Downs Syndrome and Modern Hypocrisy

I listened to a charming interview on CBC Radio 1 this morning. The host was interviewing two sisters who have embarked on a speaking tour, the exact focus of which was never clear to me.

The relationship between these girls was charming and encouraging, particularly since the younger girl (who was 30, I think), had Downs Syndrome. She was reasonably clear, articulate, thoughtful, charming. Her sister's devotion to her was profound and laudable.

They talked about their close relationship. They talked about goals, joys, life. They talked about how good life was even with a disability, and the unique insights and gifts that came along with those challenges.

At no point in the conversation was there the slightest reference toward the thought that was continuously echoing in my head during the entire interview. This thought was: if she had been conceived more recently, her Downs Syndrome would have been detected and she would almost certainly have been killed!

It was surreal, listening to this woman describe her goals, joys, frustrations, and experiences, and thinking "Yes, but modern society says you should be dead. You should not have been born."

A 2002 literature review of elective abortion rates found that 91–93% of pregnancies with a diagnosis of Down syndrome were terminated. (Source: Wikipedia)

I remember sitting in church a few years ago, right behind a couple who had a beautiful little girl with them. This girl, less than a year old, clearly had Downs. Her daddy held her on his shoulder, and I could look her straight in the face, and I wept!

"We kill people like you, little one," I was thinking. "You will have almost no peers with similar struggles, because the others were detected and their parents had them eliminated."

May God grant our nation repentance and revival!