IWKnights Corner for August 21, 2022  — 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time      

Did you know this about the IW Knights of Columbus? 

     “FOR DECADES, abortion advocates have declared the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade to be ‘settled law.’

Nonetheless, the subject of abortion rights and regulations has become more controversial with each passing year.  While our society has become divided and polarized in many ways, perhaps nowhere is this more evident than in the political and social response to abortion.

Thirty years ago, during the 1992 presidential campaign, Bill Clinton famously said that abortion should be ‘safe, legal and rare.’  But in recent years, and especially in recent months, the word ‘rare’ is almost never heard among proponents of abortion.  Even in places like New York, which has one of the highest abortion rates in the nation and no state-level restrictions, legislators have taken steps to further ‘expand abortion access’ according to the attorney general’s office.

One such step has been to mandate that pro-life pregnancy centers be labeled ‘limited service pregnancy centers’ because they do not refer vulnerable women to abortion facilities, but instead empower them to choose life.  Hundreds of pregnancy resource centers nationwide have been established or have expanded their mission to provide professional medical services in addition to personal and material support.  But instead of acclaiming such centers for their holistic, compassionate care of pregnant women and young mothers, pro-abortion groups have painted them as ‘fake health centers’ that intentionally mislead.

The irony of this is that the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the largest abortion provider in the United States, claims that abortion makes up only ‘3% of its services,’ but the 354,871 abortions performed by PPFA in 2019 (the last available year) outnumbered ‘prenatal services’ (8,626) and adoption referrals (2,667) by more than 30 to 1.  Moreover, Planned Parenthood’s prenatal services have been reduced by more than half since 2004, while the abortions they perform now account for more than 40% of the total in the United States.

In November 2018, Dr. Leana Wen became the first medical doctor to lead PPFA in nearly 50 years, but she was ousted just nine months after she was named president.  Her mistake?  In a farewell message to colleagues, she cited ‘philosophical differences about the direction and future’ of the organization.  In a New York Times editorial later that week, she wrote that Planned Parenthood has a duty ‘to increase care for women before, during and after pregnancies,’ but these goals were not shared by senior leaders of the organization with an apparently single-minded focus on promoting abortion.

Meanwhile, the lifesaving work of pregnancy resource centers and maternity homes — not to mention the work of the Sisters of Life, post-abortion ministries and others — continues to grow with support from the Knights of Columbus and other people of good will.  The contrast could not be starker.  The future of abortion in the United States and elsewhere is not primarily a question of legal or political battles, but a question of culture and, indeed, deep philosophical differences. It is, in fact, a matter of choice.  ‘I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live” (Dt 30:19).’”

     The above column – entitled “The Choice is Clear” - originally appeared in the KofC’s Columbia On-Line magazine - the author is B Alton J. Pelowski, its Editor.  You can find more information about the IW Knights at IWKnights9981.com/bulletin on facebook.com/IWknights9981 and NOW on Twitter at twitter.com/IwKnights or by contacting Rob Schultz at (314) 973-2373

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