Roe invites commitment renewal

By John Huebscher

	John Huebscher

Anniversaries help us mark the time and measure the distance we travel. When the memories are happy, we look back fondly and savor a recalled joy. If the memory is one of pain or disappointment, we reflect on that sadness and perhaps the lessons learned from the experience.

So it is every January when we take note of yet another anniversary of that day in 1973 when the Supreme Court defined the practice of terminating human life in the womb to be a fundamental right. We recall the moment. We mourn the lives never lived to completion.

But looking back is only the half of it. For anniversaries are time to renew commitment. If the anniversary is happy, we resolve to sustain the moment, to keep the flame burning, to sustain the relationships begun at that moment we celebrate.

If the anniversary marks a tragedy or loss we resolve to move forward. We promise to honor the memory of the person lost or to continue the cause that was defeated. When we mark an anniversary in this way, we make a promise that the hurt or wound of the past will not ultimately defeat us.

So it is again this January. As we ponder the day when human life was disvalued, we take heart in the ongoing witness that Catholics and others give to the value of human life.

We take heart that despite the status of the law; the public continues to judge abortion by a moral code that supercedes the limits of legal dictates. We also take heart in noting that a nominee to the very Court that gave us Roe vs. Wade does not have to publicly promise to uphold it as a condition to be confirmed.

We can also savor this January the many ways that Catholics and those of good will affirm human life and dignity.

We savor the leadership of our nation's bishops in calling for a responsible transition in Iraq and a "serious civil dialogue" that can help our nation chart a course of action that meets the "moral and human dimensions" of the situation in that nation.

We savor the public witness of Catholics and others in Wisconsin in their opposition to restoring the death penalty to Wisconsin.

We savor the efforts of those who work to extend affordable health insurance to all, knowing that concern over access to health care compounds the anxieties of pregnant women who may feel little "choice" but to terminate a pregnancy.

We savor efforts of those who work to secure the right of all parents to choose a good school for their children and to jobs that pay a living wage so they can provide for their families.

In these varied ways, those who value the sanctity and dignity of human life whether undermined by legalized abortion or indifference in other ways, refuse to accept the premise of Roe vs. Wade - that life derives its worth from the choices of others.

So, even as we recall January of 1973 as a defeat in the cause of human life, so may we take heart this January that so much resolve endures to respond to the appeal set forth by John Paul II that "together we may offer this world of ours new signs of hope, and work to ensure that justice and solidarity will increase and that a new culture of human life will be affirmed, for the building of an authentic civilization of truth and love."(Evangelium vitae #6).

(Huebscher is executive director of the Wisconsin Catholic Conference, the civil arm of the state's five diocesan bishops.)