Not all Life Issues are Equal

Stephanie belongs to a great Catholic fertility Yahoo! Group. The ladies are wonderful and have meant much to her since she first discovered them. For myself, I am so very grateful for their prayers, advice, and stories that they all share. Many an evening I sit and listen to updates from Stephanie on the latest "thread".

Today she wrote on a thread in this group regarding the Supreme Court's ruling yesterday upholding the federal ban on partial birth abortion. She mentioned something I had said to her regarding the ruling. I had told her that elections matter and that because President Bush had been re-elected he was able to nominate two Justices to the Supreme Court who ended up voting to uphold the ban. I also told her it would have been a different ruling if John Kerry had been elected president and nominated two Justices. It is likely the ban would have been overturned.

Stephanie let me know that these comments caused someone in the group to reply that the lives lost in the "unjustifiable" war (in Iraq) might not be happening if Kerry were president. After this remark and in the same reply, the commenter made a plea to keep politics out of the messages in the group. I found it interesting that this plea came after the comment about Kerry and the war. It guess it is okay to get a "politics" comment in and then ask that no one else do the same. How convenient.

Well, here at Playing and Learning, politics is welcome. Very welcome.

It is unfortunate that any Catholic equates the lives lost in the Long War with those lives lost to partial birth abortion. They are not the same, in fact they are very different. One cannot equate the murder of defenseless, innocent children who have no choice in the matter, with the deaths of our brave uniformed men and women who knowingly put themselves in harms way and who freely choose to serve and defend their nation and its people against fanatical terrorists who would, if they could, attack us not like they did on 9/11 but worse. Far worse.

It is unfortunate that any Catholic thinks that electing a man who may have, by ending the American presence in Iraq, saved the lives of many of our military men and women, would have been better than electing a man who promised his Justice Department would defend the partial birth ban, and that he would appoint federal judges and justices who would likely rule to uphold such a ban. In truth Kerry wanted to keep partial birth abortion legal, yes legal, in this nation.

It is unfortunate that any Catholic thinks talking about men and women in government who want to keep abortion legal is "politics" and should not be discussed. (It would be one thing to not want to discuss it because it does not fit the general theme and purpose of the group, but is quite another to not want to discuss it because it is "politics".) Of the three serious contenders for the Democratic nomination for president, all said the ruling yesterday was unfortunate. Unfortunate!? Unfortunate that a means of killing babies is now outlawed? Unfortunate that no longer will babies brains be sucked out of their skulls while they are in the process of being born? Unfortunate that a small battle in the war against the culture of death in this nation was won?

No, what is unfortunate is that some Catholics hide behind "politics" so as not to discuss the reality of yesterday's ruling. I do not wish to offend and I do not want to stir the pot. Again, the women in the Catholic fertility group are a special group who mean so much to Stephanie and I. But, as an adopted child given up by a unmarried teenager and as a military officer I could not just let this one go. I will pray for them and I ask that those that read this pray for me. I also ask St Thomas More, patron of politicians and judges, to pray for our men and women in government making decisions involving life, all life.