Last year, Professor Victor Davis Hanson wrote about the cancel culture:
Each generation deals with its own manifestations of age-old mob frenzies, bullying and public shaming. Salem, Mass., had its witch trials in the 1690s. The 1950s endured its McCarthyism. And we now are enduring our “cancel culture.”
But 21st-century public shaming reaches not thousands but tens of millions. And it does so instantaneously on the internet and on social media—too often, all under the cloak of masked Twitter handles.
His words still ring true, particularly as they apply to atrocities such as abortion. We live in a nation that takes the murder of human beings prior to birth, not to mention other acts, as human rights.
Jeff Mirus concurs, saying: “The secularist projects his guilt onto the world at large and asks: ‘To create the perfect world, what must be changed and whom must I cancel?’ But the Christian, who is always profoundly ashamed, asks: ‘To love God better, how must I change and whom must I help?’ And when enough Christians ask enough hard questions of themselves, ‘structural sin’ recedes.”
Mirus’ wisdom underscores the challenge confronting us today. Not only is there evil in abundance, but there are not enough Christians asking the tough questions. If there were, we would not have to write about the horrors of man’s quest for total control of his being, not to mention the bodies, minds, and consciences of others.
We see this in a recent legislative proposal put forth by Senator Cory Booker and his fellow Democrats. This proposal would trample on the consciences of pharmacists across our land, for it would establish a “duty” for “pharmacies to ensure provision of Food and Drug Administration-approved contraception, medication related to contraception, and for other purposes.” If this bill becomes law, pharmacists who oppose birth control chemicals being given to women because such drugs can kill babies prior to implantation or harm women in other ways would be out of a job. Why? Because there are no conscience protections in the proposal.
Further, the Biden-supported Equality Act would “prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex, gender identity, and sexual orientation, and for other purposes.” This proposal enshrines transgenderism into law, meaning that “men can identify as women, even if they have male chromosomes and the body of a man.”
And of course, among the most egregious of all atrocities is the abortion of an innocent child—an act that is the paramount offense against God. Not only has the law sanctioned this act, but it’s created a war on the innocent that has resulted in the bloodiest carnage of all time.
Michael Pakaluk once called legal abortion the crux of all the evils afflicting our nation today. He further said: “With legal abortion came the ‘treason of the intellectuals,’ as for example in amicus curiae briefs by historians which shamelessly distorted the history of states’ abortion legislation. . . . Robert Bork was the first victim of the ‘cancel culture’; his nomination hearing was the first poisoning of civil discourse by vituperation, character attacks, and the careful collating of evidence, designed to misrepresent and malign him.”
Why is this so? Because Bork held abortion in disdain, though nobody bothered to point out that he argued that even if Roe v. Wade were overturned, abortion would not be outlawed.
But the cancel culturists couldn’t care less about facts. They prefer demonization and propaganda.
What we need to offset the onslaught of atrocities in this nation today is more heroic bishops like Tyler, Texas,’ Bishop Strickland, who endorsed the first National Men’s March to End Abortion, tweeting: “God bless these men for being Godly Men in the Light of Jesus. . . . The atrocity of abortion must end!”
The act of abortion is the crux of all evil in our world today, and as we fight against these manifestations of our world’s embrace of evil, we cannot forget these profound words of St. Thomas Aquinas: “In this life no one can fulfill his longing, nor can any creature satisfy man’s desire. Only God satisfies, he infinitely exceeds all other pleasures. That is why man can rest in nothing but God. As Augustine says: ‘You have made us for yourself, Lord, and our heart can find no rest until it rests in you.’”
We know that nobody cancels God or His love for every one of His children. With confidence in His power, we will cancel the atrocities in our midst.