"vast ignorance is not just a question of losing bits of information, retinal holes marring an otherwise excellent field of vision. It is something more like a retinal detachment, a whole field of pulling inexorable away toward blindness. Not only are the words gone, the bits of information, but the system in which the words made sense."
John Cavadini, Commonweal Magazine April 9, 2004.
Let me begin by making clear that Prof. Cavadini is not talking about abortion in this excerpt. He is critiquing what he describes as "religious illiteracy" and offering a remedy.
But from the second I read this paragraph, I thought of the light it shone on the profound changes we are witnessing, not only in the United States, but elsewhere. For the issue in both instances is the need to know (and then internalize) the "basics," and understand why they matter, in order that the learner can be an"effective agent of moral change."
For reasons that we've enumerated on many occasions, collectively, we are beginning to see abortion in such a dramatically different light it's almost as if our spiritual eyes have undergone surgical repair. Not so long ago, that would have seemed a pipe dream.
But there is a real reason we are able to reexamine the ethics of abortion. Thanks to you, as clouded as our vision became, the retina was never detached, to borrow from Cavadini's imagery.
By this I mean that the words were never lost. The vocabulary needed to describe (and therefore "see") the unborn as one of us remained available, ready to be employed when people were shaken out of their complacency.
And that, of course, is what is happening today, much to the chagrin of the Abortion Establishment. For both "hard" and "soft" reasons, the unborn, once no more than a hazy abstraction (at best), has come into sharp focus.
The ongoing, fervent debate over a very hard truth–-abortionists lethally assailing 20+ week old unborn babies with an abortion technique so grotesque it chills your soul-- has quickened a recovery that had as one of its origins the softening effects of ultrasound technology.
We magnetically affix "baby's first picture" to our refrigerators, proudly showing our little ones off to anyone who enters our homes. Yet, as we are gradually discovering, much later in the developmental journey, abortionists jam surgical scissors into the back of the heads of these vibrant, living human beings and vacuum out their brains. There is a disjuncture at work here so radical that not even the all-exculpatory language of "wantedness" can obscure the incredible inconsistency.
But, note, in and of themselves, neither ultrasounds, which evince a cozy affinity, nor partial-birth abortions, which prompt something close to nausea, are enough. They are necessary but not sufficient ingredients.
They are vitally important first steps, precursors to visualizing the unborn, not as a kind of abstraction whom we either celebrate or annihilate, but as a fellow member of the human family. Put another way, ordinary citizens with no stake in this issue will not be pulled into our camp in overwhelming numbers so long as the unborn remains one of "them," rather than one of "us."
It is this appreciation for our common humanity that is the decisive step which can move us from a kind of benevolent neutrality into active participation on behalf of the unborn. To your credit, that understanding is beginning to dawn on more and more people.
Tomorrow, I'll talk about one determined pastor in Great Britain whose never-give-in efforts are shining light into a deep well of darkness.
"vast ignorance is not just a question of losing bits of information, retinal holes marring an otherwise excellent field of vision. It is something more like a retinal detachment, a whole field of pulling inexorable away toward blindness. Not only are the words gone, the bits of information, but the system in which the words made sense."