Five Crucial Lessons from the Uproar over Roe v. Wade

Roe v. Wade is dead.

The decision to overturn it represents more than the end of a bad law. It changes the moral debate in America today. The uproar over the leaked opinion that preceded the ruling and now its dramatic aftermath contains five crucial lessons that must orient the post-Roe future.

The lessons started with the leaked opinion. The likely intention of whoever leaked it was to prepare the ground for a furious reaction. The normal release of an unknown decision in June would have limited the pro-abortion movement’s ability to mobilize. The leaked contents with the good news of Roe’s repeal added urgency and passion to the left’s cause. The left needed the extra weeks to whip up hysteria.

While energizing the pro-abortion bases, the hysteria revealed the true and horrific face of the movement. The debate is no longer a carefully scripted campaign controlled by Planned Parenthood operatives in the name of women’s health. The hysteria of the radicals hides nothing; it allows people to see what unites and defines the pro-abortion movement. It now becomes much easier to perceive that procured abortion generated two currents, two mentalities and, yes, two Americas.

Five lessons can be learned from the Roe v. Wade hysteria

1.     Abortion is a debate about the wrong concept of freedom. The first lesson is that the fiction of women’s health is no longer the most important pro-abortion talking point. The hysterical ones have spoken and presented the issue as the freedom to do whatever one wants regardless of the consequence or human obstacles—even if it means killing babies. The pro-abortion radicals accept no restrictions; they deny biological and metaphysical reality.
2.     Abortion unites all forms of impurity and all disordered passions. Protesters from the whole gamut of the sexual revolution hot-button issues joined the hysteria around the leaked opinion. They cannot be separated. Once one gratifies the disordered sexual passions, any relationship is possible and demanded. Thus, abortion advocates connect abortion and the LGBTQ+ agenda (its flag appeared at protests). They correctly conclude that banning procured abortion threatens all moral aberrations. Indeed, the more Justice Alito insisted there is no link between these issues in his leaked opinion, the more the left made the connection.
3.     Abortion unites the political left. Sadly, the abortion struggle unites the left more than the right. Leftists allow no compromise on this issue. The Democratic Party would have everything to gain by moderating its abortion stance. However, now that it embraces totalitarianism, it no longer allows for dissent. Socialists, communists and anarchists all share the same passion for abortion, knowing that it supports their egalitarian goals. Their flags, symbols and slogans were part of the post-leak protests.
4.     The abortion radicals follow or break the law when it favours them. The pro-abortion movement used Roe v. Wade as a bludgeon of “settled law” against the pro-life cause. However, now that Roe is dead expect to see in place the Marxist maxim that legality means whatever favours the advance of the Revolution. Activists now chanted, “We will not obey!” Indeed, political officials and public prosecutors already threaten not to enforce the law in places where abortion will become illegal. The post-leak hysteria provoked many to break the law by protesting and threatening the Supreme Court justices at their homes. They have vandalized pregnancy centres and churches. The decision to overturn Roe may well give rise to a “summer of rage” in which protesters riot, burn, kill, maim, and destroy. Aiding and abetting leftists in government and media will give their blessing to the violence by repeating the “mostly peaceful” 2020 mantra.
5.     The abortion issue increasingly represents those who are anti-God and pro-Satan. The most shocking revelation of the post-leak hysteria was the openly anti-God and pro-Satan wrath. Indeed, Satanic symbols, blasphemous signs and hateful slogans found their way into the protests. Others called for attacking and vandalizing Catholic churches (on Mother’s Day). Satanic groups renewed their claim that abortion has a sacramental character for them. Tabernacles were stolen. The Blessed Sacrament profaned. Catholic politicians supporting abortion defied Church authorities with sacrilegious communions. All these things took place without official protest or regret from those within the abortion movement.

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Thus, the post-leak hysteria and coming storm reveal much about the abortion movement.

Roe v. Wade is not just about abortion. It is tied to a world of issues and a worldview. The left sees this clearly. The right not as much.

The protests gave the nation a glimpse of where the left and the abortion movement want to go. The right must see the worldview divide in full clarity and rally to the Faith and Christian civilization. It must adopt an opposite program that unifies all that is according to God’s law.

Here are five ways the right should fight back. They are the road to victory:

1.     The pro-life movement must unite around the true vision of freedom. Thus, freedom is a rule of self-control that allows a person to live free of the tyranny of the passions and facilitates a life full of truth and beauty. It is ordered liberty, not unbridled license.
2.     The pro-life movement must embrace all that is pure and moral. It must unify all those who believe in the natural moral law. The left has proclaimed there is no such thing as single-issue politics since all these issues are interconnected. The pro-life movement must see clash the same way and rise to this challenge, and above all, resist the LGBTQ offensive that undermines everything it stands for.
3.     The anti-abortion fight must serve as a platform for uniting the political right. Once the left has defined itself as overwhelmingly pro-abortion, the right must be consistent and unite around this winning issue. It must continue the political battle by passing laws that make abortion unthinkable. The goal must be total victory.
4.     The movement must adhere to the law. Just because the left breaks the law and creates chaos does not mean that pro-lifers can act outside the law. The left knows how to exploit any breach of the law by those on the right to its advantage. What wisdom is there in playing into the hands of the left? Pro-life activists who break the law betray the movement. Pro-lifers must keep the fight legal and peaceful. Both pro-life and pro-abortion activists who violate the law must be denounced.
5.     The fight for life must always be religious, in favour of God, the source of all grace and life. The left knows that God is at the centre of the debate. It knows that the Church represents the moral law and makes it the target of its action. Its radicals invoke Satan for help. How much more the pro-life movement should call upon the overwhelming power of God and the Blessed Mother to secure the final victory.

The post-leak hysteria has served to change the nature of the abortion debate. Procured abortion is no longer a health, woman’s, political or secular issue. Procured abortion is the moral issue it has always been: the killing of innocent human life.

The left is redefining the abortion fight in universal moral, religious, ethical and metaphysical terms. This new framing of the debate gives those defending life the advantage. The pro-life side must rise to the occasion and press the attack.

By John Horvat