harmonicminer

In the William Wade Lecture Series given at St. Louis University in March of 1984, Joseph Cardinal Bernadin delivered a seminal address in which he drew connections between the opposition to legal abortion-on-demand, capital punishment, assisted suicide, economic injustice, euthanasia, and the nuclear arms race, as well as opposition to unjust war and even all war.  This perspective has gone under the labels “seamless garment”and “consistent ethic of life.”  Cardinal Bernadin said:

“It is both a complex and a demanding tradition; it joins the humanity of the unborn infant and the humanity of the hungry; it calls for positive legal action to prevent the killing of the unborn or the aged and positive societal action to provide shelter for the homeless and education for the illiterate.

 In response to those who fear otherwise, I contend that the systemic vision of a consistent ethic of life will not erode our crucial public opposition to the direction of the arms race; neither will it smother our persistent and necessary public opposition to abortion. ..

A consistent ethic of life does not equate the problem of taking life (e.g., through abortion and in war) with the problem of promoting human dignity (through humane programs of nutrition, health care, and housing). But a consistent ethic identifies both the protection of life and its promotion as moral questions. It argues for a continuum of life which must be sustained in the face of diverse and distinct threats.

Notwithstanding the Cardinal’s instruction that the direct defense of life is not to be equated with the promotion of quality of life, this kind of language has been used to provide cover for supposedly pro-life Christians to vote for essentially pro-abortion-on-demand candidates.  This is due to the belief that these candidates will promote particular social programs and entitlements which are assumed to “promote life” and possibly reduce the “need” for abortion.  Such voters will usually also expect the candidate to take left-leaning positions on national defense, capital punishment, nationalized health care, etc. (essentially the entire panoply of progressive causes), under the guise that these also “promote life.”  It is as if these voters believe that we can make up for allowing the killing of millions of babies by feeding and protecting the ones we allow to live, though it’s hard to demonstrate that progressive policies actually help the living in the long run.

In this “consistent ethic of life” approach, it’s important to distinguish between straight-up moral questions (under what circumstances should it be legal to terminate the lives of the unborn?) and prudential questions (granted that we wish to limit poverty and violence in the world, what are the best means for doing so?).  Somehow, for the “seamlessly pro-life,” when it is time to vote, the merely prudential seems to trump the clear moral issue of legal abortion-on-demand.  Yet, it is on the prudential questions that the “seamless garment” arguments mostly fail.  Let’s consider a few of them.

In the 1984 election (the occasion of Cardinal Bernadin’s quote above), the argument was made that Ronald Reagan, though pro-life, was the lesser choice for the “consistent ethic of life” because of his commitment to rebuilding the US military, including updated nuclear capabilities.  The facts of history have proved that perspective wrong.  Reagan’s policies were critical in bringing about the 1989 implosion of the Soviet government.  Nuclear weapons still exist on our planet, but we are far safer from nuclear annihilation than we were.  We owe that fact to Reagan, Thatcher, John Paul II, and the many Polish and Russian activists who risked their lives speaking out, not to the nuclear freeze movement or a sham nuclear detente that allowed the Soviets to build up their arsenal of nuclear weapons while US capabilities deteriorated under Carter.

For all that the desire to care for the poor is laudable, and many of the “seamless garment” proponents feel very virtuous in voting for those candidates who promise more and greater entitlements from public funds, the facts of history now belie that approach to alleviating poverty.  The poverty rates in the USA are about the same now as they were before the Great Society programs of the Johnson administration were begun.  After 7 trillion or more dollars of wealth transference from producers to takers in the last 40 years, the rates of poverty aren’t noticeably different in the USA than they were in 1965.   In contrast, before the Great Society entitlements began, poverty had dropped steeply in the preceding decade.  (Source:  US Census Bureau)  Might that trend have continued without the interference of the Great Society programs?

Entitlement programs don’t end poverty.  They merely support people living in it and reduce motivation for people to get out of it.  As Thomas Sowell has pointed out, mobility through the various economic strata is quite common.  In the USA, the poor of this decade are often the middle class of the next.   Those who move out of poverty in this way don’t do it by relying on public assistance, and little case can be made that such programs are primarily responsible for moving people to higher economic productivity and reward.  Upward mobility is promoted by staying out of jail, finishing high school, not becoming addicted, getting a job, marrying before making babies, and staying married afterward.

Economists know that minimum wage laws and rent control simply reduce the availability of entry-level jobs and affordable housing.  There are many regulations affecting small business that have the net effect of reducing the number jobs that are available.  Such laws and regulations are usually favored by the progressive “seamless garment” voter.  How are these policies “seamlessly pro-life”?

“Anti-poverty” programs have encouraged behavior and perspectives that tend to make people poorer, not richer.  In particular, these programs result in breaking down family structure, rewarding bad behavior (more money per illegitimate child), teaching dependency and a sense of entitlement, etc.  How difficult is it for a young person who has been raised to believe he or she is owed a living by society or the government to take the steps necessary to become self-sufficient?  Young people who are taught to resent the success of the productive are less likely to begin their own journey through education, skills acquisition, employment, and self-sufficiency.  How is that “seamlessly pro-life”?

The welfare/dependency model has resulted in higher crime rates, especially among people raised with no married father in the home.  The prisons are full of inmates who had no father to raise them, a direct result of government policies rewarding broken families, or families that never really formed.  The “medicine” for poverty has made the patient far sicker.  How is that “seamlessly pro-life”?

Many on the Left warned of dire consequences as state after state allowed law-abiding citizens to carry concealed weapons.  The experiment has been conducted, and the results are in.  Overwhelmingly, law-abiding armed citizens are not a danger to society and have protected themselves and others on many occasions.  Nor are they a significant source of weapons getting into the hands of criminals.  Again, regardless of your opinion on the right to self-defense (and the means to do it), prudentially speaking, concealed carry laws (even in densely populated major cities) have been shown to be a good idea that does not endanger life and often protects it.  When a person is murdered or injured who was not allowed to be sufficiently armed to act in self-defense, how can that policy be considered part of a “consistent ethic of life”?

Here are some questions to ask yourself if you are attracted to the progressive view of the “consistent ethic of life:

Can you be “seamlessly pro-life” and also support social, economic and governmental policies that produce death, or encourage and support lifestyles that lead to death and/or degradation?

Can you be “seamlessly pro-life” and believe we should not actively resist those who would control us through fear, threats, and the direct practice of violence, whether they are terrorists, gang members, or foreign despots?

Can you be “seamlessly pro-life” and believe we should not defend our nation from aggression?

Can you be “seamlessly pro-life” if you support leaving people individually defenseless against predators?

Can you be “seamlessly pro-life” if you support light sentences for violent offenders who have threatened or taken life and will probably do so again?

These kinds of considerations are critical in seeking a “consistent ethic of life.”  Christian voters must think carefully and support candidates whose overall perspectives and policy prescriptions are likely to lead people to make better choices in their own lives.   Christian voters should avoid voting for candidates who support policies that have already been shown to produce undesirable unintended consequences, especially motivation-killing entitlement programs.

The real “seamless garment” will include opposition to legal abortion-on-demand, opposition to social programs and entitlements that encourage dependency and sloth while killing motivation, support for strong law enforcement that removes predators from easy access to victims, reasonable options for law-abiding individuals to actively defend themselves and their families, strong national defense to deter attack, and encouragement for people to move out of destructive lifestyles.

That is the true “consistent ethic of life.”

Today is the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, which allows any woman or teenage girl to have her unborn child killed for any reason, or none, at pretty much anytime in the pregnancy (despite minor limitations some states have managed to implement). Abortion may be “legal” but it will never be “safe” for the killed human being, and it isn’t all that “safe” for the mother, either. The failure of the church to unite over ending this Shoah is similar to its failure to end slavery, although, as with abolition movements of the 19th century, at least some elements of the church are in the vanguard.

Somewhere between 50 million and 55 million pre-born human beings have been killed since Roe v Wade in 1973. Abortion is THE social justice issue of our time, yet “social justice” advocates are virtually silent about it. It is especially tragic that so many churches and para-church organizations are essentially silent on the matter, when they aren’t simply “pro-choice” by default.

It is thought impolite and confrontational by many to bring this matter up. It is as if someone’s comfortable feelings are more important than the lives being taken, legally.

It is seen by some as primarily a political issue, but it is a straight up moral issue, with very little “middle ground” (what is a half-dead baby?), and our silence on it condemns us, particularly when we are silent out of concern for what other people will think of us, and for fear of offending someone whose good will we require.

Some people want to divert the discussion by pointing out their great concern for the poor and minorities, yet it is the poor and minorities whose children are killed in hugely disproportionate numbers by the Big Business that is abortion in America (Planned Parenthood and its competitors, ringing poor communities in America with pre-born infant disposal centers), one of the very few big businesses that the left never criticizes, and indeed funds with government money. Margaret Sanger and the eugenics movement are winning every day.

In any case, reasonable people can disagree about what will lift the poor out of poverty. It is a prudential question, not a moral one. It is a “how” question. No one disagrees that it would be good if there was less poverty. But legal abortion-on-demand-for-any-reason-or-none is a “what” question, namely, “What is evil, virtually always immoral and wrong by definition, and should be deeply restricted or totally stopped by a civilized people?” The answer is pretty clear. We can’t, by legislation or political action, end 90% of poverty. But we could, by concerted education combined with legal and political action, return abortion rates to those of the 1960s.

Our silence, the silence of those who see themselves as caring, loving people, is deafening.

Our inaction is worse. Our tolerance is…. intolerable.

Why kill the child for the sins of the father?

Peter Singer, “bioethicist”

The fallacy in the anti-abortion argument lies in the shift from the scientifically accurate claim that the foetus is a living individual of the species Homo sapiens to the ethical claim that the foetus therefore has the same right to life as any other human being. Membership of the species Homo sapiens is not enough to confer a right to life. We can plausibly argue that we ought not to kill, against their will, self-aware beings who want to continue to live. We can see this as a violation of their autonomy, or a thwarting of their preferences. But why should a being’s potential to become rationally self-aware make it wrong to end its life before it has the capacity for rationality or self-awareness?

The logical end of this type of thinking is that parents should be able to kill one month old babies (who have essentially no “rationality” or “self-awareness”).  You may think that I’m exaggerating the case, and Singer doesn’t really intend that outcome.

But you would be wrong.  He is on record as saying exactly that.  So:  when someone is this morally, ethically deaf, should ANYTHING they say be given any credence whatsoever?

Obviously not….  except that Singer is a hero of the Progressive Left, NARAL, Planned Parenthood, and by extension, whether you like it or not, the Democratic party, which supports these organizations.

Abortion is a MORAL issue before it is a POLITICAL one….  but sadly, there are two many Christians who want to be more “politically open,” extending to supporting the Democratic party in furthering the murder of the unborn.

It is truly the American Holocaust.  One of the saddest aspects:  the people in the USA who, of all people, should be most interested in protecting the helpless, because their forefathers were slaves, are in fact most likely to support candidates who favor making it easy for them to kill their unborn children.

Canadian Medical Association: babies not human until after birth

The largest association of doctors in Canada, in an attempt to stonewall a looming abortion debate from being unleashed, voted yesterday to support the wording of the country’s Criminal Code which states that a baby becomes a “human being” only after being born. Pro-life doctors and leaders have condemned the move as ‘shameful’, ‘unethical’, and ‘defying parody’. Delegates to the Canadian Medical Association’s annual general council voted on the motion so as to prevent what they called a “backdoor” attempt to reopen the abortion debate. They voted to pass, says a CMA report on the meeting, “a resolution supporting the current wording of the Criminal Code which states that a child ‘becomes a human being within the meaning of this Act when it has completely proceeded, in a living state, from the body of its mother…’” Canadian Physicians for Life condemned the CMA’s move, saying that “every Canadian doctor knows that the unborn child is a live human being.”

Of course, even by the distorted definition of “human being” above, President Obama wanted to withhold medical care from born human beings, when he was a State Senator in Illinois…  because their mothers wanted them dead, and our president is so radical that he thinks mothers have a right to a dead baby when they abort, even if the child miraculously survives the abortion.  Further, it seems our president didn’t even want these tiny human survivors to have “comfort care”….  because even that would involve acknowledging their status as human beings.  

After an “outpouring of concern” a very large Maine lobster is going to be spared by a Cape Cod restaurant. Instead of becoming a feast it will be returned to the sea.

Meanwhile approximately 3700 babies will be aborted today.