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Vol. 2, 2024 - 2025
A Loss of Trust. Bombarded recently by social media and the print media for decades, at least three generations of American youth have been fed information they could not rely on as correct or true. That bombarded information has become embedded in their brains, and many have accepted it as correct and true.
Particularly over the last 10 years, more and more information has become available and there is no control on the sources to be reliable. Each person has it within her or his power to use what part of this flood of information she or he wants to modify. Each person chooses which platform of the internet to use and to blast out her or his position on an issue.
This has certainly been the case on one of the most important questions of all time: When does human life begin? Not surprisingly, it is this topic and other related questions that clearly divide the populace and prevent good dialog from occurring.
The result? As a result, federal annual expenditures of more than $500,000,000 have gone to Planned Parenthood, which —according to Planned Parenthood’s 2022-2023 Annual Report— performed 392,715 abortions and had an income of $2.054 billion.
The Charlotte Lozier Institute reported that abortion accounted for 97.2% of Planned Parenthood’s pregnancy resolution services in 2021-2022.
Just using these verified numbers alone, there is no question about the huge size of Planned Parenthood’s enterprise. There is no question that Planned Parenthood is Big Business!
We are living in perilous times – many seek to take away our individual Constitutional freedoms, destroy the nuclear family, and remove a belief in God from public life and eliminate our most valuable and primordial right – the right to LIFE itself. Realizing this my wife Pat and I co- founded the St. John Paul II Life and Family Center, “JPII Life Center,” in Austin, Texas, more than 14 years ago.
We did not know where this journey would take us but set out with a purpose to save babies’ lives and to help women by providing care and education.
When I say “providing care” at the JPII Life Center, exactly what do I mean? Included is the medical care provided by our Vitae Clinic full-time OB/GYN physicians. In addition we have
become accustomed to providing care for and receiving a woman who is frightened, believes her life and health are in immediate jeopardy, and feels all alone with no one to rely on!
As Judy Ames, one of our wonderful Client Advocates, says, “We listen to their problems and provide real solutions.”
Our Client Advocates literally care for each client during pregnancy and for a total of three years. The Client Advocate almost becomes a member of the expectant mother’s family. Beautiful strong personal bonds are formed and maintained.
After Pat and I both survived a horrific car accident in May of 2024, we recognize that God left us here for us to complete as best we can the work now on going with our children, grandchildren and great granddaughter. And also to help continue the work of the JPII Life Center so that there can be this particularly special place in Austin for decades to come to care for expectant mothers and to save babies lives.
Each of us have basic needs in our lives: Safety, Somebody to care about us, and Happiness.
In addition to frightened pregnant women who come to the JPII Life Center for a free ultrasound or for other support the Center provides, we also are aware of the many loving couples who struggle to become pregnant and have a child or children for their family.
I believe we should do all that we can to help these families through moral and ethical medical procedures to help these couples have a child naturally. So I want to share with you some of the things we’ve learned that can help women having difficulty conceiving. This is where education becomes so important!
In February 2024, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos created during the IVF process should have full personhood rights.
The Alabama high court’s decision forced many people—for the first time in their lives— to think deeply about the ethical implications of the IVF procedure, which, as commonly practiced in the U.S., results in the destruction of excess embryos.
In the IVF procedure, doctors create extra embryos to ensure the best chance for a successful pregnancy. The “leftover” embryos are frozen, destroyed or donated to medical research.
Think about that! Human embryos, each a unique human being, are frozen, destroyed or worse. This type of moral and ethical issue deserves extensive discussion and thoughtful consideration.
If there were a medical procedure to assist a woman to become pregnant without the need for additional embryo implantation, that was less costly than IVF, yet equal to or even sometimes faster than IVF, and healthier for the mother, wouldn’t that be wonderful?
At our Vitae Clinic, we already have more than 300 women who can testify to the success of this all-natural method. Yes, Natural Procreative TECHNOLOGY™ or one of the other Natural Family Planning Methods for a woman to get pregnant does exist. If you or someone you know wants more information or help to get pregnant naturally, please call (512)458- 6060 or email: info@vitaeaustin.com.
Mission: The JPII Life Center promotes a culture of life through supportive pregnancy and parenting resources, transformative education, and Life-Affirming Healthcare.
Vision: Our Vision is a society that recognizes the God-given dignity of each human being from the moment of conception and empowers individuals to make informed decisions about their lives.
Shawn Carney, President and CEO of 40 Days for Life says about the JPII Life Center, “I have worked with hundreds of pregnancy care centers in my life and yours is the best one.”
The JPII Life Center’s approach is to accept each woman with no religious test and without judging her.
We accept each person without regard to race, ethnicity or ability to pay, and treat each one with respect, dignity and love. We want every pregnant woman who comes to the JPII Life Center to have her child after receiving proper care and education to best be able to rear her child.
And we nurture these women according to their individual needs for up to three years! We offer a safe haven, someone to care for them, and hope for their happiness.
In sharp contrast, Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion provider, says, “We can help.” They say a chemical or medical abortion is “safe,” even safer than medicines like penicillin and Tylenol.
“It is a lie. The words of Planned Parenthood are misleading, manipulative and isolating. They underestimate the potential physical and emotional risks associated with chemical or medical abortion… and the risks are extensive and dangerous,” said Von Dohlen.
The JPII Life Center’s Vitae Clinic combats these lies by providing fact-based diagnostic tools. Armed with medical -grade pregnancy tests and 3D / 4D ultrasounds, we equip our clients with confidence, competence and courage. By informing minds, we are saving lives!
Even though considering many of life’s important questions raging now for over 52 years, there seem to be many remaining questions today regarding human life! To help understand how the JPII Life Center works with people of all beliefs to understand the beauty and dignity of human life, let’s consider some of these important questions.
2.How did our American culture get to where we are today?
3.What has created the confusion facing so many American youth today?
7.Why do you believe married couples today are having fewer children?
9.Do you believe pregnancy is a disease?
10.Do you believe protecting a woman’s reproductive health includes having an abortion?
11.Do you believe human life begins at conception?
12.What type of healthcare should a pregnant woman receive?
13.What is Life-Affirming Healthcare?
There are so many things that those on the life side and those on the abortion side can agree on and fewer on which we cannot agree. Some matters we can agree on:
Some matters on which we disagree:
Women deserve truthful information especially when a woman is emotionally and physically vulnerable. Health professionals must be truthful, candid and share factual and accurate health information. Health professionals should deliver Life-Affirming Healthcare to a pregnant woman. People who profit monetarily from a woman’s condition and from abortion must not take advantage of a woman who is distressed and vulnerable!
During each person’s life she or he is searching often not knowing for what, it is my belief that each individual’s search is for purpose and meaning in her or his life. I believe purpose and meaning have their foundation in God.
Life-Affirming Healthcare we define as supporting all human life and it provides care for the mother and the child from the time of conception to birth and throughout one’s life. At the JPII Life Center we provide Life-Affirming Healthcare for up to a total of three years for the mother. The mother receives personal medical and prenatal care from an OB/GYN at the Vitae Clinic.
Texas law allows and provides if the mother should be unfortunate and have an ectopic pregnancy (in the fallopian tube, not the uterus) or if the mother is in danger of death due to complications of the pregnancy, the mother’s life can be saved even though the baby is lost (neither of these procedures is considered an abortion). Many women or couples have difficulty conceiving, Life-Affirming Healthcare as provided at the Vitae Clinic provides various methods of natural family planning suited to the particular couple. The Vitae Clinic has over 300 success stories of women who were told by their previous physician that she could not conceive who after each received infertility care at the Vitae Clinic have from 1-3 children. All of this is achieved naturally and without using In Vitro Fertilization (IVF). This process is less costly than IVF. No extra embryos have been collected or discarded or otherwise lost as occurs with IVF. An embryo is a fertilized egg, and each embryo is unique and develops during pregnancy as a
human person. The mothers who choose to use the Vitae Clinic OB/GYN’s receive outstanding pregnancy care.
THE JPII LIFE CENTER DELIVERS SOLUTIONS FOR THE PREGNANT WOMAN’S SEEMINGLY UNSOLVABLE PROBLEMS – WHATEVER IT IS!
We extend to each reader an invitation to come for a tour of the JPII Life Center and Vitae Clinic. See how babies lives are being saved and women have joy in their life and hope for their future.
Life-Affirming Healthcare provides:
We ask you to pray for individual and societal understanding of the right answers to these important questions. We ask you to join us to move forward for the future protecting human life with Life-Affirming Healthcare and the continued guidance of the Holy Spirit, to fulfill the JPII Life Center’s Mission and Vision.
Learn more about the JPII Life Center. Use QR code.
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Tim Von Dohlen is a pharmacist and attorney, served 14 years in the Texas House of Representatives, and in 2010 Co-Founded the JPII Life Center and Vitae Clinic.
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