Bishop Doran Speaks out For Life
Bishop Doran from the Diocese of Rockford, IL is someone I can relate to when it comes to sharing his thoughts on abortion. Wouldn’t it be great if all our Bishops and priests would give a homily like this on Sundays? I have a little trouble understanding why they can’t. Is it out of fear of losing their parishioners or of losing their tithe? All I can say is that I am glad there are clergy out there who do speak up for life and I am especially thankful for Father Frank Pavone, Director of Priests for Life, and for Msgr. Reilly, Founder of the Helpers of God’s Precious Infants. Both have taught me what it means to stand at the foot of the Cross. Both have saved countless lives and souls. I pray that one day they will be united with those souls in Heaven.
The Observer
(Rockford, IL, November5, 2004)
Bishop Doran's Column
The disconnects plummet us into an unreal state
One of the regional newspapers in the diocese recently had an article about an increase in domestic violence in one of our diocese’s major cities. The following day it celebrated a signal event in the abortion culture of the same community. It struck me as I looked at both headlines how much unreality befalls us in a world in which we are so well-informed.
I remember being in Helena, Mont., some years ago and reading a letter to the editor in a local newspaper there. It was from a woman who berated a local television station for televising an abortion in progress. She said that she was in the kitchen and her baby daughter was watching the television, the universal babysitter in this 21st century, and all of a sudden the daughter screamed. The mother ran into the living room and asked, "What is the matter?" The child said, "Look what they are doing to that baby!" The mother was very upset about this incident and said in her letter, "My child could not understand what was happening."
Au contraire! The child understood very well what was happening on the television screen in front of her. In fact, the child understood perfectly even though she did not have the words to express her horror. It is the mother who didn’t know what was happening.
At one level, I agreed with that mother that abortion is not something that should be shown on television, especially not at an hour when children might reasonably be expected to be viewing. But I submit that the reality of abortion itself is much more dreadful than any video recording of it.
We bemoan domestic violence — and well we should. Nearly all of it involves the victimization of helpless adults and innocent children, who are likely scarred for life. Domestic violence robs its victims of their God-given dignity and their right to expect a safe harbor in their own homes. It also puts our police officers at risk when they respond to these calls, which represent a drain on our civil resources and the officers’ personal resources.
It should go without saying that I am vehemently opposed to each and every instance of domestic violence of any kind — but because these are strange times, I say it anyway.
Obviously, I also support every good effort to prevent and, failing that, halt domestic violence in all its forms. Moreover, I remember our police officers and other government employees who respond to these calls in my prayers.
But now I must ask you: What is more violent than the cold-blooded and calculated smashing of an infant’s head in order to kill it? What could be more violent than that?
I still remember with dread when I was a very young child and we were being told by war propagandists that in the conquest of Shanghai the soldiers of the conquering army threw infant children up in the air and speared them with their bayonets. Dabbling in history over the years I have tried to determine if these reports were true. The evidence seems to show that while it probably was not the practice of every Japanese soldier, it did happen and, I am told, some records of it exist on film.
Needless to say, I believed the stories uncritically when I first heard them as a small child going to St. James School in Rockford, and these stories convinced me of the wickedness of our enemies and the virtue of our cause. We all knew then, as some of us still know today, that violence against children is the ultimate violence.
Thus, I submit that when we say there is domestic violence in a country that has killed more than 40 million of its tiniest citizens over the course of the last 30 years, we should be shocked and chagrined — but we cannot be surprised.
Compared to the domestic violence that abortion has caused in this society, other things that happen in that category seem relatively less serious. And I submit that this is precisely the problem we face as a society today. Cruelty to children, born or unborn, is an abomination in any society.
But violence begets violence, and our children pick up the signals given off and the values practiced by the culture in which they live. When a school teacher runs across a child who likes to torture lower creatures, pull the legs off flies or torment or injure small animals or pets, the teacher is told to make that known to higher authorities because it is a sign that the child has special problems and needs special help. Often the child is modeling abuse in his or her own life, and it’s a matter that deserves attention for the child’s welfare and the long-term good of society.
What can we say to these obviously troubled children and to all the other children in our society who grow up knowing that adults in that same society have snuffed out the lives of 40 million innocent children — and that our society’s legal structures permit this wanton bloodshed? Now, what can we say to them when they see in the media a sort of consecration of the public will that this is somehow okay?
The message the children hear is that those who provide abortions, who take innocent human life, are heroes. Perhaps we can say, "I am not touched by that directly and so I can live with it." But what we cannot do is ignore the fact that so many can and do live easily with this tragic state of affairs. That truly disturbs me, and I hope it disturbs you too.
http://www.rockforddiocese.org/observer/observer.asp
Bishop Doran from the Diocese of Rockford, IL is someone I can relate to when it comes to sharing his thoughts on abortion. Wouldn’t it be great if all our Bishops and priests would give a homily like this on Sundays? I have a little trouble understanding why they can’t. Is it out of fear of losing their parishioners or of losing their tithe? All I can say is that I am glad there are clergy out there who do speak up for life and I am especially thankful for Father Frank Pavone, Director of Priests for Life, and for Msgr. Reilly, Founder of the Helpers of God’s Precious Infants. Both have taught me what it means to stand at the foot of the Cross. Both have saved countless lives and souls. I pray that one day they will be united with those souls in Heaven.
The Observer
(Rockford, IL, November5, 2004)
Bishop Doran's Column
The disconnects plummet us into an unreal state
One of the regional newspapers in the diocese recently had an article about an increase in domestic violence in one of our diocese’s major cities. The following day it celebrated a signal event in the abortion culture of the same community. It struck me as I looked at both headlines how much unreality befalls us in a world in which we are so well-informed.
I remember being in Helena, Mont., some years ago and reading a letter to the editor in a local newspaper there. It was from a woman who berated a local television station for televising an abortion in progress. She said that she was in the kitchen and her baby daughter was watching the television, the universal babysitter in this 21st century, and all of a sudden the daughter screamed. The mother ran into the living room and asked, "What is the matter?" The child said, "Look what they are doing to that baby!" The mother was very upset about this incident and said in her letter, "My child could not understand what was happening."
Au contraire! The child understood very well what was happening on the television screen in front of her. In fact, the child understood perfectly even though she did not have the words to express her horror. It is the mother who didn’t know what was happening.
At one level, I agreed with that mother that abortion is not something that should be shown on television, especially not at an hour when children might reasonably be expected to be viewing. But I submit that the reality of abortion itself is much more dreadful than any video recording of it.
We bemoan domestic violence — and well we should. Nearly all of it involves the victimization of helpless adults and innocent children, who are likely scarred for life. Domestic violence robs its victims of their God-given dignity and their right to expect a safe harbor in their own homes. It also puts our police officers at risk when they respond to these calls, which represent a drain on our civil resources and the officers’ personal resources.
It should go without saying that I am vehemently opposed to each and every instance of domestic violence of any kind — but because these are strange times, I say it anyway.
Obviously, I also support every good effort to prevent and, failing that, halt domestic violence in all its forms. Moreover, I remember our police officers and other government employees who respond to these calls in my prayers.
But now I must ask you: What is more violent than the cold-blooded and calculated smashing of an infant’s head in order to kill it? What could be more violent than that?
I still remember with dread when I was a very young child and we were being told by war propagandists that in the conquest of Shanghai the soldiers of the conquering army threw infant children up in the air and speared them with their bayonets. Dabbling in history over the years I have tried to determine if these reports were true. The evidence seems to show that while it probably was not the practice of every Japanese soldier, it did happen and, I am told, some records of it exist on film.
Needless to say, I believed the stories uncritically when I first heard them as a small child going to St. James School in Rockford, and these stories convinced me of the wickedness of our enemies and the virtue of our cause. We all knew then, as some of us still know today, that violence against children is the ultimate violence.
Thus, I submit that when we say there is domestic violence in a country that has killed more than 40 million of its tiniest citizens over the course of the last 30 years, we should be shocked and chagrined — but we cannot be surprised.
Compared to the domestic violence that abortion has caused in this society, other things that happen in that category seem relatively less serious. And I submit that this is precisely the problem we face as a society today. Cruelty to children, born or unborn, is an abomination in any society.
But violence begets violence, and our children pick up the signals given off and the values practiced by the culture in which they live. When a school teacher runs across a child who likes to torture lower creatures, pull the legs off flies or torment or injure small animals or pets, the teacher is told to make that known to higher authorities because it is a sign that the child has special problems and needs special help. Often the child is modeling abuse in his or her own life, and it’s a matter that deserves attention for the child’s welfare and the long-term good of society.
What can we say to these obviously troubled children and to all the other children in our society who grow up knowing that adults in that same society have snuffed out the lives of 40 million innocent children — and that our society’s legal structures permit this wanton bloodshed? Now, what can we say to them when they see in the media a sort of consecration of the public will that this is somehow okay?
The message the children hear is that those who provide abortions, who take innocent human life, are heroes. Perhaps we can say, "I am not touched by that directly and so I can live with it." But what we cannot do is ignore the fact that so many can and do live easily with this tragic state of affairs. That truly disturbs me, and I hope it disturbs you too.
http://www.rockforddiocese.org/observer/observer.asp
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