Mass for Life 2019

Published: January 20, 2019

Bishop Anthony B. Taylor preached the following homily during the annual Mass for Life at Robinson Performance Hall in Little Rock on Sunday, Jan. 20, 2019.

Bishop Taylor

I'm sure most of you remember Pope Francis’ visit to the United States in 2015. I was there and I treasure the powerful, pro-life witness that was at the heart of most of his talks and homilies.

Over and over again he called for a consistent ethic of life rooted in the sacredness of human life from the first moment of conception to natural death and every stage in between.

When speaking of specific pro-life issues, he insisted that everything is connected — thus bridging the American, political divide between those who are passionate about abortion but weak when it comes to social justice and those who are passionate about social justice but weak when it comes to abortion.

Abortion is clearly the most depraved expression of what Pope Francis calls our “throw away culture” and nowhere does he imply a false equivalence of all the myriad threats to life, but neither does abortion as an issue stand alone, as some would have us believe.

In his homily to us bishops at St. Matthew’s Cathedral in Washington, he specifically linked “the innocent victims of abortion” to many other pro-life issues. Pope Francis said: “The innocent victim of abortion, children who die of hunger or from bombings, immigrants who drown in the search for a better tomorrow, the elderly or sick who are considered a burden, the victims of terrorism, wars, violence and drug trafficking, the environment devastated by man’s predatory relationship with nature — at stake in all of this is the gift of God, of which we are noble stewards, but not masters. It is wrong to look the other way or to remain silent.”

We are here today because we are not willing to look away or remain silent when it comes to abortion. Pope Francis is challenging us not to remain silent on any of these other areas either.

This teaching regarding a consistent ethic of life did not begin with Pope Francis. In 1995 St. John Paul II issued a powerful encyclical titled: “Evangelium Vitae” ("The Gospel of Life" — abbreviated EV) in which he emphasizes fostering a culture of life based on the teaching of Jesus in the New Testament and he insists that human life and human dignity must be protected from conception to natural death.

This Gospel of Life that we proclaim places the sacredness of the human person at the center of our teaching and thus touches every aspect of life — in the womb, at the end of life and every stage in between. (EV 37)

If life is sacred, then there should be no euthanasia, no doctor-assisted suicide and no capital punishment in societies where criminals can be imprisoned and pose no further threat to public safety. (EV 40)

That’s why I was unable to attend the right to life rally last year, which featured our attorney general, a pro-death penalty speaker — even though that was not the topic she was addressing that day. But it is all interconnected.

If life is sacred then we must find a way to provide universal access to medical care and compassionate care for the elderly and medical research that does not require the destruction of human embryos. If life is sacred, then immigration, when necessary, is a pro-life issue (this planet belongs to all of us), as is welcoming refugees and working to end gun violence and unemployment — and on this Martin Luther King weekend, racism.

If life is sacred, then feeding the hungry and giving shelter to the homeless are pro-life issues. Popes Benedict and Francis then build on the teaching of St. John Paul II. Indeed, Pope Francis goes a step further and condemns economic inequality, what he calls “an economy that kills.” ("Evangelii Gaudium (The Joy of the Gospel)," 53)

He reminds us once again that everything is connected. Abortion is part of an economy that kills — the abortion industry is driven by huge profits and many of the victims are poor and with few prospects in life.

Hence the image often used of a seamless garment when referring to a consistent ethic of life. Seamless because all of the pro-life issues are interwoven to the point that if the garment is torn, the whole thing begins to come unraveled. Today we give witness to the sacredness of life in the womb, but that witness will lose credibility if we forget that this life remains sacred once it leaves the womb … all the way to natural death.