Hope Deferred

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.
Proverbs 13:12

For many activists and ministers in the pro-life movement, January is a mixture of hope deferred and longing fulfilled. 

It was January 22, 1973, the United States Supreme Court in a 7-2 decision, found that a woman’s decision to end a pregnancy was a matter of privacy and a fundamental right.  They inferred this right from other Supreme Court cases that interpreted the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. In one such 14th Amendment case, the court wrote that the right to privacy “emanated from the penumbras”, which means, it is like the glow that you see around a candle, but it isn’t actually there.

On January 22, 1974, on the west steps of the U.S. Capitol, the first March for Life was held, and has been held every January since.   Every January, thousands of marchers gather, brave the cold, travel long distances, at great expense and personal hardship to themselves, to stand together, against this injustice that has taken the lives of 61 million Americans.  

61 million Americans would fill the University of Michigan football stadium about 560 times. 

61 million Americans are currently living in the states of California, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, and Arizona. 

The marchers who gather and walk for life, have hope, that one day they will see an end to the genocide that has quite literally changed the face and the fate of this nation, and each year, their hope is deferred, again. They then return, to their ministries and activism, to try again.

Ministries and activism in which, daily they see, the hand of God and the fruits of their efforts, when one, or two at a time, are saved from the lie that murder is a choice. Their longing is fulfilled, in the victories that are abortion clinics closing, parents choosing adoption or parenting over death, and in children, born and not killed.  

This is why we march, and this is why Stanton continues to fight to provide life affirming care for at-risk women and their children. Our hope, for a final and ultimate end to the killing of abortion,  may be deferred; but our longing fulfilled, to help one at a time as often as we can, is a tree of Life.