Another year, since Roe v. Wade in 1973, with more than 48 TO 49 million unborn children trashed, a slaughter without historical precedent. Generations from now, people will wonder how mankind could kill so many, so often, for so little. Some will wonder, where were the Christians, where was the church? Where were the shepherds? Were we a civilized people?
Recent polls claim that the majority of Americans oppose abortion, but do not want it to be illegal. What's wrong with this statement? How can a nation founded on biblical principles, “oppose” the killing of innocent life, yet refuse to outlaw it? The reason is that we have been conditioned to overlook abortion as a necessary evil, nothing more. If we truly believe in the depth of our souls, we would stop at nothing, to make abortion a crime. Abortion can never be legal in a civilized society.
We Americans have become numb to numbers. They don't mean a thing! According to the CDC, since Roe v. Wade, over 48 million innocent lives have been lost through surgical abortions. 3,600 lives are terminated every day by surgical abortion. Innocent lives were taken! This figure may be low. What about unreported abortions. Add chemical abortions and contraceptives and the figure might double.
What are we doing to our brothers and sisters in Christ and to our nation? Scientific advances reveal the reality of a child in the womb, but the media and culture have dulled our consciences.
Where will it all end? How can we expect God to bless a nation that has permitted deaths of innocent and defenseless babies as a right? What will it take for people to put their faith into practice? Our faith must be evident at the ballot box, at work, where we shop and in everything we personally do! What will we say when God asks us, what we did to stop the killing?
Monday, February 25, 2008
Doing it Right
Jacinta who spoke at the Stand up for Life Rally in Columbia made the right choice. Some eleven years ago Jacinta Connor found herself pregnant with addicted parents who insisted she abort her child or get out. She contacted South Carolina Citizens For Life who picked her up from the porch of her house and made certain she was put into loving and supportive hands. Now Jacinta is married to a soldier on his fourth deployment to Iraq with three children. Her oldest child recently won his schools highest award in Engineering. Jacinta did it right, SCCL did it right, as did the home for unwed mothers and other pregnancy support agencies that assisted and all who supported these agencies did it right as well
Changing the Culture
CHANGING THE CULTURE Every day our society struggles with the "Culture of Death”. The evidence is clear that abortion kills a human being. Threats against life are taking on vast proportions and we now confront an objective conspiracy against life involving international organizations such as the UN that promote contraception, sterilization, and abortion. The mass media treats death by euthanasia like progress. We have a society in which incapacitated and terminally ill persons are helped not to live to the fullest, but only to die sooner, often with the consent of the family. So many citizens believe it's okay to kill living human embryos to harvest their stem cells for speculative research and that it's okay to force taxpayers to pay for it. The U.S. Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision of 1973 legalized abortion throughout all nine months of pregnancy for any reason. Since then over 49 million children in the United States have died from abortion. How did this happen? What brought us to this point in history? - The late Great Pope John Paul ll called these trends part of a culture of death. He traced that culture's roots to three attitudes in particular: 1. extreme personal autonomy, 2. seeing some lives as not worthy of living, and 3. avoidance of suffering at all costs. Our society has absorbed many attitudes hostile to life without even realizing it.
Personal autonomy or the “Free to be me” attitude has run wild. Many people think the question of what is morally right depends on their own preferences, that there is no objective moral yardstick such as the Ten Commandments. In the name of tolerance, it is said that people have a right to make up their own personal morality. After all, who has the right to “impose” his values on others? If blind self-assertion can define the meaning of life, the lives of everyone – especially the weakest and most vulnerable – become tools for those who are the loudest.
Lives unworthy of living. So many people today do not understand or accept that the value of a human life is inherent. They feel it depends on whether a person is conscious, capable of exercising his autonomy and of performing actions which benefit society. Some so called ethicists have promoted infanticide for parents who do not want to raise a child with a disability. Ours is a culture which values efficiency and productivity, so the idea of eliminating the “unproductive” and “burdensome” sounds reasonable. This functional ethic may explain why many want to allow scientists to create human embryos solely to destroy them, to use their stem cells in research seeking treatments for diseases.
Avoiding suffering at all costs. Our culture’s desire to avoid suffering –including sacrifice, hardship, and even inconvenience – leads many to view death as a form of release. Many avoid the personal sacrifice involved in loving and caring for a family member who needs special assistance. Our “Unplanned” children are aborted to escape the disruptions and sacrifices entailed in raising a child. And when we can no longer enjoy life the way we once did, death may be seen as away to eliminate psychological suffering.
What is the answer? What do we do to change the culture? We must respect the lives of the weak and defenseless – unborn children, human embryos in laboratories, the disabled, the dying, and victims of violence for a just society to evolve. We must move away from this culture of death and toward following Christ to eternal life by way of the Cross: Loving others to the point that we put aside our personal pride and selfishness and our tendency to view others as obstacles or things to be used. Jesus said that one must learn to love God, and "love your neighbor as yourself." God has given us this model of love and solidarity with those entrusted to our care and those we meet on the way. If we live this model we may inspire others to do the same, and help create a culture in which human life is always loved and defended, every form of violence driven out.
Personal autonomy or the “Free to be me” attitude has run wild. Many people think the question of what is morally right depends on their own preferences, that there is no objective moral yardstick such as the Ten Commandments. In the name of tolerance, it is said that people have a right to make up their own personal morality. After all, who has the right to “impose” his values on others? If blind self-assertion can define the meaning of life, the lives of everyone – especially the weakest and most vulnerable – become tools for those who are the loudest.
Lives unworthy of living. So many people today do not understand or accept that the value of a human life is inherent. They feel it depends on whether a person is conscious, capable of exercising his autonomy and of performing actions which benefit society. Some so called ethicists have promoted infanticide for parents who do not want to raise a child with a disability. Ours is a culture which values efficiency and productivity, so the idea of eliminating the “unproductive” and “burdensome” sounds reasonable. This functional ethic may explain why many want to allow scientists to create human embryos solely to destroy them, to use their stem cells in research seeking treatments for diseases.
Avoiding suffering at all costs. Our culture’s desire to avoid suffering –including sacrifice, hardship, and even inconvenience – leads many to view death as a form of release. Many avoid the personal sacrifice involved in loving and caring for a family member who needs special assistance. Our “Unplanned” children are aborted to escape the disruptions and sacrifices entailed in raising a child. And when we can no longer enjoy life the way we once did, death may be seen as away to eliminate psychological suffering.
What is the answer? What do we do to change the culture? We must respect the lives of the weak and defenseless – unborn children, human embryos in laboratories, the disabled, the dying, and victims of violence for a just society to evolve. We must move away from this culture of death and toward following Christ to eternal life by way of the Cross: Loving others to the point that we put aside our personal pride and selfishness and our tendency to view others as obstacles or things to be used. Jesus said that one must learn to love God, and "love your neighbor as yourself." God has given us this model of love and solidarity with those entrusted to our care and those we meet on the way. If we live this model we may inspire others to do the same, and help create a culture in which human life is always loved and defended, every form of violence driven out.
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