O, Brothers, Where Art Thou?
by Bob Brown
 From two observations arises one question.
First of all, during my stint at the HCRTL booth at the Farm Fair, there were relatively few middle-school and high-school-aged boys who stopped by to ask questions or to view the displays. (Their female counterparts, to my happy surprise,
came in droves.)
Secondly, at the HCRTL business meetings and speaker events that I have attended, and I have been to most of them, I can recall seeing only two or three men besides myself among a much larger turnout of women.
So, the question that I would like to ask is: “What’s the deal, guys?”
Statisticians would chide me if I were to make a generalization about male participation within the entire pro-life movement based on a sample drawn from a couple of hours at a county fair and a few meetings at libraries in the same county.
Well, they would have a point if I was generalizing, but I am not. I am merely asking: “O, brothers, where art thou?”
When I was in college in the late 80’s, it seemed to me that I heard more men’s voices opposing abortion than women’s. Undoubtedly, there were women leaders taking important stands against abortion, but even now, I clearly remember thinking
that, unless millions of Average Joannas would stand up against abortion, no progress would ever be made. Men could argue and fight and do whatever we do best, but until the child bearers themselves cried out, “Enough!,” the slaughter of unborn
children would continue unabated.
That female voice was not very strong fifteen years ago; however, in spite of the continuing saga of a stifling cultural and media suppression of the pro-life message, that voice is significantly stronger now. But I am not so impressed with
us men.
Have men’s voice opposing abortion grown weaker? Has our righteous anger gone flat from complacency or from decades of seeming defeat? Maybe the few notorious cases of men (Paul Hill, Eric Rudolph) killing people in the name of the pro-life
movement have discouraged some Christian men from obeying their call to “rescue the weak and needy [and] deliver them from the hand of the wicked” (Psalm 82:4), and “greedy,” I would point out.
Men need to get back in the battle: On our knees, from the pulpit, in the public eye, and among friends and neighbors.
And the pro-life movement needs to make sure that it forms educational strategies and programs which specifically target boys.
We must make sure that we are not raising a generation of children who do not care about the lives of the most innocent children of all.
(c) 2004 Harford County Right to Life
September 2004 Newsletter |
