Pro-Life Page

by Joe Ortwerth | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com 

The Miss USA pageant will be held in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on June 8th, and one of the contestants will be a woman who was conceived as a result of forcible rape.

Valerie Gatto was crowned Miss Pennsylvania 2014 in December of last year.  She has made a central platform in her competition the need to provide greater support for victims of sexual assault.

Gatto has revealed that her mother was raped at knife-point when she was 19 years old.  Valerie says that the perpetrator planned to murder her mother after the sexual assault, but that she was able to escape when he became distracted.

While her mother originally intended to give Valerie up for adoption, she then decided to set aside her plans for law school and raise her daughter.

“I knew God put me here for a purpose, and He’s the reason my mother and I were saved,” Gatto says.  “I want to do Him proud and my family proud.”

“I could just sit here and say, ‘Why did this happen,’ and ‘Does my father know I exist,’” Valerie continued.  “But God put me here to do great things, and I’m not going to let things from the past stop me.”

Gatto graduated from the University of Pittsburgh magna cum laude with a degree in Business Administration.  She hopes to someday lead a philanthropic organization that will serve underprivileged children in the United States.

“There’s not that many role models for young women out there today that are positive and uplifting,” Valerie observes.  “That’s why I got into pageantry.”

Gatto says she will be forever inspired by how her mother overcome the horror and indignity of being violated in such a violent way.

“It gives me a deep desire to shed light on the trauma of sexual assault and rape for young women,” Gatto explains.  “I am very passionate about educating women on how to protect themselves and prevent these types of crime.”

“My mom always told me I was her light.  The way I look at it, from that moment of conception, I was the light associated with the darkness.  That’s what I hope to do as Miss Pennsylvania 2014.”

by Rebecca Downs | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 6/6/14 9:15 AM

A recent Gallup poll takes a range of issues in which respondents are asked if it is morally acceptable or not. The 19 issues are regarded as “Highly acceptable, “Largely acceptable,” “Contentious,” “Largely unacceptable,” and “Highly unacceptable.” Abortion, along with doctor-assisted suicide, is regarded as contentious, and, according to Gallup, the “moral acceptability [is] at or near record high.” Still, these issues only enjoy 42 percent and 52 percent of moral acceptability, respectively. Further down in the analysis of the poll, these numbers are broken down by political party.

And Gallup makes this worthwhile point about the abortion issue in that it “receives neither majority support nor majority disapproval, making it the most contentious issue of the 19 tested.”

When the abortion issue is broken down by acceptability for political party, only Democrats show a majority support, at 59 percent, which even then, is not such a high majority. It also certainly is not high enough to reflect the extreme position of the current Democratic national platform, and its party leaders who have such a preoccupation with supporting abortion, including President Barack Obama and DNC chairwoman Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

Independents, who are usually split in the middle between the two parties, as noted by Gallup and clear in the poll, regard abortion as morally acceptable at only 41 percent. This is the issue in which there is the biggest gap between Independents and Democrats. Only 28 percent of Republicans regard abortion as morally acceptable.

While both parties should take note on how these percentages reflect voter values, it is especially important that the GOP does so. When only just over a quarter of a party’s voters find such an issue to be morally acceptable, a political party certainly does not need to consider supporting it more. And, perhaps this is one such issue where the GOP can even win over Independents.

Further analysis by Gallup mentions that views of Republican respondents have shown regard of issues being more morally acceptable since 2001, when these questions were first asked. These include same-sex relations, pre-marital sex and divorce. Abortion is not listed as one of these issues. And, in response to those members of the GOP establishment who may claim that abortion is not an important topic or one the party needs to compromise are, in order to attract voters, Gallup mentions that “…Republicans’ views have changed little.”

Another Gallup poll, which was released days prior to the above mentioned one, also reflects this. This poll shows that 47 percent of Americans consider themselves pro-life, compared to 46 percent who consider themselves pro-choice. While the split is narrow enough for Gallup to accurately claim that “U.S. Still Split on Abortion[,]” when the breakdown is examined further, this time by importance of issue for voters, the gap is certainly more noteworthy.

The numbers are slightly different from those who regard abortion as morally acceptable or unacceptable versus those who consider themselves pro-life or pro-choice, but the idea is the same in that abortion should not be ignored completely as an issue for voters, particularly for the Republican party.

Again, Gallup counteracts those in the GOP who wish to ignore the abortion issue or say it is not important, when analysis of the poll says “[i]t is thus remarkable that the percentage of voters saying a candidate’s position on abortion is paramount to their voter has not only remained constant, but has also increased slightly.” Let that be a lesson to the GOP for 2014 mid-term elections and beyond, especially with what else the Gallup poll shows when it is broken down further.

Almost one-quarter, at 24 percent, of pro-life voters will only vote for a candidate who shares their view on abortion. And exactly half consider it to be “one of many important factors.” For those who “[d]on’t see abortion as a major issue,” there is a gap of double digits between pro-life and pro-choice voters. Only 21 percent of pro-life voters have this view, as opposed to 32 percent of pro-choice voters.

Abortion may be regarded as a “contentious” issue, according to Gallup, and it is rightly so considering how much it divides Americans who are passionate on this divisive issue. But, just because it is contentious does not mean that political parties need to stay away from addressing it, or addressing both sides of the issue, as the Democratic party truly ought to do. Regardless, it is time for both political parties to stand up and recognize the importance of the life issue, or at least those within their party who do. The polls certainly reflect it.

by Steven Ertelt | Lansing, MI | LifeNews.com | 6/4/14 4:32 PM

A pro-life group in Lansing, Michigan says fetal models have helped save a baby from a late-term abortion. Officials with 40 Days for Life in Lansing posted a picture of a set of fetal models that it says helped changed a woman’s mind about having an abortion.

“I showed the 30-week model to a late-term mom who left the clinic and DID NOT have an abortion. Praise God!” the group wrote.

As LifeNews writer Andrew Bair has written before, abortion activists really dislike fetal models.

Abortion advocates fight tooth and nail to hide the humanity of the child in the womb. Nothing is more detrimental to their cause than the public realizing the truth about what abortion does to a human being.

That is why they so vehemently oppose measures to ensure mothers get the chance to see the sonogram image of their unborn child. They threw a fit when Facebook created the option for users to make pages for their unborn babies.

The latest source of their outrage: fetal models.

At the North Dakota State Fair, Minot County Right to Life had an education booth where they displayed scientifically-accurate, plastic models of unborn babies at various stages of development. They group also handed out models of unborn babies at 12 weeks.

“It was [given] out to show a visual that at 12 weeks, the baby is a baby. No abortion talk had to come of it with any children that picked one up. Young children just saw them as babies and that was it,” North Dakota Right to Life posted on Facebook.

What is odd is that pro-lifers have been showing fetal models at county and state fairs for decades. But to take the next step—to distribute them—has pro-abortionists incensed.

Any seasoned right-to-life activist who has volunteered at a county or state fair booth knows that the overwhelming majority of the public are receptive to their outreach. Many attendees are fascinated by the basic biological facts of unborn development, which too often are hidden by advocates of abortion and their allies in the media.

From my own experience manning pro-life fair booths, I can attest to their effectiveness. Probably the most touching experience is to witness a pregnant mother come up to the table and find the model which is closest to the stage of development of her unborn baby. Children especially love the models. For them, a representation of a baby is not a political affront, it is just a baby.

The facts about human development may be inconvenient for the pro-abortion cause but they remain. By 12 weeks, babies the size of the models have beating hearts and detectable brain waves. They can kick, swim and even suck their little thumbs. Their nervous systems are developed. 

by Steven Ertelt | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 6/3/14 10:42 AM

A shocking report from the new conservative news web site The Daily Signal is making the waves around the Internet today.

When it comes to premature babies, parents already face tremendous pressure to have abortions. And when the government comes in and tells parents of premature babies there is a new government study they can be involved with that will benefit babies born well before their normal delivery date, there is a certain level of trust one ought to be able to expect.

But, as the report states, that trust was grossly violated in what is nothing less than nonconsensual government experimentation on hundreds of premature babies.

Below is an excerpt from the report and LifeNews encourages you to read the entire news article:

Just 24 weeks into her pregnancy, Sharrissa Cook gave birth to a critically ill baby boy. Dreshan weighed in at a fragile 1 pound, 11 ounces. He lay motionless in the incubator, connected to tubes and monitors in the neonatal intensive care unit at the University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital.

“He was so tiny,” Cook recalls. “I was a first-time mom. I didn’t have a clue. I didn’t know what to expect.”

It was Oct. 11, 2006. Medical personnel asked Cook, then a 26-year-old single mother, to enroll little Dreshan in a study. She says they described it as a program offering assistance and encouragement to preemies—premature babies—and their families. She readily signed the consent form.

“I remember them telling me they were a support group who would pretty much hold my hand through the developmental process,” Cook says.

But in reality, the study was much more than that. It was a national, government-funded experiment on 1,316 extremely premature infants in which their fate may as well have rested with the flip of a coin.

Other single moms were among those persuaded to sign up their critically ill babies at the University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital describe similar misunderstandings of the study’s purpose.

Bernita Lewis, then a 22-year-old student, says she enrolled her premature newborn, Christian, after medical personnel told her it simply was to gather data such as weight and height.

And Survonda Banks, then 21, unemployed and on public assistance, says someone handed her the consent form on her way in for an emergency C-section at 28 weeks of pregnancy. Banks remembers being told only that it was a way to help her baby, Destiny.

‘Parents Were Misled’

The government-backed study is called SUPPORT, which stands for “Surfactant, Positive Airway Pressure, and Pulse Oximetry Randomized Trial.” The experiment was conducted at 23 academic institutions from 2005 through 2009 under the National Institutes of Health, part of the Department of Health and Human Services.

All three women now say they never would have agreed to take part if they had known the NIH-funded study’s true nature—to randomly manipulate preemie oxygen levels. They discovered that just last year.

Dreshan and Christian are now 7 years old and both struggle with myriad health problems. Destiny died within three weeks. The mothers wonder: Did the experiment contribute to any of the medical problems of their children?

“[Dreshan] was already at a slim chance of surviving; why would I make his chances of surviving more slim?” Cook asks.

Today, nine months after the federal government convened a public meeting to examine the subject, NIH and HHS officials have yet to propose a remedy to avoid a repeat of the controversy that erupted from the multiyear study.

BY ANUGRAH KUMAR, CHRISTIAN POST CONTRIBUTOR
June 1, 2014|5:43 am
The birth rate among American teens dropped last year to the lowest ever reported in the country, but the rate among older women rose, according to new federal statistics.

The birth rate for teens aged 15 to 19 dropped 10 percent to 26.6 births per 1,000 in 2013, a historic low for the nation, according to data released from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

After a brief upturn in 2006 and 2007, the rate declined 36 percent since 2007, and 57 percent overall from 1991, the most recent peak, it says.

The number of births to teens also hit a new low.

The number of births to teenagers was 274,641 last year, also down 10 percent from the previous year and the lowest number of teen births ever reported for the United States. The number of births in 2013 was 38 percent fewer than in 2007, the most recent high, and 57 percent fewer than in 1970, the all-time peak year for the number of teen births.

Overall, 3,957,577 babies were born last year in the country, according to the data.

Follow us Get CP eNewsletter ››

"Certainly the drop in the teen birth rate is pretty astounding," Reuters quotes Carl Haub, senior demographer with the Population Reference Bureau, as saying.

The drop was likely due to educational efforts to prevent teen pregnancy and some economic factors as the rate began to fall dramatically during the recession that began in 2007, according to Haub.

"Young childbearing is becoming less and less accepted," The Wall Street Journal quotes Laura Lindberg, senior research associate at the pro-choice Guttmacher Institute, as saying. She attributes it to contraception, wider education and a broader societal shift away from having children at a young age.

"The historic decline has been driven by the magic formula of less sex and more contraception," Bill Albert, chief program officer at the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, tells USA Today.

The data also shows that the birth rate for teenagers aged 10 to 14 was 0.3 births per 1,000 last year, down from 0.4 in 2012, an historic low. The number of births to mothers in this age group decreased 15 percent last year, to 3,108 births, the lowest number of births to this group ever reported for the nation.

However, birth rates among older women rose.

The birth rate for women aged 30 to 34 years was 98.7 births per 1,000 women in 2013, up 1 percent from the rate in 2012. The number of births to women in their early thirties also increased last year by 2 percent. The rate for women aged 35 to 39 years was 49.6 births per 1,000 women, up 3 percent from 2012, reaching the highest rate for this age group since 1963. The number of births to women in their late thirties increased 3 percent last year.

"We are going up the age ladder and have been for many, many years," adds Haub, indicating that women are perhaps opting to postpone childbirth to get higher education or establish themselves in their careers.

by Carole Novielli | LifeNews.com 

John Barros, who counsels outside a later term abortion clinic in Orlando has spoken to a woman who used to run an abortion clinic in the state.

John writes, “A lady stopped by Orlando Women’s Center today to see what we were doing. She confessed that she ran the All Women”s Health Center Abortion Clinic, for 10 1/2 years… She was absolutely amazed what was going on here.

She saw the Reformation Bible College kids as well as a couple others singing hymns and conversations going on with people coming for abortions. Terri also saw ladies that had come to Christ here and the Joy that was in their hearts… She Encouraged us all to never quit… I got to spend quite a bit of time speaking with her.She told how Randal Whitney worked for her and he hasn’t changed a bit….

She has repented of her sin and is in a Church… She is dealing with the consequences of her sin and there is much pain. I reminded her that “He who knew no sin , became sin that we might have the Righteousness of God” and that “thee blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin.” She said that she can’t do enough…. I told her none of us can but He did…

A Dear Friend is going to be working with Terri… Please Pray for her She did a little video here to encourage other Front Line people to not give up… There was so much more but to much to put on here… I know there is a temptation to some to want to find her and get all the dirt but please don’t… I think it is more important to see her get the help she needs than make you famous… Stay The Course Brothers And Sisters.”

The former worker said she praises God every day for getting her out of there and now attends a local church. She says that she now prays that the clinic workers will be encouraged to leave. She also said that she prays for the patients seeking abortions.

“Two weeks ago..I had a dream about that clinic…when I had nightmares was way at the beginning when we were doing procedures up to 22 or 23 weeks…and my girls that worked for me had nightmares,” she told John.

by Steven Ertelt | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 5/28/14 12:30 PM

Melissa Carleton, 39 is a modern-day hero. Her dreams of becoming a mother finally came true even if she wasn’t awake and aware when she gave birth to her adorable baby boy.

Carleton was so excited to be a first-time mom she could hardly contain herself. But sadly, just 10 weeks before her baby boy was due to arrive, Melissa suddenly slipped into a coma and has not been able to wake up since. Now that her son has been born, Melissa’s husband Brian Lande hopes his wife will wake up and finally be able to hold her son.

On Thursday, Melissa welcomed a beautiful baby boy into the world via c-section even though she was 10 weeks into a coma.

“[Melissa]’s wanted to have a child for years,” Melissa’s father, John Farrell, toldABC News after his grandson was born. “Today, I can’t begin to tell you how happy we are. It’s indescribable.”

Carleton’s medical woes began earlier this year. She started to have unusual headaches after becoming pregnant. Doctors discovered a massive, benign tumor in her brain during her second trimester.

Carleton, a marriage and family therapist, wanted to put off brain surgery until after her son was born, but when she had a seizure in March, she was rushed into the operating room. Doctors successfully removed the mass, but the seizure left the 39-year-old in a coma. She hasn’t been fully conscious since March 11.

Help the family by going here.

From the ABC News story:

John Farrell’s pregnant daughter went into a coma 10 weeks ago, but today it’s not hard for him to be joyful. Today, he became a grandfather.

“She’s wanted to have a child for years,” he told ABC News. “Today, I can’t begin to tell you how happy we are. It’s indescribable.”

Carleton’s husband, Brian Lande, has barely left her side, according to ABC affiliate KFSN-TV.

“I know that being able to love this little guy is going to be a wonderful experience, but I also know it’s going to be very hard for me to know that I am going to be the one to hold this baby first,” Lande told KFSN-TV before the birth.

Although Carleton is in a coma, she’s able to open her eyes and squeeze her family members’ hands, Farrell said. And Thursday morning, just before surgery to give birth to her son, she was the most awake Farrell has seen her in weeks.

“In a few tender moments, she reached out to Brian, took his cheek, pulled his cheek down to her face and held it there,” Farrell said. “It was the first time she had hugged Brian since this trauma happened.”

 

by Steven Ertelt | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 5/26/14 12:26 PM

The government of Sudan is facing mounting international condemnation of its handling of Meriam Ibrahim and its decision to sentence the pregnant Christian woman to death for refusing to accept Islam.

An Islamic court sentenced Meriam, 27, to be flogged for adultery for marrying a Christian man and to be hanged to death for refusing to renounce her Christian faith.  Meriam is currently eight months pregnant with her second child, and has been imprisoned along with her 20-month old toddler since February. There are growing concerns about the health of her unborn baby.

Meriam is married to Daniel Wani, an American citizen who has ties to New Hampshire. Meriam was reportedly born to a Sudanese Muslim father and was raised as a Christian by her Ethiopian Orthodox mother.

For three months, the young Christian wife — now almost eight and a half months pregnant — has been shackled in a Sudanese prison on death row. Authorities, who refuse to recognize her marriage to a Christian man, have sentenced her to 100 lashes for adultery and execution for her faith.

Her frantic husband, who continues to plead with the U.S. Embassy for help, flew from New England to Khartoum to visit his wife, Meriam Ibrahim — and was beside himself to find her bound up and swollen. For now, authorities refuse to release his son to Daniel, because of his faith. Although the court gave Meriam days to recant her Christianity, she refused, saying, “I am a Christian, and I will remain a Christian.”

Now, as the London Guardian newspaper reports, Sudan is facing heavy international criticism.

Governments, the UN and human rights groups have called on the Sudanese government to immediately release Meriam Yahya Ibrahim, 27, and overturn both her death sentence and sentence of 100 lashes. More than 100,000 people have backed a call by Amnesty International to release Ibrahim.

Her lawyers have lodged an appeal against the sentence, which may be heard in Khartoum this week.

Ibrahim has been told that her execution will be deferred for two years to allow her to deliver and then wean her baby.

Her husband, Daniel Wani, who left Sudan for the US in 1998, has travelled to Khartoum to try to secure the release of his wife and son. He said Ibrahim was being denied medical treatment and he had not been allowed to visit her or Martin, according to media reports.

The Sudanese authorities have reportedly refused to release the child to his father’s care because of his Christian faith.

The UK government has summoned Sudan’s chargé d’affaires in London to the Foreign Office to hear its “deep concern”.

In a statement, Foreign Office minister Mark Simmonds said: “This barbaric sentence highlights the stark divide between the practices of the Sudanese courts and the country’s international human rights obligations.” The Sudanese government must respect the right to freedom of religion or belief, he added.

US senators Kelly Ayotte and Roy Blunt have raised the case with the secretary of state, John Kerry, calling for “immediate action and full diplomatic engagement to offer Meriam political asylum and secure her and her son’s safe release”.

The department’s spokeswoman,, Jen Psaki, said on Wednesday the US was “deeply disturbed” by the case and called on Khartoum to respect the right to freedom ofreligion. The Canadian and Dutch governments have also expressed concern.

The UN has also urged Sudan to adhere to international law. “We are concerned about the physical and mental wellbeing of Ms Ibrahim, who is in her eighth month of pregnancy, and also of her 20-month-old son, who is detained with her at the Omdurman women’s prison near Khartoum, reportedly in harsh conditions,” said Rupert Colville of the UN Human Rights Office in Geneva.

Gabriel Wani, Daniel’s brother, who also lives in Manchester, New Hampshire, said Ibrahim was in poor physical shape. “Meriam is in a bad condition, she is eight months pregnant. She needs proper medical attention and she needs medical supplies. She’s bleeding and nothing is being done,” he told the Daily Mail.

“She needs to eat well but she is just getting the prison food. When she had her first son it was a very difficult birth, she lost a lot of blood. She is supposed to have check ups with the doctor but it isn’t happening. We are praying for a miracle.”

by Kristan Hawkins | Montgomery, AL | LifeNews.com | 5/22/14

Standing up for what you believe in isn’t always easy. Sometimes something unexpected happens, and it’s at that moment you will decide whether or not to change course or continue on. This Monday, our team received a phone call from one of our 17 year-old high school leaders in Alabama who faced that moment this weekend.

Ke’Ontai called us from the Emergency Room, saying he was going to be okay but he had a broken nose!

He had been out in his neighborhood park on Sunday passing out Students for Life’s Abortion is not Social Justice postcards, when one man started arguing with him about when life begins. He shouted at Ke’Ontai that his wife had just had an abortion because “that’s what they needed to do.”

And when Ke’Ontai tried to give him some post-abortion counseling material, the guy yelled that he didn’t want it, pushed Ke’Ontai down, and started punching him in the face.

After telling him to file a police report, we asked Ke’Ontai if he needed anything from our team.

His reply stunned me. Ke’Ontai said that while he had forgiven the man who assaulted him, he just wants pro-lifers across the nation to pray for the man and wife.

While our National High School Coordinator, Missy Martinez, and myself had a conversation with Ke’Ontai about handing out postcards with a buddy in the future to help protect him. I want you to know that Ke’Ontai won’t be letting this assault stop him.

He is a courageous, young man…one that I am proud to say that Students for Life has helped train and equip. And now, he is more motivated than ever to do all that he can in his school and community, especially his predominately African-American neighborhood, which, according to their own outrageous admissions, is targeted by Planned Parenthood.

While he was at home recovering from his assault, I asked Ke’Ontai to share his story… of how he become an abortion abolitionist and why he has courageously dedicated his life to restoring justice to the preborn and their mothers. This is what he had to say:

I was born in Tuscaloosa Alabama. I go to Central High School where most of the students are black.

One day on my way to a friend’s house, I passed by the abortion facility here in Tuscaloosa, and I saw a lot of people standing outside. At that time, I did not know what was going on. Some people were praying and others had signs that read, “WE ARE PRO-LIFE.” So, I turned around and stopped my car. I wanted to get out to see what was going on, but I was scared. I was just sitting in my car looking around, thinking, “What is going on?” As soon as my mom got home from work that night, I started asking her all kinds questions about abortion, which was something she know nothing about.

About a week later, I was with my brother at the University of Alabama, and I met Claire. She had all of this “Pro-Life” stuff with her and I asked her what it meant. She told me about this place where girls go and get their babies pulled out of them and thrown in the trash. I had learned the truth about abortion.

On my drive home, I was thinking about where I had first seen the word “Pro-Life” and then remembered that it those people must have been standing outside of the abortion facility. When I got home, I cried and told my mom that people were killing babies here in Tuscaloosa.

That night, I went on to Google to see for myself what was happening. When I finished my research, God said to me, “GET TO WORK.” And I did!

The next week, I went to school, and I tried to start a Students for Life group. But, I ran into a lot of roadblocks with the school administration  They would give be obstacles to get through and when I did what they asked, they would give me some more stuff to do. When I was got through all the roadblocks, the administration told me that I needed a teacher to be a club advisor. I went to every teacher at my school and none of them would do it. But, I didn’t let that stop me. Instead, I just worked with Missy at Students for Life and started a community group. Already we have hosted multiple events to educate others teens in Tuscaloosa about abortion.

This past Sunday, I was in a park handing out Students for Life’s postcards. A man stopped, and we began a conversation about abortion. He started to get upset. He yelled at me, slapped all my postcards out of my hands, and pushed me down. At that time, I did not know what to think. The guy was almost 350 pounds! Then he get over top of me and start punching my face. I was trying to get away from him, but I couldn’t get out from under him. I finally escaped and quickly drove home as fast as I could.

On Monday, I went to school and my principal sent me to the hospital because my face was beaten so badly. The doctor told me that I have a broken nose.

At first, I was mad, but then I realized that I cannot be mad at this man because I know that he did not hate me, he just did not want to hear the truth. I feel deep down inside that there was something more to his actions than what meets the eye. All I can do is forgive him and pray and love him the way God loves me.

Since Monday, many people have asked if I am going to stop doing my pro-life work because of what happened.

You want to know what I have been telling them?

When Jesus was on that cross, and they were beating him. He didn’t stop.

A federal court has blocked the Department of Health and Human Services from enforcing its birth control mandate on two Christian colleges, Dordt College in Iowa and Cornerstone University in Michigan, while their cases move forward.

The preliminary injunction was granted for three reasons, U.S. District Court Judge Mark W. Bennett wrote: 1) The plaintiffs, Dordt and Cornerstone, "may suffer irreparable harm" because "they would be forced to comply" with the birth control mandate "to the detriment of their religious exercise." 2) On balance, the plaintiffs would suffer more than the defendants. The worst that could happen if the government eventually wins the case is that the mandate would take a few extra months before going into effect. And, 3) the plaintiffs "are sufficiently likely to succeed on the merits."

The birth control mandate, issued by HHS as part of its implementation of the Affordable Care Act, or "Obamacare," requires most employers, even most religious employers, to cover contraceptives, sterilization and some "morning-after" contraceptives that may cause an abortion.

Bennett wrote that he is waiting to issue a decision in the case because a similar case involving two Christian-owned businesses, Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Woods, is currently before the U.S. Supreme Court, whichheard arguments in the case in March. The outcome of that decision, due this Summer, will likely influence how he decides the case, or could make the suit unnecessary.

Alliance Defending Freedom, which represents the colleges, praised the decision, arguing that religious colleges should have the freedom to behave according to their religious convictions.

"Christian colleges should remain free to operate according to their defining beliefs," ADF Senior Counsel Gregory S. Baylor said. "Under this mandate, religious employers have no real choice: they must either comply and abandon their religious freedom, or resist and be taxed for their faith. If the government can force Christian colleges to act contrary to their deeply-held religious convictions, then the government can do just about anything. The court was right to block enforcement of this unconstitutional mandate."