Liberal Clergy “Bless” Texas Abortion Clinic, Declare Abortion a “God-Given Right”

on November 14, 2017

A group of liberal clergy gathered at a Fort Worth, Texas abortion clinic to “bless” its staff and patients, sing “Hallelujah,” and support abortion as a woman’s “God-given right.”

The Texas Observer reported liberal clergy organized by the Religious Institute gathered last Thursday, November 9, to pray for God’s blessings over the abortion clinic and counter the narrative “Anti-abortion advocacy is often inextricably tied to religion.”

The pro-abortion prayer event was organized by Kentina Washington-Leapheart, a minister who earned her Master of Divinity degree from the United Methodist-affiliated Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary and director of programs for reproductive justice and sexuality education at the Religious Institute.

“We’re trying say [the extreme right’s] narrative isn’t the only narrative related to faith,” Washington-Leapheart told the Texas Observer. “Women seeking an abortion are largely women of faith. They’re not having an abortion in spite of their faith, it’s in many ways informing the decision they make. … They have a God-given right to make decisions about their life.”

The Religious Institute is a Connecticut-based interfaith advocacy group co-founded by Unitarian Universalist Minister and sexologist Debra Haffner. The organization’s stated purpose is to advocate for “sexual health, education, and justice in faith communities and society.” The organization touts some 8,500 participating religious leaders from over 70 faith traditions.

The Religious Institute’s website provides clergy with “Scriptural reflections, sermon starters, and exegesis” that supposedly certify abortion and unorthodox Christian sexual ethics as reconciled by God. A quick search of “reproductive justice” issues in the website’s Revised Common Lectionary-Year B database revealed 28 Scripture verses purportedly affirming abortion as a “God-given right.”

For example, liberal clergy hoping to advance unrestricted abortion-on-demand on All Saints Day are offered a rather far-reaching exegesis for scriptures assigned that day in the lectionary: Isaiah 25:6-9, Psalm 24, Revelation 21:1-6, and John 11:32-44. Below is the accompanying “sermon starter”:

The readings for All Saints Day may be focused on the promise of the life to come, but they contain many resonances that hint at a better realm that can exist in the here and now. Isaiah describes an extravagant banquet on a mountain that ends the despair of “all peoples.” The psalm proclaims that “the earth’s is the Lord’s and all that is in it.” Revelation imagines a great city in which every tear will be wiped away and “mourning and crying and pain will be no more.” In the reading from John, Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead and tells the crowd to “unbind him and let him go.” Just as Lazarus is raised and released in this earthly life, so too are the expansive visions in Isaiah and Revelation not otherworldly visions for a future reality but instead an encouragement to build flourishing societies now. The preacher on this day could show how one of the ways in which these societies could be built is by ensuring reproductive justice for all.

Such blatant support for abortion in the name of Christ is not wholly uncommon. The Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD) has challenged denominational support for abortion rights over our 36-year history.

In July 2015, IRD Anglican Program Director Jeffrey Walton reported liberal Christian leaders praised Planned Parenthood for “doing God’s work.” The clergy were a part of the abortion giant’s Clergy Advocacy Board and included leaders from the United Church of Christ, Episcopal Church and American Baptist Church.

At the United Methodist 2016 General Conference, delegates voted to withdraw two of the denomination’s agencies from participation within the pro-abortion group Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (RCRC). “In contrast to the United Methodist Church, RCRC dismisses the value of unborn human life. RCRC even promotes rituals to bless all the work of elective abortion clinics, describing aborting unborn children as always ‘holy work,’” commented John Lomperis, IRD’s UMAction director and an elected General Conference delegate.

Our Holy Scriptures include numerous passages expressly indicating the value of innocent human life, including personhood bestowed by God the Creator at the moment of conception. We pray the Lord reveal his truth to these liberal pro-abortion clergy. We pray they quickly reverse their false teachings grossly misleading vulnerable women and harming unborn children.

There is nothing “holy” about advancing the destruction of innocent baby girls and boys in utero as a “God-given right.” May the Lord have mercy.

  1. Comment by Scott on November 14, 2017 at 9:00 am

    When will the UMC do what is right and take a stand for infanticide. I have yet to meet a person who is not mentally ill who said “I wish my mother never had me!”. We need to stand for what is right in God’s eyes, not societies eyes, otherwise we are a group based on the wisdom of humans, and not a religion based on the teachings and wisdom of God.

  2. Comment by J. Lee on November 14, 2017 at 10:32 am

    How is it not, to promote evil in the name of God, taking God’s name in vain? These people are celebrating judgement to themselves. Woe to them.

  3. Comment by Eric leFevre on November 14, 2017 at 2:20 pm

    Any view that holds that the New Testament does not touch the issue of abortion has no grounding in Scripture. The abortionists reading from John is particularly loathesome because truth is the over riding theme in John’s gospel. Perverting the truth of the gospel to justify the devaluation of human life is truly what Christ warned of when he said to beware of false teachers.

    John opens the gospel with a passage that bible believing Christians everywhere commit to memory. “In the beginning was the Word….” establishing Christ as the eternal Logos, through him all things were made, transitioning to humanity’s rejection of the Messiah, the ministry of John the Baptist, finally leading to one of the most damning indictments of a social and cultural system ever written.

    “But, to those who did receive him, to those who believe in His name, He gave the right to become children of God — children not born of natural descent, nor of a human’s decision, or a husband’s will but born of God.”

    In the Roman system of Pater Familias, whenever a child was born, the infant was presented to the (male) head of household. If the child looked weak, ill, deformed, or if there were already too many females in the family, the father would abandon the child to be drowned in a river, fed to dogs, or sold to a brothel.

    As primary source documents like The Didache make clear, the earliest church was called to rescue those children. Some people claim that this only dealt with infanticide, but the Didache is abundantly clear on this by using the ancient Greek word for abortion.

    When John was writing the gospel cerca 80-90 AD, he was writing to second and third generation Christians who had been rescued by the early church. People who had no clear parentage and thus Roman law considered them not of natural descent. People who had been rejected by their own parents.

    And John is reminding them and us that despite society treating them as if they had no value, God considered them to be of such value that;

    “The Word became flesh and dwelled among us.”

  4. Comment by Eternity Matters on November 14, 2017 at 2:47 pm

    No surprise. They are Molech-worshiping “Christian” Leftist ghouls who support abortions to a child’s 1st breath. http://wp.me/p5O8SK-GH

  5. Comment by William on November 15, 2017 at 11:18 am

    The progressives in the UMC continuously emphasize that all people are of sacred worth. Exactly, and the UMC proclaims the same. Are children in the womb not people of sacred worth? Plus, many on the left aggressively support abortion while finding capital punishment abhorrent. Planned Parenthood performs over 325,000 abortions annually, and is supported by far too many in our denomination. Abortion, “a God given right”? Could that be Satan talking?

  6. Comment by Dan Allison on November 15, 2017 at 5:01 pm

    This “liberal clergy” is just a gang of killers and thugs, some kind of scum that crawled out of hell, and that’s all there is to it.

  7. Comment by Jackie on June 21, 2019 at 11:04 am

    “We” called people christian based on what they say, not what they do. God looks at what we do. Just because a person wears a clergy collar or holds a certificate does not make that person qualified to represent a Holy God. God is going to make a difference between those who know Him, love Him, obey Him and those who do not.

  8. Comment by Odieonekanodie on January 25, 2019 at 11:58 am

    #liberalscum #RightToLife #GodChooses
    Abortion is murder. We can not let these “progressive” liberals take control of our government and allow these killings to continue! Liberals have no right to choose who gets to live and who does not deserve to even be born!
    It’s God’s choice for who gets to live, not theirs! Truly a sad time…

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