my gosh, we are so young

"I just thought, my gosh, they are so young. There are so many of them, and they are so young."

This is how pro-choice NARAL president Nancy Keenan recalls the moment her train pulled into Washington's Union Station a few months ago. She was greeted by a throng of an estimated 400,000 pro-lifers. It was the day of the 37th annual March for Life.

Newsweek's April 26 issue includes an article called "Remember Roe!", which states that "the abortion-rights community" is becoming "acutely aware of their waning influence in Washington"[1]. Unfortunately for pro-choicers like Keenan, abortion supporters consistently dwindle in number.

Beginning in 1980 and up until recent years, it used to be that the Democratic party defended abortion. But now, groups like Democrats for Life of America are becoming more prevalent, and support for abortion among left-wing leaders is fading. In 1992, for instance, Pennsylvania Governor Robert P. Casey, along with over 30 other prominent political, academic, commercial, and religious figures, ran a full-page ad in the New York Times asking for "communities and policies that help women to deal with crisis pregnancies by eliminating the crisis, not the child"[2]. In 2003, John Zogby determined that 43% of Democrats "[agree] with the statement that abortion 'destroys an innocent human life and is manslaughter'"[3]. And most recently, pro-life Democrat Bart Stupak pushed for rigorous abortion restrictions in health-care reform.

"So if Democrats won't stand strong for abortion rights, who will?"[1]. Leading abortion advocates are beginning to wonder the same thing. Nancy Keenan has been worried about the future of her movement for some time now, realizing that those in her baby-boomer generation who run the largest pro-choice organizations like NARAL, Planned Parenthood, and NOW are approaching their 60's and will soon be retiring. And the only passion Keenan is seeing among young people regarding abortion is not coming from her side. She was understandably alarmed upon seeing the tens— even hundreds— of thousands of young people at January's March for Life. A pro-choice rally two months before had 1300 participants[1].

I think abortion is increasingly unpopular among Democrats because it is increasingly unpopular in general. Who needs it? It kills children, hurts women, and robs men of their fatherhood. Looks like the only people it's good for are the ones making the blood money.

Regardless of my political party, I will never stand for legal abortion. And I am proud to say that neither will most other men and women in my generation. As Keenan confirmed herself, we who stand for life are young and we are many.

Vita Pro Omni!

[1] Sarah Kliff, "Remember Roe!" Newsweek, April 26, 2010.

[2] Rachel Martin, John Parkinson, and Emily Yacus, "Are Democrats Now Pro-Life?" ABC News, August 9, 2008.

[3] John Zogby, "New National Abortion Poll Says Majority of Americans are Pro-Life." Zogby International, January 16, 2004.

some nonsense

At the Medical University of South Carolina, a pregnant woman can be arrested for distributing drugs to a minor if her urine test reveals cocaine use. In Illinois, pregnant women who consume illegal drugs may be charged with "delivering a controlled substance to a minor"[1]. But if these same women walked into a Planned Parenthood and handed over $400, they could have those same "minors" killed on the spot by an abortionist, without anyone raising an eyebrow.

University of Louisville Law School Professor Luke Milligan relays such inconsistency in another way: "Imagine, for instance, a pregnant woman who approaches an abortion clinic with the intention of terminating her pregnancy. In one scenario, she is mugged at the entrance, and, due to the ensuing trauma, has a miscarriage. The law holds that a “person” was “murdered,” and it punishes the perpetrator with a life sentence in jail. In the second scenario, the woman evades the mugger, enters the clinic safely, and undergoes a successful abortion procedure. Here the law holds that no crime was committed"[2].

Milligan's example demonstrates just one of many oddball implications of this double-standard. What kind of nonsense is this? It's illegal to harm your unborn child but it's legal to kill him? It's murder if a mugger kills a fetus, but as long as a doctor commits the slaughter, it's perfectly fine? To the baby, what difference does it make who kills her? Either way, isn't she just as dead?

Inconsistencies are all over the place. In Oregon, every alcohol-serving establishment is required to display this sign (left). As author Randy Alcorn reasonably inquired after seeing it, "If alcohol harms unborn babies, what does abortion do to them?" When looking into these contradictions, he also noticed that the U.S. Congress voted unanimously to delay the death penalty of a pregnant woman until after the baby was born. Every congressman, including those who were pro-choice, apparently recognized the humanity of the unborn child living and growing in that woman's womb. "No stay of execution was requested for the sake of the mother's tonsils, heart, or kidneys"[1]; it was requested on behalf of her unborn child.

Many states have already given explicit attest to the right to life of the unborn by passing fetal homicide laws. These laws deem it murder for anyone but the mother to deliberately take the life of a fetus (arbitrary much?). Perhaps most interestingly, the "Unborn Victims of Violence Act," which Congress passed in 2004, requires that a person who "intentionally kills or attempts to kill the unborn child... be punished... for intentionally killing or attempting to kill a human being"[3]. Under this law, a "child in utero" is recognized as a legal victim if he or she is injured or killed due to any one of over 60 listed federal crimes of violence. It was because of this mandate that Scott Peterson, for instance, was convicted of double-homicide under California state law when he murdered his pregnant wife Laci in 2002.

Fetal homicide laws and similar attempts to protect pre-born children are great, but they can't do much in an abortion nation. Basically, they protect wanted babies from things like alcohol and muggers, but meanwhile, unwanted babies can be deliberately killed with scalpels and suction tubes. Does America allow for discrimination against unpopular people? Yes, it does.

It's time for America's laws to protect all human beings again, rather than just the convenient ones. Why did we give up on those values upon which our country was founded— those values that once taught nations and inspired the world?

Mother Teresa saw that legalized abortion is an American scandal that has thrown our values aside and vandalized our Constitution. She bravely wrote to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1994 about Roe v. Wade:

"Yours is the one great nation in all of history that was founded on the precept of equal rights and respect for all humankind, for the poorest and weakest of us as well as the richest and strongest. As your Declaration of Independence put it, in words that have never lost their power to stir the heart: “We hold these truths to be self evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness…” A nation founded on these principles holds a sacred trust: to stand as an example to the rest of the world, to climb ever higher in its practical realization of the ideals of human dignity, brotherhood, and mutual respect.

Yet there has been one infinitely tragic and destructive departure from those American ideals in recent memory. It was this Court's own decision in Roe v. Wade (1973) to exclude the unborn child from the human family... It was a sad infidelity to America's highest ideals when this Court said that it did not matter, or could not be determined, when the inalienable right to life began for a child in its mother's womb.

America needs no words from me to see how your decision in Roe v. Wade has deformed a great nation. The so-called right to abortion has pitted mothers against their children and women against men. It has sown violence and discord at the heart of the most intimate human relationships.

Human rights are not a privilege conferred by government. They are every human being's entitlement by virtue of his humanity. The right to life does not depend, and must not be declared to be contingent, on the pleasure of anyone else, not even a parent or a sovereign... I have no new teaching for America. I seek only to recall you to that faithfulness you once taught the world."

Vita Pro Omni!

[1] Alcorn, Randy. Why Pro-Life? p. 39-40

[2] Milligan, Luke M. A Theory of Stability: John Rawls, Fetal Homicide, and Substantive Due Process, p. 1178.

[3]HR 1997 was passed by a Senate roll call vote of 61-38,March 25,2004.

little lucy

Congratulations to my friends, Catharine and Jeff, who have been blessed with a beautiful daughter: Lucy Ann Daley. She was born on April 12 at Grant Medical Center in Columbus, Ohio, weighing 8.5 pounds and measuring 20.5 inches. Both mommy and baby are doing wonderfully. :)

We love you, little Lucy.

Vita Pro Omni!

a few circumstances (part 2)

In 1980, former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop wrote, "In my thirty-six years in pediatric surgery, I have never known of one instance where the child had to be aborted to save the mother's life." Planned Parenthood's Dr. Alan Guttmacher stated, "Today it is possible for almost any patient to be brought through pregnancy alive, unless she suffers from a fatal illness such as cancer or leukemia, and, if so, abortion would be unlikely to prolong, much less save, life." Both quotes apply to the unfortunate circumstance where the mother's life is at risk due to pregnancy; in the abortion debate, this is often proposed.

To lay some context, I will first note that, as the above quotes demonstrate, this kind of situation is incredibly rare. But, because it is possible for a woman to face severe physical risks due to pregnancy, it is important to determine the ethical course of action in such a case.

I have found that this situation, probably more than any other "tough case," can seduce even the most passionate pro-lifer to make an exception. He may feel that to forbid abortion in such an instance would be to place the life of the child above the life of the mother; and this doesn't seem very pro-life at all— because it's not.

In reality, the pro-life position has never been that a child's life is more important than his mother's, but simply that they are equal. To allow harm toward the life of a mother for the sake of her child is just as morally reprehensible as to allow harm toward the life of a child for the sake of his mother. Indeed, the pro-life proclamation is clear: all human beings have the same value. The moment we begin ranking lives and saying who should live and who should die, we have stopped being pro-life and have started playing God.

Let me get straight to an answer: There are no situations in which the intentional killing of an unborn child is justified. That being said, we cannot sit back and allow women to die from risky pregnancies. This is why the life-of-the-mother-circumstance can appear to be a rather serious predicament for the ethicist.

What should we do? Broadly speaking, everything should be done to support both the life of the child and the life of the mother. One might think of the situation as he would a terrible car crash in which two passengers are trapped, and removing one may risk the life of the other. The emergency team is morally obligated to do all they can to safely remove both victims from the car, granting neither one greater favor.

But what does this kind of ethic look like in the case of abortion? If a pregnancy becomes threatening during the second or third trimesters, a doctor can ethically induce labor, deliver the child prematurely, and sustain the child outside of the womb with intensive neonatal care. During the first trimester, however, premature delivery is not an option. The question then becomes what to do when a pregnancy threatens a woman's life before her baby is strong enough to survive on his own.

The only real-world medical problem we are really talking about here is ectopic pregnancy. This occurs when the embryo implants somewhere other than inside the uterus— usually in the fallopian tube, or sometimes in the ovary, abdomen, or cervix. Such a pregnancy often ruptures the fallopian tube, and, alternatively, results in a successful birth only 5% of the time[1]. According to analyses of statistics provided by American Academy of Family Physicians, WebMD, and Centers for Disease Control, the risk of maternal death due to an untreated ectopic pregnancy lies somewhere between .05% and .119%[2]. While this risk is incredibly low, it is real, nonetheless. Therefore, in such an instance, a surgeon can ethically remove the expanding fallopian tube with the embryo inside, if the woman so desires— that's a medical problem, and he is addressing it[3].

In philosophy, there is a principle called double effect: a morally permissible action may have a foreseen but unintended side-effect. In the case of a tubal pregnancy, removing the fallopian tube may be necessary to preserve the life of the mother, and, tragically, will likely result in the death of the child[4]. Nonetheless, removing the tube is very different from abortion, which is intended to kill the child; in ethics, intent matters.

I would like to make just a few final notes.

First, neither the health-of-the-mother-circumstance nor the rape-circumstance, if maintained as legitimate reasons for abortion, would justify the current status of abortion in the United States. Under today's legal standing, a woman may undergo an abortion in all 50 states, through all 9 months of pregnancy, for nearly any reason she deems fit. Hence, when a person argues that abortion should be legal because of situations like life-risk and rape, even if he were to succeed in that argument, he would only be justifying the 4% of abortions that occur because of such circumstances; meanwhile, his argument does not support 96% of abortions in America. Indeed, to argue for legalized abortion from so-called "exceptions" is as silly as to argue for the abolishment of traffic laws due to the fact that a man might need to run a stop sign one evening to get his wife to the hospital[5].

Second, a closely related argument to the health-of-the-mother argument is the fairly common pro-choice contention that child-bearing is dangerous, and no woman should be forced to risk that danger against her will. This argument is silly for several reasons, but mostly because the alternative the pro-choicer is suggesting is abortion, and having an abortion is more physically dangerous than giving birth— the natural outcome of pregnancy. The most recent report from the Centers for Disease Control shows that the pregnancy-related mortality rate in the U.S., for instance, is .0118%, whereas, in some nations, as much as 55% of abortions are unsafe[2,6]. Which is better for women: delivery or abortion?

Being comprehensively pro-life is neither extreme nor uncompassionate. To insist on the right to life for everyone does not infringe on the right to life of anyone, and if we are to truly stand for the principles of human rights, we must do so without compromise or apology. No matter what emotional appeals a person makes, intentionally killing an innocent human being is still always wrong; atypical circumstances do not change that.

Let's love women and children. Let's be comprehensively pro-life.

Vita Pro Omni!

[1] BBC News

[2] Pregnancy-Related Mortality Surveillance (http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5202a1.htm)

[3] On the other hand, upon realizing that an ectopic pregnancy is actually far less life-threatening than many people believe, a woman may also choose to simply "wait, watch and pray."

[4] It is important to note here that removing the fallopian tube often does not kill the child at all, because he has already died well before the surgery became necessary.

[5] A point Francis J. Beckwith makes in his book Defending Life: A Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice (p. 105)

[6] World Health Organization (http://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/unsafe_abortion/en/index.html)

in the meantime

I want to apologize for my delay in posting. I am unexpectedly going out of town for the weekend, so will write about the health-of-the-mother-circumstance when I return.

In the meantime, if you're itching for something to read, I wanted to share with you one of my favorite resources. Abort73.com is one of the most comprehensive and engaging pro-life sites on the web. Click here to check it out.

Vita Pro Omni!

a few circumstances (part 1)

Some of you know that I've started posting polls about abortion opinion on the side-bar of my blog. Mostly, they're "just for fun." I don't take the results with much more than a grain of salt due to the facts that 1) my readers may or may not be an accurate representation of the general public (more likely the latter), and 2) nothing prevents someone from dishonestly voting more than once. However, my most recent poll, in which I ask when, if ever, one believes abortion should be legal, is getting some interesting results so far.

Based on previously-conducted surveys by others and past conversations of my own, I suspected when I wrote this poll that the third option, "A few circumstances," would be a very popular- if not the most popular- answer. And, indeed, it has already acquired quite a few clicks.

A few examples of "tough cases" that I included in this poll option were the situations of rape and when the mother's health is at risk due to the pregnancy. It is not uncommon for someone to consider himself to be pro-life except in such instances. Hence, the popularity of option three- i.e. the popularity of the contention that abortion is occasionally okay.

All of this is good news and bad news.

It's good news because this means many people oppose 96% of the abortions happening every day in the U.S. (Sources give slightly varying percentages, but overall, 1% of abortions are attributed to rape and 3% are due to potential health risks of the mother). The people maintaining this view do recognize that something about abortion is not right, to the extent that they oppose its use in almost every instance.

It's bad news because this suggests that the Pro-Life Movement needs to do far more teaching about the morality involved in these tough cases. We have yet to fully succeed in helping people see that, though difficult life situations exist, all human lives are still equal.

I have previously written about abortion in the case of rape in my post entitled, "What About Rape?", which focused on the story of Rebecca Kiessling, a woman who was conceived in rape and lived to tell her story. But, here, I will discuss the morality of such a situation in more general, less personal, terms.

To determine whether or not it is morally permissible to abort a child conceived in rape, it may be useful to begin by asking ourselves what makes us, perhaps, more inclined to say that an abortion is justified in the case of rape than in another. I think this inclination is rooted in an (accurate) understanding of the moral atrocity that is sexual abuse. We feel compassion for the woman who is a rape victim, and rightfully so: she, an innocent human being, has been violated*. But from here, we often jump to the (inaccurate) conclusion that, because of this, her unborn child, also an innocent human being, can be killed.

We probably do not think of it in this way. We focus, instead, on our feeling that, in order to express our sympathy for this woman, we must allow or even help her to get an abortion- to eliminate the child that resulted from that crime. But, nonetheless, the "abortion-is okay-every-once-in-awhile" conclusion, while generally well-intentioned, is flawed in at least four ways, several of which Francis J. Beckwith points out in his book Defending Life (see footnotes):

First, it begs the question of what the unborn are by assuming they are not fully human. For if they are fully human, then we have to weigh the (assumed) relieving of a woman's mental and emotional distress against the right to life of an innocent human being. And we know that homicide of another is never justified as a way to make someone feel better**[1].

Second, this conclusion misidentifies the aggressor. The rapist is the aggressor, not the unborn child. The unborn is just as much of an innocent victim as his mother. No child should be punished for his dad's crime. As ethicist Dr. Michael Bauman notes, "A child does not lose its right to life simply because its father or its mother was a sexual criminal or a deviant"[1].

Third, this conclusion is inconsistent with what we normally conclude to be true regarding ethical actions between a mother and child (or any two people, for that matter). In no other situation would we say that a mother can rightfully kill her son because he is causing her emotional distress. For instance: Imagine that a woman was raped 9 months ago, decided against abortion, and had her baby boy (let's say she named him Andy) today. Now imagine that 5 years from now, on Andy's first day of kindergarten, she meets another parent who looks frighteningly similar to the man who raped her. She begins having terrible flashbacks of the event, and when she looks at Andy's face after school, all she can think of is the face of the man who sexually abused her years ago. Understandably, she is emotionally shaken and terribly distraught. Given this, is she justified in killing her son to make herself feel better? Of course not. So what makes us think it would have been okay to kill him 5 years earlier? Again, if the unborn is fully human, there is no morally relevant difference between killing Andy as a fetus and killing Andy as a kindergartner.

And finally, this conclusion fails to recognize the identical humanness of a child who is going to be aborted because of rape and a child who is going to be aborted because of any other reason that a person might reject as being illegitimate. In other words, we must remember that the fetus who the career-oriented woman will abort in hopes to get a job promotion is biologically and morally identical to the fetus who a rape victim will abort in hopes to alleviate her emotional pain. If a person realizes that abortion for career advancement is morally deplorable, then he must realize that abortion for emotional reasons is morally deplorable, too: in both cases, an innocent human being is killed[1].

The "pro-life with exceptions" philosophy always contradicts itself. It is as illogical as saying, "Every man has a right to freedom, but it's okay for certain men to be sold as slaves." At the end of the day, it does not make sense; and more importantly, it is morally dire.

In my next post, I will attempt to elucidate the morality of a situation in which a mother's health is at risk. But for those who are inclined to think that I will place the life of the unborn child above the life of her mother, I will assure you now that that is not the case. I would not be pro-life if I did not defend the lives of women, too. Indeed, what is beautiful about the pro-life position is that one does not have to pit one life against another.

In the meantime, I would encourage my almost-pro-life friends to take that final leap: to be not afraid to declare life for all! For it is only through protecting the lives of everyone that we protect the lives of anyone. "Every human has rights"***.

Vita Pro Omni!

* The pro-lifer believes the utmost care and assistance should be given to a rape victim in all areas of her life, and that we should especially "make it as easy as possible for her to give up her baby for adoption, if she desires. Dealing with the woman pregnant from rape, then, can be an opportunity for us—both as individuals and society—to develop true understanding and charity. Is it not better to try to develop these virtues than to countenance an ethic of destruction as the solution?" (Dr. Stephen Krason).

** To state this is not to dismiss the very real and understandable anguish that a rape victim experiences, but rather to view the situation from an ethical perspective. We can know what is right, even if our emotions are conflicted.

*** A message which National Geographic continues to promote

[1] Francis J. Beckwith makes this point in his book Defending Life: A Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice

a kingdom conquered

Happy Easter, everyone :) Christ has conquered death and brought us eternal life!

In the spirit of His life-giving love, I share the following reflection with you, written by Father Frank Pavone. May God bless and keep you!

Fr. Frank Pavone
Pontifical Council for the Family

"A Kingdom Conquered"

"Dux vitae mortuus, regnat vivus"--"Life's Captain, who died, now lives and reigns."

These words come from the ancient Easter Sequence, the Victimae Paschali, which is proclaimed before the Gospel on Easter Sunday Masses. The message is clear: Easter is not simply about someone rising from the dead; it is about the conquering of a Kingdom. Life's Captain not only lives; He also reigns. He has a kingdom, and it is the Kingdom of Life. Jesus is explicit about this when speaking to the apostles after His Resurrection. "All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me" (Mt. 28:17).

Death is not merely a single event. It, too, is a kingdom, to which some choose to belong. "By the envy of the devil, death entered the world, and they who are in his possession experience it" (Wisdom 2:24). Yet God "has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son" (Col. 1:13; see also Heb. 2:14-15). Christ, by rising, has not only overcome His own death; He has overcome ours! He has overturned the entire kingdom of death.

The effects of that defeated kingdom do, indeed, endure, even as the Kingdom of God makes progress in growth through the phases of human history. Pope John Paul II has pointed out the existence of "a kind of 'conspiracy against life,'" a "war of the powerful against the weak" in our day (see The Gospel of Life (EV), n.12).

Yet in working to overcome this culture of death, marked most tragically by abortion, we are not simply working "for victory." We, rather, are working "from victory!" Victory is our starting point. Christ is Risen! This concrete, historical event, in all its truth and significance, contains the objective defeat of the culture of death. The Victory of Life, furthermore, is present in every Mass, where we proclaim, "Dying you destroyed our death; Rising you restored our life!"

Easter gives us our identity as "the people of life" (EV n.79). Baptized into Christ's victory over death, we are also sent to proclaim, celebrate, and serve that victory (see EV 78-101). At Easter Mass, we renew the vows of our baptism, one of which is that we "reject Satan and all his works." Chief among those works is death. Yet the Son of God has destroyed death, and that means that we who follow Him likewise are called to stand against it.

Many who sincerely believe may not realize the full implications of that belief. To believe in and celebrate the Resurrection necessarily immerses us in and commits us to the conflict against evils such as abortion and euthanasia. We are not free to ignore the battle or entrust it to someone else. It belongs to our very identity to fight it. It belongs to the very identity of the priest, furthermore, to preach it.

And it belongs to our identity to do all this with the utmost serenity, confidence, and joy. Christ is truly Risen and is with us! Let us rejoice and be glad!

Vita Pro Omni!