The Lord promised Noah as recorded in Genesis 8:22 that "While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease." The continuity, regularity, dependability of the natural order stands as a grace of God. This order enables humanity to learn, to produce, to prosper. This grace blesses all living creatures and gives life profound potential, marred only by sin (21) which God chooses to engage and change without reducing human freedom.
God entrusted humankind from the beginning with the power to bring life into existence through the union of a man and a woman. This union is part of the natural order which God reaffirmed to Noah. The questions of life and death have accompanied the stewardship entrusted to humans from creation. Today we focus those questions primarily on the matter of abortion though people have struggled with war and capital punishment and euthanasia, rationing of health care, the contrast of resources for the basics of life that exist in different ways for the poor and the rich and other matters that influence who lives and who dies and when. Sometimes, lost in the discussion is the reality that all who live will die. The question is how they will live and when they will die. God in his providence has given humans the ability to bring life into existence and to participate in the decisions that may bring life to an end.
The Supreme Court ruled on Friday June 24 that the question of abortion will be dependent upon the people of the nation working through their representatives in state government. Pro-life advocates and pro-choice advocates will work together through their elected officials to find a way to meet the concerns of all. "To work together" is euphemistic. It will be a struggle for power. The Supreme Court has pushed this question of life and death back to the people to face. It will create controversy and many will feel hurt by the decisions that are made. From a pro-life viewpoint the ones with the most to lose are the unborn, and they, of course, have no voice in the decisions to be made. Both sides in my experience tend to talk past each other and see no possible way that the other side could have an insight that deserves to be acknowledged or incorporated into a decision for the state to follow.
This inability or unwillingness to listen to the other side has not always been hardened in the way it is today.
In 1971 the Southern Baptist Convention adopted a resolution on abortion that read as follows: "Be it resolved, that this Convention express the belief that society has a responsibility to affirm through the laws of the state a high view of the sanctity of human life, including fetal life, in order to protect those who cannot protect themselves, and Be it further resolved, that we call upon Southern Baptists to work for legislation that will allow the possibility of abortion under such conditions as rape, incest, clear evidence of severe fetal deformity, and carefully ascertained evidence of emotional, mental and physical health of the mother.
By 1989 which was ten years after the conservative resurgence in the Southern Baptist Convention the resolution on abortion was different. In 1989 the only basis that the Convention affirmed as a possible reason for abortion was "to prevent the imminent death of the mother." The Convention had become more conservative on multiple issues, not just abortion, but this position change may have been influenced by the Supreme Court's decision on Roe v. Wade in 1973 which took the question of abortion out of the state legislatures. In this way the Court made it difficult to search for points of agreement so that most people joined one side or the other.
The Catholic Church has held a consistent position on abortion and on the question of when life begins. However, the Catholic Church does allow procedures to save a mother's life which may result in death of the unborn child. In these cases the Church does not call the procedure an abortion.
I am hopeful that the coming debate--power struggle--concerning abortion will go beyond shouting the other side down. I am hopeful that Christians, in particular, will understand that abortion cannot be treated in isolation from other pro-life questions. I am hopeful that a consensus will develop in the nation. I am pro-life. I believe that the promise to Noah means that God has given us responsibility for producing life, protecting life, enriching life. I am grateful that the Supreme Court has pushed the question of abortion back to the people so that we can make decisions together that respect our shared life in this country and that we will all make our arguments as best we know how with respect and kindness toward others. Jesus commanded us to love our enemies. Even if we think people who disagree with us are "enemies" we have the guidance of the Lord to treat those "enemies" with love.
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