The modern-day slaughter of the innocents in the United States began with the United States Supreme Court decision of Roe v. Wade, which not only legalized abortion -- legalizing the killing of babies in the womb -- but it had the legal effect of dehumanizing the unborn. It was a case that not only allowed babies in the womb to be killed with impunity, but it denied them their very humanity. And, like the serpent before Eve, that case also perverted the idea of freedom of choice.
Matthew 2:13; 2:16-18.
When [the Magi] had departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, "Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you. Herod is going to search for the child to destroy him." Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt. * * * When Herod realized that he had been deceived by the Magi, he became furious. He ordered the massacre of all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had ascertained from the Magi. Then was fulfilled what had been said through Jeremiah the prophet: "A voice was heard in Ramah, sobbing and loud lamentation; Rachel weeping for her children, and she would not be consoled, since they were no more."
Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973)
This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.***
The Constitution does not define "person" in so many words. * * * the word "person," as used in the Fourteenth Amendment, does not include the unborn. * * *
We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer. * * *
In short, the unborn have never been recognized in the law as persons in the whole sense. * * * In view of all this, we do not agree that, by adopting one theory of life, Texas may override the rights of the pregnant woman that are at stake.
Later, the Court expanded upon this fallacious concept of "freedom of choice" by echoing words that had been uttered at the beginning of human history, repeating the lie that one could be like a god, with the freedom, the power, to choose one's own truth, one's own conception of right and wrong, good and evil:
Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-8.
The LORD God then took the man and settled him in the garden of Eden, to cultivate and care for it. The LORD God gave man this order: "You are free to eat from any of the trees of the garden except the tree of knowledge of good and bad. From that tree you shall not eat; the moment you eat from it you are surely doomed to die." * * *
Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the animals that the LORD God had made. The serpent asked the woman, "Did God really tell you not to eat from any of the trees in the garden?"
The woman answered the serpent: "We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden; it is only about the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden that God said, 'You shall not eat it or even touch it, lest you die.'"
But the serpent said to the woman: "You certainly will not die! No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is bad."
The woman saw that the tree was good for food, pleasing to the eyes, and desirable for gaining wisdom. So she took some of its fruit and ate it; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.
Planned Parenthood of S.E. Pa. v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 (1992) --
Our cases recognize "the right of the individual, married or single, to be free from unwarranted governmental intrusion into matters so fundamentally affecting a person as the decision whether to bear or beget a child." . . . Our precedents "have respected the private realm of family life which the state cannot enter." . . . These matters, involving the most intimate and personal choices a person may make in a lifetime, choices central to personal dignity and autonomy, are central to the liberty protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life. Beliefs about these matters could not define the attributes of personhood were they formed under compulsion of the State. . . .
The destiny of the woman must be shaped to a large extent on her own conception of her spiritual imperatives and her place in society.
Roe v. Wade, which made abortion not only legal, but a “fundamental constitutional right,” involves not only the outright killing of innocents, but attempts to justify that killing by objectifying and dehumanizing the victims. That decision and following cases explicitly say that some members of the human family are less than fully human persons and can be thrown away like medical refuse.
The so-called right to abortion, or “freedom to choose” abortion, is founded on a lie disguised as freedom. In a very real sense, the lie that fuels abortion and the rest of the culture of death is the very first lie – a corruption, not only of God's gift of life, but his gift of free choice – it is the lie whispered by the serpent in Eve's ear, "You can be a god. Eat of this fruit and you yourself can choose what is right and wrong. You can choose your own truth, your own reality. You can choose the child to be a human life worth protecting, or you can choose it to be a parasite to be expelled from your body." Indeed, the language used in Casey is nearly identical to that used by the serpent.
But this so-called “right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life” is completely divorced from transcendent Truth. We are not, we cannot be, gods unto ourselves. Existence is what it is. We have free will, but we cannot choose our own truth, we cannot choose our own reality. And, as with that first lie, the lie of today that is abortion, and cloning, and embryonic experimentation, and physician-assisted death for the sick and elderly, as with the first lie, these modern lies have taken an enormous toll.
By embracing the lie that is Roe and Casey, countless men and women have placed their own souls at risk. Like Adam and Eve, they have succumbed to the lie that they themselves can "choose" the morality of their actions. They believe that the forced expulsion of unborn children from the womb is not killing if they merely choose for it not to be. They believe that the termination of life within the womb is not a grave sin if they choose for it not to be. They are wrong, and in their choice, they separate themselves from their faith, from the truth, and from God.
Nevertheless, redemption is still possible. Although countless Adams and Eves have embraced the lie and eaten the fruit, saying “no” to God and obtaining only death, redemption is still possible because the New Eve, the Mother of Mercy, said “yes” to God. Thus, even now, after millions of innocents lie slain, God and his Holy Church stand ready with open arms to forgive the sins of the world, including the atrocity of abortion, including those who commit it, and those who are complicit in it by their active or tacit support.
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