How low can society go?

When one considers the many ways countless human beings are treated like cheap disposable products - from children exploited by pornographers, to young sweatshop workers exploited by wealthy corporations - it's hard to imagine how much worse it can get for the poor and vulnerable.

But dismembering and vacuuming babies out of their mother's wombs, and then selling their body parts, is as low as it gets.
Performing well over 300,000 abortions annually, the United States' largest abortion provider Planned Parenthood Federation of America, has expanded its bloody business to the sale of aborted baby body parts, according to The Center for Medical Progress.     

As part of a 30-month-long investigative journalism study called the Human Capital Project, CMP went undercover in meetings with several top Planned Parenthood officials posing as buyers for a fetal tissue procurement company.

During the meetings hidden cameras videotaped statements documenting Planned Parenthood's involvement in the sale of baby body parts.

These revealing videos can be viewed by going to CMP's website at www.centerformedicalprogress.org. But be advised that some video sections depict disturbing scenes of aborted baby body parts for sale. And indeed, any person who genuinely respects human life should be disturbed, and disturbed into action.  

In one of the undercover videos, Planned Parenthood Federation of America's senior director of medical services, Dr. Deborah Nucatola, casually describes while eating salad and sipping wine, how Planned Parenthood sells hearts, lungs, livers and heads taken from aborted babies, including babies killed by partial birth abortion - which with rare exception is totally banned by federal law.

After watching this video, Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the pro-woman/pro-life organization known as the Susan B. Anthony List said, "The moment when the destruction of a human being becomes just business as usual is a moment we must address."

According to the Susan B. Anthony List, during fiscal year 2013-2014, Planned Parenthood received more than $1.4 million per day, in the form of government grants, contracts, and Medicaid reimbursements which amounts to taxpayer funding of 41 percent of Planned Parenthood's overall revenue.

Franciscan Cardinal Seán O'Malley, chairman of the Committee on Pro-Life Activities of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops wrote, "Pope Francis has called abortion the product of a 'widespread mentality of profit, the throwaway culture, which has today enslaved the hearts and minds of so many.' "

The cardinal condemned "the now standard practice of obtaining fetal organs and tissues through abortion."

Cardinal O'Malley pastorally added that persons experiencing revived trauma from their involvement in abortion, are most welcome to contact the church's post-abortion healing ministry known as Project Rachel (www.projectrachel.com).     

Americans United for Life, an outstanding national pro-life legal team, is asking people to contact their two U.S. senators and congressperson urging them to co-sponsor Senate Bill 1881 to prohibit federal funding of Planned Parenthood Federation of America.       

Please sign the Center for Medical Progress' petition urging Congress to investigate Planned Parenthood's baby body parts business by going to www.centerformedicalprogress.org and clicking "Take Action."

A morning of peaceful protests at Planned Parenthood facilities nationwide took place on Aug. 22 from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. As followers of the God of life, we are obliged to work for the protection of the lives and limbs of everyone - especially the most vulnerable.

Let's not take this obligation lightly.

Tony Magliano is an internationally syndicated social justice and peace columnist.