This Jan. 22 will mark the 50th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s infamous decision in Roe v. Wade, a decision that instantaneously imposed abortion through all nine months of pregnancy on every state and every American citizen. Since that time, it is estimated that 64 million abortions have occurred in the United States.
On June 24, 2022, after 49 heartbreaking years, the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision overturned Roe and related precedent, returning authority over abortion to the states. It was a joyful day. It started repairing the damage done to our Constitution by the legal, scientific and moral errors of Roe v. Wade.
Dobbs undid Roe, but it did not undo the destruction wreaked by five decades of abortion-on-demand to our laws, our morality and our understanding of compassion. It did not liberate the unborn from threats of death at the hands of physicians, pharmaceuticals and parents. It did not rebuke the injustice and tyranny that flows when a person’s worth is determined by age, ability or utility.
With decisions related to abortion returned to the states, some have outlawed or restricted it, some have expanded and funded it and many are still making their way through political and legal processes.
In Ohio, a state that has benefitted from pro-life political leadership, we are in legal limbo. Our Heartbeat Law was in effect for a few months. In that time, abortions dramatically declined. Clinics were at the precipice of closing when pro-abortion legal challenges halted the law.
We believe Ohio’s Heartbeat Law will prevail in state courts and that legislators will enact more laws that protect children and mothers and strengthen and stabilize families. We can make abortion unthinkable, unnecessary and unlawful in Ohio.
But the wait is excruciating. Based on 2021 numbers, more than 400 children are aborted weekly in Ohio; 67 weekly in Columbus. Currently, those numbers are likely low.
The attacks are coming from every angle. The federal government is unleashing horrific policies. Within a few days, the Biden administration announced withdrawing conscience protections for health-care workers and others who decline to participate in abortion or other morally objectionable actions, announced that retail pharmacies will now be able to sell the abortion pill and announced that the Department of Justice would not pursue action against those who illegally mail abortion pills.
Well-funded abortion advocates have announced plans to amend Ohio’s Constitution to halt even modest protections for unborn children and the health and safety of pregnant women. It will take a massive grassroots effort and tens of millions of dollars to defeat. There is an unrelenting campaign to normalize abortion, promote misinformation and silence pro-life voices.
This is evil unleashed.
While we ultimately place our confidence and our hope in the knowledge that Christ has already conquered death and evil, including abortion, it is natural to feel discouraged or overwhelmed in times like this. Abraham Lincoln once asked how long slavery can endure in the presence of a just God. It is not unreasonable that we would ask the same.
In one of his last audiences before resigning, Pope Benedict XVI closed his general comments with “living out faith means recognizing God’s greatness and accepting our smallness, our condition as creatures, letting the Lord fill us with His love and thus develop our true greatness. Evil, with its load of sorrows and sufferings, is a mystery illuminated by the light of faith which gives us the certainty that we can be freed from it.” (www.bit.ly/BXVIfreedom)
If you are heartbroken, angry or weary from living in a world where the evil of abortion continues to brutally kill innocent children, damage women, destroy families and disrupt the very fabric of our society, you are not alone.
Our proper response to the evil of abortion is that our hearts should be broken, so we can be moved to compassion. We should be angry, tempered by virtue, to move us to action toward justice.
Our weariness is a reminder that while we fight, we do not have the strength or power to fight this on our own. Fortunately, we are not alone. We have each other, and we have the certainty that we are filled by God’s love and can be freed from evil.
How long can abortion endure in the presence of a just God? I do not know. Fifty years is a long time, but we will fight as long as it takes. If you are moved to fight it with us, join us at gcrtl.org/stop.
Beth Vanderkooi is the executive director of Greater Columbus Right to Life.
