Most Americans agree that abortion should be limited except in the case of the health of the mother, rape or incest. Most Christians agree with this also, fortunately, and many Christians are vocal and active in regards to trying to limit abortions. I would like to address the question of the morality involved in the issue though. Why do we think abortions should be limited, excepting for situations involving the health of the mother, rape, and incest? Are there any proper limits that should be applied to abortion?
Generally, Christians cite verses like, Job 31:15, Psalm 139:13, and particularly Jeremiah 1:5 in order to prove that abortion is wrong. The argument goes as such: God is the one who gives life, and he is the one who forms a child in its mothers womb, therefore, to abort the child is to kill the human life that God has created. The argument assumes that killing humans is wrong. Generally the idea that killing babies is wrong is accepted, as most people recognize that killing a baby would be murder, and murder is evil. But, not everyone agrees that human babies, while still in the womb, are babies.
Those who are proponents of abortion generally argue that it is not murder unless you kill a person, and while a fetus may be "human" it is not a person. Now, where the fetus starts being a person is under question. Is it when the fetus gets a heart beat? Maybe when the fetus has brain waves? Some have argued that it isn't really a human until a few days old, because prior to that it cannot function in the way we expect a person to function. Personally I find these arguments contrived and meaningless, resting entirely on speculation and with no real grounds for classifying a human as "person." To make such a division is simply to try and find a way to rationalize that which is immoral so you can sleep at night.
Therefore, assuming the Christian case is correct and compelling, I have two questions: "Why limit abortions where we have?" and, "What are the proper limits for abortion?" In addressing these two questions I want to examine the arguments for committing abortions in the cases of incest and rape, and then examine the mothers health. Then, after examining these positions, I want to examine the hard cases, those times when we are most compelled for the sake of compassion to go ahead with an abortion. My goal is help us reach a clearer idea of what we really believe, and what the results of our beliefs are.
In the cases of rape and incest then, why do we say abortion is acceptable? Usually the argument is that women who have been raped or who are victims of incest did not really choose the act that resulted in pregnancy. Thus, the woman was not consenting to the action, she should not be held responsible for the results. Because the woman should not be held responsible for the results of violence committed against her, she should not be forced to carry the baby in her. No one should be held responsible for the choices of someone else, particularly when those choices can have life changing and drastic effects on the innocent party.
The problem with this argument is that it ignores that the baby is also an innocent party. This is a response that has been made so often that it is basically a cliche, but it is still true. The baby, the one we are going to kill, the one we have established is in fact a baby, is completely innocent of the manner in which it was conceived. Therefore, to kill the baby, and remember, this is a baby we are talking about, because of the actions of the father would only be to add one crime to another. We cannot exculpate the the conscience of a woman for committing murder of a baby based on the crimes committed by the father.
As Christians particularly we are forced to acknowledge a problem with allowing for abortions in the case of rape and incest. We have already admitted that what is inside the woman is a baby. And all the Scripture we cited indicated that God is the one who decides on putting life into a womb. To say that we want to save babies when we want them, but not when we don't, is to admit that we know we are murdering a child, but it is okay in this instance because the child was not conceived in a way we like. There is thus no difference between a Christian who is willing to allow for an abortion in the case of rape or incest and the most hardened atheist who acknowledges that they are killing a human life, just because the mother does not want to bear the burden of carrying it.
Our problem is that either we accept that God gives all life, or we say some lives are not intended by God. We make ourselves judges of the lives of others, saying that we know that God would not bring about a life through a situation such as rape or incest. We presume to know the vast and infinite mind of God on matters such as who should be born, and who should not. That kind of arrogance has only one match: Satan himself.
Wasn't that the question uttered by Satan in the Garden? "Did God truly say..." Are we not confronted with that, and are we not the ones asking that question and giving that same lying answer that he gave to Eve? "Did God really say that he formed you in the womb? Did God really say that before you were formed he knew you? Did God really say that he knit us together himself? Surely God did not mean that in this case! No, God does not mean that he alone is the one who gives life, instead we can decide if he intended this one!"
There ought be no exception to abortion for the sake of rape and incest. Yes, the act of rape is horrible. Yes, incest is evil in every way. Abortion does not make it better, it only adds murder on top of abuse.
I know this is a hard teaching. Some will say that I am a man, and therefore I cannot understand what a woman in those situations would go through. I do not dispute that. I cannot claim that I have the wisdom and insight to be able to sit down and make a woman who has been raped feel "all better." But, whether or not I am even sufficient to comfort a woman who has gone through such a horrible trial does not change the fact of what the Word of God says about who puts life in the womb.
Our obligation then is to provide comfort, to provide assistance, and to provide love to women in such situations as these. In truth it is the obligation of Christians to provide comfort to any woman who is contemplating abortion. It is those who are most hurting who most need us to reach out to them and to help them. We may not win many to the gospel, but we should try. And, even if we cannot save their souls in the time we have to help them, at least we can try and save a life, one that God created, one he deemed to have value.
What of those pregnancies that risk a woman's health? If by "health" you mean that she could die from carrying or from delivering that child, then you have an honest moral dilemma. We live in a fallen world, things do not work like they should, and sometimes a pregnancy could kill a woman. My opinion is, and this is strictly my opinion with far less Scripture to back me up, if a woman would die, and the child would die, such as would happen in the case of the egg lodging in the fallopian tubes, then an abortion should be performed to attempt to save the mother's life (again, such as what happens when you remove a fallopian tube due to a tubal pregnancy). The goal, however, is not to abort the child, but to save the mothers life, the abortion is the horrible side effect of the treatment. If the mother is at risk, but there is a chance the baby could live, then that is a decision that is best made by the woman and her husband, based on the advice from their doctors and pastors.
Hard cases, like a child who is the result of an incestuous rape, who would be born horribly deformed, suffer for as long as he might live, and would never be mentally capable of rational though, make the hardest choices. We look and see nothing but a suffering life, and we say it is best to end such a life before it can even begin. But, the fact is that we are not God. If we believe that God can bring good out of the death of Jesus Christ on the cross, the murder of the Son of God at the hands of evil men, then why can't God bring good out of even the worst possible situation we could imagine?
We do not need to know the reason why God chose to bring a life into the world through horrible situations such as rape or incest. We do not need to know the purpose God has for those lives of suffering to which some are born. We do have to be compassionate to those who suffer abuse and wrong at the hands of others. We do have to stand on the Word of God and say that every abortion is the taking of human life. Will you take that stand in hard times, as well as good?
No comments:
Post a Comment