A few weeks
ago the Center for Medical Progress released a series of videos documenting the
illegal selling of aborted baby parts by Planned Parenthood and its affiliates. Watching the videos and the political and public
response reminded me of a time during college where I too was pro-choice. A woman’s right to choose sounded fair and
progressive – yet, I never really explored the topic. I just went along with friends and college
mates wanting to sound forward-thinking.
There was even a time when I considered working for Planned Parenthood
as a way to help the dozens of pregnant teens I encountered in my teaching
experience. I thought access to proper
birth control would prevent teens from early, unwanted pregnancies… My conversion challenged me to deeply explore
my position on abortion and many other social justice issues. Simply put, for
people to be pro-choice one must believe that life begins at birth. That means that when you or your friend gets
pregnant congratulations are unnecessary and a baby shower completely inappropriate
because the baby is not a baby until it enters the world. Nevertheless, I have
been to plenty of baby showers where the pro-choice parents celebrate the
pregnancy and even have named what they would refer to as a fetus were it not their baby! This leads me to believe that many people
decide on when human life begins based on whether it’s a wanted pregnancy or in
a desire to seem modern and tolerant.
Our Christian
faith teaches us that life begins at conception; thus, we can’t be pro-choice
while trying to live authentic Christian lives.
For us, human life has dignity and value whether the pregnancy was planned
or unwanted. The conditions on how the
baby was created does not have any relevance on whether it’s a human life or if
the baby deserves to live. Scientist argue as to when human life begins, but God
tells us clearly that He knew us even
before we were born while we were in the womb He appointed us to great things. I look back at the girl I used to be the one
that rejected traditional values and thought that pro-choice sounded so fair and
I realize that I was lazy. I didn’t
explore the issue deeply. I think many
of us are like the old me who get caught up wanting to sound open-minded and we
form our opinions and take our stance based on fear of sounding intolerant and
backwards. Yet, tolerance is not about
supporting modern choices over traditional values- it’s not about holding the
popular stance because people won’t question it. Tolerance means that I have a right to hold
my opinion even if others disagree. Yet,
sadly our church is perceived as intolerable because of our traditional values.
When I came
back to the Catholic Church I was a really misinformed, lazy liberal afraid to
sound like a bigot. I questioned everything about my faith and the things I didn’t understand scared me because
God was challenging me to change and grow.
Slowly, with the help of my brothers in Christ (and other resources) I began to educate myself
on social justice issues and I realized that love is so much more than a
feeling. To love means to make hard
choices and many times to go against popular belief- always standing for truth. Love makes us want the better for the other
in this case the best for our society. So,
if you are pro-choice begin asking yourself when does human life begin? When is a baby a baby? Explore issues with depth and an open heart.
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