It is essential that Christian churches stand with women facing challenging pregnancies, be proactive in offering answers, and demonstrate that the pre-born hold immeasurable worth.
Two years after the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, the Pro-Life movement has made major advances giving voters and state legislatures the ability to protect life. Yet, this victory only continues the mission of preserving the sanctity of life.
Twenty-four states have laws protecting unborn babies at 15 weeks or earlier, 20 of them when a baby’s heartbeat can be detected. As of May, that includes Florida’s Heartbeat Protection Act. These laws protect 200,902 unborn babies annually, an increase from last year.
The recent Supreme Court decision allowing the Biden Administration’s mail-order abortion-drug policy to continue was a disappointing setback. The Food and Drug Administration acknowledges that these drugs send one in 25 women to the hospital, and yet, many blue states protect the abortionists who break the law of other states, shipping drugs even when they aren’t licensed and sometimes to minors without their parents’ knowledge.
In the past 50 years, more than 65 million unborn babies have lost their lives due to Roe v. Wade. Since the Supreme Court Dobbs decision, as reported in 2023, more than 30,000 preborn babies have been saved.
In 2024, Indiana reported a 98 percent decrease in abortions. The Arkansas Department of Health reported zero abortions in 2023.
This rise in “abortion tourism” means that while individual states like Texas have seen a marked decrease in abortions, overall U.S. abortion rates are likely at the highest they have been in a decade, according to pro-abortion research group the Guttmacher Institute.
While states have been active in response to the Dobbs decision, congressional action has stalled. Small victories in the House of Representatives, such as passage of the Born Alive Survivors Protection Act and the Pregnant Students’ Rights Act, have not been taken up in the Democrat-controlled Senate.
Lawsuits have been filed challenging the Administration. Two cases have been and will be decided by the Supreme Court. On June 13, the Supreme Court rejected a challenge to the FDA’s actions related to the abortion pill in the case Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA. This case centered on the FDA’s failure to protect the health and safety of women and girls who take the “abortion pill” by loosening regulations related to prescriptions, such as allowing mail delivery, no longer requiring in-person doctors visits, and expanding its use from 7 to 10 weeks gestation. Nearly two-thirds of all abortions now occur through abortion pills, and 1 in 5 women who take these drugs experience complications requiring further medical treatment.
Justices rejected the case on procedural grounds, ruling that Pro-Life doctors bringing the challenge lacked standing. Further litigation could happen from other parties but, for now, the status-quo remains.
These initiatives pose a challenge to a Pro-Life movement massively outspent by abortion proponents.
The conversation has shifted in the Pro-Life movement to in-vitro fertilization (IVF), following an Alabama Supreme Court ruling finding embryos frozen through the IVF process to legally be persons. Since that ruling, many lawmakers in Congress have defended the use of IVF.
Southern Baptists have called for serious consideration regarding the use of IVF because of significant concerns with how it is routinely practiced in the U.S., often leaving embryos to be discarded or frozen indefinitely with no standard of care. Because there are essentially no reporting requirements or regulations governing the practice of IVF, it is unknown how many frozen embryos currently exist, but estimates suggest that it is over a million children.
The vast majority of women who choose to have an abortion do so because they feel it is their only option. Whether these women lack financial resources, community support, or face pressure from those around them, the Church must continue to step in and meet these women in their time of need. In 2022, pregnancy resource centers, many of which are supported by churches, provided an estimated $350 million in services to some 975,000 clients.
As we seek to support the work of these centers and the ministries of many churches, the Pro-Life movement has also rallied around policies that could assist vulnerable mothers and promote family flourishing. There is much that can be done by lawmakers of both parties to empower women to choose life, including increasing the affordability of adoption and ensuring the availability of necessary resources at the time of birth.
If we truly believe that life is sacred and each person is made in the image of God, then we must continue to contend for a reality where abortion is both illegal and unthinkable, even when such a vision seems politically implausible. Until we reach that day where abortion is no more, let us redouble our efforts to save as many lives as possible, serve mothers, and create a culture that celebrates life.
Image: Let Them Live is a Fort Wayne, Indiana-based nonprofit dedicated to supporting mothers who have unplanned pregnancies.
Comment by Diane on July 23, 2024 at 12:46 pm
How bout giving taxpayers a break – we’re the ones who are burdened with having to support the children into adulthood who “pro-life” folks want birthed. How bout these Christians pick up the financial tab if they really care about the “unborn”. Collectively put your money together, raise the kids with shelter, food, clothing, education and healthcare until they can care for themselves. Don’t depend on taxpayers who don’t share your anti-abortion beliefs to foot the bill for moms who choose not to end their unwanted pregnancies because pro-lifers stepped in to “help” these moms and babies. It’s tax payers who’re having to step in, not these so-called “do good” pregnancy centers that temporarily provide diapers and a few
necessities till the baby is maybe a year old. Anti abortion activists need to accept financial responsibility until children are 18 and on their own. Churches use to do that with orphanages. Sounds harsh – but when I read about anti-abortion folks stepping in to help mom by promising short-term assistance, financial and otherwise, it forces taxpayers to cover the long term care. Why won’t anti-abortion folks admit to this?
Comment by Bruce on July 23, 2024 at 3:08 pm
Diane, it appears that you support killing babies because they might be a financial burden (and cause higher taxes). I have never heard a more disingenuous reason for abortion.
At what age do you approve of infanticide when children are a financial burden to their families and to the state? One, two, ten? Life begins at conception.
You also ignore that most adoption agencies have waiting lists of people who want babies to adopt. I will pray for you.
Comment by MikeB on July 23, 2024 at 7:45 pm
Oh Diane,
Your hatred for God and children shows through. You take offense at the slightest reference to male words, but can’t wait to celebrate the murder of a child.
Yes, Christians are in support of Child Lunch Vouchers, adoption assistance, WIC, SNAP, and are often giving in their local church, we volunteer at orphanages, food kitchens and rehab clinics.
I hate to break it to you, but it’s our government too.
Christians get to vote, and I will vote to spend your tax dollars on reducing abortions, and non Christians like you (as you are an admitted pagan by your own words) will obviously vote to spend my tax dollars on things you hope I will hate. We aren’t going to back away from our civic duty to vote our conscious just because you hate everything we stand for.
Comment by Tim Ware on July 23, 2024 at 9:53 pm
Taxpayers do not support children that are born to mothers unable to provide for them financially. The government deficit is “financed” by monetizing it; that is, simply moving it to the Federal Reserve balance sheet. It’s money created out of thin air. It costs the taxpayers nothing.
Comment by MikeB on July 23, 2024 at 10:24 pm
I’ve been thinking lately about this topic, not withstanding the blood lust from certain comments.
Pre Dobbs it was easy to support overturning Roe. Donate write letters, protest.
Now it’s harder, we are confronted by the fact that society has grown to depend on the ability to terminate human life, just as the slave holders got used to slavery in the old south.
Iceland has some of the best maternal support, but still a hight abortion rate…
I have no idea what to do other than pray for God’s revival to change hearts…
Comment by David on July 24, 2024 at 9:11 am
The earliest surviving mention of abortion is in an Egyptian manuscript from about 1,600 BCE. It is odd that there is no direct mention of abortion in the Hebrew and Christian scriptures if it was so great an evil and obviously practiced.
Comment by Pastor Mike on July 25, 2024 at 9:08 am
Diane, I bet your thankful your mother did not consider you a “financial burden” before you were born?
Comment by Diane on July 26, 2024 at 1:01 am
Pastor Mike, Explain your remark, please.
Comment by Byrom on August 2, 2024 at 5:53 pm
It struck me recently that the sacrifice of children to pagan gods in Biblical times could easily be compared to abortion, a modern form of child sacrifice. I speak as the father of two adopted children, who were not aborted. I could give many more reasons why I am against most reasons for abortions, but my children speak for me.
Comment by Sandra on August 2, 2024 at 6:59 pm
The data given in the article concerning complications from mifepristone are wildly inaccurate.
Comment by Sandra on August 2, 2024 at 7:09 pm
The cruelty of the anti abortion movement is glaringly displayed when women die or lose their fertility (!) when they are denied lifesaving medical care for complications of pregnancy because doctors are terrified to treat, and the reaction from anti abortion folks is a collective shrug. Women are sent to hospital parking lots while miscarriage to get sicker and sicker. The lives of women seem to have no value to them at all except as maternal vessels. Also, many women seeking abortion are pregnant against their will and capacity to raise a child, and the shrugging is deafening.
Comment by Salvatore Anthony Luiso on August 2, 2024 at 7:31 pm
Regarding “If we truly believe that life is sacred and each person is made in the image of God, then we must continue to contend for a reality where abortion is both illegal and unthinkable, even when such a vision seems politically implausible.”:
Yes.
And a reality where no child, youth, or adult is unappreciated and unloved.
Comment by MikeB on August 10, 2024 at 10:14 am
Sandra,
You compare a couple cases that you aren’t documenting to 500,000 abortions per year. You get so offended that some woman woman somewhere might be hurt or die, but don’t care about babies being murdered.
You are very illogical.
Comment by Randy on September 18, 2024 at 9:32 am
“Abortion tourism” is one of the most ridiculous and inflammatory terms in the whole debate. It is useless to any effort that attempts to persuade others, and it is unworthy of someone who aspires to be taken seriously. No one who goes out of state for an
abortion is engaging in tourism, as if it was all going to be some kind of relaxing and pleasant experience.
Bethany Moy, if you want to engage with people rather than just inflame, then do better.
Comment by Thomas on October 4, 2024 at 8:04 pm
It should be called murder tourism. Mothers have no right to kill their unborn children. Women should make responsible choices before getting pregnant, not after. We can`t choose between the life and death of an unborn human being. Pro-life people should promote responsability among women and men. Thats the real right to choose, before pregnancy.