Abortion

The origin of the Christian pro-life position is grounded on divine authority and the belief that human life is a gift of God! The Christian pro-life position also recognizes (through a biblical paradigm) what is called freedom of choice. God, who is poignantly called Father, since the beginning of time, has endorsed the freedom of choice as well as all decent and reasonable parents. How? Choose what is right and you’ll be blessed. Choose what is wrong and you’ll be punished. (See Joshua 24:15.) So we say, Make the right choice, and eliminate abortion.
Having said that, Christians must take great care to be sure that the political candidates and parties they support reflect the all-important biblical value that human life is a gift of God. For example, the scriptures state the following:

I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. – John 10:10 (KJV)

Children’s children are the crown of old men; and the glory of children are their fathers. – Proverbs 17:6 (KJV)

Don’t you see that children are God’s best gift? The fruit of the womb His generous legacy? – Psalm 127:3 (Msg)

He [Jesus] said to them, Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. – Mark 10:14 (NIV)

Biblical law established a clear precedent on the issue of the unborn. In Exodus 21:22, Moses criminalized any violent act that might harm the unborn, even when injury to the fetus occurred INDIRECTLY and ACCIDENTALLY. If this be true, that accidental death of the unborn (resulting from the fallout of a fight between two men) was considered criminal and worthy of punishment, then what is to be said of those who willfully, directly, and deliberately harm the unborn?

If men strive [fight], and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman’s husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. – Exodus 21:22 (KJV)

When Elisha the prophet saw the future of a kingdom in the control of the wicked man Hazael, and, amongst other crimes, how Hazael would regard the unborn of the nation’s pregnant women, Elisha wept in anguish as follows:

And Hazael said, Why weepeth my lord? And he answered, Because I know the evil that thou wilt do unto the children of Israel: their strong holds wilt thou set on fire, and their young men wilt thou slay with the sword, and wilt dash their children, and rip up their women with child. – 2 Kings 8:12 (KJV)

God’s wrath was promised to visit those who committed the crime of harming the mothers of Israel and their unborn children in the writings of Amos as follows:

This is what the Lord says: The people of Ammon have sinned again and again, and I will not forget it. I will not let them go unpunished any longer! When they attacked Gilead to extend their borders, they committed cruel crimes, ripping open pregnant women with their swords. – Amos 1:13 (NLT)

Who could forget how Herod, a wicked politician functioning under the auspices of the Roman democracy, sought to kill the toddler, Jesus, through infanticide? This horrible account is given as follows:

Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men, was exceeding wroth, and sent forth, and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently enquired of the wise men. – Matthew 2:16 (KJV)

The unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed. We support a human life amendment to the Constitution and we endorse legislation to make clear that both the Fifth and the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children. Our purpose is to have legislative and judicial protection of that right against those who perform abortions.

Abortion is termination of a pregnancy. The Complete Book of Everyday Christianity states,

“It can be classified as either spontaneous or induced. A spontaneous abortion is a miscarriage, that is, the pregnancy ends usually due to various chromosomal or congenital defects, diseases or infections – of fetal or maternal origin. Unlike spontaneous abortion, an induced abortion is not a natural process of the body and involves a medical intervention.

This intervention is of two types – therapeutic or elective – depending on the reason for the abortion. If the mother’s life is in danger, as in the case of cardiovascular and hypertensive diseases, an abortion might be performed for therapeutic reasons. An elective or voluntary abortion, on the other hand, is requested for reasons other than maternal health and is the most commonly performed type of abortion in the West today. It is estimated that approximately 25 percent of all pregnancies in the world are terminated by elective abortion, making this the most common method of reproduction limitation.”

In Roe v. Wade (1973), the Supreme Court errantly established the nation’s abortion-on-demand policy. Since then, the issue of abortion has grown into one of the greatest moral catastrophes of our nation’s history. Alexander Hamilton, signer of the Constitution, said the following while respectfully quoting Blackstone:

“The law… dictated by God Himself is, of course, superior in obligation to any other. It is binding over all the globe, in all countries, and at all times. No human laws are of any validity if they are contrary to the laws of God.”

For mankind to extinguish the life of other human beings is clearly a violation of God’s laws. In the ninth chapter of Genesis, God expressed His divine purpose in the institution of civil government to Noah, when He stated, in verses 5 and 6,

And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each man, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of his fellow man. Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man.

Adam Clark, protégé of the legendary revivalist John Wesley, explained that by this clear and simple statement of scripture we have just read, even those responsible for the inhumane abuse of animals would be held accountable for their crimes at the judgment seat of God. He states,

from it [verse 5] we may conclude that horse-racers, hare-hunters, bull-baiters, and cock-fighters shall be obliged to give an account to God for every creature they have wantonly destroyed.

If this is true of those who carelessly destroy animal life, what is to be said of the unrepentant purveyors of abortion rights?

As verse 6 so clearly explains, those who murder men made in the image of God, show contempt for God’s image. God takes this affront very personally. It stands to reason that a person who shows contempt for God’s greatest creation, made in His very image, will continue to devastate all manner of lower life around them unless stopped and punished appropriately. After all, should the criminal show so much contempt for the Creator by destroying His most prized and highest creation, what other crimes would he refrain from committing? This is the rationale of God’s mandate for the enforcement of capitol punishment upon those guilty of this particular high-offense.

For this reason, the Christian must understand that, in principle, a society which accepts the destruction of life in the womb, is a society in contempt of the image of God. Therefore, every other imaginable evil must, by necessity, flourish, in a society that is willing to destroy those made in His image. After all, should society show so much contempt for the Creator by destroying His most prized and highest creation – children – what other crimes will they refrain from eventually justifying?

If you didn’t already know that the Apostle Peter lived nearly 2000 years ago, you might mistake his writings as a description of the mentality and practice of those who advocate abortion on demand in our world today. Peter states,

With eyes full of adultery, they never stop sinning; they seduce the unstable; they are experts in greed – an accursed brood! (See 2 Peter 2:14 NIV.)

With the images of sinful acts continually lingering before the eyes of our modern world, whether they be images presented on television, at the magazine stand in the grocery store, or shamelessly sprawled across the world wide web, we find our post-modern culture enabling, encouraging, and, in many cases, instructing the young to engage in sex as a sporty amusement.

The natural fallout of this state of being is the casual destruction of human life in the womb. Sin begets sin. Evil begets evil. And those who pay the price for a culture that revels in the imaginations of lustful acts and depthless greed? The innocent unborn.

God has created mankind in His image (Imago Dei) and that human life begins at fertilization. God, in his infinite sovereignty, uniquely formed human beings and gave them a special dignity, personal freedom, and individual accountability among all the works of creation. Human beings have been made for relationship with God and to be good and faithful stewards of creation. God created each person’s inmost being, knitting each person together in his mother’s womb (Psalm 139:13). As God’s individualized and personal creation, each person is fearfully and wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14). God has ordained all the days of each person’s life before he came to be (Psalm 139:16).

Based on Holy Scripture and the constant moral teaching of the universal Church, we know:

1. From the moment of fertilization until natural death, every human life is sacred because every human life has been created by God, in His image and likeness.
2. From the moment of fertilization, every human life must be recognized, respected, and protected as having the rights of a person and the inviolable right to life.
3. The right to life and physical integrity of every unborn human life is inviolable—it is not a concession made by society or the state, but is instead inherent to the unborn human life by virtue of its creation in the image of God.
4. Because human life begins at the moment of fertilization, it is against our religious and moral conviction to formally or materially cooperate in the termination of unborn human life.

True Christianity is strongly committed to the preservation and defense of unborn human life, which compels our religious, moral, and ethical duty to defend unborn human life from destruction, whether by surgical abortion or use of drugs, devices, or services that have the intent, design, effect, or risk of terminating unborn human life or preventing its implantation and growth post-fertilization.

The Church and all her ministers, ministries and parishioners must publicly witness to society and to the state regarding the intrinsic, inherent, and inviolable dignity of all human life, from fertilization to natural death in the following five points of cumulative logic:

1. If abortion is not the killing of a person, then there is no legitimate reason to regulate or prohibit it.
2. If abortion is the killing of a person, then there is no legitimate reason to regulate such barbaric behavior.
3. Abortion is clearly the murdering of a person, according to the law of God. Softening this clarion declaration of moral and legal truth empowers those who wish it to continue and weakens those who know it must be prohibited.
4. This absolute reality provides the gravity by which we remain in faithful orbit as a supporter of the personhood of every unborn child on earth. Murdering a person must be prohibited; innocent life must be protected, according to the universal laws of God.
5. Such acts of prohibition of murdering an innocent person and protection of life are essential to the justification for the existence of any proper civil government on earth.

Finally, the Christian community must not abdicate its responsibility in the prevention of abortion in our society. This must be achieved not only through the proper criminalization of all forms of murder, but also through education of our teenagers and young adults with regard to moral sexual conduct and responsible family planning. Sexual abilities are given to human beings to experience in part on earth what God is fully in eternity – love. Children, as a product of the love between husband and wife, are gifts from God to deepen the experience of love. No sex or childbearing outside the institution of marriage fulfills this divine intention. Christian education in the form of counseling is also important, and participation with a Christ-like humility and patience in organizations such as Pregnancy Crisis Center enables a Christian community to resolve and persevere with the child-killing dilemma.