Back in 1979 a friend of mine (I grew up with him at Box Hill) happened to be on a mission trip in India. As part of that trip he was privileged, along with the rest of his group, to visit Mother Teresa at her Calcutta hospice. There he met this amazing woman. More on that in a moment.
On 7 October 1950, Mother Teresa received Vatican permission to establish a small congregation, which would become the Missionaries of Charity. In her words, it would care for "the hungry, the naked, the homeless, the crippled, the blind, the lepers, all those people who feel unwanted, unloved, uncared for throughout society, people that have become a burden to the society and are shunned by everyone". This is one of the noblest declarations I’ve ever read - especially when I first read it some 40 years after Mother Teresa said the words, and her hospice had been operating for four decades. Mother Teresa’s first hospice opened in 1952 with help from Calcutta officials. She converted an abandoned Hindu temple into the “Kalighat Home for the Dying”, free for the poor, and later renamed it “Kalighat, the Home of the Pure Heart”. Those brought to the home received medical attention and the opportunity to die with dignity in accordance with their faith: Muslims were to read the Quran, Hindus received water from the Ganges, and Catholics received “extreme unction”. Teresa once said in an interview that, “a beautiful death is for people who lived like animals to die like angels — loved and wanted.” These words have always deeply move my heart. For Teresa the sanctity of life was the most sacred of all things on the earth.
My friend who happened to be in Calcutta, as I just mentioned, had heard on the radio the day before that Mother Teresa had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her humanitarian work over many, many years. When introduced to her, my friend warmly congratulated her on her award. Mother Teresa looked genuinely surprised as she hadn’t heard the news yet. She was completely unaware, so busy was she in her day-to-day work amongst the poor. My friend was so struck by her humility and devotion to the poor in her care, and her passionate advocacy for the sanctity of life that was reflected in her ministry. Mother Teresa was a very vocal opponent of abortion. She viewed legal abortion on demand as a grave moral wrong, a direct form of violence, and “the greatest threat to world peace”. In fact, in her 1979 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, she stated so. She said that abortion is the “greatest destroyer of peace today” because it breaks the fundamental bond between a mother and her child. She argued that nations which legalise abortion are “spiritually, the poorest” because they are afraid of caring for the unborn. She was right then, and she is right today.
Teresa taught that human life begins at conception and that every unborn child is created in the image of God and remains a sacred gift. She consistently urged world leaders and legal systems to repeal laws permitting abortion, viewing legal protection for the unborn as a core measure of a society's sense of justice. She actively petitioned against abortion laws, famously submitting an amicus curiae brief to the U.S. Supreme Court and spoke publicly against abortion policies before prominent political figures. She advocated that rather than supporting abortion for mothers facing poverty or unwanted pregnancies, she urged communities to choose adoption, publicly offering to take any unwanted child herself to place them in a loving home. There’s so much more that could be said here, of course.
But what struck me about her 1979 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech was that one line: that abortion is the greatest threat to world peace. At the time, when she said those words, there were the usual critical “Pro Choice” voices that opposed her views, of course - but with a little more respect awarded her than would usually be the case for any other “Pro Life” voice. Even her staunchest detractors had enough respect for her work amongst the poor to extend a modicum of respect. Yet this was a big statement when you think about it. Abortion is the greatest threat to world peace. Those words have proved to be prophetic. With legalised abortion, that is, abortion for any and every reason as an enshrined human right, and funded by the state, now normal in every mainstream Western Society, life in general has become very cheap. Back in the 70s there were no such thoughts or public debate about things like voluntary assisted dying, or “dying with dignity”, let alone plans for its legislation. We called it suicide, which was tragic then and it’s still tragic today. I’m convinced that with the open slather approach to abortion on demand has come the cheapening of life – the erosion of the sanctity of life at every level of our society. If we cannot regard as sacred the unborn, no life is sacred any more. And this has produced a rising, hard, callousness in our societies towards each other at every level.
The world peace that Mother Teresa spoke of was not so much about wars between nations, which are bad enough at the best of times. She was getting at the peace in relationships between people, peace in families, and peace in communities that should be enjoyed, cherished, nurtured and protected at all costs. Because these are the places where human beings are raised - the bedrock of our best communities, our way of life. But when the dam gates of abortion on demand opened, the cheapening of life gained momentum so quickly that it could not be stopped. But there’s more to it than this. We’ve moved from an attitude where early pregnancies can be aborted to late term and partial birth abortions, as well as abortion being used as a tool for the gender selection of a child. This is callousness at a whole new level, and it has introduced into our world a ruthless brutality that is now a form of worship. Now you might say that that’s a fairly extreme view. However, I would argue differently. Let me give you just a few examples.
Ginnette Paris, in her 1992 book, “The Sacrament of Abortion” wrote, “Our culture needs new rituals as well as laws to restore abortion to its sacred dimension.” Yes, you read correctly. Sarah Terzo, a freelance writer and pro-choice/consistent life activist (she is on the board of Rainbow Pro-Life Alliance and the Consistent Life Network, enough said), wrote in 2016, (NRL News Today), “abortion is a major blessing, and … a sacrament in the hands of women.” Yes, you read that correctly, too. One more quote from Ginnette Paris’ book: “It is not immoral to choose abortion; it is simply another kind of morality, a pagan one.” In another of her books, “The Psychology of Abortion” (2nd Edition), she pontificates, “Abortion is a sacrifice … and a sacred act.” Note these words, deliberately chosen here: “sacred”, “blessing”, a different “morality”, “sacrament”, “rituals”. This is about ritual – pagan rituals in our nations. And these are far from outlier views, there are hundreds of other such voices saying similar things, yet these never feature in mainstream media, or get a mention in our parliaments. Do the research. With the advent of abortion as we know it today in our societies, gates have been opened in the spiritual realm to many other kinds of demonic influences that are destroying so much of the peace we have known in community and even families. I would go as far as to say that the legalisation of abortion on demand is legalised paganism in many respects – it is pure evil. This is no longer just about terminating a pregnancy for the sake of convenience, it is much more than that now in many places.
There is so much more that could be shared but it would be inappropriate in this forum, such as very public satanic practices that are occurring in many western cultures including our own. Suffice to say it gets worse than what I’ve written here. Mother Theresa was right, but few saw it back in 1979. Here’s the thing: when we start to mess with the sanctity of human life in any way whatsoever, we open the gates to demonic influence that we have no way of controlling with laws and other “moralities”. The original assurances of “limited” abortion laws promised us by politicians, have been pushed out so far over the last 40 years as to now reflect no restraint – and no respect for an unborn life. The same is now happening with so-called “voluntary assisted dying with dignity” laws, and this is also gaining swift momentum.
If ever the Church needs to be majoring in the ministry of intercession, it is now, for such a time as this. To intercede into the spiritual realm to blunt and block the flood of demonic influence.
2 Chronicles 7:14 (ESV)
“… if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
Ps Milton