Forbidden Statistics. . .

Violence is no stranger to life.  We live in fear and have normalized so many things put in place because of our fear of violence, random or targeted.  We search for meaning to understand violence, from the rationale of the mass shooter to the causes that fuel terrorism.  Breaking news warns us of another incident, another cause for tears, and another reason to fear.

One of the statistics from 2019 that you probably did not hear is that more people died due to abortion than any other single cause.  Some 42 million lives were lost not to the random acts of violence that shape our fears or the mystery of the terrorist whose cause is death but the simple choice, mostly legal, to end the life growing within the womb.

We do not hear of this statistic because it is one of the sacred rights to be preserved and protected, the so-called right of choice.  In reality the choice has inevitably already been made.  Most abortions are chosen not for the health of the mother or because of the deformity or genetic abnormality of the child or even because of rape or incest.  Most abortions, perhaps in the upper 90% of all abortions, are chosen simply because it has been determined the child is not convenient or wanted or welcome.  It is, in the minds of many, no different than ignoring your ringing cell phone or watching people at your door through your video doorbell but not answering its call.  It is a choice, we are told over and over again.  But the choice is more than a choice.  It is the mark of our callous society so indifferent to the consequences of our choices and presuming that if you refuse to call the child in the womb a life, it is not a life.  It is the fruit of a selfish and self-centered world in which the individual reigns supreme and even the life of the unborn must succumb to the desire of the woman (whether alone or in concert with her doctors or her family).

It is as if every year another country with a population even larger than the size of Canada simply disappears.  And with it, our dignity.  Quite apart from religious arguments against abortion, the stain it casts over our nobility as a race cannot be denied.  Though we often consider the opposition to abortion largely religious and largely confined to Roman Catholics, some Lutherans, some Baptists, and some Orthodox, the reality is that this is not simply a religious issue.  Some, who do not share religious convictions with us, have admitted that the scandal of abortion casts a long and dark shadow over the presumed sophistication and dignity we want to believe belongs to us as a race.

Just something to think about as we find ourselves only weeks away from the American anniversary of a choice to legalize and protect the right to take the life of the child in the womb.  And to consider the urgency of the cause to undo our twisted view of rights and privilege.  And to restore the dignity and value due every life -- from conception to natural end.  How can we claim to be a moral people and allow this scandal?  How can we justify the loss of so many lives while at the same time claiming to be offended by the violence of war, terrorism, and mass murderers?