Life Choices

I HAVE always had a passion for films and the cinema. In the course of time, I have accumulated a small collection of my favourite DVDs. There is, however, a group of movies that, although I like them a lot because of their moral and civil-rights values, I have no desire to see again. These are those films on real-life situations which denounce the horrors of war, human-rights abuses, exploitation, etc. These films are very interesting, but they shake me so deeply at the emotional level that seeing them once is more than enough for me.

One such film is called Sophie’s Choice, directed by Alan Pakula in 1982. Sophie is a Polish survivor of the Nazi concentration camps who, on entering Auschwitz, was obliged by a sadistic doctor to make a heart-wrenching decision: to decide which of her two children would die immediately in the gas chamber, and which would continue to live, albeit at the camp. Of her two children, Sophie chose to sacrifice her 7-year-old daughter: the sorrow and the guilt of having to make such a devastating decision tormented her for the rest of her life.

I was reminded of this film when, a few days ago, I read in an Italian newspaper the story of Hassan, a father of five children who has the misfortune of living in one of the many war-torn areas of the world.

Since the war began, Hassan gathers all his children together in their small living room each evening and, with a heavy heart, but masked by a smile on his lips, kisses them goodnight, indicating where they are to spend the night.

“You will go into the bedroom with the window looking to the west” (which could be struck by artillery fire); “You, instead, will sleep in the bathroom to the east” (which is within range of machine guns). “And the four of us will sleep in the corners of this living room” (which could be struck by a missile from a fighter jet).



They then switch off the lights while Hassan prays that the silence of the night be not broken by the sound of tanks, machine guns and missiles. Every night, after sunset, Hassan is forced to make his choice, in the hope, should they be attacked, that he might save at least some of his children. Life compels Hassan to play this grim Russian roulette every evening.

Thousands of miles away from Hassan, in Australia, another human episode has made the headlines the world over, an incident that also highlights the importance of choices.

This is the story of a couple who hired a young Thai woman as a surrogate mother. Unexpectedly, the woman conceived a pair of twins, a boy and a girl, the boy with Down’s Syndrome. The ‘employers’ of the Thai woman, made their choice: “We will only take the healthy baby girl, and leave the baby boy.”

This child is now one year old, and is living with his surrogate-mother who has brought her case to the authorities. She is asking for help because her ‘rejected’ son is in need of expensive cures and a heart operation.

The Australian couple have justified themselves claiming that the surrogate mother was well aware, from the 4th month of pregnancy, that one of the two fetuses was affected by Down’s Syndrome. They had asked her to abort the foetus. The Thai woman, however, on the basis of her moral principles, refused. The Australian couple is adamant that they have no regrets at all about their choice.



Sophie’s and Hassan’s choices are human dramas dictated by extreme life conditions; the choice made by the Australian couple was, instead, dictated by selfishness…

We must all make choices in life. Scarcely an hour goes by that we are not called upon to make choices of one sort or another. Some are trivial, some more far-reaching. Some will make no difference at all in the eternal scheme of things, others will make a world of difference.



Decisions are constantly before us. To make them wisely often requires courage: the courage to say no, the courage to say yes, the courage to wait. We must remember, however, that every decision, every choice, has its consequences, and that eternal life, the Kingdom of Our Father, is our goal. This goal is not achieved in one glorious moment; rather, it is the result of a lifetime of righteousness, an accumulation of right choices, a constancy of purpose. As with everything that is worth our time and effort, the reward of eternal life requires work.

A blessed New Year to you all, dear readers. May the Lord give you the courage to make and live the right choices throughout this year.