Given our gratitude in the pro-life movement whenever a single abortion is prevented, we observed with interest two recent features in the mainstream media.

Time magazine’s Feb. 26 cover story, “The abortion campaign you never hear about,” was skeptical about our cause, but portrayed the commendable efforts of some strong-stomached pro-lifers witnessing directly to abortion providers through “common ground” efforts. A compelling, yet understated, aspect of that story involved the conversion of some abortion providers towards more compassionate care. Certain abortionists are now actually using the medical standards of risk screening and informed consent – effectively dissuading the “worst” candidates from abortion, even though their profits will be reduced. They turn away girls and women who are obviously coerced, refer the indigent for social services to make parenting possible, acknowledge that grief can be anticipated and offer aftercare. Such measures do indeed save lives. They alleviate some of the “messier” aspects of the abortion industry.

Which brings us to another mainstream media presentation – 60 Minutes’s Feb. 25 episode, entitled “Brundibar: How the Nazis conned the world,” providentially broadcast just as we read Time.

The Theresienstadt concentration camp in Czechoslovakia housed a “model ghetto” of Jewish prisoners, able to pursue cultural activities like a children’s opera, yet always at risk of shipment to places like Auschwitz. In 1944, the Red Cross came to see the living conditions there – and its officials satisfied themselves that the camp was a delightful final destination, rather than a way station before the gas chambers. The ploy worked and the Nazis produced a propaganda film about their prisoners’ marvellous living conditions.

One former resident, who lost all her family and most of her friends, told CBS, “So few of them survived. And they were so talented. So many wonderful children among them and promising children. That’s the pity of it. Children that would have become poets and artists and so many of them. And they are all gone, for nothing.” Another resident conceded that the Nazis’ deception worked. “But they only convinced the world because the world wanted to be convinced. It’s easier.”

These words are chilling. What the world didn’t want to see was that a tidy concentration camp was still a concentration camp.

With this in mind, we hope and pray that abortion providers willing to limit their destructive practices will pursue their ethical reasoning to its logical conclusion – and join the ranks of those who end such practices entirely.