A Knoxville family stands up to Planned Parenthood.
By Mary C. Weaver
Last October, Kym McCormick’s 16-year-old daughter Alaynna came home “crying and angry” about the mandatory presentation Planned Parenthood had given at her high school, Hardin Valley Academy in Knoxville.
“She said, ‘They were going to tell us about abstinence, and I listened, and not one time did they say anything about abstinence,’” Mrs. McCormick recalled in a Jan. 17 interview.
Alaynna told her mother, “I’m tired of everyone treating us like animals who can’t control themselves.”
One of the elements of the organization’s “abstinence program” is the concept of “outercourse”—which encompasses virtually all forms of sexual contact short of intercourse.
Mrs. McCormick was aware of the history of Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion provider, and its founder, Margaret Sanger, a proponent of eugenics.
But what she and Alaynna learned through extensive research provided additional shocks.
The organization’s websites for children and teenagers include not only details on contraception and abortion but also how-to information on an extensive list of perversions that can’t be mentioned in this newspaper.
“Very clearly [on one of the Planned Parenthood websites], it says, ‘There is no right or wrong time to become sexually active.’ And a little bit further down, it says, ‘There are no right or wrong answers to these questions,’” Mrs. McCormick said.
“I think there are a lot of parents who believe there are right and wrong answers.”
Since their investigation began, the McCormicks—members of St. John Neumann Parish in Farragut—have attempted to engage school and county officials in discussions about Planned Parenthood’s access to Hardin Valley Academy. It’s been frustrating, Mrs. McCormick said, because most of the officials she’s contacted will not return her calls.
“Kym and Alaynna McCormick are true examples of what people can do when they stand up against the culture of death,” said Paul Simoneau, director of the diocesan Justice and Peace Office. “They have really stood up to the school system, and Alaynna is organizing other pro-life students to take a stand against Planned Parenthood.”
Mr. Simoneau’s office is hosting an information session, organized by concerned parents and pastors, at the Chancery office in Knoxville from 6:30 to 8 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 27. Parents, educators, all Knox County high school principals, and other citizens are invited.
During the session, Alaynna will give a PowerPoint presentation she created to expose Planned Parenthood’s program for young people.
The meeting has two goals, Mr. Simoneau explained:
- to educate Christians about “Planned Parenthood’s obscene materials targeting our children” and
- to persuade local school officials to remove the organization from the approved guest-speaker list.
Mr. Simoneau said the meeting’s organizers have asked pastors of local churches to write letters to the governor, Knox County Mayor Tim Burchett, and the school system and also to encourage members of their congregation to attend the meeting.
Bishop Richard F. Stika has written the mayor, expressing his opposition to the presence of Planned Parenthood in the school system.
The organization’s “approach to ‘wellness education’ is but a thinly veiled attempt to legitimize and promote its deadly agenda,” the bishop wrote.
He noted that Planned Parenthood’s true intentions are easy to see when one visits its websites for young people, including “Teen Wire” and “Take Care Down There.”
He also referred to “Planned Parenthood’s pattern of undermining parental rights and violating mandatory reporting laws for sexual abuse,” revealed via undercover videos shot in Memphis and other communities.
Those incidents, he wrote, “played a significant role in our legislature’s efforts to defund Planned Parenthood of the more than one million tax dollars they receive in Tennessee each year.”
“Given the above, why would any parent want an organization that promotes abortion, sexual promiscuity, and the usurping of a parent’s rights to speak to his or her child about sex?”
The bishop’s support and advocacy for life mean a great deal to Mrs. McCormick, she said.
“Words cannot begin to say what it means to me to have the bishop step up and take a stand. What a powerful witness that is to my kids.”
