The politics of abortion
The moral blight of abortion has moved
Christians to oppose its practice in various ways. With the recent changes in
the U.S. Supreme Court and with legislative processes underway in states to ban
abortion, we should reflect once again on how Christ would have us respond to
this issue.
Our response at Valley Bible to the abortion
problem has been to educate rather than to protest. We view civil disobedience
to be morally wrong unless the authorities are ordering us to sin. As stated in
our position paper on the church and government
(http://www.valleybible.net/resources/PositionPapers/TheChurchAndGovernment.shtml),
we cannot disobey the governmental authorities simply because they permit
evil.
What about civil protests? It
seems that the number of civil protests to abortion has diminished noticeably in
recent years. Abortion pickets were much more common in the 1980s and the early
1990s than they are today. Yet the likelihood of abortion becoming against the
law is increasing. Far more importantly, the abortion rate has been falling for
the last fifteen years. Researchers have noted that more women with unwanted
pregnancies are choosing against abortion. Lacking any objective research
correlating the popularity of abortion protests and the abortion rate, we can
only say that all the effort that churches put into protesting abortion appears
to be of little effect, and perhaps even
counterproductive.
Why do reports
indicate that a greater number of unwanted pregnancies are resulting in births?
Could it be that more people know more about the nature of the unborn child? As
medical science has improved, we can now see the child in the womb with much
greater detail, which serves as an emotional hurdle for a conscience to
overcome. The more people are informed, the better their decisions should be
(all other things being equal).
Our
contribution has been to bring biblical information to bear on the subject
through our teaching, including our position paper on abortion
(http://www.valleybible.net/resources/PositionPapers/Abortion.shtml) which is
viewed well over 100 times each month, plus dozens of times with our Spanish
translation.
As the abortion issues
inches closer to the Supreme Court, we must remember that the year prior to the
Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision, over half a million abortion were performed
in the U.S. Any U.S. laws do little in other countries, where some have more
abortions than live births. Laws may help, but the conscience is stronger that
the law.
Abraham Lincoln noted in 1854
regarding slavery: "It still will be the abundance of man's heart, that slavery
extension is wrong; and out of the abundance of his heart, his mouth will
continue to speak." The God-given conscience is uncomfortable with abortion.
As we speak truth to that conscience, we do God's will. But remember, "the
tongue of the wise makes knowledge acceptable."
Posted: Fri - February 10, 2006 at 01:26 PM