University of Michigan head football coach Jim Harbaugh understands actions speak louder than words, which is why the former quarterback told ESPN this week that he and his wife will gladly raise any of his family members, staff, or players’ surprise babies.
“I’ve told [them] the same thing I tell my kids, the boys, the girls, same thing I tell our players, our staff members. I encourage them if they have a pregnancy that wasn’t planned to go through with it, go through with it. Let that unborn child be born, and if at that time, you don’t feel like you can care for it, you don’t have the means or the wherewithal, then Sarah and I will take that baby,” Harbaugh said.
Harbaugh, a practicing Catholic whose top priorities are “faith, family, and football,” said that to just ignore the truth about abortion would do a serious injustice to a “life-or-death type of issue.”
“I believe in, and I respect, people’s views. But let’s hear them. Let’s discuss them because there’s passion on both sides of this issue. So when you combine that with respect, that’s when the best results come. … [I’m] just contributing to that conversation and that communication, which I think is really important, in my opinion,” Harbaugh said.
Harbaugh’s decision to walk the walk instead of just talk the talk is something thousands of Christian families in America have done. But not even the coach’s generous offer to open his “big house” to any child who needs a place to grow and learn was enough to evade criticism from pro-abortionists in sports media.
“There are 10,000 foster kids in Michigan. Want to guess how many the Jim Harbaugh family has fostered. Hint: it’s around the number of national championships won,” Dave Zirin, a sports editor for The Nation, tweeted.
Abortion activists such as Zirin like to lie that pro-lifers and Christians only care about babies up until they are born. This is an invalid criticism for several reasons. First, you don’t have to do something to prove that you think murdering babies in the womb is wrong and that life has inherent value.
Second, it’s religious folks like Harbaugh who do the most fostering, adopting, and donating to crisis pregnancy centers in the United States. Overall, Christians are far more likely to adopt than any other demographic. A 2013 survey found that 5 percent of practicing Christians in the United States had adopted at least one time, “which is more than twice the number of all adults who have adopted.” At that time, approximately 3 percent of practicing U.S. Christians were foster parents, more than the 2 percent of all U.S. adults who were foster parents.
As Harbaugh noted in a recent speech at a pro-life banquet, he believes in “having the courage to let the unborn be born” despite the inevitable media attention and criticism that comes with that worldview.
“I love life. I believe in having a loving care and respect for life and death. My faith and my science are what drives these beliefs in me. Quoting from Jeremiah, ‘Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. Before you were born, I set you apart. I appointed you as a prophet to the nations,’” Harbaugh said during his speech at a recent Plymouth Right to Life event.
Harbaugh’s offer to raise babies that result from unplanned pregnancies is courageous even if no one takes him up on it. In a world increasingly plagued with radical pro-abortionists who don’t actually believe in the “right to choose,” Harbaugh is showing his community that there are plenty of options that don’t involve ending a precious life.
