Friday, June 05, 2009

Paved with good intentions

As I was crossing Daley Plaza on my way to Mass, I saw an ungainly truck stopped across from the (equally ungainly) Picaso. Garishly painted and with its sides built up so that it seemed a cross between a delivery truck and a haywagon, it was designed to attract attention. It was covered with hellfire and damnation, all with regard to abortion. It was revolting. Not that I saw any mutilated babies or anything like that (of course, I wasn't wearing my glasses, either), but it offensive in a different way, offensive through the very arrogance of its presence and its condemnatory message. I'm as pro-life as they come, and I was offended!
So I reflected on how I felt--having this abomination of a message presume to speak for me. And it seems to me that this truck was (certainly not "pro-life" at all) not even really an "anti-abortion" effort. There was nothing about this moving billboard that could have won a wavering soul over to a greater respect for life. There was nothing there to teach a sincere doubter. There was certainly nothing there to draw to repentance a woman who had had an abortion, or a man who had paid for one, or a doctor who had performed one.
If it wasn't a creative bit of propaganda from an abortion-rights group designed to alienate the uncertain from a pro-life position--if it really was what it claimed to be--it was an ugly manifestation of human pride hiding behind a noble cause.
A fresh coat of paint over that whole truck would do a lot of good.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's always the extremists who hurt the cause no matter what it is. It's almost a violent protest, and that has never accomplished anything, except for turning people off. Sounds like that is what that truck did.

Anonymous said...

If a picture is worth a thousand words, such words would not be permitted on this blog. I would gladly pay for a few cans of paint to cover such audacity.

harv681 said...

It's counterproductive at best. Groups are held accountable for the actions of the extremists in their ranks ("Birds of a feather"), so all those who define themselves as "pro life" are painted with the same brush.