Now That I Am Here, I’m Pro-Choice

I saw this message on a onesie at a family reunion about 20 years ago. It was worn as part of a funny t-shirt contest with my grandfather and his brother as the judges. It did not win! For my grandpa and his brother, both combat war veterans raised in poverty during the Great Depression, there was nothing amusing or entertaining by the message. I got it, it was supposed to be ironic. Indeed, it was. But just stop for a minute and think about that statement. Since someone else allowed me to be born and pursue the fundamental principles established in the pre-amble of the Declaration of Independence, endowed by the Creator and protected by the government, I am going to exercise my right to fight against someone else being born. Make it make sense. The principle of “pursuit of happiness” was used instead of mere pleasure, referring to self-development, responsibility, and acting withing the community, replacing John Locke’s “property.”  The beauty in the words that were used. Our founders intended for God’s creation to not be focused on how much one acquires, but to be focused on living safely, acting freely, and pursuing a meaningful life. How can someone live a meaningful life when their right to do so abruptly ends from the womb?

How confusing is it, especially our youth (let’s say under 40) to live in a country where the wealthy and politicians (on a federal level are all wealthy) are constantly messaging to fight the oligarchy, tax the rich, re-distribute wealth, saturate families with social welfare, and discourage God, marriage, societal law, or any other social norms that gave them the platform from which to speak. “Now that I am in power, now that I have convinced you I am the agent of change, now that I have you at my mercy, you all have to surrender that which is of Caesar to me.” The Pro-Choice movement was born out of this very concept. Not that women/families are innately evil, but they were sold a bag of goods and believed lies told to them by the wealthy and powerful. They exchanged the gift of life that is priceless for a promise of prosperity. In turn, we are more impoverished than at any time in history.

Anyone that knows Margaret Sanger and her quest to help poor women avoid unwanted pregnancies also knows she was married, had financial security, and was a mother to 3 children. She was also a member of the Women’s Socialist Party, a proud eugenic, and agnostic. She learned that behavior from her father. Tell me a father’s influence does not play a major role! Her mother was an Irish-Catholic immigrant who had 18 pregnancies and 11 live births and died at age 50 from tuberculosis. It was the firm beliefs of socialism and “Godlessness” that shaped young Margaret’s mind. Her time as a nurse in the slum immigrant neighborhoods in New York introduced her to frequent miscarriages and self-induced abortions. Although Margaret never advocated for abortion herself, she felt it necessary to provide women with literature deemed obscene by the Comstock Act. Her strategy was to deliberately violate the Act hoping it would lead to an amendment of the law.

Sanger made it her life’s mission to provide contraceptives for women. Her actions were in direct violation of then US law. She continued her campaign to provide articles, community education, and even imported diaphragms to distribute to women without their husband’s knowledge. She was arrested 8 times for promoting and distributing contraband deemed obscene that in her words “prevented women from full expression of their feminine spirit.” To put it into perspective, she was the Dr. Ruth Westheimer of her day. She shared things about sex, orgasms, fulfilling desires that were just not acceptable in their time. Our culture was not ready then nor is it ready now for these types of conversations. These things were happening while the country was distracted by WW1. I do not want to paint Margaret Sanger as a martyr and pioneer by any means. Media and history often romanticize people such as Sanger. Her actions were a direct result of her belief that overpopulation led to poverty, famine, and war. These reasons where “red herrings” for her true feelings as a socialist.  She wanted to eradicate any social class she deemed unfit to be in the world in which she lived. She is no hero. Her efforts met with great resistance and unwanted in America. Boston Mayor James Curley banned her from speaking from 1923-1925 and 1929. The Knights of Columbus have formally condemned her and her work in eugenics and abortion with a 2020 resolution highlighting her “racist legacy and destructive ideology.

Printers refused to print her literature, but with the help of other socialist printers and an underground network of activists, she was successful in publishing and distributing her work. She fled to Canada, used a fake passport to England where she pushed the same ideologies. On multiple occasions, courts refused trials fearing Sanger would become a martyr. Her clinic in Columbus Hill, an African American neighborhood in New York closed in 3 months due to low patient numbers. She shifted strategy and headed south speaking to poor black women who were neglected by segregated medical establishments. She knew how strong and deep their faith ran, so she turned to fellow socialist and founder of the NAACP W E B duBois for endorsement. She founded the Negro Project for the Birth Control Federation of America but after 3 years with no new clinics and low participation rates, it all closed.

Her efforts were never really about women’s reproductive rights, but more about feminism and socialism. She was nothing more than a carnival barker and fraud with selfish intent funded by groups that wanted to destroy America from the inside. She did not peddle her agenda to white affluent families. She targeted poor, migrant, and black populations. I still stand in absolute amazement she has been glorified for her efforts. If she had been a Republican, she would have already been canceled. If her efforts had been successful, there would have been no need for Roe v. Wade to have even come to the court some 56 years later; 7 years after her death. The bottom line is abortion, euthanasia, genetic manipulation, etc... has never been the answer to solve the societal ills meant to eradicate. It will never be enough for them!

Abortion alone has been responsible for the death of 35% of the African American population since Roe. Recent data from the Guttmacher Institute reported an estimated 63 million abortions in the United States since 1973. There are only 23 countries in the world that have populations above 63 million people living in them.  How are sterilization, abortion, and MAiD any different than any major genocidal campaign throughout the history of the world? Those in favor of death of any living creature after God’s design will continue to lie, manipulate, and distort the truth until every single person who does not look like them, vote like them, or think like them has been removed from the earth. The irony is, now that they are here, they are pro-choice.

Contraception has been available in the United States since the Great Depression. We are approaching 100 years since the formation of the National Committee on Federal Legislation for Birth Control (the precursor to Planned Parenthood) and 93 years since the United States v. One Package of Japanese Pessaries which permitted physicians to dispense contraceptives nationwide. For those of you who look to the government to solve problems, I remind you of former president Ronald Reagan’s rebuke “government is the problem.” Only with the love of Christ in the heart of mankind can we ever make abortion and euthanasia unthinkable.

It is in my opinion we should not glory in the number of sexual partners an individual has. Could we not encourage self-respect, self-worth, and the importance of nuclear families in our own homes and churches. Those are great places to start. Why can we not focus with our children in Sunday School, youth groups, or any youth and young adult ministry on the importance of keeping a chaste and clean life? I am broken to my core with the constant messaging to young men and women “don’t ruin your life with a child.” Get the career you want, the house you want, the travel you want, get whatever you want first then have kids later.” That is certainly a personal decision. Understand, we now have the largest number of safety net programs that at any time in history. We have more resources, more money, more schools, better education, better healthcare and in my opinion are the most tolerant and forgiving than ever. There is absolutely no reason to abort a child or euthanize the elderly. Christ died and resurrected so we may have life and have it more abundantly.