About a Society That Depends on Abortion
There is much to affirm in the discussions of abortion thus far. I share these convictions:
1) Elective abortion is the volitional destruction of a human life at its earliest stages.
2) Contemporary ultrasound technology is among the scientific-technological developments that has made it harder to deny the humanity of the developing child.
3) Abortion has become a partisan issue, as is illustrated in the radically polarized abortion planks of our two dominant political parties this summer. (It should be said that pro-life Democrats are deeply disappointed with the Democrats’ abortion language this year, while the exceptionless Republican plank is also problematic for many Republicans.)
4) Those abortion planks do not accurately reflect the real diversity of opinion even within those parties, dramatically complicating political efforts to change abortion law.
5) Christian opposition to abortion is well-grounded in scripture and tradition, especially clearly in the latter.
6) Christian opposition to abortion is best understood as part of a holistic Christian ethic of the sacredness of human life from womb to tomb, and this is how it was situated in the earliest days of the church–and far less often today. See my forthcoming book, The Sacredness of Human Life, coming out with Eerdmans in January.
7) Christian opposition to abortion has sometimes been very poorly conducted and has created disdain among many who might otherwise be at least sympathetic to the cause.
8) Christians opposed to abortion need to be able to offer good public reasons why they believe abortion is wrong and abortion law needs to change, and can do so.
9) Changes in abortion law would need to be incremental, including a relatively broad range of exceptions (rape, incest, threat to the life of the mother), for there to be any hope of public acceptance of an overturn of Roe v. Wade.
I would add that so far the commentators have not much addressed the stubborn cultural realities that underlie the continued survival of Roe v. Wade despite deep unease about it among many.
One way to say it is that the United States, like much of the rest of the “advanced” world, is a society that depends on abortion to underwrite its sexual and romantic practices. Roe v. Wade has not been overturned, and may never be overturned, because we have no national intention of changing these sexual and romantic practices.
What do I mean by this? First, the ethic confining sex to marriage has collapsed, among Christians as well as everyone else. There are small subcultural pockets of resistance (with occasional visible symbols, such as Tim Tebow) but in general Americans have sex when their bodies and emotions lead them to do so, beginning in the teenage years and early twenties.
Second, marriage has weakened as an institution. Fewer Americans are marrying, many who do marry are marrying later, many are embarked on their second, third, or fourth marriage, and so on. This of course means that the ethic that sex must be tied to a lifetime marriage seems less and less plausible to people. It also means that marriages are generally more fragile, which helps to explain why a surprising number of abortions actually take place among married women, who are often seeking to protect their fragile relationships from overwhelming economic or emotional stress.
Classic liberal solutions to these problems include the mass availability of birth control and a stronger social safety net. There are good reasons to offer these solutions, but it is clear that even if we had universal health care, and birth control sent to everyone by mail every day, we would still produce a large number of unwanted pregnancies–because men and women are so often having sex in relational contexts in which they don’t bother with birth control or couldn’t handle a pregnancy if it were to happen.
The essays thus far have said little about the special vulnerability of women, and the way women’s needs are asymmetrical with men’s when it comes to the abortion issue. A society that counts on lots of non-marital, non-covenantal, deeply irresponsible sex will produce a lot of unwanted pregnancies, and women rather than men are the ones who get pregnant. For many millions of women, this has been reason enough to protect legal access to abortion.
I have long been convinced that the sexual revolution was a trick that men (and sometimes women) played on women, in the name of pleasure and liberation for both men and women. But overturning earlier strictures confining sex to marriage has increased the expectation that people will have sex outside of marriage, and thus has increased women’s vulnerability to unwanted pregnancies. The “solution” to these millions of unwanted pregnancies taking place in women’s bodies also has been inscribed on/in women’s bodies, via abortion. Sex has become less covenantal and more transactional, and the “externality” of unwanted pregnancy is borne by one gender only. There is nothing remotely just about this, but it has created incentives for both men and women to enshrine abortion rights up there with freedom of speech and religion among our national fundamentals.
My prediction: until we learn to break our social dependence on abortion, there will always be mass elective abortion in the United States, no matter who is elected or even what the law says.
David, thank you for your thoughtful and insightful comments, and for your steadfast work on the topic. A few comments and questions: "Abortion" covers a wide range of activity, from the morning after pill to late term procedures, and for some in Christendom it even covers activity before conception, as lives known and designed by God are aborted by some form of birth control or by male masturbation, so it seems to me we always have to have this conversation in the context of birth control. And in this context, it seems we can speak of an ethical range of preferred options – the traditional birth control pill is preferable to the morning after pill, which is preferable to early term surgical abortion, which is preferable to late term surgical abortion, which is preferable to the murder of a two-year old child. Second, in terms of your understanding of the sacredness of human life from womb to tomb, why is it that there is no tradition of funerals for miscarriages within the Christian tradition? Given the high percentage of pregnancies that end in spontaneous abortions, why do we treat this differently than a child dying from SIDS? And finally, what can we learn from the countries who have the lowest rates of abortion, Germany and Norway. I'm assuming that their sexual revolutions and breakdown of marriage phenomena are not different than ours, so what are they doing right that we are not? The answer does not seem to lie in criminalizing abortion; I have seen stats showing that the abortion rates are comparable in countries with legalized abortion and criminalization. So given our political divide over legality, couldn't we find an approach that we could agree on across the political spectrum to achieve the goal of diminished abortions?
David, thank you for your thoughtful and insightful comments, and for your steadfast work on the topic. A few comments and questions: "Abortion" covers a wide range of activity, from the morning after pill to late term procedures, and for some in Christendom it even covers activity before conception, as lives known and designed by God are aborted by some form of birth control or by male masturbation, so it seems to me we always have to have this conversation in the context of birth control. And in this context, it seems we can speak of an ethical range of preferred options – the traditional birth control pill is preferable to the morning after pill, which is preferable to early term surgical abortion, which is preferable to late term surgical abortion, which is preferable to the murder of a two-year old child. Second, in terms of your understanding of the sacredness of human life from womb to tomb, why is it that there is no tradition of funerals for miscarriages within the Christian tradition? Given the high percentage of pregnancies that end in spontaneous abortions, why do we treat this differently than a child dying from SIDS? And finally, what can we learn from the countries who have the lowest rates of abortion, Germany and Norway. I'm assuming that their sexual revolutions and breakdown of marriage phenomena are not different than ours, so what are they doing right that we are not? The answer does not seem to lie in criminalizing abortion; I have seen stats showing that the abortion rates are comparable in countries with legalized abortion and criminalization. So given our political divide over legality, couldn't we find an approach that we could agree on across the political spectrum to achieve the goal of diminished abortions?
David, thank you for your thoughtful and insightful comments, and for your steadfast work on the topic. A few comments and questions: "Abortion" covers a wide range of activity, from the morning after pill to late term procedures, and for some in Christendom it even covers activity before conception, as lives known and designed by God are aborted by some form of birth control or by male masturbation, so it seems to me we always have to have this conversation in the context of birth control. And in this context, it seems we can speak of an ethical range of preferred options – the traditional birth control pill is preferable to the morning after pill, which is preferable to early term surgical abortion, which is preferable to late term surgical abortion, which is preferable to the murder of a two-year old child. Second, in terms of your understanding of the sacredness of human life from womb to tomb, why is it that there is no tradition of funerals for miscarriages within the Christian tradition? Given the high percentage of pregnancies that end in spontaneous abortions, why do we treat this differently than a child dying from SIDS? And finally, what can we learn from the countries who have the lowest rates of abortion, Germany and Norway. I'm assuming that their sexual revolutions and breakdown of marriage phenomena are not different than ours, so what are they doing right that we are not? The answer does not seem to lie in criminalizing abortion; I have seen stats showing that the abortion rates are comparable in countries with legalized abortion and criminalization. So given our political divide over legality, couldn't we find an approach that we could agree on across the political spectrum to achieve the goal of diminished abortions?
David,
Your thesis that American society has a social dependence on abortion because of the pervasiveness of its transactional and casual sexual practices outside of lifelong, monogamous relationships is compelling to say the least. I look forward to the release of your book. While this explanatory thesis of our current predicament is very persuasive, I have a few questions about a some of the particular elements of your argument.
In point #9 in your list of shared convictions you write, “Changes in abortion law would need to be incremental, including a relatively broad range of exceptions (rape, incest, threat to the life of the mother), for there to be any hope of public acceptance of an overturn of Roe v. Wade.” 1) Do you mean to say that we should support incremental changes and a broad range of exceptions in the civil law as a prudential judgment while patiently staying committed to the ultimate goal of full prohibition (with one potential exception, as I will explain in a moment)? 2) Or, do you contend that the latter issue of including a broad range of exceptions is good law based on principle, not a preliminary goal toward another end? I’ll briefly address the second. To maintain that abortion should be available to even victims of sexual assault would seem to undercut the position that human life at the earliest stages of development is still human life, deserving all the protections that being human ought to demand. I agree that the American public is nowhere near being able to truly comprehend how making such exceptions actually defies the underlying principle that even nascent human life has intrinsic value as espoused by the best of pro-lifers, but I guess I wanted us to speak with one another as members of the Church for a moment.
And on the issue of a pregnancy or labor and delivery that may threaten the life of a mother, I want to point out that this is a very different matter than the one involving victims of sexual assault. The reason why they are very different matters is because the justifications for abortion given in each situation are quite different. Regarding threats to the life of the mother, I would want to draw some fine distinctions that hopefully reveal a valid attempt at moral reasoning on such a difficult issue as this one. My view is predicated on an assumption that may be wrong, and I am open to being corrected on it. I assume there is no medical condition that would necessitate an abortion to save a pregnant woman’s life. What may be required, however, is one or many other life-saving procedures that do not aim to end the unborn child’s life but they, nevertheless, do end up killing the child. It may be foreseeable that this outcome is likely, but in situations where two lives are so inextricably linked as a mother to her unborn child, the Catholic philosophical principle of “double effect” can be employed to navigate a tragedy like this. I believe we can morally make provision for taking measures that will save a women’s life (the good effect) even if it is foreseeable that those measures could harm or end the child’s life (the bad effect). Lastly on this matter of challenging the oft-given exceptions to prohibiting abortion, I emphatically affirm that women who become pregnant as a result of sexual assault, and any woman who chooses to preserve her pregnancy in cases where doing so causes her serious harm, deserve the most comprehensive care and services that the Church and the state and many institutions in between can possibly muster.
You also state, “The essays thus far have said little about the special vulnerability of women, and the way women's needs are asymmetrical with men's when it comes to the abortion issue….For many millions of women, this has been reason enough to protect legal access to abortion.” One reason, perhaps, this point has not been raised in this discussion so far is because it so often serves to obscure the debate rather than add anything of value. It obscures the debate because focusing on the fact that only women can be pregnant can make any limits placed on abortion appear at first glance to be susceptible to claims that they unjustly discriminate against women. Allegations such as these nearly miss the whole point. Might we also say, then, that the very order of human biological reality discriminates against women—what categories does our modern world have to deal with that claim? I guess in practice we try to deal with nature’s perceived discrimination against women by creating and widely distributing contraceptives that can be used by women so they can (supposedly) act like men with respect to their sexual practices. Perhaps as a middle ground, until the rival factions of the abortion debate come to more of an understanding, we could all agree to at least prohibit all abortions of unborn girls. In this legal framework we could reduce abortions to make pro-lifers happy and protect the reproductive rights of all females, regardless of their stage of development, which would satisfy pro-abortion advocates. Even though I would support such a measure as a welcome “incremental” change to abortion law, I realize that my attempt to be flippant may not be appreciated by all, but the fact that this proposal would be so unintelligible to my pro-abortion friends reveals how vast our differences are and how difficult it will continue to be as we strive to work through them.
Thank you,
Nathan
David,
Your thesis that American society has a social dependence on abortion because of the pervasiveness of its transactional and casual sexual practices outside of lifelong, monogamous relationships is compelling to say the least. I look forward to the release of your book. While this explanatory thesis of our current predicament is very persuasive, I have a few questions about a some of the particular elements of your argument.
In point #9 in your list of shared convictions you write, “Changes in abortion law would need to be incremental, including a relatively broad range of exceptions (rape, incest, threat to the life of the mother), for there to be any hope of public acceptance of an overturn of Roe v. Wade.” 1) Do you mean to say that we should support incremental changes and a broad range of exceptions in the civil law as a prudential judgment while patiently staying committed to the ultimate goal of full prohibition (with one potential exception, as I will explain in a moment)? 2) Or, do you contend that the latter issue of including a broad range of exceptions is good law based on principle, not a preliminary goal toward another end? I’ll briefly address the second. To maintain that abortion should be available to even victims of sexual assault would seem to undercut the position that human life at the earliest stages of development is still human life, deserving all the protections that being human ought to demand. I agree that the American public is nowhere near being able to truly comprehend how making such exceptions actually defies the underlying principle that even nascent human life has intrinsic value as espoused by the best of pro-lifers, but I guess I wanted us to speak with one another as members of the Church for a moment.
And on the issue of a pregnancy or labor and delivery that may threaten the life of a mother, I want to point out that this is a very different matter than the one involving victims of sexual assault. The reason why they are very different matters is because the justifications for abortion given in each situation are quite different. Regarding threats to the life of the mother, I would want to draw some fine distinctions that hopefully reveal a valid attempt at moral reasoning on such a difficult issue as this one. My view is predicated on an assumption that may be wrong, and I am open to being corrected on it. I assume there is no medical condition that would necessitate an abortion to save a pregnant woman’s life. What may be required, however, is one or many other life-saving procedures that do not aim to end the unborn child’s life but they, nevertheless, do end up killing the child. It may be foreseeable that this outcome is likely, but in situations where two lives are so inextricably linked as a mother to her unborn child, the Catholic philosophical principle of “double effect” can be employed to navigate a tragedy like this. I believe we can morally make provision for taking measures that will save a women’s life (the good effect) even if it is foreseeable that those measures could harm or end the child’s life (the bad effect). Lastly on this matter of challenging the oft-given exceptions to prohibiting abortion, I emphatically affirm that women who become pregnant as a result of sexual assault, and any woman who chooses to preserve her pregnancy in cases where doing so causes her serious harm, deserve the most comprehensive care and services that the Church and the state and many institutions in between can possibly muster.
You also state, “The essays thus far have said little about the special vulnerability of women, and the way women's needs are asymmetrical with men's when it comes to the abortion issue….For many millions of women, this has been reason enough to protect legal access to abortion.” One reason, perhaps, this point has not been raised in this discussion so far is because it so often serves to obscure the debate rather than add anything of value. It obscures the debate because focusing on the fact that only women can be pregnant can make any limits placed on abortion appear at first glance to be susceptible to claims that they unjustly discriminate against women. Allegations such as these nearly miss the whole point. Might we also say, then, that the very order of human biological reality discriminates against women—what categories does our modern world have to deal with that claim? I guess in practice we try to deal with nature’s perceived discrimination against women by creating and widely distributing contraceptives that can be used by women so they can (supposedly) act like men with respect to their sexual practices. Perhaps as a middle ground, until the rival factions of the abortion debate come to more of an understanding, we could all agree to at least prohibit all abortions of unborn girls. In this legal framework we could reduce abortions to make pro-lifers happy and protect the reproductive rights of all females, regardless of their stage of development, which would satisfy pro-abortion advocates. Even though I would support such a measure as a welcome “incremental” change to abortion law, I realize that my attempt to be flippant may not be appreciated by all, but the fact that this proposal would be so unintelligible to my pro-abortion friends reveals how vast our differences are and how difficult it will continue to be as we strive to work through them.
Thank you,
Nathan
David,
Your thesis that American society has a social dependence on abortion because of the pervasiveness of its transactional and casual sexual practices outside of lifelong, monogamous relationships is compelling to say the least. I look forward to the release of your book. While this explanatory thesis of our current predicament is very persuasive, I have a few questions about a some of the particular elements of your argument.
In point #9 in your list of shared convictions you write, “Changes in abortion law would need to be incremental, including a relatively broad range of exceptions (rape, incest, threat to the life of the mother), for there to be any hope of public acceptance of an overturn of Roe v. Wade.” 1) Do you mean to say that we should support incremental changes and a broad range of exceptions in the civil law as a prudential judgment while patiently staying committed to the ultimate goal of full prohibition (with one potential exception, as I will explain in a moment)? 2) Or, do you contend that the latter issue of including a broad range of exceptions is good law based on principle, not a preliminary goal toward another end? I’ll briefly address the second. To maintain that abortion should be available to even victims of sexual assault would seem to undercut the position that human life at the earliest stages of development is still human life, deserving all the protections that being human ought to demand. I agree that the American public is nowhere near being able to truly comprehend how making such exceptions actually defies the underlying principle that even nascent human life has intrinsic value as espoused by the best of pro-lifers, but I guess I wanted us to speak with one another as members of the Church for a moment.
And on the issue of a pregnancy or labor and delivery that may threaten the life of a mother, I want to point out that this is a very different matter than the one involving victims of sexual assault. The reason why they are very different matters is because the justifications for abortion given in each situation are quite different. Regarding threats to the life of the mother, I would want to draw some fine distinctions that hopefully reveal a valid attempt at moral reasoning on such a difficult issue as this one. My view is predicated on an assumption that may be wrong, and I am open to being corrected on it. I assume there is no medical condition that would necessitate an abortion to save a pregnant woman’s life. What may be required, however, is one or many other life-saving procedures that do not aim to end the unborn child’s life but they, nevertheless, do end up killing the child. It may be foreseeable that this outcome is likely, but in situations where two lives are so inextricably linked as a mother to her unborn child, the Catholic philosophical principle of “double effect” can be employed to navigate a tragedy like this. I believe we can morally make provision for taking measures that will save a women’s life (the good effect) even if it is foreseeable that those measures could harm or end the child’s life (the bad effect). Lastly on this matter of challenging the oft-given exceptions to prohibiting abortion, I emphatically affirm that women who become pregnant as a result of sexual assault, and any woman who chooses to preserve her pregnancy in cases where doing so causes her serious harm, deserve the most comprehensive care and services that the Church and the state and many institutions in between can possibly muster.
You also state, “The essays thus far have said little about the special vulnerability of women, and the way women's needs are asymmetrical with men's when it comes to the abortion issue….For many millions of women, this has been reason enough to protect legal access to abortion.” One reason, perhaps, this point has not been raised in this discussion so far is because it so often serves to obscure the debate rather than add anything of value. It obscures the debate because focusing on the fact that only women can be pregnant can make any limits placed on abortion appear at first glance to be susceptible to claims that they unjustly discriminate against women. Allegations such as these nearly miss the whole point. Might we also say, then, that the very order of human biological reality discriminates against women—what categories does our modern world have to deal with that claim? I guess in practice we try to deal with nature’s perceived discrimination against women by creating and widely distributing contraceptives that can be used by women so they can (supposedly) act like men with respect to their sexual practices. Perhaps as a middle ground, until the rival factions of the abortion debate come to more of an understanding, we could all agree to at least prohibit all abortions of unborn girls. In this legal framework we could reduce abortions to make pro-lifers happy and protect the reproductive rights of all females, regardless of their stage of development, which would satisfy pro-abortion advocates. Even though I would support such a measure as a welcome “incremental” change to abortion law, I realize that my attempt to be flippant may not be appreciated by all, but the fact that this proposal would be so unintelligible to my pro-abortion friends reveals how vast our differences are and how difficult it will continue to be as we strive to work through them.
Thank you,
Nathan
These are two very different kinds of responses which illuminate the range of opinion in the Christian community about abortion. I will respond very briefly:
To Stan Dotson:
1. I draw a sharper distinction between contraception and abortion, and so the range of "preferables" concept, though appealing at first glance, doesn't quite work for me.
2. My wife and I are among those who have actually mourned miscarriages with a small funeral and burial. Both were pregnancies at around 20 weeks. Just fyi.
3. The European comparisons are interesting and worthy of further social scientific attention. I would hypothesize that a culture of more responsible use of birth control as well as a stronger social safety net would account for much of the difference.
To Nathan Berkeley:
1. I support the multi-exception legal structure for prudential reasons, not because I see a difference in the moral status of children conceived under different circumstances.
2. I cannot imagine a circumstance in which any contemporary public would support an abortion law that banned an exception in the case of rape or incest. In any case, I think this is so far away from where we actually are as a society that it is a distraction from the issues we should really be talking about.
3. Your reasoning based on double effect for the life of the mother exception are familiar to me from Catholic moral theology and seem to hold good in those terms.
4. Christian moral thinkers must engage the arguments about asymmetry and women's special circumstances related to procreation if we are to be serious participants in contemporary debate.
One issue that is important to me is the treatment of woman around the world which I truly wasn't aware of until I read the book Half the Sky. I think many people very passionate about pro-choice are so because of the ongoing history of the mistreatment of women. I have moved from many years identifying stongly with pro-life to wondering where I fit any more. I don't think what I feel can be described as being for abortion, but I don't want to identify with the pro-life postion any more. To move me back in that direction, it must address the issues raised for me in Half the Sky. It also will have to emphazie much more a whole life postion including health care reform, a stronger safety net, reduction of the availability of guns in our society and peace movements. Most all of these things are anathema to most of the pro-life friends I know. They all used to be anathema to me.
To Stan Dotson:
I don’t find your spectrum of “preferables” to be persuasive either, although I definitely find it to be a thoughtful attempt to make sense of Christian differences on this matter. One serious concern that comes immediately to mind is how such an “ethical range” could be interpreted as justifying increased or decreased moral and legal protections for a human life based upon the degree of development or capacity of that human life using the healthy human adult as the measuring stick. I do not sense that you are trying to think from this premise but it seems implicit in your comments.
I challenge two other things you wrote as well.
You wrote, “…for some in Christendom [abortion] even covers activity before conception, as lives known and designed by God are aborted by some form of birth control or by male masturbation, so it seems to me we always have to have this conversation in the context of birth control.” Were you specifically referring here to the Catholic Church? While the Church designates both artificial contraception and abortion as immoral, it is not my understanding that the Church considers every form of birth control to be just another form of abortion, as if to imply that they are morally equivalent acts.
You wrote, “The answer does not seem to lie in criminalizing abortion; I have seen stats showing that the abortion rates are comparable in countries with legalized abortion and criminalization. So given our political divide over legality, couldn't we find an approach that we could agree on across the political spectrum to achieve the goal of diminished abortions?” To answer the last question, I think pro-choice advocates bear more responsibility for inhibiting any consensus on this issue in their overwhelming opposition to any legal or moral restraints on women’s access to abortion. As long as those advocates continue to almost uniformly condemn any restraints on abortion as unjust attacks on women’s freedom and dignity, finding any common ground will continue to be very difficult.
In addition, I think you move passed the criminalization issue too quickly. Serious debate and discernment needs to take place, should the question of criminalization ever really arise, about how to allocate culpability among the doctor, procedure support staff, mother, and others who assist in facilitating an abortion. I don’t pretend that this is an easy problem to deal with, but from my experiences working in the criminal justice system, no area of criminal justice is easy. Furthermore, the U.S. leads rich countries many times over in its murder rate and yet this is no justification for removing the legal prohibition against murder. Considering whether an act should be criminalized involves asking three questions: 1. is the act wrong? 2. does the wrongness of the act warrant a legal response, including potential government use of force to support that legal response? and 3. what are or will be the practical outcomes of enforcement? Variations of these questions are asked all of the time regarding U.S. drug laws, among other areas of criminality. The point is, you have to address more than just the third question to support your claim that criminalization of abortion is not a proper goal.
To Stan Dotson:
I don’t find your spectrum of “preferables” to be persuasive either, although I definitely find it to be a thoughtful attempt to make sense of Christian differences on this matter. One serious concern that comes immediately to mind is how such an “ethical range” could be interpreted as justifying increased or decreased moral and legal protections for a human life based upon the degree of development or capacity of that human life using the healthy human adult as the measuring stick. I do not sense that you are trying to think from this premise but it seems implicit in your comments.
I challenge two other things you wrote as well.
You wrote, “…for some in Christendom [abortion] even covers activity before conception, as lives known and designed by God are aborted by some form of birth control or by male masturbation, so it seems to me we always have to have this conversation in the context of birth control.” Were you specifically referring here to the Catholic Church? While the Church designates both artificial contraception and abortion as immoral, it is not my understanding that the Church considers every form of birth control to be just another form of abortion, as if to imply that they are morally equivalent acts.
You wrote, “The answer does not seem to lie in criminalizing abortion; I have seen stats showing that the abortion rates are comparable in countries with legalized abortion and criminalization. So given our political divide over legality, couldn't we find an approach that we could agree on across the political spectrum to achieve the goal of diminished abortions?” To answer the last question, I think pro-choice advocates bear more responsibility for inhibiting any consensus on this issue in their overwhelming opposition to any legal or moral restraints on women’s access to abortion. As long as those advocates continue to almost uniformly condemn any restraints on abortion as unjust attacks on women’s freedom and dignity, finding any common ground will continue to be very difficult.
In addition, I think you move passed the criminalization issue too quickly. Serious debate and discernment needs to take place, should the question of criminalization ever really arise, about how to allocate culpability among the doctor, procedure support staff, mother, and others who assist in facilitating an abortion. I don’t pretend that this is an easy problem to deal with, but from my experiences working in the criminal justice system, no area of criminal justice is easy. Furthermore, the U.S. leads rich countries many times over in its murder rate and yet this is no justification for removing the legal prohibition against murder. Considering whether an act should be criminalized involves asking three questions: 1. is the act wrong? 2. does the wrongness of the act warrant a legal response, including potential government use of force to support that legal response? and 3. what are or will be the practical outcomes of enforcement? Variations of these questions are asked all of the time regarding U.S. drug laws, among other areas of criminality. The point is, you have to address more than just the third question to support your claim that criminalization of abortion is not a proper goal.
To Stan Dotson:
I don’t find your spectrum of “preferables” to be persuasive either, although I definitely find it to be a thoughtful attempt to make sense of Christian differences on this matter. One serious concern that comes immediately to mind is how such an “ethical range” could be interpreted as justifying increased or decreased moral and legal protections for a human life based upon the degree of development or capacity of that human life using the healthy human adult as the measuring stick. I do not sense that you are trying to think from this premise but it seems implicit in your comments.
I challenge two other things you wrote as well.
You wrote, “…for some in Christendom [abortion] even covers activity before conception, as lives known and designed by God are aborted by some form of birth control or by male masturbation, so it seems to me we always have to have this conversation in the context of birth control.” Were you specifically referring here to the Catholic Church? While the Church designates both artificial contraception and abortion as immoral, it is not my understanding that the Church considers every form of birth control to be just another form of abortion, as if to imply that they are morally equivalent acts.
You wrote, “The answer does not seem to lie in criminalizing abortion; I have seen stats showing that the abortion rates are comparable in countries with legalized abortion and criminalization. So given our political divide over legality, couldn't we find an approach that we could agree on across the political spectrum to achieve the goal of diminished abortions?” To answer the last question, I think pro-choice advocates bear more responsibility for inhibiting any consensus on this issue in their overwhelming opposition to any legal or moral restraints on women’s access to abortion. As long as those advocates continue to almost uniformly condemn any restraints on abortion as unjust attacks on women’s freedom and dignity, finding any common ground will continue to be very difficult.
In addition, I think you move passed the criminalization issue too quickly. Serious debate and discernment needs to take place, should the question of criminalization ever really arise, about how to allocate culpability among the doctor, procedure support staff, mother, and others who assist in facilitating an abortion. I don’t pretend that this is an easy problem to deal with, but from my experiences working in the criminal justice system, no area of criminal justice is easy. Furthermore, the U.S. leads rich countries many times over in its murder rate and yet this is no justification for removing the legal prohibition against murder. Considering whether an act should be criminalized involves asking three questions: 1. is the act wrong? 2. does the wrongness of the act warrant a legal response, including potential government use of force to support that legal response? and 3. what are or will be the practical outcomes of enforcement? Variations of these questions are asked all of the time regarding U.S. drug laws, among other areas of criminality. The point is, you have to address more than just the third question to support your claim that criminalization of abortion is not a proper goal.
To David Gushee:
You responded to me by saying: “ Christian moral thinkers must engage the arguments about asymmetry and women's special circumstances related to procreation if we are to be serious participants in contemporary debate.” I reread what I wrote and see that it sounded very insensitive to the point you were making. The possibility of persons misusing the issue of women’s special circumstances related to procreation is no excuse for minimizing it. The asymmetrical burdens on women in bearing children should indeed be at the center of our thinking on the abortion debate. I should’ve said that the first time around.
To David Gushee:
You responded to me by saying: “ Christian moral thinkers must engage the arguments about asymmetry and women's special circumstances related to procreation if we are to be serious participants in contemporary debate.” I reread what I wrote and see that it sounded very insensitive to the point you were making. The possibility of persons misusing the issue of women’s special circumstances related to procreation is no excuse for minimizing it. The asymmetrical burdens on women in bearing children should indeed be at the center of our thinking on the abortion debate. I should’ve said that the first time around.
To David Gushee:
You responded to me by saying: “ Christian moral thinkers must engage the arguments about asymmetry and women's special circumstances related to procreation if we are to be serious participants in contemporary debate.” I reread what I wrote and see that it sounded very insensitive to the point you were making. The possibility of persons misusing the issue of women’s special circumstances related to procreation is no excuse for minimizing it. The asymmetrical burdens on women in bearing children should indeed be at the center of our thinking on the abortion debate. I should’ve said that the first time around.
To SamB:
It is true that many pro-life people are politically conservative and have concerns about large government social service programs and gun rights. Since only one party offers anything to pro-life supporters, it is difficult to see how this will change any time soon. But I don’t see why taking a “more of a whole life position” must steer you away from being pro-life regarding abortion. There are plenty of thoughtful Christians, Ron Sider comes to mind, who are pro-life on abortion and offer reasoned arguments for why and how government programs like the ones you mentioned are instrumental in doing justice to the poor. I haven’t read “Half the Sky” so I unfortunately can’t engage you there. But I will say that legally prohibiting women from having abortions while at the same time actively working through institutions of civil society and government to provide comprehensive services and care to women facing crisis pregnancies, does not contribute to the historical mistreatment of women. Discouraging abortion and encouraging life is a moral good and a public good. And let us not forget that of the million or so abortions each year in the U.S., half of those are women in their earliest stages of development. And globally, females are aborted much more often than males. I think propagating an ideology that abortion is one valid option among many (which I don’t believe you are doing) is a mistreatment of women, both of pregnant mothers and their female unborn children.
To SamB:
It is true that many pro-life people are politically conservative and have concerns about large government social service programs and gun rights. Since only one party offers anything to pro-life supporters, it is difficult to see how this will change any time soon. But I don’t see why taking a “more of a whole life position” must steer you away from being pro-life regarding abortion. There are plenty of thoughtful Christians, Ron Sider comes to mind, who are pro-life on abortion and offer reasoned arguments for why and how government programs like the ones you mentioned are instrumental in doing justice to the poor. I haven’t read “Half the Sky” so I unfortunately can’t engage you there. But I will say that legally prohibiting women from having abortions while at the same time actively working through institutions of civil society and government to provide comprehensive services and care to women facing crisis pregnancies, does not contribute to the historical mistreatment of women. Discouraging abortion and encouraging life is a moral good and a public good. And let us not forget that of the million or so abortions each year in the U.S., half of those are women in their earliest stages of development. And globally, females are aborted much more often than males. I think propagating an ideology that abortion is one valid option among many (which I don’t believe you are doing) is a mistreatment of women, both of pregnant mothers and their female unborn children.
To SamB:
It is true that many pro-life people are politically conservative and have concerns about large government social service programs and gun rights. Since only one party offers anything to pro-life supporters, it is difficult to see how this will change any time soon. But I don’t see why taking a “more of a whole life position” must steer you away from being pro-life regarding abortion. There are plenty of thoughtful Christians, Ron Sider comes to mind, who are pro-life on abortion and offer reasoned arguments for why and how government programs like the ones you mentioned are instrumental in doing justice to the poor. I haven’t read “Half the Sky” so I unfortunately can’t engage you there. But I will say that legally prohibiting women from having abortions while at the same time actively working through institutions of civil society and government to provide comprehensive services and care to women facing crisis pregnancies, does not contribute to the historical mistreatment of women. Discouraging abortion and encouraging life is a moral good and a public good. And let us not forget that of the million or so abortions each year in the U.S., half of those are women in their earliest stages of development. And globally, females are aborted much more often than males. I think propagating an ideology that abortion is one valid option among many (which I don’t believe you are doing) is a mistreatment of women, both of pregnant mothers and their female unborn children.
To Nathan Berkeley:
The “spectrum” that I described was in response to Professor Gushee’s conviction that “Christian opposition to abortion is best understood as part of a holistic Christian ethic of the sacredness of human life from womb to tomb.” This ethic, which he states is "well-grounded in scripture and tradition, especially the latter," does not hold up in practice among faith communities. Were we to believe that a newly formed embryo was a full-fledged human being, we would afford that human being the dignity we grant all other full-fledged human beings who die, with public wakes and funerals and obituaries. Given the high percentage of pregnancies ending in miscarriages, we would spend a lot of time at the funeral parlor and cemetary. This is not to say that a spontaneous abortion at the earliest stages does not produce genuine grief. The disappointment can be devastating. It simply demonstrates that neither scripture nor tradition in fact treats the early stage embryo as a human being, at least not in its rituals. So, the implication, ethically, is that there is room for people of faith who support the use of the morning after pill, and who have serious concerns and opposition to late term abortion. The two are not equal, ethically speaking, according to our tradition.
To your second question about Catholic teaching on birth control, my reading of the Humanae Vitae makes it clear that the only method of birth control sanctioned by the Church is the rhythm method, aka Natural Family Planning, and that any use of artificial birth control is thwarting the will of God for procreation. To quote that encyclical: “ any action which either before, at the moment of, or after sexual intercourse, is specifically intended to prevent procreation” is seen as a moral evil, against what they see as the purpose of sex in natural law, procreation. Jeremiah 1:5 is often cited as a proof text, since God knew the prophet “before” he was conceived. Hence, the pill and condom are indeed potentially “aborting,” in the literal meaning of the word, a human being designed by and known by God. For the Church, then, both abortion and artificial birth control are mortal sins. To put a fine point on it, Father Phil Bloom, pastor of Holy Family Church in Seattle, is quoted in CatholicView, saying that “Birth control not only makes a couple more open to abortion, it is abortion.” To deny that birth control is the larger context for the abortion debate and dialogue is to reject the viewpoint of the majority of Christendom, at least its official teaching.
To your contention that “pro-choice advocates bear more responsibility for inhibiting any consensus on this issue”, my point was not about reaching consensus directly on abortion legislation, it was about reaching consensus on other social policy that would impact abortion, namely, universal health care. You cannot seriously believe that it is the pro-choice side of the divide that has impeded progress on the cause of universal health care, given the incredible lobbying effort against Obamacare, much less single-payer or public option alternatives. The countries around the world with the lowest rates of abortion have this in common – better access to better health care for all. Here is where consensus could be reached, if pro-life proponents were truly serious in diminishing the rate of abortion, and were not so singularly obsessed with punishing the women and doctors involved in abortions.
Finally, to your other argument about criminalization, you compared it to murder rates in comparison with other countries. In fact, we should as a society look at those countries who have the lowest rates of violent crime, and replicate what works. Of course, the gun lobby would prevent that, but the point is, do what works. Same with the war on drugs, which has shown us the lesson once again that prohibition just doesn’t work. The question should not boil down to whether any particular act should be criminalized, but what are the conditions a society can create to minimize unwanted behaviors. If countries have proven strategies for minimizing abortion, let’s do it. Especially when there are other comparable countries with proven records that strict criminalization leads to the exact opposite of its intended effect, abortion rates two and three times higher than ours.
To Nathan Berkeley:
The “spectrum” that I described was in response to Professor Gushee’s conviction that “Christian opposition to abortion is best understood as part of a holistic Christian ethic of the sacredness of human life from womb to tomb.” This ethic, which he states is "well-grounded in scripture and tradition, especially the latter," does not hold up in practice among faith communities. Were we to believe that a newly formed embryo was a full-fledged human being, we would afford that human being the dignity we grant all other full-fledged human beings who die, with public wakes and funerals and obituaries. Given the high percentage of pregnancies ending in miscarriages, we would spend a lot of time at the funeral parlor and cemetary. This is not to say that a spontaneous abortion at the earliest stages does not produce genuine grief. The disappointment can be devastating. It simply demonstrates that neither scripture nor tradition in fact treats the early stage embryo as a human being, at least not in its rituals. So, the implication, ethically, is that there is room for people of faith who support the use of the morning after pill, and who have serious concerns and opposition to late term abortion. The two are not equal, ethically speaking, according to our tradition.
To your second question about Catholic teaching on birth control, my reading of the Humanae Vitae makes it clear that the only method of birth control sanctioned by the Church is the rhythm method, aka Natural Family Planning, and that any use of artificial birth control is thwarting the will of God for procreation. To quote that encyclical: “ any action which either before, at the moment of, or after sexual intercourse, is specifically intended to prevent procreation” is seen as a moral evil, against what they see as the purpose of sex in natural law, procreation. Jeremiah 1:5 is often cited as a proof text, since God knew the prophet “before” he was conceived. Hence, the pill and condom are indeed potentially “aborting,” in the literal meaning of the word, a human being designed by and known by God. For the Church, then, both abortion and artificial birth control are mortal sins. To put a fine point on it, Father Phil Bloom, pastor of Holy Family Church in Seattle, is quoted in CatholicView, saying that “Birth control not only makes a couple more open to abortion, it is abortion.” To deny that birth control is the larger context for the abortion debate and dialogue is to reject the viewpoint of the majority of Christendom, at least its official teaching.
To your contention that “pro-choice advocates bear more responsibility for inhibiting any consensus on this issue”, my point was not about reaching consensus directly on abortion legislation, it was about reaching consensus on other social policy that would impact abortion, namely, universal health care. You cannot seriously believe that it is the pro-choice side of the divide that has impeded progress on the cause of universal health care, given the incredible lobbying effort against Obamacare, much less single-payer or public option alternatives. The countries around the world with the lowest rates of abortion have this in common – better access to better health care for all. Here is where consensus could be reached, if pro-life proponents were truly serious in diminishing the rate of abortion, and were not so singularly obsessed with punishing the women and doctors involved in abortions.
Finally, to your other argument about criminalization, you compared it to murder rates in comparison with other countries. In fact, we should as a society look at those countries who have the lowest rates of violent crime, and replicate what works. Of course, the gun lobby would prevent that, but the point is, do what works. Same with the war on drugs, which has shown us the lesson once again that prohibition just doesn’t work. The question should not boil down to whether any particular act should be criminalized, but what are the conditions a society can create to minimize unwanted behaviors. If countries have proven strategies for minimizing abortion, let’s do it. Especially when there are other comparable countries with proven records that strict criminalization leads to the exact opposite of its intended effect, abortion rates two and three times higher than ours.
To Nathan Berkeley:
The “spectrum” that I described was in response to Professor Gushee’s conviction that “Christian opposition to abortion is best understood as part of a holistic Christian ethic of the sacredness of human life from womb to tomb.” This ethic, which he states is "well-grounded in scripture and tradition, especially the latter," does not hold up in practice among faith communities. Were we to believe that a newly formed embryo was a full-fledged human being, we would afford that human being the dignity we grant all other full-fledged human beings who die, with public wakes and funerals and obituaries. Given the high percentage of pregnancies ending in miscarriages, we would spend a lot of time at the funeral parlor and cemetary. This is not to say that a spontaneous abortion at the earliest stages does not produce genuine grief. The disappointment can be devastating. It simply demonstrates that neither scripture nor tradition in fact treats the early stage embryo as a human being, at least not in its rituals. So, the implication, ethically, is that there is room for people of faith who support the use of the morning after pill, and who have serious concerns and opposition to late term abortion. The two are not equal, ethically speaking, according to our tradition.
To your second question about Catholic teaching on birth control, my reading of the Humanae Vitae makes it clear that the only method of birth control sanctioned by the Church is the rhythm method, aka Natural Family Planning, and that any use of artificial birth control is thwarting the will of God for procreation. To quote that encyclical: “ any action which either before, at the moment of, or after sexual intercourse, is specifically intended to prevent procreation” is seen as a moral evil, against what they see as the purpose of sex in natural law, procreation. Jeremiah 1:5 is often cited as a proof text, since God knew the prophet “before” he was conceived. Hence, the pill and condom are indeed potentially “aborting,” in the literal meaning of the word, a human being designed by and known by God. For the Church, then, both abortion and artificial birth control are mortal sins. To put a fine point on it, Father Phil Bloom, pastor of Holy Family Church in Seattle, is quoted in CatholicView, saying that “Birth control not only makes a couple more open to abortion, it is abortion.” To deny that birth control is the larger context for the abortion debate and dialogue is to reject the viewpoint of the majority of Christendom, at least its official teaching.
To your contention that “pro-choice advocates bear more responsibility for inhibiting any consensus on this issue”, my point was not about reaching consensus directly on abortion legislation, it was about reaching consensus on other social policy that would impact abortion, namely, universal health care. You cannot seriously believe that it is the pro-choice side of the divide that has impeded progress on the cause of universal health care, given the incredible lobbying effort against Obamacare, much less single-payer or public option alternatives. The countries around the world with the lowest rates of abortion have this in common – better access to better health care for all. Here is where consensus could be reached, if pro-life proponents were truly serious in diminishing the rate of abortion, and were not so singularly obsessed with punishing the women and doctors involved in abortions.
Finally, to your other argument about criminalization, you compared it to murder rates in comparison with other countries. In fact, we should as a society look at those countries who have the lowest rates of violent crime, and replicate what works. Of course, the gun lobby would prevent that, but the point is, do what works. Same with the war on drugs, which has shown us the lesson once again that prohibition just doesn’t work. The question should not boil down to whether any particular act should be criminalized, but what are the conditions a society can create to minimize unwanted behaviors. If countries have proven strategies for minimizing abortion, let’s do it. Especially when there are other comparable countries with proven records that strict criminalization leads to the exact opposite of its intended effect, abortion rates two and three times higher than ours.