How many people in our society today are named Ken? What if you heard that a new law were passed that said that anyone named Ken could be legally put to death? What would you say or do? Certainly, you would protest the "law" and say it was wrong. What about those who are not "Ken?" Wouldn't you also protest? Wouldn't we all come together at once to restore legal protection to all who are Ken? We could certainly say that this new law was against the Constitution, which claims to protect the rights of every person. But suppose that even the Constitution were changed to say that it's OK to kill Ken. Would we then say it was really OK? No, it would still be wrong.
In other words, there is a right and a wrong NO MATTER WHAT the laws or even the Constitution says! Every law must obey a Higher Law that is written not on paper but on our hearts, not by people but by God. That Higher Law says that every human person no matter what his/her background or condition, has the right to life. We may never kill an innocent person. Our very civilization rests on this truth. It is the difference between civilization and the jungle, between society and chaos. It is what assures us that we can walk by the next person and expect to survive the experience. It is not a question of "our" morality or "their" morality, of "old" morality or "new" morality, but rather of morality itself! Killing the innocent is wrong, and no law or Constitution can ever make it right.
The imaginary story about "Ken" is not as imaginary as we think. Just change the word "Ken" to "Jew," and we have what happened in Nazi Germany. The power of the State under Hitler declared that these human beings were not persons and therefore could be killed. Those who were involved in these atrocities were eventually tried before an international court at Nuremburg and convicted of crimes against humanity. Laws must obey the Higher Law.
Then again, change the word "Ken" to "slave," and you will see the same mistake occurring in America in the last century. The Supreme court in 1857 said that these people were not really full "persons," and could therefore be treated like property. It took a Civil War and an amendment to the Constitution to correct that mistake.
Brothers and sisters, we are making the same mistake again today. We are again falling into the error of saying that some human beings are not persons. Just change the word "Ken" to "pre-born baby" and look at what the laws say: Boys and girls in their mother' wombs are not considered persons under the law, and therefore may be destroyed by abortion. The numbers of babies lost by this mistake are far greater than those lost under Hitler. 214,000,000 babies a year are destroyed by abortion.
A woman who was 60-years-old recently said to a priest who had spoken about abortion, "Oh, we don't have to be concerned about that." Evidently, she felt that only pregnant women have to be concerned about the abortion issue.
What about the other members of society? Are we to say "It is no concern of mine" just because we are neither an unborn baby nor his/her mother? That is like a free man saying, "Slaves are no concern of mine," or a German saying, "Jews are no concern of mine." If we are decent, caring members of a civilized society, then anyone who suffers in that society is our concern! The more defenseless the victim is, the stronger is our obligation toward him/her. The pre-born baby is certainly the most defenseless of all victims.
We need to realize that whenever one innocent person is deliberately killed, all of human society is attacked. When the child is a victim of abortion, we are all victims, because our life is protected by the same principle that should protect the child's life. That principle is that life is a gift of God. It is given by God and can be taken only by God. If we start taking the lives of one another, then nobody is safe. If society tolerates the killing of one group of human beings, what is to keep it from moving on to another group? Once killing is accepted, it destroys the entire society. If you can kill an innocent, unwanted child, then why can't you kill an innocent, unwanted grandparent, or an innocent, unwanted neighbor?… And what is to keep the neighbor from killing innocent, unwanted You?
Either the right to life belongs to all, or it belongs to none. No government has the right to limit it and say it belongs only to some. Our rights do not come from governments; they come from God. The Creator gives the right to life. It is "inalienable;" that is, it cannot be taken away. Governments exist to protect those rights.
The current laws on abortion, therefore, are seriously wrong. EVERY human being is a person. You cannot exclude slaves, or Jews, or pre-born babies. The babies destroyed by abortion are our brothers and sisters, and we have a duty to speak up for them! Abortion is our concern, because we care for the weak and defenseless. Abortion is our concern because we care for the mother and want to offer her the support and help she needs to bear that child and, after birth, to either raise him/her or place him/her for adoption. To say that women "need" abortion is to insult them, and abandon them. It is also to repeat again an old error of history. It is to say to countless children, "You don't matter. I am not responsible for you."
Today, let us renew our love for life. Let us renew our sense of responsibility for all human beings and our determination to protect their rights. Let us work so that the laws of our nation may obey the Higher Law of God! God is the Giver of Life, and He will give us strength to protect and defend it!