¿Podremos Salvarnos de nosotros mismos?   Versión en español
This week, many people have written about the social justice cause represented by the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. It’s good to remember the importance, and the need that we still have, to conquer hatred and different forms of prejudice. Also, there are pro-life marches, speeches and demonstrations around the country, despite the freezing temperatures in some cities. Don’t think that God does not notice such a sacrifice. These sacrifices are more meaningful to him than “burnt offerings.”
As we progress forward, it’s important to look back. One who does not look back to see where he’s been and the progress he has made, has no sense of how far to go and how much more he must do. The pro-life issue is one of those that must be examined within the context of an established tradition of human rights.
This week is not a political protest against abortion, against racism, against euthanasia or any other violation. If we narrow down our language, our activity, and limit all our resources to overthrow abortion and euthanasia laws, there is a possibility that such laws will be with us for a long time and may affect many more lives.
We must educate others. There are those who make racism, abortion, euthanasia, human trafficking and other heinous crimes “Catholic Culture Wars” or “Black Culture Wars” or any other culture war that we can imagine.
Our primary moral duty is to help men and women of every age, every faith, every ethnic group, every walk of life and any sexual preference embrace the RIGHT TO LIFE, not create more divisions and more wars. The Right to Life begins with the right to be born. But we must not get comfortable because the number of abortion is decreasing while the number of older, sick and disabled people being euthanized is rising.
We can’t get too comfortable with the idea that People of Color, Caucasians, and people of diverse cultures can coexist in any community. That’s just wishful thinking. Man comes into the world to do more than coexist with other men. Man comes into the world to live. We are the result of a basic natural principle called, “generativity”, from the term “genesis”. When we interfere with birth, life and death, instead of following the laws built into nature, we find ourselves doing the unnatural. To deny someone the right to be born and to grant someone the right to take another person’s life or help another take his or her life, is an irrational attempt on the part of humanity to dominate nature.
While it’s true that we’re not beasts of the fields who live and hunt on instinct, we are creatures of the Earth. If that were not the case, then we would not be so consumed by anxiety over the environment and the future of the eco-system. These are important to us. Why? Consciously or unconsciously, we recognize that we are part of the natural world and that the natural world is necessary for individual and communal growth.
At some level, we know that we are natural beings; so, we fight to preserve the environment that we need to prosper. To deny a human being the right to be born, the right to care and support until that person dies without us pushing them over a cliff, is to assume that we are masters over the very nature of which we are part. Either we are part of humanity or we are masters of humanity. The hand has no right to dismiss the lung. Nor does the ear have a right to dismiss the foot. Each is part of a whole. The man or woman who authorizes the killing of the preborn child, the sick, the elderly and the disabled or who carries out such an act, that person has placed himself or herself above humanity.
A man or woman who expends energy on the “right to terminate life” in the womb or years after birth, such a person no longer shares in human nature. That person has deceived himself and others. Everyone now believes that a person who can terminate a life or sabotage a birth is a person of power. The truth is very different. Such a person is filled with fear, fear of humanity. It is in their best interested to have some control over who is born, who lives and when others die.
The combined efforts of Dr. King and the Pro-life movement have one goal and one goal only, to save us from ourselves.
3.
Franciscans of Life 
