But he has, so far, survived an ordeal that should make him easy prey for the proponents of Missouri Amendment 2, which is promising cures for virtually every disease known to humanity through human cloning and embryonic stem-cell research.

Except that Glenn Wright doesn't like lies.

If God calls him home soon, said the 48-year-old father of five, including three small children at home, how can he possibly take the life of another innocent human being to save his own?

"It's like throwing someone out of a lifeboat so you can climb in," said Wright, whose family attends Our Lady of Good Counsel Parish in Kansas City, and the Latin Mass at Blessed Sacrament Parish in Kansas City, Kan.

"Plus," he said, "I don't want to go to hell."

To Wright, even if by some miracle a certain cure for brain cancer was discovered tomorrow through embryonic stem-cell research and the destruction of human embryos, he'd turn it down. The cure, he said, is a greater evil than abortion.

"Abortion is a little less evil," he said. "You are dealing with the weakness of a man and a woman. Here (with embryonic stem-cell research), there is no weakness involved. The people doing it are completely culpable for the loss of human life."

A graphic designer who has spent his working career in advertising and marketing, Wright was diagnosed with a brain tumor on Dec. 12, 2005, the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe.

"That was the day I chose to start my own business, but God threw me a curve," Wright said, with characteristic wit.

Two surgeries later, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) now shows that his cancer seems to be in remission, although he knows his health can deteriorate rapidly.

"The last MRI I had, there was no sign of anything, not even a brain," he joked. "I'm running on prayer and carrot juice. I seem to be doing OK."

For other men, a cancer diagnosis might be a test of faith. To Wright, it was an affirmation. Instead of giving in to anger and depression, he turned to prayer.

"I wondered what God wanted me to do," he said. "And I found out when I went to the Vitae Caring Foundation barbecue."

That was June 29 at the south Kansas City home of Kaye and Jerry Meiners. The pro-life foundation had gathered Catholics from both sides of the state line, including Kansas City-St. Joseph Bishop Robert W. Finn and Kansas City, Kan., Archbishop Joseph Naumann, to raise money for a series of television ads against the destruction of life caused by embryonic stem-cell research.

At that event, he met Adrienne Hynek, director of the Diocesan Respect Life Office.

"She asked me if I had any ideas about how we could fight Amendment 2," Wright said. "I told her I used to be pretty good at advertising and marketing. She jumped at the chance to use me."

For the first time since his surgeries, said Wright's wife, Martha, Glenn's creative energies surged.

"He couldn't do anything before," she said. "Then all of these ideas came pouring out of him."

And he pulled no punches as the bumper stickers, billboards and poster ideas came rolling out of his home office computer.

With funding from an "anonymous" friend who put up the cash to make them, Wright came up with the "They're Lying. It's Cloning. Vote No." bumper sticker that has been seen in both St. Louis and Kansas City.

His friend wishes to avoid any legal entanglements with the well-financed proponents of Amendment 2. Wright doesn't care.

"What are they going to do? Sue a guy with brain cancer?" he quipped.

One of his posters points out that millions of women will need to "donate" millions of human eggs through hyperovulation procedures that carry severe health risks. It depicts a woman's head on the body of a chicken to illustrate that human cloning would turn women into "egg factories."

"He used my head," Martha said with a laugh.

Wright presented his work free of charge to Missourians Against Human Cloning, which is campaigning against Amendment 2. But his brutally frank and honest approach earned him a turn-down.

"I couldn't get them to sign off on anything," he said.

Wright said that Hynek put him in touch with Missouri Right to Life, which promptly put his ideas on highway billboards.

One of the billboards is on busy northbound Interstate 435, near Eastwood Trafficway and the Truman Sports Complex. Another Wright-created billboard is on westbound Interstate 70, near the downtown loop.

"You can read it when you are stuck in traffic," Wright said.

"There is one billboard that says, 'If it's not human and not alive, then how can you get living human stem cells from it?" he said.

He's got other billboards ready to go. With today's digital billboard screen technology, they can be changed with the click of a computer mouse button.

"As soon as they (Missouri Right to Life) give me the word, we can rock and roll," Wright said.

Other Glenn Wright billboard creations remind viewers that the famous cloned sheep Dolly was produced by the same cloning technique that Amendment 2 seeks to protect. One billboard depicts two identical sheep asking: "Cures? What cures? All we got was cloning. Don't let them pull the wool over your eyes!"

Yet another billboard shows a blue-eyed baby asking: "Would you kill me for my stem cells?"

Wright's most "Catholic" creation is a bulletin cover he designed for parishes. It shows the right forearm of Jesus on a cross, it's wrist pierced by an ancient nail. In Christ's hand is a Petri dish.

"Whatever you do to the least of my people, you do to me," the text reads, continuing, "Human life is precious, whether it's in a Petri dish or sitting across the kitchen table from you. Please vote NO on Amendment 2."

To say that Wright feels passionate about the issue would be an understatement. It is not just the wanton destruction of life that spurs him, he said, but the lies that proponents of Amendment 2 are telling to justify themselves.

"As soon as I found out about the incredible level of deceipt, I got really mad," he said. "I was flabbergasted about how wicked it all is."

As a marketing professional, Wright knew what they were up to. They were selling evil by calling it good, he said.

"Usually, there is a grain of truth mixed in with the lies," he said. "This time, there is no grain of truth."

Wright said that he has seen pro-Amendment 2 billboards that proclaim: "It could save the life of someone you love."

But he knows and, he says, proponents of embryonic stem-cell research themselves know full well, that embryonic stem-cell research hasn't produced a single cure after years of work and millions of dollars poured into it.

"It's just another example of the tapestry of lies that they've woven," he said.

Wright recalled the scandal earlier this year when Korean researcher Hwang Woo-suk falsely claimed to have created human embryonic stem cells through the cloning technique that Amendment 2 would protect.

"He used 2,000 eggs from 200 women," Wright said. "Even at that, he didn't squeeze out a single embryo."

Research using non-cloned embryos obtained from in vitro fertilization clinics have only produced uncontrollable tumors in laboratory rats so far, Wright noted. When asked directly, even the most optimistic proponents will admit that any cures from embryonic stem-cell research are decades away, if they will ever be discovered.

Wright strongly believes that embryonic stem-cell research is a dead-end, leading to no cures. Perhaps, he said, there hasn't been a single success because God doesn't want humans to cure through killing.

"Even with half a brain, I can see that," he joked. "God might not let them clone a human being. He might not want his hand forced."

If his work against Amendment 2 strikes some people as too hard-hitting and tactless, so be it, he said.

"The truth needs to be told," Wright said. "If people know the truth, people of good will won't vote for it."

His pro bono work on Amendment 2 has allowed Wright to launch his own marketing company and build his a portfolio. He called his company Fifth Station Media after the fifth Station of the Cross when Simon the Cyrene picks up the cross for Jesus.

Looking back, Wright continues to believe strongly that God has a plan for his life, even as he continues to struggle with cancer.

His surgeries have affected his balance. The right side of his body was paralyzed temporarily, but long enough for muscles to atrophy into lingering weakness. But he can walk, he can think, and he can pray, he said.

"Everything is a gift from God," Wright said. "I think God wanted to put me in this place so I could do his work at this moment. I really have no complaints."

One day last winter, Wright picked up a pamphlet written by St. Alphonse Liguori, "Uniformity with God's Will."

"I read it the night before I got diagnosed (with cancer)," Wright said. "It made all the difference in the world. I could see it as God's will, and everything has worked out. If you are fighting God's will, you don't have much of a future."

END