been without the benefit and support of people who could have spoken up about the serious negative after effects of their own abortions or the abortions of women they know. For too long knowledgeable people remained silent while women facing abortion believed the lie that this “product of conception” was just a blob of tissue, only to be told after the abortion that, “It was a boy/girl.”

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