Performing Abortion is \u201cGod\u2019s Work?\u201d The Real Story of Christianity and Abortion<\/p>\n
To the utter consternation of the abortion rights movement, the issue simply will not go away. Decades after they thought they had put the matter to rest with the Roe V. Wade decision, America\u2019s conscience is more troubled than ever, and near panic appears regularly to break out among abortion activists. Such a panic is now underway, and the defenders of abortion are trotting out some of their most dishonest arguments. One of the worst is the claim that Christians have only quite recently become concerned about the sanctity of human life and the evil of abortion.<\/p>\n
In fact, one of America\u2019s most infamous abortion doctors, Dr. Willie Parker of Mississippi, has made such a claim in his new book, Life\u2019s Work: A Moral Argument for Choice. Parker, who refers to himself as a Christian, writes: \u201cIf you take anti-abortion rhetoric at face value, without knowing much about the Bible, you might assume that the antis have Scripture on their side. That\u2019s how dominant and pervasive their righteous rhetoric has become. But they do not. The Bible does not contain the word \u2018abortion\u2019 anywhere in it.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is the same argument we so often confront on sexuality issues. We are told that Jesus never said anything against same-sex marriage. The disingenuous nature of this argument is fully apparent when we look to a text like Matthew 19:3-6. Jesus makes abundantly clear that God\u2019s intention \u201cfrom the beginning\u201d is that humanity, made male and female, should united in marriage and \u201cthe two shall become one flesh.\u201d As Jesus continued, \u201cWhat therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.\u201d That should settle the matter.<\/p>\n
Similarly, Dr. Parker claims that the Bible does not even mention abortion as a word, which is quite true but irrelevant. The Bible consistently reveals life as God\u2019s gift and mandates the protection of human life, made in God\u2019s image, at every stage of life and development.<\/p>\n
As you might expect, Dr. Parker would not change his argument even if the Bible did condemn abortion by name. Why do I say this? Dr. Parker\u2019s words speak better for themselves: \u201cAs an inspired document, the Bible is full of guidance for me about justice and love. But as a historical document, the Bible is a ruthless, unsparing record of the historic misogyny of the early Jewish and Christian people.\u201d Later in his book he attributes the pro-life position to preoccupation with regulating sexual behavior and \u201ca rigid reading of Scripture that invites no questioning or interpretive consideration.\u201d It is only by undermining the Bible\u2019s authority that he can make his pro-abortion argument.<\/p>\n
Even more recently, Nicholas Kristof, an influential columnist for The New York Times , affirmed Dr. Willie Parker in his column, approvingly quoting Parker as he states, quite astoundingly: \u201cI believe that as an abortion provider, I am doing God\u2019s work.\u201d Kristof is well known as a humanitarian, a defender of human rights and human dignity. The great tragedy is that his humanitarian vision does not extend to unborn human beings. He celebrates Parker as a doctor who had a \u201ccome to Jesus moment,\u201d turning from pro-life conviction to performing abortions. He now believes it is \u201cmorally right\u201d to perform abortions.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf that seems incongruous,\u201d Kristof writes, \u201clet\u2019s remember that conservative Christianity\u2019s ferocious opposition to abortion is relatively new in historical terms.\u201d He goes on to make Parker\u2019s argument that the Bible \u201cdoes not explicitly discuss abortion\u201d and proceeds to states \u201cthere\u2019s no evidence that Christians traditionally believed that life begins at conception.\u201d<\/p>\n
What is the truth? Let\u2019s begin with where Kristof\u2019s punch lands with force. He makes the case that America\u2019s evangelical Christians came late to a consistently pro-life position. On this he is absolutely right. He is able to document the equivocation and confusion that abounded within evangelicalism, from the annual meetings of the Southern Baptist Convention in the early 1970s to the pages of Christianity Today . An embarrassing number of prominent evangelical preachers held to \u201cmoderate\u201d views on abortion and speculated about when life begins and thus deserves protection. That did not begin to change until the latter years of that decade, when the biblical and theological logic of the pro-life position began to take hold of the evangelical mind and heart.<\/p>\n
At this point we need to separate two issues that are confused in both Parker\u2019s and Kristof\u2019s argument. The first is the historic Christian understanding of the morality of abortion. The second is the question of when what some theologians have called \u201censoulment\u201d takes place. As for the second question, though it was a matter of intense speculation in late antiquity and the medieval age, it is not a helpful theological question, nor is it answerable. The only consistent biblical logic is to affirm the sanctity and dignity of every human life from the moment of fertilization.<\/p>\n
As for the first question, the evidence is irrefutable. The early church was decidedly, vocally, and courageously pro-life and opposed to abortion. One of the earliest documents of Christianity after the New Testament is the Didache , dated to around A.D. 80-120. The teaching describes two ways: the way of life and the way of death. The way of life demands that Christians \u201cshall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, … you shall not murder a child by abortion nor commit infanticide.\u201d Both abortion and infanticide were common in the Roman Empire. Christians were forbidden to murder any child, born or unborn. The way of life honors the sanctity of life.<\/p>\n
Clement of Alexandria (A.D. 150-215) made clear the sin of women who \u201cin order to hide their immorality, use abortive drugs which expel the matter completely dead, abort at the same time their human feelings.\u201d Tertullian (A.D. 160-240) taught even more comprehensively: \u201cFor us, we may not destroy even the fetus in the womb, while as yet the human being derives blood from other parts of the body for its sustenance. To hinder a birth is just a speedier man-killing; nor does it matter when you take away a life that is born, or destroy one that is coming to birth. That is a man which is going to be one; you have the fruit already in the seed.\u201d These two are just examples of a pro-life position rejecting abortion that included \u2014 at the very least \u2014 Athenagoras, Hippolytus, Basil the Great, Ambrose, Jerome, John Chrysostom, and Augustine.<\/p>\n
As ethicist Ronald Sider commented, \u201cEight different authors in eleven different writings mention abortion. In every case, the writing unequivocally rejects abortion.\u201d The most comprehensive survey of early Christianity on the question of abortion comes from Michael J. Gorman in Abortion and the Early Church . As Gorman states, \u201call Christian writers opposed abortion.\u201d Every mention of abortion in the early church rejects it, forcefully.<\/p>\n
The Apostolic Constitutions , a document from the fourth century, asserts: \u201cThou shalt not slay thy child by causing abortion, nor kill that which is begotten. For every thing that is shaped, and hath received a soul from God, if it be slain, shall be avenged, as being unjustly destroyed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gorman writes: \u201cWriters of the first three Christian centuries laid the theological and literary foundation for all subsequent early Christian writing on abortion. We will see that three important themes emerged during these centuries: the fetus is the creation of God; abortion is murder; and the judgment of God falls on those guilty of abortion.\u201d Those three convictions lie at the heart of the Christian pro-life consensus that came together after the shock of the Roe V. Wade decision in 1973.<\/p>\n
The shame is not that evangelicals hold these pro-life convictions now. The shame is that there was ever any evangelical equivocation on such a matter of life and death and human dignity. Furthermore, there can be no question that historic Christianity condemned abortion and affirmed the sanctity of human life, born and not yet born.<\/p>\n
Let there be no confusion on this question. The Bible reveals the sanctity of all human life; the early church affirmed the sanctity of every human life; and anyone who performs an abortion is not \u201cdoing God\u2019s work.\u201d Rather, he is undoing it. As the Didache , echoing Deuteronomy, reminds us from so long ago \u2014 we are to choose the way of life, and never the way of death.<\/p>\n
________<\/p>\n
NOTES:<\/p>\n
Michael Gorman, Abortion and the Early Church: Christian, Jewish, and Pagan Attitudes in the Greco-Roman World (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock Pubishers, 1998. Original edition InterVarsity Press, 1982).<\/p>\n
Ronald Sider, ed. The Early Church on Killing: A Comprehensive Sourcebook on War, Abortion, and Capital Punishment (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012).<\/p>\n
Nicholas Kristof, \u201c A Christian Abortion Doctor ,\u201d The New York Times , Sunday, May 7, 2017).<\/p>\n
Dr. Willie Parker, Life\u2019s Work: A Moral Argument for Choice (New York: 37INK\/Atria, 2017).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Performing Abortion is \u201cGod\u2019s Work?\u201d The Real Story of Christianity and Abortion To the utter consternation of the abortion rights movement, the issue simply will not go away. Decades after they thought they had put the matter to rest with the Roe V. Wade decision, America\u2019s conscience is more troubled than ever, and near panic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[450,1232,4287,5480,3539,452],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7594"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7594\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}