This time of year always causes us to reflect on what has called itself the Pro-Life Movement.  It just may be failing.

            The objective manifestations of such a conclusion are evident:  50,000,000 dead children, tens of millions more of wounded men and women, an abortion rate in which 25 to 30 percent of all conceptions end in abortion (surgical and chemical), crashing demographics in Generations X and Y with the attendant devastation in the economic and social welfare systems, the chaos caused by destroyed families and kin groups, the legalization and acceptance of the morning after pill, the legalization of RU-486, the advancement of embryonic stem cell research, the support and funding of abortion by health insurance plans, and so much more.  Begun in the late 1960s and the early 1970s, the Pro-Life Movement has not been able to do much more than to accommodate the abortion culture, to make the culture of death more acceptable and mainstream.  There are a number of reasons for this, and while the discussion in this paper focuses on abortion, it can be applied to embryonic stem cell research or the life issue du jour.

            Contrast these losses with the gains of the Pro-Life Movement, which have not been of any real substance.  The most that can be claimed is a favorable policy here, a license plate there, funding for this, no funding for that.  The fundamental law of the land, the essential value of the society, is that life is subject to the whims of the powerful.

            As an initial, and obvious matter, the framing of the debate over whether unborn children can be ripped apart limb by limb has been decisive.  While everyone wants to live, and so everyone is actually pro-life, people understand that in America the foundational concept for the society, for the Republic, a revolutionary entity as it is, is freedom.  This means the ability to choose one’s religion, one’s place of work, one’s city of residence, one’s friends, one’s car, etc. etc. etc.  Being American is having the right to choose, and being American is the one thing everyone agrees upon – even the pro-lifers.  Being American is more important than anything else in the public’s mind because it is the only thing that apparently unites this polyglot of races, religions, ethnicities.  Being American carries with it the essential idea of freedom, of liberty.  Possessing the right to have an abortion, or to contracept, or to have sex with anyone you want, is a liberty issue for Americans, and the pro-life crowd has not fully come to understand this visceral opposition to their work.

              Pro-Life leaders routinely use the word choice to accommodate or support their position or to show the value of life.  They incorporate the word “choice” into their speeches, their websites, their organizational names.  They routinely call on women to “choose life” hearkening to the verse from Deuteronomy in the Bible where the reader is encouraged to choose life over death.

            So, the message becomes clear to everyone – choice is more fundamental, and hence more important, than life.  Choice is a condition precedent to life, and in a society where all things are reduced to the here and the now, to the material, to this world, and where satisfying individual’s wants, desires, and ego are elevated to the highest order, choice is essential.  It is the universally agreed upon good, even for Pro-Lifers.

            Closely allied with the acceptance and primacy of choice, the Pro-Life movement is reduced to providing nothing more than another option for women, or, in other words, working an accommodation with the culture of death.  We see this with the proliferation, and the celebration, by the Pro-Life movement of crisis pregnancy centers.  At first blush, the idea of helping pregnant women in need seems like a great one.  It’s a way, argue the Pro-Lifers, to provide support to women and their unborn babies, to let them know they are not alone, to help with the decision to choose life (there’s that choice thing again).  Churches, businesses, people of all walks of life, come to support, contribute to, praise the crisis pregnancy center system.  Proud speeches are made in support of this development and the “in-crowd” of the pious people flock to be a part of a crisis pregnancy center enterprise in the community.  Pro-Life propaganda touts the growing number of these places and the declining number of abortion facilities as proof of the efficacy of such a system.  But the reality is different from the hype.

            The crisis pregnancy centers (“CPCs”) undoubtedly do provide some help for pregnant women and do save some lives.  However, they serve to reinforce two dangerous, and self-defeating principles in the mind of the public – the idea of choice, to which we have already alluded, and the idea that abortion is a woman’s issue. 

            The movement has essentially told the world that abortion facilities and CPCs are on a par.  One takes life the other saves life, but that is okay.  With resources and energy going into supporting the CPCs (where many times contraception, a cause for abortion, is promoted and encouraged and counseled for the women), an accommodation has been reached with the pro-abortion crowd.  Everybody wins, America remains the land of choice.   

            The CPCs reinforce, make acceptable, and propagate, the idea that abortion is a woman’s rights issue, when it is not.  The pro-aborts came up with the idea that abortion was an issue of rights, and now the pro-lifers have impliedly, if not explicitly, accepted this viewpoint and reinforced it with their focus on the women.  No where else is this more apparent than with the CPC movement, but we hear the rhetoric on a regular basis that abortion is bad for women.  Political parties, “women’s” groups, grass roots lobbying groups, EWTN, Priests for Life, Focus on the Family, churches, the American Catholic Bishops, etc. etc., etc. all repeat the simple mantra that “abortion hurts women”.  And in so doing they agree with the framers of the issue, they accept the division of society into men and women, they validate the social and moral framework that makes abortion legal and desirable.

            To combat the pressures of a system that makes abortion a legal and legitimate option the Pro-Life Movement resorts to materialistic, or worldly, arguments.  The thought is not to offend people with religious discussions because, after all, we are in America which is a land that allows for religious freedom – choice, that is, among religions.  Therefore, America is a land where all religions are allowed and by implication no one is allowed to claim exclusive rights to  the truth. 

            Citing to health studies and statistics, making available resources and material assistance, the Pro-Life movement plays the same game of the pro-aborts.  A new world view, a different paradigm is not provided, just some arguments for, here we go again, exercising that right among rights – choice – to not have an abortion, or to have the baby.  After all, when things are reduced to material considerations, when the individual is paramount, and when the highest values are nothing more than wants and desires, then all the facts and figures in the world really do nothing more than provide rationalizations, or justifications, for actions.  They do not enlighten, they do not convince, they simply explain and people who are intent on doing what they want to do because they want to do it, will latch onto anything to explain why they had the baby, or, perhaps more frequently, why they had the abortion.

            What is witnessed here is part of a trend of the “Christians”, predominately lead by Evangelicals, to effect certain changes that benefit the business leaders of a commercial society.  By using arguments of how abortion (or, for that matter, pornography, homosexuality, etc.) causes health, economic, and societal problems, the pro-life forces are improving the environment for business.  This in reality has the effect of enhancing and solidifying the dominance of business in American society, and culture.  In turn, this encourages ever greater materialism.  By trying to be “reasonable”, the pro-lifers are defending the very materialistic culture and society that makes imaginable, and possible, the killing of children.  It is a self-defeating approach because it reinforces the worldly orientation of America.     

            Using science and “reason” to win arguments has been going on for a long time.  It is an essential component of the value system of America, and the West, and this is an example of the acceptance by the pro-lifers of the values of the dominant culture, the abortion culture, the culture of death, the American culture.    (Now, I’m not saying science and reason things are either bad or good but that they have their proper place and should not exist without faith, but that is another matter.)   Other values that pro-lifers hold to dearly include this idea of individualism (“it’s all up to you”), and that America is a great land, a land of promise, the ultimate in human development. 

            Let’s examine individualism first.  Recently there were tens of thousands of marchers in Washington D.C. on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade (why celebrate such a disaster?).   Looking closely at the crowd, and even speaking with the attendees, you come to realize that these are all individuals, walking together.  There is no group solidarity other than to claim this title of being “pro-life”.  To test this hypothesis (I believe it is more like a law), ask members of the local pro-life community to help you out when you are in trouble or short of cash or need a job or need help of any kind.  You’ll probably get a lot of good advice and see not a few heels leading towards the hills.  In other words, you are on your own.  The pro-lifers are individualists, and they are afraid, ashamed, of being overt members of a group.  Recently, the president of a students’ group apologized to the assembled 500 plus attendees at a major national pro-life event for her being Catholic.  And, God forbid, if any one would claim pride in being European-American.  (Note that African-Americans for Life is acceptable and celebrated.)  The members of the pro-life movement have accepted, and live, the values of the dominant culture that causes so much misery.  Many are individualistic and worldly.  Many contracept and engage in pre-marital sex.  They lust and are greedy and prideful.  They have God on their lips and mammon in their hearts.  They want the American Dream – conspicuous consumption without responsibility.  They think life is just grand, and can be grander still by changing this one thing.      

            Then there is the desire for celebrity status and celebrity seeking.  Who wouldn’t love to sit next to a representative or a senator?  Or get to talk to one face to face?  Wow, now that’s really moving up, and, after all, that is a very important value in America.  One that is shared by pro-choicers and pro-lifers alike. 

            And let’s not forget the infighting and outright backstabbing that goes on within the pro-life ranks.  Not exactly a sign of unity and community.

            There is something else, though.  Pro-lifers many times agree on only that one issue – save the babies!  Like the gun nuts or the environmental wackos, it is a single issue group that will oppose abortion while cheering the creation of vast economic disparities, or the bombing of Southern Lebanon, or homosexual marriage.  One issue groups have become the American way because what these groups do is to provide a safety valve of popular discontent that channels righteous anger and dissatisfaction into unproductive, manageable activities.  One issue groups, by their nature, say to the country, and the world, “Hey! Life is good except for this one thing.”  One issue groups simply cannot effectively work to achieve any lasting and significant change because there are always other issues that intrude to divide the group or to divert attention.   One issue groups miss the big picture – the foundation, the premise, of the system, of the structure, of the entity, is faulty.  These groups cannot articulate an alternative other than to say, once again, that all things in America boil down to choice.

            Now we are told that the Pro-Life Movement is like the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s or the Abolition movement of the 1820s until the 1860s, but there is a large and real difference here.  Time, and exhaustive research, is beginning to prove that Abolition and Civil Rights were primarily tools used by one group of powerful to beat into submission another group of powerful, or to subjugate people under emotional or psychological or legal constraints.  The Pro-Life Movement does not have any effective constituency in high places in the American social, economic, and cultural elites.  Regrettably, this is an essential element that, if absent, will result in failure of any movement.  

            Those in positions of authority and power in the churches and in the businesses and organizations that are supposed to be leading, if not supporting, the pro-life movement, are guilty of the sin of individualism.  How many times has the American Catholic Church bellied up to the bar, so to speak, to help out those who are faced with losing everything because they oppose the death dealers?  The situation of Joe Schiedler, a true hero of our day, comes to mind.  He nearly lost his house and everything material due to the opposition by the pro-aborts and he had to scrape and scrounge to raise the money and resources to keep from being buried under the legal assault launched by the well-funded and determined Planned Parenthood people.  The message is clear – pro-lifers, you are on your own, unless of course you accept the CPC solution and then you can be with the group that eats, meets, and retreats.

            The organization and naming of a group that terms itself “pro-life” is indicative of acceptance of the very paradigm which allows the slaughter of innocents.  By calling itself “pro-life”, this movement is saying that no one religious or ethnic group, no one world view other than that which is advanced by the real rules or America, the Regime, is given any preeminence.  By its very name, the pro-life movement accepts the values of a culture that elevates choice, because all things are relative and there is no objective truth. 

            Finally, the leadership of the Pro-Life Movement must bear responsibility for the movement’s failure.  Now, as I hope that you have surmised by now, I am not discussing those brave souls who do the sidewalk counseling.  I am talking about the mainstream public advocacy groups and education groups and political groups that are out there.  The leadership has allowed and reinforced everything we have discussed above.  But the leadership has also focused, and wasted, the energies and the resources of the faithful on false objectives.   Many of the faithful can be excused since for the most part they are decent, trusting folks with good intentions and strong beliefs.  It is their nature that makes the transgressions of the pro-life leadership all the more egregious.

            We can say one of these false objectives is the entire CPC movement, but the other false objective is the emphasis on a political solution to the issue of abortion.  Election after election, campaign after campaign, pro-lifers are mobilized, or, perhaps more properly, herded, into voting, and supporting, candidates who call themselves pro-life.  But does it make a difference, other than in election returns?  No.

            The Republican Party has long prided itself on being pro-life and leaders of the movement have repeatedly cited to Republican candidates as being pro-life.  Yet the unmistakable proof of failure is that for 6 years – from 2001 to 2007, the Republicans controlled all branches of the national government.  The presidency, the house, the senate, and yes, the Supreme Court, was all in their control, and Roe and Doe were not even given a fair hearing.  The law of abortion was reinforced and upheld.  Instead, the Republicans cared more about fighting a war for oil and Israel while giving tax breaks to the fat cats and ensuring the economic pre-eminence of their friends.  Sure, GW said that the culture was not ready for a change in abortion, but what did he do (and he could have done a lot) to change the culture?  Is he that unimaginative, is he that stupid, is he that deceitful that he was unable to do anything more than make a few speeches, sign a few dead on arrival bills, and exercise a veto once or twice?  And was the pro-life leadership so inept or so co-opted that they allowed all of this to happen?

            A president of a typical grass roots “pro-life” organization, recently penned the following stupidity:  “Polls show that a majority of Americans want to at least place more restrictions on abortion.”  The reality which this local leader, and others, ignore is that in 1973 the vast majority of Americans were pro-life, but that did not stop the elites, cultural, economic, and political, from imposing abortion on the land.  Abortion, and the culture of death, is top-down driven, and it is those in media, entertainment, business, and academia who must be converted to the Truth.  The most effective way of achieving change is to start with the conversion of the Forbes 400.  The rest will convert the way dominoes fall. 

            Yet the response of this president of a pro-life group, and others, is to do the same thing over and over expecting a different result -- try to take back public opinion when they should be focused on converting the elites.  Abortion exists because it is deemed part of the United States Constitution, which sets forth the fundamental principles of America.  Yet many tell us that by electing senators and representatives and presidents we can get people in office who will pass laws and select judges who are pro-life.  This unworkable strategy should have been decisively defeated with the failure of the last six years under Republican rule, but it has not.  Pro-life leaders continue to embrace and advocate political solutions to the culture of death and these solutions can never work unless the Regime, the informal leaders of the society, are converted.  In the meantime, much is wasted.

            There is another serious problem.  Even if the pro-lifers win, and they by no means have agreed on what victory means (yet another reason for the failure of the movement), they would only, by the very terms of their issue advocacy, have affected only one, a single, issue.  That is not enough upon which to build a society or a country.  Another world view, a different paradigm, is what is needed to end the culture of death.  Not a single issue.  That competing world view can only come from the Roman Catholic Faith and from a legitimate culture.  To effectively negate the cultural tyranny of the Regime, Catholics should organize along those lines, stand in solidarity and support of each other, and build their own culture.

            Instead, by promoting this strategy and championing the values discussed above, these pro-life leaders channel, and waste, the energy and precious resources of millions, who, as Americans at least in popular lore, rejected tyrants in the most extreme of ways.  The abortion issue shows the tyranny of the socio-economic-cultural rulers of America, the Regime, but many want to turn a blind eye to this truth while incalculable destruction goes on virtually unabated. 

            It is a harsh judgment, I know.  Still, it appears that the pro-life leaders, and many of their flocks, love comfort, a false peace, an immoral order, and, yes, choice, more than they do the Truth.  Or, maybe it’s all just another harmless political issue that gets people to turn out to vote in a system that is obviously failing.

            But I am hopeful.  With God, all things are possible.  We just have to be receptive to Him, be “wise as serpents”, and love ourselves, our peoples, and our enemies.  We have to work to save souls.  And thereby do something that gets to the root of the problem.