Kathryn Jean Lopez of National Review Online asks in her latest column whether people can agree that “all lives matter.”
“Disappointing” doesn’t even begin to cover the news lately. A man dies at the hands of police, and what could and should have been a righteous quest for justice broke out into destruction. What could have been a presidential prayer in sorrow and for wisdom and supernatural strength and protection became a profane misuse of a sacred text. And what was to mark progress in the United States of America’s commitment to some of the most persecuted in our world became an odd presidential visit, complete with misfired outrage, in response, from a spiritual leader who unnecessarily lashed out at one of America’s best charitable organizations.
This, needless to say, is a time of unrest. And one of the things that would seem to be bringing people together is the fact that black lives matter. May it be a stepping stone to a new appreciation that all lives matter, and that life is a precious gift.
But when you take a look at the Black Lives Matter website, you read an agenda that isn’t quite as unifying. There’s a hostility to the nuclear family — exactly the fundamental unit that I’ve been praying has been undergoing some healing during our coronavirus time together. We’ve seen a governor talking about the pricelessness of human life even while he has expanded legal abortion, kept abortion clinics open during a pandemic, and made decisions that proved to be grave for nursing-home populations (though they’re consistent for someone who supports assisted suicide). Our actions don’t always match our most unifying words. And in the case of Black Lives Matters, the “about” page on the website promotes a subversive agenda hiding behind euphemisms that somewhat brilliantly, if dishonestly, speak to the best of us.
