Several events at the end of June call to mind John Paul II’s words in Evangelium Vitae
describing the elements of a true humanitarian crisis. An act
previously and nearly universally condemned, that hurts vulnerable
lives, is celebrated as a “right” by people in the best position to
protect those lives. How does John Paul II diagnose the cause of
such a crisis? He identifies a serious misunderstanding of freedom—one
that divorces freedom from solidarity, from reason and truth, and from
the inevitability of human suffering.
Sadly, his observations fit painfully well the events of the last week of June.
First, legislator Wendy Davis filibustered a bill in the Texas
legislature that would ban killing unborn children in the last twenty
weeks of pregnancy and require abortion clinics to meet the medical
standards required of other “ambulatory surgical centers.” Had these
standards been observed, they might have saved lives at the charnel
house of Philadelphia abortionist and convicted murderer Kermit Gosnell.
For her efforts, Davis was lauded
by the press as one of the Democratic Party’s “most popular
politicians,” and a “hero.” The president of the United States joined
the chorus of praise, tweeting “#StandWithWendy.”
Second, on June 26, the Supreme Court issued two same-sex marriage opinions. Following upon the Court’s holding in Hollingsworth v. Perry,
same-sex couples are already obtaining marriage licenses in California,
despite the votes of seven million Californians in favor of ballot
initiative Proposition 8. The Court in United States v. Windsor
struck down Section Three of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which
defined marriage for purposes of federal law as the union of one man and
one woman. The majority opinion authored by Justice Kennedy held that
federal legislators (Democrats and Republicans) and President Clinton
passed DOMA strictly for the “purpose” of “impos[ing] a disadvantage …
and so a stigma upon all who enter into same-sex marriages made lawful
by the unquestioned authority of the States.” According to the majority,
lawmakers intended to “demean” and “injure” same-sex couples, and to
“humiliate” any children they were raising.
The majority did not devote a single line to the lawmakers’
well-documented interests in assuring a special regard, nationally, for
the wellbeing of children as a class, children for whom natural marriage
is simply the only vehicle for tying their fathers to their mothers and
to themselves, and indeed for preserving their entire historical and
genealogical identity in this world. Not a line.
Instead, the Court declared that—in the opinion of five
persons—marriage is rather about conferring a “dignity and status of
immense import,” about granting a “far-reaching legal acknowledgment” of
“intimate relationships,” and about “protect[ing]” “personhood and
dignity.” As Justice Scalia’s dissent observed, the majority held that
to disagree with their understanding of marriage is to be an “enemy of
the human race.”
Third, on June 28, the Department of Health and Human Services issued
the final iteration of a health insurance mandate concerning
contraception, sterilization, and early abortifacients. What did it
decide?
It decided to force insurers to provide “free” birth control and
morning-after pills to the employees (and their family members,
including minor daughters) of religious employers, regardless of
whatever conscientious objection the employers might have. HHS wrote that its decision “respect[s] the concerns of non-profit religious organizations that object to contraceptive coverage.”
They did this despite hundreds of thousands of opposing comments and
dozens of (mostly successful) lawsuits against the government. They did
it despite the fact that the “scientific report”
undergirding the mandate has no empirical data proving the oft-repeated
claim that free contraception will prevent women’s illnesses.
In sum, according to the powers-that-be, supporting killing unborn
human beings is “heroic,” supporting natural familial bonds for children
is “demeaning,” and forcing religious employers to insure (and really
to pay for) services for their employees that they cannot in good
conscience support is “respecting religious freedom.”
My head is spinning. So is the Merriam-Webster Dictionary.
And Americans are not alone in wondering at what moment reasoned
discourse on life or marriage or religious freedom became impossible.
Similar difficulties beset our neighbors in Ireland and the United
Kingdom. Ireland is soon to vote on legalizing abortion. It would legalize abortion to save the life of the mother (current law requires saving the life of both mother and
child). This proposed new law would allow abortion most notably in
circumstances wherein it is believed the mother would commit suicide
without recourse to abortion.
It is easy to see how, in practice, the legislation will open the floodgates to abortion, though the sponsors call
the bill “restrictive” and “life-saving.” But there is even another
problem: the best empirical data from Europe also indicate that abortion is likely a cause of female suicide, not a preventive measure.
In the UK, Parliament is considering a bill to grant “marriage” to same-sex couples. Besides ignoring child welfare, the bill undercuts
two additional, intrinsic, and perennial features of marriage: it voids
the requirement of consummation (lawmakers couldn’t agree how to define
it for same-sex partners), and it undermines the norm of fidelity by
abolishing the possibility of same-sex adultery.
In other words, if a person granted a same-sex “marriage” has a sexual encounter with another person of the same sex (but not a person of the opposite sex), it is not what people have always thought “cheating” must constitute in the context of a marital relationship, i.e.
“adultery.” In short, the UK bill grants marriage rights, while
simultaneously voiding longstanding and definitional essentials of
marriage.
Defenders of human life, religious freedom, and children’s interests
in marriage should excuse themselves these days for sputtering—for
having literally no words to offer in response to recent events. It
appears words are currently useless. All the words we would ordinarily
reach for are taken, and have suddenly been redefined.
To add insult to injury, the movers and shakers redefining the
ordinary and natural meanings of things—and thus redefining culture and
society, not just law—are beyond our democratic influence. Our hundreds
of thousands of comments to HHS about the contraception and
early-abortifacient mandate command no legal deference. The mind of
Justice Kennedy (who effectively controls the Court’s marriage
decision-making given the otherwise 4/4 split) is not open to rational
arguments from those who disagree with him. President Obama—who, in his
days as a state legislator, already indicated how far removed he is from
normal sensibilities regarding the value of human life by refusing to
use his power to stop the killing of disabled, born alive human infants in Illinois—has proved himself deaf to all our calls, letters, comments, and lawsuits.
In fact, when the president’s opinions are challenged, he often
responds with even more extreme versions of earlier positions. For
example, after he refused to defend Section Three of DOMA on the grounds
of unconstitutionality, and won in the Supreme Court, he suggested the
very next day that same-sex marriage should be imposed on the fifty
states by means of repealing Section Two of DOMA, which presently allows
states to make their own decisions about the legal definition of
marriage.
But of course we have to find our voice again, to insist upon the
natural meanings of words, and upon the necessity of logic. In addition,
in this age, we need to use images and stories. Once again we have to
be willing to be publicly visible—so as to dispel the notion that we do
not exist, or that we have given up the fight to ensure rational
discourse, and pursue and disseminate relevant, truthful data.
We have to be publicly visible also because that’s the most effective
way to dispel the negative, one-dimensional portrait of our ranks. We
have to be willing to help organize the currently disenfranchised
majority who do possess ordinary humanitarian sensibilities about
the good of life over death, the good of natural marriage, and the good
of living in integrity with our religious convictions.
Helen Alvaré is Professor of Law at George Mason University.
