J. Cameron Fraser has produced a comprehensive and informative treatment of the Evangelical response to abortion, particularly in the USA, although he lives in Alberta, Canada. Virtually nothing goes to plan in the abortion debate. In fact, Fraser observes, rightly I believe, that so much of the debate is ‘not about biological science’ (p.18).
Wading through public statements on the issue is like wading through a quagmire. Bill Clinton famously said that abortion should be ‘safe, legal, and rare’ (p.11), but then carried on as if the last adjective was meaningless. As American society lost whatever moorings it once possessed, three female pro-abortion activists founded the organisation ‘Shout Your Abortion’ in 2015 in order to encourage women to be proud of their decision to kill the unborn.
One of the most significant figures in recent times is Norma McCorvey. She was the original Jane Roe in the Roe v. Wade decision of 1973 which swept away all state laws against abortion in the USA. The pro-life cause became excited in 1995 when she professed conversion as a pro-life Methodist, to be followed in 1998 by her conversion to Roman Catholicism. Yet in the last years of her life – she died in 2017 – she abandoned any religious faith, and came out in favour of abortion rights, at least for the first trimester. In reality, she was an alcoholic who was often lesbian, who nevertheless gave birth to three children whom she failed to care for. In summary, her life was a dysfunctional mess; she craved for love and attention, looking for the wrong things in all the wrong places.
American politics has provided no clarity for the way ahead. Back in 1882 Justice David Brewer optimistically declared that America was a Christian nation. Nowadays, the call is for America to be great again – but without much idea of what that means or how it is to be achieved. So far as abortion is concerned, many of the early pro-lifers were Catholic Democrats. One of the early evangelical pro-life voices, Francis Schaeffer, argued against abortion and euthanasia on the grounds of human rights and morals. By the 1980s there was a pronounced shift in the pro-life cause to the political right. Overwhelmingly, the left entrenched itself in the view that protecting the vulnerable means killing the unborn.
The result was quite a tangle, but Ronald Reagan’s Surgeon-General, C. Everett Koop, got this right: ‘The issue of abortion is not to be decided in terms of its effect upon the mother, but in terms of its effect on the unborn child. The effect upon the mother is unclear; the effect upon the unborn child is clear – and fatal.’ (p.40) Pro-lifers have been frustrated that common-sense solutions have gained little traction. For example, the slogan ‘Adoption, not abortion’ does not work well in practice (pp.113-119).
Polling on abortion after the 2022 Dobbs decision which overturned Roe v. Wade, and returned the issue of abortion to the American states, is inconsistent (cf. p.121). Statistics are invariably misused or even invented, but some 85,817 infants have been born alive after failed abortions since 1973, and the number who survive each year is about 1,734 (p.123). Yet legal protection for such babies is often lacking.
There has been a hardening of the moral arteries, and an outbreak of delusional thinking. The actress, Anne Hathaway, said that ‘abortion can be another word for mercy’ (p.127). An American woman pastor, Rev. Rebecca Todd Peters from the PCUSA, has called abortion ‘a moral good … an act of love, an act of grace, a blessing’. She spoke of her own two abortions, saying: ‘I felt no guilt, no shame, no sin.’ (p.130) Truly, as Jeremiah said in his day, there are those who do not know how to blush (Jer.6:15).
The pro-life side has faced its own difficulties. The so-called abortion abolitionists have emerged to reject outright any incremental approach to outlawing abortion, and to agitate that all involved in abortion face criminal penalties. On 12 May 2022 the National Right to Life organisation felt obliged to issue a public statement declaring that women were victims of abortion, worthy of compassion, and declaring ‘unequivocally’ that it opposed any criminal proceedings against such women (pp.139-140). Unwittingly, this actually undermines and demeans women by not treating them as moral beings before God, but, pragmatically, in the present moral climate it would kill the pro-life cause if it advocated civil punishments for women who abort. The tactics of Randall Terry’s Operation Rescue also have suffered because of media hostility. One lesson is that culture needs to change before any changes in the law are either feasible or effective.
The media, like the populace in general, tend to muddy the waters, and then pontificate against the pro-life side. After Dobbs, France entrenched the right to abortion in its constitution. In 2017 Denmark was said to have eliminated 98% of all Down Syndrome conceptions (p.144). We can kill those with disabilities, but we must not discriminate against them!
There is no obvious strategy which will guarantee victory. Certainly, as Fraser laments, the church needs to get its own house in order (p.152). He also thinks that Rod Dreher is correct in his ‘Benedict Option’ which says that the cultural wars have been largely lost (pp.120-121). In the end, his emphasis is on revival, continued persuasion, and the extensive work of pregnancy care centres (pp. 157-158, 168-169). As I finished reading this work, I had the Cambridge Choir singing ‘Come Down, O Love Divine’ being played in the background. It was appropriate – only a deep work of the Holy Spirit can save us. Till then, we must pray, be wise, be faithful, and look to do good.
– Peter Barnes