Karen Garver Santorum - Letters to Gabriel: The True Story of Gabriel Michael Santorum

LETTERS TO GABRIEL

The true story of
Gabriel Michael Santorum

The true story of Gabriel Michael Santorum

by Karen Garver Santorum

IGNATIUS PRESS SAN FRANCISCO

All Scripture References are from
the New American Bible unless otherwise noted.

At the Death of a Child by Donald Deffner,
Copyright 1993 by Concordia Publishing House.
Used with permission.

Cover design by Riz Boncan Marsella
Cover art from gettyimages.com

2012 by Karen Garver Santorum
All rights reserved
ISBN 978-1-58617-754-6
Library of Congress Control Number 2012933350
Printed in the United States of America

F or my husband, Rick, and our dear children, Elizabeth, Johnny, Daniel, and Sarah Maria, whose love and comfort made this book possible. I thank God every day for blessing me with your beautiful lives.

Special thanks to my parents for their constant love and support over the years.

Many thanks to Sydney Leach for her help and inspiration.

Contents

Note from the Publisher:

During the 1980 campaign for the presidency of the United States, there was a moment that threatened to unleash a national controversy over the separation of church and state.

The fiery and provocative Evangelical pastor and preacher James Robison had organized a National Affairs Briefing of the Religious Roundtable in Dallas Texas on August 28th, 1980, late in the campaign. 15,000 Christian conservatives attended, and presidential candidate Governor Ronald Reagan was invited to speak.

As Reagan approached the podium there was apprehension in the audience and latent hostility in many of the media representatives covering the event. Reagan defused the tension immediately with his now famous introductory remark: I know that you cant endorse mebut I endorse you.

Ignatius Press is a Catholic publisher and this book is being republished in the midst of another presidential campaign, the campaign of 2012. The book was written by the wife of one of the candidates, Rick Santorum, and first published in 1998. Because of the increased public visibility of Senator Santorum and his family during the campaign, there has been a growing number of people asking for this book.

Because we think this book is such a beautiful testimony to the worth and dignity of very human life, we want to respond to the many requests for it. Still, following the wise example of Ronald Reagan, we know that we cant endorse Rick Santorum. But we do endorse his wife, Karen Garver Santorum, and the pro-life, pro-family principles she expresses so movingly in this book.

Letters to Gabriel is about the Santorums third child, Gabriel Michael, who died shortly after birth.

Fr. Joseph Fessio, S.J.

Ignatius Press

F oreword

Every human life, from the oldest adult to the very youngest unborn child, is a gift of God ~ to love and be loved. Gabriel Michael Santorum, living only a couple of hours after his premature birth, is a gift of God, and I recommend that these letters from the loving heart of a mother be read because they remind us of Gods tender love for us expressed by Isaiah,

Can a mother forget her infant,
be without tenderness for the child in her womb ?

(Isaiah 49:15)

May God bless Richard and Karen Santorum, the parents of little Gabriel Michael, and console them with the knowledge that their son is in Heaven with God. May Mary, the Mother of Jesus, use these inspiring letters to encourage all expectant mothers to cherish the gift of life they carry, and to love the child within their womb.

-Mother Teresa of Calcutta
June 18, 1997

I ntroduction

by Joni Eareckson Tada

Why am I living? Not many people have the guts to say it out loud, but lots of us think it. Theres a slew of self-help books, mid-day talk shows, and one-hour counseling services to help us find meaning and purpose. Sometimes the purpose is hard to pin down in this no-deposit-no-return culture.

But Rick and Karen Santorum have no trouble with that. For them, purpose and meaning are all wrapped up in one simple value: all life is sacred. They learned that when they lost their child Gabriel to a severe disability. And the value was reinforced again when Bella was born.

This little girl has Trisomy 18, a genetic disorder similar to Down Syndrome but more serious. There have been some who have looked at the Santorums and thought, Isnt this child better off dead than disabled? Rick and Karen certainly dont believe so!

They see a bigger picture. Bella, to them, is a treasure, and God has given her to Rick and Karen and the family to be nurtured and cared for. In so doing, the family unit is strengthened, sacrifice and love are honored, commitment is extolled, and their example influences thousands of other special needs families across this nation to do the same.

The Santorums also understand that if the rights of a child with a disability are not safeguarded, then it spells danger for all people who are medically fragile, whether young or old. When God is removed from the public arenawhen he and his precepts are ignored anywhere around the worldit spells danger for the unborn child, the newborn with disabilities, those in comas, and the elderly. People are not better off dead than disabled, but if this growing premise is not opposed, personhood and human dignity will be systematically targeted and dismantled, all for the sake of cost and convenience.

This is the way it is in a post-modern world played out on the landscape of disability. Some have looked at children like Bella and said, Pull out her feeding tube? Even if that does violate her rights, the little girl lacks any cognitive capacity to experience any kind of dignity. But do you see the logical outcome of such a statement? If we follow this post-modern perspective, then we should let the Alzheimer patient run around without clothes on let the intellectually disabled teenager eat off the ground... allow the child with autism to flap his arms all day repeatedly with no intervention. This is where post-modern logic concerning disabilities will lead us.

But God has called us to treat Bellaand millions like herwith respect and human dignity. God has called us to secure her rights and to ascribe positive value to her disability. People deserve to be treated with dignity, even ifand especially ifthat individual has no idea what human dignity looks or feels like.

This book you hold in your hands, Letters to Gabriel, is a clarion call to every American. We need to treat people not as things, but as individuals with inherent work, no matter how severe the disabling condition. Together we must spread the word that as the moral fabric in our society wears thin, no one is more in jeopardy than those who are too weak, too small, or too elderly to grasp how dangerous the battle is. This is why I'm so grateful you are reading Rick and Karens story....

Perhaps God is calling you to shape the future for as Proverbs 31:9 says, Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy. Even in your own neighborhood, you can advocate for those who are elderly, disabled or medically fragile. History shows that given the opportunity, society will move in the direction of convenience for the masses at the expense of the weak and vulnerable. Lets not treat people as things, but as human beings that bear the precious imprint of our great Creator God.

Its something Gabriel and Bella have taught us.

Joni Eareckson Tada
Joni and Friends International Disability Center
Spring 2012

A note to the reader... .

T his book is a series of letters I wrote to my son, Gabriel Michael, who was born prematurely and died two hours after birth.