How to Be Fully Prolife
This week 21 years ago the Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act, which legalised abortion-on-demand in South Africa, came into effect.
For the Catholic Church, this law is a stain on our democracy because abortion kills God-made life, which is sacred. So Catholics mourn the 70000-90000 unborn lives that are legally extinguished in South Africa every year, and the many that die in still-widespread illegal abortions.
No political party of any significant support in South Africa proposes to change the law, so abortion-on-demand is here to stay, and is in the process of further liberalisation.
While the Church and other pro-life groups must register their opposition to the Act, an emphasis must also be placed on engaging with government to make available alternatives to abortion. Of course, we must also pray for a conversion of hearts which might lead to pro-life policies. But, more than that, we must lead by example of being truly pro-life.
The Catholic Mater Homes and similar facilities which support pregnant women in difficult circumstances provide good examples of the types of alternatives which the government should help fund.
Of course, we must also pray for a conversion of hearts which might lead to pro-life policies. But, more than that, we must lead by example of being truly pro-life. Indeed, the meaning of pro-life is distorted when those who claim that label are taking positions that are contemptuous of human life in other areas.
Being consistently pro-life inevitably means to be at odds with positions, policies and ideologies on all sides of the political spectrum.
Abortion and euthanasia are not the only issues that define being pro-life. Indeed, the meaning of pro-life is distorted when those who claim that label are taking positions that are contemptuous of human life in other areas.
One cannot stand for the protection of the unborn in the womb but be indifferent, or even hostile, to those who have been born.
How can we mourn the aborted child but tolerate the humanitarian crises which produce images like that of Syrian three-year-old Alan Kurdi, whose escape from civil war ended with his drowned body washed up on a beach in Turkey?
Indifference or hostility to refugees and other migrants, especially children, is at odds with being pro-life. One cannot be pro-life when one is willing to tolerate people dying in the absence of accessible and competent health services, and affordable medicine.
How can we mourn the aborted child but tolerate inadequate or unaffordable health services to the poor and the aged?
One cannot be pro-life when one is willing to tolerate people dying in the absence of accessible and competent health services, and affordable medicine.
How can we mourn the aborted child but tolerate policies which result in children going hungry, or even starving?
One cannot be pro-life when one supports the withdrawal of social welfare for the poor, or stops migrants from trying to leave conditions of abject poverty.
How can we mourn the aborted child but tolerate agitation for military action or war, be it for geo-political or exploitative reasons, in which civilians are killed or otherwise harmed? Policies and practices which directly or indirectly lead to the avoidable death of human life or grave harm to innocent people are by definition anti-life.
It is not possible to be pro-life while also supporting unnecessary military conflicts and the weapons industry which produces the means by which innocent people, including children, are being killed.
Policies and practices which directly or indirectly lead to the avoidable death of human life or grave harm to innocent people are by definition anti-life.
One cannot be pro-life when one adopts anti-life positions or tolerates policies that harm human dignity. To advocate against abortion while also consenting to policies which harm or kill innocent lives is not being pro-life but merely anti-abortion.
The Church refers to the consistent life ethic, or the Seamless Garment principle. Accordingly, our concerns must include issues such as abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, migration, militarism, human trafficking, social and economic injustice and so on.
These require a consistent application of moral principles that value the sacredness of human life. The Seamless Garment is in essence the proper practice of Catholic Social Teaching. These require a consistent application of moral principles that value the sacredness of human life. The Seamless Garment is in essence the proper practice of Catholic Social Teaching.
While we must beware of moral equivalence — the denial of a minimum wage is not as intrinsically immoral as abortion, for example — we may not be selective about which lives we deem sacred, exempting those whom we consider dispensable from our concerns because to do so is ideologically convenient or profitable.
Like Christ’s seamless garment which the soldiers could not divide, so is our call to protect all human life indivisible.
To God and his Church, each human person, without exception, is sacred. We, therefore, can do no other than to be pro-life on all fronts.
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