My ancestors were French and Walloon Huguenots. That is, they were Protestants in Catholic Europe in the 1600's. They endured constant war and persecution by the French and Spanish kings who were doing the will of the Catholic Church by destroying "heretics". The kings of France and Spain waged war for a century, killing millions of Europeans. Protestants were not allowed to practice their religion or to leave the country. Germany and Holland were havens for people suffering religious persecution, and my ancestors ( and I know of more than a dozen of them) escaped from France and vicinities to the Palatinate in Germany. Eventually they made their way through Germany, Holland, and to America. It often took generations to accomplish this migration. But they were determined to find peace and religious freedom. One of my ancestors, Mary Warenbauer Ferree, named her settlement in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Paradise. It is still called that today. She died there in 1716.

It is often commented upon that the people of Europe are not deeply religious. Why not? Could it be that after a hundred years of religious warfare they were totally burned out on the subject of religion? The Catholic Church insisted upon certain beliefs and practices and sought out "heretics" with a vengeance. The people were not allowed any other religious belief; so they turned away from religion altogether. Having the nation ruled by a Pope or an Ayatollah who determines all moral decisions in life and brooks no opposition tends to turn people away from religion. People say to themselves, is this really what God wants in life?

Now the Pope has followed us to America. The Catholic Bishops are stating that no devout Catholic can vote for a person for President of the United States who supports abortion rights. (I am not Catholic, but I resent the Pope's intrusion into American politics). Our Constitution gives us religious freedom. It also gives us separation of church and state. Now American Catholics and protestant religious fundamentalists want to create a state religion and do away with the separation of church and state. Our ancestors knew what they were talking about when they wrote the Constitution. They had endured the state religions of Europe. Someone like Sarah Palin would say that we should not dwell on the past. But she is too ignorant to realize that it is important to know our past and our history in order to determine our direction in life. God gave us religious freedom to make our own decisions. We don't need the Pope to make all of our moral decisions. Abortion is both a medical and a moral decision and should be made by a woman and her physician. She can consult her conscience and her pastor and make her decision. There is not one word about abortion in the Bible. And I do not believe that God requires every fertilized egg in the world to become a fully human person. In fact, 50 % of all pregnancies are lost naturally in the first few months of life. Survival of a fertilized egg is very tenuous and I believe that a woman has every right to make her own reproductive decisions. The real reason that the church is so opposed to abortion is that it is opposed to women having any control over our own lives. Does the church make any statement that no one should vote for any American for President of the United States who believes in war? No. Certainly war destroys many born lives. The church is beginning to take a stand against capital punishment which is good. What about child abuse and the murder of so many children by their parents or by a mother's boyfriend? Does the church engage in any work to end this horror? Not that I know of. I don't see any great valuation on human life here. All I see is an attack on women. We do not need an Ayatollah in America to direct us on all moral decisions. A woman's life has value and she has the right to determine when and where she will give birth. These religious groups do not even allow sex education or contraceptives. This is another indication that their real goal is to control women's lives. I know that they have an involved and convoluted philosophy that sex education and contraception cannot be allowed because of the necessity to avoid any prevention of the development of human life. In reality, this is the means of men to control women's reproduction.