Thank God for Pro-Life Victories That Will Save Babies From Abortions

Rejoicing in the Lord, and giving thanks for his victories, is a command of God’s Word. In fact, not only are we told to rejoice in good times, but always (cf. Phil. 4:4), and not only are we told to give thanks for blessings, but for all things (cf. 1 Thess. 5:18).

And we are in good times right now.

The pro-life movement saw the reversal of Roe vs. Wade three years ago. Last November, we saw election victories that not only advance our cause, but preserve the very tools we need to fight for this cause (freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to protest peacefully, and more).

And now we are on the cusp of the greatest victory since Dobbs, namely, the cutting off, by law, of the largest government funding stream for Planned Parenthood and the entire abortion industry.

So we rejoice, and we give thanks.

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Some will decide not to rejoice, however. Dobbs, after all, did not mandate the protection of a single baby. And the Big Beautiful Bill stopped abortion funding for only one year instead of the original provision, which was ten years.

Yes, these facts are to be acknowledged, and yes, we want more. And we will be restless until we get more.

But in that restlessness, in that very justified dissatisfaction, we must yet rejoice, because “Rejoicing in the Lord must be your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10). In that scene from the Book of Nehemiah, the law of the Lord was being read to the people, and they were weeping, realizing how far they were from practicing it.

But they were urged to rejoice, to focus not simply on how far they were from the moral standard. They were not to focus just on the circumstances of their weakness, but on the joy of the Lord, which would give them strength to keep going in life’s spiritual warfare.

So it is with us.

Let’s take the Big Beautiful Bill. Yes, we should be distressed that the funding restriction is only one year instead of ten. But what if it had passed with the ten-year provision? We could have rejoiced in that, or we could have said that ten years in not enough. Why should child-killing be funded in the 11^th year? And we would be right.

Let’s take this a step further. Let’s say the law stopped abortion funding permanently. We could rejoice in that, or we could say, Stopping the funding is not enough; we have to stop the killing. And we would be right.

In other words, there is always more to win, more ground to conquer. But the ground that has been conquered is cause for rejoicing.

Consider Dobbs. It does not end abortion, by any means.

In reality, it takes the courts to “neutral,” by saying that there is no constitutional basis for preventing the people and their elected representatives from protecting the unborn.

But what a victory that is.

Think about driving a car. If you are in reverse, how do you get into drive? You have to go through neutral first.

Under Roe, we were in reverse. The Courts were saying we were prohibited from protecting the unborn. Now we are in neutral, with the Courts saying we are permitted to protect the unborn. Obviously, we want to get to drive, where the Courts saying we are required to protect the unborn.

The point is that neutral is better than reverse, and is a big step closer to drive.

Let’s also consider incremental legislation, that protects some babies but not all. Let’s be clear: no abortion is ever justified, for any reason whatsoever. And every baby in the womb is a person deserving of full protection. No government has the right to authorize a single abortion.

So when we see incremental legislation, if it represents as far as a legislative body is willing to go, that is not a limit we are choosing. It is a limit imposed on us.

And the relevant question is not, Are we morally permitted to support this legislation even though it doesn’t protect all the babies? That question can be analyzed in a moral theology classroom.

But we are in a battle to save lives. The more relevant question is this: Do the babies who would be protected by this limited, imperfect law, have a right to be protected right now or not?

If they are persons who have a right to life that does not depend on the consensus of the people, or whether others are protected, then not only are we permitted to implement the law that would protect them, we are required to do so.

And that would be a victory in which we should rejoice.

Indeed, times are good. Times are also evil, because each day, our hearts must be broken, our eyes must weep, over the daily killing of babies.

But rejoicing in the Lord must be our strength, precisely because we do have victories, and we need that strength to win even more.

Rejoice in the Lord and give thanks always!

LifeNews.com Note:  Frank Pavone is national director of Priests for Life and the national pastoral director of Rachel’s Vineyard Ministries and the Silent No More Awareness Campaign.

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