We awake to find ourselves suddenly in a Post-Roe world. The question of abortion is thrown back into the political process, and it’s dawning on all of us that we spent 40 years praying for this day, and almost no time preparing for it.
The early political setbacks are hard to take. How is it that our intellectual opponents have so many people convinced that it’s a woman’s right to end the life of her child if it’s inconvenient? How can a society so moral and sensitive not only be permissive of this idea, but fanatically in favor of it?
In times like these, I find it helpful to consider things from a broader perspective. We exist in a tiny moment in history. Our lives of 60, 70, or 80 years are a blink of an eye. The positive impact that the Church has effected in society is remarkable. We are simply fighting the final battle.
In the days of the early church, children had zero value in society. They were entirely disposable, with infanticide occurring regularly. Newborn children could be taken to a certain part of land on the outskirts of town and abandoned to die.
Over the centuries, the Christian concept of the human person started to be accepted by society and enshrined in law. No longer were people valued for their utilitarian values; they were valued for existing. Christians placed a value on the life of a child, and the world followed.
Fifty years of terrible law informed the morality of modern-day America, teaching people that some life is disposable. It will take time, effort, and still more prayer to remove this cancer so entrenched in our morality. But it’s a fight that the Church must continue, to eradicate evil in the world, and to bring the Good News and freedom of the Gospel to all people.
