Robert Morrison spoke on Sunday, September 12, at the LFL of Iowa Conference in Ankeny. The following is from his blog post.
I just returned from five days in Iowa. No, I’m not throwing my hat in the ring for the famous Iowa presidential nominating caucuses. I did feel like stomping on the hats of some of those whose names are being mentioned. Some of these fellows think the way to victory in `12 is to abandon the issues of human life and marriage. When one fellow drawls “social issues ain’t gonna change a single vote,” I can assure him: They just changed mine.
I was in Iowa to speak to Lutherans for Life. My hosts took me to Christian schools, churches, and home gatherings. Again and again, the word coming back to me from Iowa was frustration. Those common sense folks who live in farm country and who care deeply about this country told me over and over they were frustrated that both parties seem not to be listening to them.
People there are frustrated with taxes and spending, to be sure, with being forced to pay for abortions through national health care, and with seemingly endless foreign entanglement that do not promise victory—or even enhance our security. If we are winning the war on terror, then why are apologists for terrorists preparing to put a mosque at Ground Zero? If after nine years of war we cannot even make Fort Hood safe, people know something is seriously wrong.
I have a small suggestion to help my frustrated friends in Iowa and elsewhere. It won’t change everything, but it will change something. My friend Seth Leibsohn suggested this idea while he was subbing as host for Bill Bennett’s talk show. It’s very much a Morning in America idea, for that show is dedicated to “intelligence, candor, and goodwill.”
Seth suggested we all go out and buy 100 Mother Teresa postage stamps. The U.S. Postal Service issued a commemorative stamp to honor this Nobel Peace Prize winner, this frail little woman who made sure that the love of Christ was communicated to the poorest of the poor.
President Reagan called Mother Teresa “the saint of the gutters.” I remember the story of the 1994 Congressional Prayer Breakfast in Washington. President and Mrs. Clinton were seated at the head table. So were Vice President and Mrs. Gore.
When Mother Teresa begged for the lives of unborn children who were being targeted by Clinton-Gore policies. The audience erupted in waves of applause. The Clintons and the Gores sat there like stone statues.
Mother Teresa was fearless. She would tell her Missionaries of Charity in her Calcutta shelters they had to put there hands in the open sores of their dying, outcast patients. “You are tending to Jesus’ wounds,” she would say to her squeamish young Sisters-in-training. “This is how we show our love of the Lord.”
Mother Teresa knew that how we treat unborn children has a lot to do with how we treat each other. Terrorists do not care about human life, born or unborn. One of Nidal Hasan’s fourteen victims at Fort Hood was an unborn child. She said abortion—not nuclear weapons, world hunger, or global warming—was the greatest threat to world peace.
There’s an old saying: It’s better to light a candle than to curse the darkness. I think of this every year when my family attends Christmas Eve services. There, the tradition is for everyone to light a candle, each person drawing a little flame from his neighbor’s candle.
Soon, there are 3,000 little lights testifying to the light that came into the world.
I’m going to buy 100 Mother Teresa stamps. It’s one way we can show there is a government project we definitely approve of. Let the atheizers howl, but this is a wonderful tribute to a saintly woman. Buying those stamps is a way to honor her Lord and ours. It’s a way of signaling our respect and our gratitude. Buying and using Mother Teresa stamps is a small way to promote the cause of peace and appeal for the lives of unborn children.