An Eclipse of Reason

Mark S. Roberti, Director of Stewardship

Heartland Parishes of Ellis County

I recently attended the Diocesan Respect Life Conference in Salina.  Thank you, Diocesan Respect Life Committee for the wonderful job you did in organizing it!  Thanks also to Bishop Coakley, Mike Farmer of the Kansas Catholic Conference, and Dr. Amy Hogan.  Their comments and presentations were just great.  Lastly, I thank Norbert Hermes and Gina Sanders for their involvement in the panel discussion.   

Bernard Nathanson, M.D., a former abortionist, produced a video called Eclipse of Reason, documenting the termination of a baby boy at five months gestation, as seen by a camera inside the mother’s uterus.  Eclipse of reason is the perfect expression for the precipice at which our nation, and the world, stands today. 

As Pope John Paul II stated during one of his visits, “America is in jeopardy of losing her soul.”  And, unfortunately, this is on our watch!  The culture of death now seems to mingle comfortably in our, historically, Judeo-Christian society.  The question becomes, if not God’s Church, through the Holy Spirit, whose responsibility is it to resuscitate the soul of the United States of America?  Are not you and I an integral part of the Church?  Does the Holy Spirit not work through us?  Let’s, then, look at just a few of the contradictions that Christian America faces.    

Today, perfectly healthy woman -- with the encouragement of very selfish men --   take a pill to prevent their body from doing what it was naturally meant to do…have a baby.  When do we take pills?  When we are sick, right?  So, pregnancy now falls in the category of a sickness, something to be avoided. Imagine that, something as beautiful as life has now been relegated to the category of a sickness to be avoided. 

Then, in our unwillingness to involve ourselves in unpleasant or controversial issues -- and in our quest to “keep up with the Joneses” for material things, conveniences, and securities -- we have allowed the Evil One to degrade the dignity of human life.  

What most people also do not understand, and what Dr. Hogan clearly and emphatically explained, is that chemical means of contraception often indirectly result in abortion.  In some instances, conception does, in fact, takes place even when a woman is taking contraceptives.  But, the endometrial wall is thinner and less receptive and the embryo is unable to implant.  The baby is lost.  Women (and men) who would never choose abortion are sometimes unknowingly choosing it when they choose “the pill” (or any hormonal contraceptive) as their preferred means of birth control.   

Percentage-wise, the number may be small, but when multiplying that percentage by the huge number of women using contraceptives, the number may be as high as ten million babies annually.  That’s many more indirect abortions than the estimated 1.5 million annual abortions performed by America’s abortionists.

Now, let’s look at the overpopulation myth.  That’s also part of the “big lie.”  The United Nations, one of the biggest perpetrators of that lie, has recently admitted that actually the reverse is true.   The effect of that lie (it is an agenda, not a mistake) is that many countries are facing the devastating effects of birth rates below replacement rates.  The populations of most Western countries and some other countries are imploding, not exploding!   

Then we have euthanasia, “mercy killing”, but we have to ask, whose mercy?  We, the gods of our culture, now have the right to kill other people in contravention of God’s command?  Says whom?  Are we more merciful even that God?  Do we, especially as Catholics, forget that God has a purpose for suffering and that purpose is redemptive? 

And what about capital punishment, should we kill because others do?  Should we lie because others do?  Should we steal because others do?  Should we commit adultery because others do?  No!  We should kill only when it is absolutely necessary to do so, when there are no other means to prevent such aggression.  Why?  Because we are bigger than that, we are better than that.  We are called to a higher dignity… that of being sons and daughters of God.  

An eclipse of reason?  Yes, sin has blinded us to the truth.  In particular, I believe, sins of omission…when we don’t do what we “ought” to do.   We haven’t stood when and where we should stand.   We have not stood for life and the teaching of the Church.  

It is not just for the unborn, for the elderly, and for the soul of America that we are fighting.  We are fighting for human dignity.  We are fighting for our own lives and our very souls. 

Everything is at stake here.  Understanding that is good stewardship.