Today begins the 40 Days for Life campaign: prayer, fasting and presence. This movement began locally and has grown terrifically in such a short time.
Here’s the website for the effort.
More from Musings from a Catholic Bookstore.
Sheila Liaugminas has a couple of related blog posts on the pro-life movement in South Dakota, one with a video from Dr. Bernard Nathanson – helpful to focus our minds at the beginning of these 40 days, reminding us what this is all about – not a ‘wedge issue” that “right-wingers” bring out this time of year for fun, not a “single issue” about which some wackos inconveniently and inexplicably obsess, but lives.
Yes! Respect for life is not a “single issue” but as our good bishops have pointed out, a foundational one.
If we were to compare our nation to a house, the roof and walls are our foreign policy and immigration; our furnace and a/c is the environment; plumbing is health care; economy is the windows, paint, and furnishings; and respect for life is the foundation. If the foundation is crumbling, the rest really don’t matter much, because they all rely on respect for one another.
If our laws allow the destruction of the most innocent, voiceless, and vulnerable in our society, what is the influence on our culture now and in the future?
Don’t like war and crime? What influence will the killing of the unborn have upon the the killing or injuring of those who are slightly less innocent and vulnerable?
Think our economy is unjust? What will be the influence on greed from a culture that allows the destruction of the most innocent for any reason?
Think we need to remove our dependence on foreign oil and take better care of the environment? If we can kill the most innocent of human beings, what will be the influence on damaging anything that is not human?
Any perceived benefits from a set of policies (as good as they may be) which continue to allow the destruction of the unborn is short-sited and will ultimately fail.
If our laws allow the destruction of the most innocent, voiceless, and vulnerable in our society, what is the influence on our culture now and in the future?
This is a good question from a very good post. Unfortunately, I’m afraid that most people don’t see the inherent causality. After all, we are a culture that will spare no effort in rescuing a beached whale, yet thinks nothing of killing millions of people before birth. The mind of this culture thinks, Where is the foundation crumbling? See the compassion we have for just one beached whale? We are *such* good people! There is no problem!
Walker Percy said that if the present age were a patient, we would say it has dementia. Savage and sentimental at the same time, the present age has a pathology so deep that I’m not confident that it will ever recognize just how foundational the life issues are. Sadly, it seems that we will become ever more passionate about saving “our own” lives (“our own” a dangerously shifting definition of the in-groups and out-groups), while at the same time becoming ever more lethal against anything that threatens our safety and comfort.
If you look up the recent quotes for Baroness Warnock , an English “bioethicist”, for a sample of where this loss of respect for life leads. Or we could just read Paul VI, I believe he predicted much of this.
Today from David Bereit – National 40 Days Director:
What a way to start the day!
The fall 40 Days for Life campaign was barely hours
old when we received an e-mail from Jennifer in
Cherry Hill, New Jersey. She and a few others had
arrived at 6:30 Wednesday morning to pray at the
abortion center.
A couple arrived in the parking lot, got out of their
car and walked towards the building. “Joe gave them a
flyer,” said Jennifer, “and she brought it into the
clinic. About 10 minutes later they came out of the
clinic and went to the car.”
The woman argued with the man for a time, but then
they got in the car and left. “This lady looked at us
praying and blessed herself with the sign of the
cross,” Jennifer said. “We saved our first baby!”
Shortly thereafter, a text message appeared on my
phone from Chris, the campaign director from New York
City: “David! 1st 40 Days turnaround!” Later in the
day, another life was saved at the same location.
Nance, organizer of the Grimes and Waller county,
Texas, 40 Days for Life efforts e-mailed, “a BABY
SAVED from Planned Parenthood in Houston!!!”
While driving to the 40 Days for Life kickoff event
in South Bend, Indiana tonight, I received an excited
call from the Indianapolis campaign leader. A first
time 40 Days for Life volunteer was praying outside
the Planned Parenthood abortion facility this morning
when a car leaving the center pulled over and the
occupants beckoned for her to come near. The
volunteer nervously approached and was told by the
mother in the vehicle, “Your prayers are working. My
daughter just decided to not have an abortion.”