People remember Psycho, Vertigo, North by Northwest, or the Birds when they think of Alfred Hitchcock. On the second floor of the Museum of Modern Art after exploring the exhibits on floors above, I sat down for some lunch with my family. I cannot for the life of me remember how the conversation started even though it was only two days ago, but somehow I found myself telling my dad about a different Hitchcock movie. I was telling him about the film Rebecca, based on a book by Daphne du Maurier. There is a scene during one of the first conversations between Joan Fontaine and Laurence Olivier’s characters, Rebecca and Maxim de Winter where they are getting more acquainted. Rebecca tells the much older Maxim de Winter about how her father was an artist. He was a different kind of artist because he only painted the same thing over and over again. It was a tree.
Then I told my dad about a beautiful tree that was on my college campus that I loved to take pictures of because I was always rediscovering it in someway. When the sun was setting, after it rained, when it was sunny, on misty mornings, or in the darkness of the night this tree never failed to capture my imagination. Sometimes just being in a different location made me see it differently.
When I was done my dad replied, “trees are like people, each is unique.” There are so many different aspects of a person and then there are the new experiences that affect them. As you get to know someone and as they pass through life your perspective on them will change or you may see them in a new light. Each person is one of a kind, irreplaceable and whose life can never be repeated. The same holds true for trees. A tree may die or be cut down but no other tree can ever really takes its place except in terms of location.
Not everyone thinks trees are beautiful or that every tree is beautiful. Whatever one’s opinions about the coolness or beauty of trees—is not in-and-of itself related to a moral difficulty. When it comes to people on the other hand, that is another question. When you dismiss the beauty as well as dignity of the individual or you only think some individuals have that dignity you could easily go do down a morally slippery slope.
I could talk about how that can lead one to accept abortion or population control or human trafficking. I could go into how it can lead to discrimination based on race, age, religion, gender, etc. The ways in which people disregard the humanity of others is so copious. However, it does not have to be that way. There’s hope.
There are people who have changed their minds—they have come back to seeing the humanity of every individual. One example is Dr. Anthony Levatino a former abortionist. On October 8, 2015 during the Second Judiciary Committee on Planned Parenthood’s on the organization’s medical procedures Dr. Levatino testified before the committee. One of the first things he shared was a very gruesome, vivid account of a Suction D&E procedure. He used forceps to help illustrate how a baby is ripped apart during an abortion. He then, mentioned other procedures to get rid of the unborn.
He was asked why he stopped performing them. He and his wife were unable to conceive a child so instead they adopted. After the adoption his wife became pregnant and they then had a child of their own. When their adopted daughter, Heather was just shy of turning 6 she was killed in a car accident in Dr. Levatino and his wife’s arms. Not immediately, but soon after he could no longer do second trimester abortions and eventually he could not bring himself to do any type of abortion procedure. During an abortion after the devastation of losing his daughter he became aware of the vileness of abortion as well as the humanity of the unborn.
“I reached in and literally pulled out an arm or a leg and I got sick…I soldiered on and I finished that abortion…I’m telling you straight up my experience. You know after 1,200 abortions, first and second trimester abortions, up to twenty-four weeks and all the rest of it and being very dedicated to it, for the first time in my life I really looked, I really looked at that pile of body parts at the side of the table and I didn’t see her wonderful right to choose, or all the money I’d make; all I saw was somebody’s son or daughter.”
That was in 1985, since then Dr. Levatino has become a pro-life advocate speaking about his experience.
While on our way to the Andy Warhol exhibit I mentioned to my dad how different weather can affect a tree just as different experiences can affect a person. He pointed out that if you notice there are trees that break when faced with heavy winds and then there are those that bend with the wind and they remain standing. In my mind Dr. Levatino faced one of the heaviest winds of his life and did not break.
No matter what winds pro-lifers face, and no matter how turbulent those winds can be, we can always remain hopeful and determined. After all, if environmentalists can get governments to protect trees, then if we continue to work hard we can do the same to protect people at all stages of life.
About The Contributor
