in which I make myself unpopular.

I am pro-life.

I am also pro-choice.






To clarify this:

I strongly disbelieve in abortion on a personal level. Yes, to get this out of the way, I'm Catholic. I'm a member of a large religious group run by a bunch of old white guys. I go to church on Sundays. I occasionally (maybe three or so times a year) pray the Rosary. I don't eat meat on Fridays during Lent. Once in a while, I go to confession and tell my repertoire of sins to a priest and say a bunch of prayers for absolution. When people around me are sad or angry or in a bad situation, and I tell them I'll pray for them, I actually do.

And when science itself says that life begins long before we're born, I believed for a long time (and still, on a gut level, do believe) that it's wrong to create that life and then take it away without considering other options.

But.

That would apply in a perfect world, where the only people who get pregnant are the people who want to be pregnant: the people who can afford both physically and financially to have a child and to take care of it, who will take care of it and love it and raise it. That would apply in a world where women aren't raped, forced into relationships they aren't ready for, or sometimes biologically incapable of carrying the child to term without grievous harm being done to both their bodies and the bodies of their children.

I believe in the separation of church and state. I believe that morality and free will become meaningless when a choice is not offered to begin with. So I think that a law that prevents women from choosing to have an abortion if they believe it's the right thing for their bodies and their lifestyles is wrong. I think that a law that would prosecute women who have miscarriages is wrong.

And that's why I'm pro-choice.

But.

I don't think that we - and by "we," I mean the so-called moral majority, which I suppose includes me - should continue preaching abstinence in the vain and sanctimonious assumption that severing a limb will eradicate the problem. If the Catholic Church didn't disagree with using birth control and condoms to prevent unwanted pregnancy in the first place, this crisis would surely abate. If we didn't live in a society that still treats women as property and second-class citizens, this wouldn't be a problem.

If we truly treated all life with dignity - regardless of gender, sex, class, race, creed, ability, and any other category I'm missing - only then could we cast the first stone. So I support women's rights laws. I support AIDS prevention and high school sex classes that actually teach safe sex practices. I think that the self-righteous, short-sighted bastards who passed that law in Utah are wrong. I think that the fuckheads who call themselves pro-life but saw fit to murder a doctor who stood up and did what he believed to be right, I think those people are going to burn in hell. Because if you're going to respect life, respect all life.

And that's what I mean when I say I'm pro-life. It means, "when possible, I, personally, do my best to choose life."



So, when I see people angrily throw around words like "Christian," and "pro-life" as vicious, pejorative words intended to conjure up images of self-righteous, hypocritical pricks, I feel like if I speak up and say I proudly consider myself as a pro-life Christian, I would lose all credibility among the people with whom I agree. Those are stereotypes, just like the ones that every other group faces. The fact that the stereotype is true in many cases (and trust me, I know a whole addressbook-full of cases) doesn't make it any less of a stereotype.

So, please, don't use them without context. That's all. Or at least, not around me.

Thanks.