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| ‘We are for life, no matter the cost’ |
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
We
logged on to the Internet and Facebook yesterday only to be hit with a
sickening story: undercover video footage seemingly implicating Planned
Parenthood in the sale of the body parts of aborted children.
In
the video, Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s Senior Director
of Medical Services, Dr. Deborah Nucatola, discusses how she adjusts
abortion procedures to procure certain parts of a child’s body, even as
she notes that “we’ve been very good at getting heart, lung, liver.”
Listen
long enough, if you can handle it, and you’ll hear her suggest that
such items could eventually be listed on a Planned Parenthood “menu” for
affiliate organizations to purchase for a price.
Later in the
day, Planned Parenthood released a “nothing to see here” kind of
statement, asserting that the discussion was merely one revolving around
a patient’s right to donate tissue, as with any medical procedure. But
why does Nucatola then mention the costs of body parts (“Thirty to one
hundred dollars,” she says)?
Lord, have mercy.
If what
Nucatola says is, in fact, the truth, we as Christians cannot allow this
story to go untold or be buried by the media. We simply cannot remain
silent while the reprehensible act of killing a child in the womb is
made even worse by selling portions of that child’s dismembered body
simply because there is a market for them.
Speaking up about the
shameful act of killing children — as well as harvesting their body
parts — may be uncomfortable. We may lose friends and create awkward
tension at work. Our professors may mock us, and our family may roll
their eyes at us. If that is the case, so be it. Because as Lutherans,
as Christians, we are for life, no matter the cost.
As
Lutherans, we confess that every life has value, that it has worth, that
it matters … from the moment of conception until natural death occurs.
We confess that what Nucatola calls “17-weekers” are actually children —
with beating hearts and little moving fingers and toes.
We
confess that even the tiniest of humans are just that — regardless of
what scientific term the culture uses to make them seem like something
less. We confess that they are created in the image and likeness of our
Lord Himself. And we confess that because of Him, their hearts and lungs
and livers matter, no matter how small they might be.
We also
admit our own failings in this regard. Where we have failed to speak and
act for life, we repent. Where we have not cared for mothers in
crisis-pregnancy situations, we ask for forgiveness. Where we have
thought more of ourselves than giving to an organization that can assist
those moms and babies, we are sorry. Where we have been apathetic to
this pandemic of death, we grieve.
But we are not without hope, because our Lord is for life too.
He
is so pro-life, in fact, that He has given His own life for us, even as
He has laid it down for these tiniest of children. Where their short
lives are taken, He offers up His willingly. Where their little bodies
are sold, He gives His freely to us at His holy table for the
forgiveness of our sins.
Today let us confess life with renewed
vigor — to our friends over supper, through letters to the editor of our
local paper, by writing our congressmen, in tweets and emails to
Planned Parenthood, on our Facebook pages.
Let us pray that our Lord would bring an end to abortion altogether and that He would stop the horrible sale of infant bodies.
And
let us pray that He would forgive us, renew us and bolster us to make a
good confession in season and out of season: one that is always, no
matter what, for life.
Rev. Bart Day, executive director
Life and Health Ministries
LCMS Office of National Mission
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