I was so excited that the Alabama Supreme court ruled in favor of the “personhood” of the unborn child, which is an important step forward toward overturning the abomination that is Roe vs. Wade.
Building upon this opinion more recently, in its ruling, Jessie Phillips v. State of Alabama, the court opined that “the value of the life of an unborn child is no less than the value of the lives of other persons.” In a concurring opinion, one of the justices even called on the United States Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade.
“I urge the Supreme Court of the United States to reconsider the Roe exception and to overrule this constitutional aberration,” wrote the Alabama Supreme Court judge, and recommended that the court “return the power to the states to fully protect the most vulnerable among us.”
The personhood of the unborn is indeed the linchpin of the debate regarding pro-life and pro-
The Bible Is Not Silent Regarding Abortion
The murder of a human being was given as the first institutional law post-Noahic Flood. God demands an accounting of the bloodshed of every human because humans are created in the image of God (See Gen. 9:5,6), hence, shedding human blood is akin to murdering God.
Of course, murder also made the top-ten list of the 10 Commandments. As the fifth commandment, it was cited prior to other commandments dealing with other human dignity issues like stealing, covetousness, bearing false witness—all of which are vital, post-birth sanctity of life issues you can possibly place under the categories of slavery, economics, private property and justice—important but not mentioned before murder—which shows the order of importance God placed upon the shedding of innocent blood (See Ex. 20:13).
What Does the Bible Say about Pre-Birth Murder?
Most Christians seem to think the Bible doesn’t say anything directly about the personhood of the unborn baby; however, they are greatly mistaken.
The Scriptures allude to the personhood of the pre-born human in many passages, including Job 10:8 and Psalm 139:13. However, the full personhood of the unborn baby is illustrated in the clearest possible way in biblical case law (lex talionis) found in Exodus 21:22-25, which says that if there is serious injury to an unborn baby, the penalty is “life for a life.”
Furthermore, the first-century church was very vocal against abortion in the Roman Empire (See Chapter 2 of the first-century document called the Didache, which forbids abortion).
Being a ‘One-Issue Voter’
I have heard some Christians, trying to sound sophisticated and more adept regarding culture, say that they are not a “one-issue voter.” Similar to this, Minnesota pastor Doug Pagitt recently wrote an op-ed for USA Today, saying in essence that it is wrong for Christians to put abortion above all other issues. He said “These conservative leaders are willing, at all costs, to make a moral trade — anti-abortion laws and court decisions in exchange for basic human dignity.”
Of course, so-called religious leaders like Pagitt see nothing wrong with playing footsie with today’s far-left politicians who are committed to purging Christianity from the public square and squashing the rights of Christian business owners who wish to maintain faithful to Christ in the workplace. This hostility is obvious to anyone paying attention, as the American left seeks to force Christians to compromise their biblical values in business as well as having public litmus tests for Christians in governmental positions.
Moreover, people like Pagitt engage in exegetical gymnastics in order to render Jesus Christ a proponent of socialism, high taxation, open-border immigration policies and other left-wing objectives. (Although the Old Testament Scriptures commanded Israel to care for the strangers in their land, it never compromised the land’s national identity, laws and borders.)
Such policy endorsements are a stretch biblically, but because Pagitt gets ink given to him in a major news publication, conflating a Bernie Sanders checklist with Jesus Christ is worth the unsound scholarship.
What religious leaders like Pagitt don’t understand is this: Being pro-abortion is the worst affront to human dignity, because the unborn are already persons created in the image of God. If you cannot protect the most innocent human being, why should I trust your judgment or worldview on any other topic?
Are You a One-Issue Voter?
For those who say to me “I am not a one-issue voter,” I ask them this question:
If there were a person running for office, and you agreed with 90 percent of their platform, you would most likely vote for them, even if you disagreed with them on one of their views—and they would say most likely yes.
In comparison, what if you agreed with their views regarding taxes, the economy, the military, gun control, immigration, affordable housing and many other issues, but you found out that they are a member of the KKK—would you still vote for them? Of course, the answer would be no.
Congratulations, I say to them, you are a one-issue voter.
Related to this point, abortion is far worse than the horrors of slavery, unfair immigration laws and social injustice, since at least the victims of injustice had the chance to live their life and make a difference (See the life of American slave turned social reformer and statesman, Frederick Douglass.)
Furthermore, white supremacist Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, specifically targeted the black community when it came to her purveyance of abortion with a goal of exterminating the black race.
Hypothetically, if the unborn had a vote, they would never vote for a pro-choice candidate—
Abortion and Slavery
Recently, Chelsea Clinton (daughter of Bill and Hillary) made news when she commented that as a deeply religious person, she was pro-choice, and one of her reasons was that abortion is a boon to our economy. I quote her with the following statement:
“Whether you kind of fundamentally care about reproductive rights and access, right, because again these are not the same thing—if you care about social justice or economic justice, agency—you have to care about this,” she said, according to a clip published by the Media Research Center. “It is not a disconnected fact … that American women entering the labor force from 1970 to 2009 added three and a half trillion dollars to our economy, right?
“The net, new entrance of women—that is not disconnected from the fact that Roe became the law of the land in January of 1973,” she said. “So, I think, whatever it is that people say they care about, I think that you can connect to this issue.”
Congrats Chelsea—your pro-choice argument related to the economy is the same argument religious pro-slavery people cited in the 19th century. Consequently, if you can espouse a moral ethic that allows murder for any reason—including economic reasons, or to enhance the sexual freedom (and irresponsibility) of consenting adults—then you have just fallen for the same line of thinking that pro-slavery folks used in the 19th century, a view that involved sacrificing or compromising the lives of millions to enhance the quality of life for the more fortunate slave owners and freemen.
As a matter of fact, I believe that many, if not most, pro-choice people today would be pro-slavery if they lived in 19th-century America, as they are the type of persons who desire to live a life in conformity to the groupthink of popular culture, irrespective of the horrors of de-humanizing actions and law.
The pro-slavery argument of the South in the 19th century included:
The Personhood Argument
Many slave owners reasoned that Africans were less human than whites or they twisted Scripture and said blacks were those under the biblical curse of slavery given to Canaan (See Gen. 9:25). The de-humanization of slaves was also illustrated in the 3/5ths compromise of the original U.S. Constitution when some southern owners of slaves thought a slave was not worthy to be counted as one full vote.
Economics
Slave owners thought the economy would collapse if African slavery were abolished (Hence, slavery produced an economic benefit to the nation—as in Chelsea Clinton’s argument cited above.)
In conclusion, I will always vote principle over party, and the greatest determining factor for my vote is the sanctity of life—out of which arises the worldview of a host of other issues.
I have voted both Democratic and Republican; I vote principles, not party. If a person can advocate the legal murder of the unborn, then how can I trust their views related to racism, immigration and social justice, since the life of the unborn innocent should never be sacrificed for the quality of life of the post birth individual.
I must also add: The church as a whole is in a sorry state when other so-called religious leaders would attack other leaders for focusing too much on proscribing abortion. Such an attitude characterizes an insensitivity to, by far, the greatest genocide the world has ever seen. Millions of babies each year are intentionally murdered in the name of convenience, their God-given purposes in life snuffed out as their brains are sucked out of their forming skulls or their little necks snipped in the womb.
Abortion is evil. It’s really that simple. And it saddens me greatly that there is one political party with a platform committed to abortion’s defense, although they have many Christians affiliated with them who ignore biblical values they espouse on Sunday when they vote for pro-choice politicians on Tuesday.
With the midterm elections coming up, my prayer is that true Christ-followers will put biblical values above their political party, irrespective of their ethnicity, denomination or party affiliation.
God takes into account the shedding of innocent human blood; I hope you do as well.
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