EDITORIAL/Opposing the culture of death
The Little Sisters Disciples of the Lamb is an order of nuns in France with Down syndrome who believe they are "made for very great things." Indeed, they are! God made them.
The nuns with what we call a "disability" have been given the gift of eternal innocence and enjoy a healthy ministry. Their "disability" is a testimony to their ability and that every human life matters, yet we live in an age where life is dismissed at conception — if not at birth by some prominent Democrats like Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam, whom you may recall was caught in blackface in his 1984 college yearbook.
Like the nuns quietly doing the Lord's work, The Life Equality Act is one of those bills in the Mississippi Legislature that won't get much attention.
State Sen. Jenifer Branning, a Republican from Philadelphia, has authored SB2811, The Life Equality Act, which prohibits abortions based on a suspected disability or undesired gender of an unborn child.
It's morally corrupt to abort any child at any stage, but seemingly even more so because of a disability.
In Morris West's novel "The Clowns of God," Christ returns to earth where people have trouble recognizing him. At one point, he goes to a school for children with Down syndrome and picks up a little girl, a Wall Street Journal columnist observed around Christmas.
"I know what you are thinking," he says. "You need a sign. What better one could I give but to make this little one whole and new? I could do it, but I will not.... I gave this mite a gift I denied to all of you—eternal innocence. To you she looks imperfect—but to me she is flawless."
He goes on: "She is necessary to you. She will evoke the kindness that will keep you human. Her infirmity will prompt you to gratitude for your own good fortune.... This little one is my sign to you. Treasure her."
Dignity and work are essential to self-esteem and the nuns with the "disability' have inspired others worldwide.
Too quickly, we dismiss those with disabilities as too challenged when often they are the least challenged with their unconditional love and gift of eternal innocence.
The story of the nuns has inspired all who are defenders of life and its intrinsic dignity, as Sen. Branning is doing in the Legislature with this bill.
Abortion impacts African Americans at a higher rate than any other population group, the Arizona Capitol Times reported a few weeks ago.
In 2011, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released an Abortion Surveillance Report. According to that report, black women make up 14 percent of the childbearing population. Yet, 36 percent of all abortions were obtained by black women. At a ratio of 474 abortions per 1,000 live births, black women have the highest ratio of any group in the country. Why is no one addressing this atrocity in the black community?
The existence of this Order, The Little Sisters Disciples of the Lamb, according to the Catholic church, is "to allow those who have the ‘last place' in the world, to hold in the Church the exceptional place of spouses of Jesus Christ, and to allow those whose life is held in contempt to the extent of being in danger from a culture of death, to witness by their consecration to the Gospel of Life."
Standing up to this culture of death, as SB2811does, is admirable and necessary.