(LifeSiteNews) — This week, Governor Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan signed an executive order directing state government agencies to conform to Proposal 3, the new constitutional amendment guaranteeing the “right” to an abortion.
WWMT reports:
Departments and agencies are … expected to identify any laws, regulations, or policies within their jurisdiction that conflict with the constitutional right to reproductive freedom, work with the attorney general to address these conflicts, ensure that their public-facing material is up to date and complies with the recent constitutional amendment, according to state officials.
The news itself comes as no surprise, since Proposal 3 was passed via ballot initiative in November. But curiously, the executive order takes effect on Christmas Eve, of all days.
Now I don’t know about you, but that gives me pause. Why Christmas Eve? Is this a meaningless coincidence, or a deliberate choice? Does it reveal something more fundamental and dark about the progressive worldview?
Consider first that Michigan’s government employees will be off work Friday, December 23 through Monday, December 26. Thus, no one will be around until at least Tuesday the 27th to start ensuring conformity to the new pro-abortion amendment. What’s more, the executive order will quietly take effect on a Saturday. Even without the holiday, that seems like an odd day of the week for a crucial order to kick in.
Now in regard to heralding events of real significance, human beings don’t usually choose dates haphazardly. It’s already obvious how significant of an issue “abortion rights” is to Whitmer and her fellow progressives, and she presumably had some latitude as to when the executive order would take effect. But nevertheless she chose the day before a major holiday, specifically one that celebrates the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The birth. And guess what abortion prevents from happening? I think you see what I’m getting at.
If you’re inclined to see progressivism as a secular “religion” of sorts, with its own ersatz magisterium, dogmas and doctrines, rituals, morality, sacraments, texts, and proselytizing zeal, then you might easily conceive of abortion as one of the progressive “sacraments,” or rather an “anti-sacrament.” As Dr. Peter Kwasniewski once put it:
[T]here is nothing sacred or sanctifying about sin, destruction of life and self-destruction, just as there is nothing beautiful in the devil after his rebellion. Sacraments are about bringing life to man. Abortion is more rightly called the anti-sacrament par excellence, since it deprives the unborn human of his or her opportunity to be brought to life, naturally and supernaturally.
So at a time when we’re supposed to be celebrating the most monumental birth in world history, Whitmer wants to celebrate the sacred “right” of a woman to not give birth, indeed to kill her unborn child? True, an exact motivation for the choice of date cannot be definitively proven. But one cannot blame those of us familiar with Whitmer’s wicked governance, and the increasingly inverse relationship of progressivism to reality (and thus, the truths of the Christian faith), for raising our suspicions.