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A listener sent me the following story the day after I interacted with a caller about how abortion could be wrong even in cases of rape. There are many issues to be covered under that heading, but this letter touches on the key ones:

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I just wanted to say that I am so pleased to read your stance on abortion in the case of rape. My mother was a 14-year-old girl who was raped, and she tried to have an abortion. The only reason I am alive today is because the doctor miscalculated her due date and thought she was too far in the pregnancy to have the abortion, when in reality he was a month off (this actually happened twice). It pains me every time I hear even die hard pro-lifers say “except in the case of rape”. I know it is traumatizing for a girl or woman that is raped to have to carry a child, but it is no more traumatizing than someone who gets shot during a violent attack and has to deal with those wounds. Counseling and therapy can help heal the trauma, but the trauma will be there whether she has the abortion or not, and the abortion could even make it worse. It has caused me so much anxiety over the years to think that many pro-lifers would have approved of my mother’s abortion. By the way, she gave me up for adoption, and my adoptive parents were never able to have children. Thank you so much for this wonderful view against abortion even in the case of rape.
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The letter was from Christopher __________ from Vernon, who found the story and shared it with us from the website, abort73.com. Warning: It’s a pretty graphic site.

Penna Dexter interviewed Jill Stanek on Live from Criswell today. She held living little babies discarded after abortion procedures–some for more than eight hours. She said she could not bear the thought of those little babies being left alone for hours while they were dying. Unconscionably, Barak Obama’s consistent support of the pro-choice movement leads him to believe that requiring life-giving care for such infants would endanger the standing of Roe v Wade. He is right. And he is oh so contemptibly wrong.

If thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto death, and those that are ready to be slain;
If thou sayest, Behold, we knew it not; doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it? and he that keepeth thy soul, doth not he know it? and shall not he render to every man according to his works?

Obviously this commandment is inspired by the sixth commandment in Deuteronomy 5 and in Exodus 20. “Do not murder.” The clear basis of that commandment, all the way from Genesis 4 (Cain) and Genesis 9 (Noah) to the bloody judgment of Revelation 16:3-6, is that human life is created by God with a special significance related not just to function and personal enjoyment, but to the fact that every human being carries the image of God.
Saturday night’s debate was particularly revealing regarding this issue. In response to Rick Warren’s question regarding adoption, Senator Obama replied that we should address the number of orphans by providing better public health policy. Think about what “better public health policy” means. Senator McCain said we should make adoption easier.
The contrast between those answers is the same as the contrast between what makes “every child a wanted child” sound so appealing, and what makes it in reality so brutally calloused against the value of human life.
John 10 makes it inevitable that Christians hold life in such high regard. If life is not our highest value then whatever else is supposed to be our highest value will fail. It is not possible to hold freedom as a basic value without regarding the value of human life even more basic.

On June 19th I wrote about pro-life pharmacist’s facing accusations of unethical behavior for not providing abortive remedies to their customers.
Now doctors are facing the same pressure. Here’s the issue. Suppose a woman goes in for an exam and her obstetrician realizes there is a problem with the fetus which would lead a pro-choice physician to recommend a “therapeutic” abortion. But suppose this doctor is pro-life. Obviously she is not going to perform an abortion. But because she is pro-life she cannot participate in a abortion either, not even by referring her patient to a different physician. For those who are pro-life that decision is obviously justified. But for those who are pro-choice it appears to be a breach in the physician’s agreement to benefit her patient.
Obstetricians and gynecologists have lived Read the rest of this entry »

First, whatever it does, it does not manifest. Read it. It is a document riddled not even simply with visions and revisions, but with direction changes which serve no purpose greater than either obfuscating or ameliorating the sting of direct criticisms of the evangelical right. What purpose is there to adding “Although we cannot back away from our biblically rooted commitment to the sanctity of every human life, including those unborn, nor can we deny the holiness of marriage as instituted by God between one man and one woman…” to the call for “an expansion of our concern beyond single-issue politics, such as abortion and marriage, and a fuller recognition of the comprehensive causes and concerns of the Gospel, and of all the human issues that must be engaged in public life” if not simply to avoid sounding as if equating issues of poverty with abortion would reduce abortion’s significance as an issue—which it would do, of course, since part of abortion’s significance (as an issue, not an act) is that it is held uniquely significant as a fully consummated step toward becoming (or being) a culture of death. This document is twenty pages long in order to Read the rest of this entry »