This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

I have posted one blog about abortion in America after the U. S. Supreme Court threw out Roe v. Wade.

I was hesitant to do so the first time and am hesitant to do so again because I don’t believe there is a way in America to have a reasoned and reasonable discussion about the subject, given the way many citizens are unalterably pitted against each other. 

Both sides prefer to yell, scream and remain committed to their opinion.  Not talk.  Worse.  Often violence.

But, in this post, I have chosen to argue that Americans have various obligations in a post-Roe v. Wade country.  To make this point, I rely, at least in part, on perspectives provided by Paul S. Coakley, Catholic archbishop of Oklahoma City, who produced an excellent column in the Wall Street Journal.

He writes from a Catholic perspective and lays out what strikes me as a solid case for, as Coakley puts it, “to open our doors to vulnerable mothers and children.”

I don’t write from a Catholic point-of-view, though I appreciate many tenants of the Catholic church.  Instead, I write from the perspective of a Christian who believes ALL of us have responsibilities to care for those who happen to be less fortunate than ourselves – including in relation to abortion and regardless of anyone’s position on the subject.

Coakley wrote this:  “Restricting abortion isn’t enough.  We need to open our doors to vulnerable mothers and children.”

“‘If you are pregnant and in need,’” he added, ‘come to the Catholic Church.’”

Coakley adds that the late Cardinal John O’Connor spoke good words more than 30 years ago, when he founded the Sisters of Life, a Catholic pro-life religious order in New York.  O’Connor’s remark was a welcoming call to expecting mothers with nowhere to turn and a plea to the American church to act as guardians to all of God’s children.  His words rang true then and are perhaps even more important now.

Cockley’s words, no doubt, would not impress pro-abortion advocates who decry the Supreme Court’s ruling.  But Coakley says, “Reversing Roerepresented a necessary first step to bring about a culture of life, from conception to natural death, and end a culture of abortion and death.  But the demise of Roeis only the end of the beginning.

“It also is a reminder of our duty as Catholics.  [Or, I add, the duty of all of us as human beings.]  “We are called to see Christ in every human life, and to work and pray for a society in which laws reflect the inherent dignity of the human person.

“This commitment requires us to create alternatives to abortion and ultimately to make it unthinkable.  The end of Roe challenges us anew to open our hearts, and our doors, to mothers and children in need through foster care and adoption — to what Pope Francis called ‘the highest form of love, and of fatherhood and motherhood.’”

My list of what should be OUR obligations, regardless of position on abortion:

• Work to assure churches welcome all to their doors just as Christ would because, after all, the church is “the body of Christ.”
• Advocate that governments fund adequate – if not increased — levels of pre-natal and post-natal care.
• Work to assure that domestic adoption laws in states are sane and understandable.  [There are hundreds of thousands of children in the American foster care system.  Adoption is often expensive and complicated.  The government should confirm a priority to establish policies making it easier for people to adopt domestically, while maintaining and strengthening processes that protect and safeguard children.  Tax credits, allowances, and the like could make adoption a reality for more people.]
• Advocate that birth control products be readily accessible.
• Commit to discussions of other actions in the spirit of real debate and compromise, which are mostly lost in today’s political culture.

The point is that there is a lot for real Christians, not zealots who give Christianity a bad name, to do in the wake of the demise of Roe V. Wade.

In this context, I think of good words from the late Senator Mark Hatfield, a political icon in Oregon: 

“All of us need each other.  All of us must lift and pull others as we rise.  All of us must rise together — powerful, free, one self-determined people.”

That aspiration applies to a post-Roe v. Wade America – as well as more generally.