America was saved from death by prayer

Keep up the prayer!

America has just faced a serious choice. As a country, these United States were at a crossroads, and thankfully, Americans chose the path of life over the path of death. But even that is not crystal clear. On the one hand, there was one side of the debate arguing explicitly for death. Satan is a clever master, and he does not outright lie, he deceives through false compassion, and so when he uses word like “women’s rights” or “reproductive healthcare” he makes a great evil actually sound like a good thing. “My body my choice” we often hear chanted by those who have been deceived by the father of lies. Of course it is a perversion, because the debate about the life or death of unborn babies is not actually about the body of the mother, the argument is whether a mother has a right to kill her baby or not, and at which point that is socially acceptable. Is it acceptable to kill the baby when he or she is 24 weeks, or is it more appropriate at 12 weeks? The liberals wanted abortion for all throughout the pregnancy. The answer to Christians is never; It is never acceptable or appropriate to end an innocent human life because all human life is sacred. So when one side of the debate chose to make the right to kill babies their primary voting issue, they chose to side against God and His good order, His perfect design for our lives. Not just our lives but our very being. We are made in the image of God, and so mutilating a child of God is a direct affront to God.

Thankfully, Christians came out and fulfilled their obligation, their duty, to vote against death. A majority of protestants and Catholics voted for life. Contrast that with a majority of those of other faiths and none who voted for death.

Don’t get me wrong, the other side is not perfect. The President-elect is on record saying he believes abortion is acceptable in rare/extreme circumstances, such as rape or incest. He is right that these are rare and exceptional circumstances. Figures show that around 1.5% of all abortions are due to rape or incest. This is a shameful statistic, demonstrating that the vast majority of abortions are due to convenience, with mothers using abortion as a form of contraception. But he is wrong in that abortion is right even in those circumstances. It is a truth that is not easy to hear, but a Christian must always choose the life of the innocent. Rape is a grave evil, and if anyone must be put to death, it should be the rapist, not the baby. The baby is innocent of this crime and does not deserve the death sentence. There is always another option. Adoption is not perfect either, but there are plenty of potential parents willing to give unplanned babies a loving home.

Millstones are heavy, and hell is hot. Verily, verily, the hour is coming. We want all mothers to end up in His heavenly kingdom, and there is still time to make it so. As a direct result of this election, we have seen vast swathes of liberal women saying they are going to abstain from sex until marriage. Good! This is right and proper. Men have a responsibility to not abuse women and not to take women for granted, and women have a responsibility to honour themselves, too.

Where the President-elect was right is when, in his last term, he selected a Supreme Court who were able to push the decision down to the State level. Now, states are able to ban abortion democratically. The Christian response would be to ban abortion nationally, but that would be unconstitutional. Sometimes, the State and the Church are in conflict, and this is one of those times.

But the President-elect is not a perfect man, and even though his campaign defeated the campaign of the death cult, he will need help to get fully on the side of life. Thankfully, the Vice President-elect is Catholic, and the President-elect surrounds himself with many Christian pastors – I myself was recently invited to pray over him and offer him a blessing - this fills me with hope. If there are enough good Christians around the President, the United States may be governed with a Christian moral compass.

The tagline Make America Great Again is a good one; it is clear what it means. Make America Healthy Again is perhaps going to be one of the most important campaigns of our generation - removing the poison from the American diet. But the real job at hand, the one we have to continue to pray for, the best tagline of all, is to Make America Christian Again.

May Christ be in the hearts of all our leaders. May Christian values be at the foundation of every political decision. May Christian virtues underline every piece of legislation.

Politics is an ugly topic, and there will be those who wish we could keep it private. But that would be negligence. The reason the West is in the state it is in, and much of Europe is becoming godless, is because people have stopped praying through these important matters, and pastors and priests have stopped speaking on them. If we want America to avoid the pitfalls we are seeing all around us, we need more Christian teaching, and we certainly need more prayer.

We especially need more prayer where we know families that have been broken by abortion. It may be an evil act, but that does not mean it is performed by evil people. We are all sinners, and we all get things wrong. The beauty of our God is that he always offers a way out. He always offers redemption. And so if we know people who have committed abortions in the past, it is not our job to judge them but to lead them back to Christ. To let them know that He still loves them.  He sees them, He understands their situation, He recognises their mistake, and all He requests is their repentance and faith in Him. All He wants from any of us is repentance of our sins and faith in Him.

And so we must pray for the mothers who made this life-ending, life-altering decision, pray that they are healed of the trauma it brings, and pray that they re-centre their lives on Christ.

And we must also pray for the souls of the babies, that the Lord welcomes them into His loving embrace.

That is one of the good things we can make an extra effort to do at this time of year.

During Allhallowtide, we commemorated all the faithful departed. We prayed for the souls in purgatory and asked for the intercession of the saints in heaven. Let us continue to do so and keep the souls of the innocent in our minds and hearts.

Abortion was legalised in the UK in my mother’s lifetime. 1967 - one generation ago, from my perspective. In that time, 10 million babies have been killed.

In the United States, I believe it was less than a decade later, in 1973, and since then, there have been an estimated 63 million babies murdered.

This infanticide has to end, and it is our duty as Christians to educate a world that has been blinded by false compassion and deceived by the great deceiver.

As we approach the sacrifice of the Mass tomorrow, let us pray for those millions and millions of souls who were never given the chance to live. And let us think of ways we can lead the world back to Christ to end the greatest evil of our age, the continuing infanticide.

For the good of the babies and the good of the mothers.

Let us pray for the souls of the innocents, that they may see heaven. Let us pray for those who have made poor choices, that they may repent. And let us pray for all those who are considering their options that they may make the right decision and heed the words of our Lord:

“They that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation”