The Culture of Death is Advancing Before our Very Eyes: What Can We Do?
Abortion is no longer reserved for the womb, but is now also accepted in the delivery room. You might call it fourth term abortion. Or infanticide.
On Monday night last week the United States Senate voted against the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act. 53 senators voted against it and 44 voted in favor of it. 60 votes were needed for the bill to progress towards law.
The proposed bill stated that if an infant survives abortion, resulting in the live birth of the baby, then he or she is a living person who is entitled to the rights and protections of the laws of the United States. So a baby who survives a botched abortion and comes out of the womb breathing, or with a heartbeat, or with some voluntary muscle movement, is entitled to the same healthcare and provisions that any baby born alive is entitled to.
The bill would have amended the criminal code such that it would have been deemed a criminal act for any healthcare provider present when a baby is born alive to withhold care from the baby. The act would have only criminalized healthcare professionals who deny babies care, not the mother.
Bottom line: the bill made infanticide illegal. The bill stated that if a baby is born he or she deserves care. And the bill didn’t pass.
Failed abortions do happen and care for infants born alive is not currently federally required.
The Center for Disease Control (CDC) reports that at least 143 babies were born alive after abortions between the years of 2003 and 2014. The reality is that that number is probably grossly underreported. In Canada, 766 babies were born alive after failed abortions between 2013 and 2018.
Currently, there is no federal law requiring healthcare professionals to provide care to babies born alive after botched abortions and “as of 2014, only 26 states had laws mandating medical care in such instances.”
The law should have been an easy pass. It should have received unanimous support. There’s no reason any senator or any American should not be in favor of keeping an infant alive who is born alive.
What does this failed bill say about our nation?
The culture of death is gaining momentum in the United States. The pro-abortion movement no longer (wrongly) claims that abortion is the removal of a clump of cells. They no longer chant that abortion should be safe, legal, and rare. Now pro-abortionists know full well and claim without shame that abortion kills a baby. And pro-abortionists no longer care if abortions are safe, legal, and rare. Their goal is that abortion be readily available to all women all the time and even at the government’s expense. No limits, not boundaries. Abortion on demand. And funded.
We’ve radically embraced the murder of one human at the whim of another.
The culture of self has produced the culture of death.
Our current age of my body, my choice, my life, my way has caused us to champion ourselves over others. Our highest moral goal is that we live our lives our way and on our terms. So if another life infringes on that—if a baby gets in the way of that—we stand ready to snuff her out.
And this is true from womb to tomb. Not only is abortion legal and infanticide an option, but many states have legalized suicide so that those who are sick and terminal can easily end their lives. How possible it is now for a terminal patient to be “comforted” by loved ones who deem their lives too hard, too painful, too terminal. Or how easy it is for a terminal patient to seek a way out of “burdening” their loved ones with their difficult lives.
Just as infanticide is a very short walk from abortion, so euthanasia is a very short distance from physician-assisted suicide. Just as infanticide was brazenly condoned this week, we will see euthanasia legalized in the US very soon. Mark my words, euthanasia is on it’s way in. It’s no further than the horizon.
Wanted lives are protected lives, but unwanted lives can be ended.
The only lives our culture deems worth protecting are the lives we deem wanted. Babies who are unwanted are not worth birthing. The terminally ill are not worth keeping. We champion the able, the strong, the healthy. We prioritize ourselves above the vulnerable. We wouldn’t dare require someone sacrifice for another, lay down their own lives, their own goals, their own dreams to let another live or continue living.
Rather than seeking compassion and creativity, rather than seeking service and sacrifice, rather than triumphing the weak, we say end it. We say it’s too much. We give up and give in. The autonomous self marches on.
As the culture of death advances, what can we do?
Speak life
This grave national moral failure must be spoken against. You and I must choose to use our voices whenever possible. It’s always good and right to speak up on behalf of life. Whether it’s at the water cooler, at the dinner table, or on the playground let’s lift our voices in defense of the weak and the powerless. Let’s always choose to say something.
This is the exact way that I converted from being pro-choice to pro-life. When the issue came up when my husband and I were dating I exclaimed, “The government has no right to tell a woman what to do with her body.” Rather than overreacting or fighting back Mark simply said, “Tell me more about that.” He kept asking questions, forcing me to articulate my point of view. As my murderous perspective came clumsily stumbling out of my mouth, I began to realize how shallow it was, how selfish, how unsubstantiated.
Use your mouth to speak life and then trust God to change hearts.
It’s not complicated
“I don’t know what I’d do in their shoes,” is a common reply I hear when life issues come up—a prenatal diagnosis, bad news about a pre-born baby’s potential condition, a terminal diagnosis for a loved one, any kind of prediction of impending physical hardship.
But here’s what’s true: it’s not complicated. We who value life, we who believe in a good and sovereign God, we who trust our Creator and Savior—we always, always, always choose life. We always err on the side of the miraculous, the opportunity to trust God with a terrible prognosis, the chance to see him work through all things for our good.
This is not the same thing as artificially extending life—this is simply giving life a chance. We choose life, every single time. When loved ones and friends try to complicate it, remind them, there’s no gray area here.
Remember our heroes
As a people grinding toward death, we’re also a people a people who champion sacrifice. We love to remember and celebrate those who hid Jews in the Holocaust, those who died freeing slaves in America, the men and women who took down United flight #93 in Pennsylvania rather than allowing terrorists to crash it into the Capital. As we remember and retell these stories, we remind our national conscious that laying down one’s life for another is a good thing. Sacrifice is right. It is a good and holy calling to call a mother to birth her baby, no matter what. It is a good and holy calling to care for the terminally ill, no matter what.
Champion life whenever possible
Join in public demonstrations. Write Op-eds. Write your local, state, and federal politicians. Volunteer in places that serve the vulnerable (pregnancy centers, community centers, nursing homes). Foster and adopt. Support those who foster and adopt. Resource single moms. Encourage single dads. Use social media. Use your influence. Use your finances. Use your time.
This is life and death. It’s always right to speak life. This is no time to be politely quiet.
Do Not Lose Heart
Finally, brothers and sisters, do not lose heart. It is tempting in our cultural climate to become discouraged and hopeless. It feels as if our leaders are bloodthirsty, self-consumed, heartless. How can one explain supporting infanticide? But our God reigns in the heavens.
Our God is sovereign and good. He sees, he knows, he will make all things right. He is the God of love and justice, grace and truth, mercy and vengeance. Every life is precious to him. Every murder is evil in his sight.
The eyes of the Lord are in every place, keeping watch on the evil and the good (Proverbs 15:3).
For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad (2 Corinthians 5:10).
The Lord works righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed (Psalm 103:6).
Do not lose heart. Do all that you can in the sphere of influence that God has given you. And then, trust him and look forward to the day that he he will make all things new.
He will.
Author’s Note: You can hear my podcast including much of the same content here, on iTunes.
