http://www.holyspiritinteractive.net/features/prolife/frank_06.asp

http://www.holyspiritinteractive.net/features/prolife/frank_06.asp



The Ripple Effect of Abortion

by Fr. Frank Pavone


Abortion harms our entire culture in ways we have not even begun to
imagine. We may at times be tempted to think that we are not
individually affected by the fact that others legally abort their
children. But abortion does affect us all, personally and directly,
whether we are aware of it or not.

The pro-life movement has done much to teach the public about the
destructive harm that abortion does to the unborn child. Most people
also have been informed about the negative impact abortion has on
women's health, as a result of the multiple physical and emotional
complications of the procedure. But taking a brief look at the other
circles of destruction brought on by abortion can be an even more
sobering experience.


The Survivors

First of all, what does abortion do to the children who survive?
Psychologists have now discovered "Abortion Survivor Syndrome," a
cluster of symptoms that mimic those of the soldiers who return from
battle, and instead of feeling happy that they survived, feel guilty
and anxious. "Could I have done something to keep my army buddy from
getting killed? Why was it him and not me?"
Dr. Philip Ney, a Canadian expert and child psychiatrist, explains that
children eventually ask, "I was born because mommy wanted me. What if
she stops wanting me?"

The impact of being an abortion survivor should not be ignored as we
try to understand why children shoot other children in schools. We've
taught them to do so when we taught them that their lives were
disposable. Children will not stop killing children until parents stop
killing children.

The prospect that one could have been legally killed by his or her own
parents is also a significant obstacle for our young people to hear the
Gospel message of the Father's unconditional love for them.

From Generation to Generation

Abortion leads to more abortion, as well as to various forms of child
abuse. One of the biggest factors that will determine whether someone
will have an abortion is whether her mother had an abortion. The
reasons have to do with the way abortion affects the maternal bond. It
weakens and distorts it, and a woman who has an abortion faces
obstacles in her relationships with later children she brings to birth.
The act of aborting a child, rather than adjusting to the changes that
childbirth brings, constitutes a failure to mature and a regression in
one's development toward adult responsibility. This failure to mature
is one of the contributing causes of child abuse.

The Helpless Cry
Abortion threatens the survival of the human species itself, because it
introduces a distortion into the human response to the infant's
helpless cry. When a crying baby awakens her parents in the middle of
the night, initial annoyance quickly gives way to tenderness toward the
child in need. The very survival of the species depends on our overall
ability to make that transition. Abortion, by definition, is a
deliberate refusal to hear and respond to the helpless cry.
Dr. Ney writes, "Human response to the helpless cry of their young
will determine if the human species survives. The helpless cry is any
sound or signal that alerts a person that some creature is in distress
and cannot help him/herself . . . Anyone with any humanity in him or
herself must react in one way or another. The helpless cry is an
essential crisis . . . It is an accurate gauge of how human we are as
individuals and how civilized we are collectively. It will determine
whether we become more free, more mature, and more loving, or whether
we become insensitive, dehumanized, and hateful."


Marriage
Abortion destroys marriages and male-female relations generally. The
woman who has aborted a child finds it more difficult to trust the man.
Her relationship with him led to the unspeakable pain of abortion.
Meanwhile, the man finds in abortion an easy way to escape
responsibility for his actions. The fact that the law does not give
fathers a say in whether their own unborn children live or die means
that fathers are less willing to take responsibility for those children
before and after birth, and less willing to bond with them. If they are
not attached to the baby, moreover, they are not as supportive of their
partner.


Government
When our government allowed abortion, it became a different kind of
government than what it was founded to be. There are only two forms of
government. The first acknowledges that God gives us our rights, and
that government exists to secure those rights. In such a framework,
government can't tamper with the right to life, and can never
authorize its destruction.
The second form, however, says that government is the source of those
rights, and therefore has full dominion over life and death. The Pope
comments on this in Evangelium Vitae: "In this way democracy,
contradicting its own principles, effectively moves toward a form of
totalitarianism. The State is no longer the 'common home' where all
can live together on the basis of principles of fundamental equality,
but is transformed into a tyrant State, which arrogates to itself the
right to dispose of the life of the weakest and most defenseless
members. . . . When this happens, the process leading to the breakdown
of a genuinely human coexistence and the disintegration of the State
itself has already begun. . . . This is the death of true freedom"
(no. 20).

Abortion has wrought havoc on our political system, practically
destroying one of our national parties and hijacking the
constitutionally provided method for filling positions on federal
courts.

Other effects in law have been described as "the abortion
distortion." In various states, for example, pro-abortion forces have
begun to shut down avenues of free speech, such as specialty license
plate programs or tow banner advertising, just to prevent the truth of
abortion from being told.


The Church
The well-being of the Church is also at stake because of the abortion
controversy. The more the "ethic" of abortion is embedded in the
laws and practices of society, the more strained are the Church's
relations with government. The Church, after all, must interact with
government leaders on a wide range of programs that serve the people
and advance the Church's interests. But as was painfully evident in
recent controversies over whether pro-abortion politicians should be
allowed to receive Holy Communion or even appear on Church property,
the constant presence of legal abortion-and public officials who are
willing to keep it legal-will provide a source of continued conflict.

At the same time, positions on abortion are reduced, in public
commentary, to "political" positions. Given the fact that many
attorneys who advise the Church give unnecessarily restrictive legal
advice, the bottom line is that there is a chilling effect on the
freedom of the clergy-and others in ministry-to comment on
abortion. This strains the credibility of the Church, as people try to
figure out why more leadership is not evident from the pulpit on what
the bishops themselves have called the most fundamental civil rights
issue of our day.


The Medical Community
Legal abortion distorts the purpose and slows the progress of medicine.
Doctors are being reduced to their pre-Hippocratic oath days when they
were seen as dispensers of both life and death. The inherent link
between the medical profession and the care of life is being denied and
obscured. Moreover, if defects in a child are handled by aborting the
child, motivation to make medical progress in treating such defects is
deterred.
At the same time, if embryos can be destroyed, they can also be
manipulated, experimented on, sold, or combined with other species.
Bioethical oddities of immense proportions aThe fruit of abortion is
nuclear warre on the horizon.


Security

Ultimately, the economy and security of the nation and the world are
threatened by abortion. Destroying 40 million lives in a generation
can't happen without consequences, starting with the aging of the
population, with fewer younger workers supporting the system.
Moreover, how can we maintain peace between nations if we cannot
maintain peace between a mother and her own child? As Mother Teresa
warned, "If we say that a mother can kill her own child, how can we
tell other people not to kill each other? . . . The fruit of abortion
is nuclear war."

We have only skimmed the surface here and have truly not begun to
appreciate the destructive power of abortion. May we, as individuals
and as a society, face up to the truth about abortion and its many
dimensions before it is too late.

Ultimately, the economy and security of the nation and the world are
threatened by abortion. Destroying 40 million lives in a generation
can't happen without consequences, starting with the aging of the
population, with fewer younger workers supporting the system.