Herman Cain, a Christian, recently spoke about abortion and it can be seen on a YouTube video. Barack Obama, a Christian, has said he is against abortion personally but defends our Constitution and our laws.
My observation: Cain, a Christian, and evidently a libertarian, surrenders to Caesar what he has the option to fight against (legalized abortion). He says a woman has a choice; he says it isn’t the government’s business to tell people what to do. A libertarian not able to find his way to laws that enact his moral views.
My observation: Obama, a Christian, surrenders to Caesar what he has the option to fight against (legalized abortion). He says the law supports a woman’s right to choose; he says it’s his business to support what the government enacts even when he doesn’t agree. A liberal not able to find his way to laws that enact his moral views.
There’s a better way.
My litmus strip turned purple.
Cain won’t be the nominee, so yes, there will absolutely be a better way. How many choose it is yet to be determined.
Scot… you are right. There is a better way. Abortion is the epitome of what is wrong with politics and Christians. Jesus’ Kingdom ethic trumps both political parties; and Christians who side with either right or left will, by choice, are left out of what God has planned for the world in Jesus.
It’s not about Democrats and/or Republicans; it’s about church. And anyone who thinks that either party is where the action is, need to realize thst they become two bit players of what God has in mind. When you think of politics, think of church. If you think state, you have got it all wrong.
Also, Cain has released the following:
[quote]“Yesterday in an interview with Piers Morgan on CNN, I was asked questions about abortion policy and the role of the President.
I understood the thrust of the question to ask whether that I, as president, would simply “order” people to not seek an abortion.
My answer was focused on the role of the President. The President has no constitutional authority to order any such action by anyone. That was the point I was trying to convey.
As to my political policy view on abortion, I am 100% pro-life. End of story.
I will appoint judges who understand the original intent of the Constitution. Judges who are committed to the rule of law know that the Constitution contains no right to take the life of unborn children.
I will oppose government funding of abortion. I will veto any legislation that contains funds for Planned Parenthood. I will do everything that a President can do, consistent with his constitutional role, to advance the culture of life.”[/quote]
Any comments calling into question whether Cain or Obama are Christians will be deleted.
To me, the question is more as to spheres. What is the proper role of government as it relates to abortion? And what is the proper role of Christians considering the damage abortion does? The role of government, I would posit, is to protect the general welfare. There are shown public harms from legalized abortion (psychologically and socially), and there are harms exhibited in other countries where abortion is illegal (grotesque, unregulated procedures and social ostracism). It’s a tough balance.
As Christians, there is no balance. Abortion is an evil, one, as lovers of mercy and seekers of justice, needs to be rooted out. Is a change in the law the most proper way to counter that, however? Or are the unintended consequences from such a change equally (or more) problematic?
Both in government, and in the church, the question ultimately revolves around when life comes into existence. The government has set that boundary at approximately 26 months after conception. How do we interpret scripture to be accurate to the revelations of science and our understanding of the creation of the soul? Should we baptize miscarried fetuses?
I can see that a Christian objecting to abortion would not approve of the views of a candidate who accepts that abortion is a correctly legal choice in America. What such a person cannot say is that accepting that a woman justly has a right to choose abortion is inconsistent with their Christianity.
It has not been established that any conceivable honest and adequate interpretation of scripture establishes the belief that abortion is murder. If a candidate does not believe abortion is murder, then supporting a woman’s choice is perfectly consistent with the candidate’s Christian convictions.
I hate the topic of abortion and politics. I’d rather see the fight against this on a local level where those who oppose it take the hard road and get involved in crisis pregnancy centers, or loving the their pregnant neighbor who finds herself in a crisis situation.
It’s so much easier to say, “I oppose abortion because I vote against it” than to REALLY oppose abortion by loving those who need help in their crisis pregnancies. Believe me: there are few women who really, truly want to have an abortion.
Watched the YouTube clip twice to see if I had missed something. Cain identifies himself as pro-life and states that he does not think that abortion should be legal. In his other comments, I think he is saying that a woman might have the ability to choose, but not the legal right to choose. And as a moral choice, Cains believes it is wrong. His comment about the government, I think, is that it should not be the government’s choice to allow abortion. The way he works his rhetoric does make it a bit confusing, but I see his clearest statements as being where he declares himself as pro-life and states that abortion should not be legal.
“As Christians, there is no balance. Abortion is an evil”
As a Christian, do I have to agree with that? Because I don’t think I do. My view on abortion has changed a bit over the years… flipped and flopped. I’m now of the opinion that I do not know when human life begins — and is the moral equivalent to a fully-formed, birthed person. I believe it happens before birth, but I’m not convinced it happens at conception. Therefore, I’m not so sure that a first trimester abortion is evil or wrong. . . either legally or morally.
If I’m unsure, then how can I possibly support the illegalization of (virtually) all abortions? I would feel comfortable legally banning 3rd trimester abortions. By that time, the fetus has a heart beat and brain functionality. That seems awfully human to me. But 3rd trimester abortions are (as I understand it) so rare now-a-days, unless the mother’s life is in danger, that I’m not compelled to fight to change the current laws anyway.
Scot, you lost me at “Barack Obama…defends our Constitution and our laws.”
But apart from this, when did Obama ever use any of his positions to oppose abortion in any way?
Kenny – “I would feel comfortable legally banning 3rd trimester abortions. By that time, the fetus has a heart beat and brain functionality. That seems awfully human to me.”
The brain begins functioning at week 5 to 6 of a normal pregnancy and the heart begins beating at week 6, although it has been detected earlier. Under your criteria, it sounds like you should be against most abortions, since they most commonly occur between week 7 and 13.
Here’s the great divide between those who wish to criminalize abortion and those who don’t:
When does human existence begin?
Now, there’s plenty of definitions for life. There is biological life. So perhaps someone whose brain has gone dead but who’s body is kept alive by machines may qualify for this type of life. So would a blastocyst.
Then there’s conscious life. As in the ability to perceive, feel, experience, etc. This would disqualify the brain dead patient on life support, as well as disqualify the blastocyst and other early embryonic forms.
Now, things get murkier when it comes to fetal development. When is the brain capable of supporting conscious experience? There’s no good answer here, but I would recommend being conservatively safe.
But nowhere in all this does there seem to be a secular mandate for declaring early abortion murderous, or criminal, or what have you. But a religious mandate perhaps could provide such grounds, if you feel that there is something soul-ish in that blastocyst or what not, depending on your reading of your sacred text.
But we tend not to impose our own religious values on others. For instance, Muslims consider it immoral to imbibe alcoholic beverages. Should there ever be a Muslim majority in this country, would our American ideals prescribe that they impose this moral value on us through law (with criminal penalties)?
This isn’t the American way. And it isn’t the core set of principles we were founded on. So, figure out where you have legitimate grounds as a fellow human being and member of society to weigh in on one topic or another of public policy, but keep your own personal religious values, well, personal. Please don’t impose them on the rest of us.
By the way, my wife and I got pregnant while on birth control about a little over a year ago, at a time when neither of us had health insurance due to lay offs, and we elected not to have an abortion due to our personal views. But we would never impose these personal views on others.
If you take the political spectrum, and turn it into a color wheel, you might notice that “liberal” and “libertarian” are awfully close to one another, and not just etymologically. Because it does loop back around, all the time.
The better way is the Kingdom. The problem is that we don’t have the patience to pursue the Kingdom; we either pass laws banning it outright, or we permit it because we don’t wish to be legalistic. We don’t try to change the hearts and minds of our fellow citizens with the love of God; we don’t try to minister to the women who can’t think of any other option than abortion. We don’t trust the Kingdom to be a solution. We just act. Or we don’t.
I’m bit confused here. Is the point that the correct response should be to be opposed to abortion and work to make illegal?
It should sadden all of us how anti-life our culture is. The reductionist approach is to make abortion the litmus test and the issue that continually gets revisited. What about the anti-life message of our media, lives shorten and lost due to the unavailability of health care, those who support war and billions spent on warfare, support for our criminal justice system/death penalty, etc., etc., etc.
As far as women finding themselves pregnant – we still live in a society that makes women scapegoats and lets men off scot-free
I agree with Prodigal Daughter (I actually have one of those) – it is so much easier for us to ridicule Obama than to reach out and really love and care for those in crisis.
Is there any real surprise that the Church is irrelevant today?
Jim
Preach it, Jim. Very well put. My point that “as Christians, there is no balance…” was that, insofar as abortion is the taking of human life, it is murder. I personally don’t think that abortion is the taking of human life– not by how I interpret scripture or the legal holdings.
What is remarkable to me is the interplay this can have with traditions with infant baptism, christenings, circumcision, etc. Is that ritual, that religious act, the birth of the soul in some way?
Also, is a law change really the only way to eradicate abortion? Law is not necessarily a tool for justice. See, e.g., the holocaust.
Cain’s conflicting comments serve to point out the contradiction between current conservative views on economic policy (a purist form of libertarianism) and social policy (a willingness to curtail personal freedoms based on higher moral principles). That’s a contradiction that will have to resolve itself at some point.
To date, the GOP candidates for president have largely dealt with it by avoiding social issues almost completely. I’ve been amazed at the fact that Santorum can’t get more traction by focusing on his long history of advocacy on social issues. Highlights the degree to which Tea Party economic issues have dominated the conservative agenda over the last few years.
Personally, I’m willing to limit certain personal choices to some extent in both policy arenas (pro-life, pro-health care reform) to save lives and recognize collective moral responsibilities–but I realize that puts me in a pretty small minority.
Gunther –
The brain begins forming around week 5 or 6, but it doesn’t actually interconnect and start functioning for quite a while after that. Indeed, the nerves and brain structures allowing awareness of something as basic as pain don’t hook up until after 20 weeks.
Ray @19,
Thank you. I was going to ask Gunther to back up his claim, but you’ve provided evidence that backed up my understanding. I am more concerned with brain functionality than the existence of brain material.
For me, the politics of abortion come down to this: Do I want the government deciding on (and enforcing) moral issues? I cannot image a worse place for morals to come from. Let people make their own choices on this matter and live with the consequences.
abortion, like gay marriage, actually has nothing to do with effective federal governance. It’s a cynical, disingenuous move by both parties to leverage it for political gain.
I can’t believe, with the complexity of issues that the Congress and President actually have to deal with on a day to day basis, that anyone would still believe that these are the defining political issues of real governance.
It’s all a game and you’ve been used.
I am continually struck by the single sided arguments about the unborn without tying it to the intertwined life of the mother. They are a unit, without a doubt and every assertion about the care for the unborn must also make a statement about the mother or it is not tackling the true problem.
Second, there is a big difference between someone who has had a traumatic brain injury that means they will not have consciousness and a group of cells that will, if all goes well, result in a conscious human. The first case does not have a positive future while the second does. Therefore the potentiality for life does carry weight in this decision. One could argue that the whole debate is centered on the value of potential consciousness (prior to brain functioning) vs suffering of the mother and others.
Last, yes, I would love to see more work and money flow into proper care for mothers and good adoption practices as the first course of action. One thing is clear in this, the mother is already a functioning, feeling human.
Ron Paul’s stance on abortion is the best I’ve ever seen…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66jpPCIzza8
“For me, the politics of abortion come down to this: Do I want the government deciding on (and enforcing) moral issues? I cannot image a worse place for morals to come from.”
- You don’t want to see government providing a safety net for the poor, laws against theft, murder, child sex trafficking, slavery and rape?
One of the ways in which the birth control pill works is preventing implantation of the fertilized egg on the uterine wall.
If life truly begins at conception, then birth control pills are abortion, and if abortion is illegal then birth control pills must also be illegal.
I believe that is the end game. Birth control pills were illegal in this state until the early 60s. I can see someone like Cain or Perry taking us back there again.
Fish (26),
“One of the ways in which the birth control pill works is preventing implantation of the fertilized egg on the uterine wall.”
Do you even know how slight this is as a mechanism of birth control via the pill? The dominant mechanism is actually two-fold, inhibition of release of the egg and cervical blockage (due to hormonal effects). It’s rare that these two primary mechanisms fail, but in the event they do, you may well be looking at a pregnancy. For birth control methods that rely primarily on thinning of the uterine lining, they tend to thin them far more dramatically than birth control pills ever do.
As DLS #4 pointed out I don’t think Cain surrenders any thing to Caesar. Herman is answering the question, ” are there any cases where it (abortion) should be legal?” and he said “I don’t think government should make that decision.” what decision? the decision that there are cases where abortion should be legal! He is saying government shouldnt say whether a woman should abort or not. 1Snooper1 is right he is saying it is wrong to abort, yet government should not try and determine that there are cases that can be legal, nor take away the FREEDOM to commit a wrong act
Ray and Kenny – apparently it is a certain level of functionality that you are concerned with. My mistake. The brain does begin to function around 6 weeks, just not that the level that you deem saving. Fair enough.
The note to British parliament members from 1997 (interesting authority) deals with fetal awareness, and actually includes differing views regarding baby’s reaction to stimulus as early as 10 weeks. Nevertheless, the brain is only partially developed and functioning at birth, and continues developing after birth, but I’m sure you wouldn’t argue that we should allow mothers to kill their children if they so choose, since the brain is functioning enough for you to consider worth saving.
As someone who has witnessed abortions, both first trimester, and late term, I find the rationalizing by those who claim to be Christ followers to allow this practice to remain legal disturbing and sad.
I was once someone who thought abortion was fine and not my business and the mother’s choice blah blah blah. Then I recall that John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit while in the womb, and my perspective immediately changed. Luke 1:14-15. Of course, maybe the Holy Spirit waited for there to be proper brain functionality first . . .
Gunther,
Then be disturbed. You’ve brought nothing to the table in the way of evidence to support why abortion would be the killing of a human life, yet you make judgmental comments against those who don’t agree with you. Even calling into question our allegiance to Christ (“those who claim to be Christ followers”)
I see no reason to believe that a fertilized egg, a zygote, or any early developed fetus is the moral equivalent to a fully developed human being. So I have no reason to believe that human life begins at conception. I don’t believe there is any good reason to say so. There must be description of what human life and for me, human consciousness seems to be the best we have. . . Especially when Scripture itself is silent on the issue.
As for your condescending remarks regarding Luke 1:14-15. I think your sarcastic comment is more true than you’re willing to admit. I already said I believe human life begins before birth, I just don’t believe it happens at conception and that brain functionality seems to be the best measurement in my opinion.
Either way — the very fact that we’re arguing about this matter — both of us who “claim” to be Christ followers tells me that trying to make abortions illegal is bad idea.
By the way, the NLT version of Luke 1:14-15 has a footnote that says: or “even from birth.”
I hate that this one topic has probably more power in American politics than just about anything else. I have come to the conviction that our best bet is to get involved in our community and give women the support/options/hope they need to make a pro-life choice. Instead, we draw a line in the sand and people are afraid to even approach the church in time of crisis because they know they will likely be judged and told that they are a murder if they choose abortion.
I am just not convinced Jesus is that concerned with laws and politics.