United States
The U.S. records almost 45,000 deaths by suicide each year, seven out of ten by white males. This does not include the so-called “slow suicides” from prescription-drug overdose, alcohol-related alcohol liver failure, and road accidents linked to alcohol abuse, again prevalent among American white males. In contrast, Germany, the U.K., France and Sweden show holding steady or declining statistics. Princeton researchers call these “deaths of despair,” and trace the causes to various social problems, especially unemployment. They go further and suggest that the suicide rates, in many cases, stem from breakdown of the family, instability in finding work, and lack of extended family support. But Fr. Dwight Longnecker takes a theological approach. In the online publication The Imaginative Conservativehe writes that “despair is a lack of hope.” Many people survive divorce, unemployment and instability; they don’t despair and commit suicide. Rather he points to atheism: “not an intellectual rejection of religion, but real, terrible existential isolation: the loneliness of existence without anyone else and especially without God… Despair can only turn to hope when enough people turn to God and turn to one another in love and concern … by rebuilding, brick by brick, faith, the family, the church and the community.”
LifeSiteNewsposted a video on April 6 in which Abby Johnson, a former abortion worker before founding the pro-life ministry And Then There Was None, dedicated to helping abortion workers leave the industry, talks about her life as an abortion worker and subsequent conversion to pro-life. She maintains that those who work in the abortion industry, whom she calls victimizers, are in need of our prayers and help to leave that death environment. She also introduces Adrienne Moton, who was arrested and imprisoned for assisting in the atrocities at the Gosnell abortuary. Adrienne is now out of prison and working for pro-life, declaring that the best day of her life was when she was arrested. As Moton says, “I just felt peaceful. I don’t have to hide anymore.”