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"What are you watching?" my son, Joey, 9, asked as he peered at my computer screen.
I was playing Photo Editor Mike Crupi’s March for Life video on the Courier‘s website, and Joey’s interest was piqued.
Ah, I thought, a teaching moment — but how does one explain abortion to a child?
I thought back to when Joey was a toddler. I’d proudly show him his ultrasound pictures, which to this day are still prominently displayed on my refrigerator door.
"That’s a picture of you when you were in Mommy’s tummy!" I’d tell him.
So I explained that thousands and thousands of people gather in Washington, D.C., every year to show their disagreement with a law that allows people to kill babies in their mommies’ tummies.
Joey’s response was immediate: Killing babies is wrong. He touched his stomach and insisted that no one should point a gun at a woman’s tummy and shoot her baby. I explained that the babies don’t die this way but rather from a "special operation."
He looked at me with trust and confidence.
"You would never do that to us," he stated firmly, referring to himself and his brother, John, 7.
I realized his thought process had gone beyond what I had expected: He had logically concluded that if killing babies is OK, so, too, is killing children of any age. I quickly explained — to his relief — that the law I was talking about doesn’t work that way.
As I later reflected on the conversation, I was impressed that Joey so quickly formed an opinion based on what he believes is right. He also clearly saw how disrespect of life in the womb could potentially lead to disrespect of life at its later stages.
If only adults could see with children’s eyes.
