2024 BSideU for Life Annual Banquet

Good evening. It is a great honor to be here. Mary and I are thrilled to be here, and Mary of course served on the board at what was a woman’s choice and is now Beside You for Life and it is the cause of defending life that brings us together tonight.

And I need to talk a bit directly about that. And Glenn, I appreciate so much a very kind introduction. My son-in-Law’s not here. He may be glad of that at the moment. The day he got married I said, I want you to know, you have one job, I need grandchildren. I am very, very thankful. Mary and I find this the sweetest time of life in that respect.  I appreciate even the mention of the photograph going down the giant slide with Benjamin and Henry. I’ll simply acknowledge to you, what is true, which is that what followed the click of that photograph was abject humiliation.

It had rained, and we had decided, they really wanted to ride the slide, I promised to take them on the slide. I took them on the slide, and it was a mistake. We were the first people after the rain. And so they had these very slick things that you rode upon and I’ll just say that the boys landed safely. I went several feet beyond the intended target, thought I had my balance, stood up and completely fell, was not in horrible pain, but had hurt myself. And then Mary has to deal with staff members who are going “Is he crying or laughing?” The answer was “simultaneously.”

That’s something of a parable of our age. We find ourselves at this most interesting time, and I want to speak candidly with you tonight because, I look at this room and I recognize that for the sake of Beside You for Life, this is a rare opportunity for some people who really believe some very important truths to gather together, and who are committed to a very important ministry and work, to gather together to consider where it is that we stand. And so, I’m going to begin with rather sober and sobering comments, and I just want you to think about a few things with me. I was just barely a teenager when Roe v. Wade was handed down. I was a very young kid. I was the oldest of four children and had a wonderful Christian mom and dad.

My mother was a nurse and had been an obstetrics nurse until the day I was born. One of her favorite stories was that it was the end of her shift with the doctor, and she simply had to turn to the doctor for whom she worked and say, “I’m next.” She was. A wonderful, wonderful Christian mom. She was deeply committed to the pro-life cause when very few evangelical adult Christians knew what that was, and even as Catholics had at least developed some thoughts concerning abortion because of long experience—most importantly—in Europe. In the United States, Evangelical Christians gave it virtually no thought because it was not something of current discussion. The Roe v. Wade decision in 1973 changed everything, but it didn’t change everything overnight when it came to the Christian response to abortion. One of the things that happened is that even when the Supreme Court handed the decision down, many evangelical Christians weren’t sure what to think of it. It was seen in the context of part of the rights revolution that has so reshaped the Court going all the way back to the 1950s. It was a logical consequence of decisions starting with decisions such as Griswold on birth control and others. And then you just kind of fast forward and you end up seeing the Supreme Court handed it down, and very few people were truly surprised.

The Roe v. Wade decision of course was devastating, not only in the fact that it happened, but the particular shape of the decision. It grounded a woman’s supposed right to abortion in the US Constitution, establishing it as a right that basically was beyond much legislative scrutiny or reach. The pro-life movement began to develop shortly thereafter. One of the things I do with students sometimes is to show them how the cultural landscape in the United States has changed. And I get to do this with some small groups of students from time to time when I’m in this kind of conversation, and I will show them the platforms of the Democratic and Republican parties from 1960. Now I doubt you have those readily at hand on your bedside table, but that might be exactly where they belong because the function of both would be to put you to sleep. The 1960 Democratic and Republican platforms were basically so closely aligned that when you had JFK, John F. Kennedy and then Vice President Richard Nixon running against one another, there were very few policies that set them apart.

Let’s just say that very few Americans stay up late worrying about marginal tax rates. Nothing like abortion appears in either platform. It is not imaginable that it would appear in either platform. The American people are not confronted with such a question. It was not on the cultural agenda and yet it was just 13 years later the Roe v. Wade was handed down. If you look at the 1980 platforms of the two parties, you’ll notice that all of a sudden it does appear, and it appears with some distinction, because even in 1980 there was beginning to be a distinction between two parties on the life issue, but it wasn’t complete by any means. You could talk about pro-choice or pro-abortion Republicans, especially in the Northeast and in other areas, that appeared to be a permanent reality. It didn’t stay that way. Fast forward 1984, 1988, 1992. By the time you get to the 2000 Election, the two parties are actually holding pretty much diametrically opposed positions.

When Roe v. Wade was handed down, Evangelical Christians demonstrated the inadequacy of our response. There was a cover story in Christianity Today magazine and Evangelical thinkers, Theologians and Pastors responded, I will just say is in retrospect a humility mess, a humiliating mess. But you know the logic of abortion became more and more clear and then the logic of defending the sanctity and dignity of every human life became more and more clear. I was the son of a woman very early involved in the prolife movement. My mother was an activist. The Pro-life movement didn’t even have a name. It wasn’t even called a pro-life movement. She had pamphlets, periodicals and things that were absolutely shocking. So, I was not unaware of the issue, but even at the time that I was in college, at a supposedly Christian university, and it was in many ways, there was no unanimity on the issue of abortion. You fast forward, and by the time we reached the latter years of the 20th century, it’s pretty clear that the logic of the Pro-life Position has taken hold.

We had a lot of hope that there would be a reversal of Roe v. Wade. The biggest opportunity came in the early 1990s with Planned Parenthood versus Casey in the state of Pennsylvania and it was really then that I was very much involved in things then, that it could well be that this could be the Great reversal. It was not to be. In January of 1993, I was in Washington DC so this is 20 years after Roe in 1973, and I received an invitation from William Buckley Jr. to attend a meeting and gathering of conservatives in Washington DC, and I could not pass that up. I was one of the youngest people in the room. Many people in that room had been fighting for the pro-life movement for a very long time.  And the meeting began just after the inauguration of Bill Clinton for his first term in the White House. Bill Clinton of course ran and remember his motto. He wanted to make abortion safe, legal and rare.

Remember that. He certainly didn’t mean rare, but then you look at this and it was the 20th anniversary of Roe v Wade and so the March for Life had begun, and the March for Life was a major event. I had the opportunity to be at the 20th March for life and to be at the event and had been involved in some of the strategy meetings and there was great hope that the Casey decision could go our way, that Roe could be reversed and then the Casey decision was handed down and some of you will remember that it not only did not reverse Roe V. Wade, it acknowledged that the logic of Roe was entirely faulty. So, it just made a new argument, and so what we hoped and pray was the great rehearsal way. It turned out to be anything but, it turned out to be in some ways, not in every way, but in some ways an absolute continuation.

And so the pro-life movement has worked for 20 years. 20 years is a long time. The movement has struggled for 20 years seeking to build a culture of life and seeking to push back against the culture of death, and it appeared that we were just losing, but the pro-life movement didn’t give up. Something happened by the way, about that time that was a real game changer. It was nothing in the courts, it was in technology. It was the ultrasound. The ultrasound was developed, and it became more and more routine. When Mary was pregnant with our first child, Katie, they did an ultrasound, and the ultrasound was so expensive, they only did one and it was basically to make sure the baby was okay, and that’s all we knew. Now I just assumed the baby was a boy, because first born babies are, that message did not get sent to Katie. Who To God’s glory was anything but.

But nonetheless, the point is the ultrasound was not even when Mary was carrying Katie, it was not getting as routine as it would become so quickly and that’s the way it is. It’s so much technology. It is a brand-new thing. It’s extremely expensive. It’s extremely rare. The next thing you know people are taping ultrasounds of little brothers and sisters up on the refrigerator. That was a game changer. It was a game changer that the pro-life movement had not expected, because our main activity was in the courts, and in the legislators, particularly state by state after the Casey decision pressing back on what restrictions on abortion could be allowable seeking to advance the cause.

But the ultrasound offered a phenomenal, phenomenal advance in the defense of life. Time magazine ran a story on the impact of the ultrasound, and the battle over abortion and it cited one pro-abortion activist who summarized it this way. Speaking of the ultrasound in the image, she said: “the fetus beat us.” There’s a moral logic there. This is common grace. This is natural revelation. God reveals even in the ultrasound, in the image of this human life, the fact that this is a baby, this is not a byproduct of conception. This is not potential human life. This is a baby.

You don’t put an embryo in its developmental form up on a refrigerator. You put little brother or a little sister on the refrigerator. And with ministries such as Besides You for life, the ultrasound has become so powerful. Even in the video we just saw so powerfully. You see the images of this baby and you realize there is revelation there. God is making a point there. The image, the previous generations never could have dreamed of. They didn’t even know they didn’t have it. We can now point to the image. You can see the baby, you can see the heartbeat, you can see the baby move.

And about that time between 1985 and say 2005, there appeared to be a radical shift in moral sentiment in the United States in a prolife direction. Now we’re not going to claim that it was even. We’re not going to claim that it was comprehensive. We’re not going to claim that it was consistent, but it was real. It was real. If you look at surveys undertaken by major opinion centers, major posters, research organizations, think tanks, pretty consistently they showed that Americans were moving more and more in a pro-life direction. Now there was not yet a majority for outlawing abortion, for eliminating abortion, but there was an increasing majority that considered abortion something that should be avoided whenever possible, should be exceptional rather than normal. And there was the dawning awareness that the logic of life was becoming undeniable in such a way that the culture of death was losing ground to the culture of life.

That continued, so much though that even in the election of 2016, not a long time ago, barely eight years ago, in the election of 2016, the abortion issue was understood to be determinative in the outcome of the presidential election. And as you looked at state by state electoral college, as you watch what was happening, there appeared to be simultaneously two undeniable developments. One was the fact that anyone who’s going to be elected president, at least this one party, is going to have to be pretty consistently for life. And one of the interesting things is the pro-life position, the logic of the pro-life position became more and more entrenched in that party in such a way that successive platforms were, in the main more pro-life, than the one that come before. And the other party is moving exactly the opposite direction. And we kind of understand how that works. We understand the issue of abortion is like a wedge. As time goes on, the wedge press further into the society. The wedge makes very clear what is at stake. Because we really are at the point where the inhabitants of the womb is either meaningless protoplasm, or a child made in the image of God.

And those two logically, they lead in completely different directions. Well, that brings us to the last few years, brings us even to the last few months, brings us even to this afternoon, the shift from the 2016 President is pretty daunting. We understand that what we thought was a movement in one direction, great hope for the prolife movement, it hasn’t turned out how we thought. There was a great victory made. Make no mistake, there was a great victory in 2022 when the Supreme Court of the United States handed down the Dobbs decision reversing Roe v. Wade, justice Samuel Alito’s majority opinion went right to the heart of Roe and tore it out. And then in successive paragraphs, he went right to the core of the Casey decision and tore it up.

As we look at the early summer of 2022, it looked like a half century of pro-life effort had been met with final success, Roe is no more. That was going to enable every single state to move in a direction of restricting abortion and eventually eliminating abortion. Here in Kentucky, we can see the effects of that, you can see it in the changed landscape of even pro-life ministry here, a state like Kentucky. And you see how the culture of death accommodates that, look at what has happened in terms of states and borders such as Illinois, which have become destination states for abortion. A clear distinction between pro-life states and pro-abortion states, and of course with gradations in both it appeared that there was a great opportunity in 2022 for pro-life advance, and then everything appeared to fall apart. First Kansas. Kansas. We’re not talking about Oregon, Kansas. And then Kentucky.

And then you see voters who had been indicating that they were pro-life. They turned out not to vote that way, at least not with any consistency or cogency. And then there have been a succession of other statewide votes, other statewide developments, and we have lost virtually every one of them. In just a matter of a few weeks, Americans will be voting on presidential choice, state by state, of course other offices as well, future congress hangs in the balance, but in no less than 10 states sanctity of human life, the protection of the unborn life, hangs in the balance. In a state Missouri. Missouri, we’re not talking about New York state, we’re talking about Missouri. In a state like Missouri, voters are facing a constitutional amendment that would declare that abortion is a fundamental right. Now understand legally that’s massive. It is a fundamental right, a state must have overwhelming justification for any limitation whatsoever on abortion.

All it needs is 50% plus one. You look at Missouri right now, you look at the law and you say, well that clearly as it stands right now before that vote, there are significant restrictions on abortion. If this vote passes, if this measure passes, if the constitution is amended, if abortion is declared a fundamental right, it would just wipe all of that away. If this happens in state of Missouri, we will have a state of Minnesota. Remember the governor of Minnesota? Been hearing a lot of grandpa lately, so he wants to present himself kindly. He signed the most radical pro abortion law while recent America history history. Not only does it declare abortion to be fundamental right, it even makes clear that parents don’t have to be informed of an abortion obtained and experienced by a minor daughter. It takes all restrictions away on abortion away whatsoever at every moment up until birth.

Not only that, it took out language that was in statutory law in the state of Minnesota, that made it very clear what would have to happen if a baby were to survive an abortion. Since then, major media reported that eight babies had been born alive. They did not stay alive. We’re told that this a matter of fiction. It’s not a matter of fiction, it’s a matter of fact. But here we are, we have an Election coming up, and that raises the issue of the two parties. I don’t mean to be partisan; I just need to talk about this because this is too important. If I’m not talking about this, there’s no reason for me to talk about it in terms of where we stand. We need talk about the fact that one party is moving even further in a more radical pro-abortion position in which it is now boldly stating that there should be no restriction on abortion whatsoever. Where the way I put it in an article I thought was on Monday the no one in that party will not articulate a single restriction on abortion up until the moment of death that she will accept.

And then today, as if the capstone today just as I was preparing to come and be here with you, she made very clear in an interview with Wisconsin Public Radio, that she will seek to have the United States Senate eliminate the filibuster in order to legislate a woman’s reproductive choice. Alright, going for broke. Going for broke. Let’s be honest on the other side, we’ve had significant retreat for clarity, significant retreat. Now the two parties are nowhere near being in the same position here. Don’t misunderstand that. But if we’re going to be honest, we are in a significantly weaker position politically than we were four years ago, in terms of what’s in the party platform. So here we are. I have come to inspire you.

My purpose is to encourage you. We are in big trouble. We are in big trouble, and it does us no good and it does the cause of defending the human in the womb and the cause of the dignity and sanctity of human life, It does it no good for us to deny the obvious. When we thought we were winning in many ways, at least at the level of politics and policy we were losing. Okay, so let’s go home. We can’t, we can’t. I want to invoke an odd witness here tonight and that witness is JRR Tolkien. Some of you remember the Lord of the Rings. Some of you remember hearing about the Lord of the Rings, though you never read it. And that is how JRR Tolkien is basically remembered. I remember him, but I think of him in different terms. I think of his worldview, and the way he saw the world and that’s reflected in the Lord of the Rings.

It’s reflected in the totality of his writings and in what he called his legendarium. Tolkien was shaped by his experience as a boy losing his father, as a very young boy and then losing his mother before he was basically middle school age. He grew up in tragedy, and then he was called into service in the First World War. As a teenage boy, his three closest companions he formed a club that became very much a hint of what would later become the inklings with Tolkien and CS Lewis and others there at Oxford. But he was just a teenager. He was just what we would call high school student. He was committed to writing and to the imagination. And so also were his friends at this boys school he attended. They started this club. They entered in the service in World War I, that horrifying war that was so devastating to his generation.

He saw horrors on the battlefield of which he could never speak, even to his own family. And two of the four of those boys died. Coming out of the tragedy of World War I, the war supposedly so horrible that it would end all wars, but it did anything but. Tolkien of course became a philologist who became a scholar of literature. His literary work is just kind of unimaginable. Actually, the point I want to make it is hard for me to imagine. It takes a hobby learning Icelandic, mid-evil Icelandic. Tolkien began writing, and of course, as you know his writings, he became one of the most esteemed professors at Oxford University, especially holding the Murton chair at Murton college, which is one most prestigious chairs at Oxford. He wrote the Lord of the Rings. The publisher was convinced to publish it, and it became of course one of the literary monuments of the 20th century. Here’s why I’m talking about Tolkien tonight. Tolkien offering a theme of the entire work, described the three volumes of the Lord of the Rings as “a long defeat.”

Okay? Again, I need to inspire you, a long defeat. He meant by that a course of human history. It’s a deeply Catholic, it’s a deeply Christian understanding of history. It’s reflected in the Lord of the Rings. Things don’t get better and better and better. We live in an age of sin. We live in an evil age. The New Testament, this present age, this present evil age, so we are warned. And Tolkien writes about a long defeat. And this sounds defeatist, but it is not because it’s a long defeat that seems almost indefinite and almost infinite. It’s a very long defeat, but what follows the long defeat is final victory. And of course, in Tolkien’s worldview consistent with Christian theology that long defeat is human history, and that final victory is the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ in glory. That long defeat of course includes the fact that on a hill far away stood an old rugged cross. So that final victory is grounded in space and time in history in the cross of Lord Jesus Christ and in the empty tomb. And we as Christians are those who know that final victory is won and that final victory is coming, but we are still living in a long defeat. Okay? Here’s the point. We must not ever buy into the conceit that we’re winning this thing.

That was the liberalism of the late 19th and the theological liberalism of the 20th century. They were post-millennials. They believed they were bringing in the kingdom. Evidently not, evidently not. That is the point. There’s this long defeat. But of course, we know there is coming a final victory. But you know what one of the most godly purposes is for Christians in the midst of a long defeat? Make it longer. You notice thats the essence of conservatism, when you try to conserve things, you just conserve what you can. You rescue the perishing. We care for the dying. It’s the mission of the Christian Church. That’s why we preach the gospel. We don’t preach the gospel saying join the winning side in this life. We don’t say join the winning side on this earth. We don’t say join the winning side in this age. We simply say, come to know salvation in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by his shed blood.

Come to know the power of his resurrection and come to live in the sure and certain knowledge that our king is coming and will make all things well. And coming to judge. What does this mean for us tonight? Well, it means that this ministry can never have a final victory banquet.  You understand that? There never is going to be until Jesus comes a final victory banquet. We’re never going to say sin has been vanquished. We’re never going to say the scourage of abortion is over. We’re never going to say the culture of death has been absolutely vanquished the way that will happen when the heel crushes the serpents head.

So that hasn’t happened. That is not on the horizon until Jesus comes and Jesus is coming. But until he comes, we need to be found faithful. We need in the midst of a long defeat, to be taking every inch that can be gained, recapturing every foot we can that has been lost. And when we gain three feet and then lose two, we hold the one. When we gain 10 feet and then lose 12, we push back harder. That means by the way, that we don’t have any choice but to stay in the battle politically. We don’t have any choice, because we’re accountable. Even if we think we’re too good to be a participant in these things. You’re given the vote, you’re given the stewardship. We can’t step back from judicial and legislative efforts. We can’t step back. We can’t step back from contending for the culture of life when we’re talking to the media and we’re talking to our neighbor. And when we’re just talking to our own children, our own congregations.

The most important aspect of this ministry is that it can’t avoid the human aspect of what all of this means. And so, part of what it means to fight this battle and part of what it means to live to the glory of God in this long defeat is to save every baby we can save. We could lose everything in the Supreme Court in the United States. We could lose everything in the state legislature, so we could lose everything. Where the people who run things think it matters. And we don’t say it doesn’t matter, but it doesn’t change the fact that it falls to us to help every mother we possibly can, to save every single baby we could possibly save. And everything you do, and all you give, and all the volunteer hours that are channeled into Beside You For Life, they’re all worth it. If one baby is born, who would otherwise have been aborted, and you know it’s far more than one.

And you know, when the long defeat looks dark, that’s when we have to give even more. Do even more. Strive harder. If you read The Lord of the Rings, by the way, you know that’s part of the point. When things get dark, you love the light even more and want to be found worthy of the light. I can only speak of these things because I am confident of the final victory Christ will bring. And you know on that day every eye will be dry among the redeemed, and every tear will be wiped away, and sin will be no more. We’re not going to have to worry about shoplifters, and we’re not going have to worry about mass shooters, and we’re not going to have to worry about abortion. But until then, guess what we do. And it is a high and high and holy calling to press back, press back an inch, an ounce, a dime, against the culture of death. I’m very proud to be here tonight, with folks who are pressing back, who are counting on that final victory. Quite honestly, understand we are facing a long, long struggle and we fool ourselves what we think otherwise. I’m going to be a prophet, amateur, self-designated, I don’t want to be stoned, I’ve read the Bible.

So I offer a word of prophecy tonight. Every single pro-life ministry is going to be more important a year from now than now. Every single pro life argument is going to be needed more readily at hand a year from now, than now. Every organization like Beside You for Life is going to be ever more needed a year from now, then now. But if we are to have such powerful forces against the culture of death a year from now, we know what you’ve got to do now. Now, this is what we have to be committed to do together, comprehensively. I’m doing my very best to turn out an army of young preachers and young Christians who are going to fight back in every way against the culture of death as they continue every day for the gospel of Christ. And you know what? I think our work is going to be more important and more urgent a year from now than now.

And more important if Jesus tarries us 10 years from now than then. But you know what? At this point in my life, I’m looking for what we need to do now, to be in the battle the way we need to be in the battle next year. I’m concerned about 10 years from now, but I wouldn’t dare be a prophet to predict that landscape. But I do know this kind of ministry is going to be more important in the future even than now. So, you say, what did he talk about? Well, he told us we’re experiencing a long defeat, and you actually paid to come to this thing. But he also said, we’re counting on Christ’s final victory. And oddly enough, in a way the secular world can’t possibly understand, we’re trying to make the long defeat a little longer. To have the opportunity for more small victories, saved lives between here and then. I thank you for the opportunity to think about these things with you tonight, and I do hope and pray you have been in the right way, but you know sometimes to be encouraged the right way we have to be made sober in order to understand the joy that awaits us. God Bless you. (Standing ovation)