[Note: This post follows on the previous post offering primary sources mentioning abortion in antiquity. It was most recently edited in July, 2022.]
Introduction
Introduction
The following essay
offers three things: an analysis of modernity, postmodernity, and
post-postmodernity (tribalism) on the issue of abortion; some mainline
denominations’ views on abortion (over against the orthodox, early Church’s
opposition to abortion—see previous post); and an alternative, Christian
perspective of care based not on viability but vulnerability.
Western
Culture and the Arguments for Abortion
Unlike postmodern
theology, liberal theology was at least able to hold convictions. Its difference from orthodoxy was in an
approval of authorities other than Scripture and Christian tradition. Reason and experience were accepted as equal
to or even more significant authorities than what guided the Church prior to
the Enlightenment. Postmodernity, on the
other hand, is uncomfortable with commitment to any conviction—except
harbouring an incredulity towards meatanarratives (Francois Lyotard’s famous
description of the postmodern condition).
Thus, dialogue, the affirmation of people’s choices whatever they may
be, and the cardinal virtue of unity over any orthodoxy govern positions on
socially contentious issues.
Forty-four years ago in
the USA, the infamous Supreme Court Case of Roe v. Wade (1973) expressed a typically
modernist uncertainty about the ‘science’ of when life begins. The standard of certainty, employing a
rigourous doubt, allows very little past the test. In light of this supposed
uncertainty (or was it ignorance?), abortion was permitted all the way up until
birth—the moment of so-called ‘viability’ of the child (when a child could live
on its own).
Over this period, western
culture has moved from a liberal, modernist theology of the Enlightenment that
championed science as an authority to a postmodern condition. Mainline denominations that began their
support of abortion on liberal grounds continued their support as postmodern
denominations concerned not to hold absolute convictions and eager to be
‘pastorally’ supportive of whatever a woman chooses (freedom was the cardinal
virtue in modernity) about a problem pregnancy.
Science, however, has not proved to be a reliable friend to proponents
of abortion. It has pushed the point of
viability earlier and earlier. Moreover,
science is incapable of making declarations about what constitutes ‘humanity,’
only whether something is living or not.
Thus, ‘human life’ must be determined on more than scientific grounds—grounds
that only religious beliefs can define.
Even so, the dominant
discipline in the university as postmodernity took hold of western culture was
no longer science. With the postmodern
condition, the university took a literary turn.
If truth was now to be discussed in terms of interpretations of
narratives, no single view could hold sway.
This change of guard led to championing new virtues, such as tolerance,
unity, and listening to diversity rather than winning an argument. This literary turn, however, was only a
process in a move to another cultural position as western culture edged away
from science-dominated modernity.
Western culture was on a journey from the objectivity of the sciences,
through the subjectivity of the literature department, to the soft or social
sciences, sociology in particular. The
new, cardinal virtues were not, in the end, tolerance and diversity but safety from
others and preference for the marginal.
Enter the age of a violent domination and tribalism of the politically correct
group that prefers action to argument, censorship to liberty, and protection to
justice.
Thus, what we witness now
in arguments by abortion proponents is tribal language. The killing of children is all about ‘woman’s
health’—not so much personal choice, as in the modernist and postmodernist ‘70’s,
but protection of the group—the self-defined group of ‘woman’ that, of course,
does not represent all woman but only the group that wants legal abortion. To be sure, these clear shifts in the culture
have not always been clearly defined in people’s minds. The language of women’s rights in a more
modernist era favouring ‘freedom’ as a virtue can still be employed even as the
postmodern era interpreted this as tolerance of one group’s views alongside
another’s and now a post-postmodernist, tribal era interprets the same language
in terms of the empowerment of women.
Some
Mainline Views on Abortion
Mainline denominations in
the west used to represent Christian orthodoxy.
In the 1900’s, however, and particularly since the 1960’s, they came to
be represent the culture. Their
theological centre shifted from Scripture and Church tradition to wherever the winds
of culture drove them. They have dutifully mirrored the larger culture,
whatever the ethical topic, while encasing it in some religious jargon. Regarding abortion, they have stood mystified
in the face of science as to when life begins, withholding moral judgement
because they could not say with scientific certainty when life begins. As the culture shifted to its postmodern
condition, they affirmed the value of ‘unity in diversity’ rather than hold to specific
convictions at all. They have held to the
maxim, ‘unity trumps orthodoxy.’ And yet,
as the culture moves on to its present post-postmodern tribalism, it champions whatever
is perceived to be anti-patriarchal, feminist, and politically correct. So, too, the mainline denominations. Ever surprised that their enlightened embrace
of culture does not lead to swelling numbers in their pews but rather to
dwindling congregations, they nevertheless relentlessly dilute Christian faith
with cultural mores.
Several American mainline
denominations’ views on abortion are given in what follows. None of them offer a Biblical ethic of caring
for the vulnerable. Instead, they evince
a collection of accumulated arguments over the years. They vacillate in the face of modernity’s
scientific uncertainties (or perceived uncertainties) or postmodernity’s
avoidance of convictions or tribalism’s militant protection of political
correctness. Every mainline denomination
is losing membership year after year and has likely been losing members for
even longer than America has legally permitted abortion (1973).
Orthodox and Evangelical
denominations oppose abortion and affirm care for the vulnerable on either end
of life’s spectrum. They are growing in
numbers. Why, indeed, would people join
churches that say, ‘Go to science for your answers to ethical issues,’ or ‘We
have no answers, just get along with each other even if you disagree’? Why would a denomination survive if it simply
mirrors the post-Christian culture, championing the ascendant tribe of its day?
The Presbyterian Church, USA (PCUSA)[1]
This summarizes current
teaching (2016) but with reference to the 217th General Assembly
(2006) and the denomination’s most comprehensive statement on abortion, the 204th
General Assembly (1992). The PCUSA
affirms statements on abortion that allow abortion even though it qualifies
this somewhat. Its views simply reflect
the postmodern culture’s uncertainties, value of unity in or despite diversity,
and (endless) dialogue.
Open
Discussion (from the 204th General Assembly (still
affirmed)): ‘There is [both] agreement and
disagreement on the basic issue of abortion. The committee [on problem
pregnancies and abortion] agreed that there are no biblical texts that speak
expressly to the topic of abortion, but that taken in their totality the Holy
Scriptures are filled with messages that advocate respect for the woman and
child before and after birth. Therefore the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)
encourages an atmosphere of open debate and mutual respect for a variety of
opinions concerning the issues related to problem pregnancies and
abortion.’ Yet the site mentions the
following views:
1. For abortion:
‘Possible justifying circumstances would include
medical indications of severe physical or mental deformity, conception as a
result of rape or incest, or conditions under which the physical or mental
health of either woman or child would be gravely threatened.’
2. Against abortion: Abortions should not
be ‘elected only as a convenience or ease
embarrassment. We affirm that abortion should not be used as a method of birth
control. Abortion is not morally
acceptable for gender selection only or solely to obtain fetal parts for
transplantation.’ ‘Abortion ought to be
an option of last resort.’
3.
Contributing
Problems: ‘Poverty, unjust societal realities,
sexism, racism, and inadequate supportive relationships may render a woman
virtually powerless to choose freely.’
Personal
Choice: ‘Humans are empowered by
the spirit prayerfully to make significant moral choices, including the choice
to continue or end a pregnancy. Human choices should not be made in a moral
vacuum, but must be based on Scripture, faith, and Christian ethics. For any
choice, we are accountable to God; however, even when we err, God offers to
forgive us.’
Authority
and Guidance: ‘We derive
our understanding of human life from Scripture and the Reformed Tradition in
light of science, human experience, and reason guided by the Holy Spirit.
Because we are made in the image of God, human beings are moral agents, endowed
by the Creator with the capacity to make choices.’
The
Episcopal Church (TEC)[2]
When this post was first written in 2017, TEC
supported abortion in a slightly qualified way:
Resolution 1997-DO65 did not outright forbid partial birth abortions but permitted them in ‘extreme situations.’Opposed: Resolution 1982-AO65 condemned abortion in specific instances: for sex selection or nonserious abnormalities. While expressing concern over partial birth abortions, it could not even muster the theological fortitude to oppose this form of infanticide.Open Discussion: Resolution 1991-CO21 of the 70th General Convention rejected a resolution to oppose the government’s action to limit a woman’s decision to abort. The same convention (CO37) opposed legislation that would require parental notification or consent before a minor seeks an abortion.
It now is fully supportive of abortion. After the US Supreme Court determined in 2022 that the 1973
ruling, Roe v. Wade, failed to adhere
to interpreting the intention of the Constitution and legislated from the
bench, it returned the matter to state legislatures. Holding its 80th General
Convention shortly afterwards, the Episcopal Church (USA) discussed a resolution that made it to the floor that denounced the work of Crisis Pregnancy Centers. It did resolve ‘that the Episcopal Church recognizes that access
to abortion is a key element in preserving the health, independence, and
autonomy of those who can bear children’ and affirmed ‘that all
Episcopalians should be able to access abortion services and birth control with
no restriction on movement, autonomy, type, or timing.’ Also, it invoked ‘religious liberty’ as a
basis for supporting anyone ‘who may need or desire to access, to utilize,
to aid others in the procurement of, or to offer abortion services.’
The United Methodist
Church (UMC)[3]
Our belief in the sanctity of unborn human life makes us reluctant to approve abortion.
But we are equally bound to respect the sacredness of the life and well-being of the mother and the unborn child. (Book of Discipline ¶161.J)
These sentences opened the gate to diversity of views:
Against Abortion: Use of
abortion for birth control, gender selection, or eugenics. The UMC also states that it is ‘reluctant to
affirm absolute perspectives either supporting or opposing abortion which do
not account for the individual woman’s sacred worth and agency.’
For Abortion: ‘Tragic conflicts of
life with life may justify abortion.
Allow partial birth abortion if woman’s life is in danger or when there
are ‘severe fetal anomalies incompatible with life.’
Contributing Problems: Need for
education, counseling, help with financial, educational, relational, and other
circumstances that lead a woman to think she has no other choice. Adoption should be encouraged as an option in
the case of an unwanted pregnancy.
Understanding of and ministry to those who have had an abortion is encouraged.
Evangelical Lutheran
Church of America (ELCA)[4]
The
statement on abortion that still holds in the ELCA is from 1991. (Note ‘Evangelical’ is used in the German,
Lutheran sense, referring to the historical church of Lutheranism and having
nothing to do with the Evangelical movement within Protestantism.)
Open Discussion: Unity
requires open discussion over disagreements.
That said, ‘A developing life in the womb does not
have an absolute right to be born, nor does a pregnant woman have an absolute
right to terminate a pregnancy.’ The ELCA’s ‘pastoral care,
compassionate outreach, and life-sustaining assistance are crucial in
supporting those who bear children, as well as those who choose not to do so.
Through these and other means the people of God seek to be truly supportive of
life.’
Against Abortion: In
most circumstances, the church encourages women with unintended pregnancies to
continue the pregnancy while assessing the situation realistically and
considering adoption as a positive option.
For
Abortion: When considering ending a pregnancy, a woman or
couple should consider factors such as unwilling participation in the sexual
act leading to conception, threat to the life of the mother, 2 and severe fetal
abnormalities. However, “This church opposes ending intrauterine life when a
fetus is developed enough to live outside a uterus with the aid of reasonable
and necessary technology”. The statement
calls for laws protecting access to abortion.
Contributing Problems: Abortion
is a last resort: ‘as a church we seek to reduce the need to
turn to abortion as the answer to unintended pregnancies” (p.4). We “live out
our support for life in all its dimensions” (p.4) through hospitality, keeping
sexual intercourse in its proper setting and using contraception, action and
education. By contrast, attitudes such as irresponsible sexual activity,
individualism and materialism are life-degrading.’
American Baptist
Churches[5]
The ABC affirms
statements on abortion that allow abortion even though it qualifies this
somewhat. The denomination is clearly
divided over this issue, just as it is over Christian faith in general.
Open
Discussion: As a congregational ecclesiology, the ABC avoids
giving directives but only guidance to churches. ‘We acknowledge the diversity of deeply held
convictions within our fellowship even as we seek to interpret the Scriptures
under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.’
Personal
Choice:
1. Against abortion: ‘As American Baptists we oppose abortion,
as a means of avoiding responsibility for conception, as a primary means of
birth control, without regard for the far-reaching consequences of the act. We
denounce irresponsible sexual behavior and acts of violence that contribute to
the large number of abortions each year.’
2. Contributing
problems: a variety are listed in the document. Examples are: helping women who give birth to
children in difficult situations; use contraception, need for economic justice,
social equality, and political empowerment; oppose media’s promotion of sex
outside marriage, women, men, and children as sex objects.
Authority
and Guidance:
1.
For
abortion: ‘Many others believe that while abortion is a
regrettable reality, it can be a morally acceptable action and they choose to
act on the biblical principles of compassion and justice (John 8:1-11; Exodus
21:22-25; Matthew 7:1-5; James 2:2-13) and freedom of will (John 16:13; Roman
14:4-5, 10-13).’
2. Against
abortion: ‘Many American Baptists believe that, biblically,
human life begins at conception, that abortion is immoral and a destruction of
a human being created in God's image (Job 31:15; Psalm 139:13-16; Jeremiah 1:5;
Luke 1:44; Proverbs 31:8-9; Galatians 1:15).’
Not
Viability but Vulnerability: A Christian Ethical Premise
A Biblical ethic on this
issue is multi-faceted, even if no rules can be cited to do with aborting
fetuses per se. It is, of course,
possible to arrive at the conviction in Old Testament ethics alone that
abortion is the taking of human life.
Josephus, the Jewish historian of the 1st century AD, in
fact, records that this was the view of Jews in his day:
Against Apion 2:202 The law, moreover, enjoins us to bring up all our offspring, and forbids
women to cause abortion of what is begotten, or to kill it afterward; and if
any woman appears to have so done, she will be a murderer of her child, by
killing a living creature, and diminishing human kind; if anyone, therefore,
proceeds to such fornication or murder, he cannot be clean.
Ethics is, of course,
more than just rules, and one particular perspective from Scripture seems to
need more attention than it has received. Scripture’s very omission of an
explicit discussion of when life begins does not signal for Christians a
license to make this decision ourselves but rather to desist from doing
so. We are instead to recognize that God
gives life and are to care for the vulnerable whose viability is compromised at
either end of life. Our ethic does not
begin with a search for ‘viability’ but a concern over ‘vulnerability’. We are to care for those whose lives are
vulnerable: the widows, orphans, aliens, elderly, sick, hungry, thirsty, naked,
prisoners, children, and, by the same token, the most vulnerable of all—the
unborn. Indeed, concern for the
vulnerable places a premium on life at its least viable stages, and to honour
such life is to honour God.
Conclusion
The number of abortions have, over the years, tapered a little. The old, mainline
denominations no longer represent historic, orthodox Christianity but, following western,
post-Christian culture accept the practice of abortion, however qualified.
Planned Parenthood, aggressively pursuing abortion under the euphemism of
'women's health' has utterly disgraced itself even among some of its
supporters. Yet this is a tenuous time in the culture at large.
Christian churches have an opportunity to present a truly Christian ethic at
this time, not only of opposing abortion—awful as such killing of innocent life
is—but also showing its concern to aid the vulnerable in general. Christian
ethics is not interested in determining whether a life is viable but in
identifying and protecting the
vulnerable. As James puts it, ‘Religion that is
pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and
widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world’ (James
1.27, NRSV). God is on the side of the
vulnerable, whose lives are at risk from those who have power, authority, and
means to take them.
[2] Online: http://www.episcopalarchives.org/cgi-bin/acts/acts_topic_search.pl?topic=Abortion. Accessed 22 January, 2017. For the 2022 update, see: '
[3] Online: http://www.umc.org/what-we-believe/the-united-methodist-church-and-the-complex-topic-of-abortion and http://www.umc.org/what-we-believe/the-nurturing-community#abortion. Accessed 22 January, 2017.
[4]
Online: http://download.elca.org/ELCA%20Resource%20Repository/AbortionSS_Summary.pdf?_ga=1.36933280.1627463129.1484942069. Accessed 22 January, 2017.
[5]
Online: AMERICAN BAPTIST RESOLUTION CONCERNING ABORTION AND MINISTRY IN THE
LOCAL CHURCH, 12/87. Online: http://www.abc-usa.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Abortion-and-Ministry-in-the-Local-Church.pdf. Accessed 22 January, 2017.
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