Why Christians voted for a pro-choice President

Why did I vote for a pro-choice President?

First, I really focused on what Jesus taught. The Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 25. Do you know how many verses in the Bible directly address abortion? Zero. How many directly address poverty and oppression? Over 2,000. The scandal Poverty is a life issue that is very important to me.

Second, author Jim Wallis did a good job of explaining “pro-life” when he wrote,

“Choosing life” is a constant Biblical theme, so I will choose candidates who have the most consistent ethic of life, addressing all the threats to human life and dignity that we face — not just one. Thirty-thousand children dying globally each day of preventable hunger and disease is a life issue. The genocide in Darfur is a life issue. Health care is a life issue. War is a life issue. The death penalty is a life issue. And on abortion, I will choose candidates who have the best chance to pursue the practical and proven policies which could dramatically reduce the number of abortions in America and therefore save precious unborn lives, rather than those who simply repeat the polarized legal debates and “pro-choice” and “pro-life” mantras from either side.”

Third, the idea that simply overturning Roe v. Wade will end abortion is as outdated as it is uncaring. It is time to try a new approach; addressing the social and economic reasons behind why most women feel the need for an abortion, and doing it out of a feeling of love and genuine kindness towards the women forced to make such difficult decisions. The old way has failed, let’s be willing to open our hearts to a new way of addressing the issue. The website Pro-Life Pro-Obama has some good research on the issue from a Christian perspective.

We Christians need to take a step back for a moment and look at the big picture. We need more dialogue and less shouting from both sides. Consider this thought from Omar Al-Rikabi at God’s Politics:

“On one side, so-called “values voters” rally for the right to life of the baby. But they see my cousin’s death and the displacement of his family (in Iraq) as “collateral damage” in a war for freedom and their own security.

On the other side, so-called “change voters” protest a war that claims the life of innocents. But they see my unborn daughter’s life or death as a “freedom of choice.”

When I look at the reality of my family in light of a consistent ethic of life, all I hear from most politicians and preachers are inconsistencies. Both sides argue freedom for a way of life. But is any of this really about freedom, or just misplaced selfishness? Could it be as Bono once sang that, “what you thought was freedom was just greed.”

The Pro-Life Myth

I would like to challenge fellow Christians to take an objective, and Biblical, look at what is known as the "pro-life" movement. The origin of the "pro-life" movement has been the the right wing Christian extremists who seek to use fear and scare tactics in their culture war to drive a wedge between evangelicals and their political rivals. Which party is truly the "pro-life" party? The party that symbolically says it is "pro-life" yet does nothing to reduce abortions? Consider this article; Abortion on rise under Bush's economic policy:

Under President Bush, the decade-long trend of declining abortion rates appears to have reversed," said Glen Stassen, Lewis B. Smedes Professor of Christian Ethics at Fuller Theological Seminary, a leading evangelical divinity school.
Using data from the Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life, the Guttmacher Institute, and reporting by individual states, Stassen found that U.S. abortion rates declined 17.4 per cent in the 1990s to a 24-year low when Bush took office. Many expected that downward trend to continue under the conservative president, but Stassen found the opposite: 52,000 more abortions occurred in 2002 than would have been expected under the pre-2000 conditions.

Responding to Stassen's study, Sojourners magazine editor Jim Wallis stated, "We have seen once again in this campaign the issue of abortion used as a partisan wedge rather than having a serious discussion on how to act to reduce the number of abortions."

Stassen's study found credible linkages between economic hardship and abortion. Two-thirds of women who abort say they cannot afford a child; half of women who abort say they do not have a reliable mate and co-breadwinner; and women of childbearing age are over represented in the 5.2 million additional persons without health coverage since 2000.

"If we are to be truly pro-life, we must focus on real people and the conditions that lead women to seek abortions," said Wallis. "Jobs, healthcare, and a living income must be part of a pro-life agenda."

I often debate fellow Christians on the issue of Abortion. Here are a few issues I have:

You want to outlaw abortion? Okay, how many unwanted children have you adopted? Exactly how much money have you donated to struggling and impoverished mothers raising children? Why are you not handing out contraceptives in schools and elsewhere; a PROVEN way of reducing unwanted pregnancies? Care to put your money where your mouth is?

You call yourself “pro-life” yet many so-called pro-lifers support the death penalty, or the pro-death wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and what have you done to end genocide in Darfur? Or do you just think life begins and conception and ends at birth?

You think abortion is murder? Even though God doesn’t? According to Old Testament law the penalty for causing a miscarriage is not equal to that of murdering somebody. Why do you believe this un-Biblical idea? Because the right wing extremists told you so?

Why do you support candidates who do NOTHING to reduce abortions, like George W. Bush and his good buddy John McSame? Fact: abortions have been UP under Bush. Obama has shown more compassion on the issue, and has a plan to reduce unwanted pregnancies and help struggling mothers.

We won’t see a major decline in abortions, regardless if it is legalized or not, until the church offers a better solution. I think too much emphasis is put on banning abortion (and we see how well banning something worked out with Prohibition and the War on Drugs). Not enough emphasis is places on contraceptive, adoption, financial support for struggling mothers, etc. Some of the right wing extremist Christians seem to just want to outlaw abortions and dump a few boxes of free coat hangers in the inner city and smugly walk away. To paraphrase what somebody mentioned on another blog:

We need to stop asking ourselves IF girls SHOULD get abortions, and start asking ourselves WHY women feel like they NEED abortions. We need solidarity with the struggling and broken, we need to be a community of hope the offers Christ's love to the low and despised. We do not need to be a partisan attack group who protests the actions of the struggling and broken. We need to rethink what it means to be "pro-life" by putting the love of Jesus first in our actions.

As a Bible-believing Christian, I am pro-life. To me, that means I am against war, against the death penalty, against discrimination, against destroying Creation through pollution and oil addiction, in favor of welcoming the alien, reducing unwanted pregnancies, and against policies that lead to violence and poverty around the world. Life doesn’t begin at conception and end at birth. (Matthew Chapters 5 & 25, Luke Chapter 6, Deuteronomy 10:18, etc.)