During the debate about Planned Parenthood's presence in Dubuque the past year, we have seen the two sides speak to one another using the same language but not conveying the same meaning to each other.
If you would ask the nurse who works for Planned Parenthood and the person prayerfully picketing outside on the sidewalk, "Do you consider yourself pro-life?" both would say yes.
With both saying yes, there lies the problem of the debate about the abortion issue and the rights of women and their privacy. The real question is: Is human life a value that we hold as the primary good of goods in our society? Do we value life over freedom or do we value freedom over life?
When we look at the real motivation of those who support Planned Parenthood, it would seem to be very American. They value personal autonomy and argue that personal, self-directing freedom is the American "right of rights," and Americans have a right to do what they want to their bodies. The role of government is to keep out of the sensitive issues of pregnancy and sexuality.
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But for those in the pro-life movement, life is seen as the fundamental and ultimate good and all personal freedom is contingent on the fact whether a person is allowed to live or not. It is precisely in living that a person is endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, one of them being liberty and freedom.
The question that we have to struggle with is whether we want our society to value human life which then enjoys the right of freedom or do we want a society that values freedom at the expense of human life?
Presently, our country values personal liberty at the expense of human life. The goal of the pro-life movement is to convince and invite people to see that human life is the primary good and that our gift of freedom follows from this primary good and is to be ordered to the common good of all society, where children are cared for from the moment of conception, to the care of children when they are young, to help women in crisis pregnancies with life-giving help, and to the honoring of our elders with the issues that surround the end of life.
An accompanying concern that many people have with Planned Parenthood is their perceived moral neutrality with treatments that many find morally wrong and therefore do not want tax dollars paying for them. When Ann Straley mentions (TH, Aug. 13) services such as emergency contraception, birth control and vasectomies, she must realize that those are not morally neutral issues. They have moral weight and are connected with the larger issue of abortion services that Planned Parenthood claims is a small portion of their services.
The fact that Planned Parenthood offers and profits from abortion and birth control presents a view of human life where human life is not seen as the first of all values in our country. Consistent with this mindset are the beliefs that fertility is a disease and not a gift, that human life is good only in the terms that our freedom dictates to us, and sometimes there are people who just shouldn't be born.
But if we listen to the better lights of our consciences we realize that life is good and is a precondition for personal happiness -- our own lives and our readiness to honor the lives of others, regardless of age or condition.
We did not choose to live; our present life is to be lived in acknowledgement that we are not the masters of our universe. Rather we are in the hands of a loving God.
So let us all be pro-life in the truest sense.
The author was ordained a priest in 2007. He is associate pastor at the Basilica of St. Francis Xavier in Dyersville and St. Paul's Church in Worthington, Iowa. His e-mail address is dbq067ap@arch.pvt.k12.ia.us.
