Some of us have recently been taken to task by our friends on the Catholic right for being incompletely pro-life, for not really caring too much about abortion, and indeed, for mere “pro forma condemnation”. To many of these people, being “pro-life” is everything and it is nothing. We are called to be absolutists on abortion itself, and minimalists on other life issues, and indeed the economic and social conditions that contribute to an abortion culture in the first place.
What’s behind this? Matthew Bowman of Catholic Vote had an interesting rant the other day, in which he lambasted Catholics on the left for playing down abortion. He provides a reason: “the dissident Catholic Left who pick and choose magisterial authority, derive their identity from one overarching source: they are sexual revolutionaries”. At the time, I wondered if he was a cranky holdover from the battles of the 1960s and 1970s, but then I realized something – deep down, and despite the rhetoric, these people view abortion as a sexual issue, not a life issue. They see it as a sixth, not a fifth commandment, issue. This is of course unspoken, but I believe it is true. This is why you see abortion spoken in the same breath as same-sex marriage, but not war, torture, poverty, health care or capital punishment. Indeed, among the more extreme elements , you will see incessant mocking of such notions as a “seamless garment” or a “consistent ethic of life”.
I’ve already pointed out that Catholic Vote and its acolytes don’t seem to care much about the broader teachings that affect human life and human dignity. Instead of acknowledging that access to affordable health care was a basic right under Church teaching – precisely because it fosters life and dignity – they went on a campaign to destroy any reform efforts, pretending they were somehow defending the unborn. They never seemed to care that pre-reform health care was not required to cover maternity costs, that millions were prohibited from accessing health care because they could not afford it, or that maternity costs dwarfed abortion costs (something like $20,000 versus $450). They never seemed to care that abortion rates are heavily concentrated among the poor, the economically marginalized, minorities. In fact, while putting “Catholic” in their title, they backed tea-party style candidates who mocked the principle of solidarity and Catholic economic concerns in general. Look at this recent statement by Paul Zummo of the American Catholic: “Abortion to him [that would be me!] is nothing more than a distraction from the bigger issues of government mandated health care and whatever pet leftist project he has in his cross-hairs”. Clearly, to him, abortion can be quite easily divorced from other life issues. Why? Because it doesn’t disturb the tranquility of ideology.
Fundamentally, they fail to realize that abortion is so horrendous because it entails grievous violence against the innocent. But they are loath to condemn violence across the board. They generally don’t support gun control, or the elimination of nuclear weapons, and they tend to be military adventurists. Their nationalism is often of a bloody variety. It is quite amazing that blogs like this can link to people who claim to be pro-life but write things like this: “if they ever want a Gentile prime minister, my first order would be to deploy the IDF in a north-south line, facing east. My second order would be “forward march” and the order to halt would not be given until it was time for the troops to rinse their bayonets in the Jordan. After a brief rest halt, the order “about face” would be given, and the next halt would be at the Mediterranean coast. That’s my “Middle East peace plan”. If that’s what it means to be pro-life, then count me out.
One basic criticism is that we spend more energy criticizing the pro-life movement than abortion itself. Well, I don’t spend too much time railing against the evils of rape and child abuse either – does this imply that my positions are somehow insincere? No, what they want is for us to play their game, to dance to their tune. Scream loudly, accept a few scraps from the table, and support the so-called (and mis-named) “conservatives”. In other words, adopt a position that is not only doomed to fail, but is actually liable to harm to unborn.
Remember, the millennial generation is not unsympathetic to restricting abortion, but they detest what has become known as the religious right, because of its hypocrisy and narrow focus. We will never convince the younger generation with the strategy favored by Catholic Vote. We will never convince them by aligning the pro-life movement with the people who fight access to health care tool and nail, who don’t give a damn about climate change, and who are all-too-keen to back America’s right to go to war and commit torture. The cynic in me says this is the point. But it shouldn’t be. The regulations that we all seek will not take place until we change the culture, and that means taking a few steps away from the laissez-faire liberals.
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