Dear Editor:After reading the letter "Christian Extremists" in the Downey Patriot (7/18/13), I feel I must answer it. First, many couples are waiting to adopt a baby and some go to China and Russia to adopt a baby or child. There are contraceptives available to prevent pregnancy, if one isn't too irresponsible to use them. That's a "choice." I feel strongly about this because I was adopted at four months. My maternal mother died giving birth to me. My heart is deeply grateful that I was adopted and now have children and grandchildren of my own and take deep joy in them. Second, ask any obstetrician and they will tell you a fetus is a baby. Third, show me any same-sex couple that can conceive. Being a Christian, call me extreme if you wish, but there is a much higher power than the sometimes misguided decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court. From the beginning of time marriage has been between a man and a woman, and until 1973 it was illegal to kill a baby until the "enlightened" jurists of the U.S. Supreme Court decided otherwise. Biblically, murder and homosexuality are both against the will of God. This country was founded on Christian principles. If you don't believe it, you don't know your history. Marilyn Madru Downey

Dear Editor: Many seek abortions because they are unaware of the resources available through CPC's (crisis pregnancy centers). These centers are a wealth of support for the mothers and life-saving answers for her baby, including adoption by couples and families who will raise that baby and give him/her the love and nurturing we all deserve to have. As a comparison of tragic deaths, the total number of U.S. soldiers killed in all wars in the last 238 years (since 1775) is under 2 million; in the last 40 years (since 1973) more than 56 million unborn babies have been killed by abortion. Because your son and his girlfriend weren't responsible enough to use some sort of birth control to prevent conception, they chose abortion. And you are happy about this? Obviously the extremists are irresponsible parents raising irresponsible children who are murdering their unborn children. Carol Hanson Downey

Dear Editor: Religious extremists are trying to take over the country? Seriously? Ms. Rivero's hyperbolic, illogical letter left my head so spinning with confusion that I hardly know where to begin. She asserts that abortion is established law and so therefore should not be changed in one breath, but in another, she implies that traditional marriage - also established law since, oh, the ancient Greeks - should change because somehow marriage is now a right, and if we disagree with the notion of same-sex marriage, just don't marry a person of the same sex. She also asserts that "countless women" were saved by legal abortions since many had lost their lives foolishly attempting one themselves. Proof of this? Certainly the number of women "saved" by abortion doesn't even come close to the 50 million children who lost their lives to abortion, right? Just think how much more secure Social Security would be for Ms. Rivero if these people were alive today. And to brag about her own grandchild's abortion was beyond distasteful. I can only think of the loving childless family that could have taken that child and raised him/her as their own. Perhaps Ms. Rivero finds herself at odds with traditional American values of life and family because her own views have radically changed toward the extreme. With the anti-population nonsense that ended her convoluted letter, she sounds like the very religious extremist she denounces in her letter. I recommend she take a road trip across the vast, beautiful expanses of uninhabited land between Los Angeles and New York to clear her befuddled mind and reconnect with her soul. Alaina Niemann Downey

********** Published: Aug. 1, 2013 - Volume 12 - Issue 16