Political Isolation

“This is the sinister result of a relativism which reigns unopposed: the "right" ceases to be such, because it is no longer firmly founded on the inviolable dignity of the person, but is made subject to the will of the stronger part. In this way democracy, contradicting its own principles, effectively moves towards a form of totalitarianism… The appearance of the strictest respect for legality is maintained, at least when the laws permitting abortion and euthanasia are the result of a ballot in accordance with what are generally seen as the rules of democracy. Really, what we have here is only the tragic caricature of legality; the democratic ideal, which is only truly such when it acknowledges and safeguards the dignity of every human person, is betrayed in its very foundations (Evangelium Vitae, paragraph21).”

 This quote strikes me as uniquely applicable to the very situations we encounter today (this past year post Roe in particular).  In capturing the modern situation we ourselves are witnessing on a near daily basis, the quoted paragraph demonstrates both the keenly prophetic nature of EV and the consequences of widespread abandonment of the personalistic norm, a norm so consistently called for throughout JPII’s writings.

Firstly, the quote is striking in its spot-on depiction of the world we see today from a legislative standpoint.  In the fall of last year a very large number of states held special elections surrounding the topic of abortion, with mixed results.  The coming presidential election this year promises to utilize abortion and so called “reproductive health” as a central point of contention.  Just recently a controversial bill passed in Alabama concerning IVF and the fetuses created through this process.  And finally, the ongoing discussion concerning the legal limits of “gender affirming care”, whose basis can only be proven by the arbitrary “standards of care” that have been decided upon.  All of these legal issues of our own day stem from the loss of dignity of the human person and a creation of freedom as complete individual autonomy: if we can force it to happen and it pleases me, it must be good.  This situation can only be overcome by a restoration of respect for human dignity and life, as the primary good from which all other goods stem is simply to exist.

In an especial way, the reaction to the recent IVF law illustrates the hollowness of any so called “pro-life” philosophy that is divorced from the entirety.  Many otherwise conservatives reject the protection of these fetuses in Alabama, claiming that IVF is a legitimate tool to aid couples struggling to conceive.  While I can readily appreciate and understand the hardship that couples struggling in this way experience, pregnancy at any cost is not the right of the parents.  Such an attitude demonstrates a yet more subtle and nefarious avenue of robbing from humans the dignity of their own lives: by claiming to be for life at any cost all that is accomplished is to divorce the conjugal act from the total gift of self required to comply with the personalistic norm and to perpetuate a culture which regards human life as a commodity that can be sold or grasped merely at the desires of those who can pay for it.

This from Evangelium Vitae demonstrates the practical political and social ramifications of a culture which rejects the basic precept of human dignity and freedom: that we are all united in God and have moral value by virtue of our existence in Him.  Freedom in this context is aimed towards acting upon the good, and not procuring that which best pertains to me alone.  Only in this way can we surpass the radical isolation which is forced upon us in the name of democracy.