INTRODUCTION

Human Life Review, Fall 2008 by McFadden, Maria

I write this in the earliest days of the New Year, in the "transition" time - the election over (thank God), the new regime not yet begun. So we ask: What did happen on November 4, 2008, and what does it mean for the pro-life movement? I doubt there is anyone who has answered with more graceful honesty and pizzazz than William Murchison in our lead article. "The pro-life cause took a licking," he writes; while there are many things about President-elect Obama that are still mysterious ("the man's a bit of a sphinx"), on abortion he has left no doubt. He promises to be an "unabashed, unblinking pro-choice president." This did not deter many pro-life citizens, especially Roman Camolics, from voting for him, prominent among mem Professor Douglas Kmiec. Murchison's description of Kmiec's apostasy, and me reactions to it, make for rich reading indeed, and I won't spoil it by giving away his best lines. Most important, however, is that Murchison, while conceding mat dungs are bad, emphatically refuses to call them "hopeless." Some may wish to "walk away," but "the time for presenting with new force me reasons not to walk away, me reasons to care for life you can't see except in outline but can feel and listen to, the reasons to honor without partiality the handiwork of the Creator God . . . mat time is certainly here."

The times may call for reconsidering strategies, and our second article discusses a subject that many find vexing: "Should We Show Pictures of Aborted Babies?" Because "today, many good and serious pro-lifers hold different opinions on whether it is appropriate to show pictures of aborted babies to me general public," new contributor Joe Bissonnette decided to approach the subject as me great St. Thomas Aquinas, me "model of fairness," would have: "Before stating his own arguments for a position, he would give full voice to me strongest objections to it." Bissonnette is eminently fair and persuasive for the first argument; but then presents his favored position with an invigorating wallop. If you mink you're "already done" with mis question, mink again: Bissonnette's essay just might surprise you.

We go next to another unusual article, on an issue not yet deeply explored in our pages. Contributor John Burger has written a fascinating piece on how "family" is redefined when children are conceived through "donors" - donor eggs and/or sperm. He writes:

Alas, information technology has come face to face with an area of modern life in which, for some at least, too little information exists. Adopted children often search for their biological parents when they grow up. But with artificial reproductive technologies with us for several decades now, the search for "my real mother" or "my real father" has taken on a new meaning.

A painfully confusing one for me children involved, as Burger discovered after visiting Internet group sites for ("searching") donor offspring and interviewing Elizabeth Marquardt, author of the forthcoming book My Daddy 's Name Is Donor. Though most of us are familiar with the painful struggles of infertile couples, and what would drive them to seek a donor, the needs of the child have been largely ignored. Marquardt says children of such unions are often "troubled and filled with loss"; she believes parents ought to think twice before choosing donor conception.

On me other end of me fertility spectrum are unborn babies conceived naturally who are at risk of being lost, through abortion - and the people who try to save them. In "A Day in the Life," Alice Lemos takes us to the front-lines of the battle to turn around women from abortion clinics. Lemos, a sidewalk counselor, reports on a day she spent in front of one of New York City's most notorious clinics, "Choices."

Ms. Lemos was among the 200-plus guests who attended our 6th annual Great Defender of Life Dinner on October 16th, detailed in our special section. It was the first time our event focused primarily on euthanasia and assisted suicide; award winner Rita Marker is Executive Director of the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide, and fellow-awardee Wesley Smith is an anti-euthanasia activist and journalist extraordinaire. With our honored additional speakers, Nat Hentoff and Bobby Schindler, they had the deep connection of having worked mightily to save the life of Bobby's sister, Terry Schindler Schiavo. The speakers' obvious admiration for each other was moving, but something crucial happened for our guests as well. Many of our Foundation members were not aware of the then-pending (now passed) assisted-suicide legislation in Washington (Proposition 1000), how the campaign to promote it was orchestrated, and what it would mean for the citizens of that state. Well, Rita Marker brought her authence quickly up to speed, and exhorted us to take up me gauntlet. "What happens in Washington will affect every state": we must fight to "prevent assisted suicide from becoming the American way of deam because not only our lives but the lives of our children and our grandchildren depend on it."