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- Human life is a gift from God.
It is sacred.
It has an inviolable dignity,
and justice requires
that we acknowledge and respect the dignity
of each human life as created by God.
- As a man who is pro-life,
it's also not just life regarding the unborn.
You gotta realize that includes those who are handicapped,
those who are infirm, the elderly.
If you don't have God in your life,
you don't have pick up your cross and follow me,
if you're just as valuable
as just the chair you're sitting on,
then euthanasia makes a lot of sense.
Right?
But suffering gives us the option of serving and of loving.
Whether it's a handicapped sibling,
whether it's going to the nursing home,
at any point, we are all children of God
with his breath in us.
Dignity is there.
- This culture of death requires and demands
of us a spiritual response.
It requires and needs men who will stand up for life,
men who will stand up for the weak and the poor,
the vulnerable, the elderly, the handicapped,
and that begins within their own families.
- The scripture talks a lot
about protecting the widows, the orphans.
Protecting those that are the most vulnerable
is the most basic responsibility for us as men.
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- Abortion is one of the greatest tragedies
in human history, where the most innocent,
the most vulnerable, is ripped out
of one of the most sacred spaces, the womb.
To protect those that need protecting,
if we're not willing to stand for that,
we're not gonna be willing to stand for much.
It's what we're called to do as men.
- It's because the child in the womb has no voice
that this becomes the primordial issue.
A nation that kills its own children
is a nation without hope.
- A couple of years ago, another sister and I were praying
outside of an abortion clinic.
A man drove up in his SUV, and he rolled down the window,
and he said, "Hey, Sisters, I just want to thank you
"for being here because 27 years ago,
"I drove my girlfriend to a place just like this,
"but there were people like you outside praying,
"so we just kept on driving. "And I just got off the phone
"from wishing my daughter a happy birthday (laughs),
"and now I have this most beautiful daughter.
"Thank you for being here."
That man, his name was Andre, he was looking for someone.
He wanted to be a protector.
He wanted to provide, and when he was given that in,
that window, when he saw others protecting life,
he, then, protected life.
He protected the life of his daughter.
- One day my wife says, "I think we need to adopt."
So thought about it, prayed about it.
I said, "Yeah, okay, we'll open ourselves up to it."
Two birth mothers chose us.
It's like same time the same day,
and it was like, "Oh, all right, God, here we go again."
One of the birth mothers,
she didn't want to give her child up
for a loving adoption, but she just said,
"I can't provide for this child."
She said, "I just don't want people to think
"that I don't love this child."
But it was obvious that she did.
I said, "Actually," I said, "It's quite the contrary.
"I mean, what you're doing is like the greatest act
"of love that I've ever witnessed."
Yeah, I couldn't imagine the strength and the selflessness
that that takes.
Love involves sacrifice.
Love hurts.
From the second I held my two youngest sons,
they're my sons.
I can't imagine my life without those two kids.
Open yourself up to God's will and, I mean,
Thank God we did.
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- I was raised from a Hispanic family.
My parents are from Columbia.
My dream was to be a Major League Baseball player.
I didn't have a Major League bat,
but I had a Major League mouth.
And welcome back to the show, I'm John Morales.
I got to interview many different types
of professional athletes from Michael Jordan
to Walter Payton.
I would go to the car wash,
and I remember guys would recognize me from TV.
And I'd go to the grocery store, and the little old ladies
in the bakery would wanna say hello.
Sports taught me a lot about perseverance,
and about teamwork, and about dedication.
I always considered myself Catholic,
but it wasn't the most important part of my life.
I was worshiping at the altar of sports,
and that's when I went off the path.
In my early 20s, I was looking for love
in all the wrong places, doing the night club scene,
and I wasn't really following God's plan
for love and human sexuality.
And sure enough, I met a young lady,
and lo and behold, one day she tells me that she's pregnant.
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I couldn't believe it,
but somehow I knew deep down in my heart
that this is a human being.
This is a baby.
But I really wasn't living a life worthy of the Gospel.
I gave in, and I wrote the check
to pay for the abortion.
And so I realized that I will never see that child
until I get to the other side of the veil.
You just don't forget something like that,
and I would go to the ball parks sometimes with film crews
to do interviews, and I'd see dads with their little babies,
and I would think to myself, "Wow, how I wish I was a dad."
I probably wrote the check out of a sense
of guilt and responsibility.
I think I was scared more than anything.
We weren't living God's plan.
It left a hole in my heart.
It really did.
I went through bouts of depression, and it was a decision
that I regret for the rest of my life.
One day, I walk into a church in Chicago,
and I'm talking to the pastor, and he's like, "John, listen.
"I gotta go do the next Mass.
"Here, talk to Cindy."
About a year-and-a-half later,
he was celebrating our wedding Mass.
We had been married a little later in life,
but having children was something
that I had always longed for.
We started looking into the possibility of an adoption.
Lo and behold, one day a young mother who is looking
for a family.
A little gift from heaven had landed on our laps.
We named him Joseph Dominic.
And so in Spanish, he's Jose Domingo.
His birth mother could've easily aborted him.
He could've easily been one of the statistics,
but by the grace of God, chose life.
She chose adoption, and she chose us.
And for that, I am eternally grateful to our Lord.
He's now 12 years old.
He's taller than my wife.
He's in sixth grade, bats left, throws right.
We've spent so much time together.
For me, the issue of life went from the back burner
to the most important human and civil rights issue
of our time.
That's where I got the inspiration to make "The 40 Film,"
a documentary film that takes a look
at where our nation was 40 years after Roe v. Wade.
I think that in this day and age, more than ever,
we live in a media world.
I know that the Lord used me as his instrument
to promote the culture of life,
to promote the pro-life message through this film,
so it's all part of this spiritual revival.
As men, we need to step up to the plate,
and we need to do our part.
If people only knew what abortion really is about,
what Planned Parenthood really stands for,
and I believe that the truth is being exposed,
and I believe that the tide is turning
towards the culture of life.
Science is catching up with scripture,
and people are actually seeing through their own eyes.
All you gotta do is look at an ultrasound.
Abortion will not only become no longer legal,
but it'll become unthinkable.
If I had the opportunity to talk to a young guy
who may have made a mistake, and he's thinking of abortion,
I'd put my arm around him and say,
"Listen, this is a life-changing decision.
"It's a human being made in the image and likeness of God.
"Never forget that there's always the option of adoption."
My life is so much more joyful because of adoption.
Every day, I give thanks to the good Lord
for the joy and the beauty of the sanctity of life
that I have today with my little child.
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- I think when it comes to the gift of human life,
particularly the unborn, men have been silenced
in a lot of ways because this is now a women's issue.
And I think for the most part,
we've kinda said, "Okay, I guess that's the case.
"I guess I'll be silenced," instead of saying,
"No, a father wouldn't be silent when his own children
"or even someone else's children whose lives are in danger."
- If he were to say, "Listen, I'll be with you.
"We can do this.
"I'll help you.
"I will be with this child regardless
"of what happens to us,"
I can tell you that probably about nine out of 10 women
would give birth to that child.
If they perceive that kind of support from the man
that has been responsible with them
for the co-creation of this child.
- I really would like to see more men involved
in the pro-life movement.
I would like to see more men as sidewalk counselors.
My husband is a sidewalk counselor in Detroit,
on infamous 8 Mile,
and he's seen women either being dropped off
by their boyfriends or their fathers.
The guys leave, they come back,
and the women are all there on their own
with really no support.
When the women do come over and talk,
it's always if they had the support,
they will gratefully accept it.
- I've had the opportunity to go to the March for Life
in DC a number of times.
I think it's important for us because it,
for men to be present at those, because it, again,
it's showing everyone else that we, as men,
are stepping out, and we're willing to stand in front
to fight for those that need to be fought for.
What better place for us to stand
than at a place like the March for Life?
- The desire of a woman's heart is to choose life.
It's simply imprinted the way God created us.
And men have a huge role in this.
We can tell a woman all day long
that we think she'd be a great mother,
and then we'll bring in one of our men volunteers,
and he'll tell her the same thing,
and it changes everything.
- We cannot sit back and watch these atrocities happen.
We have to stand in the gap,
and sometimes that simply means saying something,
speaking up, but most of the time,
it has to do with our actions
in defending those who cannot defend themselves.
And certainly the unborn child,
the most defenseless, needs us.