Venerable Fulton Sheen Warns About Infanticide

“When Divine Life came to the world, He, too, was treated as disposable life.”

Matteo di Giovanni, “Massacre of the Innocents,” 1488
Matteo di Giovanni, “Massacre of the Innocents,” 1488 (photo: Public Domain)

Nothing surprises me anymore, is a frequent refrain as the culture unravels. Yet, we still can be caught by surprise at the rapid descent into depravity. For instance, we did not expect such a deafening silence among the left as abortion slips into growing acceptance of infanticide.

Our hearts scream, It’s a baby! as if somehow that escaped them. And therein lies the surprise. They knew that all along. They just don’t care. Whether inside the womb, on the way out, or on the outside, once people excuse abortion, they become comfortable killing babies even outside the womb despite shattering the “my body, my choice” delusion.

 

Throwaway Culture

During the lifetime of American archbishop and media evangelist, Venerable Fulton J. Sheen (1895-1979), abortion became legal while infanticide was still unimaginable. Yet, he addressed the situation because as we are witnessing, the mindset is the same.

 In the Lewistown Daily Sun, January 25, 1975, Venerable Sheen wrote about the “moral pollution” of our “throw away” culture: “Could it be that we live in the Peril of Over-kill? When life first came to earth, Cain used the first Over-Kill to attain it with his brother’s blood. Abel was disposable life. When Divine Life came to the world, He, too, was treated as disposable life.

The sacredness of life has nothing whatever to do with when life begins; it depends on who produced it. The time element has little to do with the value of life, otherwise, there could be fixed an age-limit for living. Life is sacred because it is produced by humans. ...

We must also be careful if we give to mothers the right to destroy a child because it may have ‘defective traits,’ that someday a child may claim the right to destroy the mother because she has the ‘defective trait’ of poverty or senility.

He was indeed right, as the “right” to kill the mentally disabled has led to euthanasia.

 

 Children Are Not Ours

When Ven. Sheen spoke on birth control (“those who believe in it actually believe neither in birth nor in control”) he spoke of distorted thinking that has led to abortion and now infanticide.

“Suppose a family had five children but they had enough money to buy only four hats. Do you think they would be permitted or should be permitted to cut off the head of a child in order to bring the economic to the level of human and the human to the level of the economic? Suppose a husband says that he can no longer support his wife. Ought he be entitled to shoot her?”

For those who cling to human reasons for needing to end their life of their child:

What is forgotten here, in giving the primacy to the economic, is that we receive blessings as we put ourselves in the area of God’s love. … the extent that we put ourselves outside of the environment and area of God’s love, we exclude those divine assistances that would otherwise come to us.

Ven. Sheen quoted Kahlil Gibran on children: “Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of life’s longing for itself. They come through you, but not from you. And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your soul, for they have their own souls. You may house their bodies, but not their souls. For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow that you cannot visit even in your dreams…. You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth….”

“And that is the story of life. God sets up the target, you are the bow, and your children are the arrows. You have a messianic mission. In your life, you represent the conquest of love over the ego. You symbolize the defeat of your selfishness and represent the victory of charity. Every child begets sacrifice, tends toward an incarnation, and every child becomes for you a pledge of your own salvation.”

 

Natural Advancement

Ven. Sheen’s words on abortion and life ring true for infanticide because it is actually all the same thinking. In the article, No One Should be Surprised that Infanticide is Now on the Table, Cole McKeown explained that the Democrat vote against requiring care for babies born-alive after attempted abortions is simply the natural advancement of pro-abortion thinking. The reality, he said is that “if abortion is ever okay, it’s always okay.” According to him, using milestones such as a heartbeat or when a baby can feel pain is subjective and it is illogical to say, “It’s okay now,” and a moment later say, “Now it’s not.”

By using subjective milestones that get volleyed around in the pro-life/pro-abortion tug-of-war, birth is now just one more milestone that no longer qualifies babies for protection. A mother’s desire (keep in mind that many women at abortion clinics have caved to the desires of others) is more and more the standard that determines life or death for a baby.

Regarding infanticide, McKeown pointed out: “You may be think, ‘Surely our country would never go that far,’ but why not? Who could have anticipated the legalization of abortion 20 years before Roe vs. Wade, which is arguably a much greater jump in values?”