If Al Gore wins, the unprecedented campaign against the unborn will be elevated to a whole new level. Fetal tissue research will gain the financial backing of the federal government to continue harvesting the organs of pre-born babies killed in their mother’s womb by abortion. It would not be unreasonable to conclude that the black market for fetal parts would attain full legal status. Nor is it beyond the realm of possibility for the United States to join with China in openly selling human organs to wealthy people needing transplants. (On October 27th, the London Electronic Telegraph reported that China was now selling human organs on the Internet.)

If Al Gore wins, China will no doubt continue — unimpeded — her mad rush towards Superpower status. Taiwan will be under constant threat of attack. Bill Clinton and Al Gore have shown us for the past eight years that they are not concerned, and perhaps have even aided and abetted, China’s surge towards world hegemony. A weakened, demoralized and ineffective United States Army, led by President Gore, would be no match for the well armed, highly-motivated People’s Liberation Army led by Jiang Zemin. The infamous Laogais, factories that produce goods for sale in the United States using slave labor, would continue to flourish under a Gore administration. Earlier this year, the Clinton-Gore administration successfully granted China Most Favored Nation (MFN) status, despite the large number of protests by activists decrying China’s forced-abortion policies and brutal persecutions of Roman Catholics in that country. Clinton-Gore has repeatedly demonstrated a lack of concern for religious persecution and human rights abuses. Instead, they wined and dined China’s president and top officials at state dinners in the White House.

If Al Gore wins, home schooling — which has become the educational option of choice for over two million American families — will suffer. The National Education Association, a federal department that the Carter administration created to thank the teachers’ unions for their support of his candidacy, is on record as opposing home schooling. Given Gore’s ties to the teachers’ unions, it is no surprise that he opposes home schooling. The public school establishment opposes home schooling for two reasons: loss of per diem monies for each child not enrolled in public schools; and the embarrassment suffered by the consistently strong academic performance home schoolers have exhibited nationally. The Clinton-Gore administration’s dislike of home schoolers was held in check by a Republican-controlled House and Senate. With smaller Republican majorities in each chamber, Gore is sure to exercise leverage against this threat to his favorite union.

If Al Gore wins, he would most certainly pack the Supreme Court of the United States with activist pro-abortion Supreme Court justices. It is projected that the new administration will have the opportunity of appointing three or four Supreme Court justices in the next term. Gore has said he would only appoint justices that support abortion rights in all cases. A Supreme Court constructed in the image and likeness of Al Gore would be a disaster for pro-life Americans. Many of today’s most significant moral issues, in fact, hang in the balance — including same sex marriage, partial birth abortion, the spread of pornography, federal aid to religious schools and parental notification. A Gore majority on the Supreme Court would wreak havoc on any efforts to contain this spread of evil, setting the moral values agenda back generations.

If Al Gore wins, the United States of America will be on a fast track toward forsaking every last vestige of our Judeo-Christian heritage. The wholesale assault on traditional morality will be reinforced and heightened, with pro-lifers, home schoolers and pro-family activists all being painted as “hate-mongers” due to their opposition to homosexual rights and efforts to stop the slaughter of the unborn.

Luckily for America, there's still a chance Al Gore will not win. We must hope and pray that the vote recount in Florida does not reverse the apparent victory for George W. Bush, and that our great country is permitted to step back from the edge of the precipice.

On the Feast of All Souls, we pray for those who are still being purified but who have the assurance of one day entering the Kingdom of Heaven where they will join the Communion of Saints.

The Catholic theology of the suffering souls in Purgatory has its roots in the Bible, contrary to what many evangelical Christians believe. The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us that Purgatory is where “All who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of Heaven. The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned” (1030-1).

The Bible has several references to a place of purification where those who cannot immediately enter heaven will go in order to be cleansed of every last vestige of sin. Only those who are completely without sin can enter the Kingdom of Heaven. In the book of Revelation, John tell us: “But nothing unclean shall enter [heaven]” (Rev. 21:27). Thus, Purgatory is a place where we go to be purified in order to later enter into Heaven.

In the second book of Maccabees, it said about Judas Machabeus, “In doing this he acted in a very excellent and noble way, inasmuch as he had the resurrection of the dead in view; for if he were not expecting the dead to rise again, it would have been useless and foolish to pray for them in death. But if he did this with a view to the splendid reward that awaits those who had gone to rest in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from this sin” (2 Macc. 12:43-46).

The poor souls in Purgatory are now in a passive state and need our prayers. “Have pity on me, have pity on me, at least you, my friends, because the hand of the Lord has touched me,” the book of Job tells us (Job 19:21).

Similarly, in the Gospel of Luke, Jesus alludes to Purgatory by saying “If you are to go with your opponent before the magistrate, make an effort to settle the matter on the way; otherwise your opponent will turn you over to the judge, and the judge hand you over to the constable, and the constable throw you into prison. I say to you, you will not be released until you have paid the last penny” (12:58-59). The fact that Jesus clearly says that we will not be released until we have “paid the last penny” is interpreted by the Church as an affirmation that each and every one of our sins must be atoned for before we can enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

In the Gospel of Matthew Jesus says, “And whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come” (12:32). It would make no sense for Jesus to say that forgiveness is possible in “the age to come” if there was no Purgatory. The damned in hell can never be forgiven and those in Heaven do not need forgiveness. Purgatory is the only logical explanation for Jesus saying this.

St. Paul tells us in his first letter to the Corinthians, “If a man’s building burns, he will suffer loss. He himself will be saved but only as one fleeing through fire.”

The commemoration of the souls in Purgatory was initiated in the 11th century by St. Odilo. While an abbot at a Benedictine monastery in Cluny, he issued a decree, Omnium Defunctorum, stating that November 2 would be set aside by all the Benedictine monasteries in Cluny as a time to pray for the souls in Purgatory. Soon other monasteries began following suit. Before long, the Carthusians also began to pray for the poor souls in Purgatory on November 2. Pope Sylvester II recognized it as a feast day, and the practice spread to Germany, England and Spain. By the 14th century, it became an established feast day for the Universal Church.

A variety of traditional practices are associated with the feast of All Souls Day. In many European and Latin American countries it is common for families to visit cemeteries to pray for their departed loved ones. Entire clans go out to clean and decorate graves with flowers and candles. Many return home and bake special breads to commemorate the feast day. Mass, too, is offered for the suffering souls — a Requiem Mass for which priests traditionally wear black vestments.

The shorter, darker days of November invoke a somber feeling consistent with the mood of All Souls Day. All around us we see the signs that yet another year is drawing to an end. The trees are arrayed with their glorious color; their once green leaves now spent, having completed their mission. The once verdant waves of tall grass that swayed in the summer breeze now sit bundled up in tight, thick haystacks.

It’s fitting that along with the signs of year’s end, the Church turns our thoughts to the poor suffering souls of Purgatory and asks us to pray for them so that they may soon join the Communion of Saints in Heaven. In this manner we are joined with those who have gone before us, and reminded that we are merely pilgrims on a journey towards our Heavenly home.

All Saints Day is one of the oldest and most significant feast days on the Church calendar. Sadly, it has lost some of its relevance in the modern age, becoming grossly overshadowed by Halloween, the Holy Day’s overbearing secular counterpart.

My family, for one, has never stopped assigning a high degree of importance to the feast day. Years ago, my husband and I would take our children to an All Saints Day party every November 1. At these parties, each child would dress up as a particular saint, tell all the others who they were and give a little anecdote about their particular saint’s life and mission.

Being a sewing enthusiast, I would spend considerable time creating their costumes. One year my first son Bobby, who was three at the time, portrayed the boy Jesus and my second son Michael, who was two, dressed up as St. Joseph.

The following year, Michael insisted on being Archbishop Thomas Becket after watching the video movie “Becket” for days on end. It seems that three year-olds have a way of never tiring of a good thing. In spite of the fact that his costume was technically challenging, I worked hard to replicate the bishop’s garments with as much accuracy as possible. I made a chasuble from gold lamé and applied white and gold trim in the shape of a cross. Underneath, Michael wore a simple white gown that served as a cassock. The miter was the tricky part, but I managed to cover a cardboard cut-out of a miter with the same fabric from which I made his chasuble. As he traipsed through the neighborhood on Halloween night, a great number of people commented on his costume. “He looks like Father Chris,” one lady said, referring to our parish priest.

Halloween served as dress rehearsal for the following day’s All Saint’s Day party. It also served as a way of bringing the Church into an otherwise thoroughly secular American holiday. We’d attend Mass on the Holy Day, and after that the All Saints Day party — always an enjoyable and effective way of teaching young children about the lives of the saints.

This year we’ll be taking our youngest son, Andrew, to an All Saints’ Day party hosted by a Catholic home schooling group in our home town. In fact, it’s practically guaranteed that any Catholic home schooler you know has such a party in the works. With more and more Catholic families availing themselves of the home schooling option, it’s just a matter of time before these wonderful traditions become more widely practiced in our culture.

There are other traditions families can tap into to celebrate All Saints Day. It is customary in certain Catholic countries, for example, to make special breads in recognition of the big day. In his book The Fine Art of Italian Cooking (Random House 1989), author Giuliano Bugialli provides a wonderful recipe for Italian All Saints Day bread.

The feast of All Saints can also be an excellent time to teach your children the Litany of the Saints by reciting it together at the conclusion of the family Rosary. It also provides the opportunity to point out how the Church tends to “group” the saints — i.e., “all ye holy martyrs, pray for us; all ye holy patriarchs and prophets, pray for us….” This illustrates for them how the Church does not try to name every individual saint, but rather seeks the intercession of those grouped together in particular categories.

The Feast of All Saints was first instituted by Pope Urban IV in order to commemorate the large number of martyrs and saints that the Church wanted to honor but could not do so individually. In his Decretale Si Domminum, Pope Urban IV said, “Any negligence, omission and irreverence committed in the celebration of the Saints’ feasts throughout the year is to be atoned for by the faithful, and thus due honor may still be offered these Saints.”

The secular America holiday of Halloween has its roots in All Saints Day. “Hallow-een” is really All Hallow’s-eve, the night before All Hallows Day. The ghosts and goblins that dominate Halloween have their roots in Druid festivities and have become synonymous with the modern observance of Halloween.

By celebrating All Saints Day with parties honoring the saints, by dressing our children as saints rather than goblins, by teaching our children the litany of the saints and making special breads and the like, we are again building up the great Catholic culture that forged Christendom and gave the West its glorious patrimony.

So what did the boys' mother do that caused her to be kicked out of the only home she and her sons had? She missed a workfare appointment.

Amazing, isn't it? Two social workers and four guards whisk two little boys from their destitute and bewildered mother and hustle them off to foster care because she missed an appointment. If every person who missed an appointment lost custody of their children, America wouldn't have enough foster homes to go around. Middle class people can miss an appointment. Welfare mothers cannot. If they do they can lose their children, as Eve Essenger found out.

Critics such as Richard Wexler of the Virginia-based National Coalition for Child Protection Reform said that oftentimes Child Protective Services remove children from their families for “neglect” when too often the “neglect” is really poverty. “First of all,” Wexler explained, “state 'neglect' statutes are breathtakingly broad, and typically define neglect as lack of adequate food, clothing, shelter or supervision. There is virtually no poor family in America who could not be accused and have their children taken away because of the breadth of these laws. Indeed, the single biggest problem in the child welfare system today is the confusion of poverty with neglect.”

Others agree with Wexler. Teresa Cunio was a social worker with the Texas Department of Protective and Regulatory Services for six years in the 1990s. When Cunio was asked if in fact some social workers confuse poverty with neglect, she replied,” Absolutely! The department tracks the average household income of families where children have been removed. I would be willing to bet that about 80 percent or more are below the poverty level.”

Groups such as Wexler’s say that instead of spending vast sums on foster care, the money would be better spent keeping families together, especially since tough Welfare Reform measures are being implemented across the county. Oftentimes families are in a no-win situation because of these measures. Under Welfare Reform, a woman must take a job in order to “earn” her benefits. Too often these women do not make enough money to afford child care. If they don't show up for work, they lose their benefits. If they lose their benefits, they can't pay for housing. If they don't have housing, they lose their kids. If a mother decides to leave her children alone at home because she doesn't have child care and someone reports her, she will lose her children for lack of supervision.

Wexler says that instead of throwing money at foster care and thus encouraging social workers to remove children from their homes, children would be better served if the states spent more money on Family Preservation programs, which provide struggling families with intensive services. Wexler says that Family Preservation programs are currently out of vogue with Child Protective officials because financial incentives are motivating them to continue removing children from their homes.

Wexler favors Family Preservation programs such as the Washington-based “Homebuilders.” Charlotte Booth, Homebuilders' executive director, said that social workers often remove children from their homes out of fear that if they leave a child behind, they will be blamed if the child later dies or is seriously injured. Booth's program sends trained therapists to homes where the children are at an immediate risk of being removed by Child Protective Services, and works with the family to get the problems resolved.

Impoverished women are not the only ones who can lose their children to Child Protective Services. Home schooling families are frequently subjected to interrogation by social workers after being turned in by neighbors who view home schooling as a strange method of educating children. According to the Home School Legal Defense Association, a legal group that has sued social workers for invading the homes of home schooling families, many such families are contacted by social workers throughout the country. In most cases, social workers demand to enter the family’s home to conduct a search, oblivious to the fact that the 4th Amendment prohibits government officials from entering a private home without a search warrant.

Jill Floyd, a social worker with the Yolo County (California) Social Services Department, found out last year that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeal agrees with the Home School Legal Defense Association's position that social workers, along with police officers, must have a search warrant to enter a family's home, absent an emergency. In a stinging rebuke to the social worker and police officer who coerced entry into Robert and Shirley Calabretta's home in 1994, the 9th Circuit held that they both had violated the Calabretta's civil rights when they literally broke into the home. What were the allegations that caused Floyd and the police officer to feel that the Calabretta children were in terrible danger? A neighbor had called into the hot line and reported that she had heard a child say “No, Daddy, no.” On this alone, Floyd and an armed police officer descended on the Calabretta home to interrogate Mrs. Calabretta and her children. To add insult to injury, the social worker then had three year-old Natalie strip searched.

The Calabretta case is an important victory for parents. It reinforces the 4th Amendment guarantee that Americans are to be safe and secure in their own homes in the face of repeated assaults by U.S. government officials. Notice to Child Protective Services workers and police officers: the 4th Amendment still applies, even when an anonymous voice whispers “child abuse” into a toll-free hot line.

The trick to pulling off a successful Halloween party that falls on a school night is to organize everything ahead of time and purchase ready-made food so you can concentrate on having fun rather than slaving over a hot stove.

The other matter you want to have a handle on are the safety issues. Plan on a responsible adult accompanying the children during Trick or Treat; ensure that masks don't obscure the child's vision when crossing streets; and establish rules with the kids ahead of time regarding candy inspection and how much of the sweet stuff can be consumed on Halloween day.

Your efforts at maintaining proper nutrition for your child shouldn't be completely abandoned just because it's Halloween. Organize your party so that the kids are fed a good meal before they head out spooking and munching.

The holiday also provides the opportunity to form your child's social conscience. Offer to buy your kids' candy for a nickel apiece on Halloween night, and plan a trip to your local homeless shelter the following day. Lots of good can come from this practice, not least the joy you'll see on the faces of the shelter residents when the children walk in bearing gifts.

Quick Party Planning

OK, so it's party time. You'll first need to decide whom to invite. A busy weeknight is not the time to invite the entire neighborhood, so decide on a few close friends who who might contribute a salad or a dessert (um, forget the dessert). Once the list is drawn up, engage the kids in helping prepare the invitations. You can give them black and orange construction paper, scissors, glue, glitters, markers — the sky's the limit. Or else you can use the computer to make the invitations.

Currently there are a number of quality CD-ROMs on the market that allow you to design professional quality invitations. One such product is PrintMaster Gold by the Learning Company. Others include the American Greetings CD and the Hallmark CD. All are available at any computer store.

Once the invitations are made and delivered, you’re ready to make decisions on the menu. A quick and simple entree like spaghetti is perfect for your Halloween party. A tossed green salad and store-bought loaf of French bread is all you need to round out your dinner.

A bag of ice and some soft drinks will keep all your little ghosts and goblins happy. With today's pre-washed packaged greens it's easy to make a salad: simply open the package, toss in some walnuts, dress with a little extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar and you're in business.

If you use Halloween-themed decorative products — table cloth, paper plates, paper cups and plastic silverware — your party will have a festive look and clean-up will be simple. When you're shopping for the paper products, pick up a Halloween-themed centerpiece for added atmosphere.

Creative Costuming

No Halloween party is complete without costumes. For those who are sewing-challenged, some pattern companies sell patterns that do not require sewing but can be put together with Velcro. Oftentimes, costumes can be made from clothing you already have on hand. Your daughter's ballet costume can double as a ballerina costume. You're son' baseball outfit can be called up as a Hall of Fame Halloween costume. Don't be afraid to be creative!

As far as sound effects are concerned, there are scores of Halloween-themed CDs available. The Monster Mash is always a good choice. There's also Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor if you want to add a classically spooky touch to your party.

When everyone gets home on Halloween afternoon, put out a healthy snack for the kids (this will sidetrack them from eating too much candy before dinner), and then start decorating the house. This is another area where the kids can be entrusted with pretty much the entire job. While they're decorating the house, you can get the spaghetti going. Once that's made, you're ready to set the table with your Halloween dinnerware. Keep the spaghetti on the stove, with the greens and bread close at hand.

Let the Festivities Begin!

Once your guests arrive, serve up some drinks, feed the kids and send them out on their happy adventure. Discuss the route they plan to take so they don't disappear for hours to the outer reaches of the neighborhood. And remember, especially after sunset it's always a good idea to have an adult tagging along.

Now you can enjoy a leisurely dinner with your friends. When your ghosts and goblins arrive back home, get straight into the candy inspection and buy-out. The Halloween effect can be heightened if you dim the lights and play some of that great Bach mood music.

Since all your table settings will be disposable, the clean-up process should be a snap. Simply bring out a trash bag and let everyone deposit their plates, cups and silverware in the bag. Tie up the sack and throw it out!

Now you can actually allow your ghosts and goblins to do what they've been doing all along — sampling their candy for dessert.

The night might end with a viewing of It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, and perhaps some scary stories. Whatever you decide to do, enjoy it. After all, these are the good old days.

Happy Halloween!