Catholic Standard and Times - Take charge: You have the power to change Council’s decision

Take charge: You have the power to change Council’s decision

“I implore the Catholics of this city to take a stand here and now. Write to the council members who voted to label us this way and tell them what you think.”

By Michelle Laque Johnson
Editor-in-Chief

When the Philadelphia City Council labeled the City of Brotherly Love a “pro-choice city,” Cardinal Rigali rightfully called the label “shameful.”

But even more outrageous than the vote was the reaction of Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania’s president and CEO, Dayle Steinberg, who said: “What’s shameful is to equate reproductive rights with homicide.”

One has to wonder if Steinberg knows the definition of homicide. What exactly does Steinberg think abortionists are doing when they enter the mother’s womb and dismember an infant?

However, let’s enter Steinberg’s fantasyland for a brief moment and pretend that a fetus is not a human being; that it’s only “a bunch of cells.” Okay, what would Steinberg say is happening in a partial-birth abortion when the abortionist pulls a baby, which is on the verge of being born, halfway out of a mother’s womb, plunges scissors into its skull and sucks its brains out? What should we call that lethal and calculated attack directed specifically to the vital organs of this “clump of cells” science calls a fully functioning human organism?

“Pro-choice” people think such graphic language is barbaric. That’s because the reality of what they are supporting is gruesome and it is easier to hide behind words that obscure than to face what’s really happening to the infant. But if we can’t talk about what we’re doing in real words, there’s something wrong with it, don’t you think?

What was even more shameful to me about Council’s decision was the reaction of the Catholic councilmembers who voted that this label be applied to our city. In explaining his pro-choice vote, Councilman William Greenlee noted that the resolution “only mentions the word abortion once.”

If all the Catholics on Council had voted against the resolution, which passed 9 to 8, it would have failed. I’ll tell you something — I would not like to have to stand before God and explain to Him why I thought it would be a good thing to tell the world that Philadelphia is a city that actively endorses killing His children.

Of course, it’s true that this vote doesn’t have any “legal” meaning. It’s simply part of the battle for the hearts, the minds, and the souls of the citizens of this country — and, you know what? That matters. It’s souls that we should be most concerned about.

It’s become abundantly clear to me that when most of the secular media refers to someone as a “right-wing extremist,” what they really mean is that he or she is pro-life. You could be liberal on every other issue of our day (and ironically that’s true for most Catholics), but if you are pro-life, most of the secular media will label you as a “religious zealot.”

Why? Because, in my opinion, the polarization in this country has really come down to one issue and one issue only: abortion. That’s why the battle is so fierce, that’s why it feels so bad.

What every Catholic needs to understand is that the battle is not about — and has never been about — which political party you prefer. That has absolutely nothing to do with anything.

It’s about the most important issue of our time — the defining issue of our time. And every single one of us is going to have to answer to God for what we have or haven’t done about this. How can we be divided about the issue of whether an infant should live or die? What’s happened to us?

Think about it. When Adolph Hitler was running for Chancellor in Germany, would it have made any moral sense for someone to say: “Well, I don’t agree with him on the Holocaust, but I’m supporting him because he’s strong on the economy”?

If you and I had lived in the 1800s, would we be proud to say that we had voted for someone who thought slavery was a good idea?

So how can we today say what amounts to the same thing about any public officials, be they Republican or Democrat: “Well, I don’t agree with him or her about the abortion holocaust, but they’re strong on the economy.”

The fact that so many of those who hold themselves out as candidates for the office of president of the United States are avowedly pro-abortion should be profoundly disturbing to the entire nation — and even more so to Catholics, who are called to an even higher standard of conduct. (“To whom much is given, much is expected.”)

Pro-abortion people are convinced that President Bush filled two vacancies on the U.S. Supreme Court with pro-life justices and that he will get the chance to install one more before he leaves office. That is driving them crazy. So the battle is escalating. Some elected officials are hoping to sidestep the U.S. Supreme Court and to legislate abortion rights, even the right to partial-birth abortion. Do any of us really believe God is smiling down on this?

Pro-life people need to stand up and be counted. We need to make our voices heard as citizens and not be drowned out by the media-amplified roar of the congenitally outraged proponents of abortion.

I believe in the “seamless garment” argument — that we as Catholics must be pro-life on all issues from the death penalty to abortion.

Yes, war is a life issue and that is the focus of many citizens today. Some see the Iraq war as a waste of American lives. Others believe it is saving American lives that would be lost due to terrorism.

Whatever your view, I think it’s important to look at the numbers. Did you know that the number of babies who die each year from abortions (1.5 million/year) are higher than all the American casualties from the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, World War I and II, the Korean War, Vietnam and the Persian Gulf Wars combined? [See http://www.california prolife.org/abortion/aborstats.html.]

In the movie “Schindler’s List,” the title character cried because he couldn’t save everyone — but he saved as many individuals as he possibly could. How can we do less?

To those who think such a stand is “extreme,” I ask you to consider for just a moment why God put us here on this earth. What’s the point?

As the old Baltimore Catechism said: “God made us to know Him, to love Him and to serve Him in this world so we can be happy with Him in the next.”

To know, love and serve God means to keep His commandments, and one of them is “Thou shalt not kill.”

That’s why I implore the Catholics of this city to take a stand here and now. Write to the councilmembers who voted to label us this way and tell them what you think. Demonstrate in front of City Hall. Write letters to every newspaper in the region. Change this. You have the power!

Don’t you think that if the secular media wrote about abortion the way they do about the war, everyone would be pro-life? Take charge of this issue.

I pray for the day when we do not need to argue over whether it should be okay to kill babies — and the elderly and the disabled.

It is incumbent on all of us — you, me and our neighbors — to work for that reality. Then, the United States and its citizens can once again proudly label themselves: “one nation under God.”

Contact Michelle Johnson at mjohnson@adphila.org or (215) 587-3698