The premium, the button and the incense

The abortion premium

As WorldNetDaily's Bob Unruh reported on Nov. 5, U.S. House Minority Leader Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, stated that the government health plan currently before the Senate will require all participants to pay a "monthly abortion premium."

It took awhile for that to sink into my head after I read it. Surely it must mean something other than what it clearly sounds like. Anything else.

"The premium will be paid into a U.S. Treasury account – and these federal funds will be used to pay for the abortion services," Boehner wrote on his blog. "The commissioner must charge at a minimum $1 per enrollee per month."

In other words, unless I misunderstand, the socialized medicine plan from hell would not only bilk other patients to provide elective abortions for those who want them, but require all enrollees – even those who view those abortions as murder – to finance them! Sure, this may be in the Constitution, but … on what planet?

The leftists' purpose here has to be twofold:

To provide ongoing funding for baby killing so that, even if sources for actual medical needs run dry, abortions can still be performed; and

To utterly crush the pro-life faithful, whom the leftists have always despised, by forcing them to choose between their integrity and their right to buy medical treatment for themselves and their families.

And those enrollees who object on moral grounds? Well, if House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is going to have people incarcerated for refusing to buy insurance, as she says she is, can jailing conscientious objectors en masse be far behind? Chuck Colson and the signers of the Manhattan Declaration don't think so.

The Button

Stay with me for a minute. This all connects. And it's not any crazier than Nancy Pelosi.

"Button, Button" was one of the most compelling psychodramas ever presented on the classic television series "The Twilight Zone." In it, a woman is visited by a mysterious stranger who presents her with a plain, empty box with a button on the outside. If she chooses to press the button, he tells her, she will receive $200,000, but as a result someone she does not even know will die.

For a week she and her husband agonize over the box, debating their need for the money, the moral implications of pushing the button, and even whether the whole thing is only a badly designed hoax. In the end, however, she succumbs and pushes the button.

Relieved that nothing happens, she and her husband laugh it off and go to bed. When the mysterious stranger returns in the morning, however, he hands them a briefcase containing the promised money and picks up the box. When they ask what will happen next, he tells them that the box will be reprogrammed and offered to another person, another person whom they do not even know. Finally figuring out the grotesque game and how they set themselves up by their own greed, the couple stares in horror.

The incense

When Roman emperors were uniting their subjects in Caesar worship some 2,000 years ago, all that was required of each person was to drop a pinch of incense into a burner once a year and declare, "Caesar is lord." However, many Christians refused to participate in what they rightly saw as idolatry, and they paid the ultimate price for their recalcitrance.

When a similar requirement manifests itself in the end times, as the Book of Revelation says it will, many believers will see it for the ruse it is but will sign onto it anyway. The same might be said of the health bill as it is currently written.

We already know the "monthly abortion premium" is not a hoax because a 2,032-page piece of written legislation testifies to its reality. We already know what class of person has to die so that we can have coverage, because that is spelled out on line 16, Page 96, Section 213.

If the bill passes, those willing to sell others out for a perk will learn, as the button couple did, how thin the line is between victimizer and victim. Their fate will also be spelled out in the health legislation – if it isn't already – probably under a heading like "Rationing for Enrollees of Medicare Age" or "Participants with Serious (read: 'Expensive') Illnesses."

When the mark of the beast arrives, it may sneak up and trap people unawares – but only in Hollywood. In the real world, contrary to much folklore, God doesn't care if we pay for our groceries or medical bills with cash or a smart card. But you can bet He cares most deeply about whether we knowingly cooperate in the systematic murder of children, whether to the tune of one dollar per month or one quarter of a penny per lifetime – or maybe just a grain of incense to keep from making waves.

Marylou Barry blogs at MarylousAmerica.com and writes a series of children's books available through Amazon. You can read them at HouseWithTheLightBooks.