A wave of violence surrounding court’s pending ruling

The biblical teaching that violence only begets violence has long been proved true but rarely more poignantly than in the recent attacks on pregnancy counseling centers in Oregon and New

York, disruption of church services, and the alleged plot on the life of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Maybe America was too busy burying its slain children from the most recent mass shooting at a school to connect the dots among the many efforts to intimidate, and thus influence, conservative justices as they consider reversing Roe v. Wade. Given that these acts of violence were all aimed at pro-life people, they should be investigated as terrorist acts.

It is a terrible irony that the people who want to protect life must put their own lives at risk. Maybe violence is what we should expect when abortion, one of the most-violent acts conceived by humankind, is Ground Zero. Whatever one’s argument for abortion, there’s no debating the utterly inhumane violence inflicted upon a gestating human being.

The entire abortion apparatus is reprehensible on its face, but over time we’ve become accustomed to it. In the process, we’ve found ways to discuss abortion that sidestep its appalling reality. We make the objectionable more acceptable by manipulating language. The object of termination isn’t a “baby,” we’re told. It’s a fetus. The terminology may be accurate, but “fetus,” despite its definition (“unborn offspring of a mammal”), does sound rather reptilian.

Republicans and Democrats have predictably defaulted to their usual crouches, each side accusing the other of insufficient outrage. Usually, the effect is a standoff, but this time Republicans have the stronger case. The public hasn’t heard much from the media about the reported dozens of attacks on churches and crisis-pregnancy centers since May 2, according to the Washington Stand, a news site recently launched by the prolife Family Research Council. A draft Supreme Court opinion that outlined the end of abortion rights was leaked on that date.

If you go looking for stories about this or that bombing, you’re likely to find them only in religious news outlets, such as the Catholic News Agency or Get Religion. The pregnancy centers that were destroyed or damaged do nothing worse than help vulnerable pregnant women through counseling and resources, as well as provide diapers and other baby supplies. So much for pro-lifers caring for babies only until they’re born.

Despite these attacks — and the alleged attempted assassination of Kavanaugh — President Joe Biden hasn’t been moved to condemn them.