It’s crunch time for the procrastinators amongst us. Shopping for the holidays, which can be a real art form in America, starts to resemble a NASCAR race with the finish line approaching. But if tacky is what you’re looking for this year, Planned Parenthood has the best – or, well, worst in this case – by far.
While it’s obvious to most Americans that central to the Christmas season is a special birth and the family-centered celebrations which mark that event, several Planned Parenthood affiliates decided to offer “the gift of life” certificates – services to include abortions. Oh yes, indeed, nothing says “Happy Birthday” like an abortion from Planned Parenthood.
Following the Alice in Wonderland “up is down and down is up” theme, Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Illinois began offering gift certificates as a holiday wish list suggestion. Promoted as “the gift of life,” the certificates (they admit) include abortion. Apparently it’s a slippery sled ride from Merry Christmas, to Happy Holidays, to Happy Abortion! (And “Plan B” by the chimney – for the romantics amongst us?)
It would be nice if Planned Parenthood’s mangling of the holiday season stopped there. But Cecile Richards, the President of Planned Parenthood, the world’s largest abortion provider, celebrated Christmas this month with a nationwide e-mail “Choice on Earth” campaign, brazenly celebrating their anti-Life agenda.
When Planned Parenthood first chose the “Choice on Earth” fundraising theme in the mid-1990s a maelstrom of protest for the offensive moneymaker ensued, and at that time the campaign reportedly went the way of all bad fruitcake.
But it’s back. For Planned Parenthood, tis’ the season to be greedy, it appears, as they work to gather in charitable donations to supplement their taxpayer-funded coffers.
In fact, right about the time that the credit card bills come due in January, Congress could give taxpayers a gift by defunding Planned Parenthood. Eliminating their yearly federal subsidy of over $300 million should be one of Congress’ top priorities.
Planned Parenthood’s fumbling fund raising efforts reveal a fundamental disconnect with the heart of most Americans, where the majority of us embrace unborn children in the womb as a gift, wrapped and hidden until the birth-day of celebration. As exciting as opening Christmas gifts can be, nothing compares to the joy a mother feels when she meets her child for the first time.
Bad taste isn’t crime. But it’s sad that no one at the nation’s largest abortion provider seemed to have paused long enough to notice that when “Peace on Earth” was first proclaimed, it was a birth that the angels were celebrating.
But as always the real victims of Planned Parenthood’s crass marketing will be women. You have to wonder if those women who find an abortion gift certificate waiting for them on Christmas morning might think that Santa simply ran out of lumps of coal.
Stay classy, Planned Parenthood.
Charmaine Yoest, Ph.D. is president and CEO of Americans United for Life, the nation’s oldest pro-life organization.
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