Thank God for Abortion Providers?

on March 12, 2015

The head of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice recently blogged for Huffington Post an ode to abortionists:

Every day doctors, nurses, medical assistants, abortion doulas, and receptionists risk their lives to make sure that those of us seeking an abortion are met with compassion and love.

I thank God for abortion providers.

Yet, shame is always at the door. Shame stands outside the clinics shouting obscenities. Shame kills new health care workers’ ambitions to provide compassionate abortion care. Shame whispers in the ears of doctors telling them they are not needed.

Despite shame’s best efforts, the spirit of compassion calls healthcare workers to selflessly serve patients. The spirit of justice sustains them as they endure harassment. The spirit of abundance provides us with such caring and dedicated professionals, whose work helps heal lives and the world.

So, thank God for the important ministries abortion providers offer. Thank God for the compassion they show those of us seeking abortions. Thank God for the martyrs. Thank God for their courage. Thank God for abortion providers.

RCRC was founded in 1973 to rally religious support for unrestricted abortion rights.  Its members include the Episcopal Church, the United Church of Christ, and two United Methodist agencies.  That Christian entities participate in RCRC’s unalloyed celebration of destroying unborn life is a scandal.

There’s more attention for liberal denominations abandoning Christian sexual ethics.  But the greater outage is that 40 years ago they stopped affirming what Christianity has always believed about the sacredness of human life.

If there’s any good news, it’s that liberal Protestant prelates 30 and 40 years ago proudly broadcast their support for abortion rights, but today, they are almost entirely silent.  Perhaps, after over 50 million exterminated unborn in America, they are embarrassed by the horror and tragedy.

But RCRC, funded by liberal foundations, chugs along, exploiting denominational affiliations to gain a sort of limited legitimacy.  United Methodism nearly voted at the 2008 General Conference to withdraw from RCRC.  Its defenders absurdly claimed RCRC wasn’t chiefly about abortion.  In 2012 a legislative committee supported withdrawal but delegates in plenary were denied the chance to vote due to behind the scenes machinations.

It should be a chief priority for United Methodists to withdraw from RCRC at the 2016 General Conference.  The new emerging African majority is pro life.  So too are growing numbers of younger U.S. clergy.  

When United Methodism quits RCRC it will signify its departure from 20th century Protestant modernism and its return to global historic Christianity.  A million unborn babies may go on being killed annually in America.  But no corner of the Body of Christ should be complicit in that destruction.  The Church, whatever its other failures, cannot pursue with integrity its sacred vocation without defending the innocent and most vulnerable.

  1. Comment by Mark Brooks on March 12, 2015 at 9:22 am

    People like to believe there is ‘progress’, but we are the same fallen humanity despite our toys. Canaanites sacrificed their children on the altars of Molech seeking prosperity, the king of Moab sacrificed his firstborn son, and what are America’s abortuaries with their white walls and white-robed killers but places of sacrifice to the gods of American affluence? I shudder in contemplation of the day that the iniquity of the modern Amorites is complete.

  2. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 18, 2015 at 3:49 pm

    I don’t wish to misinterpret your words, but I don’t think American affluence is a factor in choosing to abort.
    Since many women who elect this procedure are doing so because of the inability to afford the pregnancy, much less raise the baby after it’s born.

    As you pointed out, there have been many instances where babies have been sacrificed for many different reasons.

  3. Comment by Mark Brooks on March 18, 2015 at 6:02 pm

    A recent analysis by the Brookings Institute demonstrates that wealth and affluence does indeed play a significant role in the decision to abort:

    https://liveactionnews.org/rich-women-have-more-abortions-than-poor-women-study-finds/

    Women are not killing their babies for lack of funds. That’s an old lie. The problem isn’t the Marxist concept of “poverty”. The problem isn’t a lack of welfare payments. The problem is a lack of Jesus Christ. The problem is one of evil.

  4. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 18, 2015 at 6:17 pm

    Evil is a matter of perspective, and yes, religion does play a role.
    I’ve known at least ten women over the last four decades who chose abortion because they knew they could not afford the financial demands as well as the lifelong commitment to raising a child.
    So it’s not a lie, it’s just another reality.

    Their choices do not make them evil people. And some of them were (and some still are), Christians. But one could be of any faith and face that life changing decision.
    All wish to say, is, it’s a personal decision that should only be made by the pregnant woman…. period!

  5. Comment by Mark Brooks on March 27, 2015 at 1:15 pm

    To proceed from relativism to dogmatism in the same statement seems incoherent to me. You are what you do; if you do evil, you are evil. An evil choice is still evil. To murder a baby is evil.

  6. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 27, 2015 at 4:49 pm

    I realize one should be very careful to avoid pregnancy if there is no intention beyond sexual pleasure.
    But people that don’t follow the same religion as you, may not see it the same way.
    The fact is, if it’s not your womb, then it’s not your responsibility.

  7. Comment by Mark Brooks on March 27, 2015 at 5:15 pm

    It is the life of a human being that creates the responsibility. Or are you opposed to laws against murder in general? Strange, how little concern you have for the most helpless human involved. The infant has no reality for you. That’s how it is, I guess, when you define someone as a non-person.

  8. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 27, 2015 at 5:37 pm

    Prefacing, in my opinion, but if the fetus cannot survive outside the womb, it’s not a viable entity.
    Maybe after a Social Security card has been issued?

    Pretty simplistic, but that’s the way it is!

    For centuries, women have sought abortions for their own personal reasons. Why should that change just because some religious folks think every pregnancy should go to term?

  9. Comment by Mark Brooks on March 28, 2015 at 3:08 am

    I recognize this music. Obfuscations, evasions, false generalizations, twaddlizing, all in order to defend your dogmatic belief in one thing over everything else.

    MarcoPolo, the God through whom all things was made came to Earth 2000 years ago so that people, not saints and great thinkers but just ordinary people like you, could know truth. Instead of denying truth in unrighteousness, instead of living a life of perpetual blindness, making gods of your own imaging, you have the hope of the real God, if you will believe.

    —-
    “There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.”

    Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

    Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”

    Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.” Nicodemus answered and said to Him, “How can these things be?”

    Jesus answered and said to him, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not know these things? Most assuredly, I say to you, We speak what We know and testify what We have seen, and you do not receive Our witness. If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but[b] have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

    “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”

    —–

    Christ has come so that you need not be condemned, falling into the endless cycle of chasing after this or that falsehood, desperately trying to make what you believe right rather than believing the right thing, and ending up eternally separated by the one true source of all light and knowledge. The first step is to believe in Jesus, what he said, what he did, the name of Christ. And you can proceed from there. It doesn’t all come overnight; there will be a time of transition, if you truly believe. But believing is the first step. You may not do that in response to this post, or maybe you will, but either way, as to that, truly, the choice is yours. Make the right one.

  10. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 28, 2015 at 8:41 am

    Thank you for your sincere gesture to sell me on Jesus.
    I was raised in the Methodist church, so I know the doctrines of which you speak, but I do not worship that religion.

    I have nothing against the Christian religion, as many of my relatives still practice and preach it’s tenets.

    Life is marvelous in all it’s wonder, and I don’t discount the possibility of a great Energy or source of Wisdom. One could go as far as calling IT a Deity, and that’s satisfying to the soul and mind, but I hold no expectations on that being an actuality.

    Again, I thank you for your honesty, and I hope we’ll peacefully agree to embrace differing faiths.

    Namaste’

  11. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 28, 2015 at 6:21 pm

    I would call it an infant only after emerging from the womb. Prior to that, it’s the property of the mother.
    And that’s where other people butt in too much. It’s none of their business. If it’s not your womb, then leave the woman to decide for herself.

    Funny how so many religious people will fight tooth and nail to keep an unwanted pregnancy form being aborted, yet after birth, the same people complain about having to support yet another child on welfare! Crazy priorities!

  12. Comment by Eternity Matters on March 12, 2015 at 9:31 am

    These “Christian” Left pro-abortion extremists insist that life doesn’t being until the first breath and that Jesus is OK with killing any unwanted children for any reason before that time. http://wp.me/p1wGU

  13. Comment by CarolinaSistah on March 12, 2015 at 9:02 pm

    Eze 20:26 And I polluted them in their own gifts, in that they caused to pass through [the fire] all that openeth the womb, that I might make them desolate, to the end that they might know that I [am] the LORD.

  14. Comment by Namyriah on March 13, 2015 at 9:52 am

    “Compassion and love” for women who kill their own children. The Nazis thought their extermination of “lives not worth living” showed their compassion too.

    These people will find Judgment Day to be a highly educational experience.

  15. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 18, 2015 at 3:42 pm

    The Nazis exterminated people who were already born.
    Yes, it is that difference (and others) that maintains the distiction between Abortion and Murder.

  16. Comment by JESUS_CHRIST_LIVES on March 22, 2015 at 9:39 am

    “The Nazis exterminated people who were already born.” Figure that one out for yourself did you? The womb is not a magical space-time portal where one “virtually” exists as a “non-human”, and then becomes “human” after coming out of the birth canal. Location has nothing to do with the act of being murdered. Babies in the womb are alive and horrifically dismembered in order to kill them during an abortion! We would not dream of doing that to a convicted Death Row inmate as part of his or her execution in this country, but we do it to the most innocent of people, babies in the womb. To infer that babies are not alive while in the womb is simply wrong headed and ignorant. Please stop being so incredibly obtuse and wise up.

  17. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 22, 2015 at 10:05 am

    That’s quite an “Online Name” you’ve got there!
    I never said that the fetus in the womb wasn’t a living organism. I simply said it is the woman’s right to abort for whatever reason she deems necessary.
    It’s not your property to determine what is to happen to the fetus, so I believe you shouldn’t have ANY say in the matter.
    Not being obtuse, and my wisdom serves me sufficiently to know to steer clear of religious fundamentalists.

    Have a nice day!

  18. Comment by Linda on March 13, 2015 at 10:54 am

    “Shame stands outside the clinic shouting obscenities.” They object to shouting but they are OK with murder. There is nothing in the world wrong with shame, animals are not capable of shame, humans are.

  19. Comment by MarcoPolo on March 18, 2015 at 3:59 pm

    I’ve finally come to agree with your position, Mark.

    Much like CVS drug stores no longer sell tobacco products because of their inherent health risks, the Methodist Church might ought to consider rescinding support of abortion rights.

    For the sake of religious congruency, a Holy entity like the United Methodist Church, should probably not contribute to choices that humans make that might encumber their duty to a life affirming God.

    Personally, I still defend the legal rights of any woman to obtain these critically important services, should she choose.
    But if the more progressive Methodists disagree with the Church’s stance, they can seek another denomination that supports their ideology.

  20. Comment by Vickilynn Pabalan on March 19, 2015 at 10:10 am

    If this unborn unity is not a person, then you are not pregnant. Abortion is murder. Plan and simple. God commandments, one of which is though shall not kill. Protests should be peaceful and prayerful. Yes, abortion is against God’s law! but so also is being unkind to those we differ with.

  21. Comment by Byrom on March 20, 2015 at 12:28 am

    From both a purely biological standpoint, the union of a human egg and a human sperm creates a new and unique human being. That is also supported in the Bible (e.g., Psalm 139). That new life may receive its nourishment from its mother, but it is not a part of the woman’s body. The nourishment that the baby in the womb gets from its mother is a process no different from the baby outside the womb getting its nourishment from its mother’s breast. None of us knows how or when a newly formed human is imbued by God with a soul/spirit. Only God knows. As a Christian who has repented (changed his mind) from his past ambivalence toward abortion in some circumstances, I believe that all human life is precious to God from the moment of conception to the moment of physical death. The baby that is aborted because of the unwise choices of its biological parents is an innocent victim – and a murder victim at that. My wife and I have two much-loved children (now grown), because two women chose to give up for adoption their babies that they felt they could not care for at the time.

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