Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Peace and Joy in Our Lord Jesus Christ! You may have heard this argument by advocates of abortion: "You cannot legislate morality or force your religious views on others!" You may wonder how to respond to such a statement.

To say that laws cannot make an immoral person moral is correct. To say that we do not legislate morality is nonsense. Virtually every law is based on an idea of what is right or wrong.

Laws are not passed to control thought, but to control behavior. For example, we impose our morality on rapists. We do not care so much why rapists rape, or what their moral and religious views are, or the reason why rapists disrespect women. Rape is evil and when people want to do evil, it is clearly correct for the government to impose its morality on them. Similarly, pro-lifers do not care so much what people think about babies, as long as they do not kill them.

Indeed, if laws should not be based on morality, what on earth should they be based on? The reality is that laws are based on our collective moral values and is the way society decides which activities it will and will not tolerate.

If we are going to reject a law simply because it is supported by religion, then we would have to abolish most laws. A person does not have to be especially religious to say that it is wrong to abort a child, any more than they would say it is wrong to steal money. Certain activities are unacceptable to civilized people regardless of religious beliefs. Abortion is one of those issues. In reality, abortion is a civil rights and a human rights issue.

Let us not forget that the black civil rights movement was dominated by pastors and was often headquartered in churches. That did not make civil rights merely a religious issue.

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