Candidates’ and Elected Officials’ Public and Private Positions on Abortion Must be the Same

IS THERE ROOM for a variation in a believer’s public position on the right to life and a private position? Some have said, “Yes.” The call to discipleship says “No.” There is one faith in agreement with itself, never in conflict with itself. In practice, such a duplicitous position cannot but cause the Church to question if there is faith at all. There is room for “cooperation without compromise” on many things. Abortion is not one of them, nor can it ever be.

To attempt an expedient navigation between two polarized positions, such as charting and sailing a mendacious position through the straits of modern Secularism and orthodox Christianity on the most important matter of all, human life, reveals either a flawed understanding of the call to follow Christ in all areas of our lives, no matter the consequences, or a Machiavellian mindset that is out of sync with the mind of Christ (Philippians 2:5-11). Either way, the life, the irreducible God-given spark of life is extinguished. Such a sinister voyage is doomed from the start. Yet, babies will die along the way of the attempt. This must not be.

We must require that our public servants, including those running for offices, be honest about their faith and their position on the sanctity of human life. Specifically, abortion is a particularly heinous sin that must be opposed whether in public or private life. The Scriptures are unambiguous even if some of our leaders may be:

Upon you I have leaned from before my birth; you are he who took me from my mother’s womb. My praise is continually of you. ~ Psalm 71:6

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you… ~ Jeremiah 1:5

And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb. ~ Luke 1:41

Those women beguiled by this present evil age, who have given their offspring to Moloch, may find forgiveness and new life in Jesus Christ. You may know that your unborn child is safe in the arms of Christ. The preponderance of Scripture points to the blessed destination of these children. There are infants whose praise is perfected in heaven even now. Earth may seek to silence the cry of the babe, but God says, “let the children come unto Me.” So, dear woman, you have suffered enough. Cast your burden upon the Lord and He will forgive and He will grant you new life. Jesus Christ grants dignity to the downtrodden, to the poor women taken advantage of by a godless, disposable culture.

We call upon all Christian political candidates and elected officials to remain steadfast in their public condemnation of abortion. Abortion is a blight upon our land, a blight that will devour our future, and spoil any otherwise legacy of good. The effects of its insipid carnage cannot be fully known for many years. But if Holy Scripture alone is not sufficient to buttress my appeal, there is more than ample evidence to the horrendous wake that follows this irreversible act of violence to the image of God. Those who support abortion, or play Pontius Pilate by seeking to wash their hands of the matter, will undoubtedly awake, sadly and regrettably, on the wrong side of history. For God will not bless or condone the taking of human life. Indeed, His righteous judgment is already prepared for those who do evil and those who condone it. Genesis chapter six which chronicles the catastrophic flood that destroyed the world begins by revealing the sexual sin of a fallen race of Humankind that disregarded God’s design for marriage. This led to the inevitable pain of family breakdown. Violence broke out as a result of the social disorder and added to an already untenable human societal situation. The very land became infected by the murderous culture. Abortion is a most violent act that, often, follows blatant disregard for God’s laws (“written on our hearts”) concerning sexuality. The abortionist’s knife and his gruesome metallic claw, under the guise of helping women, destroy the men and women of a new generation. Homemakers: gone. Teachers: gone. Presidents: gone. Loving parents: gone. And, if you prefer a more fiduciary consideration of the matter, “taxpayers,” gone. Soldiers: gone. Law enforcement officers: gone. All future life erased as if they never existed: tiny spinal cords snapped with a rose-cutting snip or their brains crushed in an eternal instant. But they did exist. Oh, yes, they did.

As one born out of an unseemly and unrecognized union, and as one who escaped the abortionist’s skillful and bloody sword of death, through the pleading of my father, I am here to say that all life matters before God. I say with Mother Theresa,

“Give us the children. Do not abort the babies. Let them live. We will take them.” Christian organizations such as Rachel’s House in Kansas City are models of those ministries that stand ready to support the continuing echo of the late Mother Theresa’s plea.

God have mercy on us. Lord, give strength to public officials to stand up for the right to life, the sanctity of Biblical marriage of one man and one woman, equally yoked in faith, and in the protection of the innocents.

I have not seen a better statement than the one by Forward in Faith, an Anglican movement for the Biblical truth to be applied in every area of life. I quote from the Reverend James Sweeney’s fine article and the position of the Anglican Church in North America (and the position of so many other Christian denominations like the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, the Presbyterian Church in America, the Southern Baptist Convention, and others):

“As Christians, we are obliged as disciples of the Risen Lord to resist and speak out against the senseless slaughter of millions of unborn children through abortion. Jesus calls each of us, as his disciples, to be the “light of the world” and commands us to “let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” (Mt. 5:14-16.) We must proclaim the Truth of the Christian faith in our actions, our works, and our words. When innocent children are being put to slaughter through abortion, we must resist and speak out against it. To suggest that a faithful Christian can be “personally opposed to abortion” but support legal abortion is directly contrary to Jesus’ command to “let our light shine before others.” (Mt. 5:16.) We must in faith, and with the courage of our convictions as faithful Christians, proclaim the inherently evil and unjust nature of abortion, resist it without qualification, and oppose those in leadership who promote the ongoing slaughter of unborn children through public advocacy and political action. We do so at Jesus’ express commandment. Christian life, particularly in an increasingly secular, pluralistic culture that rejects much of what the Bible says, is a challenge. We must pray for God’s grace and the strength to faithfully witness the Truths of the Christian faith to those hostile to us and to God’s word. But, we know and accept this challenge, knowing that our Lord, Jesus Christ, is with us always to the end of time” (Mk. 28:20.) (A Christian Reflection Upon THE RIGHT TO LIFE by Rev. James Sweeney, Forward in Faith).

Lord, who sent Your only begotten Son to us in the form of an infant, and who blessed the womb by Your glorious Incarnation, grant that we, too, may be so in awe of Your gift of life, that we not only care for the destitute and the refugee among us, but that we stand like the Bell Rock Lighthouse, immovable, in our private advocacy for Your gift of life, but, especially, in our public influential position on the horrors of destroying human life in the womb. We pray for the sake of Christ Jesus and our conscience, have mercy, O Lord, have mercy. In Jesus’ name. Amen.