Guest Post by Pro-life Leader Frank Pavone, National Director, Priests for Life
Forty days after rising from the dead, Jesus Christ ascended into heaven in the sight of his disciples. Ten days later, he sent the Holy Spirit and empowered the apostles to preach repentance and new life.
Christians around the world celebrated these two events very recently, and on Ascension Sunday, the American people and their leaders rededicated the nation to God.
The convergence of these three events helps us understand our human dignity and the need to fight for it in these midterm elections.
“God so loved the world…” (Jn. 3:16). He so loved humanity, that he not only took it upon himself in the Incarnation (“he emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” – Phil. 2:7), but brought it into glory in the Ascension and filled it with his Spirit at Pentecost.
On the night before he died, Jesus prayed to the Father, “give me the glory I had with you before the world began” (Jn. 17:5). If he already had that glory, what changed after the Resurrection and Ascension?
What changed was that now he had that glory in his human nature, and therefore made it possible for us to have it.
There is only one human nature, shared by men and women of every time and place, of every condition and circumstance, and of every social status. It is shared by born and unborn, rich and poor, healthy and sick. That one human nature is united with God and taken into glory.
If the Church is to proclaim that the destiny of human beings is to be seated on the throne of God, we cannot ignore those same human beings when they are thrown in the garbage by atrocious acts like abortion, or when their dignity is assaulted in any number of other ways.
Otherwise, the proclamation of that hope is simply not credible to the waiting world.
And if these truths do not compel us to advance human dignity by our active participation in the effort to elect leaders and shape public policy, we likewise undercut our credibility.
The events of Scripture show us what we mean when we say that “human life is sacred.” It is about where this life comes from, to whom it belongs, and where it is meant to go. It is about that great trajectory to which Jesus referred when he said, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (Jn. 12:32) and again, “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am” (Jn. 14:3).
Jesus is “lifted up,” first on the cross, and then in glory.
Then he lifts us up by giving us rebirth in his Spirit.
These realities rescue us from meaninglessness, and therefore from purposelessness. We know who we are; we know whose we are; we know where we are going.
Believers in 2024, by the millions, realized that the elections were a choice not simply between candidates or parties, but between good and evil.
That is still the best way to describe our choice in the midterms. The revolution for truth that we all started in 2024 will either gain momentum or stall.
It’s time to elect public servants who choose to adhere to God’s truth, to reject evil, and to defend the dignity of human life from conception to natural death.
Frank Pavone is national director of Priests for Life and the national pastoral director of Rachel’s Vineyard Ministries and the Silent No More Awareness Campaign..
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