Malcolm Cutchins: ‘I would choose Johnny every time’

January has been “Sanctity of Human Life Month.” There are few better examples of honoring the choice of life than Coach Gene Stallings and his wife Ruth Ann and their Down syndrome child, John.
Coach Stallings was featured on the Focus on the Family broadcast on 89.1 FM (Montgomery) last Wednesday. (The entire interview is available at http://www.listenfamily.org.)

Friend and foe alike have to admire the coach for bringing John to the football sidelines year after year. The “John Mark Stallings Equipment Room” on the campus in Tuscaloosa honors his memory (along with 700 other memorials of some sort). Most remarkable are Coach Stallings’ descriptions of John’s daily life. “John loved to go to church… he would put his money in his Bible on Saturday night to be sure he was prepared for the offering plate the next morning … he never complained …he told me every day he loved me.”

At one time, Stallings coached the St. Louis Cardinals NFL team, a predecessor of the Arizona Cardinals who play in the Super Bowl this weekend. He told of a trip some years later back to the neighborhood in which they had lived. While he and his wife struggled to just recall the names of their neighbors, “John knew the name of every neighbor, every child, and even the name of each neighborhood dog!”

Stallings surmised “if we could have one wish for our children — we’d wish they’d spend eternity in heaven.” John “did not know one bad word at 46. He saw the best in everybody. He never forgot a name even those he hadn’t seen in 20 years. At his 40th birthday party, he called everybody who came by name.”

He was “always agreeable.”

On Stallings’ perspective of the impact of John on his own life, he noted, “What a joy it’s been; a real blessing in disguise … My life was richer because of him … If I could go back 46 years and the Lord would give me a choice (of a normal child or Johnny). I would choose Johnny every time! Eventually these children will be whole in Heaven … The very pinnacle of my happiness is Johnny.” (For more, see the book, “Another Season.”)

In February 2001, John Mark was one of the first four people to be presented a “Change the World” Award from Abilene Christian University. The presentation to John Mark noted the impact of his life:

“As a young man with Down syndrome, Johnny has been a shining light of love and joy to his family and friends, professional football players, fans and national viewing audiences, Whether he was with his dad in a United Way TV ad, serving as the most excited fan on the sidelines or just demonstrating great determination in every task, Johnny has changed the world of everyone he has met.”

What a contrast with these days of increasing government funding of abortion (and the Speaker of the House trying to justify funding of contraceptives as “cutting costs”).

Dr. Malcolm Cutchins is an emeritus professor of engineering of Auburn University and writes a weekly column for The Opelika-Auburn News.