Dear Editor,
“You cannot call yourself pro-life if you support abortion restrictions but ignore the dignity of the poor, the immigrant, or those facing execution,” Pope Leo recently stated.
His call is not partisan but moral: life is sacred, without exception or convenience.
Yet too often our leaders, most visibly President Trump, present a selective version of “pro-life” that excludes those who do not fit neatly into their vision.
Transgender Americans have been targeted with bans from military service and restrictions on medical care. Immigrants and refugees have been branded as “invaders” and subjected to cruel family separations and harsh detention.
Even the language used, calling people criminals, threats, and do-nothings, erodes dignity and normalizes exclusion. To be pro-life is to affirm that every person, from the unborn child to the refugee, bears equal dignity.
The Pope’s words point us to something higher: Our task is to see beyond dehumanizing rhetoric and demand leaders defend human dignity in full. If you continue buying into and parroting Trump’s rhetoric, you are admitting that, in your heart and mind, only selective lives are sacred.
Ace Jones, Greensboro