One of the best-known Christmas movies is “It’s a Wonderful Life” written by Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett, and Frank Capra, who also produced and directed it. For those of you who have never seen it, this is a story of George, a man whose life did not turn out the way he wanted. Because of financial issues caused by a selfish, dishonest man from town, George contemplated suicide. For a moment he believed that he was “worth more dead than alive.” It was at this point in the story where Clarence, his guardian angel, stepped in and showed George that he truly had a “wonderful life.”
Clarence showed George what life in his town would be like if George had never been born. It was not a pretty sight. The dishonest man owned just about everything. All of George’s friends’ lives were completely different, and his wife was a spinster. Most devastating was that George was not there to save his brother’s life when they were children, so his brother was not there to save the lives of hundreds of men during WWII. This movie shows the value of the life of someone who did not realize all the good things he accomplished.
I have watched at least part of this movie every year for a long time, but it has only been in the last couple of years that something occurred to me. In real life, the story of this movie plays out somehow every time a child is aborted. There are thousands of souls who were never born, and, unlike the movie, we will never know what the world would have been like had they been born.
I do not believe anyone has the right to tell another human being, “you should not exist,” but I am not without compassion for the mothers of these children. I don’t believe they made this choice lightly or that they made it out of selfishness. I believe they made this choice out of fear, and that fear is not unfounded. Parenting is scary under the best of circumstances, and most of these women are living under some of the worst. However, that does not make their decision right. I believe God creates each soul individually with a purpose in mind. We are each supposed to do our part to fulfill His plan. Every time a person is not born, something goes undone.
These women need our help. Our society needs to change. Fathers need to step up and be real fathers. Corporations need to be less concerned with profit and more concerned with paying their employees living wages. Adoptions should be affordable for families who want children. Reliable childcare has to be available for working parents. Parenting classes, supportive families–the list of changes is long, but I believe it is worth it. I can’t help but wonder what wonderful lives this world is missing. Jesus’s mother Mary was certainly scared, but she accepted the task of raising the Son of God. If she can do that, our society should be able to support the right to life.
“And Mary said, ‘Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.’ And the angel departed from her.” Luke 1:49