In the classic Christmas film, “It’s a Wonderful Life,” the main character, George Bailey (who considers himself a failure) gets to see what the world would have been like if he had never been born. With the help of his guardian angel, Clarence, George comes to realize the positive difference he made in the lives of others, and how their lives would have been negatively affected without him. As Clarence says to George at one point, “Strange, isn’t it? Each man’s life touches so many other lives. When he isn’t around, he leaves an awful hole, doesn’t he?”
The sad and tragic reality is that we’ve created roughly 63 million “holes” in the United States of America since the infamous Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision of 1973 — which effectively legalized abortion on demand throughout our nation. We just observed the sad anniversary of that infamous judicial decision this past Saturday. Undoubtedly, we’ve aborted hundreds and thousands of men and women in the last 49 years who would have made a positive difference in our world: scientists and doctors who would have found cures for some of the diseases that plague us; economists who would have helped to turn around our sick economy; good priests and religious who could have saved some souls who otherwise will die in the state of mortal sin.
In last Sunday’s second reading St. Paul told us that “God has set each member of the body in the place he wanted it to be.” When a member (or a potential member) of the body of Christ is eliminated through abortion or some other act of violence, God’s plan is undermined, a “hole” is created in the Church and in the world, and the entire body of Christ suffers.
We hope and pray that 2022 will be the year when the Supreme Court finally reverses its erroneous and toxic decision of 1973, so that the “holes” created by the sin of abortion will cease to afflict our country.
