During this election cycle in particular, now that there’s another vacancy in the Supreme Court, one key issue that we’ll be hearing about again is the matter of abortion.

This matter is often easily relegated to the back burner in our personal thoughts and political discussions. It doesn’t usually make news except when the news cycle calls for it during an election season or a time to appoint a judge or a justice. So outside of these times no one pays too much daily attention to the fact that there are still over 2,000 abortions every day in this country. Thankfully those numbers have come down significantly since the fateful Roe v. Wade Supreme Court horror in 1973. But it’s not enough.

Over 2,000 innocent babies are willfully killed every day in America.

So what is the number one issue facing us today? The economy? The pandemic? The rioting? So many matters of great import these are. But we dare never forget that still there are over 2,000 babies slaughtered every day.

Your political persuasion shouldn’t matter here at all. This is not a women’s reproductive rights issue. To be pro-life is not in itself a matter which has fundamentally to do with reproductive rights. We may certainly argue about whether a woman has the right to decide to use birth control or not, and that’s a debate worth having. But it’s not this debate; for every preborn child—every one—is already the product of reproduction. As soon as a woman is pregnant, she carries a human life inside or her that is not her own. She carries a baby. Even in the first trimester, it’s a baby, and that’s a matter which is biologically proven. A fetus is alive, is human, and is distinguished from its mother. Arguments about viability are also irrelevant. “Viability” means able to survive on its own. Tell me, is a one-year-old child able to survive on its own?

So many things is thrown up in the conversation which are nothing but distractions. What if the fetus is deformed? What if it’s defective? What if, heaven forbid, it’s the result of rape? Are any of these factors sufficient to justify killing it? Even when the matter of saving the life of the mother is raised, we must begin with the fact the fact that in this case we are dealing with two lives. Why not, in that rare case, seek to save both? Why couldn’t we seek to take the baby prematurely so that the mother does not die, and then try to save the baby? The point here—the only point—is that this has nothing to do with a potential life. It has to do with a living human being, a baby.

And this is why our Sunday morning prayers at worship always include, in our prayer intentions for those in trouble, “any unborn children in danger of abortion.” For that’s what they all are: children.

The ending of this horrific daily genocide must be first among all of our political concerns, for I can think of nothing more pressing.