As many of you know, I am a foster kitten mom. While this job brings many joys, I recently experienced one of the greatest heartbreaks. Two of my babies died. I felt like I should have done more for them or that if they were in someone else’s hands they would have survived. God doesn’t want me to beat myself up though, he wants me to learn from it.
While I mourned the loss of these tiny lives, a thought came to me. As much as I mourn these tiny kittens that I’ve known for just a couple weeks, how much more I should mourn the loss of my American brothers and sisters who are killed in abortion each and every day, the ones I largely forget about. One statistic says 2300 babies are killed every day in our country alone. Can you imagine the outcry our country would make if it was kittens being killed? And yet even many Catholics these days are largely silent. We forget the genocide happening before these tiny lives even have the chance to experience life outside of the womb. How can we fight for the rights of those living outside of the womb if we ignore the rights of those not given the chance to be born?
Of course, this shouldn’t be an either/or scenario. As Catholics we should fight for both. Unfortunately, many have forgotten this. We fight over which situation and lives today are more important while others are forgotten. It is so easy to do this. We are supposed to fight for all lives.
I recently had a conversation with a fellow Catholic about making abortion illegal. It shocked me to hear his response that we should make abortion unnecessary, not illegal. Again, I invite you to consider the outcry if this same tactic had been used for slavery. If instead of making slavery illegal, Abraham Lincoln had only tried to make it unnecessary. Most likely, our black brothers and sisters would still be held in bondage today, because we can always make excuses for why something is “necessary.”
Why do I write this? Because I find it frightening that as Catholics many have forgotten their beliefs. Abortion is the murder of a child. Period. If you support murder inside the womb what is so wrong about allowing murder to be legal outside the womb as well? Free all the murderers from prison and declare it is their right to do as they deem necessary. I hope you find this statement ridiculous. If we are to reject abortion, the greatest genocide in our world today, worse than all the concentration camps, we must act upon it. Pray, pray, pray. Do not be afraid to speak the truth, share insightful articles (not attacking) on your Facebook page, volunteer or donate baby supplies for low income parents at the Women’s Care Center, offer to babysit for a single parent, pray outside an abortion clinic, spiritually adopt an unborn baby (can be found in October 11 bulletin) and so much more. You don’t have to do big things to save a life, but we are all called to do small things each and every day.
Again, I am not saying we should not care for all forms of life, the immigrant, the poor, the hurting, the elderly, those being discriminated against for their skin color. No, we should and we can care for all. But caring for these people should not bring us to care less for the unborn. We can do both/and. Our efforts for people we can see are essentially meaningless if we do not also give all people the right to be born. I invite you not to be apathetic, but to care and care deeply for all people. Be like Jesus and love, care for, and serve all those most in need in our society today. They need us. Let us respond with our wholehearted yes.