Sanctity of Human Life Sunday is usually an encouraging day for me. As a pro-life woman in an increasingly secular world, I often feel small and alone in my desire to see life celebrated at every stage. The March for Life and decelerations of support from around the country remind me each year that there are millions of people who join me in this cause. Usually, today is a day of encouragement. But this year, Sanctity of Human Life Sunday is a heavy day for me.
This year I’m celebrating Sanctity Of Life Sunday with my precious little boys. As the two of you careen into a pillow fort and ask me to read yet another book, I look into your smiling faces and my heart feels heavy because I know a truth I pray you never discover.
You, my precious baby boys, have been used as an argument for abortion.
Although many abortion activists would like to keep their arguments solely based on individual freedom (my body, my choice) many have found that arguments based on personal preference don’t stand up to the magnitude of grief that occurs when you take a human life. Even while pro-choice advocates deny an embryo is human life, reality strikes at the center of the human conscience and reminds even the most staunch abortion advocate that a child that will no longer be here every time an abortion occurs. Children are being prevented from entering this world, and in response to this truth the advocates of abortion on demand have turned to one of their ugliest arguments yet. I shudder when I realize that their current tactic threatens you both in and outside the womb. They try to claim it would be better for you, my precious children, if you weren’t here.
Your mother checked all of Planned Parenthood’s boxes. Young. Unmarried. Addicted. Homeless. In today’s cruelly polite society even those who oppose abortion often feel uncomfortable saying a pregnancy should be continued under those circumstances. I can pull up my computer and find dozens of arguments for abortion that use your life (and thousands of other children lives) as a case study for why we should continue to be a pro-choice society.
“The child might be abused” the internet activists cry, and I nod sadly. You were abused.
“The baby would end up in foster care” the politicians argue, and I sigh. You spent your whole life in the foster system, waiting for normalcy that seemed to never come.
“What if drugs and alcohol are involved? Don’t you know the child could have special needs?” The clinician states this fact as if it’s a nonnegotiable reason to abort, but as I buckle you into your seat to bring you to yet another medical appointment, I know full well the impact those toxins had on your developing brain. You will live with the impact all your life. But you will live.
“What if the mother doesn’t even want them?” This question brings tears to my eyes at the thought of a young woman whose only motivation to check herself into rehab came when she saw your smiling face for the first time. She never managed to continue in her sobriety, and I don’t know where she is today. But I do know, despite her later protestations, that she did want you. Even when she couldn’t raise you. Even when she declared she didn’t care. She did love and want you and that love brought her the only sober months in her entire adult life.
“Why not let people do what they want? Does it really matter?” The apathetic world around me often questions. I watch the two of you chase after a balloon with sequels of delight, and that’s when I begin to weep.
I weep for the millions of tax payer dollars that have been spent to equip your mother to end your life, when I know that same money could have been spent on outreaches and programs to assist her after she chose to give you life.
I weep for the broken young women who caved to pressure and now ache to hold the children they will never meet.
I weep when I remember fellow christians who are eager and willing to declare the evils of abortion, but who don’t take time to reach out to the homeless, addicted, frightened, young woman in their midst to ask how they can help.
I weep for the millions of children just like you who are playing in heaven but will never have a chance to play here on earth. I believe they are happy and at peace now, but I wish we could meet them here. Maybe they would have been your friends.
I pray you never hear these arguments for abortion. I pray by the time you are old enough to read and understand the implications of the pro-choice movement, abortion will not only be illegal but also unthinkable. I pray that people take time to celebrate and embrace your life instead of arguing over wether or not someone should have ended it. I pray you show the world what an incredible gift you are.
I know life may not be easy for you, my sweet boys. You have been through so much in your short life span, and you will carry those scars through life. I promise to be by your side, to love you, and to point you to the Healer of all pain. I don’t know what life holds for you, but I pray it is wonderful. I’m thankful your mother chose life.
And no matter what you do or where you go, I want you to know that I’m glad you’re here. And as I watch you try yet again to catch your ever elusive balloon, I know you are too.
“Defend the weak and the fatherless; uphold the cause of the poor and oppressed."
- Psalm 82:3
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